Music Review - CCTV AllStars

CCTV AllStars – Worth keeping an eye on

This Swedish-Czech-American-Brit-Mexican hybrid has combined talents, styles and sounds from all over the world to create the best album you are not listening to… yet.

When asked the question what they think they sound like, the first answer is ‘a car crash’ and if they’re not your new favourite band simply from that answer allow me to go into more detail. CCTV Allstars are the best ska band you haven’t heard of since Adequate Seven. They combine the funky beats with what they call Full Rhythm Music.

The band set up consists of Lead Singer, and acoustic guitarist Eddy Allen who produces singalongwithyourfriendswhiledrinkingbeers style lyrics and fuses them with political statements telling any government around the world, to go fuck themselves, in the most polite way possible. The bass and drums keep his wackiness in check while maintaining their own level of insanities respectively, and the melodies fly up, down and all over the place with the trumpet and trombone making these songs worth listening to.

The global impact comes through on the album as each languages Allen sings come in all shapes and sizes stirring up English, Czech, and Spanish without ever compromising the feel of the song, so much so, that you always feel you understand the lyrics. This is clear on Puto Babylon and the hidden final track on the album The way you’re loving me as every half a line the languages change.

The band isn’t just a giant mass of noise thrown together though, like all the best albums ever created it has tender, more down-paced moments. Just A Word has this with Busker’s Song that has the lead singer reminiscing of a short while before he met the other band members, busking on the streets by himself.

To see them perform the album live makes you want to bring the band around with you 24/7 for when you pull out your iPod generic mp3 player and put them on. The energy and excitement that they reproduce it with live cannot be contained on any recording. All members are dancing, chanting and singing along without ever fluffing notes.

To sum up, these guys rock, simple as. The hard rock roots, with a fun, fast-paced, ska-style sound fused with Latin beats and controversial lyrics make them one of the bands to keep an eye out for in the near future. Due to their international relations they often play shows around various continents. They’ll be returning to Britain in September for the Stroud Fringe Festival, which is always host to a number of other awesome bands and they still have slots up for grabs. So if you have a band that you think can wrench the gut out of Gloucestershire then sign up now @ http://www.stroudfringe.co.uk/default.asp

But for now, check out more information on the band here; http://www.myspace.com/cctvallstars

The most annoying job in the world...

... is searching for a bloody job!

I haven't posted much recently because what time I do have on the internet is usually spent sifting through pages and pages of jobs in preparation of my return to the mothership.

Job hunting sucks. As a writer the best way to search for jobs online is to search through websites dedicated to writing and bloggin, but rather than job offers there, you know what I find? People posting adverts about themselves. Often going something like this:

If you're looking for a writer, to write articles, blogs, reviews, anything! Then I am the person to speak to then I am the write (see what I did there) person to ask as I studied Creative Writing (or some not too dissimilar alternate to this) at University.

Sound like anyone you know? Yup thought so. And you know what the annoying thing is I bet those people have a blog exactly like this and might possibly be writing about their frustrations on their personal job hunting.

My biggest worry is that I'll return home after a very successful year of living abroad and have to resort to my main area of experience and expertise - the services of retail and selling, a.k.a. a f*@%ing shop assistant. It almost leads me to believe that my 2:2 degree in Creative Writing with Drama is worth nothing...

... quiet you.

Hopefully next time I post there'll be some more positive news.

Peace

Brolly Conduct

Have you ever stood at a bus stop when it's raining? There's no room under the shelter so you are left to stand in the rain, surrounding you are several other people with umbrellas. I'm going to take a moment to break this situation down two-fold.

Problem 1: Lack of you're own umbrella

Now everybody has a day where they are feeling particularly retarded, perhaps you are one of those people that it happens often to - you are not alone, or maybe you just don't own a brolly, in which case that's your own fault. However everybody has a day where they are left with no protection from the harsh rain. Should you spot one of these people, be a hero, offer them to share. Now understandably if there are three people under your umbrella already then I'm sure Mr Being-rained-upon won't mind. If you are the grumpy sod who's standing there in a suit, waiting to go to your big lawyer meeting, holding your briefcase with a lack of flamboyance to look professional but loud enough look to impress people, whilst listening to spoken word, pretentious poetry on your iPhone that's reserved for music because you prefer Blackberrys for texting then throw another person a bone. Offer them to share your umbrella. It's just nice.

Problem 2: Too many brollys!

Everyone's stood in a crowd at a bus stop or a street crossing and been surrounded by sensible people with umbrellas and you have remembered yours today. It's pandemonium. You get tangled up, bang one into the other, maybe tear a hole in one from one of your spokes then you feel guilty but don't want to offer them yours because, well... you'll get wet. It's the same when walking down the street and you see a sea of dry people with they're own protective covers on a stick. Now this particular situation takes some skill and discipline but can be overcome. It's all to do with eye-contact. You have to make sure each person you pass knows what you're going to do with your umbrella when you both pass and attempt to avoid a brolly collision. A flick of the wrist to the left early can allow the on-comer to do the same ever so slightly so when you pass both people can remain dry by keeping the umbrellas close enough to keep the rain out by acting like a moving jigsaw puzzle. This is probably the hardest maneuver to execute but the simplest - and my personal favourite - for the Brolly Rookies (i.e. Australians, Californians) is the old Up and Under. Sounds, as it is. Again with eye contact you let the opposite umbrella holder your thought process and whoever makes the first move will raise their umbrella high enough to avoid the other one while they lower there's ever so slightly. It's smooth efficient and executed correctly can keep everybody dry.

Keep that in mind next time it's raining, especially when you remember to take your umbrella.

Signing off.

Booooooooreeeedd

Ok so I'm online waiting for some Czech dude to send me some slideshow so I can proofread it and I'm bored of waiting so I'm going to write here for a little bit? You don't mind do you? Didn't think so, if you did, you probably wouldn't be reading it.

Pina Coladas are so last year, mango coladas are the shit.

Needing a new iPhone.

Changed a lot of different currencies today to go home. I got somewhere close to 1600 euro. There's an expression for this... I think its; Boo Ya!

Have got a book called 'I hope they serve beer in Hell' that I'm looking forward to reading. It seems similar to a kickass book I read last year called 'The Alphabet of Manliness'

Speaking of Kick-Ass, has anyone seen that film yet? I thought it was shamazing.

Seriously Mango Coladas. Do it.

Going home Saturday, started packing, got bored, stopped.

Ooohh, ooohh also: Got an email from a dude who said he's gonna pass my CV on to the right dept in his magazine maybe for a job.

Also applied to be an intern at SLAM magazine, in New York. Should be interesting.

That will be all for now, need to check if the proof reading thing has arrived yet. I'll be back soon to talk more about PLAYOFF BASKETBALL!

Cau

So no one told you life was gonna be this way...

Friends have that special talent of turning a frown upside down, of turning the grey skies blue and every other overused saying that you want to add.

Because the truth of the matter is, there is no amount of writing that can let you know important these people are to you, so I don't know why I'm trying. But best friends are everything someone needs. There are those people that can say just a few words that mean so much, even when you know that they are always there for you, that reminder every once in a while can make a really shitty day positive.

Those people without friends in life (and there are enough of them that those with friends should not take them for granted) are understandably sad in life. I don't mean that in an offensive or jokey way either. It's really quite sad when you think that some people in this world don't have friends they can rely on being there for them.

So I guess this is just me letting my friends know how much I love them

xxx

Kladno visit... or thereabouts

Just when you think you can't drink anymore beer, you go to a beer festival and re-kindle your love for it.

Katka and I decided to avoid all the loviedovie crap of Prague on the 1st of May and got out of the city to go to a beer festival. The excitement was saturating as we made the bus journey to Kladno, only to find that there was no beer festival, instead we had to catch another bus toward the airport - who puts a beer festival at the airport? Alas we bought another bus ticket and made our way to Velke Dobra.

The festival took place in a giant field and as the bus approached it we got our things ready to run off and grab the nearest liquid sex we could find, but the bus didn't stop. Why wasn't it stopping? Where are you going? No wait, the festivals back there.

We ended up walking back in the direction we came from a couple of hundred yards because the bus driver, I think was just teasing us. But when we finally got there, Katka's first choice was Bakalar, which as I later found out is always her first choice... but with good reason.

As we were drinking we decided to scope out the best beers and make our choices for the days consumption.

The walk around the field offered many an exciting prospect of alcohol. The consensus pick for our first one (the Bakalar was just to warm up) was a corn beer. We were extremely lucky to have the last corn beer of the day as well as one with a raspberry flavour to it, both were amazing but the corn beer was especially tasty - it would go down as the best of the day in our opinion but there was still more to come.

We did make a quick stop for food at this point and there was plenty to choose from. We went with something substancy; bramborove, patatas bravas or potatoes with cheese ham and spices in english. And God said it was good.

Back onto the beers.

The next two beers were a weizen (wheat) and a cerny (dark) and they were not brilliant. They were good but in comparison to the previous ones didn't stand a chance so we sat down, relaxed and watched some crazy Czech ladies sing crazy czech songs in crazy czech outfits and a beer drinking contest. In the form of a boat race, this was a very one-sided affair as the winning team won before the first contestant on the second team finished his beer.

Out cups were getting close to empty by this point so I went to the toilet and Katka bought the next two beers. These were good not fantastic but good, and we had to drink them quickly because it was clear that despite still being early in the afternoon a lot of the tents were running out so after making quick work of these we grabbed some more food and made our final choice. Can't remember it by this point, but it was a good one, sorry I can't tell you much more than that.

On the whole an incredibly successful trip and one that we will do again in the near future no doubt. Stay tuned for more information - if I can remember it.

Na Zdravi