Taken from the Mogwai website:

Mogwai’s first live album will be released on Rock Action Records this spring. Released alongside the live film Burning (by Vincent Moon). The formats will be CD and DVD and limited deluxe triple vinyl box set which will also include the dvd of Burning, set lists and a poster. The artwork was designed by Aidan Moffat.

To mark the announcement of the full track listing for this release Mogwai will be giving away a free MP3 of the song 2 Rights Make 1 Wrong taken from the Special Moves live CD via the minisite: www.mogwaispecialmoves.com

The track list for the the cd/dvd version is:

- I’m Jim Morrison, I’m Dead
- Friend Of The Night
- Hunted By A Freak
- Mogwai Fear Satan
- Cody
- You Don’t Know Jesus
- I Know You Are But What Am I
- I Love You, I’m Going To Blow Up Your School
- 2 Rights Make 1 Wrong
- Like Herod
- Glasgow Megasnake

The track list for the vinyl version contains the above plus:

- Yes! I Am A Long Way From Home
- Scotlands Shame
- New Paths To Helicon Part 1
- Batcat
- Thank You Space Expert
- The Precipice

The extra songs featured on the vinyl release will be available as a free download with the CD.

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Awesome, awesome, awesome.  Alright so it’s never going to fully capture the Mogwai live experience (unless you’ve got a terrifying home music system) but it should be a lot of fun.  Not a bad set list all told (especially with the extra tracks) and the free download is well worth listening to as a taster.  As my last post detailed – my favourite song of the last 10 years.

 

My year in lists

Wow, the year went fast.  My first full year living in another country.  It’s not been a bad one all told.  Before we move on too far I want to recap the last year.  Favourites of the year…

Movies:

• Star Trek
• Moon
• Coraline (3D)
• District 9
• Inglorious Basterds
• Avatar

Albums:

• Bat for Lashes – Two Suns
• Beirut – Realpeople Holland
• Bill Callahan – Sometimes I wish I were an eagle
• Fuck Buttons – Tarot Sport
• Mono – Hymn to the Immortal Wind
• Tortoise – Beacons of Ancestorship
• Yeah Yeah Yeahs – It’s Blitz!

Songs:

• My Delirium – Ladyhawke
• My Night With The Prostitute From Marseille – Beirut
• Black Hearted Love – PJ Harvey & John Parish
• Eid Ma Clack Shaw – Bill Callahan
• I’m Sorry, Baby, But You Can’t Stand In My Light Any More – Bob Mould
• Stillness Is the Move – Dirty Projectors
• High Class Slim Came Floatin’ In – Tortoise
• Carry Me – Malcolm Middleton
• Soft Shock, Hysteric – Yeah Yeah Yeahs

Overall it’s not been that great a year for music, a few good albums, none really classic.  Some good songs though and out of the above I can’t choose a top one musically.  Film wise it would be Moon which was just a wonderful experience (though Star Trek was pretty damn awesome, coming from a non-Trekkie).  And if I had to choose some favourites of the decade..?  Seeing as real thought would have me still choosing come 2020 I’m going to take these off the top of my head (and a quick scan of iTunes)

Movies:

• Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
• Donnie Darko
• Wall-E
• Amelie

Albums:

• Johnny Cash – American III: Solitary Man
• PJ Harvey – Stories from the city, stories from the sea
• Elbow – Asleep in the back
• Ed Harcourt – Here be monsters
• The Divine Comedy – Regeneration
• Idlewild – The remote part
• Spoon – Kill the Moonlight
• Wilco – Yankee Hotel Foxtrot
• Broken Social Scene – You Forgot it in People
• Explosions in the Sky – The Earth is not a cold dead place
• Mogwai – Happy songs for happy people
• Rachel’s – Systems/Layers
• m83 – Before the dawn heals us
• Marianne Faithful – Before the poison
• Mono – Walking Cloud And Deep Red Sky, Flag Fluttered And The Sun Shined
• Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds – Abattoir Blues / Lyre of Orpheus
• TV on the Radio – Desperate Youth, Blood Thirsty Babes
• Gorillaz – Demon Days
• Gemma Hayes – Night on our side
• Eluvium – Talk amongst the Trees
• Kanye West – Late Registration
• NIN – [With_Teeth]
• Sufjan Stevens – Come on feel the Illinoise
• Clint Mansell – The Fountain (OST)
• Jarvis – Jarvis
• My Latest Novel – Wolves
• Neko Case – Fox Confessor Brings The Flood
• Andrew Bird – Armchair Apocrypha
• Bat for Lashes – Fur and Gold
• Battles – Mirrored
• Dan Deacon – Spiderman of the Rings
• Feist – The Reminder
• Iron & Wine – The Shepherd’s Dog
• Low – Drums and Guns
• Malcolm Middleton – A brighter beat
• Radiohead – In rainbows
• Rob Crow – Living well
• Star of the Lid – And Their Refinement Of The Decline
• Crystal Castles – Crystal Castles
• Elbow – The seldom seen kid
• Foals – Antidotes
• Fuck Buttons – Street Horrrsing
• Los Campesinos! – Hold on now youngster
• Metronomy – Nights out
• Mogwai – The Hawk is Howling
• Remember Remember – Remember Remember
• Santogold – Santogold

Song (if I could just choose one):

• 2 rights make 1 wrong

That’s it folks.

 

This scar is a fleck on my porcelain skin

Sometimes all you need is a glass of wine, some nice cheese and a few crackers, a good book and soft music in the background. Whimsical. Mute. Entrenched.

 

My poor aching feet

I went running today for the first time with my new shoes.  They came with ‘instructions’ to wear them in for a few days first then just go on short runs of about 20 mins for the next few days.  Right.  20 mins.  So after waiting ages for K to come home I went without her and decided to start things easy and go round the block.  That took 5 mins so when I got back to the start I went round again.  When I got back round to the start again I was pretty much dead so I stopped.  Only for K to come home and drag me out again so she could go! 

I will improve!

 

This week I ave been mostly eating…

I’ve been rather slack when it comes to my blog.  Oh well.  Life has been busy.

It’s winter here now.  Truly.  I’ve gone skiing twice now.  My second lesson at the weekend didn’t go too well.  On the first run down I stacked it and got sifted to the ’slow’ group, comprising me and 5 middle aged women.  It got worse as I went on though.  Felt pretty disillusioned with the whole process and had a bit of a strop until I saw a chubby guy about my age crying on his arse with his tutor holding him by the shoulders saying, “It’s ok Danny, we just need to get to the bottom of the slope; can you do that?; come on, we’re getting there, we just need to crack your balance…’, NO! I want to stop!”.  I decided to man up after that shameful display.

In the afternoon I progressed to the big boy slope and after 1 run of sheer terror I felt pretty good about the whole thing and was rather annoyed when the weather came in and we had to go home.

Ached like a bitch for the next few days.

A friend of mine let me know that the Blur set at Glastonbury was the best gig of his life which made me feel great.  Watching the footage on line it’s really taken me back to the old days, watching Blur with friends, crowd-surfing, singing to my throat gave out and leaving soaked to the skin with sweat, water and stale lager.  Upset I missed the gig.

I’m working in elderly care at the moment which is nice as I find old people fascinating and some of the most interesting people I’ve ever met.  You don’t seem to get as many war stories in NZ though and I’m not sure why.  I’m currently sitting waiting for a medical registrar job to come up but in the mean time I’ve applied formally for jobs in December.  K is working as an anaesthetic registrar which is pretty cool.  I’m proud of her.

So many things.

Right now I’m listening to an almost perfect live version of 2 rights make 1 wrong from the Evening session in 2001.  It’s glorious and well worth digging out.  Time for bed now though.

 

My badly strung declaration to you / love not by degrees

I am still alive.  Back on nights over the long Easter weekend.  Destined to work every Bank Holiday in NZ ever.  I really mean to blog more.  I really do.  I also mean to cut down the time I spend online which is the prevailing force at the moment.

Let’s see, what have I been up to since I last wrote something down:

• saw NIN in Auckland – different set from recent tours but energetic and great setlist.
• saw Kings of Leon -they  just don’t do anything for me
• missed Dan Deacon which really pissed me off
• got soaked on Franz Joseph glacier
• gently spun in a circle hanging from a log 25 ft up being watched by about 40 people while ice climbing and then dropped my axes
• climbed back up and got them
• went to Hokitika Wild Foods Fest
• spent more time in Greymouth than was really necessary
• made a hand forged knife and had fun axe throwing in Barrytown spending a brilliant day listening to Stephen’s terrible jokes
• drove a lot surrounded by stunning scenery
• sea kayaking in Abel Tasman
• going in the sea and not getting eaten by sharks
• managed to get K to walk somewhere
• got pleasantly pissed wine tasting in Marlborough and spent a lot of money
• decided I liked Nelson
• caught, killed and ate salmon
• dressed up in old clothes with shotguns in Shantytown
• watched a bunch of movies and bought (yep – bought) a lot of music (see above pages)
• went to the Food Exhibition and ate lots of free stuff
• felt bad about not keeping in touch with friends and family enough
• got snowed on walking in Arthur’s Pass and buggered my knee after slipping over
• shaved off my beard for the first time in 4 years and promptly grew it back
• found out that K still fancies me even without a beard (though prefers me with one)
• made soup!

And lots of other things as well.

Photos for all these things can be found here.

I’ll see about updating more regularly.  I should really go to bed now though as it’s almost mid-day.

 

Trip

Off to Geneva and then Chamonix tomorrow, rather earlier than I was expecting.  Got to go and pack now.  Back next week.

 

1066

In an attempt to actually get off our collective arses, K and I went to Battle last weekend for a day out.  Not really knowing much about it except it being the site of the Battle of Hastings we had a really nice day.  We spent most of the day wandering around the wonderful National Heritage site at Battle Abbey.

It was really quite sobering to walk over some quiet, pretty but unspectacular fields with the knowledge that almost 1000 years before in the exact place you’re standing, the fate of our nation was completely altered and over 7000 men died in the mud.

I forget how much I used to love history.  The audio tour was fascinating and the whole site was a wonder.

The next day we woke to find about 6 inches of snow had fallen.  The weather is somewhat odd right now.

 

Could it be, I’m alive after all that..?

So yeah, a while has been and gone.  I want to write more frequently than I do.  You know how time is.

K and I went on holiday last month – spent a week and a half in Las Vegas and San Fransisco.  It felt strange to be back in LV again but stranger perhaps to see Phil there again since last time I was there he declared never to set foot in the town again.  Which makes it even nicer that him and Kristin came up to say hi on our first day.  Brief but lovely.

I think that if you take LV for what it is then you can have a great time.  Set your sights low and you’ll be surprised.  Aside from just wandering around casinos and hotels (we stayed here for some cheesy fun):

we saw a few shows (Cirque du Solei: Mystere and Ka), watched brides on skateboards:

saw the Bellagio fountains dance along to Frank, got addicted to slot machines (ok, so that was more K than me):

Plus I bought a hat.

We moved onto SF (the flight is really quite stunning – some beautiful scenery en route)

…a city which I adore and can almost find work my way around without a map.  Unfortunately, K got sick and we had to see a doctor.  A 10 min consultation with a man in a black Nike sweat suit and white Nike trainers plus a prescription for Abx cost $200.  Holy fuck!  Still, new experience and we still had a good time.

A detour back through to LV to avoid an early flight plus a bit of luck meant we got a free upgrade to a much nicer suite for our last night at:

We had a hot tub in our room!  Add in room service and breakfast in bed and it pretty much beats the hostel option.  I’ve not given up on them completely though.

So, yeah…really nice holiday that seemed to last forever (in a good way), good weather and great company.

 

Night out

Had a really fun night.  Amalgamation of friends.  Engine Rooms.  Saw the Gloria Cycles and they were really good.  Better than most of the bands I’ve been buying music from this year (it’s been a slow music year currently aside from the MGMT album, especially after the brilliance of last year).

Saw them about a  month ago in a local pub but frankly was too drunk to pick up on anything other than they sounded pretty good.  This time, before drunkenness kicked in, they actually were good.  Great in-fact.  Reminding me of many an indie band with sing-along choruses, catchy tunes and energy.  My mate Antony interviewed them recently after chatting to them after the last gig and they sound like pretty nice people.  I’ve had brief chats with them at the last two gigs and they seem nice and open to everyone.  Plus the lead singer looks remarkably like a friend of mine – we got a picture of them together tonight.

In the current music climate they could go very far.  I’m certainly putting my money on them.  Hopefully get to see them next time round again.

They put on a night with support from Transformer who were pretty fun and right for the night plus a table tenns competition and free bangers and mash!  Classy.

If I get my arse into gear I’ll get my ticket for the Great Escape festival in Brighton tomorrow.  Sleeeeeeeeeeeeeeep…

 

Hanging with the stars

So after complaining to a friend the other day and then again to K tonight at dinner about how I’ve never really seen anyone famous in Brighton, I happened to notice that we were in the same restaurant as Norman Cook/Fatboy Slim.  That made me so much more excited than it should do!

He was wearing a lumberjack shirt and had more gray hair than I thought he should do.  Then I gossiped with the waitress after he left.  Ha ha.

That pretty much makes me famous…

 

Mountains

And as a quick update – Ron has added his blog from last week on the Mountaineering course with some photos and a brief video of us huddled togther up Jacob’s Ladder.  Check it out here from the 23nd-27th February.

He’s also given a link to Paddy’s site – Paddy was the third member of the course over the weekend and well, his website says it all: World’s Fittest Athlete.  He’s held 157 Guiness World Records over the last 20 years (including an outstanding 8794 one armed push ups in 1hr).  He was a lovely man and you would never have known.  Gentle giant.

Later

 

Please prescribe the red one…

20 past 1 in the morning.  Psychiatric hospitals can be quite creepy at this time of night.  My second of three nights currently. 

Last night was ridiculously quiet but tonight’s already been a lot busier.  It’s still strange compared to medical nights though.  I mean, medical you’re up and working pretty much all night.  Here, I could have gone to bed at 10.30 last night and slept through (as it was I went to bed at 2 after arsing around and reading for a while).  But then you don’t know whether to sleep much in the day as you’ve just had an entire nights sleep.  Thing is if you stay up all day and then have a really rough night you could be awake for over 24hrs which is never going to be conductive to work or ability to funtion.  So, I went to bed last night and during the day.  And now I have a headache as my body has no fucking idea what’s going on!

While I’m thinking of it: movie update of recent weeks:

I actually really liked 1408.  I’m a big Stephen King fan as most people know (and am actually reading The Tommyknockers at the moment) and enjoy his short stories almost more than the novels so was rather glad this got made.  It’s a good adaptation and John Cusack did an amazing job.  An imaginative and creepy presentation of an old, potentially cliched story.

Really did very little for me after expecting so much.  There are some really funny moments but about half way through the humour seems to disappear and it just gets really unpleasant.  I don’t mean in a gratuitous sense, more watching people trying to deal with difficult situations badly and everyone being so negative and aggresive to everyone else just got really depressing.  I’m still holding out for Superbad though.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Shoot ‘em up is the most ridiculously entertaining thing I’ve seen since Transformers and before then…well, who knows?  It’s amazingly fun, completely stupid and absolutely worth watching.  Paul Giamatti and Clive Owne are so much fun.  Watch it.

I’m pretty sure I actually had something to say rather than just talking about movies but I’m tired and have a headache so may leave it at that.

 

The sun and the moon

On inspection of the email/internet usage policy I am allowed to use the internet for personal use on ‘designated break times’ so that’s better.  There is also a clause about not commenting on the Trust, work or your collegues on ‘blogs or podcasts’.  Hmmm.  Trust and collegues fair enough but work?  I think it’s ok to talk about work in a vague way as your thoughts realting to the general aspects of your work and how you feel about it are your own to share.  As long as you respect and in no way break patient confidentiality (and lets face it – if you do then you should be disciplined and labelled as a complete idiot) then I can’t see why it should be a problem.  However, as someone who’s had a mishap with blog related mistakes (somewhat of an understatement though with hindsight, accurate) I’m going to be careful.  I don’t want to get struck off!

To be fair, I don’t really talk about work much anyway.

—————————————————————–

So despite exhaustion bordering on coma I went out with my flatmates last night and we drove into the country to a place where you could not only see the dark night sky but also stars.  And more stars than I’ve seen for a while. It was beautiful. Made even more so by the annual Perseid meteor shower. Yep – lots of shooting stars.

The hill on Ditchling Beacon was wonderful (I’m going to have to go there in the daylight) and it found the 4 of us lying on the bonnet of the car looking up into a deep blackness with a sorounding rim of clouds.  It truly was stunning – the Milky Way was really visible and we made out quite a few satellites whizzing around (something I don’t often notice).  Just lying there watching the night sky was remarkably peaceful though when we stood up from the car after lying bent backwards for half an hour my back was in agony. 

I think I’ve found the place to go when I want to escape for a while. I’m just hopping it’s not a dogging site!

 

The mousey girl screams violence, violence…she gets hysterical

It’s been a busy week all told.

I managed to find a flat.  Actually I found two.  One yesterday which was an ok flat with people who seemed really friendly and nice.  But the place was small and after going back today with a tape measure I realised too small.  So driving home I got increasingly concerned about what to do (as I’d said yes to them).  But then a new opportunity presented itself and now I have a new flat with a bigger room and an enormous house and living area with people (who on initial presentation) appear to be awesome.  Which is nice.  Feel an arse for letting down the first guys but then it’s a year of my life that I need to be happy with.  I’m often told I don’t think about myself first enough.

So in a few weeks time I will be living with two final year art students in Kemp Town, Brighton, about 10 mins from the hospital.  Now I’m all excited.  Even better this means I should be able to go on holiday this week.  Got to ring the landlord and letting agent tomorrow to get confirmations and will know more then.

Back to the Lake District for more walking and climbing (if the weather holds as it’s been really shitty here recently – floods).  I think I’m going to try and go up to Scotland and climb Ben Nevis too as we’re doing Three Peaks in 3 weeks and it would be a good idea for one of us to have attempted it beforehand.  Looking forward to (firstly)not being at work for a week but also to being outside and getting some fresh air and exercise.

What else?  Ulka had an amazingly fun party Thursday and I got very drunk on Pimms.  And yet again no one could tell.  That I was drunk – it’s always been that way – I must hide it really well (Abi once told me I often come across as drunk normally so it can be difficult to tell sometimes.  Ha ha.  Weird, she didn’t mean I sway and slur my words, but I’m often excitable and bouncy which is apparently what I’m like drunk).  Last to leave.  Felt rough the next day and then that night cooked for Ulka (a really nice red-onion gratin – starting to get really good at it) before we watched the first series of Peep Show.  Good night.

Bed.

 

Extremely drunk.

More later…

 

Can you remember what he said to you?

Great weekend.

Decided to be a good son and go home home for the weekend. Spent Saturday hanging out with my little brother and we saw 4: Rise of the Silver Surfer which was about as good as I was expecting (a lot better than the first but not the Greatest Movie In The World). The Fantastic Four have always been young and goofy to me and the movie pretty much got that right. Story was silly and overblown, acting ok, effects great and not too long. Could have been much worse and the Silver Surfer spin off could potentially be awesome. Here’s hoping.

Didn’t end up furious with Mum so that’s a positive! Came close when she decided to point out ‘well, you are almost 30…’. WHAT! No. NO. No no no. I’m not. Jesus. She’s still not found anywhere to live yet though.

And then Sunday with my step-family and Dad for Father’s Day. Translated = the whole day either beating up or being beaten up by my two nephews. Ha ha.

Spent a lot of time on the monkey bars and climbing frame (I really fucking want one of those – so much fun). By the evening I was so worn out and battered and bruised that I decided to end it in the traditional manner by thoroughly soaking the two of them with their super-soaker resulting in two sodden kids, a few tears and a victorious Uncle Andy! Ha ha.

 

Being big is great! (speaking of which I’ve put weight on- in fact I weigh more than I’ve ever weighed before and have finally broken the 10 stone barrier! Ha ha. Never been that much before – go me. Of course, everyone I’ve told wishes they could be only 10 stone and then got moody).

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Skip forward 4 hours and I’m quite drunk. Got called by the Sarah and Maddie who are having an ant infestation and needed ‘a man’ to sort it. Guess Mike was unavailable so they called me. Turned up to find S wearing an item of clothes that really gives credence to the word ’shorts’ and both near hysteria. But unscrewed the side of the bath – site of the infestation, discovered and destroyed the ants nest (not pleasant) and looked heroic! That’s my man quotient filled for a while. Makes up for the lack of any other masculinity.

Then Ulka came round and we’ve hung out and polished off a bottle of rather nice Rioja and some Cognac. And then I realised I’ve run out of alcohol (except for that horrible Welsh whisky Rob bought a while back). We arsed around on Facebook and t’internet, talked about animal costumes and generally had fun. Now I need to go to bed. So I shall.

Night.

 

Round three (I guess)

Why am I here? Again?

Well, I’ve reached blogging uncertainty. I’ve grown out of my old journal after almost three years, 508 posts, 1028 comments and a bunch of friends, both virtual and real world, who stuck with me. It got me through bad times and good. It got me thrown out of a house. It lost me friends and it gained me friends. It was an experience.

But people move on. I felt myself changing and I needed a new place to change to. To change with.

I set up Blog number two over at after being tempted away by the pretty headers and fun library functions of another service. Appealing to the hoarder and the collector in me. The promoter and (I guess) the show-off-er? Er? I still like it but even after a short time I realised that I was falling back into old patterns. But it has a use: I’m going to keep that blog going for the entertainment side of things. But I wanted somewhere to move to, to write. About me and the things important to me.

I wanted the on-line equivalent of going to the pub with close friends or going out for dinner with a confidante. I wanted talking when I just need to, to friends and family. I want all those pretentious sentiments. Ha ha. Look, I just want somewhere to appeal aesthetically to my sense of nature.

And so, an old friend (the old friend who actually got me into the whole blogging thing in the first place), popped up out of no-where, a long time after I thought he had stopped listening and pointed me in the direction of this here site. And you know what? I like it. Same as I did the first time round.

So, despite knowing full well that it may not last / work / satisfy and eventually something else will undoubtedly come along and distract me with shiny ribbons , it may just for a while occupy me and stop the blogging uncertainty that seems to be preying on me.

Anyone who wants to join in is welcome.

Andy