Last week involved meeting up with some Sydney girls who are also on exchange and walking along tower bridge and seeing tower of London (from the outside), house parties, a few pubs, curry in brick lane and then heading over to the Ten Arms (the pub where Jack the Ripper selected his victims), nice walks from Trafalgar Square to Buckingham Palace, through to South Kensington and Hammersmith. Going to a few galleries as well, which is free so very much the cheapest option here; went to the National Gallery in Trafalgar and V&A in South Kensington.

Last destinations before leaving this Saturday will have to be British Natural History, British Museum and Science Museum.

Just before going to reading I needed a tent. I went on good advice to check out Argos, and it was a totally different shopping experience.  You get this catalog which is about 4 inches thick, and you type in the item numbers into a computer then check it out. You wait in a waiting room and some dude comes out with it. It’s like online shopping, at a retail store. The tent I got was awesome though, shit to carry but it was a quickdraw which meant you opened it and bam, spring loaded instant tent.

I got to reading casually late, by a day and a half. I didn’t know it started on the thursday night (the camping part) and had a bus booked friday morning. I was surprised when I got the call from a couchsurfer mate asking where I was on the thursday night. By that time, my jaw was slightly throbbing but I thought I could deal with it.

Come friday morning, I left early to get to Victoria Coach Station. Jaw status was painful. And to make it worse, Calcot is not even close to where the festival was. Google maps shows 1 hour 15 minute walk but it took us (us being me and some chavs I met at the station who stole a trolley and put our shit on it and started to wheel it down until we were stopped by local cops) around 3 hours, getting lost and taking breaks. I was carrying 2 bags, a tent, sleeping bag and air mattress thing. We arrived at Calcot at 12:30pm, and the venue at 4 or so. I went to the White Camp to set up camp, and missed deftones (which would make it a nice 3 times now). On the friday I did see Placebo and Faith No More. It was enjoyable for the first part of the night until Faith No More, it felt like -2 degrees, high winds and a burning sensation in my mouth. I left right after they played Epic to find the camp, and sleep it off using painkillers and anesthetic. I never even got to meet the CS’er and his mates that day, because they went out to see Kings of Leon and other bands. Nothing is cheap in England, I tell you, 500ml cokes were 2 pounds…. 4 AUD for a coke! Plus you had to buy the festival program, 10 pounds!

Saturday morning as better, finally met the other guys in the camp and had a ball. Went out the whole day on saturday looking at rad bands and having fun, the reading festival is massive with so many campers. The surprise band at reading this year was Them Crooked Vultures which stars John Paul Jones from Led Zeppelin,my favourite ginger Josh Hommes and bearded drummer Dave Grohl. It was awesome to see. We got home half way through gossip, and sat next to a nice fire some Welsh guy started. We did silent disco’ing until 4 in the morning, so very strange seeing people dance around to no music, but it was awesome. Awesome as in, fun to do with a couple of drinks but undeniably stupid.

Sunday was pretty enjoyable. We started the day with some campyard cricket, and I presented the aussies well. Hit a few fours (at least it would have been a four) and 3 nice cattle sweeps. We missed deadmau5 for this intense test match, but I have to say I was an amazing batsman against the pommies.

Radiohead headlined and opened with Creep. Life is complete.

The train back was easy. Took 20 minutes to get from reading station to paddington, which beats the 2 hour bus to calcot. The difference was about 12 AUD, well worth it. The train system in England is great.

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Friday:

Fallout Boy

Placebo

Friendly Fires

Kaiser Chiefs

Jamie T (fucking awful brit hiphop)

Faith No More

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Saturday:

Metric

Eagles of Death Metal

Enter Shakari

Surprise Band: Them Crooked Vultures

The Prodigy

Gossip

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Sunday:

Crystal Castles

Crystal Method

Yeah Yeah Yeahs

Bloc Party

Radiohead (best setlist EVER…. opened with CREEP)

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Just saw the dentist today. Turns out I need a root canal. Most expensive festival ever.

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Last Thursday marked my departure from New York into London. I was pretty glad to be getting out of the States, I think 5 weeks is enough to absorb the States. My flight was a night flight so rocked up to the airport early and stayed around JFK leeching all the internets.

The guy on the plane next to be was an ex-pat aussie, and told me a few of the tips that we (the ones with shitty exchange rates) do. Got an oyster card straight off the bat for the tube/bus and saving some money that way. The public transport here is excellent, plentiful, clean, fast and not too badly priced (buses are a pound, tube maybe 2 pounds) which works out to be 2 or 4 dollars a ride. I’ve been trying to work out bus routes as it’s the cheaper option and not too much slower than the tube, and you get to see London streets. I got lost heading up to the Hostel I’m at (which is very fucking dodgy and totally misrepresented on the website), and getting caught in rain (the real welcome to London), finally getting here, and being surprised how ghetto central London can be. Being jet lagged and just hell tired, went to bed.

Next morning I woke up 5am local time, and hit the streets. I heard you can see a lot of things from embankment station, so went there and just followed some windy roads admiring London. I ended up in Trafalgar Square (which I didn’t know at the time), and it was amazing to see Nelson’s Column in the morning while it was empty. Another impressive thing that lead me towards it was the Arch near the square, and just followed that down to The Horse Guards and some memorials. I used the map and navigated my way through to Westminster Abbey. The architecture here is amazing, and there’s so much of it everywhere, such a big change from back home and the States (although DC has some really awesome buildings too). Went down and around Abbey, up some bridge to Southbank and walked up the Thames, seeing House of Parliament, Big Ben 2, London Eye ending up to Tate Modern. It was free, so I went in. Got internet access there, found out about some Couchsurfing events, back to T. Square for some free hug event. Free hugs was big in Sydney with that dude on Pitt St. and being involved with this was a bit strange. There was a picnic at Regent Park after, and that was really fun. I met a few of the locals who live there (well I lie since most weren’t from England), and had a ball just chilling with them. Afterwards was some Indian food, and some icecream, then back to the ghetto for a bit of a sleep.

The next day I met a family friend for lunch in Chinatown. It’s not too bad of a Chinatown, it’s next to Eros/Shaftsbury Ave and the theatre district, and near where I was the night previous (soho/leicester square). It was fun. Ended up going to Hendon and discovering the East.

Monday I went to Bristol, just to see the Banksy Exhibit. The bus there was 17 pounds, 5 hours there and back. The queue for it was 4.5 hours. No exaggeration. I have pictures of this proof. But it was well worth it. I was in line with two local Bristol people, cracking jokes, so the wait wasn’t too bad. Banksy is such an amazing artist, and no words can describe his work. He’s quite the genius with new media and social commentary, you will have to check out my flickr just to see a sample of his work. What was even more amazing was the fact that he went outside of his area and put works in normal exhibits like the nature section and dinosaurs, and classical paintings and hidden away some gems. As a visitor you had to discover all his pieces hidden away, which MADE the exhibit that so much more awesome. I got back into London at about 830pm then went to a pub tucked away from the Strand for a CS event, games night, where we played stuff like Uno, Jenga and Apples to Apples (which was such a fun game).

Tuesday I slept in, didn’t really go as I couldn’t be bothered and a tad burnt out. I did go to the pub at night for the London CS weekly meeting, seeing a few familiar faces and new ones. The events are really good to go to, meeting new people and travellers alike, and getting advice, finding about the town and history, and having a laugh. There’s a lot of Aussies here, in the motherland.

Anyways, today I bought internet, taking it easy, tomorrow I’ve got to move all my stuff and buy a tent for a weekend festival in Reading, just outside of London. Cheers.

London Flickr

Bristol Flickr

Looking back at the trip, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Las Vegas, New York City, Chicago and Washington DC, we did a fair chunk of the US and worked out ample times on all places. The music stuff was a good break up from all the touristy things, plus a few days off here and there, but right now I’m tired of moving around and stability will be nice… end of September.

We went to Georgetown with Jasmine; it happens to be the “place to be” where all the “trendy” people go (which are probably as cool as smashing your head against the wall). The requisite for trendy area: Banana Republic, United Colours of Benetton and most definitely Urban Outfitters and American Apparel. We had dinner at some Englishesque pub/bistro and had some steaks.

The next 2 days were non-stop ownage of Smithsonians. We went to the Hirshhorn first which was a 3 level modern/contemp art gallery and it was pretty cool, some nice intriguing works there. I particularly liked the geometrical artworks, which were a plenty. Hirsshorn also has a sculpture garden, which is cool if you’re into that sort of thing.

Next was the Natural History museum, which is awesome. I think we spent close to 4 hours there, it had everything, ocean, dinosaurs, mammals, butterflies, gems, rocks blahhhh. I liked it a lot. I high fived a T-rex. Lots of photos were taken and can be found here. We also walked to the Washington Monument which we nicknamed as “the penis”, because of the phallic connotations that something of that stature would have. Lincoln memorial was also on the books, a bit of a walk down a nice war memorial, and a long strip of water avoiding geese shits left right center, but we made it without any marks on our precious shoes. The size of Lincoln is amazing. It’s also turns out to be an awesome setting in Fallout 3, which is probably my favourite game, so seeing it in real life without power armoured Paladins was amazing (I just used my super imagination). Dinner was at Chinatown, which isn’t really a Chinatown, more like a lane full of Western Stores (Maccas, etc) with Chinese script on them. They were still constructing the Chinese Gates which you see in all REAL Chinatowns. We had dinner at a Chinese/Japanese place, which was alright but nothing to write home about, so I won’t.

The next day was a massive day for aeronautics, the National Air and Space Museum is rad. We did 2 movies in the Einstein Planetarium, which was a new and pleasant experience. I don’t think we really have them in Australia, but in the US, Planetariums are popular. There’s a LOT to see in this one, spent the whole day here. The history of WW2 stuff was interesting, they really like enforcing that they (America) were the victors (Fuck yeah!). Then did a quick rundown of the Freer which did not interest me at all, Asian and African Art. District 9 also came out today, and after hearing the massive boners people on FB were getting, I was really excited to see it, and we did.

District 9 was rad, a nice change from the alien v. human, or America saves the day sort of thing. It’s well thought out, has a few good plot points, awesome acting from the South African bru, and much in the image of LOTR, extraordinary CGI. I went in there without looking at the viral marketing, or reviews, (except with maybe a trailer), and was well rewarded for it, so go see it before people ruin the plot/storyline! Ponyo also came out, and I love Hayao Miyazaki’s movies, so I’m keen for that. Also keen for Inglourious Basterds next week. ANDDDDD 9, Where the Wild Things Are…

I also tried out Heroes of Newerth, a game based on DOTA. It’s in Beta at the moment, and free to play. It’s got great graphics and a leap ahead of WC3’s engine, the gameplay is smooth and with the formula tried and tested in DOTA, HON delivers. I was never a big fan of DOTA, but HON feels much slicker. The game join system is awesome, and if you D/C you can reconnect to the game and regain control of your character which is something that a lot of games are lacking. It’s not really noob friendly, but after 3 games I think you can pick up the process. Games average out to 40 minutes which is a perfect length for something like this. Also, the game is only 200 megs (the Mac client anyway), which is freaking amazing because it looks so clean. There’s still a few bugs or whatever, but the community exists already, and it’s free, so get an account and jump in. I think it’ll be popular game, and hopefully a once off payment and not a subscription model. Regardless, it’s worth 10 minutes of your time playing.

I’m in Washington DC one more day. Not sure what to do, seen all the things I wanted to. 3 days, perfect length for this place.

Oh, quick addition:

Future Primitive Mgmt can go fook themselves. I recorded some Crystal Castles at All Points West, and was testing iMovie Youtube uploading out, and uploaded maybe 1 minute of Crystal Castles, and they removed it off youtube for “copyright infringement”. I hope CC gets the fuck off that management/label and go to one who actually knows anything about the internet, thanks.

PS: I’m still going to upload all 5 videos of Crystal Castles at APW and Lollapalooza somewhere, just need a home for it (my finished movie runs at 1 hour 40 minutes with CC, Tool, Depeche Mode, some DJ’s and Jane’s Addiction).

Monday I went out to downtown, past Grant Park to the Field Museum, saw Sue the Tyrannosaurus Rex, Bushman, some taxidermy, and mummies. Diana organised me to meet her mother and friend, and after the museum we had some traditional Chicago Deep Dish Pizza, and my god, it was fucking excellent. I still approve of thin and crispy, but the deep dish is tasty.

Tuesday we went to Lincoln Park Zoo, and down to the Oak Beach (or something) and had a jump into Lake Michigan. It was absolutely freezing, and my feet were numb. We saw a cold front of clouds sweep over the city.

I loved Chicago. I definitely want to go to another Lollapalooza.

Pictures of Lollapalooza are uploading and can be found here

Pictures of random Chicago-ness will be uploaded later can be found here

Thank god for stable internet \o/

Oh I also have a 1 hour 40 minute video of my festival/concert august jamboree, and will be trying to find a home for it.

Yesterday in New York, did Liberty and Ellis Island. Not that impressed, you have to book months ahead for the Statue Tickets and wait 3 hours in line to get up to the Crown, and I don’t think it’s really worth it. Alas, the only things left to do here now are the museums and galleries, which I will go to next time I’m in town.

The last couple of days I’ve been somewhat offline, and unable to post anything. The internet in the hotel room drops out all the time, which means I can’t actually post any photos up. This weekend was huge, Lollapalooza happened.

We realised soon after landing in Chicago that we aren’t anywhere near downtown or northside, and that walking to the station was 40 minutes, and the train itself takes 30 minutes but comes every 1 hour. With this knowledge, I organised with a friend from Chicago to stay at hers because it was far closer to the venue and would save me the 2 or so hours travelling a week.

Friday at Lollapalooza I spent pretty much by myself, got there in the afternoon and it was terrible weather, lots of rain. I stayed around for White Lies, and with the beauty of the 3 day pass, left the venue to get some hot coffee, and went back for Crystal Castles. The stage was reminiscent of all points west, lots of mud, and lots of ruined shoes. Alice was drunk and being obnoxious on stage, jumping into the crowd, getting groped and yelling at people, and giving shots to the crowd. Still, not a great live band and I much prefer their album work. Walking from south side to north side to see the Decemberists, a bit of Peter, Bjorn and John (since I missed them twice when they supported Depeche Mode; turns out they do a Joy Division cover of Transmission), Of Montreal and finally Depeche Mode (again). Same setlist from the Mode, with less one encore and no Strangelove. I met up with Liz for dM and we had a great time watching the mode, and afterwards went out to a bar (or what we would call a pub) and some club with her friends. They played pretty much rnb and hiphop, rock/metal isn’t really popular in chicago.
Saturday morning we walked through the north side of town, going into some adventure stores as I was looking for a cheap winter jacket. Discovering North Chicago one street at time. Saturday had Tool headlining, I didn’t spent much time at any one band before then, just moving around and looking at the stalls and art installations they have there at the festival. Liz went to the arctic monkeys, who I saw at APW and thought were rubbish, so instead I got a free shirt cleaning up rubbish, and another Tool poster. The weather was a total change from the day before, it was stinking hot. Tool was Tool, and once again, same setlist, same awesomeness.
Sunday we went to the famous Portillos for an Italian Sandwich, Navy pier and through Lakeshore Drive and Millennium Park. Caught Boysnoize, some MSTRKRFT (seemed more like a DJ set and not an album set), Silversun Pickups, Deadmau5 and Jane’s Addiction. Lollapalooza is such an awesome festival and I had a rad time at the festival, it was located in a great part of town with the Chicago skyline in the background, simply beautiful.

Pictures soon.

Little Italy was fun. Walking around, I heard it was much better at night, so probably tomorrow night I will check it out. It’s also next to Chinatown so had a looksie there, and it’s big but nothing impressive.

Empire State was a totally disappointing experience. We did some stupid NY ride first to get the express ticket, and the ride was totally lame, with Kevin Bacon narrating, stupid CG effects, and just so very lame. The express ticket was a lie, we had 3 queues to wait, one to get into the “ride” (which I use the term loosely), to get to the 80th floor, then the 87th. Such lies. It was 47 dollars for this experience. To top it off, once at the top, you have to duel people to get a view. While the view is nice up there, we went in the middle of the day and we got a lot of smog, perhaps it would be much better at night but I would think there would be more people. Winter would be a nice view with the snow.

Depeche Mode was fun, same setlist though. This time instead of having a beer spiller next to me, I had some tone-deaf lady shouting in my ear. Alas, such is the concert life.

The concert had great backdrop, and animations. What was interesting was with the main backdrop, they had a sphere in the top middle which protruded out, causing a sphere effect which they utilised a lot with their imagery. It felt like a long show, and looking at setlist.fm, it was 21 songs. I was worried they would play out all of their new album because they opened with a couple of songs where from  Sounds of the Universe, which I thought was rather crap. But alas, they played a lot of classics, which everyone chimed and danced on to. They also played 2 encores.

1. In Chains
2. Wrong
3. Hole To Feed
4. Walking In My Shoes
5. It’s No Good
6. A Question Of Time
7. Precious
8. Fly On The Windscreen
9. Little Soul
10. Home
11. Come Back
12. Policy Of Truth
13. In Your Room
14. I Feel You
15. Enjoy The Silence
16. Never Let Me Down Again

Encore:

1. Stripped
2. Master And Servant
3. Strangelove

Encore 2:

1. Personal Jesus
2. Waiting For The Night

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We went to a Cinema in Times Sq to check out what their cinemas were like, same prices for shitty postmix drinks and 3 day old stale popcorn, but goddamn the seats are comfy. Harry Potter movie sucks, Snape kills Dumbledore.

My friend from NJ drove me around the city, and the traffic here is slow, really slow. It took 30 minutes to go 3 blocks, on top of the dodging of people trying to cut in with their SUVS. I don’t know how people who live it actually drive every day, I’d rather use the train or whatever, anything is better. Went past the MOMA but didn’t go in, and went to the Public Library. I went through the Brooklyn bridge to Brooklyn (for reals) into Williamtown which is a trendy street, Thrift stores are popular here (think op shopping back home where you buy 2nd hand clothes, vintages and the like), and had a NY style pizza. Apparently there’s free music there every Sunday, and this Sunday is Deerhunter, but the lines go for like 3 hours. I’m pretty tired right now so might give it a miss.

So, today was All Points West. I organised to meet some APW forum randoms and Couch Surfers, and met some cool people. Anyways, the festival was pretty well organised, from the start. The ticket gave us free light rail, which came every 5 minutes, to the venue. The venue was a nice park, looking over the river and you can see Manhattan cityscape and the Statue of Liberty.

I saw tool, my bloody valentine, gorgol bordello, crystal castles, black gold, arctic boringkeys, …. and something something about trails of the dead… it was a great line-up. I got ankle deep in mud as the whole ground got flooded last night, I can’t feel my legs as they feel broken from all the mud trudging, and pretty sure I have whiplash and I’m 130 dollars down. I did however pop several boners over tool, too bad the tool setlist was boring as fuck, I heard this guy said “I only like only 4 tool songs, which was the the whole concert”, he was speaking truth.
This dude at the ID tent didn’t accept my ID, the stupid fuck. my NSW drivers licence is actually made of hologram plastic with photos and DOB, not like the shitty NYC piece of cardboard. He asked for my passport, what tard is bringing a passport to a festival. I went to another ID tent, this time a girl, and she loved my accent, and bam, got the ID wrist band. It has 7 tabs for the 7 drinks you were allowed to have, and they all fucking broke off when I was running around being a douche. I participated in Improv Everywhere, it was fun, we looked silly running around doing stretches, and freeze tag and our “epic” battle. Videos will probably be here http://improveverywhere.com/video/.

Oh yeah, I also got smashed by mozzies, they must love foreign blood.

I have high standards in festivals in USA now, so lollapalooza better not be crappy, which it won’t be, hoping Tool does at least 1 different song… something rare would be nice. H., Pushit, Ticks and Leeches (don’t bother commenting, I know he doesn’t sing this), or Parabol with Parabola. Whatever.

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