It's Tigerfest and The Kays Lavelle album launch this week, as well as being May, which says to me that our first barbecue of the season can't be much further away, surely. Ach, who knows though, this Spring's been all over the bloody shop so Christ knows. Still, we're firmly into the first stirrings of Festival Season now which is... erm, well certainly not a bad thing I guess. There are some fucking shitty festivals (blogs, bands, etc...) out there, and I am becoming distinctly picky in my taste for festivals, and really quite [...]
So more sold-outy stuff this week, with Johnny Flynn already inaccessible at Cabaret Voltaire on Friday. I am actually going to interview him for the site, but I think I might have forgotten to include a guestie on my request, so I may have to hide in the toilets after the interview to avoid being thrown out for lack of a ticket. This is the last week for the Communion Compilation Competition as well. By the end of the week I will pick the best pictures of hipsters being extremely hip and [...]
It's busy week, in the absence of Mrs. Toad, and ends with me actually DJing twice in the space of two nights towards the end of the week as well once at some point on Friday, although I'm not all that sure where - Cabaret Voltaire I think - and then the following day at the Bowery at MarchéMarché , which should be good fun. I have been promised that on no account am I expected to motivate people to dance, which probably helps matters considerably. Oh, and I've just realised that I am approaching a hundred kilos [...]
You could drink yourself into a coma going to every interesting gig in Edinburgh this week. I think I might need a few orange juice gigs, if just to vaguely preserve both liver and waistline. Although it may be too late for both, I have to admit. I think I am going to start driving to gigs (tonight is by necessity, but we'll see how it goes) just as a way of forcing myself to stick to fizzy water or some such beverage. Maybe Skinny Water , perhaps (thank you Cogstar), a drink so monumentally stupid that [...]
Well the Trampoline show for this Friday, with Ziggy Campbell and Yusuf Azak has been cancelled, which is a bit of a tragedy for my music fun, but at least spares me some of the Olympic amounts of typing this post is going to require all through bloody August. Fucking hell, it's like a mini novel. Fortunately I don't think much was actually on yesterday, when the sort of hangover generated only by consuming an entire bottle of gin prevented me from doing anything productive at all. So this post is being written now and dated two days [...]
First Scottish headline date this year for The Sad, and it was a pity they had support acts. Up first was The Foundling Wheel , a solo experimental/punk din. His music often sounded like the screeching of a freshly castrated goat being farted through the arse of an angry dalek. I tried to think happy thoughts, but these were interrupted continuously by the racket emanating from the speakers before me. It's music you either love or hate. Hated it. Thank feck for the arrival of Y'all Is Fantasy Island's Adam Stafford, I thought. Until he [...]
So Matthew's plane crashed on the way back from Italy, after a rather nasty accident apparently involving a trainee pilot, gin and a difference of opinion on the work of Tom Waits. Only kidding, folks. Matthew's alive and well, but figured he'd be trawling through unread e-mails all day, so you have to endure my own personal brand of humour and warped self importance for one more post. Sorry. Tuesday 30th June 2009 - I Heart Hiroshima and the Pineapple Chunks at the Bowery I Heart Hiroshima [...]
Well the mammoth video nightmare of the last week is nearly over. This week I will be working in the Meursault tour diary from when they went away to the North of England for a few days in our big green van. They recorded some excellent sessions while they were touring, including three songs in the back of the van from some campsite in, erm, Lancashire somewhere I think, and also a few songs at a bandstand in Newcastle. The tour diary itself might just be mental, and but for some judicial editing could easily become the most offensive musical [...]
Hello everyone - sorry for the lateness of this post, but unfortunately sometimes actual jobs with wages and things have to take precedence over things Toad, just for a little while. I have spent the day at a meeting in Inverness, and I am desperate for a really good sleep. There's not a lot on in Edinburgh this week as far as I can tell. The brilliant Animal Magic Tricks is playing pretty much as I write this, and I am gutted that I won't get the chance to see her. Well, not until Saturday, anyway, which is [...]
Christ on a bike, after nothing at all last week, all of a sudden things are going bananas this week. You could pretty much be at a good show every night if you wanted. I'm not going to write much in this intro because, frankly, there are so many gigs to bloody write about that the post would run on far too long otherwise. Suffice to say that Friday's party was, from my perspective, a massive success. The open mic bit at the beginning was not an idea many people were overly convinced by, but I think pretty [...]
Welcome to another week tending the fertile pastures of Edinburgh's gig scene for shuffling indie kids. I'm working flat out to get the Sparrow session done for this week's podcast so beyond tonight I will be hiding in the house for most of the week, I'm afraid, probably swearing at the computer and cursing analogue technology for being so fucking shit and chewing all my tape of the session. Frustrating. Really, very frustrating. Still, I think we have time for one last session this year, but I will be renting a digital camera this time, [...]
Song, by Toad
Peenko
A-Trak - "Round of Applause" / "Where My Money At" (MP3 Download)
SHOCKING NEWS: Ben Gibbard turns to pills in wake of Zooey Deschanel divorce
Diplo - "Climax" (MP3 Stream)
Skrillex Uses Satanic and Homosexual Influence to Win Grammys
