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5 Days Off Festival. Full streams now online.

This Amsterdam based festival ripped through our favorite cityt back in July leaving all non atendees jealous (yeah I know Sassan, shit was good).

But now we can all put jealousy aside and listen in to the full on streams from 5 Days Off. Excellent selections by the likes of Vitalic, M Mayer, DJ Hell (love it), Teifshwarz, M.I.A., and many many more.

This is why I love the internet!

Listen to 5 Days Off in its full Real Player glory!

Unedited rant on booze and Oasis

2005 is going down as my most sluggish summer date. With the usual array of shows and big tours floating in and out of Boston, I for one have barely budged outside a few special must sees with Oasis being the highlight.

Oasis is one of those bands that bounce me between love and hate. A few good records in 94 and 96 which lead into a trail of tears. As each subsequent record was a bore, they were tossed on sale on half.com. Revisiting those early tracks kept Oasi in iPod rotation but things were getting pretty f'ing bland there for a while.

Next,word comes of their new record, a new sound... keeping hope i download an iTunes EU leaked copy and discover the boys have begun to play like a bunch of guys hanging around their shitty basements again. Wonderful.

And of course, on the trail of a decent record (depending on which bullshit review you care to eat up), they announce a world tour which includes a stop at ye old Great Woods in Mansfield, MA (Tweeter for all the new heads). Great Woods is one of those tragic venues in the music biz. Preshow tailgating calls you to stay, drink, and chat for as long as humanly possible before the main act gets on, but is a skull banger to to leave once the show ends... as long as 3 hours in some of the deep pakced lots.. but this is rock, so who cares.

Back to the show. One thing I famous for when attending an Oasis show is to become as intoxicated as I possibly can. Its my little secret weapon against Oasis: be as drunk as Liam, laugh at Liam... the mindstate is both calming and accepting of a bumbling lead vocalist who, righteously so, doesnt give a shit about me you or the venue. To me, thats fine.

The point I am making is that I hate the venue and I need to drink to see the band. Its this potion for disaster that drives me back everytime!

To my joyous surprise, the show turned out to be one of the best and tightest Oasis shows I have seen since back in 96. Liam looked sober and worked damn strong without moving a fucking inch from the mic stand. Solid vocals and no mishmash. Great opener, solid version of Mucky Fingers ... half way through the gig i sobered up enough to realize, "Hey they may be back in form, but I sure could use another Newscastle."

Love Oasis.

Coldplay and R Ashcroft - does it get this good?

Shit, didnt think much of this when it was listed on the Live 8 itinerary...
but even I must admit, this is the best performance of the event.

Download the entire video on demand below:
Bittersweet Symphony (with Richard Ashcroft)

Find the MP3s via your normal sources....

Ellen Allien @ Sonar 2005 live online!

Kendra knows how I like it. Big ups for pointing me to one of the best minimal Ellen Allien sessions I have heard in a long time. Brought to us courtesy of the good folks at Samurai FM. God bless Japan.

Ellen Allien Live @ Sonar 2005 in Barcelona (my second home).

$40 Maximo.

One thing to know about me is my tendency to over-purchase tickets for shows. The usual two will suffice for an average known band... but if I see a $10 show for an up and comer at a small venue, I'll usually splurge and buy 4.

I am not looking to scalp them, rather, I feel that since the price is so good I can probably convince a few people to come with me without risking a big money loss.

So take the Maximo Park so a few Sunday past at the Middle East in Cambridge. This show was the right price and the right night.. so I thought! Problem was, low promotion and a hot swelting Sunday night in June was just not getting anyone out of the house.

I can only push and promote a small band to a certain limit. You either take my word or take the word of the album playing on your system. Difficulty is that at 10p on a Sunday, people are either settled in for the week or in no mood to endear the sopping humidity that makes this June all too famous.

3 tickets left and no takers... hell, at least I can sell or (gasp) give them away at the door....

10p outside the MidEast and its a deadzone. No smokers in sight, no strollers walking by... just me and the door.... the bouncer moved inside.

I have never not given away a ticket when I had spares. Tonight was a first in my musically career. It wasnt so much the money but the fact that at 10p I saw NOT ONE person enter the venue in 20 minutes time!

I did what any honest music fan would do. I left them at the will call and made the ticket girl promise to give them to any souls that wandered in. God only knows if any did.

So how was the Maximo Park show? Well, outside of onstage soundcheck and filling in less than a quarter of the cellar with 100 people, Maximo played as though the room was full... which is what any band should have done. A solid 1 hour set of tracks off their latest 'A Certain Trigger' and words of insight related to finally having heard their music on Boston radio (what channel????) proved to us early adpopters that this band would back soon.

I wouldn't compare it to U2's first show in Boston playing to less than 50 people in 1980 (no I was not in attendance), but it was well worth the 40.00 I spent on a ticket(s) to see them.

Hopefully my early investment will produce some good futures later on.

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