soledad penadés

repeat 4[fd 100 rt 90]

Although I just could find a couple of minutes yesterday to remove the polka dotted header image, I've been wanting to write about The Pipettes' Saturday concert at the Roundhouse since then…

As expected, there were lots of girls, boys and children all dressed in polka dots, with lassos, tutu's and all that stuff. But there were also some unusual people, like a very tough, completely bald and square-shouldered complexion man, which we thought was a bodyguard at the beginning but ended showing himself as a sweet bloke, singing in the ear of his girlfriend and clapping the hands like the biggest fan ever.

There was also a completely drunk man that was miraculously able to stand, but oscillated continuously in an erratic way, sometimes hanging on the people surrounding him and other times placing his head about the shoulders of the poor attendants ahead.

Misty's Big Adventure were the support for the big act. I had never heard of them and I must confess they were quite weird. Somehow they looked to me like a circus parade, maybe because of the singer's hat - something like And now ladies and gentleman you're going to see the most unexpected show in Earth!!- and then that guy with the red suit and lots of hanging hands appears on stage, kind of scaring!

It was a real pity that the sound equalization for this band was soooooo poor. We just could hear the trumpet because we were in front of the girl playing it, and same goes for the chorus. The piano/keyboards player was extremely funny and amusing, with that way of moving the feet at the same time that she played. You have to see it for understanding it. We definitely want to listen more from them.

The big act, The Pipettes live, was somehow disappointing. Although they did really well, singing perfectly, making perfect jokes, etc, etc, it was all so perfect and prepared as it was in this concert I found days before. I always thought that a live was the opportunity to improvise or experiment with arrangements, expand songs a bit more, play them with a different rhythm, kind of interacting with the public, but maybe I was expecting too much from this!

Apart from that, and from the fact that I'm beginning to consider to bring with me a box in order to see something on the stage, I really enjoyed the evening, and quite liked the little funny details as the candies which we were offered before and during the concert (no, they weren't drugs!) and the confetti which was poured from above our heads in the last song, kind of resembling snow. It was so amazing to see people keeping the confetti in their heads after the concert had finished!

Something which surprised me was that I was expecting more fanaticism but people was quite quiet; apart from singing and dancing, nobody threw lingerie to the stage or cried or whatnot. The only passion act that we saw consisted in a lesbian couple having the time of their lives, right in front of a group of super-pure girls-with-mummy which were complaining about the artificial smoke in the concert hall prior to the beginning of the concert, and really looked a bit embarrased.

All in all, it was cool, but I'm not sure if I would recommend it to somebody outside Christmas period. You know, during Christmas we allow ourselves a certain degree of naivity but when it finishes it's kind of different… So it will depend on how innocent do you feel like!

PD We brought a camera but didn't charge it, so you'd better rely on this search for The Pipettes at Roundhouse in flickr for some pictures.

I went to the post office this morning to pick up a valuable item: the tickets for The Pipettes live at the Roundhouse next Saturday!

Since it's only two days until the concert, I take the opportunity that I give myself (since this is my own blog) and therefore declare the following days as Polka Dotted Days (note the header! look at it! - obviously it just works if the people which read the blog through the feed do come here and have a look at the header… now do it).

I discovered The Pipettes a couple of months ago, being curious about what other people were listening to in last.fm, and I discovered about this concert in last.fm as well, so it looks like it's working well as a music promotion platform :-)

And since I'm still regretting not having gone to a concert that La Casa Azul played in Barcelona a couple of years ago, even if they are not directly comparable, I thought it was a good idea to go and start the holidays in a funny way.

It all looks very much like american 60's-ish and those movies about High School graduation balls. I wonder if they will serve punch and choose the queen and the king of the party! Although being a Brit event, they will either serve mulled wine or alcopops or something like that, very girly. Who knows!

I'm looking forward to it - while trying to come up with a polka dotted something to dress with on Saturday, but I think I don't have anything like that (yet) :-)

I forgot to point that out! Two days ago I saw my profile at last.fm and it showed me a "FREE download" on one of radix's songs, which I had recently played. And then I remembered the e-mail they sent some weeks ago about the downloads server going live quite quite soon (really soon this time, in fact).

So I just followed the link and effectively, his famous Counting Stars is freely available for download.

I did then a quick and imperious visit to xplsv's label page and verified that effectively all of our releases at last.fm are free to download by anyone, which is a great way of promoting ourselves and letting people know about our music. Tracks get downloaded with the appropiate artist - track name.mp3 naming, so it's much better than the usual services which tend to rename tracks to a random_number.mp3
As they have enabled free downloads and free previews whether you're logged in or not (in the youtube style) I would say this is the real alternative to the crappy myspace music pages. A neat design without loads of unneeded elements, with quick access to music and easy to browse and have a look, that's what people need, not that space…

The artist and tracks page have now a better design so they are more different in comparison to the usual profile page. Hannah is doing a great work, kudos to her!

Now I just have to get some time and add the vast amount of missing tracks so that we can dominate last.fm's downloads! Ha ha!

Although Saint Etienne's He's on the phone is one of my favourite songs ever, I hadn't watched the video yet. But youtube still has it!

So there I was having a look at it and thinking omm… this could have been better if she just moved a bit more, and the camera could also play a bit more with the music, and why are they so static?, etc, when I spotted some familiar images in the background. What are those neon lights? I think I've seen them before… then I noticed the lyrics referring to the girl being in Leicester Square. But actually what appears there is Piccadilly Circus - or that I think. What do you think? is it Piccadilly Circus or not? Actually I have the feeling that the streets which have bookstores could also be some little streets near Charing Cross which have lots of bookshops and are as narrow as the ones which appear here.
I can obviously understand it, Leicester Square has way less neon tubes which are very cool for video clips. So maybe they were in Leicester Square ready to record some planes and then found Piccadilly Circus, which is quite near, was nicer and then just thought "nobody is going to spot the difference" :P

PD Super +1 "100% londoner" to Saint Etienne for using a tube map style in their site menu - incredible uncomfortability and pain-in-the-ass site navigation aside…

Iba a dejar esto como "Sin título", pero me lo he pensado dos veces y creo que un adjetivo que le va mejor es "petardadas". O tontipop, como le queráis llamar. Allá vamos:

Glad

Este me lo ha sugerido mi hermana. Me encanta el inglés del cantante, por no hablar de sus atuendos, obviamente. Y esos efectos especiales… ¡espectaculares!

Vocoder - What happens now?

No sé por qué, tengo la impresión de que uno de los cantantes-instrumentistas, el del pelo a lo afro, es Juan Pardo. Pero a lo mejor estoy totalmente equivocada. Identificaciones aparte, no sé si me gustan mas los gallitos de la cantante o el rapeo del hombre del mostacho, que perfectamente podría ser guardia civil. Por el bigote, digo. Y superdivertido como aporrean la 303 como si fuera un teclado :D

Lo vi en Music Thing - Truth funnier than fiction.

Alaska y Dinarama - La funcionaria asesina

Todo un clasicazo para acabar; una de las letras más crueles que he oído, al tiempo que disparatada (… los disuelvo con lejía… los mato a sangre fría…). Pero es que además el vídeo es total, como el déspota ;) . Observad a Alaska deslizándose sobre esa lengua-tobogán, a las bailarinas usando una sierra mecánica a modo de barra, y finalmente, cómo se convulsiona el resto del público, siguiendo esas coreografías guatequeras que se llevaban tanto en la televisión al final de los setenta principio de los ochenta.
Éste lo he encontrado yo :P