I came across some videos of Antony performing with The Metropole Orchestra, and was blown away by this song “I Fell In Love With A Dead Boy”, which is from the EP of the same title. I’d not heard this song previously, and this live rendition with the orchestra is just stunning.
The rendition of “Rapture” from the debut self-titled Antony And The Johnsons album is also sumptuous with the orchestra, and the subtle beauty of “Another World” is magnificently presented also. Also, if you’ve not heard Antony’s unique re-interpretation of Beyoncé’s “Crazy In Love”, then you should really check it out.
From September 16th, Thursdays and Saturdays in the top floor of Dignity West will be taken over by my club night: IQ [IndieQueer], a club night aimed at playing music that you don’t get to hear in the usual gay clubs here in Galway.
This was the highlight of my summer. The Sunday morning of Electric Picnic, myself and three of the guys I was performing with as part of Werk at thisispopbaby headed off to get coffee and food. The Dublin Gospel Choir were on stage in the main arena, singing wonderful music. We sat and finished our food and coffee and enjoyed the music. Then they started a Stevie Wonder medley, which got us up to dance. During the course of the medley, myself and Tom started doing bits of one of the routines we were doing later that night, and the other two guys joined in.
Some girls came over to us after those songs and asked if they could dance along with us, as we “looked like a lot of craic”, and we’re never ones to refuse to dance. So we all started dancing together calling out simples moves to each other. Over the course of the next few songs, more and more people behind and beside us started to follow along too, and people came up from the crowd ahead of us to dance behind us too. People took photos, smiled, and watched. Some people we dragged up to join us too and at some point we looked around to see a crowd of people all following our moves behind us.
When the set finished, we held Tom (who was doing most of the leading dance-wise) up on our shoulders as the dancers behind us applauded us and the Gospel choir both. So many people came over to say thank you, and saying it was the best moment of the festival for them, but we were just happy to dance along to the fantastic music and thrilled when other people saw fit to follow what we were doing and dance along with us.
It was a beautiful afternoon. I’ve only discovered two youtube videos of it so far, but you’d never know, more might surface.
Firstly, a short one, where you can see myself, Chris and Tom in front, and Stephen in the red vest behind us.
Secondly, a video shot from the side, showing more of the people who were dancing along behind us.
edit: here’s a 3rd video, this time from the front, and you can clearly see myself and the other three guys who started it all:
edit again: here’s a 4th video, also from the front and a bit short too.
Thanks to everyone who came out and supported us at Electric Picnic yesterday. Great day and LOVED the flash mob! If you have any pix or videos send them on, we’d love to see them!!!
Flash Mob…. it’s not often that you get to watch a show from the stage but this made our day!! Think poor Kerry-Anne nearly forgot the words when she saw them!! It’s what the Picnic is all about!!! Thanks guys!
The whole weekend was fantastic, and the rain on Sunday/Monday didn’t marr it at all, just made things a little more challenging. I had another random beautiful moment where I was having some chips between catching UNKLE and Fever Ray, and sat down at one of the upright pianos in the wood sculpture areas near the electric arena. Of course it was delightfully out of tune and honky tonk, so I started playing some Ray Charles and Tom Waits covers on it, and ended up playing in the rain to a few people who were crossing the area to catch The National or Foals. But it was wet, and when my chips were gone, I headed off to catch Fever Ray instead, but it was rather lovely too. I’m sure those pianos suffered through a lot of “Chopsticks” and the like, so a bit of jazzier stuff was a nice respite I imagine.
If you’re around Dublin, come check it out. (click the poster for the facebook event page)
After the last two nights of fun this Summer, we couldn’t let August pass without another RIP.
The Button Factory will open it’s doors again for a third installment on Friday 27th August, and to help get us in the mood for Electric Picnic / back to collage / the leaves falling from the trees, DJ Seán John will be back to rock our world with more of his signature beats, and joining him this time will be DJ ebby.
Spinning his own blend of rock, alternative, quirky pop and electro, ebby has been DJing gay alternative nights in Galway since 2006, namely AlternativEden, IQ (IndieQueer) and Smells Like Queen Spirit, while Dublin dwellers may have caught him this year playing at Paddy Monster.
DJ Laura Lovejoy will be on the decks in the Button Factory side bar. Obsessed with 60s pop, as well as girl groups, soul, motown and surf, Laura’s record collection is a treasure trove of the finest pop hits and obscure gems. She’s currently the weekend resident DJ at the Garage Bar in Temple Bar, and before that she played at Antics, Retro Revival at Le Cirk, Shebeen Chic and Dice Bar. She ranks Phil Spector and Joe Meek among her favorite producers, and the multi-talented Laura also plays guitar and sings with the band The Pulpit, who rocked RIP back in June. She’ll be accompanied on the decks by band mate Evan O’Leary.
The lyrics for this song were written years ago, I think circa 2002 or so, but didn’t become a song until some time in 2006. I wrote the music for this and another song Caoineadh initially as piano instrumentals first. The lyrics for Caoineadh started to come as I was playing through the music for that one, but it was only as I was going through old ideas and words that I’d sketched out that I noticed that the other instrumental I’d been doodling on at the piano fit rather well with the words of Maria. I have two other melodic lines written (possibly two violins, but I’m toying with the idea of going with woodwinds for this song, as I think it’d suit it better, but that’s for another day I guess) but they’re not recorded in this demo at all.
It’s a song that I always mess up the verse order in when I play it live, but at the same time, it’s a song that I tend to pull out a lot when I’m playing live, as it’s just lovely to play to be honest. I might record an instrumental version of this when I work out the rest of the instrumentation. I think that would be lovely.
