Dave blogs it old school

On Friday I’m going to Peterborough.
The Weekend I’m in London.
Monday night is Manchester.
Back to Derby Tuesday.
Then gigging in Nottingham on Wednesday.

So I better get some stuff done before Friday.
Eek.

Ok I have a lot on my mind right now so I’m warning you, this could get messy. And long.

I’m not even gonna start on the letter I showed you. Well ok I’ll give you one line about them, they either have more money than sense or they were given that stuff free and thought of a funny thing to do with it. Thank you for your thoughts on that by the way. Though one thing that confused me, quite a few people commented saying stuff like ‘you should take this opportunity’ or ‘they’ve given you the key to…’ do something, I forget what… But whatever, they haven’t really have they? It’s not like I’ve been sat here writing songs for the last year with no microphone to record them on. What they’ve given me, is a third microphone and an idea for a song topic. If you’re reading this, I don’t mean to sound ungrateful, though I must say your methods are… unusual, what I’m saying is, nothing has changed. No real opportunity has arisen. If I write a song about what they were talking about, it will go on my channel, about 6,000 people will see it and it will be forgotten because in my head, it will always be mixed up with the reason it was written.

So there’s that “one line” about the letter for you. Now do you see what kind of mood I’m in and why this post began with a warning? I will think no less of you if you stop reading now, whether friend, fan or some other form of individual who has stumbled upon this blog. In fact I’ll probably think better of your judgement than those who read on. But write on I must I’m afraid, it’s too late to play music and I need an outlet.

Lately I’ve been feeling a bit stuck. In this city where I live and so few of my friends do, in this routine of losing touch with old friends, making new ones and only being able to see either, old or new, on odd occasions, while communicating through some form of technology.

I haven’t seen or even talked to my friends from university in far too long. And we were so close. What troubles me though is that, I could hop on a train tomorrow and go see them for a day or two, and quite soon I may have to, but that’s not what I’m missing. I’m missing them being there every day. I know I have rarely if ever mentioned them on this blog, because I started it after I moved back to Derby and it’s more connected with my online life. But last year I lived in a house with four friends, and there were another five a couple of houses down. That made me so happy, coming back from uni and seeing who was in, going out for a drink in the middle of the day just because we were students. Even now when I hardly talk to them they mean so much to me. It’s Joe’s birthday soon, hopefully something will happen for that, it usually does.

I currently have three big projects taking up the majority of my time. A video for student.com which is a large and daunting task, but it’s nice to challenge yourself. Obviously my EP, but that isn’t moving very fast. It needs at least one more song that I haven’t written yet, and I don’t write enough. And lastly the collab EP I’ve mentioned before. This is at least starting to move somewhere. I have most of the songs with people waiting for parts to be done. The latest one I recorded for was a song I’m doing with Ben (Loka). Every time I do something with/find something out about Ben I like him even more. I sent him a first draft of the song to see what he thought, and I was expecting to get back a reply saying something like, ‘I like it, what would you like me to do?’ Oh no, he sends me three mp3s the next day, one with him singing on it and two with different guitar ideas! Another reason I like Ben is because, in a community where 20 year olds are considered old, he is one of very few ‘grown ups’ I know from the youtubes. Not that I mind hanging out with the younger generation, see today’s video for proof of that, a happy birthday video for Nic who has just turned sixteen.

Well anyway, I want this collab thing finished soon so I have something completed that I can give to people. I think I’ll feel less stuck then.

By the way the tennis was amazing today. Two of the best players ever in a five set Wimbledon final. We’re so lucky they have each other, if there was just one of them they would just win everything practically unchallenged. But they really push each other.

This blog has stopped being about whatever it was supposed to be about.

So I’m going to stop.

p.s. I have 5 mosquito (or similar) bites all within 1 cm of each other on my left thumb. They are very annoying.

p.p.s. I hate it when people tell me a cover isn’t as good as the original. Of course it isn’t. I mean OF COURSE it isn’t. The time and money they put into it, then I come along and record a version from my bedroom in one afternoon. That’s not the point you fucking idiots. You don’t understand music or life, fuck off.

I played a gig in Nottingham last night. On my way there I got a text saying ‘There’s a prcel here for you.’ To which I replied, ‘Ummm…. what?’ This was at a bar I’d never been to in a city I don’t live in. A parcel. For me.

Well I’ll cut out the crap and tell you I’ve just opened it, it’s a usb microphone and a stand. That’s about £70 worth of stuff, and there’s a letter which I shall type out for you now.

“Hi Dave

You’re probably wondering why someone’s sent you all this stuff. It’s because times are changing.

You let the world know your opinions on your blog, and we like you for it. But this is different. This is your chance to be a mouthpiece for your entire generation. Are you up to it? We hope so.

We’re sure you’re bored with seeing the image portrayed of young people in the media: that you’ve all been led astray by gangstas, that you can’t tell the difference between life and videogames, that you’re a bunch of wasters. A lost generation. Losers.

So why don’t you beat them at their own game? After all, you’re a media mogul too. Over 5,000 people watch you on your blog, and they’re probably just as bored with all these media opinions as you are. If you spoke up for yourselves, you could really make a difference. How about it? It’s not called YouTube for nothing.

We like your songs (sorry you didn’t win the Frtellis competition). Anyway, maybe you could write another one. How about one that tells us what you think about your generation? What should the media reaally be saying about you? We’d love to know. You’re a performer, after all. Good luck in Nottingham tonight!

Your subscribers are powerful too, so why notuse them? They’re happy to make comments about your videos, or videos about your videos, so what about getting them involved? Say the word and see what they have to say. Just like your Heinz protest.

Who are we? That’s not important right now. What’s important is that opinions change. But to put your mind at rest we’re not a for-profit organisation, and we’re nothing to do with politics.

We’ve got your best interests at heart, so do what you do best.”

I’m going to save my many reactionary thoughts for a moment because I want to hear what you think based on the letter alone. I don’t generally ask for comments on here, but I would like to know what people think about this.

So I finally got round to calling up Virgin about our broadband, which currently is low speed and high price. They sent a leaflet around offering a much better deal, so I call up and follow the automated voice woman to the ‘change your service’ section. This is obviously located in India where a guy who is probably wildly overqualified and quite difficult to understand told me that those deals are only for new customers. What the fuck? He told me the best deal he could do me which was better but not great. So I called again, this time following automated voice woman to the ‘I’m leaving your fucking company’ section. This one, funnily enough, was in England. Amazing how they start to care when you’re leaving. I told the woman the deal I was on, and what I’d seen they give to new customers and also the best competitor I could find.

Hold please.

She comes back with a better deal than any of them. Basically lowering our bill by £6.50 a month and making our broadband five times faster with a free wireless router to boot.

The thing I hate is that they know so many people just wont bother phoning (like me - I’ve been meaning to do it for months) that they don’t do it automatically. They wait for you to say you’re leaving then they’ll give you anything you want because they know how much money they’re making out of you.

Well anyway, I’m glad I finally got round to it, hopefully the upgrading won’t have complications… Unlikely I know. But my advice to you, if you’re beyond the original 12 month contract (or whatever it is) just call them up and say you’re leaving, they’ll give you anything you want. Same goes for phone contracts and probably other things. They’re all bastards.

Most of you reading this probably don’t know I quite like my tennis. I use to really enjoy playing when I was younger and if I hadn’t spent the last 10 years dedicating most of my waking hours to music, I would have been playing sport. I suppose I would have made a go at either tennis, football or athletics (whether sprinting or jumping), but instead they all faded out over time and now I’m lazy and unfit, but at least I’m making music, and I’ve got a better chance of making a living from that than I would have those. I haven’t played tennis in years, mainly because none of my friends played since I left school, but I still feel like after about an hour of playing I’d get back into it. When I watch it I remember how each shot feels, and how the rhythm you get into when you’re playing well is so very similar to the feeling of playing a song you know inside out, more so than any other sport.

Unlike a lot of British ‘tennis fans’ Wimbledon is not the only tennis I watch, but it certainly is special. Ever year I feel like there is one game that really gets the tournament going, and I’ve just watched this years. Andy Murray, the only British player with any hope of getting anywhere lost the first two sets against Gasquet, ranked number ten in the world. Having just watched Euro 2008 without really caring about the result (though I was happy to see the sublime Spanish team beat the lumbering brute strength of the Germans - that was simply a victory for good football) I wasn’t looking forward to a second week of Wimbledon with no one to cheer for.

Had Murray gone out in straight sets it would have been through no fault of his own. He played well from the beginning but Gasquet was simply incredible, it was like watching Federer play, the natural ability, the consistency, and the ease with which he pulled off the most difficult of shots. But Murray took the third to a tiebreaker having raised his game to match the phenomenal Frenchman. He won the tiebreaker on a shot that should have been impossible to reach, ending up beyond the grass and stopping himself just in time to not fall into the little pit the cameramen stand in. They must have got some brilliant celebratory shots.

Errors started to enter into Gasquay’s game, which had previously looked almost flawless, and Murray suddenly looked the one who was unstoppable, and it proved so as he took the fourth and fifth sets to make it into the quarter finals.

What struck me most about the game was that, regardless of the result, it was a joy to watch. No offence to Tim Henman, he had a very good career and seems like a nice guy but my God he was a chore to watch! Murray has a confidence and aggressive side that Henman never really had, I expect him to win points. The fact that he came back to win it in five sets just adds to the excitement by offering the prospect of another match to come, this time against world number two Rafael Nadal. At the end Murray showed off his muscles, I imagine to show the effort he’s put into the physical side to his training, which was noticeable - comparing to the last time he was at Wimbledon, he’d never have been able to keep up that level of play for 4 hours. But he won’t be comparing with Nadal in that department, the Spaniard is build like a brick shithouse.

While I’m hovering around the subject, the tennis players of today must be some of the fittest sportsmen around. The way the cover the court is unbelievable, and to keep that going for longer than two back to back football matches, credit where it’s due.

Back to Murray, I have just one thing against him: he’s one of those Scottish people who like England to lose. I don’t get that, I support Scotland against anyone but England and Ireland (I’m half Irish). I wonder how he’d feel if all of the English people in the crowd at Wimbledon wanted him to lose.

In other news I was recording today and equipment kept fucking up. Had someone been in the room I’d probably have killed them just for being there. I’m winning clipstar at the moment so hopefully I will be able to get some better stuff when that’s over! Though I’m only winning by 2 votes and there’s a month left. I was kind of hoping that mentioning it in a video would do more to be honest; I’ve got just over 200 votes out of almost 6000 subscribers. Oh well.

I’m a bit gutted to find out that there were ten entries in the Fratellis competition that were better than mine.

Probably gonna do a video telling people I’m not making videos anymore and too blame the Fratellis. Yeah, that sounds like something I would do.

=)

Recorded a song for the collab ep and sent it off to get some beautiful harmonies recorded by Ms Tsontilis. Don’t mean to sound too full of myself but it’s pretty goddamn good! I can’t wait to hear it with Emily’s part. I won’t say what song it is because I’m gonna leave it as a surprise. I also added some bass lines into a few of the other tracks I have half done, because I’ve recently discovered the joy that is the bass guitar.

In other news I have a gig in Nottingham one week from today (3rd July) if anyone is near. It’s in a place called Bar None. don’t ask me for directions cos I’m clueless. I imagine Google knows, ask him.

Also, lets face it: The finale of Dr Who looks fucking awesome.

I think I can sum up my current level of tiredness by saying that my legs alone were not enough to tackle the stairs, and that I had to use my hands as well to crawl up the neverending (14) steps.

Yesterday, I think it was yesterday though I’m struggling here, I went down to London. It was a long day. It began at around 8:30 and an hour later I started driving, By 1pm I was at Victoria station in London looking around for Tom, when suddenly there was Mr. Nerimon and Miss Mhazzrocks standing right in front of me!

We found the others and went off to do some random touristy things, which were suggested in jest and done anyway, mainly because they were indoors. Funny thing about meeting people you rarely see, personally anyway, I never really want to do anything but hang out with them, you just feel like you have to go and do something because you’ve made such an effort to be there. Anyway we did stuff (science museum, Tate gallery, Wagamamas) and then a few of us headed back to a hostel, well nine of us… six if you ask the guys at the hostel! It was a great night, we just sat around with a few drinks talking until falling asleep somewhere around six of the AM.

It was a shame Alex couldn’t come back, half a day is not enough with my #1 fanboy. But it was great to talk to Myles, Laura and Ian (who might be the most awesome person ever, by the way) again for it had been too long, plus some of the guys and girls I speak to in stickam - got to speak to them without looking at a computer and with inappropriate touching. The only thing I’m disappointed with is the lack of an appearance by stickerman!

Ok so at this point I’m going to go collapse on my bed. This was going to be longer but it’s not happening tonight!

So bye.

So I forgot to give the last post a title, and in my little behind the scenes part of this website it just called it ‘44′. I’d never thought about how many of these I’d done until I saw that. So although blogging was certainly already a bandwagon when I hopped on, I have at least kept it going now long enough for it not to be a fad and frequently enough for it not to be… crap. I suppose I could write frequent crap, but quite a lot of people read it so it can’t be that bad. Plus it’s kinda for me anyway. Well half for me, half for people who are interested in getting to know me more than my videos allow.

Tomorrow morning I’m heading down to London to see some friends. This pleases me. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen any of them, and they’ve all been off meeting each other at various collections and congregations that I have been unfortunately unable to attend. I even seem to have managed to get various little projects sorted out to an extent with which I’m happy, so all that remains is to remember to get up early, and getting up early is a lot easier when you’re looking forward to the day anyway.

I don’t think I even know everyone that will be there so hopefully there will be a nice surprise or two waiting for me. If anyone who reads this is going let me know so I can get excited!

Also and very much off topic, I saw this video a few minutes ago. If you can’t be bothered to click that link it basically says that Calum, one of the guys in charge of the 365 project, is doing a 36 hour (StickAid? 24 hours? pfft!) stickam chat to raise money for charity. It starts at midnight tonight, so if you have any free time over the next day and a half then here is the link to the stickam page, go say hi!

Another topic change, my last few videos have apparently not show up in quite a few peoples subscription boxes. So check my channel if you think you may have missed any. The last three were Gideon, VLR and ID.

One last thing before I go, Alex Day must go on countdown. That would complete my life.

I just used the phrase ‘That’s the best thing I’ve ever heard’ so I figure it warrants a blog.

Basically, Pav had an RE exam and in it he ” lolled about” which went like this…

Castle03: i wrote the flathead lyrics
Castle03: then said, oops i just accidentally broke into song
Castle03: btw my friend does an awesome cover, check him out at musicfromblueskies on youtube

Fantastic.

Also VLR series two started today, you probably know because you probably watch my videos. Listen to it, it’s amazing. If you haven’t heard of it I’m very jealous because you get to go and listen to the whole first series for the first time. I have to wait TWO WEEKS now for a new one.

Third good thing; I thought the hoi sin stir fry thing I found open in the back of the fridge was a mistake a couple of hours after eating it, but I feel alright now.

Final thing, last blog I mentioned Stickerman… well he has made his way onto youtube! Find him here. All I’ll say is that video contains the line, “My name’s Hermione Granger, and I’m a BEARD!”