Django's gammy-handed genius

I'm in danger of usurping Tedium's status here as the only bloke that ever posts anything so I'll clear this up and then enter into a temporary monastic silence for which you can all be thankful.

Django Reinhardt, whose name I cruelly mis-spelled, was an awesome dude, who is one of the greatest guitar dudes ever. He was an illiterate gypsy who lived in Germany but escaped Hitler's concentration camps with help from a Luftwaffe officer called Dietrich Schulz-Köhn (who also went by the sobriquet "Doktor Jazz") and who admired Django's playing.

Django badly burned his hand when he knocked over a candle at home when aged 18. His wife Bella made fake flowers out of paper for a living and all of the flowers caught fire, maiming young Django. N.B pic above is of Django's actual hand, not an artist's representation.

For my money this is a far better story than Schindler's list.

Also, and I realise this is getting tedious now, Jimi Hendrix allegedly named the Band of Gypsies after Django.

Inner Circle, The Strokes and Sheldon Whatisname are not so interesting, I reckon.

Gimme some kind of sign

As the great Peter Andre once said.

I know there's been some talk of not organising rehearsals on the blog, so as not to run the risk that we'll be invaded by hysterical fans on a Tuesday night, but I found this awesome picture and needed an excuse to use it.

So squidders, feel free to reply by email but: Shall we play together again soon?

and can we put this on a t-shirt?

Ink Jets Home

Thanks to the mercy of a retired judge, Silky-ink has been dispatched home a day early from Sydney.

I had beers with a mate who edits Aust Dazed and Confused magazine. He was very enthused about the ink and wondered if he could put us in his mag. I mumbled something about ''not quite ready yet'' but stuck him in the back pocket for later.

I was bending Tedium's ear the other night while waiting for the other half of the band outside the Midian, about how I have no time for late career revivals from artists who I already have a shelf-full of records by and who should have the good grace to quietly fade away and die. Ted poionted out that he is more a completist kinda guy, who has to own everything by everybody he likes.

And so it is, with more than a little surprise that I reveal that the two albums I can't get enough of at the moment are Bruce Springsteen's We Shall Overcome and Built to Spill's newie, You in Reverse.

Go figure.

Paddy's Geeky Buzz

I plugged in my speakers last night after I'd got home from rehearsal. Last year I bought a DIY kit for some sweet speakers and Crafty Dave kindly cut the woodwork for it. I put a splash of undercoat on it and then sort of just poked it in the corner of a room and neglected the project for months.

In a burst of madcap, energy-fuelled enthusiasm over the last week I painted the speakers with some frighteningly glary black gloss and assembled the puppies.

New hifi equipment is a bit of a thrill. You listen to your old, familiar music collection but the geeky buzz that comes from the extra clarity and stereo imaging of really lovely speakers makes the old, familiar music collection just that much more enjoyable to listen to.

It was late by this stage so in consideration for my neighbours I didn't crank it too much but I listened to some Chili Peppers, some Mars Volta, some Stravinsky, some At The Drive-In, I pulled out my copy of Amadeus and watched a bit of that (ooh those courtiers were nasty to poor old Mozart) and was loving every bit of it.

Hooray.

Goodbye, inky Tuesday?

Greetings again on a busy day of blogging. A potential spanner in the works of our well-oiled machine... I've just been told by work that I'll probably have to go away to Sydney for a few days next Tuesday.

Now I don't wanna upset the squid cart here or put anybody out but...

How do people feel about a monday night rehearsal?

Subscription

Well fellow Squiders, so bouyed was I by last night's rehearsal that I immediately subscribed us to Triple R. A band subscription specifically dedicated to Holly C of Best of the Brat (it seemed only fair after the contribution she has, unbeknownst to her, made to the band). You may well have missed the announcement as it was during half an hour of the most annoying radio I have ever heard, needless to say Holly was away… I nearly turned off but I was determined to hear our name.

Love and Theft

Nothing to do with the band follows:

-We were burgled in July 2005. The thief took a laptop, digital camera and mini iPod, and in return left a bloody hand print on the wall (either he had cut himself on the window he smashed or was savaged by my two 2-month-old puppies...I suspect the former.
-Policeman comes and takes blood swab from wall and tells me the stuff's gone and I probably should have had insurance...thanks for the tip.
-I get a call from Det Insp Towner in May 2006. They have caught a bloke via DNA comparison and the thief is currently serving time for another crime in Sale.
-To cut a long story short he pleads guilty at his trial yesterday and in an effort to reduce his sentence he shows up with cheques for the broken window and the stolen stuff. Now, so long as the cheques don't bounce, I am completely gobsmacked.

Versing not Rehearsing

I, for one, am very excited. The first full band rehearsal on Tuesday which will be a ripper if I can get Dan some chords by home time tonight. Things have been very quiet in blogland recently and Dave's post was undermined by the fact that I saw before I saw the post so I responded in person...it did seem a little cruel to goad him in to posting and then maintain a stoney silence. As you can see I had very little to write but I wanted to get the blogging in motion once more.

No more sore shoulders

After trying to load the drums into the car this morning with only one strap remaining on the old Ikea 'hardware' bag, I finally bit the bullet and purchased a proper set of bags for the kit, including a new hardware bag complete with padded shoulder strap. Hopefully this will stop any future cases of strap cut shoulders to all the Inkers who regularaly help me load up after rehearsal.

A Heads-up

A friend asked me last night when our gig is and why she hadn't got the invite. Just to let everybody know, we play the Rod Laver Arena in a couple of weeks time. Tickets are available through Ticketmaster but you'd better get on to it quick: our last show there sold out in half an hour.

Treadmills

CGI cannot take away from one take greatness and this band have achieved what that little dribble-fuck from Jamiroquai had to spend millions to do. I can't help but feel Crafty could manage something like this if only he didn't use his powers for evil instead of good.

Greenwich Midian Time

It was totally squidtastic to get back in the ring last night (the old ring of Midian to be precise… not as nice but doesn't leave us as politically compromised as the Dane Centre). After overcoming a lack of second-guitarist, a flat car battery (thank you RACV-man), a bird shitting on me while waiting for RACV-man, a poorly wisdom-toothless wife with a puffy, sore face and a broken string and machine head about three songs in, we rocked.

It is all set to happen again next Thursday… do we have a Silky? Dave said kind things about the new song and many other things about how tired and old he felt (yes, kiddies out there in blogland, Crafty says a lot more in person). Paddy sneezed and croaked and coughed and ripped the bass to shreds before loading out in a large utility vehicle. If there were a prize for the band member who has shown up to rehearsal in the largest variety of cars then it would be Paddy's to keep.

Mad For It

Greetings from the heart of mad-chester, where New Order were officially better than the Beatles, Joy Division are still the cutting edge of British cool and Primal Scream actually made more than one good album.

I've seen some weird shit on this tour, inkers, and that's pretty surprising seeing as the whole thing is a propaganda exercise funded entirely by the British Government.

In the un-picturesque town of Trentham we were taken to the latest £100 million attraction—an Italian style garden and monkey forest complex.

Yep, that's Italian garden and monkey forest—two timeless British traditions. I fear the monkeys won't survive the winter. They should have just used the members of Supergrass…

we also went to the museum of the toilet in particularly-unlovely stoke on trent (also known as the birthplace of Robbie Williams, take your pick which is better) These are all excellent examples of a hot new trend I'm thinking of calling:
Fool Britannia

I wish they'd stop feeding me black pudding.

I might get to meet Tony Wilson tonight (exciting for me, not so for most other people I acknowledge). will keep you updated on my 24 hour party peopling adventures if I have any.