Ben's Events

Evan Dando - Joe's Pub, New York, USA - Saturday 30th January 2010

2010-01-30T18:11:00.004Z

Being in the USA at the same time as Evan Dando is doing a solo tour, always seemed like too good an opportunity to miss. So, I headed up from Philadelphia to an absolutely freezing cold New York - to see Evan Dando play, then to catch the Arsenal vs Man U game in Nevada Smiths the following morning. The gig was in Joe's Pub, a weird gig venue that was almost like a dinner show - doors opened at 6, most of the audience had a dinner reservation (with a minimum $12 spend per person), the show ran from 7 until 8:15, then we all got thrown out so that another show (with another set of dinner reservations) could kick off at 9pm. Very strange indeed.

So, without any support act, Evan Dando walked on stage just after 7pm, tuned his guitar for a minute or two, then started playing Confetti. This was very well received, so he played a number of other songs - Lemonheads songs, his solo songs, and the now expected covers. All of this was played with an excellent sounding Fender guitar, and for some of the songs he had Chris Brokaw helping him as well. Obvious highlights were his versions of Style, No Backbone, Tenderfoot and the set closer Layin Up With Linda - but really, the whole set was packed with great songs.

As an Evan Dando gig, this was fairly standard, the songs came thick and fast, he barely said a word as he fell straight from one song into the next, and it all sounded excellent. It struck me as a strange place to be playing, as people ate their pasta for dinner, but there we go. I enjoyed the set very much - but still think that nothing beats a full, electric, plugged in Lemonheads set. So, whilst this was very good, it left me wanting more - and thinking about just how good the full band are.

Work trip to Warsaw, Poland - 18th to 19th January 2010

2010-01-19T21:25:00.004Z

A flying visit to Warsaw, where the high temperature for the day was scheduled to be -7 degrees. I say a "flying" visit, but it almost didn't happen thanks to the lack of urgency in Aer Lingus's approach to flying. Almost a 3 hour delay spent sitting in the departure lounge at Gatwick, then the danger of the crew having worked too long, or the airport in Warsaw closing for the night. Just before that latter problem became a reality, we got going, and arrived at 11pm. Luckily, I was staying in a hotel across the street from the airport, so a 2 minute bracing walk after leaving the terminal building, I was in my hotel. As I quickly remembered is customary in some parts of Eastern Europe, the heating was jacked up to the highest possible level, making it possible to sit around in a t-shirt and ignore the fact it was -10 outside.

The day I was in town was no warmer - at one point whilst stood outside waiting for a taxi, a gust of wind blew and made it feel like I was wearing no clothes. Really cold. There was a load of snow on the ground which obviously never gets the chance to melt through winter, but unlike the UK chaos recently, the country still seemed to be moving OK. They just moved the snow to the sides of the road, piled it up into huge white walls of the stuff, and carried on as normal.

After a day of work (including a huge burger for lunch, in an empty backstreet American diner called the Pink Flamingo), I headed back to the airport for my (thankfully not delayed this time) flight home. Whilst waiting for checkin to open (no online checkin on Aer Lingus from Warsaw, how advanced!), I strolled into the now mostly disused old terminal building. Presumably a modern piece of post communist architecture when it was built in the early 90s, it already looks very outdated, and was very spooky when you were standing inside an empty building that should be buzzing with activity.

Trip to New York City, USA - 12th to 13th December 2009

2009-12-12T19:50:00.002Z

Work trip to Philadelphia, USA - 7th to 11th December 2009

2009-12-11T19:49:00.002Z

After a long period of not being able to travel for work (thanks partly to my daughter being born, but mostly to the recession), the credit card tentatively came back out again for a pre Christmas trip to Philadelphia. My office is right opposite City Hall with its statue of William Penn on top, so I snapped this picture as I was heading from one floor to another. Despite the cold starting to arrive for winter, my stay there had nice clear days - and even a day where the temperature got up to 15 degrees, which was a nice surprise.

After almost a year of not going to the US (after a while of going there very regularly), I was surprised at how easily I got back into the swing of things. I made an early visit to Old Navy to stock up on some cheap jeans, and generally found it very easy to slip back into eating burgers and drinking Vitamin Water all day long. A couple of nice meals (complete with over attentive and falsely "happy" service), and it all seemed very familiar again.

The highlight of the trip (not difficult, since the rest of the time in Philly was spent either in meetings, sleeping or eating) was my office Christmas party (or "holiday" party as they insist on calling it. A free bar for 4 hours was certainly as good as you get anywhere else - and by 9pm when the bar ran out, an impromptu pub crawl broke out. I got to see an excellent selection of Philadelphia bars, and luckily managed to remember it all too.

Arctic Monkeys, Screaming Females - Terminal 5, New York, USA - Thursday 10th December 2009

2009-12-10T19:50:00.004Z

Whilst I was on a work trip in Philadelphia, Arctic Monkeys were due to play a club gig in nearby New York. I wasn't really a big fan of their latest album, and had also spurned the opportunity to see them in London the previous month (I didn't fancy a trip out to Wembley Arena). But, with the excuse of an evening in New York thrown in, I bailed out of work an hour early, and headed up to New York on the train, taking in some of New Jersey's highlights on the way. On arriving in New York, the temperature seemed to have dropped by 10 degrees from Philadelphia, making it a memorable trip as the wind blew through my coat like it weren't there. VERY cold indeed.

We eventually made our way up to 56th street, to Teminal 5. There were a good number of touts outside and in the nearby streets, suggesting that an Arctic Monkeys gig was a bit of a big deal at least. After an obligatory ID check, we got into the venue, a large hall with a couple of levels of balcony around the edges. The crowd was pretty young, with lots of New York high school kids, college students, and a fair number of English voices around also. There were also lots of the kind of people you expect to see at a gig like this in New York - people who thought they were ultra cool, but in reality came across as a bit self absorbed and/or coked up.

The support band were a three piece called Screaming Females, who came from New Brunswick, New Jersey. They had a strange looking woman on lead guitar and vocals, who was the only female in the band. Their guitars sounded pretty fantastic (I would expect you need to see them live to appreciate this, as I doubt their recorded stuff is as good), but sadly the same couldn't be said of the vocals. For the vast majority of the songs I heard, I found myself wishing that the singer would concentrate on just playing the guitar as well as she was, and would get somebody else to do the vocals. Despite that, the songs were good, and the quality of that lead guitar made you willing to forgive quite a bit.

After a short break, Arctic Monkeys appeared, looking very different to the last time I saw them. Longer hair, more rock star looking, and generally looking the part much more. Their first few songs drew quite heavily from Humbug, featuring quite a few false song endings which drew applause, only for the song to kick back in again with more noise than before. Throughout the set, I thought the sound was fantastic - both from a technical point of view inside the venue, but also the way the band set themselves up to play live. When they played some of the older songs, they sounded very accomplished indeed, with some excellent new twists on the way they were played. Despite not having really liked the new album before this evening, the songs they played from it sounded really very good - forcing me to go back for another listen to the album.

As well as the new songs, there were obviously some of the old favourites - I thought that Still Take You Home was amazing in particular. The best audience reactions seemed to be for Brianstorm and I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor, the latter of which featured some very enthusiastic crowd surfing. The band ended their main set with a reworked and brilliant sounding version of Fluorescent Adolescent, which also featured an interlude where the drummer sang Last Christmas. Great stuff. Throughout the show, the crowd were roaring their appreciation between songs, and Alexa Chung was busy dancing on the balcony. All in all, the band went down a storm.

Despite the very late night, I was really glad I went to this. Arctic Monkeys had been getting muted reviews for their latest album and live shows, so I wasn't sure whether I would enjoy it. But, the gig was so much better than expectations, and confirmed just what a good band they are. I also feel lucky to have seen them in such a small venue (rarely possible these days in the UK), which is how they come across best. A fantastic band, playing a set that sounded really special.

The Cribs, Los Campesinos, Sky Larkin - Brixton Academy, London - Thursday 3rd December 2009

2009-12-03T22:48:00.003Z

This was the night when Wichita Records took over Brixton Academy. Having seen The Cribs recently in Kentish Town and been very impressed, I took the plunge and bought tickets for this gig, part of a tour of some bigger venues. I was then delighted to see that they had pulled off their "lets get great support acts" trick again. After Adam Green at the Forum, this time it was the amazing Los Campesinos!, and Sky Larkin.

Sky Larkin were up first, playing songs drawn mainly from their criminally underrated album The Golden Spike (and the BBC seem to agree about it being underrated too). The songs were catchy, and the band managed to not get completely lost in the largeness and emptiness of Brixton Academy (when you are on first and playing to an empty venue) - their sound filled the venue nicely, and their set was well received.

Next on were Los Campesinos!, a band I'd seen before in the most amazing circumstances, and have loved ever since. They kicked their set off with Death To Los Campesinos!, which ensured the audience were right into what they were doing from the word go. As well as a selection of the best tracks from their first two albums, they also played a clutch of new songs from their forthcoming album, Romance Is Boring. These sounded excellent, quite a bit rockier than some of their older stuff, but very good. All in all, I was gutted when their set ended, so good it was.

But obviously The Cribs soon made up for any disappointment caused by the loss of Los Camp - their set was once again full of power and energy, and never dipped below being fantastic. Again they dropped pleasant surprises (in the form of older songs) into the set at various points, my highlights of this set were Emasculate Me, the obvious Be Safe, and City Of Bugs which is becoming one of those awesome set closing songs. A brilliant set (again) from a band who, if there is any justice in the world, will be getting bigger and bigger as they continue to get better and better.

Arsenal vs Chelsea - Emirates Stadium, London - Sunday 29th November 2009

2009-11-29T19:01:00.000Z

A depressing realization took hold in North London today. That was the fact that Chelsea are a significantly better football team than Arsenal. Five years ago, these were even matches, and Arsenal tended to have the edge when it came to the result. Now, the gap is getting embarrassing. I know that Arsenal had injuries, most notably to Van Persie - but I don't think many Arsenal fans will seriously suggest that it would have been different had he been there.

For most of the first half, it could have been different. Arsenal controlled more than their fair share of possession, all the while without really creating any decent chances. Whether that was because of a lack of decent forwards in decent positions, or committed Chelsea defending, or something else, who knows. But by the time 40 minutes were on the clock, things seemed to be going fine from an Arsenal point of view.

Then it all went wrong. 2 goals in the last five minutes of the first half. Both from Ashley Cole crosses, one finished by Drogba, the other an own goal, and neither that the defenders will be proud of. All of which won the game for Chelsea, and made the story all about how Chelsea soaked up all we could throw at them, then beat us - and beat us pretty clinically. As the second half came and went, there was no obvious way that Arsenal were going to get back into it - the gap was too wide. Wenger (to his credit) threw on alternative attacking options quite early, but Walcott had a wretchedly ineffective game, and with 7 Chelsea defenders every time we went forward, there wasn't likely to be much of a way back into the game. Dismal stuff.

As an aside, it absolutely was not why Arsenal lost the game, but the referee was appalling today. Over officious in moving free kicks a yard to the exact spot he wanted them taken from. Willing to book Traore for his first foul (thus blunting his defensive game from the first quarter hour), but totally overlooked a litany of Mikel's fouls until the 70th minute. Picked up and ran the width of the pitch to give the fourth official the "missiles" that came from the crowd at Lampard and Drogba - of course they shouldn't have been thrown, but if any referee had done that at Stamford Bridge five years ago when Vieira was getting pelted, they would have done little else for the whole game. Over picky, and it seemed like he gave Chelsea lots of small advantages, and denied those to Arsenal.

Still, none of this takes away from the fact that Chelsea are in something of a different league to Arsenal at the moment, and that is upsetting. It seems hard to imagine Arsenal having a spine with the strength and power of Cech, Terry, Essien and Drogba. We are a million miles away. They soaked up all we could throw at them, and still had plenty more. That's Arsenal out of the title race (as Wenger admitted after the game), and until we have players that are more than just skillful but lightweight, you can't see us winning the title. A big wakeup call, we are still some way away from where we want to be.

Dead Social Club, Nerys Joseph, Jon Paul Palombo - The Enterprise, London - Saturday 31st October 2009

2009-10-31T22:34:00.003Z

After the excitement of beating Spurs, what could improve the day more than an afternoon's celebratory drinking, followed by a gig in the evening? Being Halloween, there were lots of people out and about in fancy dress, and being a warmer than expected (for the end of October) evening, the streets seemed to be busier than ever around Camden. My destination was the Enterprise, where a few decent bands played. Last time I went to a gig at the Enterprise, the band were amazing and the floor almost caved in, so expectations were high!

First band on was really a solo guitarist and vocalist called Jon Paul Palombo, who had a backing vocalist here to help him out. His full band are supporting Glen Matlock a few days after this gig, and he was just filling in for another band at this gig. The songs were pretty much all decent, and you could see that they would work a treat when played with a full band. Put simply, they were obviously far too good for a "bottom of the bill" slot at the Enterprise - so it was a treat to see them there - I suspect their normal home is playing bigger slots at bigger venues.

Next up was a lady called Nerys Joseph, who sat behind a keyboard and played what I guess you could describe as "angst ridden" songs, about things that angst ridden females write songs about. Played on a piano, they sounded nicely melodic, and her voice was quite powerful too. She had a flautist and a guitarist for some of the songs - and although it wasn't exactly my cup of tea, she obviously had some talent for singing and songwriting.

Even more "not my cup of tea" was the next band. I don't know what they were called, but what they were doing didn't float my boat at all. Its probably a good point to remember the phrase "if you have nothing good to say, say nothing", to suffice to say that the bar was calling loudly after a couple of songs of their set.

Finally, the band I had come to see, Dead Social Club. They had got into the Halloween spirit, arriving on stage in white t-shirts that they had drawn on, plus face makeup. Quite a few of the audience had dressed up as well, all of which made for a good vibe. The keyboards at the beginning of their opening song built the atmosphere up from the very beginning, and they benefited from excellent sound in the venue. They played songs I hadn't heard the last time I saw them - including Calm It Down, and the excellent Let Love Die. For a couple of those newer songs, I thought the guitars were excellent, and really made the band sound like a true crossover between a synth band and a guitar band. I hate to compare bands to The Killers, but I mean it as a compliment in this case! The final song of the set was the excellent The Bridge, and with no encore, they left the audience wanting more - always a good result. I was really impressed by Dead Social Club again, and will be aiming to see them again soon.

Arsenal vs Tottenham Hotspur - Emirates Stadium, London - Saturday 31st October 2009

2009-10-31T15:38:00.003Z

After what seemed like an eternity since I last made it to an Arsenal game (well, it was almost two months ago), the biggest game of the season so far was not one to be missed. The baby was packed off to her grandparents, so Spurs at home could be enjoyed in full. I attended the game on 7th November 1999, which was the last time we lost to Spurs in the league - and avoiding defeat in this game would ensure we got to the 10th anniversary. Of course, in the run-up to the game, Spurs players, manager and fans were giving it large about how they are ready to overtake Arsenal now - but then, don't they always say that?

Going into the ground, it was good to see the results of the recent "Arsenalisation" in the lower tiers - lost of fantastic decoration, which makes our stadium more like a museum or art gallery in some respects - and a definite cut above any other stadium I've been to. Arsenal are leading the way once again.

Arsenal started the game very sluggishly, for the first half hour things just weren't clicking. Although David Bentley could have been booked a couple of times in the first 20 minutes, Spurs seemed to be doing a good job of containing Arsenal. Of course, certain Arsenal players didn't help with that, namely Diaby who had an awful first hour or so, and Almunia, whose distribution I thought was very poor, losing the ball pretty much every time. Bendtner seemed to be putting in the effort and playing pretty well, but even that didn't last, as he limped off after just over half an hour. And the man we all look to for inspiration, Cesc Fabregas, seemed not to quite be clicking to begin with.

Then, in an awesome 90 seconds just before half time, the game exploded into life. Robin Van Persie managed to steal in front of Ledley King, turning what seemed like an innocuous chance into the first goal. The celebrations were enthusiastic, both on the pitch and in the crowd. Then, straight from the restart, when we hadn't even properly finished celebrating, Spurs gifted the ball to Fabregas, who ran 30 yards from the centre circle and scored. The stadium went absolutely crazy, one of the best celebrations I've ever been a part of - and I think the sheer surprise that we had managed to go 2 goals up in 90 seconds, without really having threatened until then, was a big part of what was making everybody so happy. Half time arrived, and the celebrations continued in the concourses, with everybody looking shellshocked but happy.

Those 90 seconds basically won the match. Unlike a couple of annoying examples from previous weeks, Arsenal showed no signs of screwing this one up. In fact, I was surprised by how much Arsenal dominated after that, and by how poor Spurs were. Maybe I made the mistake of overestimating them (an easy mistake to allow yourself to be fooled into). There were decent spells in the second half where Spurs just couldn't get hold of the ball, and the "ole" shouts started with a good 20 minutes to do. They even almost gifted us the third goal too - inexplicably stopping playing when the referee had clearly waved play on. Their stopping almost fooled our players into stopping play too, but luckily we went on to get the goal. We even had the opportunity to miss a couple of complete sitters later on - and at 3-0 up, even Diaby started to stroke the ball around, now that it didn't matter any more.

Any win against Spurs is always received well in N5, so when the final whistle went, it provoked an afternoon and evening of celebration around the pubs of Holloway Road. By normal standards too, this was a decently emphatic victory - we never seem to stick 5 past them, which is a shame, but this was as emphatic as we tend to get against them. Just what the doctor ordered, and our incredible average of over 3 goals a game continues.

Kasabian, Amorphous Androgynous - Forum, London - Wednesday 21st October 2009

2009-10-21T21:29:00.005+01:00

Off to the "HMV" Forum for the second time in a week, for a Q Awards gig. Despite Q magazine being possibly THE most out of touch and "dad-rock" loving publication in the world, their interests do occasionally manage to happen upon decent bands. So, a chance to see Kasabian in a much smaller venue than they would ever normally play (at least in this country) was a gig I was quite excited about.

I got into the venue in time to see a decent amount of the support band, an act called Amorphous Androgynous. When I arrived, they were playing a strange cover of Oasis track Falling Down. I say a "strange" cover, because the band had 9 members, playing an eclectic mix of instruments - kind of a hippie band, and a new version of the Polyphonic Spree. I was utterly unsurprised to see that they are supporting Hawkwind later this year. A few of their songs actually sounded pretty good, but they were a weird, weird band to watch, especially to watch in support to Kasabian.

After what seemed like an unreasonably long changeover, with Kasabian's old roadie guy having some good banter with the crowd, the opening bars of Underdog kicked in, and provoked the obvious enthusiastic reaction from the crowd. When Tom came on stage to start singing, I thought two things. First, that he had had a much needed but very dubious haircut. And second, that the sound was screwed to the point that you couldn't really hear much of the vocals or guitar on Underdog. A shame, because its a great song, but luckily the sound improved hugely after that.

The set itself was a fairly standard one for this year, very similar to what they were playing when I saw them in July. One thing that is obvious when watching Kasabian is the number of excellent singles (or otherwise very strong songs) they now have. There are a good half dozen from their most recent album (like Underdog, Fast Fuse, Fire, Where Did All The Love Go, etc), and about the same again from the previous two albums combined. That means they have a good dozen huge tunes to play, which means you don't end up with too much album track filler. That probably goes some way to explain why their live sets are going down so well.

Of course, as well as having the dozen excellent songs, they also have the two or three truly massive songs, that are becoming amongst the songs that this decade will be remembered by. So, when they kick into Club Foot as the last song of their main set (a song that is all over the TV and at football grounds, despite being five years old now), you know you are watching a band who aren't just making music for now - they are writing songs that will still be being played in ten and twenty years time. That, as well as their ability to put on an excellent live set, makes Kasabian gigs a pleasure to attend - you get to watch a band writing themselves into guitar music history, and UK popular culture. Great gig.

The Cribs, Adam Green - Forum, London - Thursday 15th October 2009

2009-10-15T23:08:00.006+01:00

Having just released what is possibly the best album I've heard in 2009, I snapped up a ticket to see The Cribs at the Forum in London. As the gig approached, I was even more pleased to see that Adam Green was supporting them - they certainly seem to have a knack for picking incredible support bands sometimes. All of this, plus Comet Gain opening up, meant that the area around the venue was pretty busy much earlier than normal for a gig there.

We got into the venue just after Adam Green had come on stage, so got to see most of his set. He seemed to be playing most of his hits, and I was very pleased to catch Jessica soon after I came in. He had something of a band with him, so it seemed like a full (but a bit short) Adam Green show. He seemed to go down quite well with the audience, and I certainly enjoyed his set.

Then to The Cribs. This was a relatively small gig for them (certainly by comparison to what they had lined up for later in the year), and it was all the more exciting for it. They are certainly one of the more exciting bands out there at the moment, especially when you watch the obvious chemistry between Johnny Marr and the rest of the band. They walked on stage to cheers, and launched straight into the fantastic opening track from their new album, We Were Aborted.

Cribs gigs are always full of nice surprises in the setlist, and this was no different - Hey Scenesters coming along right after the opening song. They play two or three songs at a time, without speaking in between, which just adds to the sense of delight when they kick into a song you really love. And a lot of people really do love a lot of their songs - the earlier ones especially getting great reactions from the hard core.

By the time the set was breaking down to some of the later songs like Ignore The Ignorant, Be Safe, and Men's Needs, you got the feeling that you were watching a truly exciting band, playing at the peak of their excellence. The crowd loved it, the intensity never seemed to dip for a minute, and the whole thing was quite brilliant from start to finish.

Setlist: We Were Aborted / Hey Scenesters! / I'm A Realist / Emasculate Me / Girls Like Mystery / Last Year's Snow / Cheat On Me / We Share The Same Skies / We Can No Longer Cheat You / Direction / Hari Kari / Save Your Secrets / Our Bovine Public / Another Number / Ignore The Ignorant / Be Safe / Mirror Kissers / Men's Needs / City Of Bugs.

The Pixies, Art Brut - Brixton Academy, London - Thursday 8th October 2009

2009-10-08T23:07:00.004+01:00

As reforming bands go, there aren't many bigger than The Pixies. They had a crack at reforming a few years ago, and played a load of concerts to generally rapturous audiences and reviews. This time, they got back together to play a series of "20th Anniversary" gigs, to celebrate the release of Doolittle - their most popular album. With tickets at £30 a go, merchandise at high quality and high prices, and £15 CDs of the gig on sale - it was safe to say that they were being paid quite well for their efforts.

This was one of four shows at Brixton Academy, each of which had a different support band. The support for my night was Art Brut - they played to a half empty venue, most of whom had never heard of them before, but I enjoyed every minute. Eddie Argos shambled on stage during thr opening riffs of Formed A Band, in a suit which looked like he'd just come from work (like most of us actually had). He looks like a very unlikely band frontman, but the cleverness of their lyrics and the quality of the guitar riffs, make them a mesmerising band to see live - if you "get it". I do, but I suspect that a majority of this audience did not, and were probably thinking "what the hell is going on here". So, I really enjoyed the set, but it played out in front of quite a few bemused onlookers, especially those in their late 30s as most Pixies fans seem to be.

After what seemed like an eternity, during which anticipation in the venue was almost reaching fever pitch, the film Un Chien Andalou (or at least an edited version) started up - at the end of which the band walked on stage and played a couple of b-sides. They then proceeded to play the whole of Doolittle in order. The opening bars of first track Debaser witnessed cheers the like of which I don't think I've ever seen at a gig before, it was like the venue was going to explode with happiness. One of the good things about this particular album is that the "hits" are fairly evenly spaced throughout, so there was never too long to wait for a real crowd pleaser.

Overall, I have to say, the album sounded great, the band really seemed to be enjoying playing it, and the crowd certainly enjoyed listening to it. After Doolittle, we were treated to a couple of encores - some more b-sides, and a couple of hits from other albums. This was a pretty expensive night out, to hear some admittedly fantastic music - you get the feeling that the Pixies could spend a good many years yet, just milking the cash from an adoring fanbase. Gig review here.

The Lemonheads, The Loose Salute - Forum, London - Saturday 19th September 2009

2009-09-19T23:22:00.010+01:00

It never seems like often enough that The Lemonheads visit the UK. The last time the full band were over here was last summer, for an outdoor gig on a blazing hot day. Before that, the last time I had seen them was in a bar in Chicago, on a freezing cold December day. Although it always seems like too long between chances to see them, luckily they always seem to come back to play another gig - hopefully they will never retire.

The audience at this show, unsurprisingly, were a bunch of 30-somethings who were reminiscing 1992 by coming to the show. The support band, The Loose Salute, played their set to general indifference, given that few would have heard of them, and that they weren't all that similar to The Lemonheads in terms of their songs. But then again, support bands are fairly irrelevant at shows like this, it is all about seeing the main band.

So, after what seemed like a very long wait for the roadies to set up 3 instruments, the band appeared. Evan said hello, then they started playing Tenderfoot - a song which, when it is the first song of a gig, always bodes well for the rest of the gig. How good Lemonheads gigs are can depend on Evan Dando's mood when he is on stage - they only really vary between "utterly amazing" and merely "good", but how up for the show Evan is can have quite an impact. Luckily for this gig, he seemed to be having a good time! The first half of the set was drawn mainly from Its A Shame About Ray, Come On Feel The Lemonheads, and Car Button Cloth, before the band showcased three songs in a row from recent covers album Varshons. The highlight of the three for me was undoubtedly Layin Up With Linda, for which Evan's vocals were outstanding.

As is usual for Lemonheads gigs, there was a short acoustic interlude, where we were treated to Different Drum - a rare pleasure indeed. With the band back on, they finished up with a fantastic version of Rudderless. Fairly standard Lemonheads show - but when your standard is that good, its always going to be a good night. Please come back to London soon!

Setlist: Tenderfoot / Down About It / Confetti / Pittsburgh / My Drug Buddy / Alison's Starting To Happen / Style / Bit Part / Its A Shame About Ray / Big Gay Heart / Hospital / Layin Up With Linda / I Just Can't Take It Anymore / Dandelion Seeds / Its About Time / Hannah And Gabi / If I Could Talk I'd Tell You. Acoustic: The Outdoor Type / Frying Pan / Favorite T / Being Around / Why Do You Do This To Yourself / Frank Mills / All My Life / Different Drum. Encore: My Idea / The Great Big No / Rudderless.

Mumford And Sons, King Charles - The Scala, London - Wednesday 16th September 2009

2009-09-16T22:24:00.003+01:00

Mumford And Sons gigs in London are like buses in London - you wait ages, then they all come at once. Only a few weeks since their excellent Borderline gig, the band were back, this time at the Scala for what is probably their biggest headline show to date. The show had actually been set for April, and almost sold out since then, so it is fair to say that anticipation was high. You know you are getting somewhere as a band when there are touts outside your gig, and by this yardstick, evidently Mumford And Sons are starting to get big.

Inside the venue were a lot of what seemed to me to be London students - lots of checked shirts, cardigans and floppy haircuts, and a fair few female fans. I wrote after their Borderline gig that Mumford And Sons reminded me of the Magic Numbers in the early part of their career - and the crowd at this gig definitely seemed to bear that out. There were lots of couples there to see a band that will probably become a very acceptable band to take a girl on a date to see.

Anyway, enough about the audience. I managed to catch a few songs from the main support band, a band whose name makes them quite difficult to find with a simple Google search. King Charles isn't the easiest band name to find online, but there we go. Their singer was wearing a very tight and bright stripy leotard type thing - and with crazy dreadlocks, he looked generally very "alternative". No, actually, he looked like a total state. So, at first glance, I thought "I am going to hate this lot" - which meant it was a very pleasant surprise when I heard their songs. They played some decently catchy, quite funky songs, with a drummer that looked a bit like Boris Johnson, and this singer leaping madly around the stage. He generally seemed a bit needy of attention, and everything he did screamed "LOOK AT ME" - but the songs sounded good, and that's all that matters I suppose.

By the time Mumford And Sons ambled onto the stage, there had been quite a wait since the support band, which meant that the anticipation had built to quite a level. They walked on stage, and stood fiddling with their instruments for a minute or so, as the spontaneous cheers and applause filled the venue - without them even having played a note. When they did play a note, it was to kick off with the incredibly powerful and atmospheric Sigh No More, the title track and opening track from their new album. The way that this (like many of their songs) starts off quietly, then builds to such a rich finale, can send a shiver down your spine when you are watching and listening. Fantastic band.

This was one of the first gigs where the band have been touring their album as such, so it gave a good opportunity to hear how those excellent early demos and EP tracks have been translated into an album. They had an extra 5 musicians at the back of the stage, so the sound was definitely deeper and more complex - but for me, this took something away from the beautiful simplicity of 4 people playing acoustic instruments. In a way, the extra musicians added bits to the songs, and meant that the real band had to work a bit less hard - but it seemed to take away from the intensity of it all, to some degree. Still, with songs as good as they have, I'm sure their album and their live set will win them a huge number of fans on this tour. I'll definitely be aiming to come back, the next time they play in London.

The Hold Steady, Nic Dawson Kelly - Islington Academy, London - Thursday 10th September 2009

2009-09-10T21:23:00.007+01:00

After an enforced travel ban, during which I haven't been to America for 9 months, a Hold Steady gig was always going to make me nostalgic. As part of a short trip to the UK to play the End of the Road festival, they also managed to find time to squeeze in a London date - and it was a relatively small one, at Islington Academy. Knowing that when they are in London, they stay at the Jury's Inn around the corner from this venue, I couldn't help thinking that this played a big part in the choice of venue.

I got into the venue just in time to see a bit of the support act, a guy called Nic Dawson Kelly. He played typical singer songwriter fare, leading with his guitar and some interesting sounding vocals. His voice didn't seem to be all that powerful or distinctive (although of course this could have been thanks to the sound), but a couple of the songs were interesting enough. Whilst his set was going on, the venue was slowly filling up with a few hundred balding men in their 30s or above - just the core audience for a Hold Steady gig then!

When the band arrived on stage, it was pretty obvious from the outset that they were very up for the gig, and were on very good form. Kicking off with Constructive Summer and Hot Soft Light, the venue became suitably hot and sweaty within five minutes of them starting the show - and of course, that was the way it all continued. Just what the doctor ordered. The band seemed to be having fun from beginning to end, so the gig became one large party, soundtracked by Hold Steady songs.

We also got to hear a couple of new songs in this set - a couple of which sounded really rather good indeed. Presumably this was a warmup for their festival set a couple of days later, but hopefully the new songs may mean there is a new album coming in the not too distant future. Good though the new stuff sounded, it was the old favourites that really sent the venue crazy, Your Little Hoodrat Friend in particular seeing bodies flying around at the front. As the encore drew to a close (including a rare treat of a rendition of How A Resurrection Really Feels - one of quite a few songs from Separation Sunday that were played), Craig Finn left us all with the words:

We're The Hold Steady, you're London, England, and we fucking love you.

On this showing, there is an increasing number of committed people that love this band too. This was a relatively small gig for them, but their fanbase seems to keep on growing in size and fervour. Quite justified it all is too, The Hold Steady on their day can put on a live show that few bands can top. This was one day where they were on incredible form, and it was a fantastic gig as a result.

Setlist: Constructive Summer / Hot Soft Light / Multitude of Casualties / Magazines / Our Whole Lives (NEW) / Sequestered in Memphis / The Swish / Massive Nights / Party Pit / Goin' On A Hike (NEW) / Stevie Nix / You Can Make Him Like You / Heaven (NEW) / Sweet Payne / Same Kooks / Separate Vacations (NEW) / Little Hoodrat Friend / Stay Positive / Slapped Actress. Encore: First Night / Stuck Between Stations / How A Ressurection Really Feels / Killer Parties.

England vs Australia (1st ODI) - The Oval, London - Friday 4th September 2009

2009-09-04T21:35:00.001+01:00

After completing the Ashes victory at The Oval, it was (almost) straight back there for the first of a seven game one-day series. I say "almost", there were 2 T20 games, neither of which produced a result, so we had been starved of cricket for a couple of weeks. Obviously, some of the personnel were different for this game than for the tests, with people like Owais Shah and Ravi Bopara back in the lineup. Joe Denly sadly missed out, after being tackled in a football kickabout the previous day (by the aforementioned Mr Shah), and Adil Rashid was somebody that most fans were looking forward to seeing.

After winning the toss and putting Australia into bat first, England did a decent enough job of restricting them to a not too damaging total. The Aussies started well and finished well, but the middle of the innings saw England restricting them from scoring too much. Rashid and Swann were the pick of the economical bowlers, and Paul Collingwood weighed in with a couple of useful wickets. They picked it up at the end of the innings, but 20 overs in the middle where they hardly scored ensured that England had a very gettable total of 261 to chase.

Having done some of the good stuff first, England then did what they often do in 1 day cricket - failed to finish the job. The target of 261 was always in sight, but we were always behind the pace in trying to chase it. It meant that England were never out of the game (literally until the last ball, where they needed a six to win), but we never really kicked into gear and started scoring quickly enough. So, there was the hope that we might make it, but an ever growing sense that we would not. Ravi Bopara was probably the pick of the top order batsmen, making a good 49; Luke Wright and Adil Rashid also weighed in with useful runs towards the end - but they were fighting against a tide that wasn't going their way.

England's one day side isn't a patch on the Test team, and in some respects, it isn't hard to see why. Shah was out hit wicket, Wright was out on a silly run out, and at least 2 batsmen pulled stupid shots to get caught. When we make mistakes like those, it isn't a surprise that we don't win games. Some bucking our ideas up is needed for the rest of the series.

Arsenal vs Celtic - Emirates Stadium, London - Wednesday 26th August 2009

2009-08-26T19:29:00.002+01:00

This was a relatively straightforward game for Arsenal, to book an all important place in the Champions League group stages. We went into the game having won the first leg 2-0, with 2 fairly lucky goals - despite that, we had looked by far the better side, so 2-0 probably wasn't an unfair score. We won this game 3-1, with a dodgy penalty to get us on our way, and 2 very well worked second half goals to round off a pretty comprehensive victory over the 2 legs. All simple and boring enough.

But of course, what this game will now be remembered for, thanks to the media's stupidity, is the fact that our penalty for the first goal should probably not have been a penalty. Did Eduardo go to ground easily? Probably. Was it the most blatant dive ever? Not really. Is he the only player ever to have done so? No. Will the media scream as loudly the next time Rooney, Drogba, Gerrard or somebody from one of their favourite clubs does the same? Of course they wont!

In the media's eyes, Eduardo became the first player in English football to dive for a penalty, since Robert Pires did so in 2003. When Rooney did it in 2004 to end our 49 game unbeaten run, they said nothing. When Dirk Kuyt did it in the Champions League in 2008, they said nothing. When Steven Gerrard does it, they say nothing. I really don't like being paranoid, but the media's reaction (along with all the talk of UEFA investigations, retrospective bans and the like), just smacks of some kind of anti-Arsenal agenda. When other players from other teams do the same, it just never seems to get the oxygen of publicity to keep the story alive for so long.

So Eduardo will now be held up as the symbol of everything that's wrong with football (even in a week where hundreds of West Ham and Millwall fans had pitched battles outside Upton Park, like something from the 1970s); and all the fuss may even provoke a UEFA investigation and ban. No problem, as long as the same applies to all other players who are found to be doing the same. The fact that has absolutely no chance of happening is the annoying thing - some players and clubs seem to be immune from this kind of treatment in the eyes of the media. Hopefully, Arsenal can use this to their advantage - to build a mentality that everybody is against us, to use that to build a great team spirit, and do good things this season. That would annoy all of the anti-Arsenal idiots more than anything else.

Mumford And Sons, Alan Pownall - The Borderline, London - Monday 24th August 2009

2009-08-24T19:51:00.003+01:00

After what seemed like a while waiting, the wonderful Mumford And Sons finally played a London headline gig, in the intimacy of the Borderline. I had first got into them a year ago, seen them play a short set at Pure Groove records back in December - but then fate had conspired to make me miss all of their London dates since. With their gig at The Scala next month sure to be a triumph, this was a great chance to see them somewhere smaller first - in front of what looked like an audience of family, friends, and diehards.

Support came in the shape of a short set from Alan Pownall, a long time friend of the band. I say "short", it probably lasted no longer than 20 minutes, to the extent that a trip to the bar accounted for most of it. He played quiet acoustic songs, to a mainly respectfully quiet audience. It all sounded good enough to me.

Mumford And Sons took the stage at 9:30pm sharp, to a wild reception. They kicked off with the title track from their forthcoming album, Sigh No More, immediately followed by lead single Little Lion Man - both of which got the crowd going nicely. Of course, many of their songs follow a similar format, starting quietly with vocal harmonies, then descending into a riot of loud vocals and instruments, before ending suddenly. However, this never seems to get boring in the slightest, such is the hard work that all four band members put in - switching instruments, and generally doing a number of different things on any one song.

At times, this gig reminded me of some of the early Magic Numbers gigs I went to - a very tight band, with vocal harmonies, songs that sound instantly familiar even on the first listen, and a feeling that the band is about to become pretty famous. I would certainly be surprised if Mumford And Sons aren't very well know in a year's time. Tunes like Roll Away Your Stone and Dust Bowl Dance show that as well as the folky stuff, the band can also provide the soundtrack to a party.

The best thing for me about this gig was hearing some of their songs for the first time - like Timshel, Thistle And Weeds, and encore Whispers In The Dark. The last of these was an unfinished new song, that showed what the incredible future for this band might be like. A true indie rock classic, it deserves to see them see significant success. I'm really looking forward to their Scala gig next month now, but was really pleased to see them at this gig - if there is any justice in the world, it will be one of their last in a venue this small.

England vs Australia (Day 2, 5th Test) - The Oval, London - Friday 21st August 2009

2009-08-21T09:50:00.005+01:00

Lots of interesting side stories to set up this test nicely. Obviously it being the vital last test of the Ashes series, which England needed to win to secure the series, was interesting enough. Add in the fact that it was Flintoff's last ever test match, and may turn out to be Ricky Ponting's also, and there was a fair degree of interest in the game. On the way out of Oval station in the morning, I lost count of the number of people that thrust things into my hands - it seemed like everybody with something to advertise was there. Compared with the heights of the same game in the last Ashes series, and this game had a decent amount to live up to.

On the strength of this day's play, it most certainly did live up to the previous heights that the Ashes has provided. The initial session was standard enough, dull even - Australia removing the last 2 England batsmen for about 25 rune, with relatively little fuss - although Steve Harmison did provide some entertainment with a couple of boundaries. A brief rain shower prompted early lunch, then a 50 minute delay of the start of the afternoon session.

That afternoon session, when it did eventually get started, was possibly the most incredible couple of hours of Test cricket I think I've ever seen (certainly from inside the ground) - and will hopefully turn out to be the session where England won the match and the Ashes. Australia collapsed completely, going from 70-0, to 160 all out. Broad and Swann did all the damage from England's point of view, the Aussies were 8 down by tea, and finished off completely quite soon after. So, it was an excellent few hours in the sunshine, watching Australian wickets tumble at a very pleasing rate.

Whatever happened after that afternoon session, it was always going to be the story of the day. England lost a few wickets of their second innings, but finished the day with a lead of 230. On a wicket that seemed to be doing as much as it was, I don't hold out much hope for using my ticket for Monday - and if I were Australia, I really wouldn't be looking forward to batting last, whilst trying to save the series.

Kasabian - Brixton Academy, London - Thursday 16th July 2009

2009-07-16T19:58:00.005+01:00

Five days after seeing Kasabian blow away a packed Wembley Stadium in support of Oasis, it was time to see them play a headline show of their own, in a much smaller venue. In London, this was one of what seems like increasingly rare opportunities to see them in venues as small as Brixton Academy, as they are stepping up to arenas now. So, a chance not to be missed. On what was an absolutely baking hot summer day, the humidity levels had crept up to an almost unbearable level, even before getting into the venue.

Once inside, it was hotter and even more humid - definitely the hottest gig of the year for me, and rivalling the hottest gig I've been to. One of those where you go to the bar intending to get a beer, then decide that a Coke might be more useful, and you actually end up getting a Coke and a pint of water. I know, lightweight. Not for the first time at a Kasabian show, I was offered pills on several occasions, by scally twats in tracksuit bottoms - maybe showing that the band are the natural successors to the Stone Roses as well as Oasis!

So the set itself - it was pretty similar (although obviously longer) than the set they played in support of Oasis, starting off with an incredible version of Underdog, the bass of which ripped through your stomach. Shoot The Runner and Processed Beats provided the old stuff in the early part of the set, but much of it was of course about showcasing the songs from the new album.

The best of those songs, judging by the 2 sets I've seen this week, is undoubtedly Fire. A real crowd singalong favourite, and a song that works excellently both in the recorded and live versions, it is one of those that has people singing the riff long after the gig is over. Like LSF in that respect, but different, more complex, and possibly better. All in all, an excellent set from an excellent band, who are getting huge before our eyes.

Oasis, Kasabian, Reverend & The Makers - Wembley Stadium, London - Saturday 11th July 2009

2009-07-11T22:19:00.008+01:00

Occasionally, Oasis decide to do a series of absolutely massive gigs, and 2009 was decided to be the time for the latest set. With Kasabian and The Enemy supporting on every date (in theory), and 500,000 tickets selling out in a few hours, they really do still know how to do these things on a ridiculous scale, and to shift an awful lot of concert tickets. In the UK, there are still few that can match them.

Obviously, one thing about Oasis gigs, especially big ones, is that they can tend to be full of complete tossers in the audience. A Saturday at Wembley Stadium was always likely to live up to your worst expectations on this particular score. That, coupled with a light but determined drizzle, could have made this something of an annoying day. So, it was all the more fantastic to get into the Golden Circle at the front of the standing area - offering protection from the worst of the rain, and from the most idiotic of the crowd, piss throwing and all.

Reverend & The Makers were the first band of the day, a band who I'd seen once before, on home turf a few years ago. I wasn't very impressed with them then, have been largely unimpressed with their recorded output since, and was not terribly enamoured with them tonight either. They do have a couple of decent songs, Heavyweight Champion of the World being the obvious standout - and their live show definitely seems to add something to the songs as they would be on CD. That said, what they do still doesn't really grab me - I can see how they would be entertaining at a festival, but can't ever really see them attracting huge crowds to their own gigs - their songs just don't seem good enough for that.

Next up were The Enemy. Oh, hold on, The Enemy pulled out of a gig, AGAIN. They are starting to look like the Pete Doherty of the modern era, pulling out of shows all over the place - this being the second on the Oasis support tour alone. Now fair enough, people occasionally get ill and can't play gigs - although when you look as pasty as The Enemy, eating some fruit and veg might be advisable to avoid getting ill quite so often. But when you hear that they played a great set at Somerset House the previous night, then hit the aftershow party, and were fine to support Oasis on the Sunday at Wembley - that just sounds like a hangover, which is not really being very respectful to anybody. Not to the fans that paid good money to see The Enemy play, and not to Oasis who gave them a great opportunity to increase their fanbase. Quite what they were playing at, crying off probably the biggest gig they've ever played, I'm not sure. Poor show, and if I were Oasis, I might not invite them back in a hurry. Such a shame, because when they do show up, they are really good!

Still, every cloud has a silver lining, and in this case, the silver lining was that Kasabian got to play a longer set to fill the time. So, we headed into the Golden Circle, and before too long, the opening riffs of the amazing Underdog started booming from the speakers. This kept going for a good couple of minutes, building the excitement nicely before the band came on stage and launched into the song proper. A fantastic opening song it is too, and of course it was immediately followed by the likes of Shoot The Runner to build the crowd up more.

As the set went on, you were reminded of just how many decent singles Kasabian have made across their 3 albums. Their latest album of course provided most of the album tracks to fill out the set, but these were all pretty decent, the highlight being a raucous version of Fast Fuse. But it was the singles you had almost forgotten about, that provided the most excitement when they appeared - songs like Empire, latest single Fire (which sounds absolutely incredible live), not to mention Club Foot and LSF. All in all, this was a fantastic set, probably one of the best support sets it is possible to see, and it would have eclipsed most headliners.

Oasis, however, are not like most headliners. When they are on form as they were tonight, they are one of the best live bands it is possible to see. I guess it helps that I liked them from the start, and that I was at University during the 2 years when they were the biggest band in the world, but still nobody can do it quite like them. Songs like Roll With It and Live Forever made welcome returns to their setlist this time, and My Big Mouth was being played live for the first tour in a while. It was a largely brilliant setlist, there were always songs that could have been added, but what they played sounded great.

Noel Gallagher thought it was a good night also, writing later:

"Saturday was altogether a different kettle of fish. What a night. One of THOSE nights. What an atmosphere! It pissed down but that only added to it. Easily one of the best nights ever. There was some moments, let me tell you. If you were in that crowd, and if I wore a hat I'd doff it in your general direction. I wouldn't go as far as Mr Bruno saying, "You're the best fans in the world". As Arsene Wenger once said, "Everybody thinks they have the most beautiful wife", or even more ludicrously (is that a word? ..it is now!!), "You're the best human beings in the world!"?? Nonsense! My kids are the best human beings in the world. Fact. BUT the version of "Don't Look Back In Anger" was very special indeed."

This was a fantastic show from a great live band, made all the better for me by that magic Golden Circle wristband. This made the show like being in a 2,000 capacity venue to see Oasis, which is a rare treat. The fact that there was a stadium of 80,000 people behind you, just made the stage show and sound even bigger for the benefit of those at the front. The performance of the band, and my experience on the day, mean that I'll remember this one for a long time. One of the better stadium gig experiences you could wish for, that's for sure.

Setlist: Rock 'N' Roll Star / Lyla / The Shock Of The Lightning / Cigarettes And Alcohol / Roll With It / To Be Where There's Life / Waiting For The Rapture / The Masterplan / Songbird / Slide Away / Morning Glory / My Big Mouth / The Importance of Being Idle / Half The World Away / I'm Outta Time / Wonderwall / Supersonic / Live Forever. Don't Look Back In Anger / Falling Down / Champagne Supernova / I Am The Walrus.

Trip to Haute Vienne, France - 1st to 8th July 2009

2009-07-06T10:28:00.005+01:00

A week's holiday, and I went to stay with my Aunt in France. She lives in a tiny village in Haute Vienne, a rural département in the region of Limousin, slap bang in the middle of France. So, a week of doing very little, in the middle of nowhere was on the cards. We arrived in France on a shuttle at about half past midnight, and planned to drive through the night whilst the roads were quiet. One lesson from doing this is that France is big! Even if you average 80mph, which is quite possible on the excellent motorways, it takes ages to get anywhere - a good 2 1/2 hours to Paris, a couple more hours to Orleans, and a few more to where we were going. There is no real way to do it much quicker, you just have to bite the bullet and accept that it will take an age. Starting the trek at midnight was probably not the best idea ever - by the time we arrived at 8am, we were beyond tired, and wishing we had started the journey those few hours earlier.

When we eventually reached our destination, it was the classic small, remote French village. The photo here is of a petrol station that had obviously closed down a while ago, but was still there (albeit a bit tatty) - with pumps pricing their petrol in Francs. The village had a couple of bakers, a cake shop, a few bars, and a couple of general shops - so all you could need for a few days relaxation away from much going on. The village was very close to Lac Vassiviere, and also had its own small lake as part of a big village green - really beautiful, and a nice place to spend a lazy week.

One thing about places like this in France and Spain is the number of other English people there. Some nice ones have worked hard all their lives, and are retiring to enjoy the weather. Others seem to have screwed up their lives in the UK, and burnt all of their bridges with other people - so are running away to start afresh. Because of this, there are quite a few English people around who don't exactly do the country proud - who are busy repeating all of the mistakes that made them leave the UK in the first place. Something that is strange to see, and that makes you feel somewhat sorry for the locals who have to put up with some of them.

Surrey vs Middlesex - The Oval, London - Saturday 27th June 2009

2009-06-27T14:27:00.004+01:00

After watching Kent beat Surrey just a few days previously, I was back at The Oval on a glorious Saturday afternoon for the dead rubber of the Southern T20 group. The game between the two most useless teams in the group, who couldn't seem to win a thing this season - and that despite Middlesex being reigning T20 champions. I was on a stag do, where not many of the participants were especially interested in goings on in the middle of the pitch - more of an excuse to drink beer in the sunshine. But with a game this irrelevant, it was hard to care too much about what was happening.

Surrey batted first and scored 160, a total that turned out not to be good enough. Brown stayed in for pretty much the whole innings, scoring 77 but probably taking too many balls with which to do it. It was strange not to see Mark Ramprakash batting, but then he was probably being saved for matters more important. The Middlesex run chase looked pretty easy from the moment Owais Shah came in and started to run the show - his unbeaten 61 saw Middlesex home with 10 balls to spare, which is a decent margin in this form of the game. So, a nice day out in the baking sunshine (although 15 minutes after the game, the heavens opened all over London, and there were hailstones to be had), to watch a game that will not be remembered for very long at all.

The Killers, The Kooks, Howling Bells, Passion Pit, Air Traffic - Hyde Park, London - Friday 26th June 2009

2009-06-26T21:25:00.006+01:00

With a 4 month old baby, Glastonbury is obviously out of the question for this year at least. So, to get a safe, clean, nearby and non time consuming festival "experience", I headed for Hyde Park, for one day of Hard Rock Calling. Having already announced Neil Young and Bruce Springsteen as headliners (following in the vein of their usual super oldies like Aerosmith, The Police, and The Who), it was slightly surprising to see a third day announced, with The Killers and The Kooks headlining. A "full supporting bill" was also promised, which then disappointed as a few uninspiring bands were grudgingly announced about a fortnight before the show. In any case, it was a gloriously hot day, so a decent opportunity to sit in the park.

I arrived just in time to see Air Traffic's set on the second stage. They have obviously been writing a few new songs in the last couple of years, which sounded like they were very much in the same vein as their debut album. The set was a good mix of new and old - whilst they worked the crowd very well, and sounded OK, they didn't really inspire me. I have compared them to Keane before (with the improvement of adding a guitarist and some guitar based songs), and I would completely stick by that assessment on this showing. Interesting to watch, sounded nice, would fit really well on Radio 2, but no more exciting than that. Maybe my general disappointment when I see Air Traffic is mostly my fault for expecting something more "rock and roll".

After Air Traffic, I moved back into the sunshine of the main stage, where Passion Pit were playing. I had heard good things about them, and was interested to see what they were like. Overall, I was impressed - they reminded me of an interesting cross between Black Kids and MGMT - playing songs that combined indie rock with an element of a dance beat. All in all, they had a fair few decent songs, and sounded like a band that are perfect for festivals. Hopefully many people will walk past their sets this summer, and be suitably impressed. As well as that, I also thought they would probably sound incredible in a small indoor venue, their gigs are probably real party events.

An excellent Passion Pit set over, the next support band were Howling Bells. I have heard some (but not all that much) of their stuff, and was interested to see them live. Generally, I was reasonably impressed, but not much more enthused than that - I would certainly not be walking over broken glass to get to a Howling Bells gig any time soon. They were fine, they passed the time, the odd song stood out as being better than the rest - but they just didn't really grab me any more than that.

Next up were The Kooks, who predictably prompted lots of screaming from the zillions of teenage girls that had by now entered the venue. Putting The Kooks and The Killers on the same bill is always going to attract that particular demographic I suppose - this was generally a very safe, very middle of the road gig. That said, I was surprised how good I thought The Kooks were, they seemed to be well fired up for playing the gig, and they all bounced along merrily throughout. The set never really seemed to dip for the whole hour, and that length was just about right to not need to include any of their weaker songs. The girlies loved them it seemed, and I thought they sounded good also. They are now a band where you think "where do they go from here" - they are pretty big, but not likely to be selling out a gig like this as headliners, and with the added risk that people will just get bored of a third album of the same kind of music. We will see.

Finally, The Killers - it wasn't even dark properly when they came on stage, which meant that the show definitely improved in atmosphere as it went on and got darker. They started with Human, which seemed to go down a treat - one of the songs from their third album with which I'm not really very familiar. The set overall seemed to play most of that album (I could tell when a song started that I didn't know, that we were listening to something from the new album), so most of it got an airing. As well as that though, there was plenty of room for the stuff I went to see - basically their first album! The set seemed to abruptly switch after about an hour, when the band totally stopped playing any new songs, and turned instead to single after single from their first two albums. Almost like 2 sets - a "new album" set, and a "greatest hits" set. I preferred the second, of course, but the first wasn't half bad either.

Surrey vs Kent - The Oval, London - Wednesday 24th June 2009

2009-06-24T19:26:00.002+01:00

A sunny Wednesday afternoon, and an excellent opportunity to bunk off work a bit early, and head to The Oval for a Twenty20 game. The T20 World Cup just having finished, everybody had been impressed by the quality of the 2 week tournament - so an excellent time to resume the domestic tournament. Kent had been having a decent season so far, despite being robbed by floodlight failure in Sussex in a recent T20 game. Surrey on the other hand were doing terribly in their T20 group - with little to nothing to play for by this stage.

After getting into The Oval, sadly it was my turn to get a beer. With a sellout crowd (including lots of people there on corporate jollies - times must be tough if the Lords test matches have been abandoned for £12 T20 games), you would have thought that Surrey might have opened a couple of bars. Unfortunately not, so I spent half of the Kent innings waiting to pick up a few drinks. Surrey don't seem to employ the brightest people in their food and drink outlets, which I suspect was the cause of the lengthy wait. Poor - they like the money people spend, but aren't willing to employ enough staff to give those people a decent experience.

I arrived in my seat just in time to see Martin van Jaarsveld reach his half century, then get dismissed shortly afterwards, with Darren Stevens and Rob Key following him back to the pavilion soon afterwards. After a couple of slow patches, followed by a decent bout of scoring, Kent got to a total of 168, from which you really thought the game could go either way - you could see Kent defending that, but you could also see Surrey making it.

Surrey's run chase did not start well, they lost Newman and Ramprakash very early on, and things were looking great for Kent. But then, a decent stand including Afzaal getting a half century, got them right back into the game. Like any good Twenty 20 game, it swung both ways right until the end, and at the end of the 19th over, Surrey needed 14 to win, and Kent looked to be in a decent position.

At that point, the umpires intervened - giving Kent a 6 run penalty for a slow over rate, and reducing the requirement to 8 from the final over - very achievable. I must confess I don't quite understand how the time allowed to bowl your overs can be just a flat 75 minutes - if you take 9 wickets, that is a very different ask, compared to taking none. Anyway, 8 runs needed from the final over - which made it all the more incredible that Surrey failed to do it, especially as they got themselves to needing 3 runs from the last 4 balls. An excellent Kent run out cost Surrey their final wicket, and won Kent the game - a fantastic finish, and a great T20 game all in all.

Kings Of Leon, Glasvegas - O2 Arena, London - Tuesday 16th June 2009

2009-06-16T21:12:00.002+01:00

With a free evening on the horizon, I headed to Scarlet Mist, to see what if any gig I could pick up a late ticket for. I was very excited to see a Kings Of Leon show, with Glasvegas supporting them - but less happy that tickets seemed to be like gold dust. Nothing on Scarlet Mist over the week or so I was checking, and tickets being touted for silly prices on eBay. So, I was rejoicing when, having almost given up hope of getting a ticket, one popped up. A couple of quick emails and texts later, and it was mine. All good stuff.

Before the gig, I headed down to the O2 early, to have a bit of a better look around - last time I'd been there, I'd been whisked in and out, and not really had much chance to nose around. The venue is like a little piece of America, with seats like a big multiplex cinema, and lots of identikit eating and drinking places. Nando's, check. Frankie And Benny's, check. More than one Starbucks, check. A minimum of Four English Pounds for a beer, check. The American owners must be very proud, they have created the ultimate corporate venue, in the richest market in the world for that kind of thing.

Anyway, with the £4 beers, I got settled into my (very comfortable) seat for the show. Glasvegas were on first, and although they played an excellent set, it got lost a bit in the hugeness of the venue. There seemed to be a few people up at the front who were getting into what they were doing, but for everybody else, it looked like something vaguely exciting that was happening a long, long way away. The lights were up a bit too high (maybe to help thousands of people find their way to their seats), the air conditioning was on full blast, and the sound was echoing around the venue. If you didn't already know and love Glasvegas, you wouldn't have been converted by seeing them here (and through no fault of theirs). Even for a convert, it was a struggle to enjoy their set from half a mile away.

Kings Of Leon, on the other hand, were altogether much easier to enjoy. The venue filled up by the end of their first song, and although there were a lot of what you can only describe as "new fans" (you know, the kind that had heard Sex On Fire on Capital Radio, and decided to come along), the atmosphere was pretty decent. They opened with Closer and Crawl, before throwing in a load of songs from their first 2 albums. California Waiting, which had been missing from the previous night's set, made a most welcome appearance as well.

Generally, when you watch Kings Of Leon playing live, the thing that strikes you is how damn good they are. A few years ago, they were a well kept secret - now, with 3 sold out nights at the O2, and festival headline slots, they seem to have accidentally become one of the biggest bands "in the UK", (at least for UK audiences), and have attracted a crowd who seem to hang on every word from all four of their albums. They have undoubtedly courted the mass market recently, and it seems to have responded, in a big way. Sex On Fire is the biggest selling download track ever, and that is a huge achievement for a guitar band - KoL are a real mainstream band now.

Anyway, this was a very accomplished gig as expected, from a band that are now well and truly in the big league. Apparently their home country is also starting to realize what a great band they are now, so they will be busy in the Autumn, touring US arenas. We can only hope that they remember how well their UK fans have treated them, and helped them on their rise - we hope to see them back soon.

Trip to Valencia, Spain - 11th to 13th June 2009

2009-06-13T11:51:00.006+01:00

After being there not very long ago, I returned to Valencia for a wedding (congratulations to Matt and Diana!). Again flying via Madrid, I found the weather a damn sight better this time - when I landed at lunchtime, it had just hit 30 degrees for the day, and there it stayed for the rest of the trip. No rain in sight this time, which was a bonus.

The night before the wedding, a group of us headed for the wonderful El Tornillo bar, scene of some good nights in the past. This being a Thursday night, there was not much going on there (especially as early as we were around), but despite the general lack of people and slightly strange music policy, we did manage to hear a few decent tunes. The following day was wedding day - because of the heat in Spain, these things don't kick off until about 8pm, so we had the day to go to the beach. In the early evening, everybody gathered at a country house, where the short formalities happened. Because the house wasn't licenced to actually do the legal marriage, our friends had got "legally" married a couple of days earlier. The short ceremony was therefore to confirm this, and to kick the party off.

This being a Spanish wedding, party was the order of the day (or night) - drinks, food, dinner at midnight, then a free bar until 4am - it was rather a heavy evening and night. Nobody really moved before midday the next day, the English contingent made the most of a late night, putting the Spanish tendency to stay up late to shame! When I fell onto the plane home, it was a most welcome chance to sleep!

Arsenal vs Stoke City - Emirates Stadium, London - Sunday 24th May 2009

2009-05-24T16:34:00.003+01:00

This was the last game of a season that has been frustrating for the most part, but with a few signs of encouragement along the way. We were playing catchup for most of the season, having lost to Fulham, Hull, Stoke, Villa and Man City by the end of November. The last 3 of those defeats came in November, truly an awful month for Arsenal fans, which also saw William Gallas stripped of the captaincy, and the media loving all of our troubles.

After that, we went 20 or so games unbeaten, but with far too many 0-0 draws in a frustrating 6 or 7 game spell in January and February. Then Andrei Arshavin came along, some injured players came back, and we all got excited again. Two very disappointing semi final defeats, and a 4-1 capitulation to Chelsea in the League, and we were all down in the dumps again.

In reality, we probably overachieved in a lot of respects this season. With the inexperience of our squad, and some of the injuries we had, we actually did pretty well. But the squad strength is ultimately the cause of our problems - they may be a world beating group of players in a few years, but they have weaknesses at the moment. I like many Arsenal fans fear that the "promised land" will never arrive - that the players won't improve, or that other clubs will keep picking players off during transfer windows, so that we are forever running to stay in the same place. But, I guess we need to keep the faith.

So, last game of the season, in the sunshine, and with nothing to play for. In those circumstances, Arsenal may just be the best team in the world, so we strolled to an easy 4-1 victory, which was all wrapped up by half time. The Guardian report tells the full story, but it was a decent day for Robin Van Persie, who scored 2 goals. So, another season over, and we "look forward" to a long summer of boringness. Thank God we have the Ashes to distract us, but it will still be a long 6 weeks until that all starts.

Arsenal Youth vs Liverpool Youth - Emirates Stadium, London - Friday 22nd May 2009

2009-05-22T21:43:00.002+01:00

Everybody knows that Arsenal have some great young players. So, it shouldn't really be a surprise to see the Arsenal Under 18s team in the FA Youth Cup Final. What is probably more surprising is why they haven't been there over the previous years - this being their first final since the early part of the decade. In any case, it was a good opportunity to see some promising kids play, all for £3 admission too. As expected, there were plenty of fans there who were a fair bit younger than the players, and a good few local kids there too - always a good thing to see.

I had the unmissable opportunity to watch this game from the Diamond Club - the very exclusive area in executive box level, which is home to under 100 members, who each pay £25,000 a year for the privilege of watching their games from there. It has a Raymond Blanc restaurant (at a price!), and a "free" bar - not free of course for those paying £25k a season, but free for us for the evening. It isn't often that Arsenal buy you a beer, so I took as much advantage as possible.

About half an hour before kick off, Lukasz Fabianski walked into the bar where we were waiting for the game. A few started to bombard him with autograph requests, and I just stood and gawped, not really too interested in his autograph. A few minutes later, though, Cesc Fabregas arrived, and for him, I was interested. After fighting through a few kids, I managed to get a photo with the man himself - something decent to remember from an otherwise disappointing season!

So to the match. The view was obviously fantastic - the best view I've ever had at a football match. We looked down onto the Directors Box, with Arsene Wenger, Pat Rice, Liam Brady and a host of others there. The view for me was like watching on a huge widescreen TV, it was a TV perfect angle, right on the half way line. Very much like watching on telly, except you had the added bonus of being there. The roof of the executive tier comes surprisingly far down, so it feels quite cosy in there, almost like you are in a room with one open wall, if that makes any sense.

The game itself was full of good news - Arsenal won 4-1, and looked by far the better team throughout. Knowing him from the first team, I was keeping an eye on Jack Wilshere, and he was fantastic - setting up 2 goals, and drilling in a penalty himself. Watching the kids is always a bit weird in that they play exactly like the first team - it seems that the layout and style of play is exactly the same in every Arsenal team, just the players are different. So, it was like any Arsenal game where the team are on song, the play is fluent, and the result is the right one. A pleasure to watch, and we should be able to finish the job next week in the second leg.

The Guardian, to their immense credit, sent a reporter to cover the game (although, being based in Kings Cross, and living in Highbury they probably didn't have to travel too far!), so we can at least read a vaguely professional match report - not one that is more interested in the view from Diamond Club. As for Diamond Club, you could really get used to watching games from there - but the £25k a year required to do so may be a little hard to find!

Work trip to Valencia, Spain - 12th to 16th May 2009

2009-05-15T22:28:00.002+01:00

Over the past 4 years, I've been doing a lot of travelling for work. In fact, until very recently, I'd barely gone a month without leaving the country at some point. Then my daughter came along, along with a recession induced travel clampdown, and I have been in London for the last 3 months. After constant use of the passport for a few years, I have to admit I've been going a but stir crazy. So, a sneaky work trip to Valencia for a conference was most welcome - especially as it was Valencia, which is obviously a great city.

The trouble with recessions is that everybody scales back their travelling. Which means that airlines scale back their flight. Which means that travelling gets harder. There are 3 direct flights a day from London to Valencia - 2 on Ryanair, and one on EasyJet. None were at the time I needed to go, so I found myself going on Iberia, changing planes in Madrid. One advantage of this was that I got to see the fantastic new airport terminal there, with a nice executive lounge, which enabled some early sampling of some Spanish ham.

Eventually in Valencia, it was scorching hot (and still only lunchtime). Our venue for the week was the Palacio de Congresos, a modern venue with lots of glass on the outside - which meant you could easily enjoy the Valencia sunshine from inside the building. Of course, during the week, we also got some time out in the sun, which was a welcome change from windy London. Wearing a suit in 30 degree heat was not a huge amount of fun - but its always a nice problem to have!

The congress centre was a block or two away from the New Mestalla, the football stadium that is being built for Valencia CF. Construction has slowed down recently, because of Valencia's money troubles, but what is built so far looked really impressive indeed - almost like a flower shape. On my taxi ride between conference centre and hotel, we spent much quality time stuck in traffic, looking at the new stadium. Looking forward to going there before too long.

My hotel was in a completely different part of town, in the City of Arts & Sciences. So, good views to be had, and it was an easy stroll to get out into the riverbed, to look at some of the fantastic architecture. There seem to be new buildings still springing up there too, as they develop the whole area from the city centre to the sea. One one evening, we had a tour of the Formula 1 circuit, the pits, and the Americas Cup area. There has been a ton of development in Valencia over the last 10 years, but I was struck by how empty much of it is - the tourists are not here (although of course this is still only May), and you wonder how many white elephants the city will be left with in a few years time.

Arsenal vs Chelsea - Emirates Stadium, London - Sunday 10th May 2009

2009-05-10T18:28:00.002+01:00

After the extreme disappointment of the Manchester United game on Tuesday, there was at least something to cheer Arsenal fans up the following night. Chelsea's last minute exit to Barcelona, after having had 25,000 penalty claims turned down, was highly amusing. The intensity, bitterness and sheer sour grapes of their complaints, just underlined for many people how pleased they were to see them go out of Europe. Some of the dissent at the end of their game was just symptomatic of their "win at all costs" mentality, instilled in them by Jose Mourinho - his shadow still looms large over them.

So, we had the opportunity to laugh at Chelsea. Looking at their team sheet for this game, it was amazing just how many detestable players they have - Cole, Drogba, Anelka, Terry, Mikel, etc. Frank Lampard isn't that likeable, but came a poor sixth in the hate stakes - and would have been seventh if Michael Ballack had made the starting XI. Incredible. By contrast, the Arsenal team wasn't all that hateable - Adebayor being left on the bench saw to that. Fabianski bizarrely came in to face Chelsea after screwing up against them last time, and Arshavin again missed out, with a virus this time.

Arsenal started off OK, lots of possession, a few decent chances, the best of which fell to Theo Walcott to miss. Overall, the first half hour or so was a tale of much Arsenal possession, but relatively little to show for it. Against teams like Chelsea, that is always something that makes you nervous you might get punished. And, before too long, punished we were - Alex getting up relatively unopposed for a header, and the ball bouncing in off the underside of the bar. Again a soft centre in defence, and the keeper may have done better, but it was 1-0 to Chelsea, against the run of play.

Before half time, it became 2-0, a decent Anelka shot from outside the box, which swerved a bit, but was still nowhere near enough to the corner for the keeper to have missed it. It was a fair shot, but should really have been saved, and I think it needs to go down as a(nother) keeper error. Not good, and you have to question Fabianski's future at Arsenal now.

Just after half time, it was 3-0, an own goal from Toure. A good header from Nicklas Bendtner pulled one back with about 20 minutes to go, but Arsenal were never likely to get themselves back into the game. A late Malouda goal made it 4-1, for Arsenal's heaviest home League defeat for over 30 years, and what was something of a hammering all in all. The Arsenal players didn't really seem to show up - players like Van Persie and Nasri were rather anonymous, Walcott missed everything that came his way, Diaby was absolutely useless - and the few that did seem to be up for the game were always going to struggle against that background. It was pretty much the same starting team that had beaten Chelsea earlier in the season, and it just underlined the size of the gap between Arsenal on form, and Arsenal on a bad day. That gap is too big, and needs some experience to bolster our "bad day" performances so that we can get results from those games.

So, a depressing game. Despite the season being over, it could get a whole lot more depressing next week, as Manchester United could win the League against us - a grim possibility. It was all looking so hopeful about a month ago, but this will turn out to be a frustrating season for Arsenal fans. Thank God there is a long summer with no football, I am just about sick of it for now.

Arsenal vs Manchester United - Emirates Stadium, London - Tuesday 5th May 2009

2009-05-05T21:08:00.003+01:00

Without a doubt, the biggest game at Emirates Stadium so far. More than likely, Arsenal's biggest home game since Anderlecht in 1970, a game which I (like many) wasn't alive for, and which even fewer Arsenal fans actually remember. Having lost the first leg at Old Trafford, Arsenal knew they needed either to win this game by 2 goals, or get a 1-0 win, which would of course involve stopping Rooney, Ronaldo and co from scoring. Tough stuff.

As requested, the fans were in the stadium early, building up the singing to the point where the ground was rocking when the teams came out. The flags, one on every Arsenal fan's seat, looked good, and the whistles made it an uncomfortable place for Man United to have the ball. The game kicked off, and Arsenal started taking the game to United - looking generally pretty positive for the first 5 to 10 minutes.

Then, after about 10 minutes, Kieron Gibbs slipped over in the box (as defenders do from time to time), and gifted an easy ball to Park Ji Sung to finish. 2-0 on aggregate, an away goal, and Arsenal needed three goals to go through. That completely burst the bubble of enthusiasm and confidence for both the team and the fans. Three minutes later, Ronaldo scored one of those free kicks that is really pretty hard for a keeper to do much about, to make it 2-0 on the night, 3-0 on aggregate, and the tie practically finished. So much anticipation, nervousness, and so many hopes for what Arsenal might do in the game - and the entire game plan had gone out of the window inside 10 minutes.

After that, the rest of the game was a complete let down from an Arsenal fans perspective. We huffed and puffed, didn't create a whole lot, and looked vulnerable whenever United broke at pace into our half. The third United goal came in the second half, one of those breakaway goals that Arsenal used to score when we had Pires and Henry. But, to be fair, it was the kind of goal you concede when you are busy chasing four goals at the other end. Arsenal didn't necessarily set themselves up wrong, or approach the game wrong, it was more that the whole plan had gone wrong before the game was even 15 minutes old. It is always going to be very difficult to recover from something like that.

Still, every cloud has a silver lining - Arsenal did score one goal, a penalty, for which Darren Fletcher received a very harsh red card, which will keep him out of the final. Obviously, it would have been much more fun had it been Rooney, Ronaldo, Ferdinand or one of the more odious Mancs, but there we go. All in all, a disappointing tie for Arsenal - we didn't really create very much across both legs; United defended far too well for the likes of Walcott and Adebayor to get any change at all out of them; and given the number of chances they created, they deserved to go through. For Arsenal, there's always next year, hopefully with more experience, and better luck.

Arsenal vs Middlesbrough - Emirates Stadium, London - Sunday 26th April 2009

2009-04-26T14:47:00.001+01:00

A game near the end of the season - in the sunshine, with nothing much to play for, can often be a bit of a lazy kickabout. This was one of those for sure, slightly surprising in that Middlesbrough at least did have a hell of a lot to play for. For Arsenal, this is probably the least important game between now and the end of the season, so the pedestrian nature of the play was understandable. But for Boro, needing points to avoid relegation, they didn't seem to show up - which really makes you think that they will be playing Championship football next season.

Arsenal rested some players with the Manchester United game in mind, so Adebayor, Song and Djourou all started on the bench. Still, there seemed to be plenty of creativity in the team, with Arshavin, Fabregas, Nasri, Denilson and Walcott making up an attack minded midfield. From the word go, they had the better of the possession, and seemed to making all the running without really even breaking sweat. Cesc Fabregas opened the scoring by finishing off a wonderful attacking move with Andrei Arshavin, with just under half an hour gone. Other than that, in the first half, I recall Almunia having one minor save to make, but that was about all that Middlesbrough offered. There was the constant possibility that Jeremie Aliadiere would do what he constantly failed to do when he played for Arsenal (i.e. score a goal), but any real threat along those lines never really materialised.

So the second half became a procession in the sunshine, it reminded me of a testimonial or preseason friendly game at times - and I think the tally of zero yellow cards showed just how much commitment there was around. Arsenal did not want to take any risks with a Champions League semi final coming up; and Boro will obviously think that there are easier chances to get the points they need to stay up - so may have been eyeing those up instead. Cesc Fabregas added the second goal that had looked inevitable for a while, with around 25 minutes to go - by rounding the keeper and finishing excellently. It was his last kick of the game, he was subbed before play could restart.

So, an easier 2-0 win at the top level, you would be hard pressed to see. Towards the end, Arshavin had a couple of wayward shots, to much amusement from the crowd. The introduction of Adebayor and Diaby obviously saw the workrate plummet, passes start to go astray, and clumisness creep into Arsenal's play. But, to be honest, it was too late for Middlesbrough to come back, even if they looked like they were trying to do so. An easy win in retrospect, taking Arsenal to 20 unbeaten in the league (although with Chelsea and Man U to come in our last 4 games). There are more important games to come, so this was a good one to get out of the way with the minimum of fuss. Unless Middlesbrough improve significantly and fast, we won't be playing them next season.

Arsenal vs Chelsea, FA Cup Semi Final - Wembley Stadium, London - Saturday 18th April 2009

2009-04-18T20:13:00.004+01:00

Arsenal's first visit to the new Wembley, and the only thing to dampen the excitement before the game was sharing the journey there with 30,000 Chelsea fans. A bunch of more idiotic people, you could not wish to meet. You could spot them a mile off, generally looking very pleased with themselves from the word go, and of course exhibiting more than a little mouth as usual.

I never used to like going to Wembley when the old version was still there, and that hatred hasn't changed much for the new version. Although it is in London, it contrives to be a total pain to get to, it is in the middle of a horrible concrete wasteland, is horrendously overpriced at every turn, and I always thought it was just very overrated as a stadium and an experience. The pitch there is a case in point - the venue for Cup Finals and the like, and the pitch cuts up something stupid. You'd think that would be an obvious thing to sort out, in between working out how to fleece fans for £5 for a hotdog.

I was sat in the lower tier corner, and the stadium does look fairly impressive when you are in your seat. The middle 3 blocks of the lower tier are corporate central, which I think makes the stadium look stupid when the cameras are on a half empty area at kick off. Still, whatever they need to do to make money, eh?

The game itself was quite forgettable. Obviously, given that Arsenal lost, I also want to forget about it as quickly as possible too. Arsenal had a strange team selection, with no Arshavin (despite him not being available in the Champions League), and no Nasri. Looking back on the game, we didn't create much, probably didn't deserve to win as a result, and with either of those 2 playing, it could have been different. We ultimately lost through what Arsene Wenger called 2 cheap goals - both caused by a combination of defensive cock-up, plus an exceptionally bad day at the office for Lukasz Fabianski. I hope it doesn't affect him too badly.

So, a day that will be remembered as Arsenal's first visit to Wembley. The sun was shining, and it could have been memorable for good reasons besides that - but ended up being a day to forget, as quickly as possible. Having got to the Champions League semi final as well, we all hope that doesn't end up the same way. Getting revenge on Chelsea in Rome would be ideal.

The Enemy - Brixton Academy, London - Saturday 11th April 2009

2009-04-11T22:16:00.004+01:00

So, after a recent false alarm, where I got to find out what a down to earth and decent band The Enemy are, I finally got to see them play some of their songs. Their cancelled gig in Tunbridge Wells proved that they care about their fans, and seem to really be aware of where they have come from. This gig, though, was one of the biggest on their pre second album tour - one where they could revel in the acclaim that being in a big rock band brings.

The band started the day appearing on Soccer AM, where again they underlined their "nice, humble, normal bloke" credentials. They seemed really in touch with reality, and very much sticking up for their home town. They said how honoured they were that Oasis were playing Coventry, when they didn't really need to; Tom talked about how he bought a Coventry built Jaguar that his grandad worked on building; and about how they sponsor local football and rugby league teams. Lastly, they talked about how they actually have some respect for people on TV talent shows, because at least they get young people listening to music. All in all, a very grounded band, in touch with the normal people in their fanbase.

Anyway, on to the gig. Brixton Academy was a sellout for 2 nights, although judging by the ticket prices from touts outside, and the amount of space available inside, it was one of those Brixton sellouts that wasn't quite as busy as it could have been. Busy enough for the bar queues to take a while, of course - but there also seemed to be quite a few couples there. I got inside just in time to catch the end of the support band - Twisted Wheel, who seem to be popping up all over the place lately, and are no less mediocre for it. The song I heard was pretty dull, and generally they are one of those poor bands that survive for a while under the patronage of Oasis - but I really don't get why anybody would like them.

The same cannot be said of The Enemy, who played what I thought was a fantastic set. They only played for 45 minutes - an hour with the encore - but every minute was really enjoyable, they definitely left the audience wanting much more. Their guitars sounded fantastically grinding, and the songs rocked out that much more live. The band and especially singer Tom seemed to be really up for the gig, which always helps of course. Highlights for me were a really rocky, anthemic version of Happy Birthday Jane during the encore, and This Song, which had everybody singing every word.

The fact that, for a lot of their better known songs, people seem to know and sing every word, really reminds me of Oasis 15 years ago. Tonight's set was drawn mainly from their debut album, with a few tracks from the new album. These new songs seem to comprise a lot of anthems - songs you can imagine people singing as they fall out of pubs. That, along with their common touch and the way they connect with their fans, make me think that they could become absolutely huge in the next 18 months. That would need luck, of course, as all bands do - but the support slots for Oasis, the quality of the new songs they played tonight, and the fact that they seem to have captured the mood of large sections of the population, mean that they could well be the next "band of the people". On tonight's showing, with their excellent songs, and their great live show, they look like they would deserve it - it couldn't happen to a nicer band.

Arsenal vs Manchester City - Emirates Stadium, London - Saturday 4th April 2009

2009-04-04T16:34:00.002+01:00

This was the first Arsenal game in what seemed like ages, after another of those boring international breaks. The worst thing about them is definitely that you only get 2 rounds of matches in a fortnight - so no games on the first midweek of the break, no games on the Sunday, anywhere in the world. So annoying, and when your players all come back injured, especially when their international managers have risked playing them, you really start to hate international football.

Still, this game had a distinct feelgood factor about it - maybe you need the boredom so you can get the elation when its all over. The sun was out, Arsenal had a chance to carry on their excellent form from March, and Cesc Fabregas was back in the side. For most, the first chance to see him link up with Arshavin was the thing they were most looking forward to in this game. Of course, when you play Man City, you can never be sure what kind of team will show up, so we were all hoping for their usual "away from home" team - the crap one!

The game itself was a fairly simple 2-0 victory in the end, and was even one of the duller 2-0 wins you are likely to see. A goal inside the first 10 minutes set the win up, a habit that I really wish Arsenal would get into more often. Then, less than five minutes into the second half, came the second - to kill off any sense that Man City may have regrouped at half time. Both were from Adebayor, on his return from injury, and both set up by Fabregas, on his return from injury. What a fantastic time to have them both back, with so many important games coming up.

There were a few City chances, especially in the first half. Shaun Wright Phillips made a decent chance for Fernandes to miss in front of goal, and Micah Richards had a decent shot that tested the keeper. In the second half, they quietened down significantly though, to the extent that the last 35 minutes were pretty much like an Arsenal training session. It wasn't the cut and thrust that the English game can be known for, and that some fans pay to see - but we got the 3 points with minimum fuss, and saved energy for Villarreal away on Tuesday, which was most definitely what I wanted to see.

Stereophonics, Noisettes - Royal Albert Hall, London - Thursday 26th March 2009

2009-03-26T22:38:00.005Z

I wouldn't normally do this, but I went to see Stereophonics. A mate had a spare ticket at the last minute - and, needing to get out of the house, I went along. Not exactly my favourite band - although I liked their very early stuff - and this was the first time I'd been near one of their gigs since walking past their encore at Reading 2000. Tom Jones was on stage with them that evening, which they probably don't do at every gig! This show was for Teenage Cancer Trust, at the Royal Albert Hall, so a great cause in a fantastic venue.

The support band were Noisettes, a band I walked past when they were supporting somebody a couple of years ago, but who sounded crap at the time. They had a number of decent support slots, most notably Muse, but just didn't go down very well at the time. This time, they seemed like a totally different band - much better. They were fronted by a very tall black woman, who jumped around the stage quite energetically - even falling on her arse at one point. They played a decent half hour set, including their very catchy single Don't Upset The Rhythm, and another standout track called Never Forget You. Really enjoyable set, they are a much improved band since 2 years ago, and they look like they are about to go quite big.

After some inspiring videos of people who had been helped by TCT, Stereophonics arrived on stage. They started off with a couple of excellent old songs, More Life In A Tramps Vest, and A Thousand Trees. All in all, they played quite a bit of material from debut album Word Gets Around, which seemed to be well received by the audience, me included. It reminded me how good their very early material is, in contrast with how bland much of their radio friendly later stuff can be.

One thing about Stereophonics is of course that singer Kelly Jones has a fantastic and distinctive voice, without which they would undoubtedly not have survived as long as they have. Some of the songs are good, some are average, but it is his voice that lifts the band above others that weren't as successful. The audience at the gig surprised me - lots of them seemed to be incredibly excited to be there, as if Stereophonics were their favourite band in the world. I guess I shouldn't have been surprised, but it was a bit of a weird thought. They have a few nice songs, but I can't imagine how you could say they were your favourite band. Whatever you could like about Stereophonics, there is another band out there that does it better, surely?

The highlight of the gig for most people, and a low point for me, was when they played Have A Nice Day - the audience were all on their feet, with hands waving from side to side. The song is a crime against music as far as I'm concerned, absolute middle of the road daytime radio dirge. Ok, it was one of their most famous songs, but really, it is incredibly dull and wet.

But it wasn't all like that - they of course played the radio friendly rubbish, but there were plenty of obscure songs like Goldfish Bowl, and early album tracks like Same Size Feet. All good stuff. The show ended with Local Boy In The Photograph, before a 4 song encore which finished with the excellent Dakota. A good way to finish what was a long set at almost an hour and 45 minutes.

Despite not being a huge Stereophonics fan, I was glad I went to this show - they clearly have a hefty catalogue of big singles, so you are always going to hear a lot of songs you know. I still think that they are a band who made a great first album, then sold out to get themselves played on Virgin Radio all day long. Since then, they have written a few songs that have got close to their early heights, and as long as they keep playing them live, they will probably keep playing to lots of people for years to come. I find it quite hard to get excited about them, but they have been around long enough now to deserve a bit of respect at least.

Arsenal vs Hull City - Emirates Stadium, London - Tuesday 17th March 2009

2009-03-17T21:55:00.004Z

Its amazing how much, and how quickly, things can change in football. Last time I went to an Arsenal game (just before the birth of the daughter that has kept my hands rather full ever since), all was doom and gloom. We had injury worries, players who were terribly out of form (especially in front of goal), and a new signing who was yet to do anything concrete to show why we bought him. My last Arsenal game ended with our zillionth 0-0 draw in a row, and the team booed off at the end. Grim stuff.

Since then, and since I have been changing nappies, I have missed 4 Arsenal games. In those games we have reached the Champions League last 8 after a long night in Rome. We have scored 7 league goals (after looking like we couldn't buy one for all of February), and beaten Burnley in the cup with some real champagne goals. Players have come back from injury, Bendtner has turned his form around, and players like Song and Eboue have been playing like we all hoped they could. We have got back into the top four of the Premier League. And, Arshavin scored his first goal. 4 games, 2 weeks - its amazing how quickly things can change.

So, it was a very different - and much more positive - stadium that I walked into for this game. The short notice meant that there were empty seats - 5,000 according to Arsenal, but quite a few more in reality by the looks of things. All this also seemed to mean that there were quite a few people that don't get to many games - all of whom sounded like they were in good voice. I don't know what it is about midweek evening games, but the atmosphere is always much better.

All in all, this was a very good game I thought - plenty of chances at both ends, and of course the right result at the end! Hull took the lead early on, with a very lucky, heavily deflected shot - which looped over the keeper and into the net. In truth, they had probably started better, but the goal was still outrageously lucky! They then set about timewasting mode - engaging in frustratingly long waits to take goal kicks and free kicks. This went on until the hour mark, when the referee finally had the sense to book their keeper for such blatant timewasting. Why he felt the need to subject us all to it for 45 minutes before acting, I have no idea.

As we got properly into the second half, the game effectively became a one team match - Arsenal did all the running, had the vast majority of the play, and most of the chances. By the time Nicklas Bendtner had come on, Arsenal were virtually bombarding the Hull goal with chances, many of which looked like they were easier to score than miss. Bendtner himself had a decent game, to add to his very solid performance on Saturday - and he was involved in the equaliser, being one of the players who took turns to tee the ball up, for Van Persie to eventually smash into the net.

The winner came about 10 minutes later, another chance that seemed to involve lots of players in the penalty box, Gallas finishing this one with a strange backward header. The replays showed he was offside, but given the sheer number of bad decisions Mike Riley seemed to make in the game, that wasn't a surprise - and was a refereeing break that Arsenal probably deserved. Hull's timewasting seemed to abate after that, and despite a couple of scares near Fabianski's goal, Arsenal held out for the win.

So, into the FA Cup Semi Finals, for our first visit to Wembley. As well as a Champions League quarter final, and back in the top 4 of the league, this could still be a very good season. We all thought that this time last year, but you never know, one day it might all come true!

A New Arrival - University College Hospital, London - Tuesday 3rd March 2009

2009-03-03T00:28:00.005Z

Just before half past midnight on Tuesday 3rd March, after a labour that lasted just over 24 hours, my first child arrived - a beautiful baby daughter weighing 7lb 8oz. We called her Julia. She means that gigs, football and travelling are off the agenda for a while (travelling had already been banned for a month), and will be coming back only gradually! Therefore, I won't be updating this blog very much for the next month or two. Even in Julia's first week, gigs by Mumford and Sons and The Maccabees, plus Arsenal vs Burnley, have all gone by the wayside - there will be many more I'm sure.

Arsenal vs Fulham - Emirates Stadium, London - Saturday 28th February 2009

2009-02-28T15:29:00.003Z

In a season that can only be described as a frustrating, depressing affair for Arsenal fans, this game was probably the low point of it all. After three successive 0-0 draws in the League, and an absolute paucity of goals generally, the Roma win gave everybody a lift, which most hoped would be carried over into our League form. Not to be. It wasn't just yet another 0-0 draw that was so annoying for many, it was the manner of the draw, the opponents, and what happened in the game.

Fulham showed up at Emirates with an awful away record. But, to their immense credit, they were willing to play football, to pass the ball around, and to go forward in search of scoring opportunities. Usually, Arsenal sides eat teams like this for breakfast - it plays right into our hands. But, this looked to be an Arsenal side that was shorn of any creativity whatsoever. Often, the excuse for frustrating home games is that the opposition were negative, they put 10 men behind the ball, and were only interested in not conceding. This cannot be said about Fulham, who were creative and positive from the word go. That fact just made Arsenal's performance seem like they had run out of excuses as well as ideas. Which, when you charge the prices Arsenal do, is always going to cause unhappiness.

Arseblog has a post which is considerably more emotive and fact laden than I am capable of (especially a few days later, now that I have calmed down a bit!), but a performance like this was really not good enough. I don't boo at Arsenal games - I don't think it does the team any good - but it was hard to be too critical of those that chose to boo at the end. The most upsetting part of it all was the total and utter disappearance of our midfield for the last 15 minutes. They looked knackered, and allowed Fulham to (literally) control the game for the last period. Embarrassing, and completely a reflection of how poorly Arsenal played.

All of this would and could have been a mortal blow to our Champions League qualifying hopes. By beating Stoke at home, Aston Villa could have gone 8 points clear of Arsenal, with (you suspect) not enough games to make up the gap. But, from leading 2-0, Villa contrived to draw their game the next day, then to lose to Manchester City whilst we beat West Brom. So, the gap could have been 8 points, in fact a few days later it was 3. A reminder of how quickly football can change, and lets hope that isn't the last dramatic swing back in Arsenal's favour. With plenty of players to come back soon, fingers crossed that things get better!

The Enemy - Tunbridge Wells Forum, Tunbridge Wells - Friday 27th February 2009

2009-02-27T20:58:00.003Z

This was the gig that never happened - for a very stupid reason on the face of it - but in reality it was only ever due to happen in the first place because this band care more about their fans than almost any other.

It all started when The Enemy - the band that are supporting Oasis this summer, and who (along with fellow support band Kasabian) probably embody the descendent of the Oasis musical family tree better than anybody - decided that they would play a series of 5 gigs in small towns. Presumably some kind of canvassing happened before they decided on the towns, but Tunbridge Wells was the "representative" from the South East of England.

Not only that, but the Forum in Tunbridge Wells was the chosen venue - admittedly, there aren't an abundance of choices, but there we go. The Forum is a fine choice, a venue that has been around for over 15 years - putting on lots of mediocre touring bands, the odd band (like Oasis, Coldplay, and most recently The Kooks and The View) who did OK; and simultaneously giving lots of local kids a venue to watch bands in, and lots of local kids who picked up a musical instrument a place to play. So, a great thing that a band like The Enemy were coming to a place like The Forum.

The venue was announced at 9am on the day of the gig, and the first 50 people to email a specific address got a pair of tickets. All exciting stuff, and as well as me getting lucky, half a dozen friends also did - so we were set for a good crowd at the gig. The rest of the day was spent getting excited about it, and (for me) getting the train down from London to Tunbridge Wells after work. It was during that journey that I got a bad phone call - the gig was cancelled because Tom had hurt his hand riding a bike. Most annoying, and you suspect that their Wembley Stadium Oasis support slots will not have the same misfortune! Still, it was a free gig, so whilst disappointing, it wasn't the end of the world.

As 10 or so of us were in the pub getting over our disappointment, somebody was on the phone, waving frantically at the rest of us. He had Tom from The Enemy on the phone, calling personally to apologise for cancelling the gig, and saying to go along anyway to have a drink with the band. Incredible - and over the next 20 minutes, the rest of us all got calls from members of the band. Mostly from Tom, although mine was from Liam, which was slightly disappointing, especially when all of your mates are getting calls from the main man! So, they cancelled the gig, but then called everybody to say sorry. This being a 50 person task made it all the easier, plus the fact that they had everybody's mobile numbers - but still something I don't think you'd get Pete Doherty doing when he cancels a gig.

So, we all went to the venue and got a beer. One of The Enemy's mates was DJ-ing on stage, and it was a bit weird inside - a full crowd there, looking towards the stage, in the full knowledge that no band was going to be playing. Then, at about 9:30, the band showed up. Tom took to the stage, apologised again for cancelling, and said that there was a drink for everybody at the bar. Again, something that not many bands would think to do for their fans - so full marks to The Enemy. The band stayed around for a good hour afterwards, talking to everybody, signing autographs, posing for photos, and making vague promises to try to reschedule (we shall see!). All in all, they really made the effort to try to make up for cancelling the show, and those that waited in the venue I suspect now have a lot more respect for The Enemy. Well done to them for "keeping it real". If they can reschedule the gig as well, that would be the icing on the cake.

Arsenal vs AS Roma - Emirates Stadium, London - Tuesday 24th February 2009

2009-02-24T20:15:00.004Z

After a few months of depressing League form, it was great to have Champions League football back - possibly for the last time for a while, if the League form doesn't improve. That said, I suspect the Champions League may be our best chance of a trophy this season, as the playing style suits us much better than the "English" style. Our biggest danger is probably when we meet another English team to knock us out! I am one of those Arsenal fans who loves the big European nights at home (as opposed to the crap European nights) more than anything else - and on an unseasonably warm evening, the atmosphere was much better than usual inside the stadium.

Roma had had a season of two halves so far, really struggling in Serie A for the first few months, but then coming good in the last 10 games or so. Meanwhile, they had been doing well in the Champions League, getting a win and a draw against Chelsea in their group. Given how good they can be, I was surprised by how poor they were in this game. They had their moments - a couple of chances in the first half, some fleeting moments in the last 20 minutes or so, and a very tense last 5 minutes plus injury time. But for the rest of the game, Arsenal pretty much dominated. A surprisingly poor showing from the visitors.

However, that probably shouldn't take anything away from one of the best Arsenal performances in a while. The team was set up to attack, with Van Persie up front on his own, Nasri in central attacking midfield, and Bendtner and Eboue given licence to roam on the left and right. Roma just didn't seem able to cope with the four of them, and for large periods of the game, Arsenal were first to most of the loose balls - with sharp passing, good possession, and a number of great chances created. For the first 15 to 20 minutes of the second half especially, Arsenal seemed to be mounting wave after wave of attack.

The goal came not long before half time, Van Persie being fouled in the box, and getting up to despatch the penalty pretty emphatically, despite some Roma gamesmanship to try to put him off. The other good chances in the game came all over the place, but Bendtner and Eboue both missed very good chances indeed. Bendtner missed 2 within a couple of minutes - the easier of which he didn't even manage to hit the target; and Eboue later took an age to finally shoot, before missing when he should have done better - even accounting for the fact that he is a defender.

Overall, though, there were plenty of positives from the game. Nasri was absolutely outstanding throughout, and this was a really big game for him. Scoring 2 against Manchester United earlier in the season, and now this - he looks like a player who can really do it when it matters. Toure and Gallas are starting to look like proper defenders again, to the extent that you almost fancy us to keep the clean sheet we need in Rome in a fortnight. Both the BBC and the Guardian reports talk about how we could have scored more - that is true, but the clean sheet this evening is the thing that could well be more important. We go to Rome in decent shape, I think. It could have been better, but it could also have been a lot worse.

Glasvegas, Friendly Fires, White Lies, Florence & The Machine - Brixton Academy, London - Saturday 21st February 2009

2009-02-21T21:14:00.009Z

This show was the finale to the now traditional NME tour, which takes some of the best new bands out around the country. At least, the best new bands in NME's opinion, that they are actually able to book. This often provides the chance to see absolute gems of bands like Arctic Monkeys, Maximo Park, and The Cribs - but also gives the dubious pleasure of The Horrors, Joe Lean & The Jing Jang Jong, and other bands that may have seemed like a good idea at the time, but rapidly start to not look so clever. However, the line up this year looked like the best for a few years, at least at the time the shows happened.

First band of the evening were Florence & The Machine, a six piece who were fronted by a tall ginger woman. She ran on stage wearing an incredibly short skirt, revealing that about 2/3 of her height was made up of legs. She was fresh from winning the Critics Choice award at the BRITs the previous week, and has appeared in virtually every list of the acts that will do well in 2009. So, expectations were high.

Florence & The Machine's set was possibly the one I enjoyed most in the evening, partly because my expectations were comfortably exceeded. Her voice was nothing short of incredible, and it is this that really is the standout thing about the band. The songs were decent enough, but Florence is the kind of singer who can make a song that is merely "good", sound "great". She also seemed to have a good rock and roll spirit, dancing crazily around the stage, throwing flowers into the audience, and generally seeming to enjoy herself. The band finished on a fantastic cover of You've Got The Love, a song that you need an amazing voice to do justice to - and they blew the roof off the venue. A really enjoyable set, far too short when it finished after half an hour.

Next up were White Lies, who I'd seen a few months ago and really liked. Since then, they had scored a number one album, and started to sell out headline gigs in decent sized venues. Their set was therefore totally expected in its excellence - their sound was again massive, and they really play with a confidence that they expect to be playing big venues very soon. The comparisons with The Killers, Joy Division and Interpol are all obvious - perhaps the quality of their songs is the only thing I'm still not sure about. There was a great moment in their set when Florence (minus the Machine) ran on stage to duet on a chorus, then dived into the crowd when she was done. Despite the fact that the 2 singers were in a completely different key, it was a good cameo. So, a great set again from White Lies, they are a sure bet to be back at Brixton as headliners later in the year.

The final support band were Friendly Fires, who are not really my cup of tea. I'd seen them at the Camden Crawl a couple of years ago, and whilst they make a nice noise, I wasn't totally enthused. I'm not generally much of an "indie rave" fan at the moment in any case, which means I'm always going to be unlikely to like them. What was hard to understand at this gig was why they were on the bill (other than it being a collection of decent new bands) - because the contrast between them and White Lies or Glasvegas was huge. Still, a testament to the eclectic nature of the NME Tour I guess. Their set was decent enough, but just not my cup of tea really - although I suspect at a festival, they would be much more enjoyable.

So, finally, Glasvegas. Their live shows and their fantastic debut album had ensured that they were rightly headlining this tour, but the event seemed to be a bit of a disappointment for me. The "wall of noise" wasn't there (and generally the bands seemed to be a bit quiet tonight). That took a lot of intensity away from the set, and meant that, whereas previously the guitars could have almost literally blown you away, they were now just one part of the songs. Also, there were a lot of non-believers around me, by that I mean people who didn't really seem to "get" why Glasvegas are so hyped.

Having said all that, of course it was an enjoyable set, kicking off with Geraldine, starting to wind down with Go Square Go, and finishing up with Daddy's Gone - fantastic songs all of them. But, I just felt that something had been lost in the band's transition to the bigger venues they undoubtedly deserve to be playing - some volume, some intensity, and a bit of the excitement of knowing that everybody in the audience was converted to the excellence of Glasvegas. Good gig, but I hope that some of these things return before I see them next.

Arsenal vs Sunderland - Emirates Stadium, London - Saturday 21st February 2009

2009-02-21T15:13:00.002Z

So, after the triumphant, free scoring game against Cardiff, where Eduardo returned, and the goals started flowing, everything was fixed in the world of Arsenal, right? Wrong. 5 days later, Eduardo was ruled out through a niggly hamstring injury, and the frustration returned. Andrey Arshavin made his debut on a beautiful sunny day that reminded you about the existence of spring and summer. He had a very bright first half hour, testing the keeper with a couple of decent shots, and sitting up a couple of good crosses.

But, after half an hour or so, Arshavin's lack of match fitness started to show, and he became less and less involved in the game. The excitement that Arsenal fans had been enjoying until then started to fade, and frustration took over instead. People soon started to realise that Sunderland had come to defend and secure a 0-0 draw, and that their goalkeeper and defence were more than competent enough to manage it against our midfield and attack.

As the second half started and dragged on, Arsenal played more and more in the Sunderland half of the pitch. They tried to get through the defence, but couldn't manage it. Vela and Bendtner both missed half decent chances, but really, it was the midfield that failed the team on this occasion. Every time Alex Song or Denilson got the ball, they succeeded mostly in slowing down the pace of our moves, which meant that getting past the defenders was going to be ever more difficult. Sadly, it is the only way that some of our less talented midfielders seem to know how to play.

On another day, this could have been a 2-0 win to Arsenal, but on this day, it was yet another 0-0 draw. Arsene Wenger can talk all he wants about it being good to remain unbeaten, and good to keep another clean sheet; but the more relevant statistic is that we are 6 points off a Champions League spot, with only 36 points left to play for (and for the others to drop). The manager had better dust off his European atlas, because we are going to visit some new cities next season - that's if Everton don't catch us. Arsenal fans never need an excuse to support a team playing Spurs, but next week's Carling Cup Final could secure another UEFA Cup spot for 6th place in the League - if Manchester United win. It is very sad that this is even something on the radar of an Arsenal fan, but this is our new reality.

Arsenal vs Cardiff City - Emirates Stadium, London - Monday 16th February 2009

2009-02-16T21:14:00.003Z

After what seemed like ages since the last Arsenal home game, this was the first of several in quick succession. The initial attempt to replay against Cardiff was snowed off a fortnight previously, so were in the strange position that all of the fifth round ties had been played (at least the first attempts at them), before we had even got through the fourth round. This also meant that Arsenal were in the quarter final draw, with a very winnable set of home games to see us to the semi finals.

On the way up to the stadium, I walked past the Lord Nelson, which was full of hundreds of Cardiff fans, all boxed in by police. Holloway Road resembled a war zone, with broken windows in the pub, and bits of smashed furniture in the road. Some will tell you that Cardiff fans unfairly have a bad reputation - but I've never seen any other away fans do that (well, Ok, apart from Spurs).

The game itself was a million times better than the first game, although that wasn't saying much! This time, Cardiff's confidence seemed to have gone - they were nowhere near as bright as they were in their home game, and much less able to make life difficult for Arsenal. Much of this may have been because the Arsenal team were on a high, thanks to Eduardo's return to the first team. He was greeted with rapturous applause, well deserved, and combining with creative players like Nasri and Vela, his reappearance really managed to get the Arsenal fans excited again that they could be creative and play good football. With Fabregas and Walcott to come back too, and Arshavin yet to make his debut, there was a real sense that the worst of our season - with its lack of penetration and no quality players - could just about be behind us.

The game itself was the best Arsenal have played for a while - the team seemed to gel a lot better, and defence, midfield and attack all seemed to know what they were doing. With 2 goals on his return, this really was the Eduardo show. His first came after he had played a big part in the buildup, working with Vela, then getting his head onto a cross to score. Bendtner added a second with a header shortly after, before Eduardo won and converted a penalty just after half time. When he was replaced by Robin Van Persie after an hour, the whole ground was on their feet to applaud him. Thank God he's back.

Van Persie put the icing on the cake with a fourth goal right at the end, and although Cardiff had a couple of decent chances themselves, 4-0 wasn't terribly unfair. On another day, it would have been a frustrating 1-0 win for Arsenal, but things seemed to go right today. The Cardiff keeper was probably man of the match, which says a lot about how the game went. This was a big boost for Arsenal fans, with the return of Eduardo seeming to bring the return of decent play and goals with him too. For that amongst many reasons, welcome back Eddie, we have missed you!

The Cribs - Heaven, London - Tuesday 10th February 2009

2009-02-10T23:23:00.003Z

The Cribs have just finished writing a new album, with new member Johnny Marr this time, so this was one of a handful of dates designed to road test their new material. Now that the Astoria has been closed down (if not yet knocked down), shows like this are having to find themselves new venues. A few seem to be landing at Heaven, a gay club under the arches of Charing Cross station. It isn't the best venue for a gig, as the arches mean that the venue itself is a bit of a maze, and only a bit of it is the actual gig "floor". But, being in a railway arch did help this to be one of the loudest gigs I've been to for quite a while.

Whilst waiting for the band to come on stage, there was an extraordinarily long bar queue to navigate. Like Koko (which I have moaned about before), Heaven charge £3.60 for a can of beer, whereupon the bar staff throw it into a plastic pint glass as quickly as possible, then pour the inevitable froth down the sink. They seem to be quite surprised when you complain about this! I really wish venues would stop ripping their customers off so blatantly - it is a shame, because it kind of impairs your enjoyment of going to see the band, through no fault of theirs.

Anyway, that was only a minor downer on a couple of hours of extreme fun. The Cribs played a fairly long and absolutely electric set, with Johnny Marr on stage with them throughout. The sound was clear, good, and VERY loud, and about half a dozen new songs were sprinkled in amongst a "greatest hits" set. The highlights came thick and fast throughout the set, and the band seemed to be really on form, with everything falling into place for a great show. This show was one of those that really mark The Cribs out as one of the best live bands in the world. There were digs at other bands (notably The View tonight), great songs, and an awesome amount of energy in their performance.

It seemed like I was not the only one who didn't really like the staff at Heaven - Ryan Jarman wasn't a fan of the security guards either. When they hauled a stage invader away, he demanded that they bring him back, and let him stay on stage. The NME Review talks about this at great length, as well as listing what the band played. So, the fan spent the rest of the gig on stage. During the "encore", an incredible version of The Wrong Way To Be, a second fan also managed to win his battle with security, and ended up wearing the bass guitar around his neck. Then, Ryan Jarman dived into the crowd, and the music stopped, leaving a scene of chaos in the venue. The very definition of "rock and roll" - a fantastic gig all round.

Tottenham Hotspur vs Arsenal - White Hart Lane, London - Sunday 8th February 2009

2009-02-08T14:46:00.005Z

Spurs away - always a pleasurable trip, and all the more so this season given the fact that Spurs are in a relegation battle. Arsenal have had their own struggles too, which meant that the level of piss taking was a bit more subdued than normal - but the 3,000 Gooners still arrived at White Hart Lane knowing that they would not want to swap places with Spurs fans for a second. Maybe Spurs' troubles this season have really started to worry their fans, as the noise from the home sections was distinctly less evident than normal.

Irritatingly, I missed the first 20 minutes of the game, thanks to being caught in a police escort from Finsbury Park to the stadium. I left the pub 5 minutes too late, by which time it was surrounded by police, and the ensuing escort seemed to take forever. Far from being an escort of dangerous hooligans, there were plenty of normal people there - plus lots of muppets thinking they were "pwopa nawty" boys, taking pictures and filming everything on their phones. We were marched into the Tube, chucked onto an empty train (which had been terminated especially), then wrapped up and marched up Tottenham High Road - which was completely empty because the game had started. When we did finally get to the ground, the cordon of stewards making people go in single file to the turnstiles was unnecessary and not at all appreciated.

What I had missed in the first 20 minutes was Arsenal's best period of the game, and about half of the Emmanuel Eboue show. He had the ball in the net, a goal which was harshly disallowed because the referee gave the softest foul ever. He had made a couple of other decent runs, looking like our brightest player - and also stupidly talked himself into a booking for dissent. When I got to my seat, people around me were saying "Eboue is going to get sent off here", and it took about another 10 minutes for that to happen. A ridiculously stupid flick on Luca Modric (like Beckham's in the 1998 World Cup), which the referee saw, and had no real choice but to punish. Wenger does like to defend his players, but notably failed to defend Eboue on this occasion. You have to wonder what it would take for him to be kicked out of the club once and for all - he is a stupid cheat, and I don't know an Arsenal fan that isn't ashamed of him. Wenger talks about intelligence being a key quality for his players - it is very obvious that Eboue has none.

Other than the Eboue idiocy, the first half saw a decent chance that Adebayor just failed to get on the end of, and the blow of him being stretchered off with a hamstring pull. He has been in dog awful form recently, but with our lack of bite in attack right now, we really can't afford to lose him. On his way off, the stretcher went around the "long way", right past the Paxton end, so that the sporting and gracious Spurs fans could abuse him as he was lying in pain on a stretcher. Showing their true class.

Having 10 men for most of the game obviously stretched Arsenal - although 0-0 at half time was a goal better off (albeit a man worse off) than we usually are at half time at the Lane. We had what looked like a pretty determined reaction in the second half, which in hindsight was a great display with 10 men. Song had a really decent game, and the best Arsenal chance of the match, missing from 6 yards midway through the second half. We were bit timid going forward (despite keeping 2 up front), but that was understandable given the disadvantage in personnel. We could probably have done with a sub later on, as we seemed to "drop a little bit physically" (as Mr Wenger might say) towards the end. But, the main subs available were creative, attacking players (including Eduardo, at long last), and keeping it tight was really the aim of the game here.

Just as the game was about to end, it sprang into life, the last 5 minutes or so becoming really end to end. There were injury time sniffs at goal for both teams, Modric (who had a good game generally, despite looking like an 8 year old girl) had the best chance, but Almunia saved the day.

This game kept our unbeaten League run against Spurs going - we have not lost a League match since November 1999, so depending on how next season's fixtures work out, we are pushing 10 years since we last lost to them. Today was Spurs' first clean sheet in all competitions against Arsenal since November 1998, so maybe they are making a little progress. That said, in League terms, a point didn't really do either team any favours. Arsenal fell further behind the Top 4 (and are closer to being caught by Everton), and Spurs failed to get clear of the Bottom 3. Arsenal now have a significant gap to close if they want to finish 4th - the next 13 League games will be very, very important now.

Arsenal vs West Ham United - Emirates Stadium, London - Saturday 31st January 2009

2009-01-31T17:01:00.002Z

Arsenal were unbeaten in 9 Premier League games going into this match against West Ham - always a tricky game, because they have a nasty habit of pulling off annoying results against Arsenal recently. Having said that we were unbeaten in 9, we have had distinct troubles scoring goals, and have generally been lacking something significant in the way of creativity. We are missing Fabregas, Walcott, Rosicky, and all those signings we failed to make in the summer. And, with this game happening 48 hours before another transfer deadline, most of the talk in the pubs was about whether we would spend any money. Knowing Arsene Wenger, expectation of that was generally low, but people were living in hope!

The game itself was a 0-0 draw, and like that at Cardiff the week before, was an utterly dull game, devoid of anything much in the way of entertainment. It is tempting to say that both sides got what they deserved in the way of goals, but it is a stretch to say that West Ham even deserved their "nil" - they came for a point, rarely crossed the halfway line, and Manuel Almunia earned his clean sheet for the game with no effort whatsoever. A terribly unadventurous tactic from West Ham, and when you think that Gianfranco Zola is their manager, it really seems unbecoming of such a great player to send his teams out with so little ambition. Still, he got what he came for I suppose.

On Arsenal's side, there were a couple of chances, the most notable of which fell to Adebayor - who was unlucky on one occasion, and just plain useless on another. Emmanuel Eboue had another totally useless half hour, after which he was substituted injured - whereupon Carlos Vela took about one minute to contribute more to the game than Eboue had managed in 30. But generally, as a fan, this was a game you kept watching out of duty to your team; and out of a vain hope that something might happen. In your heart of hearts, you knew it wasn't going to, but you felt compelled to keep watching just in case. No creativity in midfield, not much bite in attack, and nothing to suggest that Arsenal would ever have managed to get the breakthrough against a team that defended with determination. We need to do better if we are to qualify for the Champions League next season - and that is becoming a real worry.

Work trip to Frankfurt, Germany - 26th to 28th January 2009

2009-01-28T17:00:00.004Z

My last work-related travel abroad for a while, took me to Germany to run a training course. As I went through Heathrow, I was strangely tolerant of the BAA employed idiots on security there, knowing that I wouldn't be seeing them again for a while. When I got into Frankfurt and checked into my hotel, I was very surprised to find the shower in the middle of the room, in a glass cube. I must admit that I almost walked into the glass cube when I first got into the room - it made for a strange experience to wake up and see the bathroom right next to my bed. They did hide the toilet in a (small) separate room - and you could watch TV from the shower. An interesting way to make the most of a small room space.

The couple of days I was working were tough, long days - which means that you look forward to the time off even more than usual. The main time off on this trip was a visit to Wagner's Apfelwein tavern - a very traditional Frankfurt restaurant, that has been running for decades. You sat at long wooden tables, drank cold apple wine mixed with sparkling water, and ate pork. Lots of pork - the special was a mixed platter of belly pork, shoulder pork, ribs, sausages, and ham; with potatoes and sauerkraut on the side. Very nice, very filling, and a very good way to kill an entire evening whilst eating and drinking. After the food and drink fest, we headed to a famous music bar called Balalaika - a fantastically atmospheric bar, with jazz musicians getting up periodically to do their thing. A definite note for a return visit, next time I'm in town.

Cardiff City vs Arsenal - Ninian Park, Cardiff - Sunday 25th January 2009

2009-01-25T18:55:00.003Z

When Arsenal were drawn away at Cardiff in the FA Cup, I immediately wanted to go. This is Cardiff's last season at Ninian Park, a historic football ground that is one of the last relics of what the game used to be like - at least, certainly one of the few grounds that Arsenal would be likely to visit now. The floodlight pylons come into view as you approach the (quite rough) area, and the 4 stands make this out as an old, traditional ground. Getting inside and onto the away terrace, the Popular Bank looms large to the right, bathed in the afternoon sun (which I'd guess is what makes it popular).

This was obviously a big day for all at Cardiff, and the PA announcer did a great job of building up to kick off. He got the fans to Do The Ayatollah, talked about the long and famous history between Cardiff and Arsenal football clubs, encouraged a warm welcome for Aaron Ramsey back to Ninian Park, and played some really rather good music - including local favourites Stereophonics, and Rage Against The Machine's Sleep Now In The Fire. So, when the teams came out, everybody was up for the game.

Which made the game itself an even bigger disappointment. Although there were a couple of decent chances on both sides; Arsenal played very poorly and lacked much penetration in their play; and Cardiff played well, but not well enough to really cause sustained problems for Arsenal. So the game was a bit of a nothing, somewhat of a stalemate. Robin Van Persie had a couple of decent shouts at goal, Bendtner and Nasri were wasteful on a couple of occasions, and Cardiff had chances - a good free kick, and at least one shot that flashed dangerously across the face of goal. But in the end, a disappointing 0-0 draw, that deserved to be a 0-0 draw. During the game, standing on the terrace, I noticed that the terracing area was much less packed than it would have been in the past - no fun allowed any more. Probably the biggest regret of the day was being denied the chance to have a good old goal celebration on it.

When the final whistle went, a minority but a significant section of the Cardiff fans immediately resorted to their tough guy antics. Many of the fans on the terrace closest to the Arsenal fans hardly seemed to watch the game at all, watching the Arsenal fans instead - they really seemed to hate English people more than they actually liked their own team. So, a familiar sight at the end (also seen the last time they played at Highbury, of dozens of coppers standing in front of them, physically preventing them from getting onto the pitch and near Arsenal fans, whilst they stood and postured. It all looked a bit pathetic - it is a minority of Cardiff fans, but a sizeable one, that seem to play up every time they get a big game. So, a bit of a shame that they get to come to Emirates in 10 days time, to play the idiots again. Hopefully it will be a better game next time.

Work trip to Amsterdam, Zeist and The Hague, Netherlands - 21st to 23rd January 2009

2009-01-23T16:59:00.010Z

Another trip to the Netherlands, not long after the last one, and this time it was a tour of the country. Time spent in Amsterdam, a day in Zeist, and a trip to The Hague as well - all in less than 48 hours. The trip started annoyingly, my flight from Gatwick was delayed by an hour due to a change of tyre on the plane - but BA got everybody strapped into their seats before they announced this. We were about to push back, when the pilot announced that they were going to change the tyre - most annoying, because I would have spent that hour in the lounge with free food and free wifi. So, the journey took one hour to change the plane's tyre, 40 minutes to fly to Amsterdam, then a 20 minute taxi once we landed - not what you need.

For this trip, I was staying at the Qbic hotel - a new capsule hotel in the World Trade Centre at Amsterdam Zuid. Like most of the capsule hotels that are springing up at the moment, the offer is for a very small, functional room, for a cheap price. The general features are good decor and design, excellent use of space in the rooms, free wifi, vending machines and auto checkin machines. You really get everything you need if you know what you are doing, aren't going to stay very long, and come prepared - and you don't pay the earth for it.

The room I stayed in reminded me of an Ikea show apartment, where they pack all of the essentials into an improbably small space. The excellent design really makes the most of the space available, and when you get into the room, it actually seems quite roomy. A very good hotel, especially for the price, and being right outside Amsterdam Zuid train station (from which you can get almost anywhere in the country), it is in an absolutely fantastic location. I'll definitely stay there again next time I'm in town.

On this trip, I went to a couple of gigs, which meant that I came into contact with many Dutch people (other than the colleagues I usually encounter). This reminded me that in many, many ways, the Dutch are extremely like the British - they like football, loud music and drinking beer; when they talk it sounds quite like English; they tend to like the same types of food; and the Dutch just generally remind me of Brits at almost every turn. But there are some different, cooler things about Dutch people too (stereotyping hugely here of course!) - they are liberal, much more willing to live and let live. They are extremely direct - if they think something, they will tell you, whereas Brits tend to beat around the bush. Generally, our Dutch friends are just like us, but a little bit more so.

Oasis - Heineken Music Hall, Amsterdam, Netherlands - Thursday 22nd January 2009

2009-01-22T19:47:00.009Z

I went to see the same band in the same venue the previous night, and was delighted to get the chance to see a decent band for 2 nights in a row. Heineken Music Hall doesn't take cash inside the venue, you have to buy and spend tokens instead. Having only a €20 note the previous evening, I had no choice but to buy loads of tokens - and no choice this evening but to exchange all of those tokens for beer. What a shame! There seemed to be many more Brits in the venue this evening (even thought it was emptier than last night), and so the atmosphere seemed much more pro-Oasis, and much more intoxicated. It was a very friendly crowd though, which suggested that smoking rather than drinking was the order of the day for the Brits in Amsterdam.

On reflection, last nights gig was a decent show, but just fairly standard for Oasis. They come along to these shows with a poor support band, and playing the exact same set that they have been playing for a few months, all over the world now. Even they must be bored with doing the same every night, and it feels a bit like they are short changing their fans. So, I was expecting to be underwhelmed this evening. But, I was pleasantly surprised. The Oasis set was excellent from the start, and I must confess that I will never fail to be excited when Fucking In The Bushes is playing on an empty stage in front of me.

Liam Gallagher was much more up for the show, and on form, than he was the previous evening. His voice sounded much improved from the beginning, and also got better and more snarling as the show went on. But more than all that, his banter made it a totally different, and much more enjoyable show than before. He dedicated Slide Away "to all the lesbians", which got a huge cheer; Morning Glory "to all those that have seen us the last couple of nights. And witnessed some shocking vocals, I apologise"; and Ain't Got Nothing "to all the homosexuals", with some very funny comments afterwards - "you might think you ain't one, you might not look like one. But they're out there".

The band were on form apart from that, Rock N Roll Star and Supersonic in particular were incredible sounding. Even though they played quite a tired set, one that I had heard 4 times before, and as recently as last night, it still finished too soon. Wonderwall and Supersonic to finish the main set just left you wanting more, and the encore was a great way to round off the evening. Liam introduced I Am The Walrus by saying "this is definately the last song. You've been fantastic. Nearly as good as us." - and he wasn't lying - Oasis were absolutely excellent, and much better than the previous evening. They may be unimaginative (no, really, they are), but they can still put on a great crowd pleasing show.

Oasis - Heineken Music Hall, Amsterdam, Netherlands - Wednesday 21st January 2009

2009-01-21T17:01:00.003Z

As I was due to be in the Netherlands for a couple of days on a work trip, I was overjoyed when I found out that Oasis were playing in Amsterdam when I was due to be at a loose end of an evening. I was even more happy when my trip got extended from one night to two - and Oasis were playing the other night too. Both gigs were sold out, but a trip to Seatwave got me tickets for both nights, at not too much of a premium (most of the rip off was in Seatwave's booking and insurance fees - so as well as encouraging touting, they are making a hefty chunk of cash out of it too - scumbags!). Early in the week, Oasis cancelled a date in Dusseldorf, when Liam was told to rest his voice. So, the shows were touch and go in the end, and I was in full solidarity with Liam by having a full blown sore throat as well.

The venue was the Heineken Music Hall, a purpose built music venue in the complex next to the Amsterdam ArenA football stadium - alongside a big cinema and some shops and restaurants. It was a good size venue, which looked quite a bit smaller than (say) Wembley Arena. There was a big flat floor, a few seats at the back, and a couple of small balconies on the first floor. Given that most of the venue was on the ground floor, I'd say it was a bit bigger than Brixton Academy, but not much bigger - making it a pretty small venue to see a band like Oasis.

As I was going into the venue, I was standing with quite a few (mainly Northern) English lads, who had been on the drinks and smokes all day in Amsterdam. But, once I got inside, I heard few English voices - it was a largely Dutch crowd. One thing that amused me was the generally wide tolerance of spliff smoking in the venue - a very Dutch audience indeed - along with some crazy mullets in evidence in the crowd.

Oasis bowled on stage at 9pm on the dot, and played a setlist that was extremely standard by recent standards (i.e. the same as they have been playing for the last 6 months). Liam was wearing a very cool looking coat - like the jackets the Libertines used to wear, with columns of buttons down the sides. His voice sounded somewhat ropey from the off - even as early as second song Lyla, he couldn't really hit some of the high notes in the chorus, and needed considerable help from Noel's harmonies to make the choruses sound OK. On a couple of other occasions, most notably in To Be Where There's Life, he was distinctly out of tune, and it seemed as if the instruments were carrying him a bit. Liam dedicated Cigarettes & Alcohol to anybody "not stoned", which got a big cheer from the front.

As the set went on, Liam got better, and so of course did the songs - saving bankers like Wonderwall and Supersonic for towards the end. When they play songs like that, you can't really fail to like them. I thought that a couple of Noel songs, especially The Masterplan and The Importance Of Being Idle, sounded immense tonight, and really underline how many great songs they have. They may not have made a decent entire album for 10 years, but there are some real standout songs along the way, and The Importance Of Being Idle is definitely one of those.

All in all, this was a relatively standard Oasis gig, pretty good, but a setlist that they just seem to be able to bash out in their sleep by now. They are very polished at playing this particular set, but you hope that it might change a bit before their big UK gigs in the summer. After a day's work, I'll head along tomorrow night for some more!

Dead Social Club, The Belgrave Scandal - Bardens Boudoir, London - Sunday 18th January 2009

2009-01-18T22:22:00.008Z

There was plenty to do on this particular Sunday evening. There was a snooker final on TV - always good for consuming an entire evening - and the Philadelphia Eagles were busy losing the NFC Championship game too. But, there was a free gig on offer - 2 of my friends' bands, at a trendy venue, in a trendy part of town. So, I jumped in a cab and headed into the depths of Dalston, to see some live music.

First on were The Belgrave Scandal (well, there was supposed to be another band on first, but they showed up at the venue half an hour after they were due on stage). They played a similar set to recent shows, drawn largely from their newer material. There was a decent crowd in the venue (certainly for a Sunday night in a place that isn't on the Tube), and they seemed to react well to the Scandal's songs. For me, their guitars sounded particularly good tonight - lead guitarist Dave was on top form, and the sound was distinctly trashy and exciting. A shame that they haven't played The Collection for a while, but you can't have everything I guess. They promised new songs at their next gig, which sounds enticing.

After very little changeover time, Dead Social Club took to the stage. By this time, there were a few more people in the venue, making it seem that bit more atmospheric. They played about 6 songs, which again sounded excellent, proving that the last time I saw them wasn't a flash in the pan. Their earlier songs seemed to be quite long, and to take a while to build up - but by the end, you appreciate why. Their final song, The Bridge, is a real slow burner, which builds up and up to a series of riotous choruses - very good indeed. Their sound is hard to put your finger on, but I would stick with a combination of New Order, Joy Division (same thing, almost), and Bloc Party, with a bit of Killers synth in there too. Decent band, and they have some decent slots lined up for the next couple of months too.

Work trip to Atlanta and Philadelphia, USA - 12th to 15th January 2009

2009-01-15T16:32:00.005Z

A two-stop trip to the USA, taking in a city I'd never been to before in Atlanta. Right down in the south of the US, I was expecting lazy drawling sentences, and food that had enough cholesterol to kill you if you even just looked at it.

When the plane landed at the huge Atlanta airport (the busiest in the world), the large queue at immigration was not a surprise. There were a lot of people (which does tend to cause queues), and judging by the immigration officer I saw, they do not exactly employ the brightest minds down south. As I was waiting in the queue, a plane load of soldiers was arriving - as they walked through the immigration hall, there was a spontaneous round of applause - something one would never see anywhere except the USA.

Despite lots of fanfare about them moving to an electronic travel authorisation (of which the day I arrived was the first day), I still had to fill in the annoying green visa waiver form. This did leave me wondering what the point of the switch was - it presumably creates some convenience for the US authorities, at the cost of extra hassle for travellers.

After all the waiting and hassle of immigration, we were then made to go through security to get OUT of airport! Atlanta is a huge connection hub, so I suppose the majority of people arriving on international flights would need to clear security anyway - and I guess they think its easier just to make everybody do it. But when you have just got off a 9 hour flight, and just want to get out of the airport, it is absolutely the last thing you need! After security, you then have to take a 6 stop train journey to get to a place where cabs pick up - a truly huge, but rather inconvenient and unfriendly airport.

Atlanta itself is a car city, a bit like LA, so there are plenty of freeways with 8 lanes in each direction. On the approach to the city, it has a typical US city skyline - a few distinct "signature" skyscrapers, plus lots of other generic tall buildings. But because of the sprawl, and the fact that it is built for cars, the centre of the city is pretty dead - especially after 6pm. That makes it a weird place to be staying - after all the office workers go home, the area is inhabited just by lonely people on business trips! Because you need a car to get about (despite the excellent subway system, everybody seems to use a car - the subway was empty when I went on it), walking the pavements is a lonely thing to do - there is absolutely nobody walking around the city.

My Atlanta hotel was the huge Marriott Marquis, which, as with many of the city's landmark buildings, looked like it was built around the time of the 1996 Olympics. It had a huge atrium which looked like a massive ribcage, going right the way up to the top of the building. But, being January, there being a recession, and the Olympics not being in town at the time; the place was very empty. Apparently a lot of the big hotels in town are like that - they built lots of capacity for when the whole world came to visit for the Olympics; but the world hasn't seemed to be too interested in coming back since.

All in all, my experience of Atlanta wasn't great - one of the big advantages seems to be the hot weather, which wasn't especially evident in the second week of January. If you have a car, I'm sure things are more entertaining, but Atlanta did not seem like one of the better cities in the USA - far from it in fact - a somewhat soulless place, with an eerily quiet city centre.

After a couple of days in Atlanta, I flew to more familiar territory - Philadelphia. When I landed, and during my 24 hours there, the temperature didn't get above -10C the whole time. It was so extremely cold that it was just funny - although the lack of wind meant that it could have been a whole lot worse. I was only in Philly for a day or so, but after Atlanta, it was comfortingly familiar. This will be my last trip to the US for a few months - a shame, as I like Philadelphia more every time I visit.

Arsenal vs Bolton Wanderers - Emirates Stadium, London - Saturday 10th January 2009

2009-01-10T15:14:00.006Z

On the coldest day in London for over 10 years - it never got above freezing all day, Arsenal fans were not exactly in the mood for another display of negative football, which is to be expected when Bolton are in town. The away side named only 4 subs, presumably to make a point about how stretched they are, and to try to justify the inevitable negativity and all out defence. For their part, Arsenal were suffering from injury losses too, Gallas joining the casualties, and that meant Kolo Toure became our seventh captain of the season so far.

In the shivering, freezing cold, the first half wasn't too bad an affair (at least by the standards of recent home games), the highlight being a decent Van Persie chance, where he controlled the ball, and went for a nice flick with the outside of his boot. Other than that, the talk at half time was whether this was the coldest football match in memory - recalling happy days at Oldham, Middlesbrough and Stoke.

As expected, and as usual, the second half saw Arsenal step things up a bit in the search for a goal. There was an increasing amount of "knocking at the door" (as Arsene Wenger would put it) - including a fair sitter missed by Adebayor (who had yet another nightmare game - his form really is awful at the moment); and a very decent long range shot from Kolo Toure.

As the half went on, we saw the predictable substitutions from Arsenal, which really illustrate how few options we have available at the moment. Bendtner and Vela came on for Eboue and Diaby - hardly inspiring. It did at least mean that Nasri was able to move infield, where he looks like our best creative option in the absence of Cesc Fabregas.

Finally, when it looked like we might be heading for an unbelievably frustrating 0-0 draw (with Kevin Davies as the irritator in chief); Bendtner made a decent contribution for once, stealing in at the far post to put the finish on an excellent ball that Van Persie (again looking sharp and generally at his best) had put across. Bendtner has been far from impressive lately, but this was an important goal, and will hopefully be the start of a bit of form for him - we certainly need it from either him or Adebayor! The second league game in a row that finished 1-0 to the Arsenal - at the moment, we all realise that there are many worse results than that.

Work trip to Zeist, Netherlands - 6th to 8th January 2009

2009-01-07T13:35:00.003Z

What better way to start the year, than with a work trip to the Netherlands? In the middle of a huge cold snap in the UK, the Dutch had an even worse one. It was foggy, the fog was freezing, there was snow and ice, and it got down to -10C. I often think that UK weather is bad, but other places seem to have extremes that we just don't get close to. It was so cold (and slippery) at times, that it was just funny rather than annoying.

I was staying in Zeist, which is a pretty rich town by the looks of things. One of those places that's near enough to the big cities to be useful, but from which you can just walk off into the forest. Not surprisingly, a lot of well off people choose to live there, because it is a lovely place to live if you like peace and quiet.

For dinner one night, we ventured out of the hotel, to a Chinese restaurant. It seemed to be quite busy, and there were even some Chinese people in there - always an encouraging sign. I have experienced the ubiquity and strangeness of Dutch Chinese restaurants before, and this was another such experience. It turned out that the place was full because it was their Tuesday "all you can eat" night, so we got to enjoy weird satay stuff, and a bizarre mix of Chinese, Indian and Indonesian food. I know that UK versions of ethnic foods are probably not 100% authentic, but the Dutch versions are even less so.

My journey home was one of those bad ones that happen from time to time. It was an especially foggy day, but the airport seemed to be open, and flights were leaving OK. I waited there for a few hours, until my flight was boarding - whereupon they cancelled it. Apparently, fog in London had closed City airport - typical that the UK weather caused chaos, whereas the (worse) Dutch weather caused no issues at all. A quick call got me the last available seat on a Heathrow flight - involving an hour's delay and an annoying detour. The whole experience reminded me of how crap the UK can be at times, and how much better the Netherlands seems to be on so many fronts!

Arsenal vs Plymouth Argyle - Emirates Stadium, London - Saturday 3rd January 2009

2009-01-03T16:10:00.003Z

FA Cup Third Round day is always one of my favourite days of the season. People go on about "the magic of the Cup", but it really is good to see big teams forced to play against those annoying smaller teams - and of course, to see which of them come unstuck in the process. The draw was good this time around - a home draw against Plymouth, which meant a fairly easy game (one hoped) for Arsenal; and 9,000 Plymouth fans in town for an almighty day out. Always a very good natured day, and being a Saturday 3pm game made it all the better.

Surprisingly, Arsenal started the game with pretty much a full team - the only first teamer that didn't start was probably Adebayor (although on his current form, whether he should be making a first choice XI is quite debatable - only the fact that Bendtner is worse would save him). For most of the first half, Arsenal were cagey - or it could be that Plymouth were doing very well in front of their massed fans. They even had a couple of decent chances, and with a bit more luck, could have caused us a few real problems. At the other end, Arsenal had a couple of sniffs, but not much more than that. A decent first half for Plymouth - Arsenal were not a class apart by any means - but it was hard to tell whether that was because Plymouth were bright, or Arsenal were quiet.

Very early in the second half (in fact, the seats were still only just filling up after half time), Robin Van Persie (who was captain for the day) put Arsenal ahead. This kind of killed the game as a contest somewhat, at least for a few minutes - and you couldn't help thinking that Arsenal had just been toying with Plymouth, before finally deciding to put them out of their misery. We weren't in total control by any means, but the goal showed that bit of class that Plymouth just didn't have themselves - so it really seemed to highlight the difference between the 2 teams.

A few minutes later, it was 2-0, then 2-1 - Bendtner looked like he forced a Plymouth player to turn into his own net, one of the few decent things that he did, during another disappointing and frustrating performance. Almost immediately afterwards, Plymouth went up to the other end and scored - I wasn't really paying attention to the game at the time, but it certainly drew a decent cheer from the 9,000.

So, 2-1 for the majority of the second half, and it stayed that way until right at the end, when Van Persie added a third. Being the FA Cup, we also got to see a few of the younger players - Kieran Gibbs came on as a first half substitute, and looked very impressive I thought, to the point where I hope he starts next week against Bolton. We also got to see Carlos Vela and Jack Wilshere again, although neither really had enough time to make that much of an impact.

All in all, a very professional job was done today. Looking at how Chelsea and Man City got on, there are always a few teams that slip up in the FA Cup Third Round - so you always breathe a little sigh of relief when you get through unscathed. Plymouth obviously raised their game because it was a big occasion for them, so it was more difficult that it may otherwise have been. Arsenal weren't exactly sparkling, but seemed to do just enough to get what we needed. Onto the draw for the 4th Round.

The Belgrave Scandal - Proud Galleries, London - Thursday 1st January 2009

2009-01-01T22:11:00.003Z

Everybody must know that New Years Day is the new New Years Eve, right? You get to go out to bars that aren't completely packed with idiots (and are actually pleased to see you), you avoid being ripped off at every turn, and you can leave before midnight without missing all the fun. So, having done nothing on 31st December, I ventured out on 1st January instead. Not much seemed to be open in London, but one place that pushed the boat out was Proud Galleries. And, The Belgrave Scandal were playing as well, which provided another reason to hotfoot it over to Camden. Whilst waiting for the band to play, we took over a nice stable, which also featured a lovely pole dancing pole in the middle.

After an interesting sounding band that I didn't catch the name of (they also looked like the Yeah Yeah Yeahs), the Scandal appeared on stage. The gig room at Proud was furnished with some nice comfy sofas, and there were a decent number of people inside, sheltering from the freezing cold. The band played what has become a fairly standard half hour set - at least from the last couple of times I've seen them. They kicked off with Black Pages and Brighton Away, then showcased a few of their newer songs. These new songs seem to be growing on me, the more I hear them - a slower number with no name (yet) in particular sounds like a corker.

As each song passed, the volume of the applause from the audience seemed to get louder and louder - and the first timers in the crowd seemed to be moving their feet and getting into the set. We finished as usual with Take That Train (still my least favourite Scandal song), and an excellent version of House Of Cards. All in all, it was a really good set - Dave's vocals sounded stronger than ever, and the band seemed to be enjoying the set as well. The new songs increasingly stand out in their set, and they have a couple of even newer songs in the pipeline, which will hopefully carry on the improvement. A good start to 2009 for The Belgrave Scandal, hopefully this will be their year.

Arsenal vs Portsmouth - Emirates Stadium, London - Sunday 28th December 2008

2008-12-28T16:59:00.003Z

This was one of those games where the result was much, much more important that the way it was achieved. After a couple of draws in the past week - both against good teams, but you feel we needed more than 2 points from the 2 games - it was important to pick up 3 points here, against one of the so-called "lesser" teams. It was good to see Tony Adams again, and nice that he waved when Arsenal fans sang at him, but we were hoping to make him unhappy in his day job.

The first half was boring. When we all gathered under the stand at half time, the over riding thought was "how very dull". There was lots of Arsenal passing, but very little penetration, no real chances created, and not much to get excited about. Bendtner and Adebayor did not exactly make a dynamic duo up front, Nasri was stuck out on the wing, and the rest of the midfield hardly looked creative. At the other end, Peter Crouch was allowed an unchallenged header, which hit the post - reminding us of Arsenal's defensive frailty, which could strike any any moment.

The second half started as more of the same - Arsenal had the vast majority of possession, created a couple of chances, but either nobody felt like shooting, or the final ball was astray. Still, we know from enough previous games that patience is key here - if we try it enough times, we will score eventually.

The introduction of Carlos Vela made a big difference to the game, for me. He went on the left wing, Nasri switched to the right, and the move injected some flair, creativity and something interesting to Arsenal's play. Vela was lively, worked hard, scared the opposition, and generally played a big part in helping to win the game. The winner came from a Gallas header, but Vela had done enough to unsettle the opposition defenders over the past 10 minutes, to be able to claim some of the credit.

Three points to finish the year, and overall, it doesn't seem like too bad a Christmas break now. For sure, we need to bring in some further resource to our squad in January, just to give us a few more options of the type that Vela provided today. We still have an uphill struggle to finish fourth I think, but with no League game for 13 days, we can at least forget about it all for a short while. A useful 3 points, the result was much better and more important than the game and performance.

Aston Villa vs Arsenal - Villa Park, Birmingham - Friday 26th December 2008

2008-12-26T20:03:00.002Z

Generally speaking, I like Christmas football, and Boxing Day football in particular. Strange things tend to happen, and you tend to see some weird results. Today, we just saw a great game of football - really exciting, and what makes people say nice things about English football. I went to Birmingham in full expectation that Arsenal would lose to Aston Villa (possibly quite badly), so the eventual result was better than that as well.

The first half was a masterclass of Aston Villa's ability to create high quality chances, and Arsenal's total inability to defend against a decent team. Villa hit the woodwork at least 3 times in the first half, and created a stack of other chances too. The worrying thing throughout was that you could see lots of the chances coming from a mile away - the dangerous free kick that you just knew would find a Villa head and lead to a chance on goal, for example. Arsenal often had all 11 men back defending, but seemed totally unable to prevent such opportunities turning into occasions where the defence was evaded, the keeper beaten, and only the post saved Arsenal from going behind.

Having had such a rotten first half (other than a slight sniff for Van Persie, we did not look like we had a hope in hell of scoring), it was a very pleasant surprise when we scored about 5 minutes before half time. To describe this as "against the run of play" is a huge understatement - when I saw the ball hit the back of the net, I was too surprised and disbelieving to actually celebrate properly! It was a decent finish from Denilson, but completely undeserved on the balance of play, so it made for an amusing time in the away end.

After a half time break spent discussing how lucky we were, we went 2-0 up after a few minutes of the second half! A good move, this one - Diaby was having one of those rare moments where he looks like Patrick Vieira at his best (I did say it was rare). There was some great work by Eboue on the move as well, setting up Diaby for a very good finish. This goal was celebrated properly on the pitch and in the away end - we had an amazing and very lucky 2-0 lead, which prompted shouts of "we've only had 2 shots".

Even more stupidly, after going 2-0 up, we briefly became the better team in the game - some good passing, a few decent moves, and about 5-10 minutes where we looked in control of the game. Van Persie hit the post with our best chance of this period, but it didn't last too long. We were brought back down to earth with the award of a penalty to Villa on the hour - which looked justified enough both at the time, and watching on TV later. Barry took it very well indeed, it gave Villa a huge lift, and prompted Arsenal to resort to hoofing the ball into the upper tier of the stands in desperation again!

After all that, it wasn't a surprise when Villa eventually equalised, after yet another defensive lapse from Arsenal. It was in the 91st minute - always a time where you expect this Arsenal side to concede. But overall, I have mixed feelings about this one. Of course, it is very frustrating to have been 2-0 up, then 2-1 up on 90 minutes, and still to "only" draw the game - especially when it isn't the first time that we have let a lead slip recently. But we didn't deserve 3 points from this game, by any stretch of the imagination at all - so one cannot be too upset about not getting what we never really deserved. A point was better than I expected from the game, less than we could have got, and less than ideal. But, hard to complain at the end.

Arsenal vs Liverpool - Emirates Stadium, London - Sunday 21st December 2008

2008-12-21T18:47:00.008Z

Having played, and got decent results, against the rest of the "Big 4" so far this season, Liverpool was the final test. They came into the game top of the League, so the team to beat for the season so far - even though I don't really rate them all that much, they do seem to be doing all the things that Champions do. Winning when playing badly, being quite lucky with injuries, getting fortunate refereeing decisions - they have had things their way so far this season. Whether they have the bottle and experience to keep going through the run-in is another matter - and that is where I think they will come unstuck.

I sat upstairs for this game - there was a fantastic view of the whole stadium, but it did seem a bit remote - like a TV view. I was very pleasantly surprised by the level of noise up there, I had expected there to be more atmosphere on the moon than in the Upper Tier, but there was singing and everything, throughout the game! Perhaps the fact that I was above the REDsection helped matters here, as the noise from downstairs definitely seemed to encourage people upstairs. There were a few muppets (including a Liverpool fan, who cheered when they equalised), but generally a good crowd near me. A pleasant surprise.

The first half started OK, got better, then got worse for Arsenal. We went ahead after a period of play where we looked increasingly dominant. The goal was a good one, the finish from Van Persie in particular was one to watch again on TV. Along with his goals at Chelsea, he seems to be showing this season that he is a big game player, and can score cracking goals in important games too. Towards the end of the half, things turned for the worse. Firstly, Liverpool equalised - a ball over the top exposed our obvious defensive weakness, and Robbie Keane (of all people) scored with an excellent finish. When the ball came over, our centre backs were far too far apart, and were totally outpaced. We knew that they were prone to it, but it was depressing to see it happen yet again. Then, right at the end of the half, Fabregas limped off with an injury that could cost us far more than a poxy equalising goal over the rest of the season. Grim stuff going into half time.

The second half started off OK, Arsenal looked quite bright. But, 15 minutes in, Adebayor's sending off really took the wind out of the home side. It looked like a very harsh decision, but then the ref seemed extremely fussy all game (except of course when Keane tackled Gael Clichy very hard early on - and he gave nothing). Generally, he kept blowing his whistle all the time - usually in Liverpool's favour. Adebayor's second yellow card was probably technically correct as a decision (and you have to question Adebayor's sanity, knowing he'd been booked, knowing the referee was fussy, but still going in for the challenge) - but it still makes Howard Webb something of an officious tosser. For much of the rest of the game, there was excellent focus in booing the referee for his anti-Arsenal decision making - there is no way he would have done that at Anfield or Old Trafford, and the crowd let him know what they thought of him.

After the sending off, Arsenal dominated much of the rest of the game. A few players seemed to clearly step up and take some responsibility, and the general team performance looked like one of those "backs to the wall" displays that you sometimes see from teams with 10 men - and better than we might have had with 11 men. Arsenal seemed to have all of the initiative, created the vast majority of the chances, and it was generally incredible how little ambition Liverpool showed. On their display for the last 25 minutes of the game, they did not look like potential or worthy champions - but then, they are much better than us at disposing of the crap teams!

Overall, a point was a very decent result in the circumstances. Our opponents were top of the league, we played with 10 men for half an hour, lost Fabregas at half time, and the referee was Liverpool's 12th man. At times towards the end, you thought we could have won the game - but given all that happened, it is hard to be too disappointed with the draw.

Mumford And Sons - Pure Groove, London - Friday 19th December 2008

2008-12-19T21:22:00.005Z

Over the past year or two, one of the real shifts in the music industry in London has been in its record shops. On one hand, the crappy chains are deservedly struggling, as people realise that they don't need to spend £13 on a chart album any more. At the same time, the "proper" record shops seem to be going from strength to strength. Selling original stuff that is hard to find elsewhere, and being great places to spend time, the more innovative shops are also going into the gig business, with lots of instore performances. Pure Groove is one such good shop - selling only 100 items, hand picked by the staff, just their choice of 100 albums, singles and t shirts (plus 100 free downloads as well, from their website). Doing that in Central London (rather than up Holloway Road, where the shop used to be) is a risky thing to try, but the in store performances really attract people in now.

One such performance attracted me in, by Mumford And Sons - a band whose MySpace tunes and EPs had really impressed me. In fact, they had been on almost constant rotation on my iPod for the previous couple of weeks, so this was an easy choice to make about whether to go. I got there half an hour before show time, and joined a queue which quickly got quite a bit longer. We waited in the cold for half an hour or so, and were then let into the shop, walking past some blokes standing having a cigarette by the door as we went.

Those blokes turned out to be the band, who soon afterwards walked through the shop, and got up on stage for a 4 song set. I had heard 2 of the songs before, but the first and last ones were new to me - and I really enjoyed the whole set from start to finish. The singer bears more than a passing resemblance to Carl Barat, but it is his voice that really stands out - it is an absolutely rasping, piercing voice, incredible. The band's music is reminiscent of Noah and The Whale (and the other London bands from the same scene), but seems much more folky and American at the same time. Although it is all rather familiar, they definitely seem to have something about them that others do not - and some pretty good songs as well.

This was of course a very short set, but I really, really like this band - they are going to record a new EP in January or February, so hopefully that will mean more gigs very soon. If there is any justice, Mumford And Sons will be coming to many more peoples attention next year.

The Hold Steady - Roundhouse, London - Wednesday 17th December 2008

2008-12-17T22:46:00.007Z

After almost a year of not having seen them, and a near miss when they postponed this gig from October, I went along to see the new, improved Hold Steady. With a new album out this year, and one which received a warm critical reception too, the band are inching towards the more widespread success that their music and lyrics deserve. This show was their biggest ever headline gig, an event which London has hosted before, on the band's rise.

We got into the venue very early for some strange reason, to find the main room almost totally empty. There were a few people bagging a space by the front barrier, but apart from that, there was nobody in the venue. Maybe because The Hold Steady don't often tend to have decent support bands, and that it had been incredibly hard to glean any info about who was opening up for them - so people had no reason to show up early. The support band were called The Mark Inside, and whilst stationed at the bar, their set rather passed me by. I was vaguely aware of a band playing somewhere in the distance, but they seemed utterly unremarkable, they looked like they were trying to look like Kings Of Leon, but didn't seem to have either the charisma or the songs. So, not a huge surprise that all involved seemed determined to keep their appearance a virtual secret!

By the time The Hold Steady came on stage, the venue had filled up nicely, but it was still fairly easy to get a decent place in front of the mixing desk. They kicked off with Banging Camp, before the opening tracks from the current album, Constructive Summer and Sequestered In Memphis made an appearance, to a very enthusiastic response. The band spoke very little to the audience, preferring instead to just crash from one song straight into another. Surprisingly for me, the songs seemed to be drawn fairly evenly from their last 3 albums, with a few from their debut in there as well. So, a career spanning set, in front of an audience who seemed to know even the older stuff - obviously their back catalogue has been selling OK!

All in all, this was an awesome set I thought, the band seemed tight as ever, and the songs were again a perfect soundtrack to a lairy night. The singer was looking as up for it as ever (he has apparently lost weight too, due to all the exertion of being the band's frontman), and as the set progressed, he did start to talk a bit more. Their version of Lord I'm Discouraged, which ended with a solo on a double necked guitar, was suitably over the top and rock and roll; and I loved the version of Your Little Hoodrat Friend that rounded off the main set, and was a real highlight of the show. A minor shock in the encore, that they didn't finish off with Killer Parties, but this was a brilliant show overall, and reminded me how much I'd missed seeing the band over the last year.

The Belgrave Scandal - Monto Water Rats, London - Saturday 13th December 2008

2008-12-13T19:23:00.002Z

As quickly as possible after the lower league football match, I headed back into town for a meeting with The Belgrave Scandal. Playing the opening slot at the Water Rats, it was a struggle to get from Leyton to Kings Cross in time - but I just about made it. This is a great venue for the Scandal to be playing - the venue for Oasis's first ever London gig (although they play bigger places now), and a room that The Courteeners were playing in just 14 months ago. The band at the top of the bill, The Maybes?, are getting good reviews also, so an all-round decent slot to be playing.

The band came on stage just before 6:30, and kicked off with Black Pages and Brighton Away. The stage was bathed in lots of blue light, and the room was full of smoke, which made the room seem fuller (and hotter) and the set more atmospheric (even if the guitars did seem to be a bit too quiet). The audience were also fairly quiet for this one, but of course it was early, and they definitely got warmer and more enthusiastic as the Scandal's set went on. By the time Take That Train turned into House Of Cards at the end of the set, there was a decent sized crowd, and they seemed to be enjoying what the band were doing.

This set provided another good opportunity to hear some of the band's new songs - a couple of which are new to the point that they don't have names yet. One which does, 5 O'Clock Shadows, has really started to grow on me, and the other newer ones sound like they represent a different and very positive direction for the band. This is probably the last Belgrave Scandal gig of the year, they have definitely improved hugely (especially in the vocal department) this year - and their new songs really sound like they are capable of doing things in 2009.

Leyton Orient vs Cheltenham Town - Brisbane Road, London - Saturday 13th December 2008

2008-12-13T16:45:00.003Z

The annual trip to see Leyton Orient play, which took place in the pouring rain, as is traditional. We arrived in the ground early, to take advantage of the Arsenal match being shown on the big screen in the bar. We had £35 "gallery" tickets again, which gave easy access to a nicely stocked bar, and some lovely salt beef sandwiches for £4 a throw. The gallery also had heating, which was a big bonus on a pretty disgusting day for weather.

Shortly after the Arsenal game finished (in disappointment, for the umpteenth time this season so far), we went outside to brave the elements and watch the third division football on offer. It was raining hard, and the pitch was very wet indeed, which added to the amusement value - footballers that aren't very good in the first place, don't get any better when they play on a pitch that kicks up spray every time you touch the ball. So, there was a lot of slipping and sliding around, which made the tackles seem even clumsier and less skillful. What might be a yellow card in the Premiership and Champions League, you are lucky to get a free kick for at this level.

Early on in the game, the weather claimed its first casualty - the linesman slipped and pulled a muscle, which required 5 minutes of treatment before he was replaced by the fourth official. Either that or he didn't fancy standing in the cold, so he faked it. That was an unusual thing to see, and it added to the amusement of those around me, that we were watching something quite amateurish (although of course a linesman at any level can get injured). From a refereeing point of view, the rest of the game was no less lively, with a penalty and a red card to add to the list of incidents.

Orient and Cheltenham, both towards the bottom of the division, were fairly evenly matched, and so the game was quite tight. Cheltenham took the lead in the first half, before Orient equalised through what looked like a rightly awarded penalty. Then, in the second half, Cheltenham got the winner, with a goal that reminded me of Wayne Bridge's Champions League winner at Highbury in 2004 - painful memories there! We were sat just behind the benches, so we got to experience the crazy antics of Cheltenham manager Martin "mad dog" Allen - he shouted like a nutter throughout, but it obviously worked, because he got the result.

Orient players were booed off at the end, after a disappointing performance, where they created little, but still contrived to miss a couple of really good chances. JJ Melligan provided most of their creativity on the right hand side, but (like many flair players) absolutely did not fancy the parts of the game that required slightly more work. He went missing when Cheltenham scored the winner, and even changed his kit at one point, because it got wet. A good player, who annoyed defenders when he ran at them with the ball (the red card for the away team came when somebody clattered him), but something of a tart apart from that. This was a pretty big win for Cheltenham, so their fans were making all the noise when the game finished - as the Orient fans skulked away, muttering under their breath about the missed chances to win the game.

Arsenal vs Wigan Athletic - Emirates Stadium, London - Saturday 6th December 2008

2008-12-06T17:17:00.008Z

Straight off the plane from Philadelphia, I went to this game, hoping that Arsenal could win 2 League games in a row for the first time in a while. Having beaten Chelsea away the previous week, we were all aware that it would have all been in vain if we couldn't do the same against Wigan. Despite a disappointing defeat for the kids against Burnley in the week, we had Adebayor and Van Persie back up front for this one, as well as the excellent looking Djourou in defence again, and Kolo Toure back to partner him.

Things in the game started off OK, then got a bit more frustrating, before eventually turning weird. The first half hour saw Almunia with little to do in goal; Arsenal having the majority of possession; and creating a few decent half chances. After about 25 minutes, a ball seemed to deflect off Alex Song into the path of Adebayor, who pounced to sweep the ball past Kirkland for the goal that won the game. A good reaction from Adebayor, who managed to remain onside, and was in the right place at the right time.

The second half contained the frustrating and weird parts of the game. Arsenal created and squandered a host of chances - hitting the post more than once, and having at least 3 other chances where you just couldn't believe how they didn't go in. This happened across the first 30 minutes of the second half. Then, with 15 minutes to go, Arsenal seemed to crap themselves - as if they feared that they wouldn't score a second, but might concede a goal. They retreated to defending, and in the process, handed the initiative to Wigan. Wigan responded, came back into the game a little more, and an Almunia save from Melchiot was needed to keep us in the game.

The scapegoat for all of this was Emmanuel Eboue, who came on to replace Nasri on the left wing after half an hour. He had been injured for 6 weeks, and was playing in a totally unfamiliar position, so his poor game was understandable. What wasn't acceptable was the extent to which the Arsenal fans got on his back. He isn't the greatest player in the world, but booing your own players is inexcusable. Arsene Wenger admitted that he was becoming a liability, in no small part because the fans were on his back so much - which ultimately led to his substitution, and the cheers and boos as he went off. I have no idea who these Arsenal fans are, but there were a hell of a lot - too many - of them. Alan Hansen thought so too it seems, Arsenal fans have something of a poor reputation right now - and rightly so on this showing. No matter what the frustrations this season, booing does not help, and "fans" should not be doing it.

Work trip to Philadelphia, USA - 1st to 5th December 2008

2008-12-05T17:17:00.006Z

What seemed like my billionth trip to Philadelphia (actually, I counted, it was the 8th time I've been), and I still haven't seen the Liberty Bell. Shameful. This was also my 7th and final visit to the goons at US Immigration this year, and thankfully my final foreign trip of the year. It got off to an annoying start, with an excruciatingly long flight over there. 200 mph head winds meant that we almost started going backwards as we approached the US east coast. All in all, we were in the air for almost 9 hours (as opposed to just over 7 that it should have taken) - I really wasn't psyched up for that at all, so it was a very boring and annoying flight.

Some of these trips involve a decent amount of "play", mixed in with a lot of hard "work", but this was not one of those. This was generally all work, and lots of it - there just never seemed to be enough hours in the day whilst I was there. Apart from an evening out seeing Nada Surf, this was a trip of long hours, lots of meetings, and not seeing a lot apart from my office and my hotel. So, although I have had some good times in the US this year, this was not a memorable trip to finish off the year.

One thing I did encounter (again) on my travels was a branch of the Philly deli chain called Wawa. This sells sandwiches, coffee and the like, but encapsulates the endless complexity and customisation options that exist in the US. You can have everything they sell, every possible way - so complicated in fact that you have to go through a touch screen set of menus just to order a sandwich. I captured the whole ridiculous set of choices, here.

Not much to write home about other than that - I saw a lot of people wearing Phillies clothing (now that they are World Series champions) - or maybe I just noticed them more. Those 200mph winds were still there on the flight back home, so we were in the air for less than 6 hours. Good to put the passport away for a while, I'll enjoy not going near an airport for a month or so.

Nada Surf, Delta Spirit - Trocadero, Philadelphia, USA - Thursday 4th December 2008

2008-12-04T17:16:00.005Z

Whilst in Philadelphia, I was keen to do something other than work, so it was good to see that Nada Surf were playing. I had seen them at Glastonbury back in 2003 (and in the 1990s also I think), and they were quite good (especially as the sun was out at the time), so I downloaded their new album, had a listen, and bought a ticket for the show. It seemed like I was one of the only ones that did, as I got an email the day before, advertising 2 for 1 tickets on the door. Given that the venue was like a converted cinema, so couldn't have held more than 1000 people, that constitutes a real struggle to sell their tickets.

The support band were called Delta Spirit, and having been banished to the balcony if you wanted a beer (and been banned from leaning over the balcony with a drink in your hand, presumably lest the evil substance pollute the under-21s below), we settled down to watch them. They had a very radio friendly sound I though - what Americans call "alternative", but the UK thinks of as mainstream. So, they played songs that sounded, well, nice - they played them very well, but I didn't think they were particularly exciting. Towards the end of their set, they got a lot better - they pulled out their one or two really good songs, and also played a mini-encore as well, featuring a cover. The last 10-15 minutes of the set was actually pretty enjoyable, but it was a shame that the previous half hour wasn't as good.

Then, Nada Surf appeared, to a hall which was actually decently full by the time they arrived. I recognised their first couple of songs, and they seemed to be getting a good reaction from the audience. I have heard 2 of their albums - current album Lucky, and their 2002 album Let Go. Given that, I recognised probably the majority of the songs they played, which was quite pleasing. Pleasing because it meant I enjoyed the gig more, but also because I presume that the stuff I know is the good stuff! They had a female vocalist join them on stage for one song, which featured some nice chorus harmonies, but for most of the gig, they were a 3-piece.

Generally, most of Nada Surf's songs were again quite radio friendly alt-rock. During the show, I was thinking about this, and how strange it is that there is lots of this kind of music in the US, but relatively little appetite for it in the UK. Nada Surf would be highly unlikely to be very successful in the UK - because there just doesn't seem to be the market for what they do - no huge network of competing commercial radio stations, no advertisers that demand inoffensive content that sounds nice, but is fairly bland.

Having said this, Nada Surf have a tidy collection of some pretty good songs, as far as alternative radio rock goes, they are definitely among the best of the bunch. A very "American" experience here - not the type of show and tour you would see happening very much in the UK. So, an interesting experience, I was very glad I went.

Chelsea vs Arsenal - Stamford Bridge, London - Sunday 30th November 2008

2008-11-30T17:13:00.007Z

A thoroughly fantastic afternoon in West London, made all the better because it was so unexpected. Going into the game, expectations of a decent result were pretty much as low as they could have been, given recent form, injuries and internal strife. Coupled with that, Chelsea are obviously a tough team to play at any time - although they have not been quite firing on all cylinders recently, they had Anelka in form, and of course are dangerous.

I got to the ground about 20 minutes before kick off, just in time to see and hear the Chelsea stadium announcer do his stuff. This odious little tosser should really be banned from doing what he does, so much of a windup merchant he manages to be. Today, he was fairly restrained, a sarcastic "welcome back" before he introduced William Gallas, a big build up for Ashley Cole, and a mention that Wayne Bridge "once scored a goal at Highbury". No other club seems to have so little class - but then Chelsea are of course a breed apart from normal, decent clubs.

Apparently, things were not much more sporting in the Sky Sports studio for this game - always an organisation that loves it when Arsenal have a bad time. Their pundit panel was made up of former Chelsea manager Ruud Gullit, and Jamie Redknapp - the man whose Dad manages Spurs, whose cousin plays for Chelsea, and who used to turn out for Liverpool and Tottenham. He hates Arsenal, and is barely able to disguise it. Added to Andy Gray, it was a hostile panel at best - thanks as ever to the Arsenal haters at Sky.

The first half seemed to last for about 5 hours from where I was standing - which was high up in the corner of the away end. Chelsea had the better of the first 15 minutes or so, having lots of possession but not creating a great deal. Midway through the half, Arsenal created a couple of decent chances, but then seemed to fade and let Chelsea take control again. The referee seemed to be giving a number of soft decisions to Chelsea, but I guess that is to be expected when you are at Stamford Bridge, and when the referee has Terry and Lampard in his ear all the time. The Chelsea goal was unfortunate - mainly because Djourou had a very good game apart from scoring it - luckily he didn't end up as the fall guy for another defeat. The only other incident of note in the first half was when Ashley Cole came over to pick the ball up from near the Arsenal fans, and had lighters, coins and kitchen sinks galore thrown at him. No less than the little twat deserves.

So, at half time, we went in with an uphill task. The second half started much the same - Chelsea seeming to be in control possession-wise, but not really creating anything. The Arsenal defence of course played their part in that, mopping everything up excellently at the back. The Arsenal equaliser came after about 10 minutes, Van Persie firing an excellent shot into the top of the net. Immediately, I started getting texts saying that he had been offside, but who cares. He added a second, which was definitely not offside, about 5 minutes later, and it sparked the most mental goal celebrations I have experienced for a while - both on the pitch, and in the away end.

When the second Arsenal goal went in, quite a few around me were starting to say "oh shit, we have quite a while still to go". But, the team kept their discipline and resolve, and saw the game out. Despite a total lack of running (or in fact any movement at all) from Adebayor, and some shocking refereeing decisions (of course not mentioned by Scolari when he was moaning about the Van Persie offside), the job was finished. Talking of the referee, Branislav Ivanovic must be getting him a fantastic Christmas present! How he stayed on the pitch, after a number of clumsy and cynical challenges, was a mystery - but referee Mike Dean spinelessly failed to book him on a number of occasions.

So, a very useful win, and if that doesn't give our players confidence, nothing will. We even did it despite being 1-0 down at half time, despite Adebayor being anonymous throughout, and despite Almunia's distribution playing us into trouble on more than one occasion. It was strange how little Chelsea managed to create in the game, and it is notable how their new manager has failed to beat a "Big 4" team in his 3 attempts. All good news, and the celebrations amongst the away fans continued for some time after the final whistle. Of course, none of this will help us beat Wigan next weekend, but it does at least provide a day in the sun for the time being.

A Quick Minute, Dead Social Club, Day And Buffalo, The Belgrave Scandal - Tower Tavern, London - Saturday 29th November 2008

2008-11-29T21:14:00.004Z

This was the first ever proper gig by a band called Dead Social Club - my mate is the singer, so I went along to see what they were like. As if I needed any further encouragement, The Belgrave Scandal were playing too, so it seemed like a thoroughly decent way to spend a Saturday night. I got to the Tower Tavern, a pub next to the BT Tower, whilst the bands were still soundchecking, and therefore managed to get away without paying the £6 door tax. So I spent the £6 on 2 beers instead.

The Belgrave Scandal were on first, and surprised me. Every time I see them after not seeing them for a while, they surprise me with how good they are. They definitely get better all the time; their new songs are increasingly good; and the way they execute them live is also getting tighter and tighter every time I see them (apart from the odd off-day, which surely everybody is allowed!). They started off with my new favourite song of theirs, Black Pages, and played 2 or 3 newer songs that I'd never heard before as well. All sounding very promising, the move to London seems to have been a good thing for them, and you just get the feeling that a bit more hard work will soon see them noticed.

The next band were a Japanese band called Day And Buffalo, who were more than a bit strange. Their lead vocalist sat on a bar stool on the floor of the pub, facing the rest of the band on stage. The other vocalist was a Japanese woman who was wrapped up in a big shawl. Lots of low level weirdness, but despite this, they were actually quite good. They had definite influences that were obvious for all to see - The Pixies, Sonic Youth, The Breeders - so if you like those band, you would probably like Day And Buffalo. The Pixies angle was especially strong, given the male and female singers in tandem. There were some very good power rock riffs in there too, something of a throwback to the early 90s, but a very enjoyable set.

Dead Social Club were on next, and by the time they came on stage, the venue was absolutely packed with friends of the band. So, they had the crowd in the palm of their hands from the very beginning. I wasn't sure what to expect from them, especially being their first gig, but I was really, really impressed. They had obviously been practicing, which is cheating! Their sound reminded me at first of Bloc Party, with grinding guitars, atmospheric keyboards, and haunting vocals. However, as the set went on, they started to remind me more of New Order or Joy Division. In fact, after a couple of songs where the bass and keyboards really reminded me of New Order, they then played a New Order cover - a really very good version of Ceremony. All in all, this was a great start for the band - a friendly crowd cheering their every move helped, but the band showed that they are a decent prospect - they have good songs, play them very well, and have a sound that is reminiscent of other good bands, but still something individual to themselves. A very good start, I'll be back for more gigs soon.

The final band I saw in the evening were A Quick Minute, who reminded me to some degree of The Darkness. They played amusing cliched rock songs, but also had a funny, really over the top stage presence - like the band was sharing a joke with the audience. Some of their songs were half decent as well, some decent heavy rock riffs, and some good singalong metal-light choruses. A pretty entertaining live show all in all, and it was obvious that the band were having fun in the process.

This was actually a very good evening of live music at the Tower Tavern, I saw four excellent bands. It helped that the venue was packed for the Dead Social Club set, and that set went off really well - so that alone made it a good night. The Belgrave Scandal played an excellent set as well (just a shame that there weren't more people there to see it), and the Pixies influences of Day And Buffalo gave us some decent tunes in between. But tonight was all about Dead Social Club's live debut - and a very promising debut it was too.

Work trip to Brussels, Belgium - 26th to 27th November 2008

2008-11-26T17:18:00.003Z

Another of those 2 day, 1 night work trips, this time to my office in Brussels. So, it was off to St Pancras International to get the Eurostar again. Although getting the Eurostar is much more convenient than heading all the way out to the airport (for me at least), it is often cheaper to fly - especially if you want any flexibility, or any modern travel conveniences. My ticket for this journey cost well over £350 return (partly my fault for booking late), and when you get a cold “cooked” breakfast, whilst sat on a tired and tatty seat, you do wonder what they spend the money on.

Talking of tired and tatty, I saw lots of building work going on in Brussels, some of which is long overdue. Parts of the city are gleaming and modern, of course – but others are very run down. Gare du Midi, where the Eurostar arrives, is a good example – on the platforms where domestic trains stop, I would be amazed if there has been any work done for 30 years or more. Much of the city’s infrastructure, and a surprising number of city centre buildings are like this – they look like they haven’t been updated or even touched since the 1970s. So, although the building work is a small annoyance, it needs doing for sure, and there is lots more on the “to do” list!

My hotel on this trip was on Place du Sablon, in an area that I’d never been to before. I was really pleasantly surprised – the square had an amazing looking old church on one side of it, there was a huge Christmas tree in the middle of the square, and the "normal" trees were also decorated with Christmas lights. Given that it was very cold and foggy, there was a lovely winter feel to the place – and there were plenty of bars and restaurants in the streets around the square to warm up in. A really nice part of town, that I will try to stay in again when I visit next.

On the way home after my meetings, I encountered a full lounge – full of EU workers who had knocked off for the weekend (on Thursday afternoon!). It made for an interesting journey home, listening to the sheer number of acronyms they spoke to each other in. Although they were (apparently) speaking in English, much of what they were saying was truly unintelligible. Who needs the arguments over whether to speak French or English, when they have invented a language all of their own?

Arsenal vs Dinamo Kiev - Emirates Stadium, London - Tuesday 25th November 2008

2008-11-25T21:17:00.005Z

There have been some bad weeks for Arsenal fans recently. Losing to Fulham, Hull and Stoke were all bad. Losing various players to various injuries doesn't make things better. Realising that you will not challenge for the title, and will struggle to qualify for the Champions League, is a depressing thing to come to terms with - especially in November. But generally, the 10 days leading up to this game were full of depressing stuff for Arsenal fans. A spineless loss against Aston Villa; Theo Walcott getting injured for 3 months whilst on international duty; Gallas opening his big fat mouth and getting us all over the back pages for the wrong reasons; and finally another pathetic, directionless defeat against Man City. With Gallas (at last) stripped of the captaincy, and Cesc Fabregas installed as captain the day before the game, most were hoping that a genuine turning point (for the better) had at last been reached.

The game itself was more of the same (or at least similar) in terms of the performance. Arsenal created little, struggled to cope at times with a Kiev side who were very physical, and didn't often look like scoring. Given the number of injuries (not to mention the bad form), expectations were low, and the game was very much as expected. It was quite tight, fairly unremarkable, and not all that good to watch. Kiev had a couple of chances towards the end, as they realised that a draw would not be good enough for them, but Almunia made some good saves to keep us level.

Then, a few minutes from the end, Nicklas Bendtner latched onto a fantastic long pass from Captain Cesc, to score. The fact that he managed to control the ball was mildly surprising, but the finish was emphatic. Even if he was wearing the most ridiculous pair of pink boots when he did it. Kiev players were frustrated and appealing to the referee, but they can all sod off, especially the one who got a second yellow card for his troubles towards the end.

This was one of those games where, undoubtedly, the result was much more important than the performance. Keeping a clean sheet was a very positive thing (although I suspect Chelsea will test us more in that department on Sunday),; and a win sees us through to the knockout stages of the Champions League, and therefore able to rest some players in Porto in 2 weeks time. The way our season is going, you have no idea what will happen on Sunday now – whether a win tonight means that we will lose then for sure, or whether this is finally the start of a run of form. For the time being though, congratulations to Captain Cesc, and good luck for the rest of your (hopefully long and successful) reign!

The View, Holy Ghost Revival - Astoria, London - Friday 21st November 2008

2008-11-21T21:16:00.007Z

Eighteen months to 2 years ago, I seemed to see The View all the time. Last time I saw them properly was at The Forum in London last April, but the first time was only about 6 months before that - and I'm sure I saw them half a dozen times in that short period. They have been away for a while, making a second album, and this was the sole London date on a huge tour of the UK - taking in some very small venues, in some towns that wouldn't normally get a visit from a band like this. So, this was by far the biggest date on the tour, and there seemed to be photographers galore at the front.

Support for this show were Holy Ghost Revival, one of The View's labelmates on 1965 Records. Having a former Rough Trade employee as your head honcho (one who signed The Libertines too), should spell success - but The View aside, none of 1965's other signings have really pulled up any trees. Watching Holy Ghost Revival made it easy to see why not. The band had a pretty "unique" stage show - pretty entertaining in parts, and you could see how somebody could see them live in a small(er) venue and think they were amazing. But, they seemed to be all about the live show, and not much about their songs, which seemed distinctly average.

The band are from Seattle, and have a frontman who more than earns his money. He sang 2 songs from in the crowd, and he reminded you of Iggy Pop with his shirt off, rolling around on the stage. Their tour manager even came on stage to sing one song, which was probably the best of their set. It was very entertaining to watch (even if it was a bit reminiscent of The Darkness in its over the top, cheesiness) - you didn't want to take your eyes off the stage in case you missed something. But, not a single song that they played made any lasting impression. I can see how they got signed on the strength of their live show - but can also see why they don't sell many records. If you heard them on CD without seeing them live, you wouldn't give them a second listen. That said, I will try to get in early, next time I see them supporting somebody, as they are worth another look live.

Very early (but then, this is the Astoria), The View came on stage to a venue that still had lots of space to move around in. They started off with a couple of new songs, the second of which was the excellent new single 5 Rebbeccas. That was followed immediately by Wasted Little DJs, by the end of which, everybody was thoroughly warmed up! The set comprised about half old and half new songs overall, the newer songs sounded generally quite good, albeit more elaborate and less punky than the older material. The audience seemed to react well to the new songs too, which bodes well for their new album.

But overall, it was of course difficult to go mad to songs that you were hearing for the first time. This was a showcase gig, but the warmest audience reactions were still for the old, familiar songs - and these were sprinkled in regularly, so that a familiar tune was never far away. The set ended up in familiar style, with Same Jeans and Superstar Tradesman, although there did seem to be a couple of other decent songs that might make potential set closers in a few months time. The View seem to be capable of writing material that at least lives up to their first album. Welcome back.

Trip to New York and New Jersey, USA - 14th to 20th November 2008

2008-11-18T22:24:00.012Z

Following a few days in New England, we headed back into New York city for the weekend. The commuter train from New Haven trundled through lots of towns on the edges of New York, before eventually going underground, then pitching up at Grand Central Terminal. A few blocks walk along 42nd Street, and we reached our hotel, the Hilton New York. A room on the 35th floor gave a pretty decent view of (some of) the city, and you could just about see the lights of Times Square. Being a posh Hilton, doing anything more than breathing the air was obscenely expensive - despite having a "free" breakfast included, we were still expected to leave a 20% tip on the $50 "cost" of the breakfast - a nice scam.

The following day, we woke up to pissing rain and virtually no visibility whatsoever. Arsenal were due to play at 10am, so we headed to Nevada Smiths to watch the game. Given the result, I wish I hadn't bothered - another spineless display from Arsenal. In the pub, it was amazing how many people were there (it was packed at 10am when the UK games kicked off), all wearing various Premier League team "jerseys". There was a good Arsenal contingent there, as well as a surprising number of Fulham fans. There were lots of football songs being sung throughout - with lots of strange accents used in them, and in the ways that people were describing the game. "That's a cock sucking call" was said a few times - just weird. Warren Barton was the TV studio pundit for the coverage of the Arsenal game - sadly, with the sound turned down, we did not get to hear his perceptive analysis!

On walking out of the pub after a(nother) depressing Arsenal display and result, we almost bumped into the Kaiser Chiefs, who were playing a gig that night at a venue a couple of blocks away. All very English - bumping into an English band, after watching a football match in the pub - all in the middle of New York.

We seemed to divide much of the time in New York between the SoHo and Greenwich Village area; and Midtown. Staying in Midtown meant a fair bit of walking around that area - at around 5pm on Saturday night, we were in Times Square, which was like hell on earth. Very busy with very, very slow moving and dithering people. Even late on Sunday night, the place was packed - MTV were doing something with a famous person in their studios, so there was a huge crowd outside watching. The whole city seemed to be rammed with Brits as well, all most weird.

After a weekend in New York City, we headed off to Hoboken in New Jersey, to stay for a few days. In reality, this is about 10 minutes (at a quick time) from Manhattan, but may as well be a million miles away in many respects. Being in New Jersey, it is not in either New York City or State, so it is not on any of the transport maps, and is generally not considered by New Yorkers. Getting on the train there was like going back to the 1970s, although the brown, cream and orange decor didn't help there! The main street of Hoboken had lots of independent shops and restaurants, and a generally slower pace of everything than Manhattan.

So, despite Hoboken being a decent enough place to live, eat and shop, we found ourselves heading back into Manhattan every day, for more excitement - it seemed crazy to have New York so close, and not to go there. We did the MoMa, Top Of The Rock, Central Park, and all of the standard stuff - then concentrated on buying stuff (despite the rapidly worsening exchange rate). It was getting colder and colder by the day, so indoor activities started to take over the agenda. It was a great few days in New York, but eventually the cold was setting in so much, it was good to get back to London - relatively warm at a whole 10 degrees.

Trip to Connecticut, Rhode Island and Massachusetts, USA - 10th to 14th November 2008

2008-11-12T02:28:00.011Z

This was my 6th trip to the USA this year (so far) - this time for a holiday in New York and New England. We flew into New York, stayed for a short night's sleep, then headed straight out of town the next morning. We caught a train from Penn Station to New Haven, Connecticut - to pick up a hire car, then drive around New England for a few days. The train trip out of town took us past some lovely looking NY stockbroker belt towns. We also got to see the beauty of New England in the fall - going through valleys with fantastic colours, as the leaves all changed colour before falling off.

New Haven is a pretty town, and also the home of Yale University. That means there are lots of students, which in turn means good cheap food. Best of all is Pepe's Pizza, which came highly recommended by a few American friends that had been to New Haven. "Best pizza I've ever eaten" was a comment from more than one person. So we headed there, and got 2 people absolutely stuffed on fantastic pizza for under $20 in total. The pizza was very authentic, and absolutely delicious. The experience was rather like a pie and mash shop - things work in a very particular way, and you need to learn what that way is quickly! They have obviously been doing the same thing in exactly the same way for years - which, when it is that good, makes complete sense.

Having picked up a car, we drove through Connecticut - seeing pretty valleys and villages - then into Rhode Island. Rhode Island is a very small (in fact, the smallest), but a very independent state - one of the first to declare independence from Britain, and quite non conformist on lots of other counts too. We entered Rhode Island almost by mistake - driving through a nice looking village centre, which turned out to be 2 villages - Pawcatuck in Connecticut, and Westerly in Rhode Island - which are joined together. We crossed the state line halfway down the main street, and it was something of a surprise. There were lots of other really picturesque villages by the coast in the state, the village of Watch Hill in particular had a very nice harbour, and some absolutely huge houses! Eventually, we wound our way to Providence, the state capital, then exited the state again, into Massachusetts, where we stayed the night.

The following day was spent driving around Cape Cod. Again, there were lovely small villages, beautiful scenery, and those multi coloured trees again. Being 11th November, it was Veterans Day, so there were parades and ceremonies in the small towns. We stopped in the lovely town of Falmouth just before 11am, and saw their Vet Day parade, which reminded me how much more respect Americans seem to have for their servicemen that we do.

Many of the towns in the Cape Cod area are named after towns in Devon and Dorset, like Falmouth, Yarmouth, and Barnstable. Driving around, it was clear to see that the area is a big tourist area (and the scenery was amazing) - but it did have some of the slightly depressing features of small town America. The same chains of restaurants and hotels seemed to repeat themselves every few miles. There are many motels and diners, mostly built during the boom in car ownership and population in the 1950s - and many have not had a lick of paint since. They have either been taken over by the same big national chains (there is a Dunkin' Donuts every 2 miles, it seems), or have just been allowed to become shabby and neglected - all of which makes for a slightly "faded glamour" feel. I suppose going in November, when it was all quite empty and closed up, may not have helped on that front. In general in the US though, I have found that there is great diversity (in things like the people, food, etc) in the cities, but that the small towns all seem to be very similar. Maybe that isn't too different to the UK or anywhere else, but it really strikes you when you visit small town America.

Talking of Devon towns, our tour of Cape Cod eventually ended up in Plymouth, where some of the original pilgrims from England landed - in 1620 in the case of this small town. We saw their boat, and the famous Plymouth Rock, which is supposed to have been the first spot where the pilgrims set foot in America. This was a town full of history, all linked to England, and to the birth of the US as a nation, so it was a really interesting place to look around.

After a night in Plymouth, we drove the short trip to Boston - no trip to New England would be complete without visiting its biggest city. Boston is obviously a pretty big and significant city, and also has bags of history - many of the "first" things in the US were done there. In fact, Boston, New York and Philadelphia are the 3 big cities in the US that do actually have decent history to speak of. The centre point of Boston is a place called Boston Common - a big green area, right in the middle of the city, that has been the centre for meeting, protest and demonstration since the early 1600s. It is one of those great city centre parks, that gives you the fantastic view of significant green space, with the city's buildings rising up in the background.

Boston Common is also the starting point for the Freedom Trail - a 3 mile walk past most of the city's historical landmarks. These include the old Boston City Hall, the state Senate building for Massachusetts, and a whole load of old buildings with historical significance - not just for Boston the city, but some central places to the American Revolution too. The mix of (small) old buildings and (big) modern buildings made for a strange sight at times. Many of the plaques talked about how they didn't like the English very much, luckily, they seem to have warmed to us again since! During a fantastic day of sightseeing there, we visited Cambridge (home of Harvard University), and the North End (the big Italian neighbourhood in Boston), as well as covering most of the centre of town (using the Subway, which had a station with the fantastic name of Alewife). Boston seemed like a really, really nice city - which I got the feeling would be a great place to live. It is dominated by various universities - so there are lots of young people there, and everything seems very relaxed and easy going.

After the day in Boston, the weather turned wet, so we were glad to have got the sightseeing in whilst the weather was good for doing it. The next day and a bit was spent making our way back from Boston to New Haven - slowly, and with plenty of stops and picturesque detours. One big stop was in Mystic, Connecticut, where I was introduced to Five Guys - quite simply the best burger and fries it is possible to eat. They have a branch about a block away from my office in Philadelphia, so I will most definitely be making a number of further visits there. I just wish they would come to London.

All in all, a great few days in New England, looking at some lovely countryside, and exploring a fantastic city. After giving the hire car back in New Haven, we jumped on a commuter train back to New York City, for a few more days there.

Arsenal vs Manchester United - Emirates Stadium, London - Saturday 8th November 2008

2008-11-08T13:25:00.004Z

After the most difficult week in a while for Arsenal (in fact, since the last one - about a month ago), what better than a game against Manchester United to get back on track. Before the game, most seemed to think that we would get beaten and beaten badly; whilst a few had a sneaking suspicion that having struggled lately, we would never be more likely to turn around and beat the Mancs. We were of course all hoping for the latter. In the papers before the game, Nicklas Bendtner was getting lots of press, being pretty much our only striker available. Arsene Wenger was also full of fighting talk - chatting about how our problems aren't due to inexperience, and how a player can be intelligent at 20, or stupid at 30. Fabregas and Gallas seem to bear that out.

So to the game, which overall was a pulsating and enthralling game, one of those games that makes people trot out the cliches about the Premier League being the best in the world. End to end stuff, both teams doing lots of attacking, and plenty of excitement from start to finish. Arsenal probably shaded the chances created, and definitely made more of theirs, which on the day was the difference between the two teams. The pundits were purring afterwards, and this time, for once, they were right.

Nicklas Bendtner was quiet, but did some very important work up front, allowing Nasri to step up and score the 2 goals. Denilson had his best game for a while, working hard in midfield, and the defence (Clichy in particular - again - as well as Almunia) had a good game. By contrast, Manchester United were wasteful in front of goal, Wayne Rooney especially having a bad day at the office (after his recent run of such good form as well - shame!). On another day, with Arsenal finishing like they had against Fenerbahce, and United finishing like we know they can, United could have won this game 4-0. But they didn't, they lost it 2-1, which sparked an all day party in Islington.

The size of the party was all the bigger, given the fact that we seemed to have been playing against 12 men at times. The referee was fussy in penalising Arsenal players, and didn't seem to apply the same standards to the other team. In the first 20 minutes, Wayne Rooney amazingly escaped a booking for a cynical and deliberate hack on Theo Walcott, and we then saw 2 Arsenal players booked for essentially the same offence. Then at the end, the referee added 6 minutes of injury time, which seemed like the longest 6 minutes ever. The 6 minutes were probably just about merited, but it did seem to add to the feeling that Howard Webb was trying to afford Manchester United every advantage. You won't hear that on TV, but that was definitely how it seemed from the stands.

Anyway, sod the referee, even he couldn't take victory away from us. Arsene Wenger has said that our title fortunes this year will depend on how we do against the big 4, and this was a good start. It is very frustrating that we can beat the best of the best, but insist on making title challenges so difficult by capitulating to crap teams. Still, I will never, ever tire of watching Arsenal beat the Mancs, so this was a very welcome victory indeed. I would much rather we beat Man U and lost to Stoke, than the other way around. Thinking about it like that, maybe it wasn't such a bad week after all.

Arsenal vs Fenerbahce - Emirates Stadium, London - Wednesday 5th November 2008

2008-11-05T19:23:00.007Z

Since the disaster (which had been waiting to happen, one suspects) at Stoke, there has obviously been lots of fallout. In the 4 days since, lots of writing and lots of opinion has emerged, including this incisive piece from the Gooner editor. For many Arsenal fans, the rest of this season will now involve detaching from any idea that we might win the League, hoping that we can finish in 4th place to qualify for the Champions League; and praying that Arsene Wenger can come around to recognising where things have gone wrong - then start to get back onto the right track.

This game wasn't the best start, to be honest. Probably best described as 2 hours of my life that I'll never get back, it was one of the more dull, frustrating and generally forgettable games of recent memory. Fenerbahce were clearly in no mood to concede five goals again, so they turned up looking very defensive indeed. They went forward about twice - maybe three times - in the whole game, but otherwise just concentrated on wasting time and not conceding. All of the "European" tactics were on display - shirt pulling, falling over, rolling around, getting the physio on, making substitutions last 5 minutes - and for the away side, it all worked a treat.

Having said all this, of course there is some responsibility attached to Arsenal for the 0-0 draw. Teams will occasionally come to Emirates to defend and waste time, and if you are a team with aspirations to win things, you should be able to deal with this. More often that not, Arsenal would have been able to (especially at home in Europe) - but not tonight. Confidence is generally low at the moment, and things were definitely not right in the passing and shooting departments. Fabregas looked like a completely different player to the maestro who won the European Championships; Van Persie did almost everything right until he got into the penalty area, whereupon he became completely unable to shoot on target; and Bendtner had a real game to forget, with little impact at all. There were others that didn't exactly have a game to get excited about, and generally the wayward passing was a worry for the second game in a row.

So, there wasn't much to get excited about in this game - lots of the buildup play was fine, but let down by one pass too many, or a dodgy final ball, or a crap shot. But on the bright side, we kept a clean sheet, we didn't lose, and a couple of players that had been drafted in for the day (Djourou and Ramsey in particular) looked decent. Manchester United, Liverpool and Chelsea also all struggled in the Champions League this week, and in a way, it isn't a bad thing that we play United on Saturday - I'd almost rather play them than a team that's had a week off. It would be just like Arsenal to win that game after a few games of crap - at least, that's what we have to hope!

Work trip to Paris, France - 4th to 5th November 2008

2008-11-04T19:22:00.004Z

I hadn't been to Paris for 9 months or so, and was missing the place. Sadly, however, this trip did not involve the opportunity to see anything except train, station, metro, office, and hotel - then the same sequence in reverse the following day. So, the massive roof of St Pancras station - still amazing even when you see it for the 10th time - was about the most interesting thing I saw on the whole trip. That and the inside of the bar next to my hotel, where I had dinner - which had Good Shoes, The Pigeon Detectives, and Oasis on the stereo - strange but good.

My hotel room was a typical Paris hotel room - about the size of a postage stamp, and of a slightly dubious level of cleanliness and modernity. The hotel was firmly from the 1970s in most ways. What did surprise me was that I had a full 4-poster bed in my room - but then virtually no other floor space apart from that. To take the picture here, I was practically climbing out of the window, so cramped was the room. Made me wonder why they bothered with the stupidly extravagant bed, in a room the size of a broom cupboard. Very Parisian. This trip was very little except travelling and working, but it did at least remind me that I like Paris, and I need to come back for a weekend before too much longer.

Stoke City vs Arsenal - Britannia Stadium, Stoke - Saturday 1st November 2008

2008-11-01T19:14:00.009Z

Although I don't go to anywhere near as many away games as I used to - travelling so much for work has removed my desire to go up and down the country at the weekends - I am still a sucker for an opportunity to visit a football ground I've never been to before. So, Stoke City away in the Premier League was an opportunity that wasn't going to be missed in a hurry. On an absolutely freezing day, we hit the M1 to head for one of England's less remarkable towns.

And utterly unremarkable it was too - the Britannia Stadium is just off the motorway, in the middle of an industrial estate. Pre match entertainment consists of a crap branch of Harvester, and the surroundings include factories, car parks, and car showrooms. All very boring - there are lots of new grounds like this (including Reading, Bolton, and many more); and every time I visit one, I thank our lucky stars that Arsenal built their new stadium close to civilisation, rather than by the motorway.

Because of the lack of anything whatsoever to do outside (and the cold and windy weather), we headed pretty quickly into the ground. Luckily, the pies on offer were the best thing about the day, so it was good to have plenty of time to enjoy them! The chicken balti pie actually tasted of something, and the pie tasting in general was the absolute highlight of the day!

When the game started, the locals were very predictably small time and bitter, with plenty of chips on their shoulders. Of course, as an Arsenal fan, you encounter all the bitterness about us being a "Champions League" club; and are also hated for coming from London (of which many Northerners seem to have a pathological hatred - they should remember who subsidises them!). In addition, given our foreign players, the locals often also resort to old fashioned small minded patriotism - the "In Ger Lund" song was first aired a whole 2 minutes after kick off. So all in all, the Britannia Stadium is one of the less hospitable grounds in the Premier League for an Arsenal fan.

I said that the pies were the highlight of the day - they didn't have much competition from the football. Arsenal just didn't seem up for the game at all, and Stoke took full advantage. We did start with some taller players, to counteract Stoke's long throws and aerial ability - it would have been nice if Toure in particular had tried jumping though - his lack of any effort to clear a Delap long throw led to the first goal. Toure didn't want to jump up to head it away, Almunia didn't fancy coming to get the ball either - Arsenal players just didn't really seem to care about having the ball all day. Given that, Stoke's superiority in effort and application meant that they thoroughly deserved the win. The game was marked (again) by a lack of any creativity from Arsenal - we hardly created a chance all game, and the norm was for passes to find the opposition rather than a yellow shirt.

Adebayor limped off just after the second goal, and Van Persie got himself sent off with a ridiculous and unnecessary challenge on the goalkeeper soon afterwards. He obviously couldn't be bothered to stay out there any longer, and as a result is now banned for League games against Manchester United and Aston Villa - just when he had watched fellow striker Adebayor walk off injured. Thanks Robin, you are a genius. If that doesn't get him fined a couple of weeks' wages, nothing will - but I suspect that Wenger will defend him as usual.

So, we have now lost to Fulham, Hull and Stoke - 2 newly promoted teams, along with a cast iron favourite (as usual) to be relegated. Along with disappointing draws against Sunderland and Spurs, and the fact that we still haven't played a decent side yet, and it is all very depressing. With our next 4 League games against Manchester United, Aston Villa, Manchester City and Chelsea, this could get a lot worse before it gets any better. And the buck for all of it has to stop with Arsene Wenger, and his decision not to strengthen the squad in the summer. If he honestly thinks that there is no player out there that could make our squad better, he has lost the plot completely.

Wenger said that Stoke were physical - they were slightly (although not overly), but if you know that is going to be the case, you buy some players to cope with it. Wenger seems to be doing little to address the obvious flaws in our squad, but is then complaining when those flaws are exposed. The whole game was such a disaster that there were Arsenal fans fighting amongst themselves by the end. A real day to forget. The title challenge is over, and Arsenal fans are no longer in any doubt that we will face a real battle to finish in 4th place this season. We have an abject lack of bottle, determination, "mental strength" and decent leadership in our side at the moment, and I think that many people will rightly be questioning whether Arsene really "knows" anything any more.

Some good stuff has been written in the aftermath of this game, firstly by Gunnerblog, and secondly by Arseblog. I would agree with both - it is sad what is happening to Arsenal at the moment, and we have to hope that it does not get too much worse, before it starts to get better.

Arsenal vs Tottenham Hotspur - Emirates Stadium, London - Wednesday 29th October 2008

2008-10-29T21:21:00.004Z

This was a good game of football - with, from an Arsenal fan's view, an utterly shameful result. No team - I don't care who they are and I don't care who they are playing - should draw a game after being 2 goals up in the 89th minute. They certainly shouldn't do it if they aspire to win the League, and they most definitely should not do it against their local rivals, the team at the bottom of the League. Arsene Wenger admitted he was angry afterwards, and most Arsenal fans were even angrier - with him and his team. First Fulham, then Hull, now Tottenham - this Arsenal side have such a soft centre at times, it is ridiculous. We have now dropped 10 league points without even playing a decent side yet. On our day we can beat the best in the world, but we don't have enough of those "days" at the moment; and our off days are very worrying indeed.

From a neutral's perspective, this was a great game - reminiscent of the 5-4 game at White Hart Lane in 2004. Neither team's defence really covered themselves in glory - Spurs' defence and keeper seemed to crap themselves every time Arsenal brought the ball near them; and Arsenal's keeper in particular (not helped by his defence), let in practically every shot that Spurs managed to get on target. In terms of the play, how Spurs managed to get a draw still confuses me, because Arsenal played them off the pitch at times. But, we have only ourselves to blame for what happened in the end.

The first goal, and the first sign that this might not be as easy as we'd all hoped, came after about 15 minutes. Bentley picked up the ball about 40 yards out, and booted it over Almunia's head and into the net. The goal reminded me of the "Nayim from the half way line" effort that Spurs are so fond of - a bit of a freak goal really. Bentley saw Almunia off his line, and it was a good strike - but not one you see every day. By just after half time though, Arsenal had got themselves back to 2-1, with two very similar goals. A corner which Silvestre headed in, and a free kick which Gallas headed in. Not often that you see 2 Arsenal goals from set pieces in a game, but nobody near me was complaining.

It even got better before it got worse, 2 more goals from Adebayor and Van Persie, and all seemed to be well with the world. Then it all went wrong. Gael Clichy fell over for no apparent reason, the defence failed to close Jenas down, and he curled a shot past Almunia for 4-3. Then, right into stoppage time, another long range shot bounced off the post, the Arsenal defenders were nowhere to be seen, and Lennon got there first to score the equaliser. Spurs players and fans celebrated like they had just won the Champions League (a reminder: it was only a draw, and you are still bottom of the League), and there was silence pretty much everywhere else in the ground. If you lose a game you deserved to lose, there are no complaints, but to throw away a win like that is just ridiculous. Fair play to Spurs, in keeping going until the end, and playing for each other when they got their chances, they did what we used to do quite well.

Afterwards, Arsene Wenger trotted out the usual crap about the team being young, and about this being a learning experience. How many more learning experiences must we watch this team go through, after Fulham, Hull and now Spurs? Surely they don't need to learn how to not concede 2 goals in injury time? Something seems to be wrong with the Arsenal team at the moment, and we can only hope that it gets fixed soon. I suspect that the root of the problem might begin with a "G" and end with "allas", but we will just have to trust (again) that Arsene knows best. But more than a few Arsenal fans are finding their faith in Arsene distinctly tested just lately.

Oasis, Glasvegas - Roundhouse, London - Sunday 26th October 2008

2008-10-26T22:09:00.007Z

The final show in the BBC's Electric Proms was a big one. Oasis and Glasvegas, at the Roundhouse in Camden. It was announced a few days before their album came out (although those in the know had been hearing rumours for a while before that), and when tickets went on sale at 8:15am one day, they were all gone in literally a few seconds. Then they were all over eBay for silly money. So, I was delighted that the promoters (and presumably the BBC themselves) put some very strict anti-touting measures in place. Ticket holders had to go to the venue any time from 10am on the day of the gig; show photo ID, a credit card, and proof of address, and be wristbanded, along with their guest. You then needed your wristband and a ticket (the number of which was cross referenced against the wristband) to get back into the show later. Really strict, and hopefully this will be applied to other gigs in huge demand in future. Anything that makes tout vermin's lives harder, or that removes their customers by making them not willing to risk cash if they may not get in, is great news.

Anyway, I got into the venue just in time to see most of the Glasvegas set, although I did miss the first song or two. Watching from the back, they looked and sounded incredible as ever. Since I last saw them, their album has come out, almost outselling Metallica in its week of release - so they are becoming really big news. I thought that their sound was much clearer than any time I've seen them before - maybe because there were professional TV sound engineers looking after it. And, they were very very loud - even after half an hour, my ears were fully ringing when they left the stage. A really good set, and I'll definitely aim to go and see them again soon.

Between Glasvegas and Oasis, there was the opportunity for plenty of celebrity spotting in the seats upstairs in the venue. First person we saw was Joe Cole and his WAG, sat in the front row at the side of the stage. Then, more and more people kept appearing in the centre of the upstairs - Samantha Janus, Nicole Appleton, Russell Brand, and eventually ~~James Bond~~ Daniel Craig. When that lot were all in place, it was remarkable how crap Joe Cole's seat was by comparison - definitely a second class celebrity at this gig!

Eventually, Edith Bowman bounded on stage and introduced Oasis, and we could then get on with probably the best Oasis gig I've seen in a long while. The small venue helped, and the idiot count was extremely low - this was fairly hardcore, pretty cool Oasis fans only. Liam seemed up for the show, and all of the band in general seemed to be really enjoying themselves - when that shows through, it always makes for a good gig. In many respects, this was like the triumphant homecoming gig in front of a select group - and in that regard, it was a privilege to have been there.

There were rumours of special covers, and songs that aren't played very often, but none of that materialised - the set was identical to the one that has featured on the current tour. Although there was a 50 piece choir backing Oasis, they didn't really seem to do anything different as a result - the choir just fitted in around the band's normal set. In the venue, you couldn't even really hear the choir, it was only when I got home and put the TV on that you knew they were there. Having said that this was a fairly standard Oasis show, the sound was very good, and there was a fairly riotous atmosphere for the vast majority of the songs. So although the songs were the same, the occasion, performance and atmosphere were all significantly better than a normal Oasis gig.

The set lasted for about an hour and three quarters, and hearing songs like Slide Away, Wonderwall and Morning Glory never fails to remind you of how absolutely fantastic Oasis are/were as a band. The old songs sound so good (even if Liam's voice can't quite do all that it used to any more), that you almost wish they would stop making new records, and just play all the classics every time. Of course, everybody, including the BBC, NME, and Gigwise were at this show, so reviews are ten a penny. From my perspective, this was a special show, one that I feel lucky to have been at, and a great reminder to the world of what a good band Oasis are.

New Orleans Saints vs San Diego Chargers - Wembley Stadium, London - Sunday 26th October 2008

2008-10-26T17:12:00.010Z

I had an American colleague in town this weekend, so I reluctantly abandoned West Ham vs Arsenal, and went to Wembley for the annual NFL game there. I'd never been to an American Football game before (although I'd done hockey and baseball before), so was interested to see what it was like. Although, probably the reason I'd never been before was that it doesn't really interest me that much - so I was more of a curious observer than anything else. In Central London during the day, and later on the approach to Wembley, I saw plenty of people wearing NFL clothes, split pretty evenly between Americans and Brits. The Brits in particular were wearing shirts from any and all teams, not just the 2 that were playing this game.

After the pre match warm up, sponsored by Visa (which I was really grateful for - how else would it have happened, without Visa's amazing support?!), the players buggered off, and the "pre game show" began. This featured Stereophonics playing a couple of songs (not very loudly) from a stage which was wheeled onto the pitch just beforehand. The whole thing was supposed to by hyping up the excitement levels, but it all just seemed more than a bit fake. Whilst Stereophonics were playing their songs, the Saints cheerleaders were doing their stuff, people were moving big inflatables around, and some soldiers brought British and American flags onto the pitch. There was lots going on on the field, but I struggled to see the point of it all. Then, they had the national anthems sung - Ne-Yo singing the US anthem, and Joss Stone singing God Save The Queen. When Joss Stone was introduced, she was roundly booed, and deservedly so! Finally, we had the "coin toss", which Rebecca Adlington "helped" with - strange to introduce a British swimmer that won 2 Olympic gold medals, when this just seemed to give the Americans there an excuse to talk about how Michael Phelps won 8 gold medals. Anyway, after all of this completely over the top buildup, the game finally started!

The game itself was a decent enough game actually - fairly open and high scoring, with a few touchdowns, and some good "glory" passes and runs. One thing I noticed was that it seems to take forever and a day to do anything - for example, the last 5 minutes or so of the second quarter took about half an hour! Kick the ball, take 6 seconds off the clock, stop the clock, go for an advert break! It all just seems to drag out far more when you are in the stadium (which to be fair is also true for televised football matches, especially the break after the players come out) - which of course reminds you that this sport is made for TV. All those breaks are great when you are at home watching on TV - go to the loo, grab a drink, etc - but they drag the whole thing out absurdly when you are in the stadium, and it actually makes it pretty boring. Of course, the OTT stuff carries on through the game, with a very excitable announcer with a ridiculously deep voice talking shit throughout.

Other than all this, I noticed a few strange things apart from the game. Firstly, the sheer number of people hanging around the pitch during the game - to be expected when you have 50 players on each team, I suppose. At most points, there were just dozens and dozens of people milling around the edges of the pitch, making it all seem much more important and involved than it probably is - being just a glorified game of rugby. The other thing I noticed were the heat pipes, which spray hot air at the players on the bench, to keep them warm. Stupid, and further proof (as well as the pads and crash helmets) that NFL players are sissies. I know it can get pretty cold in the US, but you wouldn't catch football and rugby players standing by a heater, oh no!

An interesting experience all in all, quite funny to laugh at some of the ridiculously excitable and hyped up parts of what goes on. The BBC showed the game, and got into the spirit of things too. I was really glad I went in the end, but I'm not sure I'd rush back to an NFL game - the fluff around it is more interesting and exciting than the game itself at times, which is never a good sign for a sports match!

Vampire Weekend, Pete & The Pirates, El Guincho - Forum, London - Friday 24th October 2008

2008-10-24T19:44:00.005+01:00

One of the best bands I saw at Glastonbury this year were Vampire Weekend, and there were so good, I saw them not just once but twice. So, when they announced their autumn UK dates, I was very keen. By the time the gig actually came around, I had not listened to them for a while, and had almost forgotten about them in some respects, so this show was almost like a reintroduction to the band.

We got into the venue just after 8pm, and were surprised to see the opening act, El Guincho, still on stage. I guess that, given the relative lack of material in Vampire Weekend's catalogue, there was a good explanation for that. El Guincho were 2 Spanish guys, one of whom had a synthesizer, and the other had a drum machine. They both played interesting sounding stuff, and shouted over the top. They reminded me a bit of the Ting Tings in a strange way (and not just because there were 2 of them), and I could totally see why they were supporting Vampire Weekend. I probably wouldn't go and see one of their shows, but they were interesting enough to watch for 20 minutes or so.

The main support act were Pete & The Pirates, who I was really looking forward to seeing. I like a lot of the stuff on their album, and as a former Reading resident, it is always good (and more than a bit surprising, given the lack of decent venues there), to see a band from Reading. Anyway, their set was a good one - they had a good number of fans in the audience, and they went down really well. Knots, one of their best songs in my view, appeared early in the set, and Mr Understanding (their absolute standout tune) was towards the end. The rest of the set sounded good - the band sounded tight and competent, and they had more than a few very decent tunes. Last time I saw them, I liked them - but tonight they were better than I remembered.

Vampire Weekend came on stage late, as expected, and to a fantastic reception. Mansard Roof as the first song got everybody excited, and the set was of course mostly drawn from their album. There were a couple of new songs (definitely one, maybe two), but the sound of tunes like Oxford Comma reminded me of just how good they are live. They sound very much like they do on record, with the excellent exception that the guitars sound much, much rockier and better when they play live. The set was fairly short but very good, didn't dip at all, and when they left the stage, everybody was still up for much more. The encore included a very amusing cover of Fleetwood Mac's Everywhere, as well as a very fast and furious version of Walcott, which topped the night off brilliantly - a great song, played fantastically well by a very good band indeed.

Work trip to Plzen and Prague, Czech Republic - 22nd to 24th October 2008

2008-10-24T10:23:00.006+01:00

After a ridiculously long day trip to the Netherlands, I spent a day in London - then got up absurdly early again for a trip to the Czech Republic. When the alarm went off, I spent a good few minutes wondering why on earth I hadn't just gone directly there. My first destination was Plzen (or Pilsen if you prefer), where my company has an office. A 40 minute or so cab ride from Prague airport, and we were there - a fairly small town, which looks in many respects like a mini version of Prague, at least in the central old town. One of the big things that Plzen is famous for is a massive brewery, so we sampled some of the produce during the evening we spent there. One other remarkable thing about the town is the synagogue pictured here - it is one of the 2 or 3 biggest in Europe, and has fairly recently been restored. Looks amazing and very imposing from the front - part of you wonders how a synagogue of this size managed to survive Nazi occupation, World War II, and 40 years of Communist neglect. Impressive.

After a day and a half in Plzen, we went to Prague for an evening out, before returning home. It never ceases to amaze me that, no matter the time of year, the centre of Prague is absolutely crawling with tourists. We were staying somewhere pretty central, so I took my colleagues on a walk around the old town. It was pretty freezing cold there already (a reminder of just how damn cold it gets in winter), so after a short visit to the Old Town Square, we retired promptly to the warmth of a bar. Just like the last time I was here, baked pork knee on a spit was very high on the agenda, washed down with plenty of lovely Czech beer.

You don't have to spend much time in Prague to appreciate what an incredibly beautiful city it is (which was lucky, as I was only there for about 12 hours this time) - but the sheer number of tourists do tend to affect the experience somewhat. All those glass shops and souvenir shops, and the establishments that "cater for tourists" (i.e. at vastly increased price and reduced quality) tend to affect the place, and not in a good way. I guess it it rather selfish and unreasonable to wish that all the tourists would go away, but the city could definitely do with a few less of them! A victim of its own beauty, I suppose.

Work trip to Utrecht, Netherlands - 20th October 2008

2008-10-20T17:06:00.008+01:00

A day trip to my office in Zeist (which is a lovely little town in the middle of nowhere, close to Utrecht), meant a very early alarm call in the morning - a 4:40am taxi to get to the airport in time for the first flight of the day. In fact, I think my flight (the 6:25am British Midland, if you care) is the very first flight of the day to take off from Heathrow. Once the plane was full and it pushed back from the gate, we sat on the tarmac until precisely 7am, whereupon we took off - I guess because the Heathrow runway only opened for takeoff at that time. A huge 37 minutes later, and we had landed in Amsterdam, and an annoying 15 minute taxi after that, we were at the gate. It is often irritating to lose an hour on the way from the UK to Europe, because no matter how early you get up, it is virtually impossible to get anywhere by 9am.

After a quick injection of caffeine in Schiphol airport, I met a colleague, and we embarked on the train journey to Zeist. Obviously, being the Netherlands, this is a rather unremarkable journey across flat countryside, although we did see some windmills and farm animals on the way. Plus the Amsterdam Arena. A change in Utrecht, where we bought some very nice chips with mayonnaise, and we arrived in Zeist about an hour after we left the airport. Picking up more colleagues there, we though we would be better served heading back towards the bright lights of Utrecht for some lunch.

That was a mistake. Being a Monday, and being a town which is occasionally lively but mostly quite pedestrian, there were not an abundance of places to get food. We walked around the whole city centre, past the Dom church tower, which is the tallest and most recognisable building in the city. Despite a few tourists around, there seemed to be no restaurants open for lunch. So, we eventually retreated back towards the station, for one of the strangest Chinese (or more likely, Indonesian) meals I have ever had. Obviously, the Dutch used to own Indonesia, but the food they got back was perhaps not the best - it looked to me like the Indonesians may have played a small joke on their colonial masters, at least in this restaurant.

Eventually, by 4pm, it was time to head back to Schiphol - after a very long day that had left me flagging. One of those journeys followed where you just want to get home as quickly as possible, but everything seems to be happening really slowly. A delayed plane, a big queue for immigration, and long wait for the Heathrow Express back into London - all most annoying. It was a good day, certainly better than a day in the office, but the length of the day reminded me exactly why I usually try to spend a night when I visit the Netherlands.

Arsenal vs Everton - Emirates Stadium, London - Saturday 18th October 2008

2008-10-18T17:20:00.004+01:00

After what has seemed like ages (I swear that international breaks get longer and longer every time), Arsenal played a game again. A disappointing result away at Sunderland in the last game before the break, pretty much summed up a very inconsistent start to the season so far. Fantastic against Sheffield United, Blackburn, Porto and Bolton, but average (and nowhere near creative enough) against Fulham, Hull and Sunderland. We haven't really played a decent team yet, but are still stumbling in too many games we should be winning. The season so far has been useful at realigning Arsenal fans' expectations - and we won't be challenging for the League based on recent displays. Our best is certainly good enough to win cup matches against anybody - if we produce it at the right times - but it doesn't seem to happen often enough to sustain a title challenge.

This game was an excellent three points - not the most simple or convincing three points, but a much needed and well won three points all the same. Liverpool, Chelsea and Manchester United all winning at the weekend made it all the more important. Everton went ahead in the first half, taking advantage of some (more) lax defending to get the first goal of the game. After that, you feared a "defend at all costs" 70 minutes, and the rest of the first half was a pretty tight and dull affair - with Arsenal's heads looking as though they had dropped.

The second half was, thankfully, a completely different performance. Some reshuffling of personnel saw Kolo Toure come off injured (and pass the captain's armband to Manuel Almunia in the process), Alex Song move to his better position of centre back, Eboue move to his better position of right back, and Walcott come on to add a bit of spice to the game. Altogether after this, Arsenal looked a bit more balanced, and we were back level after around 5 minutes, following an excellent Nasri shot from outside the area. Robin Van Persie made it 2-1 soon after, finally managing to finish off a move where several others had tried and failed to get the ball into the net. Then, in the last minute, Theo Walcott got the goal that his second half performance had deserved - the Everton defenders never looked comfortable with him, and he took full advantage as they started to tire.

Other than a victory where we came from behind, there were 3 other fair talking points from the game. The first was who was captain in William Gallas's absence - Kolo Toure for the first half, then Manuel Almunia for the second half. Clearly, Wenger went with experience and length of service, but there were many in the crowd (me included) who would have loved to have seen Cesc Fabregas given the armband - it would have been a great statement of intent.

The second talking point was a disgraceful tackle by Tony Hibbert, where he clattered all the way through Denilson. When a few Arsenal players (most notably Gael Clichy) took exception to this and squared up to him, Hibbert grabbed Clichy by the throat, and a melee ensued. The ridiculous outcome of this was that, despite giving the referee more than enough justification to have sent him off twice (once for the tackle, and once for grabbing Clichy around the neck), he escaped with a pathetic yellow card. And, even more outrageously, Clichy was also booked for his part in the aftermath. So, one player tries to maim another, one player takes exception to this, and both get the same punishment. Next time a player gets injured like Eduardo, I hope that lax refereeing, and especially the failure to punish these tackles properly, is given its fair share of the blame.

And the final talking point was in the stands, specifically in the away section. There appeared to be stuff being thrown down onto the Everton fans, from the upper tiers of Arsenal fans. Clearly and understandably, the Everton fans weren't best pleased about this, but Arsenal's stewarding only seemed to blame the Everton fans, and make the situation much worse. So, there was a 10 minute standoff in the away end, which looked quite animated. This YouTube clip seems to show what was going on, and this opinion piece provides some more detail. Very strange - there has never been an incident like this at Emirates before, so something must have happened to make people decide to throw stuff off the Upper Tier. But why at Everton fans, especially when our next home game is against Spurs - whose fans would of course make a much better target?

Anyway, a good 3 points out of this game, and with Spurs losing again, it was a good weekend overall for Arsenal fans. Talking of Spurs, when The Guardian print a whole page of jokes about your club, you know you are a true laughing stock!

Oasis - Wembley Arena, London - Thursday 16th October 2008

2008-10-16T20:40:00.009+01:00

After a sneak preview of the new Oasis material and show in Canada last month, here was the real thing - London dates, with the full Oasis experience back at home again. Of course, seeing Oasis in the UK is somewhat more authentic (the Canadians, much as they loved the band, couldn't beat the fanaticism of a UK crowd) - but it does also mean spending your evening with more than a few total idiots. And not just the ones on stage, there are usually rather a lot of them in the crowd too.

Tonight, however, the idiocy was confined mainly to the venue management and security. Given that Wembley Arena is one of the more soulless and expensive places to watch a band in any case in my experience, they really have to go some to make it much worse - but they managed to. Arriving outside just after 8pm, I eventually got inside just before 9pm, missing the first 3 songs of the Oasis set in the process. There were 2 people scanning tickets, which was taking a hopelessly long time, so the queues were backing up all around the venue. Add some inept and especially officious security, and it was obvious there were going to be problems. Totally unacceptable from a venue that claims to be "world class". When you charge £40+ for tickets, the venue really should be hiring enough staff to get people inside, and able to see what they paid for - otherwise they are just taking their money, and expecting paying punters to put up with it. Whatever the excuses were, they weren't good enough.

When I did eventually get into the arena to watch Oasis, the set was the same as the standard for this tour so far. My Big Mouth, which they had played a week or so ago, was sadly dropped again, and Live Forever was still missing. But, all the recent set staples were there, and having listened some more to some of the new album, tunes like I'm Outta Time sounded like they could be real growers. All in all, the band sounded on top form, really good and loud, and it was a very good set. Liam and Noel didn't seem especially up for it, and did look to be going through the motions a little bit - but they sounded very solidly great.

This show was filmed and shown live on MTV, so we had the strange situation that the main room lights were on throughout the show. This did mean that it didn't really seem like being at a gig in some respects. Just as TV companies can screw paying football fans around by changing kickoff times, it seems that they can screw paying music fans too, by leaving the lights on at gigs! Still, as long as the people watching from their sofas enjoyed the show, that's all that matters - they are the people that keep the live music industry afloat, after all...

So, a great set from Oasis, but lots of other things around the gig were far from great. Which is a real shame, because it must be a bummer for Oasis to play a really good show, but have idiots around them meaning that many people still have a bad overall experience. Apparently there were many hundreds of fake tickets that didn't get people into this show too, quite apart from those with valid tickets needing an hour to get in due to crap security Judging by the army of touts outside beforehand, plus another army of fake merchandise sellers outside afterwards, and those crap security guards and greedy venue management; there certainly were plenty of scumbags around to ruin people's days. This kind of thing happens to Oasis more than most other bands - a sign of how successful they were, and how big and important they still are as a band. Really good set from a great band - but a shame that so many parasites (outside the venues) and incompetents (managing the venues) manage to dampen the experience.

Cajun Dance Party - ULU, London - Friday 10th October 2008

2008-10-10T20:39:00.005+01:00

A few months after first seeing them at the Bloomsbury Ballroom, I went to see Cajun Dance Party at ULU. Which is a place that even London taxi drivers have no idea of the existence of, or even the street it is on - maybe it is in some kind of black hole. So, after directing the cabbie there, we eventually camped in the secret back bar (the one with no queues whatsoever, unlike the packed one that most people seem to gravitate to), and waited for the band to come on. There was a support band, called Swanton Bombs, but I didn't see enough of them to pass judgement.

As Cajun Dance Party came on stage, the back bar emptied, and we got a decent place quite near the front of the stage. There were still tickets on sale for this gig a couple of days before, and it didn't look anywhere near sold out to me - there was plenty of space around. Which, given the fact that the venue only holds about 800, was a surprise - I had expected CDP to be able to sell out at least a venue this size.

The set included most of their album The Colourful Life, as well as about 3 or 4 new songs, including the excellent Five Days. Highlights for me were Amylase and The Race, both brilliant indie pop songs. But, the PA sounded generally very quiet throughout, which was a bit strange. And, exactly the same as the last time I saw them, I thought they sounded very similar - too similar - to how they sound on record. Don't get me wrong, I like their CDs, but the live set just lacked something for me. They seem very good at making great sounding albums, and then at almost exactly reproducing that sound when they play live. It sounds good, but to me, it doesn't make them very exciting as a live band.

A good show overall, but it left me wondering what to think about Cajun Dance Party. Listening to their CDs, you scratch your head and wonder why many more people don't like them - and why they aren't already playing places like the Astoria, rather than struggling to sell out ULU. But then when you see them live, it all seems a bit too polished, and like the CD - so I can understand why their gigs aren't such huge attractions. But surely people need to have seen them live first to work this out? All very confusing.

White Lies - ICA, London - Tuesday 7th October 2008

2008-10-07T20:39:00.005+01:00

My first trip to a gig at the ICA (although I had been there a couple of times before to look at photos and paintings), and the headline band were White Lies. They used to be called Fear Of Flying, before they completely changed name and direction. They played a big showcase at the Camden Crawl, then signed a huge record deal after the customary bidding war. Very few gigs, but plenty of hype and coverage since, this was their first "proper" tour. The London date sold out in June, and was a pretty small venue for this tour, given the size of the other venues in much smaller towns. You suspected that some people - either the band, their management, or their record company - were trying to starve the London public of White Lies, to build up the hype and anticipation. This was their first sold-out London gig, and so was accordingly stuffed with a mixture of industry people and die hard fans.

After a couple of support bands, White Lies took to the stage just after 10pm. Dressed almost all in black, they immediately piled into their set, the first number of which was a synth heavy tune - it reminded me of The Killers, or, dare I say it, The Bravery (but in a good way). To be fair, this first song wasn't really representative of their whole set, but it certainly did set the tone for a show containing a whole range of influences. The synthesisers sounded like The Killers, the similarities with bands like Interpol and Joy Division were obvious, and the singer even sounded like Jim Morrison at times.

Throughout the set, it was blindingly obvious how absolutely huge the band's sound is. They are very tight, very polished, and sound absolutely like the finished article when they play live. It was strange to listen to the massive sound they were making, where the bass made your stomach vibrate, and the riffs reminded me of Muse - in that they wouldn't be at all out of place in a stadium. But then, when the songs finished, you could hear individual people clapping and cheering, in a crowd of 300 or so. White Lies are much too big for venues like the ICA, and pretty soon, they will quite obviously be playing much bigger places.

So, the sound was huge, the live performance was incredible, and they will be graduating to very much bigger venues in the very near future - you can absolutely see how this band will headline festivals and stadia, and would probably go down an absolute storm in the US. A comparison with U2 isn't as completely ridiculous as it sounds. Despite all this, the one thing I wasn't completely sold on was (all of) the songs. A few were incredible, a few were pretty good, but a few were average. Of course, as a young band, there is plenty of time and scope to write more songs - and if they can continue to write more like their best, I think they will be a very significant band for years to come. Tonight's gig could well turn out to be an "I Was There" show.

Arsenal vs FC Porto - Emirates Stadium, London - Tuesday 30th September 2008

2008-09-30T14:38:00.003+01:00

After the slip up against Hull City on Saturday, there was obvious demand amongst Arsenal fans for some kind of reaction. There were calls for the first team to be dropped en masse and the kids brought back in, calls for Gallas to be stripped of the captaincy (probably not a bad idea, given the fact that, were he not captain, he might not even be in the team). And, most ridiculously, there were calls for Wenger to go - which thankfully didn't happen.

When reviewing the Hull game, I said that on another day, Arsenal could have won that game by a few goals. This was that "other day". We created plenty of chances, put a few away, and Porto's few chances didn't happen to amount to anything - despite a couple of spectacular saves from Almunia. The same display yet the opposite outcome to the Hull game. True, Porto were surprisingly uninterested, and looked very surprisingly crap. Maybe they just don't travel well, or maybe they aren't the side they were - probably a bit of both - but it was a surprise how lacklustre they looked. Certainly made things easy for Arsenal.

Van Persie and Adebayor finished the game with 2 goals each - Van Persie's were both fantastic goals in their own way - the first was the all important one to break the deadlock, and his second came after a fantastic piece of skill and shot. Adebayor's goals, however, were less good - a penalty, and a header that can only have been a mishead, but it foxed the defender and went in. Added to the chances that Adebayor missed - there were many, and some were criminally easy - Van Persie had the better game for his 2 goals. Still, nobody was complaining about either at the end.

By the time the game was all but won at 3-0, there was some fun with substitutes. Ours were warming up wearing pink bibs - possibly Arsene Wenger's revenge for Saturday. Porto put on a sub called Hulk, who was introduced to massive cheering from the home crowd - especially as the announcer called him "The Hulk". After that amusement, our subs actually did OK - Bendtner had a great game I thought, and Vela looked pretty lively as well.

All in all, this was another game in a period where Arsenal are seeming to blow hot and cold - and this was one of the "hot" games. We seem to be able to sweep anybody away when things are going well, but equally capable of losing games to teams we really shouldn't lose to. We are top of our Champions League group, which is a decent place to be - but we need to work on the consistency if we are not going to come up too short again. Which means that the international break for 2 weeks coming up, is again most unwelcome. No home game now until 18th October, lets hope we can build on the Porto and Sheffield United games, and forget the Hull game quickly. Tonight certainly helped us do the last of those.

Arsenal vs Hull City - Emirates Stadium, London - Saturday 27th September 2008

2008-09-27T14:37:00.005+01:00

Since the disastrous performance and result at Fulham 5 weeks ago, things have been mainly good. Arsenal had won 3 league games in a row, scoring 10 goals in the process and conceding one. No goals conceded from open play all season, top of the League, and the kids won convincingly in the Carling Cup. The mood before the game was generally that things could be a lot worse. Hey, we could even lose at home to a newly promoted team - that would be bad!

This game was one of those hiccups - seemed to me like it was just one of those things that happens to teams sometimes. Only our second ever defeat at Emirates Stadium, and you could have got good odds on the first 2 teams to beat us being West Ham and Hull City. It was a pretty freakish result - although one that Hull worked hard for, were well organised to go after, and in the end may have deserved. Arsenal created far more chances of course - but from the opposition point of view, it was 3 points well earned by their organisation and commitment in defence, chances well taken, and a goal worthy of helping to win any game.

From Arsenal's perspective though, this was a smash and grab. All seemed fine at half time - Arsenal had created the better chances and had the majority of possession, even if they hadn't got all that close to a goal. When Fabregas was involved in bundling the ball into the net about 5 minutes after half time, it seemed like another win was on the cards. But then, a fantastic goal by Geovanni, followed by a winner about 5 minutes later, completely knocked the stuffing out of the home side. By the time Arsenal came to terms with what was going on, and what they needed to do, Hull had organised themselves enough in defence to make that task extremely hard. Then, their commitment right up until the end ultimately frustrated Arsenal, despite a good number of chances being created and missed.

What lost Arsenal this game, in truth, was the abysmal defending from the corner that led to Hull's winner. An unforgivable lapse in concentration, again, from a set piece - and William Gallas in particular deserves both barrels for allowing it to happen for the umpteenth time. Our weakness from set pieces is such a well known and glaringly obvious failing, that any team could feasibly come to Emirates with a game plan to win corners, nick a goal, then shut up shop. It seems ridiculous that any team with title aspirations should have such an obvious weakness.

All in all, this is a game that Arsenal could quite easily have won - the wonder goal knocked us onto the back foot, and the set piece goal took full advantage by hitting us where we were weakest. But Arsenal created plenty, and on another day, the game could easily have been won by 3 or 4 goals. Just one of those things. It was nowhere near as depressing as the Fulham game a few weeks ago, where nothing was created, and we never looked like being able to score. But, despite the fact we could have won it, there definitely remains something significant to work on in training this week.

Hull City (or "West Brom" as Arsene Wenger rather unfortunately called them afterwards, in a moment of confusion) fans celebrated in North London all evening, after a very good result for them. I'd rather see that than have Chelsea, Man U or Spurs fans celebrating in our backyard, so fair play to them for being chuffed with a pretty spectacular result for their team.