i've got a biiiiggg lessbiiaaan crush on you!

The hall is black, the only light shining down on the stage. The lady there picks up a sea-foam green guitar and plucks a couple of notes. Someone nearby wolf-whistles. 
"You trying to say guitar players are hotter than piano players?" she jokes, her voice soft. The room laughs. "They are," she adds. More laughter. Her voice is soft and timid, she looks scared and shy. She starts to sing. Boy oh boy, that voice. Like nothing you've ever heard before. Strong, beautiful, amazing. Who is this lady? Why, none other than the gorgeous Regina Spektor!

Yep, thats right. Last night was THE night. Josi and I got there and, seeing as she's a bit of a newbie at all this, she started snapping pictures of the great Opera House. We mingled and talked and went outside but that doesn't matter. Because the only thing that matters right now is her concert. The support act, Brooklyn band Jupiter One, was quite good. I'm not completely sure of my feelings towards them, but it's definately not negative.
Anyway, so they played. Weird mixture if you ask me, cello, drums (or bongos, the drummer wanted to be "subtle" for a change), and a guitar. But the guitarist slash lead singer slash violinst slash piano player did play alot alot of instruments. They were also the band for Regina Spektor!
It started out with just the main guy doing some pretty wacky stuff on the violin, and then he picked up gee-tar and did some wicked cool pluckin',

 ...and then the cellist came in added to the funky sound going on. Pretty sure his name is David Cho. 

...and then came in the drummer! Seemed like he already had a couple of fans out there in the audience. We could hear people cheering as he walked on. He was pretty mad. They rocked out for a bit, nice.

Then they left. They went offstage and it was intermission. We were so much closer to Regina Spektor! It was kinda cute, the lead singer kept thanking her and saying how nice it was that she let them open for her. You could tell her actually was thankful! Anyway, so we left, got some maltesers and drank some coke from a glass bottle and made a pretty statue:

...and we made a video of a malteser falling down a hill. But then we heard the *dongdongdong* informing us that the concert was about to commnce, so we collected up our bits n bobs and headed in! Boy oh boy, sitting down in the concert hall for Regina Spektor was amazing. It was completely packed.  Unlike for Jupiter One. We all waited and you could hear people around you talking animatedly about her songs and which ones were their favourite. Josi and I didn't talk, we waited. We were so flippin' excited! Then the lights went dim and the members of Jupiter One walked out followed by the most cutest woman ever: Regina Spektor.
She sat down, looked at her band members and started to play The Calculation which was shortly followed by Eet.  She was amazing. Her voice was so strong and so confident! Various cries of "WE LOVE YOUR REGINA!" and "YOU ROCK!" made her smile her adorable smile but she was undeterred. She. Is. So. Cute!
She just played and played and played, and then when she spoke, well, slap me round the face and call me donkey but her voice was so soft! I thought it would be loud and boisterous but it was small and quiet. She is a very deceiving person. Because of her talking voice I thought she'd be not funny or anything, but she was really entertaining aswell as funny and smart. People calling out comments all over the place, she had answers for the majority of them.

Okay, soooo, anyone else agree how gorgeous she is? I don't think I can come up with any really intellectual words right now. I'm still in awe of how gut-wrenchingly spectacular her performance was. She had the whole entire crowd under her little finger. Not only that, but everyone was so polite. We didn't utter a word when she was getting ready and only a couple of times didn't someone scream out or 'wooo' when she was preparing her lovely self.

"Hold on, one more time with feeling,"

I've droned on long enough. In a nutshell, Regina Spektor is supermegafoxyawesomehot and her show was that times about the google xponential. Be jealous! Oh, whatta babe. 

Oh! Almost forgot. You will never ever ever ever ever ever guess who is playing at the Enmore Theatre on the 25th of July. Don't go Googling that, its cheating! Guess!

"You've got to dig it to dig it, you dig?" -

I dig it, Thelonious, I dig it. Some songs just make me think. I put them on and I'm off, wondering about why we have eyelashes or if dogs are really some kind of alien animal and they're going to take over the world someday. But other songs, boy oh boy, I don't even know how to explain it. They put me in this kind of trance and it's like a montage of my life. Kind of like, oh this reminds of the time this happened! And then this happened! Oh yes, and then I meet this person. I wonder if we'll be friends soon? Anyway, and then I wanted to learn this instrument and blahdiblah.
In a way, music is all rather stereotypical itself, isn't it? There's the group that goes out all the time, and they seem to listen to rap and electronica and stuff like that, then theres the group that doesn't go out that much and they are kinda more of the indie/rock persuasion. Then there are the just pretty much cool kids, who everyone secretly wants to be but won't admit it, and they listen to the jazz and the funk and the soul and the classical. Some people are part of their own boat, and occaisonaly visit others but they stick to their own stuff. Me? I think I'm part of Group 2. I'm spreading out though.
I probably sound like the biggest stereotyper (is that a word?) out there, but from where I'm standing thats what it seems like. This is the view from my third eye...

Do the Shuffle Struggle

Ahoy there, mateys! Me and my loverly friend Isabella are playing a game. Not necessarily a game, but something like that. We have both decided to make our way through our music makers/iPods/portable music players, what have you. It's on shuffle, and if you start again then you lose or you just have to, well, start again!
The rules are as follows:
1. You can only skip a song if it's at least halfway/three quarters through.
2. You can't change the song to your liking! Unless you wanna lose the game!
3. You have to listen to every song. You can't "accidentally" leave it on while playing/reading/making/watching something else. Like I did. In English today. But that was an accident.
Thats it! Oh, no, one more thing. There is no winner. Why would there be? It's not a race to see who can get through their music first, no, no, no! It's simply a little fun to see what you used to listen to, what you have on your iPi that you didn't know you had, to rediscover old tunes that you forgot about. It's purely for the nostalgia, on my part. So far, I've listened to the craziest of mixes. Something along the lines of: Randy Newman, Grace Jones, Spoon, The Mama's and The Papa's, The Cinematic Orchestra and some calming Chopin. Weird, huh? Maybe they can tell what music you like and don't like...hmm...thats a thinker.
Wanna join in on the Shuffle Struggle? Be my guest, and trust me when I say it's a struggle. I'm up to song number 123 (!!) out of 1310. Whoopee!

scandanavian ukulele shmootz

Oh, ukulele players. Where would be without you? I don't really have much to say. Promise, though, that this is the last video I'll post for a while. You just kinda gotta see it. Oh, and again, thanks Allya. Merlin, woman, you needa stop finding so much cool stuff! See, this is what happens when one has to go to school and her proxy sister is home sick and can just find sweet things on youtube. Flip on a stick with a brick, mother bees!

Okay, well enjoy. Thanks Allya. Again. Sweet Merlin, woman, you da bomb. Also, because they keep getting cut off and I'm so over it I'll just link it up. You'll love Brett Domino after this. Forever more. Babe!
One more thing:

REGINA SPEKTOR NEXT WEEK !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

tube tube tube !

grab a cup of tea and shush yo trap

Gorillaz: Some Kind of Nature ft. Lou Reed

Sia: Soon We'll Be Found

OK Go: This Too Shall Pass

Mayer Hawthorne: Green Eyed Love

The White Stripes: Seven Nation Army

The White Stripes: Doorbell

Blakroc: Coochie

I don't own any of these videos. Also, I realise that some of these videos may be sliced in half and/or aren't the actual video for that song. I don't care, I just want you to hear the songs :)

the awesome apple does fall far from the awesome tree

Babe Alert! Right now, all that is going through my head is: "Chuck, Chuck, Chuck, Chuck, Sold out Strokes tickets, Chuck, Chuck..." I think you know what it continues as. Have any of you seen it? Not only is Chuck one of the most awesome shows of all time, but it was made by Josh Schwartz - the creator of the O.C and a freakin' genius - but its theme tune is Short Skirt Long Jacket by Cake! Cool much? Again, I thank Allya. Or should I not thank her? I can't get my mind off of it now and all I wanna do is watch Chuck, bother.
Anyway, lets stray away from my obsession with Chuck and talk about The Strokes. Alas, I was not succesful in my atempt at getting two tickets for my birthday. One show only in July. "Oh em gee, babez, seew devo", if I wanted to turn bogan on you.

can you ever just be whelmed?

My brother made a fair point the other day. While I listen to anything my sisters (proxy and normal) give me, I rarely listen to what he points my way. Why is this? Because the majority of his music is classical, and for some reason unbeknownest to all of us, I automatically think its going to be boring. But more often than not I'm proved wrong.
You heard Scheherazad? Cause you really should, its flipping amazing. The violin solo, the percussion, the everything just blows my mind. My brother took me to see it last year and I just went into that kind of trance and just all these thoughts swarmed into my head. I could feel my mind just breaking into little bits at the genius work that is Scheherazad. I wanted to fall asleep but I knew that if I did I would so regret it later,  why would I want to miss out on this extravaganza.
Again, my bro made another fair point. The music I listen to now, how long will that be around for? The average time for a really popular hiphop/rock/rap song to be 'in' is probably a couple of weeks, my kinda music lasts a little longer. Months or years maybe, I prefer to go for not just one song but the whole band. For example, me getting into The Shins was simply an accident. I had my iPod on shuffle and the song Australia came on and I thought, hey, if I like this maybe I'll like the rest? Good thinking 99, they changed your freakin' life.
But classical stuff, Beethoven, Rachmaninoff, Handel, Bach - they've been around for hundreds and thousands of years. Dude, and we thought The Beatles had it good for staying so well-known for so long? Pfft, pretty sure the composers win that one.
Even if people have never heard their stuff, they surely must've heard of them. Even if only in passing. I guess, what I'm trying to say is that no matter how popular a band or a song is it's going to get old. But classical isn't. Ever. And I'm pretty sure I can say the same for jazz, yeah?
Never mind, consult your pillow on that and share your thoughts! Tea and sympathy for those who do :)

P.S In a way, you gotta give it to the musicians aswell. Imagine playing this in front of an audiece of thousands:

Difficult, ey...

i like toastems

I was with Allya yesterday, my lovely and gorgeous proxy sister, and it was a pretty damn good time. Not only is she the Guru of all good movies but basically she's the Dalai Lama of music aswell. She knows her stuff, and its all legit.
To start off, we went to video shop and got out Jennifer's Body. Creepiest film ever, probably third most quotable...or fourth.
But thats not important. Whats important is the fact that when it comes to Music Festivals, Australia positively, 100%, utterly and completely comes up not trumps. It sucks. It was okay when we had Great Escape n shizz like that, but we don't anymore!
In a way, we still got it good. We have Big Day Out, Byron Blue Fest., Wangaratta Jazz Fest., maybe Australia is more of the bluesy/jazzy feel.
Anyway, so this festival is the most epic festival ever. Allya showed it to me, and I actually wanted to cry. Would you like to hear the lineup for 2010? No? Didn't think so, but you're gonna hear it anyway:
Lady GaGa, The Arcade Fire, Spoon (!!!!), The National, The Black Keys, MGMT, The Strokes, Erykah Badu, Grizzly Bear (!!!), Gogol Bordello, Wolfmother, The xx, Dirty Progectors, Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeroes, Temper Trap, The Walkmen, Mumford and Sons, The Dodos, Rogue Wave, The Ettes and oh my gawd so many more but I won't talk about it. We can't get too upset, now can we? Lets just put this behind us, and imagine what it would be like to live in the windy city of Chicagi!

Just try and read these lineups. Literally mind blowing. Blood and guts everywhere they're so flippin' grand.





I could ramble on for ever, but I won't. I'll shut my trap and go and clean my room like a good girl. Is this a pathetic excuse for a post? Never mind. I'll just sit here and listen to The Beatles marathon kinda thing thats on at ABC digital radio. Listen to it. So goddam good. Looovveeee tthhheeeemmm !
Oh, and before I choof off, just thought you should all know: I'm moving to Chicago. And thats final. Lollapalooza, here we come!