So, my missus recently got a new Blackberry and it came with a feature which can read your text messages to you if you’re driving or operating heavy machinery or milking a cow and whatnot. On discovering this, I immediately did what ANY normal human being would do:
Yes, I texted it lots of swear words. You would too. Thats all for now folks.
P.S. If you know anyone with this feature on their phone, try turning it on when they’re not looking, then waiting until they’re in the cinema or at a family dinner or in church until you text them. Have fun!
love Shambles x
*I meant blue as in the nature of the language the phone was using, its sort of a pu- oh never mind…
I am a walking, talking (especially talking) contradiction in terms. A big old hypocrite, even. I enjoy learning about Buddhism and try to live by its philosophies, yet I eat meat and drink alcohol and regularly concede that in some situations, with some people, you might just have to give them a kicking. I sneer at over-excited teens who jump and scream at the sheer giddiness of simply existing; yet who cry and despair at the miniscule amount of work required of a university fresher, whilst myself despairing at a workload which regularly accomodates trips to the pub and long lunches. I mock trend-followers, whilst walking around Glasgow University in my skinny jeans, my long coat and my unfeasible haircut. Oh and the scarf.
My personal hypocrisy of the day however, comes in the form of youths. Bloody youths, with their youtubes and their fringes and their insistence on continuing to breathe in between sentences like “oh no, its totally cool, like, i’ll put it on bebo later” and “ohmygod, did you hear what Jonny said? What a loser, he’s so gay, eugh, like whatever.” I physically groan at their attempts at humour, or any time I hear them talk about the minutiae of their lives as though nothing has ever been as important as X telling Y he fancies Z but Z likes…etc etc. Worst of all is the manners, or lack thereof. Walking into the shop i’m leaving without waiting for me to vacate the doorway, but offering no acknowledgement or thanks for my holding the door open, for example. Their nonchalance towards shouting, screaming, littering, throwing things at people, mocking the unfeasible haircuts of others (ahem) occasionally causes me to physically growl. Then sigh, and despair.
It just…oh wait a minute, hang on.
(Look Dad, I know I have uni in the morning, I’ll stop soon. What do you mean I’ll never get to sleep? Just because i’m playing my Nintendo DS whilst watching The Big Bang Theory, writing an article and messing about on facebook/myspace/twitter/etc at 1 in the morning? I just do that until i’m tired. Then I lie in bed for around 2 hours listening to podcasts until my brain finally quietens down enough for me to fall asleep. Its a perfectly healthy system, now excuse me, i’m going to make a microwavable cheeseburger, i’m peckish. Oh look, the wrestling is on).
I’m sure I heard my father growl slightly, then sigh as he left the room and went to bed there. Weirdo. Can’t believe he didn’t offer to make that burger for me.
Anyway, it just boggles my mind that these bloody kids, some of them not even old enough to drink, or smoke, or gamble, think they know everything. Wait til they get to my age, then maybe they’ll stop being such idiots. God, it really is tough being 23.
Hello folks! You’re looking particularly lovely today, I must say. It could be the way the light is hitting your face, the beers I had for lunch, or it could be joy at the fact that I’ve FINALLY finished the video for the wee collaboration-cover I’ve done with my pal Shirley Valentine! I quickly knocked up a rough wee demo of my ukulele version of Frank Turner’s “Ballad of Me and My Friends” and Shirley lent her gorgeously awesome vocal talents to it. I liked it so much that I decided to make a wee music video. It features me, a rubber duck, some photo adventures and some tasty animation from my very own hand. If people seem to like it (and even if they don’t) me and Shirley Valentine will hopefully do a proper version of this, with real microphones and everything.*
So here’s the video, I hope you enjoy it! Oh and you might want to turn your speakers up, I was working on it late at night so I’m whispering at the start…
…and at the end, yeah. Well there you go! I hope you enjoyed it! Thanks again for watching, I really appreciate it. Comments are always welcome of course, I haven’t really done a video quite like this before.
Til next time folks!
love Shambles x
*As opposed to making a tent out of my bedcovers and recording my ukulele/vocal parts whilst underneath, to eliminate outside noise/echo. You’ll find me in the dictionary next to “Lo-Fi.”
I had a wee gig in Pivo Pivo last night. The last time I played there a good number of folk came to see me and there were a couple of other punters in, so there was a nice atmosphere. The staff were (and still are) lovely and the sound guy made me feel pretty comfortable on stage, so I couldn’t complain, it was a lovely gig. On TOP of that, there was free pizza! Winner.
I played there again last night. Hardly anyone in apart from the other acts and some of my lovely, loyal friends who came to see me play (and to get free pizza, perhaps?)
I was on last, playing to mostly just my friends and the first act on, I think he said his name was Dave Gibb…hmm…I think…well, he was awesome anyway. But there was NO FREE PIZZA! I was crestfallen. I’d come straight from work, had to get a taxi to the venue to be there in time and hadn’t had any dinner, so not getting:
paid/much exposure since nobody was there/free pizza…that was a bummer.
However, when I was on stage and realised that the only reason I had a crowd at all was that my friends had come to see me play, I felt pretty great. It reminded me that I’m a very lucky man to have such lovely friends. I enjoyed the gig even more from this point and had a bit of a laugh with the absurdity of playing my songs to my friends who have all heard them before but still listened politely and made noises at the right parts. Ahhhh, you guys.
My pal Amy also drew a lovely little sketch of me and my mate Neil. I had to edit a small portion of it, since it was RATHER INAPPROPRIATE AND INSENSITIVE, to say the very least:
Its pretty accurate, apart from Neil’s shirt and the fact that I don’t own laughter trousers. I may buy some. The night’s many doodles were lovely and more than made up for the lack of pizza in my belly. Well, that and the beer.
So, thanks lovely pals, for coming along. I appreciate it a whole lot.
Hello folks! Since i’m still working away at a wee cover/collaboration with one of my favourite-ever artists, Shirley Valentine and its not quite ready yet, I thought i’d share another one of my artistic masterpieces shite sketches in the meantime.
The majority of my sketches look angry at me just for drawing them. I suppose that makes sense. I’d be pretty grumpy if I’d drawn me. Oh dear.
SO, here’s Triangle Boy.
I feel a little guilty about this, but it really helped me solve my problem of not being very good at drawing arms.
Boy can I draw a grumpy triangle though huh? If you’d like your very own angular doodle, let me know. I’ll just be waiting. Right here, waiting. ANY minute now, the e-mails will start pouring in…
A while ago I took a fancy to doing silly little sketches. I soon remembered that I can’t really draw however (hence all my doodles being mostly square) and I haven’t drawn so much since (except on my lecture notes).
I quite like one or two of them though, and this is one of my favourites. He’s called the Domino Kid, funnily enough.
I think I like the Domino Kid so much because he combines my love of boxy type sketches with my love of really bad puns.
See, my updates aren’t all videos and ridiculous photos of my face, sometimes they’re bad sketches and shite jokes. Don’t say i’m not good to you.
Hello folks! As you might’ve guessed from my preamble, its my birthday today! Prizes for guessing my age without cheating and using myspace/google and such. I don’t yet have many birthday tales to relate, since its only the afternoon and not much has happened except snow and me helping my dad move a couch. I did get a LOVELY coat though, so I’m glad of the cold weather in a way.
Oh but I should also say Happy New Year to you as well! I’ve had quite a quiet Hogmanay and New Year time and haven’t been skulking around the internet as much, opting instead to spend more time with my folks and friends, so I haven’t updated in a while. With that in mind, I rather thought I might share a couple of wee things and pieces of news.
So!
On the last day of the year, after months of coming last, third and second, I finally won Wiilympics!* Sure, its just a competition between me and my friends, but we take it pretty seriously, and the stakes were bigger this time. Last winner of the year, and I won a Scrubs DVD boxset, a big tin of sweeties, a pez dispenser in the shape of Link from Zelda and a LOVELY cigar (which I smoked on Hogmanay after the bells). Here’s the glorious final score that won me the tournament by ONE POINT!
Good times. Good, good times.
I played a gig recently, in Macsorleys. Some of my set was captured on camera and I got a hold of the audio from the gig, so I have a little live mp3 for your listening pleasure! Its a live performance of “Beer Song.” Oh and look out for the laughter, i’ll explain afterwards…
…what with this gig being in a pub full of everyday punters just in for a wee swally, the atmosphere was a bit rowdy and there was the odd drunk numpty who’d come up to me between songs, or sometimes even during my set. The laughter you hear in the song was when one such numpty tried to shake my hand to say goodbye while I was mid-song. I told him I was a bit busy. Here’s a wee photo from said gig:
That set up makes it look like I do have a band, but they all hate me and fucked off.
…actually, thats not a million miles from how I gave up on being in a band and struck out on my own in the first place, haha.
Hopefully I’ll some interesting new demos up soon too, since I received a mandolin and a ukelele for Christmas! With any luck i’ll come up with some new tunes and get them recorded. And of course, i’m sure i’ll have another video up before long.
Well, apart from a very lovely Christmas and a peaceful New Year, thats about all my news for the time being! I’m off to watch some Star Trek, then get ready for a nice birthday meal with my folks and some drinks with those of my friends who are hardy enough to brave the elements this evening!
Til next time folks, all the best,
love Shambles x
*Wiilympics is a competition between myself and three of my best friends. We play all our 2-4 player video games competitively against each other to see who is the best. It usually features laughter, beer, food and arguments. Oh yeah, and I’m the new champion!
A few nights ago I played a gig for which I was paid in beer, for the first time ever.
It’s a new thing for me; getting paid at all for what I do. About a month ago I made the princely sum of £16 for a half-hour set in a pub’s back room. My pay came solely by virtue of the number of people who came to see me, which is the first taste I’ve had of what it must be like to be a ‘real’ musician. Technically, the people in that back room paid me, just as you pay the artists you love every time you go to a gig, buy an album or download a track.
It was a good feeling, just as it was the other night where I played in a pub whose ’stage’ was basically the floor where some tables had been an hour earlier. It’s my first experience playing to so many people who weren’t there to see me, and proved simultaneously fun and intimidating. Highlights variously included:
1. A drunk idiot getting on the drumkit behind me and hitting them (arythmically), before being removed by the staff.
2. A different drunk attempting to shake my hand before he left, while I was still mid-song.
3. Yet another friendly drunk shouting out requests, one of which I actually knew. He joined in, singing better than me as I played “Caledonia”, a fitting close to my set. He bought me a pint and his friend gave me four quid for another.
Sure, its nice playing acoustic nights and folk gigs, but there’s a very different excitement to be found in playing to a busy pub full of folk who haven’t paid to hear you and quite probably don’t want to hear you; winning them over just by being yourself, without pandering to what you think they’ll want to hear (apart from “Caledonia”, thats a classic!) is a good, good feeling.
I like to think back on the words of my new, incredibly tall Polish friend from Hell is Harmony: “You are a very brave man, I couldn’t get up there and do that without my friends.” Being told you’re brave by a guy who looks a bit like a Viking is high praise indeed, but my friends are always there, in one way or another – if not in the building, then in the music, which I think is why I can keep doing it.
This article was originally printed on Stereokill.net. I highly recommend checking out the website for more original content, reviews and features.
Hello friends I bloody love Christmas so I just wanted to do a quick little video to wish you well during this festive time.
Here it is!
I’ve always loved Christmas, but since I stopped getting lego under my tree, its not been about the presents for me. Its about my family, my friends, the magic…and, ok, the dinner. As far as I’m concerned, Christmas is a pretty magical time, and whatever it means to you, whether its about a slap-up meal and feeling full up while you watch shite telly with a paper hat, a house full of loved ones, relatives and thoughts of the ones you miss, or a day where someone burns the turkey and everyone falls out before making up at midnight over some mulled wine and mince pies, I wish every single one of you; every friend, every colleague, everyone I know, a magic, happy and Merry Christmas.
I bloody love Christmas so I just wanted to do a quick little video to wish you well during this festive time.