Music is something that didn’t really come into my life until I was a tween. I don’t have the early memories of music that many do surrounding their first years. I do remember Mums reggae christmas tape, her Michael Bolton CDs, and that I got a New Kids on the Block tape when I was five.

My first foray into metal came when I was about 11 years old. My Mums partner was a huge Metallica and Megadeth fan. I really liked Megadeth when I heard it. So much so that I convinced two friends to do a dance to it in our Primary School talent quest. It’s pretty embarrassing thinking about it now!

I listened to Megadeth around the same time I got into Aqua, Backstreet Boys, Hanson, Destiny’s Child and Spice Girls. Spice Girls were the first band I ever became obsessed with. I had their CDs a VHS of the movie and I cut out every single picture I could find to plaster my bedroom wall. The one and only time I went trick or treating I dressed up as Sporty Spice.
Around this time mum found a TLC tape in our driveway which I claimed for myself. I loved it, perhaps without realising how dirty it was, and I learned the Waterfalls rap off by heart.

The first years of high school saw new genres added to my love list. Nu metal, rap, punk, and ska. I was introduced to many new bands through mixed CDs sold at the store and mix tapes borrowed from boys at school. Limp Bizkit, Linkin Park, System of a Down, MxPx, and Eminem were the big ones.

Later years of high school came and I was getting over my wigga stage. I no longer rapped along to Eminem every day. I was listening to Incubus, Alien Ant Farm, and Rammstein. All bands I still love to listen to. Rammstein was what first sparked my interest in the German language.

When I left home I was pirating a lot of music. I didn’t know what a lot of it was before I had it on my computer, I just went for punk. I ended up with The Ataris, Third Try, and Fenix TX splattered throughout the mix CDs I made for my discman.

A couple of years ago I got back into music after seeing the video for Helena by My Chemical Romance. It was love at first sight purely for aesthetics, but I found I loved the music too. I became obsessed and would spend hours on the MCRmy street team site. I knew every fact about the band and had hundreds of photos saved. But then Welcome to the Black Parade was released and it was different to the music I loved them for.
I joined MySpace and found the world of online music. I started listening to songs people suggested and found Fall Out Boy, Coheed and Cambria, and Mindless Self Indulgence.

These days Mums partner introduces me to most of the “new” music I hear. My favourite is Sonata Arctica.

I think it’s true what they say about the music you listened to when you were a teen staying with you for life. I still like the music I listened to when I was about 16, Rammstein and Incubus etc. And I’m not (too) ashamed to admit I think Fred Durst did some great stuff that I still listen to on long road trips.

Can you match music to periods of time in your life? Do you still like the music you listened to when you were a teen?

New old music from My Chemical Romance. This is a cover of Bob Dylan’s Desolation Row, done in a punky style for the movie Watchmen coming out in March. I’m just excited to hear them do something new after over 2 years since their last studio release.

A theme song for many (if not most) females. And I don’t think that’s a good thing at all. That said, I can’t help but love Lily’s hair.

The Fear – Lily Allen

If you can’t see the video it’s been sucked out by your reader, click through to the site to view it :]
Lyrics
I want to be rich and I want lots of money
I don’t care about clever I don’t care about funny
I want loads of clothes and fuckloads of diamonds
I heard people die while they are trying to find them

I’ll take my clothes off and it will be shameless
‘Cuz everyone knows that’s how you get famous
I’ll look at the sun and I’ll look in the mirror
I’m on the right track yeah I’m on to a winner

Chorus
I don’t know what’s right and what’s real anymore
I don’t know how I’m meant to feel anymore
When we think it will all become clear
‘Cuz I’m being taken over by The Fear

Life’s about film stars and less about mothers
It’s all about fast cars and passing each other
But it doesn’t matter cause I’m packing plastic
and that’s what makes my life so fucking fantastic

And I am a weapon of massive consumption
and its not my fault it’s how I’m program to function
I’ll look at the sun and I’ll look in the mirror
I’m on the right track yeah I’m on to a winner

Chorus

Bridge
Forget about guns and forget ammunition
Cause I’m killing them all on my own little mission
Now I’m not a saint but I’m not a sinner
Now everything is cool as long as I’m getting thinner

Chorus

So, good great news. Real Groovy Wellington and Christchurch branches are saved!!!

I went in there today to see how it was all going and get the Red Hot Chili Peppers Stadium Arcadium CD (which is so cool and only cost me $23 for 2 CD set! I’m listening to it as I write this) and I noticed someone using a voucher. I thought that was a bit odd considering they’re meant to be in receivership but I asked if I could use mine and the chick serving me said I could because they’d been bought. :D

Even better, the manager of the store bought it so nothings going to change. The Christchurch store has also been bought (by it’s current manager as well I believe).

One of my defining characteristics is my constant search for truth. I’m known at work for constantly checking things with Google.

If we receive a group forward that seems dubious my colleagues just say “Kim will find out if it’s real”. And I will. It doesn’t matter how long it takes. I’m determined!

I demonstrated this will power again yesterday when I wanted to find a song. I’ve previously spent hours looking for a music video when all I knew about it was that it was dance-y/techno-y and had two people dancing across a basketball court. I found it after a few hours of searching.

This time I knew the tune of the song, I thought it sounded like the Red Hot Chili Peppers, and I took at a guess at remembering some of the lyrics. The first and last time I heard this song was 5 days ago. I’ve never been a big fan of the Red Hot Chili Peppers so the task seemed pretty big.

I thought the lyrics were ‘all I wanted was someone to…’. Google kept telling me the lyrics belonged to a group called Hidden In Plain View who are no longer together and don’t seem to exist on the internet apart from some lyrics and a Wikipedia entry. I was still pretty sure it was the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Anthony’s voice is pretty distinctive.

Many many searches, reading of lyrics, and watching of YouTube videos later I decided to listen to the 30 second clips of the hundred or so RHCP songs in the iTunes store. The song I was looking for didn’t have the chorus as part of its clip but I recognised the tune enough when I heard it to look up the lyrics and hope I’d found the right one. I squealed and ran to tell the boy when I realised I had found it!

The song is Hard To Concentrate from the album Stadium Arcadium. The lyric I thought I knew was “all I want is for you to be happy”.

Red Hot Chili Peppers – Hard To Concentrate

With the news that Real Groovy has gone into receivership I’m welcoming the arrival of JB Hi-Fi with open arms. Real Groovy has been great for imports, second hand CDs, and vinyl; but pricing on the popular music they stock is expensive compared to places like The Warehouse, often costing an extra $10.

I’ve been waiting for JB Hi-Fi to come after I first visited one of their stores in Auckland last year and scored some imported CDs at a great price. The site is the recently closed LV Martin and Son in the BNZ Tower in Wellington. They are currently advertising for ALL staff, so if you’d like to work at JB Hi-Fi pop over to their website and fill out an application form.

We are all inclined to have our own taste in music, but often this comes to us with a holier than thou attitude and a disdain for people that have less than adequate taste compared to our own.

The biggest problem with this is that we’re missing out on the many genres and instruments available to us. And that’s where collaborations between genres and where using instruments not normally associated with a specific type of music can pay dividends.

It worked perfectly for Metallica with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, and Portishead with the New York Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra.

Apocalyptica are doing something similar.

This four piece cello metal band hail from Finland. The current line up includes three cellists and a drummer. They’re a perfect gateway from metal to cello to classical music.

The videos describe it best. Apocalyptica were made famous by their Metallica covers so it’s the perfect place to start, if you can stop laughing at the ridiculousness for a few minutes you may just come to appreciate how fucking amazing it is :]

Apocalyptica – Enter Sandman

Apocalyptica – One

♥ In a combination of a different kind Greg Pattillo is mixing beat boxing and flute. How? Watch.
Greg Pattillo – Flight of the bumblebee

Greg Pattillo – Super mario brothers theme

Greg Pattillo – Inspector gadget theme

Fuck yea!

I stood in the longest line I’ve ever seen in Wellington on Wednesday

If you are familiar with Wellington, picture a line that stretches from the main doors of the TSB arena, around the side of the building, down the stairs, across the driveway, through Frank Kitts park up the ramp right down to the over-bridge! That was where we joined it. It was massive and took approximately 45 minutes to reach the front of the line and get in the doors.
When we did eventually get in they were taking all of the studded belts. Thankfully the pat down consisted of one or two soft pats and somehow she didn’t feel my belt.

We got in just after Alter Bridge started, completely missed Redline. Alter Bridge has three members of what was Creed, unfortunately they don’t (IMHO) have the same star power. The singer did make sure he told us at least 5 times how sick he was and how sore his throat was. That may have been the case, but I wasn’t impressed by their music.

After Alter Bridge was POD. They opened with Ka Mate coming over the speakers. I don’t think I’m the only one who thought it was strange. I can’t see the relevance between them and a haka.
I’ve never been a big fan of POD but the crowd seemed to lap them up. Especially when they requested that all the hardcore fans go mental…they truly did!

What we were all waiting for was Disturbed.

Disturbed is huge in New Zealand. Their last three albums went to number one here. And David made sure to thank us for it.

I ended up near the back of the Arena. I could see OK and I wasn’t getting too bashed up by big guys crashing into me (only a little bit). I did miss David’s entrance though. He came in wearing a straight jacket and Hannibal mask.
They opened with a song I’m not familiar with. i haven’t listened to their newest CD very much so I only know a couple of the songs off it. I’m a fan from their first CD and their sound changed quite a bit on the latest offering.

In all Disturbed is one of the best bands I have seen live. The songs took on new meanings. Probably the meanings they were meant to take in the beginning. But hearing them live meant I could feel the words and not just hear them. Jumping around while screaming “This is the way I pray” made something click.

Down with the sickness, Deify, Prayer and Land of confusion were the stand out songs for me.

The only downer were the assholes who thought it would be cool to smoke inside (cigarettes and weed [it's illegal to smoke in a public building in New Zealand]).
And to the people sniggering at the few of us wearing ear plugs, you should try it sometime. It cuts out the crap bits of sound because of the bad acoustics, so you can hear the singing properly. We’ll be listening to music for a lot longer than you, when you go deaf too :D

Disturbed has announced a New Zealand tour. And this time it’s a lot more worthy of the tour title because they are not playing exclusively in Auckland! They are including Wellington and Christchurch.

Yay

I’ve been listening to Disturbed for a long time (a long time for a 22 year old anyway). I was introduced to the when I borrowed a mix tape (yes a tape) from a boy at school when I was 14 and I copied it using my awesome double tape deck stereo. There was a strange song on it with someone screaming Ooh ah ah ah ah! I didn’t know how to use the Internet to my best advantage back then (typing words of a song into Google and finding out what it is :]) so it wasn’t until a while later that I discovered this was Disturbed’s song Down With The Sickness.
I downloaded their first couple of albums when I was a poor non appreciative teenager but I own at least one album now :S
I’ll be picking up their latest one this week.

Tickets for Wellington go on sale to the public July 10 through Ticketek or pre-sale through The Frontier Touring Company on July 8.
$82.50 for seated or GA.

I just spent the last 4 hours searching online for this video (literally). I had time to kill and was on the computer so decided to try to find a video I remembered I like the one time I saw it at the bowling alley one and a half months ago. I couldn’t remember the name of the song, and of the words, the tune, the artist, all I could remember was a girl with her leg over the guys shoulder and they were dancing on a basketball court (or something similar). I new it was a Ministry of Sound type song and as that is not my usual genre of choice I really didn’t know where to start.

I don’t know how I did it but 4 hours and a lot of youtube, lastfm, azureus and google searching later I found it!

David Guetta – Love Don’t Let Me Go (version 2)

I mostly just love the first and last 40 seconds. Unfortunately the video doesn’t look nearly as good on youtube with sound coming out of the laptop as it did on a huge crystal clear screen.

I quite like this song too…

David Guetta – Love is Gone

These are both so different to my usual choices of music.