While Soundwave wasn't too impressive an organised thing, the people deciding to put it on felt the need to make a little bit more money by running what they called "Sidewaves". These were side gigs that bands from Soundwave would play in each city.

Not having our complete fill of As Tall As Lions and The Dear Hunter, my brother Michael and I went on the Monday.

That was the day after Soundwave. We'd both been to work that day and I was exhausted from the day prior.

As well as burnt.

The Dear Hunter were one of a few bands I got photos of that night…

Here's what happened…

My American Heart

I have no idea who you are or what you sound like. I apologise. 

We only heard glimpses of you as we were standing in line. You / they / whoever it is sounds okay. 

mewithoutYou 

Before that night, I had never heard of "mewithoutYou". Today, I'd just look away! Look away!

mewithoutYou is interesting but the lead singer has what is quite possibly one of the worst voices I have ever heard in my life. It's like stuffing a sponge down the throat of a taco chip and then smashing a bottle over its head and requesting that it sing music that your parents would love.

I have no other way of explaining it. Seriously.

Ok, so he could play the accordion… it doesn't mean he could sing…

Ok, I lied. I do. I was just being lazy and comedic (or attempting to be, anyway).

Full credit to him for handing out food to the audience though. I wonder if he's used to his audiences feeling an urge to throw him out of a window and has used this to quell them in the past.

The fresh food didn't go down quite as well as the singer had hoped. This was what I saw as we left the gig…

Unfortunately for any of us who tried the fresh food that was good for us, it was a little… too fresh… 

…seriously, who eats raw asparagus. 

I actually said to Mike as they were playing their set that "this music makes me want to slaughter innocent children".

It wasn't that the songs did it… just his "singing". But if you thought we would escape the wrath of his voice – whoever he is – you'd be wrong because…

Kevin Devine

…mewithoutYou returned in Kevin Devine's set.

Kevin Devine was a surprising one for me because while I had never heard of him let alone heard him, I actually didn't expect him to be as good of an artist as what he was.

Click on the image to see it bigger!

Mike & I didn't catch the entire set for him as immediately after the mewithoutYou punishment session was over, we headed outside for some food. Unfortunately, all we could find was a dodgy slice of pizza at an even dodgier kebab shop and after that we headed back inside to see what else was on before As Tall As Lions & The Dear Hunter. The first song we heard Kevin Devine play felt like your typical Dashboard Confessional acoustic emo rock mish mash and Mike and I turned to each other, our nods echoing the same thoughts we were having.

And then Kevin played a song called America… and everything changed.

Click on the image to see it bigger!

Here was a musician who was baring his heart and letting everything out in a beautifully constructed song filled with wondrous lyrics and a remarkable sense of passion. While I'd easily bet that Dashboard Confessional's Chris Carrabba is one of those singers that empties his soul into a schooner only to see every girl drink out of it in hopeful agony, here was a singer who was pouring out his life and his observations into a song because he could.

It wasn't about getting the girl. It wasn't about fucking. It was about something tangible, something real.

And that was nice to see.

It was also nice to see him just blending in with the crowd as the rest of the fans waited around for their favourite bands.

I'll be buying some of his stuff later on, me thinks. 

Click on the image to see it bigger!

As Tall As Lions

Click on the image to see it… yep, you guessed it… bigger!

After seeing ATAL play the day before at Soundwaves, I was looking forward to hearing them play in a gig where the sound guy wasn't a deranged idiot with a packet of plastic forks shoved up his ass and ears. I was looking forward to hearing them sound brilliant and play a different set.

I got half of it.

The half I got was them sounding excellent. They really are a brilliant little band, even if we only got to see two of the band members play down there. It's a shame that they really didn't do anything to change their set. 

"Stab City" would have been nice. I only yelled it out at each thing I saw them at. *sigh* 

Click on the image to see it bigger!

On the plus side, while we were standing in line, there was a small laughterish line as – while I wore one of my trilbies – I commented to the mustached guy out of As Tall As Lions "nice hat". He in turn said "thanks," saw my hat, and smiled.

I guess he didn't see my freshly signed As Tall As Lions shirt from the day before.

While the set was more or less the same of what we heard at Soundwaves a bit over 24 hours ago, we got a nicer rendition of "Love, Love, Love". Sure, it's hard to beat one where one of the guys from Cartel and the lead out of The Dear Hunter co
me along, but there were enough up on stage for As Tall As Lion's last song to make it something that no ATAL fan would forget.

Love, love, love… click on the image to see it bigger! (Yeah, not as good as the original lyric but what are you gonna do…)

The Dear Hunter 

While As Tall As Lions and The Dear Hunter are very different bands and each command a different sort of stage presence, Mike is probably right:

The Dear Hunter were the better of the bands to see.

Click on the image to see it bigger!

It's so simple when you see them play. While the two ATAL members who were there have a lot of fun and put a lot of passion into what they do, it's just not as amazing as seeing some of the fun the band members are having in The Dear Hunter. They're jumping all over the place, shaking their heads while their hair whips around at the environment madly. The light dances off of beads of sweat and you can see without a doubt that this is live music at its best: musicians pounding away at notes and lyrics to produce a sound that is nothing short of amazing.

It's just so brilliant to see something like this. Rock. Pure unadulterated rock.

And sheer pleasure in the eyes of the people playing it for those of us who love it. Brilliant sounds bouncing off of tired walls, reverberating through our ear drums and pushing us deeper and deeper into the brilliance of this this music.

It was a shame that one of the guitarists was too fucking loud. 

He must be a fan of Spinal Tap. I expect there's a bloody "11" painted in white out on his Marshall amp and I suspect that night that the sound guy knew he was too loud but couldn't do anything about it.

Everything that The Dear Hunter did was fucking brilliant… except for this guy.

Yes, he's a great guitarist and he was certainly doing some very cool things. I would just like to have heard the rest of the band… I was there for the songs, not for a ear shattering guitar solo that had more in common with noise than anything else.

If the guitarist – whoever he is – ever comes across this page, do a few of us a favour and heed these words of advice: shut the fuck up by turning yourself down. 

Take off your sweater, your shoes and your shirt and click the pic! (Once again, my linking caption blurb doesn't do a song justice…)

Once again, it was a shame that The Dear Hunter chose a path much like As Tall As Lions and opted for pretty much the same set-list as they'd used at Soundwave. While I didn't know their discography, I know Michael as well as a couple of others who were shouting for an encore were looking for something more than just what they'd heard before, and not even two days prior.

But other than that… brilliant. Definitely worth seeing if you love music.

Leigh's Final Word & Some more images…

By the end of the concert, I was exhausted. During the last few songs in The Dear Hunter's set, I got to talking to a gorgeous Kiwi girl named Sarah (I love the Kiwi accent on girls… *melts*) who was taking pictures of broccoli… and the band. But we got to talking and as the show ended, I quickly got her email (alas, not the phone number…) so I could… you know, communicate with her.

As the lead singer of The Dear Hunter was getting off of stage, I told Mike to go up to him.

And then when he did… eventually… I got a shot of them together. Mike was annoyed at me for not getting two shots. Lack of professionalism on my part or something. I think the image was fine. That's a Michael smile!

Click on the image to see it bigger!

So it's a cross between a smile, a frown, and a lemon… it's the moment that Mike will remember most. 

Earlier on in the night, some random photographer took a picture of Mike & I… here it is. He can be found at his website, in case you were curious.

Finally, here are some more pictures from the night. I don't have as many shots left over as I did from say something like Soundwave.

Please remember that I don't make money from my shots so if you're going to link to them or embed them in a page, make sure to leave a link back to my site with some sort of "I found these at Leighlo.com!" or something like that. I've already had some people embed without linking back and it just makes me realise that there are some grade A asses out there, and not the sort I want to do fun things to.

Back on topic, while I would love to make cash out of my photography, I do this for fun at the moment so if you like my shots, leave me some comments and if you want to use them, leave a link or a trackback. It's the un-ass-ish thing to do.

As Tall As Lions getting all Love, Love, Love-y…

Sing until your lungs get sore…

All you need is love, love, love… love is all you need. Ish. Sort of…

…although I could go for some sex. Not with these people. All they want is Love, Love, Love. I'm just saying in general. Sex. For me… ahhh, forgetaboutit… 

The Dear Hunter's lead singer really getting into it…

Encore! Encore! 

Someone whom I've liked since I first heard played: Ruthie Foster. I'm heading to bed now, but here's an image to salivate those… err… saliva glands.

Click the image to see the phenomenal Ruthie Foster appear in a larger image that I shot tonight (the same image… but bigger)!

This year, the Soundwave festival got distorted and turned into this:

Geeze… what a mess. People everywhere you turn… too many to count… bad planning… great music though… want to know what happened? 

Last year's Soundwave was actually pretty cool. Deftones and Thrice and +44 and As Tall As Lions… shit, I even got pictures.

This year I was back with an extra battery for the old Coolpix 5700 and the hope to see more of the bands I'd paid to see. Unfortunately, Coheed & Cambria had dropped out so that just left As Tall As Lions and Sugarcult being the bands I really only cared about. Michael told me to care about The Dear Hunter despite me not hearing their music beforehand and while we both were cool with seeing Incubus later on, the schedule made seeing any other bands too conflicting.

Oh and if you're here looking for a specific band, press CTRL + F to "Find" text in my page and look for the band that way. It's a pretty long blog and unless you wanna skim through or just look at the perdy pictures, you'll have to search your way through. Or I could even provide a handy anchorlink section for the bands (which I'm not going to do but the idea was nice). Also, these images are as always copyrighted by meso if you wanna use them, just leave me a comment. It'd be nice if to comment if you like them and my words. It's not like I get paid for this. Hell, this blog took a couple of days to write.

Mmm… crowds. Click it for a bigger (essentially) crowd.

A note to the schedulers: you suck. 

Geeze. How much did the scheduling suck this year? It was just pointless. Okay, so at least the metal and hard rock stage was ages away from the stages I actually care about… but as far as scheduling went, there were way too many conflicts and the distance between stages made it impossible to make it to a band you wanted to see if there were conflicts.

But that wasn't the biggest scheduling problem. The most irritating came on the day when…

No one told anyone that several acts had been moved around.

How hard would it have been to put up a sign around various stages or get a message out there that acts were being screwed around with?

I guess it would have been about as hard as placing numbers next to stages or handing out maps as neither were actually done. As a result, no one really knew what the stages were apart from 1 & 2 which were clearly noted by being right next to each other in a pit a mile wide. Seriously, we had pissed off Stage 4 goers at Stage 5 trying to figure out where Stage 4 was. 

Maps. Shit, you hand them out at the door. It's really easy. 

Signs. You stick them next to the stage and put them at various marks around the land you're renting. They tell people where to go. I know I'd like to tell the people "organising" Soundwave 2008 where to go… but before I get pissy, let's start with something simple like…

Lines.

Granted, Soundwave 2008 was automatically going to be bigger than 2007. The first one which appeared last year was more of a test bed for a formula that would serve Big Day Out styled fun with only rock. There was no dance, no random pop, no electronica or whatever-the-hell we heard ten minutes ago on Mix FM. At Soundwave there is only rock. Rock, hard rock, progressive, metal, commercial, punk, emo… what have you.

Rock plain and simple.

Now I'm not sure how big Soundwave was last year but I know damn well it was a lot easier to get into than what it had going for it this year. I was stuck in a line for an hour and a half. That was just to get in. The organisers were pouring us through at a slow trickle and it was severely irritating. It's not as if the security were doing anything special either. Bags were hardly checked when you did get in but you were lucky to reach that point. One kid had a satelite dish fall on him (though I think he might have climbed the booth it sat on… still…) and there was blood, a neck brace, and a stupid fence ahead that got removed permanently because it shouldn't have been there in the first place. 

Click to see how bad the line was from the eyes of my phone camera!

Others in the line suffered heat exhaustion as we were all standing out there with sun beating on us as if we were a bongo drum. I quite liked how when one of the girls behind me pleaded that she needed to go to the bathroom, one of the Soundwave security officials told her to "hold it".

Yeah. That's brilliant. You make us sweat out a line because an event is badly planned and we have to hold it. Christ.

The lines didn't stop there, though.

A little birdy phoned in from the grapevine to tell me that apparently Soundwave's organisers had gotten greedy and had oversold the event by 6,000 tickets. Apparently police were ready to shut it down while we were standing in line. While people might be quick to disspell the idea that riot police were ready to shut it down, I saw quite a few riot police fans on the outskirts of Sydney Park as I left so this wouldn't surprise me.

Anyway, with a ridiculous amount of people in Soundwave, we all had to compete for the same piss poor selection of food and beverage. And I mean piss poor… like hell, I expected to be ripped off. You don't go to a rock festival and not expect that, especially not one in Sydney. Three bucks fifty for the worst lemonade you'll ever have and ten bucks for a Bacardi Breezer can. Yeah. Fine. Stupid but fine.

But you really don't expect to be standing in line for an hour just so you can get that drink in the first place.

Click the image to see it bigger!

That was the line as we were watching As Tall As Lions. All of those people were trying to get slushies, crappy-ass lemonade, and all of them were waiting in a line that wasn't moving because there weren't enough stalls or another people working in the stalls that were there.

There just simply wasn't enough beverage on a hot day. Granted it was hotter than anyone could have realised, but there just wasn't enough people handing out water, selling water, or other drinks in plain site. Loads of food that you could line up for ages for and hate the moment you put it in your mouth, but just not enough to actually… you know… keep you alive.

So next time: more stalls, less stalling.

Seriously, the slushee store may have tasted like crap but one person in the entire thing serving a line that people stood for over an hour in? Geeze, that's just not fucking on.

Then we should talk about parts of the event itself because if I sat here and commented about how badly the event was planned and organised in the first place, we'd be here a bloody long time.

Amenities.

I've alread
y mentioned that the drinks and food were in pretty much pathetic numbers. Luckily you got the toilets right!

Lots of toilets! In ridiculous rows! 

Sadly I don't think I have the skill the scrub the image of the toilet I used from my head. A tank of urine and paper and things I'd prefer to forget make me wonder what sort of technological back-end I was asked to put my back-end into. Thankfully, I only needed to take a leak so I didn't have to find out.

Thankfully.

Bands.

Hey, you got the bands right! There were great bands there! I mean sure, you dicked a few of us around by canceling various acts and not actually telling us. And then you further dicked us around by rescheduling acts without telling anyone.

But the bands were good. I didn't get to see as many as I had hoped to… you know, the whole stupid schedules and messing around with the schedule thing… but here goes…

Sugarcult 

I do have some pictures of the band but I only got a few and they weren't very good as it was the beginning of the day and I was hardly in my… realm… zone… thingy… so to speak. But anyway…

Sugarcult were ok. You could tell the band had a great stage presence and that the leader was having fun, but my brother thinks that he must have busted his voice pretty early on stage because he's one of the singers who sounds like his voice is unnaturally high and has had his balls removed. Almost as if his agent has said "I will return your balls when you retire."

A broken voice meant that he wasn't singing high for the songs he sang high on recordings… and that made him sound like crap. Sure, he was having fun, but every time he went low, we said "ha… ha…" or laughed to some other variant. "He's goes lower for the live show," I said at one point and it was entirely true. Kind of a shame but what can you do.

As Tall As Lions

Click on the image to see it a little bit bigger!

Originally scheduled to go on at a certain time but moved around to another time (City & Colour and As Tall As Lions looked as if they traded places which didn't impress some of the City & Colour fans who got there as As Tall As Lions started playing), Mike and I went and tried to buy lemonade for a few minutes before the band started. It was a futile effort as my tone a few paragraphs above would have noted.

An irritating futile effort.

By this point I was needing water and fearing heat exhaustion. I'd sent a message to Dad that said "This is a fucking joke. I can't even get a drink. Next stop heat exhaustion." Before the band started, I saw a security guy in a yellow vest with a couple of waters so I went over and asked him for one. He didn't give me one of the two but went into a tent and found one for me. Mike & I shared it and I was glad that one of the security guys was actually doing his job compared to the rest of the pricks who just stood there as they were a bloody brick wall.

A brick wall wearing a yellow jacket.

Nevertheless, As Tall As Lions…

 …were good. Very good. Even though it was really only half of As Tall As Lions, they still performed well with the mustached one (I don't know their names and I'm too lazy to Google) even carrying a bottle of Maker's Mark (my favourite bourbon actually… well, one of them anyway) on stage and at one point letting a member of the audience finish it for him!

They sang beautifully and at one point even had one of the members of Cartel (another band I originally wanted to see but got ditched because of the scheduling stuff-ups) and The Dear Hunter up there singing with them. How nice. All big members of the same family… ish.

I even got a t-shirt signed. An As Tall As Lions shirt. Not the Capcom one I was wearing. 

We did learn something else that the organisers might want to take on-board for next time and you can add this to the list of Soundwave 2008 gripes because this one really comes into play with As Tall As Lions:

Hire sound engineers who actually know what the fuck they're doing.

Seriously.

The sound guy stuck doing As Tall As Lions delayed the performance by around ten to fifteen minutes because from the looks of it, he hadn't turned the bloody DI on. What the fuck?! My brother should be doing this job. He's be doing it right. Not some bullshit sound engineer who can't even fix the most basic of problems because his head is kept inside his elevated tent so far that nothing else but his ego can reach out.

Shit. I don't even know if that made sense. That's how pissed it was making us.

I miss half a band while I'm standing there because of the sound guy? Yeah… that's my money's worth.

The mustached one from As Tall As Lions sings with one of the guys from The Dear Hunter. Click for a slightly bigger image.

The Dear Hunter

Click on the image to see it a little bit bigger!

These guys were a surprise for me. Mike had been telling me for months now how much they rocked but I as yet hadn't heard them play.

But he was right. They rocked. 

He thinks they're better than As Tall As Lions. I look at them differently and while I accept that The Dear Hunter are bloody excellent, I think As Tall As Lions are up there too. Different sort of music, different sort of sound.

Click to see the image a little bit bigger!

But they look like they're having fun. Sweat glistening on faces, head shaking, body moving… they're having a ball up ther, that much is evident.

Truly great. I suggest you all go out and listen to their latest CD (the one with "Red Hands" on it) or check them out at their site.

Incubus

Click on the image to see it a little bit bigger!

It should be said that Incubus were the second headlining act. They are apparently inferior to The Offspring.

Why? 

Geeze, I don't know. I suppose this was decided by the same people who couldn't work out that "water is vital for human survival but we won't worry about it" at Soundwave 2008.  

Click on the image to see it a little bit bigger!

Incubus put on a really professional show. Perfect singing, perfect playing… just plain perfection.

But while it was perfect, I didn't think it was as good as some of what I'd seen earlier that day.

It felt too perfect if you know what I mean. It lacked the distinctive personality that the other bands we'd seen had.  It lacked the imperfections and flaws that made those bands more human.

Don't get me wrong: I loved hearing them play the older tracks (mostly because the newer tracks aren't what I'd call good) and I loved being a part of the throng that was listening to them. But it's different.

Incubus were excellent. Easily the most professional band there.

It's just that professionalism made them… less real… less fun, if you will. 

Click on the image to see it a little bit bigger!

The Aftermath 

Yes, I saw four bands. Barely four. One hundred buck tickets for four bands. Look at all that value.

Seriously, if it's going to be organised as badly, as greedily, and as pointlessly next year as it was this year, I think a lot of people are going to be like my and say a nice big "fuck you" to the organisers of Soundwave. We'll go and do something where the organisers aren't trying to kill us.

Oh and here are some more images from the day for all who are curious to see what I go. If you want to use the images, it'd be really nice for ya'll to leave me a comment. I know people have stolen last year's Deftones images I did and while I can't do anything about it, it'd be really nice to get some recognition. It's not like I'm asking for payment here.

One of the guys from Cartel – probably the lead guy – singing on stage with As Tall As Lions. Click it to see it bigger!

The lead singer from The Dear Hunter really gets into it! Click to see it bigger…

Here he is a slightly more calm moment. Click it to see it bigger.

Brandon (I think?) from Incubus in a self reflective pause while the band plays on. Click to see it bigger!

God he really belts it out, doesn't he? Click the image for more belting.

Brandon has his shirt back on in this one. Scroll up if you prefer him shirtless. Click this to see it bigger if you don't care.

Might post some more later on. I still have some, believe it or not. 

Leigh  

EDIT: Apologies to all who wanted to see Incubus shots without watermarks. I found some dickheads on another forum or two linking to my images directly without mentioning or commenting to me and I decided to take some sort of action on my images. I will be re-linking to ones with smaller watermarks in a few days just as I'll also be blogging the other As Tall As Lion & Dear Hunter gig, but give me a few days. 

And now I'm deaf.

But I did meet a hot girl from New Zealand tonight. I got her email.

Oh and I saw As Tall As Lions & The Dear Hunter. Sweet.

I'll be writing about Soundwave and tonight's concert in the next day or two.

For now, here's a taste of tonight…

The lead singer from the Dear Hunter.

Falling asleep now… 

So here's my writing from Thursday to Friday and even a little bit from Sunday.

And all of these images are shot by me and therefore copyrighted to me, but if you want to use them, don't hesitate to give me a holler by leaving me a comment and I can provide bigger ones. Like if you want to print some and such.

Dad trying to get an interview out of Nigel…

8.00 PM

Sometimes I wonder if I'll ever develop my Dad's waning attitude. The thought sort of scares me. Much like developing his humour which has already started and I probably can't stop.

We're heading to Kell's Kitchen to see Nigel Kennedy tonight and while the restaurant name suggests trendy, Dad's wearing nothing but a t-shirt, daggy jeans, and sandals. Frankly, I'd be surprised if they let him in. And honestly, that sort of laziness feels disrespectful to Kennedy himself.

It dawns on me that I could have always gone with friends, but between the few I have, they're either:

Not people who like jazz
Too busy
Don't like violin
or,
Don't want to be seen out with me

As a result, going out with my Dad to see Kennedy is all I have.

*sigh*

8.13 PM
Parked. *sigh*

8.33 PM
Standing in line with a Bourbon and Coke.

So much for worrying about getting in.

8.45 PM
Highlight so far (as I wat in the line):
Walking into Kell's and seeing a happy and spirited Nigel to my right.

I take a sip of the Bourbon and coke.

'I should've brought my violin from him to sign,' I think to myself.

9.14 PM
What a quaint venue this is.

And look… there's even a hot girl to my right with braces and a lip ring.

9.17 PM
Left, even.

It didn't take me long to lose track of time.

Nigel has a way with music. He treats music as if it's a loved one. Dignity, respect, and passion. Seeing Nigel play is a treat and you can tell he's happy when you're happy.

This was the way jazz is supposed to be.

Hot, dingy, crowded, cramped, sweaty.

This is jazz not some bullshit nightclub where beats are all that matters. This is people pushing out their hearts and souls in the strike of a bow, the horse hair lighting the string on fire and sending a pulse of sound our way. This is a bassist plucking like a madman, the notes bouncing and jumping all over your earlobes threatening to cave in your senses and make you believe that insanity is brilliant.

This is jazz. This is excellent. This is…

FUCKING AMAZING.

I'm sorry for being so frank but seriously, that will be the best twenty dollars ever spent.

Seriously. It doesn't get much better value than that.

You know when you're hearing some of the best renditions of Miles Davis, Herbie Hancock and Jimi Hendrix by some of Sydney's top jazz musicians as well as Nigel Kennedy, something in the universe is definitely right.

And it's not just Kennedy… it's the entire band. From Jonathan Zwartz on bass, Hamish Stewart on drums & percussion, Dale Barlow on sax & flute, and Gerald Masters on the organ (and I'm sure I'm spelling some names wrong), they were all standout.

Like… wow.

There will never be jazz that good in Sydney for a while I bet.

Click on this image to see it slightly bigger!

The last song they played was a suggestion  by Dad. Nigel asked what they should play and Dad said "Song For My Father".

"That's top," Nigel said and they got into, Dad clapping the beat on his lap as they started. It didn't exactly get everyone into the whole clapping thing though a few joined in.

I haven't been able to get the version I heard there out of my head yet.

As I write this, it's Friday and it's still playing along in a constant brilliant loop.

At the half-way mark, I got to hug Kennedy. At that point, your original thought of "well hang on, I kind of want his autograph on my Vivaldi CD" goes right out the window and into the lap of someone who seriously can't get their head around hugging the guy you want an autograph of.

Seriously… I got to hug Nigel Kennedy.

I got to talk to Nigel Kennedy. Like he's a bloke. Just a guy I know.

Un-fucking-believable. In a good way.

If you thought my happiness was up there when I got to hug him, you should see what happened at the end of the night.

Dad hanging out with Nigel…

I got to hang out with Nigel Kennedy!!!

Now sure, it was a school night… hell, it IS a school night and I'm writing this now (hey… an update for my blog… and all it took was a world class violinist)…

A school night and shouldn't I be sleeping? I mean I do have a lot of troubles with getting to work on time. Or even remotely near on time.

But geeze… this was Nigel Kennedy.

I quite liked how he told me I needed to get with blonde babysitting bimbos. I happened to agree.

It should be said that while I enjoy every sort of music and generally follow the mantra of "as long as it sounds good, I like it", I have two favourite artists.

Not in any order:

• Mel Torme
• Nigel Kennedy

Now not to put a dampner on any of this but… Mel Torme is dead. And I've just hung out with Nigel Kennedy.

I'm over the moon right now. Fly me to the moon and let me sing above the stars. That sort of over the moon. NASA could've let me shoot down the satellite with how universally accepted I am right now.

More pictures below. Leave me a comment with your email in it if you want bigger ones or just more pictures cause… I have LOADS more!!!

Click the image to see it bigger!

The pictures are all done.

All I need to do now is put it all together.

But before I do, here's the glimpse of a master…

I'm tired and am heading to bed. Pictures and blog of Nigel Kennedy  should be on late Friday / early saturyuday.

Too tired to check spelling. 

Knowing my luck, I've probably just collapsed in a corner somewhere and am drooling in patterns that make Virgin Mary sightings seems like child's play.

Still, this is my first blog of the year… an automated message bringing you what I think is among the best of my blogs for the last year. 

How many people do you know that wrote around 250 blog entries in the one year?

The answer is probably obvious. 

None. You and your friends have lives.

Still, I'm planning a whole bunch more for this year ranging between crap for the Gimmick Guy, a year-long blog-ject (like a project but specifically for the blog), Chimp, and a bunch of other things that I won't burden with you right now.

So here is my year in review… some of it anyway. Some of it's happy. Some of it's sad. All of it is past-tense.

Let's talks about sex bah-bee…

• March – The Big Clit – More hits on this than that clit ever got. Maybe. 
• June – Another random sex post. – This time about Starcraft! 
• August – Vaginal Discrimination – Today's discussion centres itself on a very important topic… 
• August – The planning for World Laids Day begins – I can't be the only one who celebrates this… 
• September – I almost get picked up at the Bondi Road pick-up joint… – If only.
• October – Guys really need to remember to support important causes – Men. You have a duty to support the breast.

 Leigh chills with friends!

• February – One of those General Pants kind of days (WITH PICS!) – Nice. Relaxing. Billboard-y.
• March – Art with Dee and some guy named Anthony Bartok (WITH PICS!) – It has Dee in it. Reason enough to click.
• July – Fashion. Vodka. Red Bull. Cream. Girls. (WITH PICS!) – You pick the ones you like most.
• July – Famous for wearing a hat (WITH PIC!) – This relates to the blog link above this.
• August – Partying is such sweet sorrow… wait… no it isn't. It rocks. (WITH PICS!) – Hey, I met Juliet at this one!
• December- I have a big night out with some sexy models and Wendell. (WITH PICS!) – I so have a new-found love for Kiwi girls after this.

 
Click-click-click says the camera!

• January – The Manta Meet – When a DSLR Users.com member comes down from Queensland, it's worth a meet! 
• January – Images from a time you'd want to remember – Nice relaxing pictures shot around the harbour.  
• February – A1 Grand Prix: The Cars – What you go to the Grand Prix for. 
• February – A1 Grand Prix: The Cameras – What you don't. 
• February – The sights & sounds of Soundwave – …and I'll be doing it again this year!
• August – Eclipse of the heart – It's a red moon. Seriously, if you can think of a better name, I welcome you to try!

Live on scene, it's Ace Reporter Leigh!

• March – I don't wanna rock DJ but you're making me feel so nice – It's a cool stormy night… and you're listening to Leigh on the radio!
• August – Mike & I experienced more… while experiencing less. – At least the music was good. 
• October – The fifth best restaurant in the world! – And I got to eat there… sweet! Took a while though. Lol.

Leigh's Productions Of The Year!

• March – Gin & Jews – Like Snoop Dogg only more like Richard Cheese with a circumcision. 
• April – Pubey The Prepubescent Potato! – Mr. Potato Head just grew some balls. 
• May – Zimbabwe! – Like Oklahoma!… but with violence.
• May – A song for the digital photographer – Bobby Brown no longer accepts my calls.
• May – The movie I entered into Tropfest: Two Bricks – In case you're wondering, I didn't even make it in as a finalist

Leigh's Random Crap

• January – Happy Australia Day – What better way to say it than with a nice picture. 
• April – Fuji Astia CF Card – My April Fools Day prank of the year for Leighlo.com. Fooled some people. 
• June – Phone Home – I need a new phone now. I should probably re-read this. 
• June – The many uses of Jam Sessions DS – There I go… pushing the boundaries of what it's mean to be used for… 
• July – Johnny Suicide – Did you ever feel like you could just jump in front of a train? 
• September – Argh! 2007 – International Speak Like A Pirate Day, me lardy. I mean hardy. 
• November – Vivaldi leaves me – My cat abandoned me. I haven't seen him for ages…

Closing down.

For good.

Mike and I headed down there after work yesterday. There's a whole smattering of CD's t-shirts, and crappy DVD's on tables as well as literally "what's left" in the aisles and they're taking 50% off everything.

I'll give you an example. Mike got the rare-in-Australia Up In The Attic import disc from Alien Ant Farm for 15 bucks instead of the original price of 30.

I got the Dave Matthews Band DualDisc edition of Stand Up for 5 bucks (down from 30) and a disc I've been wanting since I pretty much started watching MTV when I went to school in Texas, Live's Secret Samadhi … for 5 bucks.

There's a little bit of jazz… actually, there's probably still quite a lot of jazz left… but they've closed the jazz section and just emptied the discs on a table. So… you'll have to dig around to find something you want… but in case you've always wanted some CD's but were always too cheap to get them, get your ass down there now and see if they have them for cheap before they close today. 

Last week, my brother and I headed to the "Sony. Experience. More." thingy on at Darling Harbour. As press, we were privvy to press stuff… which basically means we get there earlier with less people as well as a mini press conference thingy.

My brother Michael speaking to one of the people at Sony in the computer division. 

Anyway, here are some pictures from that event (because I'm lazy, tired, and a combination of other things I don't care about mentioning) as well as some text about it.

First up… Australian rock band The Androids played as we walked in…

The Androids! Click on it to get a bigger version!  

The Androids! Click on it to get a bigger version!  

So there we were… at the Sony experience… experiencing more… or less… or something.

Look at those shiny Sony lights… doesn't it just make you want purchase something not made by Sony…

It's like that bear statement… "lions, tigers and bears oh my"… Well… TV's and digital cameras and video cameras and… audio (oh my!)… including these cool things: 

They're really tiny satellite speakers. They're wired… which is unfortunate because they'd be brilliant if they could run off of Bluetooth or some other wireless technology. Anyway, they mostly send the highs but less of the mids which the subwoofer now helps to send out. Cool device though. I'll take some.  

This thingy was kind of cool. It's apparently a Sony A-series prototype.

I'm not really sure about the authenticity of this to be honest. It looks a lot like a Sony A-series body with a battery grip attached to the bottom rather than a professional Sony A-series body, though the prism on the top is a nice touch, especially if they're trying to give a nod to those of us who like the old-school styling. The manual control switch at the base of the lens mount looks interesting…

…but I'm far more interested in the Carl Zeiss 85mm 1.4 lens on the front of that thing. I'll take one. I don't have a Sony camera and I'm not likely to buy one… maybe because it's got "Sony" written on it or because it doesn't perform as well as its Konica Minolta predecessor… but a Zeiss lens would be nice…

Sony had some people there making lollies from those lolly stores around the Westfields and what not. Quite nice actually. I still have some.

They were imprinted with the word "SONY" in blue on the white bits in the middle so when I ate them, they burned holes in my flesh… you know, being evil and all. Or me being good.

Or something like that.

I never know anymore, to be honest. Good, bad, evil, sexy, anal… shit, it's all the same these days.

More images in the "continued reading" bit… 

The Androids! Click on it to get a bigger version!
 

The Androids! Click on it to get a bigger version!

They had this nifty model of a Sony lens that had been cut in twain… twine… twoon… you know what I mean… even if I don't.

It's pretty useless a lens (duh) but as a show-piece it's pretty nifty, especially when you consider that a lot of attempts by companies to demonstrate what's in a lens usually do so by use of a cheap graphics or a plastic manufactured model… but full kudos to whoever at Sony thought they should cut one in half.

I wonder how much fun it was to be the person cutting it in half.

And did they hire a Nikon or Canon person who would no doubt take pleasure in doing it… mwahahahaha…