Music Monday: Reading Festival Review Pt 3!

Hi guys, final review of Reading Festival!! yay!

So by this last day, I had sort got into a proper routine now, I knew exactly where I was most time (except later that night which I will explain nearer the end of the post) and I knew all the secret places that make surviving at the festival a little easier *cough* the church by Tesco has nice toilets and serves cheap breakfast *cough*. Unfortunately it was the last day (even though I left the next morning), so I was incredibly sad when I got home (but also relieved since there were some not so great parts about it which again I will explain later).

Anyway onto the bands! First band I saw were Haim, who'd I'd been really looking forward to the whole weekend, and they didn't disappoint. I especially liked their new song "The Wire", but of course songs like "Falling" and "Don't Save Me" were crowd favourites too. Next was Fall Out Boy, who I didn't really watch from the crowd because I wanted a good view so I was fairly far a way and looked a bit weird jumping around to some of their songs as no one else was, and I think the 8 year old me would have slapped myself for not trying to get right to the front or something because she liked that kind of music a lot more than I do now even though I only knew a few songs, but anyway it was a great set and was kinda surreal (as was Green Day and Eminem from the previous days).  the straight after that were Nine Inch Nails, who I hadn't listened to before so I didn't quite know what to expect but they were pretty good! Also managed to get really close to the front of the main stage this time which made it even cooler since I could see all the cool smoke and effects they used, the only thing is is that their songs seemed to get progressively worse as the last few seemed to all sound exactly the same: just a heavy bass line which gave me a really bad headache (I sound like a grandma). And then Biffy Clyro. Again, hadn't really heard of them and just assumed they'd be some quiet folky hipster type band from the music that was played while the stage was being set up, but obviously, I don't think I've ever been so wrong in my life. Me and my friend actually decided to leave the front of the crowd after their third song since the moshing was the most violent of the whole weekend, including a guy on top of a guy's shoulders with another guy on top of his, and naturally they all fell down and the guy at the bottom of it all got a concussion. The annoying thing was that I'd just made friends with a nice person and his friends and then these loud albeit very funny nice guys and a couple girls too ran in front and pushed us far away from them, but we had a good chat with those people too anyway (including the question: "what language do you speak, I speak Christian" they were super drunk). So, back to the band, I was intrigued by them so I will check them out as unfortunately due to the fact that me and my friend left pretty early I don't really know if I'll like them or not. We also then proceeded to get lost in the dark and go to Tesco to find that it was closed. (yay.)

Anyway, I'm just gunna go say all the other things which I haven't mentioned about the festival as these three posts have mainly been about the bands: Camping was fun and horrendous at the same time, as it was freezing at night and someone decided to "mark" our tent which was lovely but it rained so hopefully that washed off, I didn't once use the toilets at the camping sites as they were like the pit of hell itself so me and my friends either used the toilets at the arena, Tesco or the church we found.  The thing I regret is not forcing more of my friends to come with me and not actually taking any details down from any of the people I met, and for being a bit reserved when it came to talking to new people at the start of the festival. It was only really on the Sunday that I found my confidence with new people, and found myself having a conversation with a person through my tent about Game of Thrones even though we couldn't see each other and sharing food my with random people and just chatting and giving people high fives and hugs.

So to conclude, it was one of the best experiences of my life and as long as the line up is good next year, I'm definitely going again. This years line up wasn't as good as some of the previous ones (especially the 2011 one- The Strokes, and Muse playing "Origin of Symmetry" in full, I would have killed to see that, I'm not joking) as it was trying to cater to a slightly wider audience and they should probably just stick to the normal demographic or it loses its identity a bit, but I still loved it. Recommend you go 9/10! (would have been 10 if it was the 2011 line up!)

Yas xx

P.S. if you are confused about my sudden enthusiasm for Muse, its because I have recently rediscovered them and now they're my second favourite band and my fave band for the moment (that changes every few months, recently it was tame impala, and before that was the vaccines etc.but I think Muse will be my favourite band for a long long time, but The Strokes are still my all time favourite band). Anyway I'll probably do an updated top five bands or maybe ten in the future.)

Song for the Week

My history teacher played this in our lesson and I forgot how much I like this song, so I'e decided to make it the song for the week!

Sweet Home Alabama- Lynyrd Skynyrd

Happy Monday! 

Yas xx

Song for the Week

Arghh behind on my blog! Damn you, A2 homework! Sorry guys for the lack and lateness of posts, school has overwhelmed me! No Music Monday post this week, but I do have a couple of book reviews up my sleeve so stay tuned for that! Will do my final Reading Festival post next Monday yay. Today's song for the week isn't the usual type, its just something which I've had in my head for the past week or so:

Wake Me Up- Avicii

Yes, its a little more top 40 than I would normally pick, but I think its genuinely a good song.

Happy... Tuesday this time!

Yas xx

Reading Festival Review Part 2!

So, Saturday of Reading review! This was the day I was most looking forward to as one of my favourite bands, Tame Impala played that day and they are still my favourite live band after seeing them for the second time! Their set was of course considerably shorter than when they had played at Hammersmith Apollo, but that didn't stop them from still being amazing!

I'll go chronologically now, the first band I saw was Palma Violets, and their entire set was brilliant and energy filled, Chilli Jenson looked like some  sort of wizard that was controlling us what with all the weird hand movements and everything. I was most looking forward to Palma Violets that day because I've never seen them live before and I've been listening to them a lot recently. Anyway back to their set: Chilli Jenson actually went into the crowd, plus Alana from Haim was in the crowd on someone's shoulders at one point! So basically a fun gig. Next was Splashh, fun and lots of moshing, but not as good as Palma Violets. I caught the very end of Imagine Dragons, and I kinda regret not having seen all their set as they were good, plus my favourite youtubers Dan and Phil introduced them on stage! Ah well, at least I got to see them perform Radioactive.

Then next it was Tame Impala, who I've already talked about (my favourite band from Saturday). I managed to catch 4 of Jake Bugg's songs after that, and luckily he played my favourite song by him ("Seen it All"), before I had to rush off to see Eminem. And yes, Eminem. Eminem was one of my favourite artists as a kid so I was so fricking excited when he came on stage, even though I was incredibly far away as there were so many more people than there had been for Green Day. People said he was miming, but I like to think he wasn't. Highlight of the set was when he sang "Stan", and Dido came on stage and we all went absolutely mental. The only problem was for me personally that there were too many new songs which just aren't as good as his old ones to be honest, and there was also zero on stage chemistry between him and Dido, but it was still Eminem so it was a pivotal moment all the same and I did enjoy singing lyrics which I obviously didn't hear properly when I was little so I was just making the lyrics up.

Anyway, overall Saturday was a great day, some great bands and the ones I was most looking forward to didn't disappoint!

Day 3 next Monday!

Yas xx

Song for the Week

Hey guys, everyone's back to school now! Collective sigh from all teenagers. So I thought it'd be appropriate for today's song for the week to be...

Rock and Roll High School- Ramones

Happy Monday!

Yas xx

Music Monday: Reading Festival Review Pt 1!

Hi guys, so last week I went to the Reading Festival! And no, not Reading as in books, Reading as in the place. It was so much fun and at the same time disgusting but was well worth it! I saw tonnes of bands including all the main stage headliners and loads of smaller bands too, but writing about all of them is going to take a lot of time and space so I'm spreading this review out and won't talk about everyone I saw but almost everyone. As a heads up I'll list everyone saw in chronological order, note that for some of the bands I only stayed for a couple of songs!

Friday:
Parquet Courts
Fidlar
Peace
RX Bandits
The Strypes
Green Day

Saturday:
Palma Violets
Splashh
Imagine Dragons
Tame Impala
Jake Bugg
Eminem

Sunday:
Haim
Fall Out Boy
Nine Inch Nails
Biffy Clyro

So, a quick review of Friday's bands- Parquet Courts were great, they had a really great energy so the atmosphere was awesome, and I'd only heard two of their songs before seeing them so I was pleasantly surprised when they played the songs which I hadn't heard yet, I'd definitely recommend checking them out. On the other hand there was Fidlar, I did have a lot of fun at the gig but they didn't really convince me and I probably wouldn't listen to them on my iPod so I don't recommend them. The only reason I watched Fidlar was because I was waiting to see Peace, who I preferred but I'm not mad about them, I will check out their album though. While waiting to see The Strypes I wandered into the Lock Up Stage tent and caught a good amount of RX Bandit's set as I was intrigued by the sounds emanating from that tent, and was glad I did watch them instead of Kate Nash who I could hear wailing unintelligibly from the Festival Republic tent where The Strypes would be on. And The Strypes were awesome, really loud and fun with some great songs and a surprisingly long set, everyone singing along to "Blue Collar Jane." They may look about 12 but they're helping to save this generation of rock n roll. And then what we'd all been waiting for: Green Day.

Green Day deserve their own paragraph because they were just that AMAZING! They played a couple of songs, Billy Joe Armstrong talking to the crowd and getting us to chant, and then they proceeded to play their album "Dookie" in full! They even got a guy up on stage to sing along before they played "Dookie", and other highlights of their performance was when Billy  got out a hose and what I can only describe as a toilet roll gun and started covering up the nearest camera with, you guessed it, toilet roll, and got an awesome t-shirt gun and starting firing Green Day merch out into the crowd. Mid set billy also started randomly playing a bit of AC/DC's "Highway to Hell" and got everyone singing along for a bit. After playing "Dookie" they played a couple more songs with two encores, and out of their whole performance these songs -"Boulevard of Broken Dreams", "Wake Me Up When September Ends", "Basket Case", "Minority", "American Idiot" "Jesus of Suburbia",  and "Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)"- stood out to me the most. It was an incredibly long set so I was kinda tired by the end of it but it was well worth it, they saved the best till last in my opinion with their encores so I'm so glad I saw the entire performance. If I ever get the chance to see them again I am definitely going.

Anyways so that's day one of my Reading experience covered! Stay tuned for day two and three!

Yas xx

Song for the Week

Hi guys, so I spent most of today watching and listening to Radio 1 on their website as they had a Radio 1 Reboot where loads of DJs were essentially trapped in a room for our entertainment while they waited to be randomly chosen to do their show for an hour, the catch being that one of the DJs wouldn't be chosen and all that waiting would have been for nought (poor Gemma Cairney). Anyway, I was listening to the one hit wonder slot and heard this song, which I remember loving as a kid, so I thought I'd have it as today's Song for the Week!

All The Things She Said- t.A.T.u.

Happy Monday!

Yas xx