Norman Ralph

My good friend Andrew got married earlier this month in Jamaica and, due to the costs involved in getting out there, I wasn’t able to go to his wedding in person. I felt quite bad about the fact I couldn’t share in their happy occasion so started to think about what I could do to make it up to him when I noticed that my work were offering box seats to go and see Taylor Swift perform live at Manchester’s MEN Arena. Andrew is a big Swift fan so I entered the competition (having had to Google the answer to the question) and lo and behold I won a pair of tickets.

I am not what anyone would call a Taylor Swift fan, prior to entering the competition I was only vaguely aware she existed, mainly through Andrew’s fanboy ranting, and had heard maybe one song. So it was with some trepidation that I boarded the train in Leeds heading for Manchester Victoria. Andrew made the trip a lot easier by bringing along a bottle of Wray and Nephew overproof rum which we mixed with some apple juice (not my choice, but was actually really good at hiding the killer after taste of overproof rum).

We rolled up the box at about half seven and settled into our free Spanish chicken and pasta meal and the free bar. There was a Scottish pop duo supporting Taylor that had some catchy melodies but were nothing I would write home about. The overwhelming sensation from the build up to the main event was how young a lot of the audience were. Andrew and I have a combined age in the mid fifties, so we were significantly older than most of the people there to watch the gig (ignoring their parents).

Taylor Swift was actually really good live. Not only is she quite beautiful, she can sing and dance and also plays guitar, piano and ukulele. Increasingly rare in the manufactured pop world, Taylor also writes some of her own material. Her songs are not brilliant, a little cliched in places and clearly aimed at the teen market she didn’t quite sell the sentiment of her songs to me. Where she excells, though, is in how she performs. Taylor is a master on stage. She had the audience eating from the palm of her hand and was literally conducting them to her tune. As a live act, Taylor ranks up along Muse and Marilyn Manson in her ability to manipulate and motivate an audience into going on the concert journey with her.

The second week of January is upon us and it seems my diary is filling up faster than I could ever have imagined. I have developed a very bad habit in recent years of making big plans and not really following through with them, with perhaps the exception of the trip to Europe I did last year.

To try and counter that, I am going to post up the things I have planned right now so that I will hopefully see them through. It will also remind me to blog about the events and give me a lot more to say in my review of 2011, rather than the the relatively dismal look back at 2010.

The first major highlight of 2011 I have already organised is a trip to opening night at Opera North’s production of Carmen with my friend Aislin. I really love the opera and have only really started up going to see them again since I met Aislin. It is really cool to have a friend that likes some of the more obscure hobbies that interest me like opera and ballet etc.

Carmen was a natural choice for me to go and see as it is one of my favourites. I have seen a couple of productions of it, although both times were amateur ones, so will be great to see a professional performance.

I am hoping to squeeze in a few more operas this year too following the success of Turn of the Screw last year and what I am sure is going to be an epic experience at Carmen. It will also be my very first opening night!

Next up is a trip to Langdale with some of my family. Langdale is one of my favourite places int he whole world despite its relatively unglamorous reputation in comparison to the rest of the Lake District. For me though, the valley has everything I could possible want from a remote, relaxing holiday destination. It is quite simply a stunning part of the country, a long glacial valley with a few vllages spread out along the valley floor and walled by soe impressive hills. The valley is home to three of my top 5 Lake District pubs, the Old and New Dungeon Ghyll hotels and the Wainwright Inn.

February also sees Andrew’s stag night, which will be an interesting experience as it will be my first ever stag do. Andrew is getting married in Jamaica in March which i can’t afford to attend, so it is my intention to make sure he gets a fantastic send off! Whilst I am talking about Andy, I should probably plug his great football blog that is probably his one true love (sorry Laura).

I have two trips abroad planned for April this year. The first is to go an see a band I really like play live in Dublin. Josh Ritter is doing a few dates in Europe as part of his tour and Dublin was the cheapest place to go and see him play. The other two cities he is doing in British Isles are Edinburgh and London and at the moment, both of those places are more expensive to get to and stay over in than Dublin. So look out Emerald Isle, I am coming for a party.

I plan to head over to Dublin on a Thursday and stay until Sunday, hopefully getting in a tour of the Guinness brewery as well as maybe seeing some of the sights and sounds of one of Europe’s capital cities.

The second trip in April is a little more ambitious. I hope to go and visit a friend of mine who is currently working for the British government in New York City. I am hoping to get out there for a week or so around Easter time to take advantage of the bank holidays (meaning I have to take less annual leave from work). I have never been to the Big Apple before, other than layovers at the airports there. I am not usually a city fan and prefer countryside and remoteness over the hustle and bustle of one of the world’s most populous conurbations. However, it is one of those cities that is everyone’s must visit list and that includes me. I want to be able to say I have see Time square, visited central park and been up the Empire State building.

I am going in April so that I have a chance of catching a ball game at Yankee stadium but I haven’t actually checked the schedules to see if this is going to be possible.

Following that is not going to be easy, but I have plans to go on holiday to Malta at the start of summer with my mum. Normally I would never consider Malta as a holiday destination, but on seeing the photos and stories my mum and auntie told when they visited the island a couple of years ago I was instantly sold on the idea. Malta has a rich history, perhaps best known for its role in the second world war where the nation and its people were awarded the George Cross for resisting the axis powers.

June sees the long awaited marriage of two good friends of mine, Bryony and Chris. They have been together for over five years and I don’t think anyone could imagine them not getting married. The ceremony is taking place at Lincoln Cathedral and I have the honour of being one of the ushers. I have been to quite a few weddings over the years, but this will be my first as a participant (of sorts) and the first of my generation of friends. Technically Laura and Andrew get married earlier, but as they will be in Jamaica and I will be in Leeds I don’t think it counts.

The final plans for 2011 are less entrenched than those above. I want to try and get back to Venice in the Autumn as I had such a fantastic time there last year and would love to spend a few more days there, perhaps an extended weekend. I aim to also spend more time in my role on the management board of the AHS as I feel that the next 18-24 months for the organisation could be key to its continued success.

I have been lucky enough to get to a number of gigs over the last month or so and I thought I would put a quick post up about them.

November started with Linkin Park at the MEN Arena in Manchester. I used to love Linkin Park back when I was a youngish teenager but I have to admit that I had kind of drifted away from their music over the last few years, bar the odd scream-along at Wendy House when one of their singles came on. This meant I surprised myself as much as anyone else when I suggested to Chris that I tagged along with him to go and see them play.

The gig was pretty good all round, despite the fact we were sat at the back of the arena on the upper tier (about as far away from the stage as possible). Their new material from the album A Thousand Suns is really good, but not necessarily designed for arena tours. I felt that they blended the new stuff in pretty well with their older material. Chris posts his views on the gig here, where he disagrees with my view on this.

I had a really good time at the concert and it was fun to relive some of my angsty youth.

The second gig of the month was a freebie from work in recognition of some of the work I have been doing over the last few months. I got an email on a Thursday to say that I had been awarded two tickets to see a concert at the MEN on the Friday (as in the next day!) This was quite a shock and meant that I would have to arrange travel etc to Manchester and find someone to go with. Normally this wouldn’t be a problem, but for some reason whenever I get tickets to stuff from work there never seems to be anyone that wants to go.

Luckily for me, the tickets were to see Gorillaz, which is an awesome band, so I didn’t mind the last minute running around trying to sort everything out. The other lucky break was that another girl from my ofice had also won tickets, so meant that it didn’t matter if I found someone to go with I could always tag along with her and her partner. Little did I know at this stage that the running around trying to find someone to come would prove to be the least stressful thing of the whole occasion!

I left work on the Friday at three-thirty and headed back to my colleague’s house to grab a quick drink and then catch a train from Dewsbury to Manchester. This journey normally takes a little over an hour, however on this occasion it took nearly 4 hours, including having to change at Rochdale due to the train being too late to carry on!

Anyway, we eventually made it to the gig about 2 hours later than expected and got into the arena just in time to see that last couple of songs by the support act, De La Soul, who were really rather good. Chris showed up just as Gorillaz started (see his story here) and we enjoyed a fantastic show. The event was made even sweeter by the realisation that all our drinks and food were on expenses.

The Gorillaz themselves were really good. I wasn’t sure exactly what to expect as I struggled to work out how an animated band would translate to real life performance, but Damon Albarn really pulled it off with his high energy style and fantastic animation of the band on the giant screen on stage.

I am not a huge Gorillaz fan beyond a few of their singles, but the concert was really good (the free beer helped no doubt) and I would recommend them to anyone who wants a really fun, live band who don’t take themselves too seriously!

The final gig of November saw me head to York’s Theatre Royal to see comedian Kevin Bridges perform. I have come across Kevin Bridges a few times, mainly on TV shows like Mock The Week and Michael McIntyre’s Comedy Roadshow, and I have always found him to be really funny. He is a Glaswegian and proud of it and has some fantastic material covering crazy people, nostalgia and self-image issues.

I went with some friends from work and we enjoyed a few beverages on the train and then in York, which is always a nice palce to go drinking, before heading to the theatre. The support act was a young Scot whose name escapes me now, but he was funny enough and a good warm-up act using plenty of crowd interaction to get us in the mood. Kevin’s set was fairly long and had me in stitches quite a few times. The funniest part of the night was when he learned (from a member of the audience) that suit pockets are really pockets and if he undid the temporary stitching he could use them. They say everyday’s a school day!

Again, an act I would recommend to those that like some not too mainstream comedy but also not too alternative. A good laugh.

This is likely to be my last major blog post before I head off on my road trip of Europe as I have loads of prep to do before we leave and I want to cover that prep in my first blog post from Europe (hopefully Amsterdam).

I am writing this post whilst on the train from Carlisle to Leeds on the famous Carlisle to Settle railway route, it is beautifully sunny outside and the scenery is really something to behold. I really do love the English countryside and I am lucky enough to have experiences some stunning scenery in my time.

The reason for me being on this particular train is the fact I have spent the last few days staying with Sarann and her family whilst enjoying Solfest, a music festival based on the Solway coast. For my long memoried readers, here is a post I made about the festival last time I went.

Solfest always manages to deliver when it comes to acts. For a small festival, I always manage to see a dozen or so really good acts, with maybe four of five that are really outstanding. This year was no different – acts like Alabama 3, James, Eat Static, Utah Saints, Magic Numbers, The Jam and The Damned all being pretty big names.

I particularly enjoyed the old school combination of The Jam and The Damned on the Sunday night, followed a really nice chilled set from The Magic Numbers.

The weekend was great as a little mini break from the pressures of clearing my desk ready for the Europe trip, as well as from the stress of planning and paying for the trip itself. Sarann’s dad makes a great host, and Sarann makes a better chef – even if most of the fare was vegan! I did manage to sneak in a couple of pasties and a sausage and hash brown butty.

All in all a great weekend and well worth the £89 ticket price.

Just got back from celebrating Sophie’s 21st birthday at D-Fusion in Leeds. D-Fusion is a karaoke bar/restaurant/night club and is well worth a punt if you are bored or just love singing in public! Drinks are reasonably priced for this kind of place and the staff seem really friendly. Their song collection appeared to be particularly weak to start with, the book of songs being very thin. However, the manager informed me that they had over 20,000 songs on their karaoke control machine and that they could find any song we requested.

With this being a Tuesday night, many of the faces were from A-Soc and a few of the committee got the ball rolling in terms of singing, Zoltan biting the bullet and getting up first.

The night was good, although I left relatively early as had just compelted a 12 hour shift at work and I am due back at work in less that 8 hours! Luckily I have a half day, finishing around lunchtime but back for 12 hours on Thursday to try and make an imapct on the backlog we have built up.

I’ve never been to one of the mainstream festivals before – Leeds/Reading, V Fest, Glastonbury etc. This is for several reasons, firstly the cost – £150 for a festival is too expensive, secondly there is the fact that they are massively ovwercrowded – 30000 people is just too many, finally there is the stigma. I usually don’t see myself as a music snob, but it seems that the sort of music fans that attend the mainstream festivals are the sort of music fan that pisses people off.

Having said all that, Muse were playing V Fest this year and, for those of you that don’t know, my girlfriend Liz is obsessed with them. The moment she heard they were playing she booked two tickets for the day they were headlining at the Staffordshire version of the festival. This mean attending one of the festivals I never thought I would, especially since the escapades of last summer!

We got up early on the Sunday, leaving about 9am to drive the 130 miles from Leeds to Weston Park, near Cannock, Staffordshire. The drive was pretty uneventful and there were no jams getting into the venue. The queueing wasn’t too bad to get into the actual arena either – maybe 20 minutes. Once in the arena we headed over to the main stage area to try and camp out for the headliners so we would be near(ish) the front. We managed to get to the first few rows right in the middle for the first few acts – The Futureheads, Alannis Morrisette, Lostprophets and Maximo Park. Unfortuantely, as mentioned above the sort of music fans that attend these festivals are prats, so after about 5 hours of getting squashed, beaten, crushed, kicked and being generally uncomfortable (and the fact that I had managed to lose my mobile telephone for the first time in nearly 10 years) we abandoned our position and fled the main stage area. We rustled ourselves up ome food – which considering the fact we were at a festival was not too over priced. We managed to find a place that did a giant Yorkshire pudding filled with sausage, mash, onions and gravy for a fiver! We also managed to find somewhere to sit amongst all the mud.

After queueing for a while to use the “toilets” and having missed The Kooks’ set. We headed back for the headliners. We didn’t go so deep into the crowd, but found ourselves a nice little spot not too far back where we could enjoy the music and see the stage without fear for our lives. The first headline act were the Stereophonics. They were absolutely awesome live. Kelly Jones really knows how to work the crowd and their back catelogue is impressive. I know it’s a festival and bands play their singles but I really had hoped they would play a few of the album tracks! Muse were the second headline act and they know how to put ona show. I am not the world’s biggest Muse fan – most of it is just noise – but they are good live, if only for their light and special effects show! Six giant satellites mounted with lasers and spotlights aodrned or surrounded the stage!! All in all a fun day, except for the hour or so queue in the mud to get out of the car park – but even that wasn’t as bad as I had expected.

Pleasently surprised is probably the right phrase. I wouldn’t pay to go back again, but if the chance arose to attend for the day again for free then I would probably think about and it would depend on who was playing.

Keep an eye out for more detailed reviews of the sets people played.

A couple of weeks ago Chris, Michelle, George and I went across to Manchester to see Avril Lavigne live on tour. I had a few reservations about the trip when Chris first approached me with the idea. Avril is not everybody’s cup of tea and her target audience is definitely not the twenty-something year old male!

The gig was awesome. She is really good live. Her set was a little predictable, but with five albums now there are not that many variations she can make. The encore epitomised the predictability as she sent out dancers before she appeared, removing any hint of spontaneity. The music was good though and Avril commands the stage like few others. She may only be my age but she definitely is a star.

That’s right, there are now just twelve days until Chris, George, Michelle and I head over to Manchester to see Avril lavigne’s latest tour hit town. I can’t wait, not just because it is a well earned chance to let my hair down but alse as it signifies my last exam – it being the day after the gig (I’ll worry about that later). Exams have been going okay this time round, although I am getting less adept at judging my own performance. I am putting the work in for these too, which is something of a divergence from past exam periods. I am even letting my revision disturb and interrupt my social life too! Although, that is less of a worry as the group’s end of exams/graduation celebtrations are going to make any event held now seema trifle in comparison! Check out the events at thecircle.chrisworfolk.com and take a loof for yourselves!

I have two exams this week, which are the two hardest of the ones I’m taking, so not much opportunity for relaxing. However, our main houseparty is on Friday so that should be good. Just need to learn all the Avril lyrics now so that I am not outdone by the ten year olds at the gig!!

The latest album from one of the greatest rock/pop bands of the late 20th Century has managed to find itself on my play list recently. Accelerate, the fourteenth studio album by this American behemoth, is somewhat different to their previous offerings of late. Far more upbeat and with what seems to be a reinvigorated sound, it is definitely not what I expected from the band. Having said that it is still very much an REM album, with the great mix of punk and rock – the driving guitar sound along with Stipe’s eponymous (pun intended) vocals. The second track Supernatural Superserious is one of the stand out songs on the album in my opinion. Very much a non-serious song with an incredibly uplifting beat and incredible melody.

There are some standard REM fayre on the album too. Die hard fans will be immediately drawn to the third track, Hollow Man, with its haunting vocal and depressing bass line. Even this track, though, has been touched by the new found joie de vivre of the album in general!

If I was going to give marks out of ten I would be tempted to knock a mark or two off for straying so far from their roots but the album just leaves me far to upbeat to care! I love this album and recommend it to all!

I have just bought a day ticket to this year’s V Festival. Liz and I are going for the Sunday as Muse are headlining. We ummed and arred about getting weekend tickets but couldn’t justify the £150. There are some great bands playing on the Sunday though, including the likes of Muse, Stereophonics, Maximo Park, The Prodigy and The Kooks (see the full line-up here).

I can’t believe it is festival season already!