Grand Rose Band at Moles, Bath

This one's a tale of serendipity. I bumped into a guy and his sister debating laptops in PC World. We twisted their arms and they made the right choice: the Mac. Turns out the guy, Alex, is the drummer in The Grand Rose Band. I'd enjoyed the mp3's on their site and so jumped at the chance of seeing them in the intimate settings of Moles in Bath.

Fantastic.

An hour of superb guitaring rawkingness later, Moles was rubble. Well, not quite, but you get my drift. For crying out loud someone, please sign these guys and get them on the road! They beat the pants off almost all bands I've seen in such a small club and their sound and presence would translate to a late afternoon slot on the NME stage at V for sure (hint!).

No pics, I was having fun.

Bristol at night.

I have a magical picture of Finsbury Avenue Square in Broadgate at night which I'm going to print out large. However, in the short term, click the image to see ones I took of Bristol at night!

I admit it now: I was fully prepared not to like Green Day. Their one and a half minute speed-pop just seemed eminently disposable and designed to appeal to a particular market segment.

I was completely won over.

Firstly, kudos to "New Found Glory" for pumping out 45 minutes of fuck-you skate punk that got the kids nicely warmed up for the main event.

Green Day themselves opened with "American Idiot" and rocked their socks off for the next hour and an three-quarters with complete and utter showmanship. They used every trick in the book, flashbangs, flamethrowers, tickertape, audience members taking over instruments on stage (hi Tristan!), singalongs and much more, to keep the audience completely pumped.

Superb and worth the stupid drive to see them.

The usual pont and click pictures here.

Last night was Megadeth at the Birmingham Academy with Diamond Head in support. The latter were good fun. It would be churlish to complain about Megadeth - it did exactly what it says on the can. It was half an hour of massive, goes all the way to eleven, speed metal before the band even took a breath. The sound was pretty poor, which probably didn't really matter to the audience who were clearly getting off on it. Good luck to them!

Shaky, blurry, audience pics here.