18 & Life

From RagnarokRadio.co.uk.

If there’s one way to shake off a hangover (or possibly make it two thousand times worse), it’s the grooves and rumblings of some Finnish melodic death metal. Thankfully (or possibly unfortunately), we have Insomnium’s (3/5) thundering strides pulsating across the fields and through the skulls of the gathered metalheads already regretting last night’s celebratory drinks upon arriving at Bloodstock Open Air 2009. Everyone has just about recovered in time for Sodom (3/5), returning to British soil for the first time in twenty years to air the likes of ‘Napalm In The Morning’ to a fair few rows of pumping fists. Add ‘hundred’ to the end of that ‘fair few’ statement and you have a rough description of Saxon (5/5), who are, simply put, fucking awesome. The piledriving ‘Let Me Feel Your Power’ is delivered with the energy of a band several times younger than they are (Saxon could be the grandfathers of some of today’s metal upstarts) while the seminal ‘747 (Strangers In The Night)’ sees cheerful drunken moshpits erupting from stage left to stage right.

Continue reading “Bloodstock Open Air, August 2009” »

I wrote this piece at fifteen years old after visiting New York. It’s my young self’s recollection interspersed with facts about the Big Apple.

Darkness. Just darkness. Where am I? Argh! Now there’s a shrill ringing sound coming from somewhere. Slowly but surely, little by little, my brain starts to function again. The next sense I recover is my sight; I’m in my bed. It’s dark outside. The glowing orange digits of the noisy alarm clock read 0500. Five in the morning!? It’s not time for school yet, is it?

Continue reading “The City That Never Sleeps, April 2006” »

Written for a Glasgow concert promoter. This was one of my first interviews, and I see it as a strong, informative Q&A piece, but I have since started to prefer prose articles. I find they allow for greater expression from a writer, better quality entertainment for a reader, and more effective publicity for an artist.

New Yorker Acey Slade (born Emil Schmidt) certainly lives up to his Sagittarian star sign; he can’t sit still for one minute. Being a past member of a string of bands – Dope, Murderdolls and Trashlight Vision have all at one time counted him in their ranks – he has certainly been round the music industry block a few times. He is currently fronting his own solo project, The Dark Party, which he is touring extensively in the run-up to the release of their debut album. Standing in the cloakroom area of a dingy underground Glasgow club, and speaking in much friendlier tones than his glam-punk rockstar persona would suggest, he took the time to give a little insight into life in such a travelling circus…

Continue reading “Acey Slade Interview, May 2009” »