In an attempt to milk the Leeds stuff on this blog for as long as I can, I give you more video:

Dashboard Confessional - The Good Fight

Dashboard Confessional - Vindicated

We're back! What a weekend!

It was amazing - I saw so many bands and had such a great time. All thanks go to Ian for such a great idea and an awesome birthday gift.

I can't say I'm not happy to be home though. I don't know if I'd ever be able to do more than one of these a year - I am aching all over and so very very tired. And my level of appreciation for human style plumbing has grown so much. I can't tell you how amazing it was to use a normal functioning toilet after three days of sharing what amounts to a glorified hole in the ground with thousands of other people. As we drove home this morning, we stopped off at a Welcome Break on the highway and I told Ian I'd be back, that I was going to the toilet. "But you went before we left?!" he said as a walked towards the loos - I had to stop myself from shouting back "I just want to watch it flush!"

Pics are here. *Update: Ian's (much better) pics here.*

And here, my friends, is my very first upload to You Tube - suitably low quality and all over the freaking place.

Okay, so I missed a day, SUE ME.

I've been avoiding blogging about the Muse's and Pearl Jam's and Franz Ferdinand's of this festival, so on to another relatively obscure (in the wider music world) band.

Today: Wolfmother

Ian's there already - he sent me a photo of himself in the tent this morning, looking oh so cold. I am truly scared of the cleanliness aspect of this music festival business, mostly about the fact that I probably won't be able to wash my hair. But at least I don't have this dude's hair to deal with.

Hmmm. I guess that means I don't have his luxury trailer either.

Anyhoo, these guys are pretty awesome, very Led-Zeppliny, I do foresee a bit of rocking out happening when these guys play.

Wolfmother - White Unicorn

Wolfmother - Woman

So that's it, I'm off to Leeds this afternoon - will blog a billion pictures upon my return. Have a great long weekend!

Today: The Kooks

When I see this lead singer all I think is young, young, young. He's only 19. Also, these guys really subscribe to the 'rockers should have rock hair' belief. Very catchy, happy music!

The Kooks - You Don't Love Me

The Kooks - She Moves In Her Own Way

Today's band : Dirty Pretty Things

Formed from the ashes of The Libertines, I really like this band, or the little that I've heard from them. They're a bit grittier, I think, than the Libertines, in terms of sound, but that might just be Carl Barat's voice.

Wikipedia entry here.

Dirty Pretty Things - Deadwood

Dirty Pretty Things - You Fucking Love It

Okay, so here's the idea: every day this week I'm going to be putting up a music video for an artist we're seeing this weekend at the Carling Leeds Festival.

Today - Panic! at the Disco

To be honest I don't know a hell of a lot about them - their Wikipedia entry isn't that exciting either - other than that the sound is a lot like Fall Out Boy, a band playing on the same stage on the same night as Panic!. They seem to have some tenuous connection too. I must confess I am a bit of a fan of the kind of classy goth emo rock these bands have been putting out there, it's all mightily sing-along-able stuff, which I'm sure it's going to be hip to hate in about a month.

Panic! at the Disco - I Write Sins Not Tragedies

Panic! at the Disco - Lying Is the Most Fun a Girl Can Have Without Taking Her Clothes Off

Following on from Vaughan’s post, here’s an example of the love of complicating things that my field is prone to.

I send out an email to a supplier, asking for a quote on printing and wrapping a magazine and personalised letter. I send the specs out and get this email back:

Hi Natalie
I hope you are well.

Please can you confirm if the letter is to be simplex or duplex lasered.

Many thanks

Is it printed on ONE side or TWO?

Oy vay! Have a good weekend.

You didn't think I forgot did you? Nope - I'm sticking to this regular blogging thing, keeping it up, okay yeah I totally forgot but I'm so over it.

Tonight I have experienced the Great Bath Paradox, wherein you run/draw a seriously full, seriously hot bath with the express intention of spending simply aaaaaages wallowing in suds and relaxing, and just end up getting out like 10 minutes in because it's too damn hot and your stupid body is more used to showers. How is one meant to realx in these hurried times, when even your skin screams 'this is taking too long, it's so inefficient, you're using too much water, a shower would do!'.

To be honest, I've been pretty stressed lately, largely due to having more responsibility at work and two magazines whose schedules seem to make it impossible for me to scrape some time off. Seeing all my colleagues jetting off on 2 week trips to Turkey or seeing them come back tanned and full of stories of Egypt isn't helping things.
It is just a case of realising that once my visa's sorted out I can take these awesome massive holidays, secure in the knowledge that I needn't be saving money for the instance where I have to return to SA for good.

Well, rant over, here's Nelly Furtado's new video.

I know when to take photos - early morning on the walk to the bus stop, when makeup and hair straightening is still fresh!

There was a lady walking behind me, I was trying not to be self-conscious about self-photo-taking :)

Bleurgh, not too happy about this: I'm going to have to work on the Friday of the Leeds Festival weekend! Am leaving work at 4pm though, hot-footing it to King's Cross and sitting for 2 and a half hours to Leeds.
Sure, I'm pretty annoyed - I don't get to do the drive-up and I have to fork over the cash for the ticket. But I feel okay about it. I'm really looking forward to roughing it and camping again, sleeping bags and booze and music.

And getting to be a part of a memory of Ian's that I've been very envious of. He loved it when he went, and I want to make our own memories of that together, I want us to have stories about bad-ass stage antics to reminisce over. Personal highlights will definitely include The Kooks, Franz Ferdinand, Peaches, The Arctic Monkeys, hell, loads!

New Nelly.

My boyfriend is spending the day playing hockey, and as such I have free time, and really should be cleaning up the flat, or playing a mental game of 'will she/won't she' with the pecan pie in the kitchen, so I'm going to avoid those things altogether and blog. You happen to be the unfortunate subject of this post, Ms Furtado.

Old Nelly.

I'm really torn with whether to like you now or not. I'm tempted to ask, what happened? Why did you go from fresh-faced, sweet, intelligent, smartly sexy Nelly to trashy, red-lipsticked, ho-bag Nelly? From "I'm Like A Bird" to "I'm, Like, Totally Easy"? The reason for my irritation towards you is your image. Chicka, I dunno if you hired a new stylist or what but you've gone from a comfortable, almost edgy point on the spectrum right the way to the wrong end:

New Nelly.

Old Nelly being: quirky, cute, smart, likeable
New Nelly being: stanky, a bit dodgy, sexy but like too sexy, yeah?

Old Nelly.

But I am a little torn here because while your songs are named 'Maneater' and 'Promiscuous' and your album's entitled 'Loose', the music ain't half bad! I love the hook up with Timbaland, I like the folky stuff that's hidden away round back, I like that you've gone a bit experimental, you're talking and not singing in some, it's good stuff!

New Nelly.

That said, I am pretty much wholly switched off by the new look.

Old Nelly.

Go back to what you were doing, it was working! Keeping it fresh is good, but right now you look anything but. Gone are the simple white vests on deep tan, cute furry jackets and attitude look, now it's chavvy earrings, every strap you wear hangs off your arm (how eighties!) and a look that screams 'I'd blow your mind baby but I probably need to have a shower first'. Some may disagree but I think the whole problem is that you're giving us too much, it's like there's no present to unwrap, there's no mystery left. You're not being Lil' Kim about it, fair enough, but that's just not you anyway. Even on a mildly slutty level, you reach the same lows.

New Nelly.

Rocking the hair, though, I'll give you that.

Nat

What has happened on the blogging front? Seriously people! I don't care that you have actual lives to live! Give me something to read at work!

Ian and I have pretty much given each other our birthday presents (and our birthdays are only in late Sept): Ian is taking me to the Leeds music fest (line up here) and I'm taking him to Dublin for a break. They're both kind of bowling ball presents because they're things that we'd each love to do individually, but that we also want to do conversely (if that makes sense), but I'm happy and so is he! So it's not so much a case of that Tiffany's necklace I wanted, but more 3 days without a shower. Oh, and kick-ass music and beer. Sucks for me huh! I'm positively bouncing off the walls for this.

Oh it's miserable outside! I feel the winter blues knocking on my door. Ian has taken to rolling himself up entirely in the duvet, leaving me to wake up sporadically and YANK the duvet back, as though trying to make a point to a man in the deepest state of sleep.

Deep in sleep and full of wine, as was the case last night. I woke up in front of the telly, having missed everything I wanted to watch, with my legs outstretched, Ian's legs outstretched on top of mine. Worst case of knee lock EVER. I tried to wake Ian up gently, and then shook him rather violently, causing him to look at me with evils, and get up in a huff, knocking over a glass and breaking it, a shard of which I then cut my foot on this morning. Clever.

Look, Steve Jones! So tan in real life.

I promise to post a pic of me with my glasses on soon - yes I wear glasses now. To and from work and at work only. Ian says I look like a teacher.

Ok now it's your turn to detail the mundane goings-on in your life as I have just done here. Go!

10 best Will Ferrell sketches.

I would just like to say, that I have the best boyfriend EVER.

In other news, he has pics of the Innocent smoothie fest and ensuing drunkeness here.

I have like a bazillion white vests - these things are uber useful, and the importance of each one (and the slight differences between them) is no doubt lost on the male reader, as it is on said best boyfriend in world. I do kind of see his point, and perhaps I'm in a bit of a wardrobe rut, but I need each and every one okay!

Yeah, perhaps photographing them on a white background was a bad idea...

This is just too cool!