Buzzfest

Buzzfest, Houston.

30 Seconds To Mars, complete with Jared Leto's fetching hot pink mohawk, are performing hit single The Kill. Bouncing onto the stage, fresh from his band's Diamond of a new album and looking in tip top form, is none other than Deftones' Chino Moreno.

Mum-Rock Ravers

I was hanging out with Sledge at the Moneen and Emery gig in Clwb on Tuesday 30th March. Between sets, and well in any downtime where we could hear more than tinnitus and grinding riffs, the conversation turned from mix tapes to Dad-rock classics to the new genre of Mum-Rock.



Mum-Rock: (muhm-rok) noun Music your Mum listens to. Typically 60's and beyond rife with riffs, often soft electro beats and love lorn lyrics. Quintessential dreamy frontmen a given. Sub genres include Mum-Pop.
Examples of Mum-Rock:
Queen - Danceable, beautiful and talented.
The Beatles - Goodbye, Hello?? They were 60's hotties causing mass hysteria.

Hey Jude!

Beach Boys - 60's to NOW surfer dudes

Free - Paul Rodgers? SWOON!

I feel Free!

INXS - 90's free darlings.

Duran Duran - New romantics, like Danielle Steel but less wordy.

Rolling Stones - Not classically gorgeous but, boy, are they naughty

Pet Shop Boys - The musical, 80's electro-pop version of Gok Wan.
Adam Ant - New wave romantic and 80's, 90's and noughties film star. Whose Mum wouldn't love that?
David Bowie - Androgenous appeal. Married a supermodel.
Genesis - Heavy rock with a soft edge. Perfect for chicks.
Roxy Music - Brian Ferry = Heart throb. Songs = danceable diamonds.
Meatloaf - Bad boy!

Swoon!

T.Rex - Why not?
Elton John - Kleenex rock music
Electric Light Orchestra - dance-pop-rock created by beautiful geniuses.
Wet Wet Wet - in the Mum-Pop sub-genre. Soft, M.O.R. inoffensive pop.


Modern Prog Mum-Rock: Reminds Mum's (well, Suze) of the 60's, 70's and 80's. Not nessercarily fronted by easy-on-the males. Oh, and it doesn't hurt her ears

30 Seconds To Mars - Pretty boys channel 70's, Tangerine Dream esque, slightly strange vibes.
Paramore - The anomaly. Hayley Williams is, infact, a girl. But Suze loves their soft melodies, delicate tunes and club banging beats, so their on the list.
Jimmy Eat World - Catchy and diverse. Excellent Modern Prog Mum-Rock driving anthems.
Stereophonics - Could possibly go in actual Mum-Rock. End of the day, Mum's love Kelly Jones.
Foals - Danceable electro-indie bangers. What's not to like?
The Killers - Brandon Flowers. Mass appeal. Cue huge hysteria.

Mum hearts Guy-Liner!

Well that's the round-up and the highlights of Mum-Rock. Discuss.

BBPD.

Into The Wild

30 Seconds To Mars' set was dramatic from start to finish; pyrotechnics, big screens, military style get ups and one hell of a light show. Performing to a practically sold out crowd, the Tinseltown natives played every show stopper from This Is War, A Beautiful Lie and all bits inbetween. Think The Kill, Closer To The Edge and Night Of The Hunter.

Then the lights went out. One single spotlight hit the box in Cardiff International Arena. Jared Leto appeared teetering on the edge clutching his guitar as he perched high above his captivated audience before belting out a tune or three.

Then the lights went out. Three or four masked men ran around the arena wielding high power torches. Then 30 Seconds To Mars appeared in full on the B Stage, located behind the sound deck. With only a small barrier, everyone standing near the back got the rare feeling of elation that you get after hours of queueing scores you the best front-row-centre spot in the house. Jared and Co were mere feet away, Leto scoring a Welsh flag and continuing to wear it for the entire B stage set.

Back to the main stage and it was en core time. Before 30 STM can make it back to the stage the entire crowd start singing the hook for Kings And Queens. Really bloody loudly. The guitar wielding Americans get back to the stage. Thirty fans were called up and Kings And Queens  kicks in. It's moments like that one when you really wish you'd been one of the ones queueing all day in the rain for that best spot in the house.

All in all this has been a pretty good gig with surprises galore. Shame about the long pauses between songs. A 5 minute wait for the final tune is a little long for most.

BBPD.

PS Girls....Jared Leto is as handsome in person as in magazines AND the man can play guitar!

Snowgate

OK, so it is still pissing down with snow, my cassette-wielding car is still stranded at the stables and somehow I have still made it to work. Everyday. Early. What's that about? But whilst on the train this evening, inbetween paragraphs of HST's Generation Of Swine, I got to thinking about what I am looking forward to.
Number 1) Kicking off my birthweek with Young Guns, All Time Low , The Blackout and My Passion on The Kerrang! Relentless Energy Tour hitting Cardiff on January 29th to . I literally tingle with excitement. Info here and beyond: tour.kerrang.com

Number 2) The vast number of immense gigs and albums gracing our shores over the forthcoming months; 30STM (Actor-cum-rockband not to everyone's taste, but I find them inoffensive...sorry Ian Watkins!), You Me At Six, Reel Big Fish, The Temper Trap, Fightstar, Dead By Sunrise...KISS!

Number 3) I love A Sides! And B Sides! The possibility of a cassette revival leaves me salivating a little bit (is that wrong? Oh well, if La Roux's hair doesn't have to be right then neither do I!). Is anyone else stoked to make a proper stop-record-pause-rewind-stop-record-stop-playback mixtape!? The Tapeworm are a cassette only label helping keep the magnetic-recording dream alive. For more info www.tapeworm.org.uk/.

Number 4) A Mark Hoppus-Pete Wentz hair-off! Sadly, this is made up but how great would that be? Well, until PeWe lost his emo-fringe to the mercy of Mark's clippers. In reality, the punk pair teamed up to create a tune for Tim Burton's Alice In Wonderland. PeWe hasn't ruled out further work with the Blink-bassist assuring us 'it sounds nothing like Blink 182 or Fall Out Boy' (from Yahoo news UK). No hint of sarcasm, my breath is actually baited.

Number 5) Praise be for Christmas anarchy! As if splattering Joe McElderry's sad cover of Miley Cyrus's The Climb all over his Christmas pudding wasn't enough, Rage Against The Machine promise of a victory gig. This year. In the UK. For free! Should be. According to this week's Kerrang! magazine Mr Morello and his angry mob 'couldn't be more excited about it' and say the free show will be 'insane'. On top of all this the US politcal-rockers donated all the GBP800,000 (yeah, my pound sign doesn't work. Brilliant) profits from their Christmas Number 1 to UK charity, Shelter. RATM - we salute you.

BBPD