Posts Tagged ‘Uncategorized’
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Sometimes you have to take the good with the bad.
Faith no More was an excellent concert. I had fun. Like most live events though your enjoyment of a show can really hinge on the audience itself. I’ve been to shows where because the crowd was lacklustre, the band was the same. It works the other way round too. It’s a symbiotic relationship. Faith no More I am pleased to say had the crowd eating out of their hands. The only thing that threatened to derail the show for me was “Missing Toof Guy”.
About two thirds into the set everyone is getting their groove on, and just enjoying themselves. I was in the General Admission area, because this didn’t seem like the kind of show I would want to be seated at. Most people that had seats were actually standing anyway. A big burly dude appears in my immediate proximity and recognises a friend of his who was standing right next to me. Dude had come from closer to the stage than we were, and was absolutely drenched in sweat. He kept going on about how he lost one of his teeth in all the action closer to the stage. It wasn’t the most eloquent of exchanges.
“Bro! Missing Tooof! Haaa Haaaa Haaaa!”
He was extremely obnoxious and arrogant. To make matters worse, he was rolling into people bowling them over and at the same time to greasing them up with his sweat something akin to how “Slimer” would goo someone from Ghostbusters. The slightest touch and you too were dripping wet from HIS sweat on one side. Unfortunately someone in front of him reacted to this moisturous effect. Turning around disgusted he pushes Missing Toof Guy. Missing Toof Guy (MTG) suddenly goes from happy go lucky mode into bar room brawler mode. He is not a small guy either. Things start to get very ugly, with the guy who pushed him immediately recognising it was a big error in judgement, and starts to back down. MTG needs to prove he is the Alpha male though and continues to pursue the possibility of a fight. I’m standing directly next to both of these guys, so now I’m totally out of the concert experience for at least two songs. I know that if shit goes down, there is a big chance I’m getting caught in the middle of it, whether I like it or not. All of this is happening while the song “The gentle art of making enemies” is playing. There is irony there I guess.
Like Murtaugh from “Lethal Weapon” – I can recognise that I’m too old (and crippled) for this shit.
Things eased a bit when MTG took off for a while. I was relieved. Turns out he only went for another beer and to bring some of his boys closer to the fight action. Great. He even made a point of tapping the pushing guy on the shoulder to let him know he had returned to start some shit after the show finished. I’ll give credit where it is due though. Before the encore had even begun, the guy who did the pushing bounced, and MTG and his brawler friends had to choose between their love of fighting, or the concert experience. They chose to stay. I was able to enjoy the rest of the show, and decided that not making eye contact with MTG was wise, seeing as he had that lost opportunity of a fight slip through his fingers, he’d probably look to start more shit if he could.
I might have missed two songs or so, but I am happy nothing transpired from it.
Be safe out there. Heh.
Thanks for reading!
Marc
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Last night I was lucky enough to catch one of my favourite bands from my youth, Faith No More (who for the sake of my laziness will be referenced to as “FNM” in this post). The anticipation and expectation of their self proclaimed second coming had set the bar high. I think everyone was expecting a lot. To make things less complicated I actually took the day off work and spent the day drawing, slowly psyching myself for the upcoming show. By 6pm, I finally got my ass down to a local fast food joint and then after a rushed dinner made my way to the venue, Vector Arena in central Auckland.
Parking is always a pain in the ass, but I found a good spot. Not long after entering the venue, the first band Eagles of Death Metal came on to warm the crowd up. By the time they were down they had definitely accomplished that task. “Can you dig it?” and “Ladies!” seemed to be their catch cries of the evening. They were just good old rock n roll. It was fun. However the crowd were definitely there to see FNM. So…did they measure up? Quite frankly. Fuck yes.
The intro had the band playing a cover of “Reunited”, before Mike Patton strutted on stage in a pimping suit with a cane for walking aid to add the vocals. It was great. They quickly got into “From Out of Nowhere” to start proceedings off. I got pretty much all the songs I wanted to hear – except for “We Care A Lot”, can’t win them all I guess. There were even some unexpected songs thrown into the set. Very welcome. Some were the bands own. A couple were not. A brief cover of Lady GaGa’s “Pokerface” had the crowd amused before blasting into “Chinese Arithmetic”. At the end of the set the band gave us two encores. On the first they ended with Crowded House’s classic “Don’t dream it’s over”. Encore number 2 they came back and asked if the crowd wanted more. A rapturous cheer let the band know the verdict. Again, they launch into the same Crowded House song. They do this another couple of times before drawing some boos. Ha ha! Mike Patton replies to the criticism with a “what? – you said you wanted more – I thought we were giving you what you wanted?” It was awesome.
The crowd was definitely reflective of the bands longevity. I doubt there was anyone under the age of 25 at the venue.
It was an amazing concert. Some other things worth noting. The backdrop was simple velvet looking curtains being back-lit with different shades of lighting. It helped keep the casual mood. At one point someone threw a shoe on stage. Which Mike Patton picked up, huffed a couple of times, before throwing it back out into the crowd. The set was stopped for two minutes, with the band urging the crowd to chant “Tom Jones!” in an effort to coax the man from his hiding place. The attempt was in vein. Tom Jones never showed up. “I guess he ain’t here” – General Patton said. We put in all that effort and the bastard doesn’t even show up? Rude.
Photos of this concert are on my Flickr page.
The people surrounding me were mostly well behaved. I’ll post on this more tomorrow.
If the band is coming near you. I very much recommend attending the show.
Thanks for reading
Marc!
Hello all.
I figure I’ll weigh in with some thoughts about February 14. For once I’m finding that the day is far more tolerable as it is not only on the weekend, but also sharing the day with Chinese New Years. Valentines Day is a funny concept to me. Possibly it is because I am a dude? I write a comic about a guy who is a hopeless romantic though, so I figure I should give my take on it.
First of all, this is just me. If you celebrate Feb 14 – and you enjoy the day for what it is. That is awesome. I’m not an old curmudgeon or anything. I could jump on the tried and true – “oh it’s all just commercial bullshit”. That would be too much of an easy dismissal. I think the day serves its purpose. What is that purpose? Why to remind us males to show affection if we had forgotten to throughout the whole previous year prior to. It’s the get out of jail free card.
Myself. Well the ladies at my workplace believe I should be hung, and wonder how my wife married me, because I do nothing on Valentines. It can be a point of contention every time February 14 rolls around on the calendar. However I will hold to it, and I have always been consistent with not doing anything for it. Now before anyone jumps on me for being horribly negligent of affection towards my spouse. Allow me to explain myself here. For me, the idea of being told to be romantic on a certain day is a bit of a sham (again, just for me it is). I don’t want to be told when I should buy my wife some flowers. Instead – I think the better way to go is hold out on Valentines, and then be spontaneous at other times throughout the year. If your partner doesn’t see it coming, and its a genuine surprise, then I think you get a much better result. Much more romantic in my mind.
Does that excuse fly with the wife? Hell no. I had to compromise somewhat this year, and make her breakfast in bed. Ha ha.
Maybe I’m just anti-authoritarian?
Hope your day was nice irrespective of whether you care about the day or not, and Happy Chinese New Years too.
Thanks for reading
Marc
Chocolate Dip for an extra 60 cents – IT’S A TRAP!
February 1st, 2010 |Posted In: Blog, Uncategorized
Hello, welcome to February! This is it, the month the comic launches. In two days time in fact, you will see an all new brand spanking new page up! Awesome. It has been too long. Thereafter you should see a new page every week. I’m looking forward to taking Adam in some new directions. Building some storylines up, adding new characters, sub plots. It’s gonna be fun. Working in full colour has also been a challenge for me. It’s been great to experiment and try and learn that. You’ll get to see soon enough on how the first page turned out.
Being Summer, I have been hitting our local Ice Cream parlour with the intensity of a thousand burning suns then amplified through a gigantic magnifying glass and focused on a population of ants. There have been some excellent hot days, which just demand a nice cookies and cream in a cone. Well a couple of days ago I was down there again. The problem as always is too much choice. There are a dozen flavours of Ice Cream. 2 choices of cones, or you can have sundaes. Maybe if you are just after a drink, you can get either a milkshake or a thick-shake. Pretty much like Captain Planet – the POWER is yours.
I decide to be adventurous on this fine summer’s day. I see a gentleman opting in for the chocolate dip option at the cost of an extra 60 cents. Immensely impressed with the addition of the hardened chocolate on top of the already lavish ice cream cone, I decide this is a move I have to follow. The flavour – Caramel Fudge. The chocolate dip would it accompany it perfectly, I say to myself.
4 minutes later I’m outside the store deciding on which angle to attack this mammoth ice cream. Even at the one scoop option, I have a generous serving. Unfortunately my man Admiral Akbar wasn’t around as the Chocolate dip was a TRAP.
I realised this after my first bite. The hardened shell of chocolate gave me the appearance all would be okay. However, under that shell the ice cream was already melting. Once I bit in, it was like a dam had burst. Ice cream started flowing freely down my hand. The shell had to be eating quickly for damage control. Too little too late, the avalanche of ice cream was already in full force.
Next time, don’t get carried away, just go for the plain ice cream.
Thanks for reading
See you in a couple of days for the new page!
Marc
Summer time lets you appreciate the small things
January 19th, 2010 |Posted In: Blog, Uncategorized
As it is summer time in this part of the world, I’m taking this opportunity to reflect on the simple things that make this season great. Ice-creams, cold beers, BBQ’s – what’s not to like? Picture this. The best example of the summer season is liberating yourself from everything and getting in your car for a drive. Do it first thing in the morning. The promise of the hot day is still ahead of you, but it’s warm without yet being uncomfortable. You can turn up the car stereo to some loud rap music, reminiscent of the opening scene of Office Space with the character Michael Bolton singing along to Scarface’s “No Tears”.
You smile smugly at the people on a bus doing their daily commute. Sure, they have the upper hand in winter, when the rain contributes to bad traffic and their only concern is the Susan Boyle song playing on their iPod. For now though, enjoy your moment. Crank up that Public Enemy, and just enjoy the drive. It’s summer after all.
Also: Dont forget the webcomic is dropping February2!
This public service announcement was brought to you by the letters G, J and the number 6.
Thanks for reading
Marc
Hello again,
Checking in, as I have not done so in a while. I hope wherever you are reading this, you are well and 2010 has been treating you well so far. I finally decided on a release date for the webcomic. You will see the first page go up February 2 (if you are in Europe of the States) and Midnight February 3 if you are in New Zealand like myself. I was trying to think of when a good launch date would be. I knew I wanted it two or three weeks out from now, but wasn’t too sure when to lock it down. My birthday is actually February 3, so i decided, that I would launch the comic on that date (in my time zone) and if I am still doing this a year from now, then the comic and myself can share birthdays and it will be easy to remember that anniversary! Not too much longer and page one will be up! I’m in the midst of getting ahead, and keeping my momentum going on it. I’m enjoying the work. The digital thing has been an interesting switch to make, but overall I think the fact that I am spitting out the artwork faster is a big positive.
It has already been an interesting year for myself. I wont comment on that further until I know more information, but I might update about it soon. Mostly I am just being kept busy with summer. It seems to be the social time of the year for sure! I’ve been catching up with friends all over the place. Which is great. It’s always fun to just hang out with people and talk crap you know?
Saw a cool movie, “The Cove” on the weekend. It was really eye opening. Kind of insane. I wont say anything else other than, you should all check it out. It’s a fascinating and at the same time terrifying watch. It will make you think less about your own worries and concerns that is for sure. The world is much larger than you or I my friend. Ha ha!
I’ve been trying to catch up on my comic reading as well. I finally got the latest volume of “The Walking Dead” from Image Comics. That series is killer, if you’ll excuse the pun. It reads like a horror/zombie movie should. It has great characterisation, and spares no one. Absolutely brutal, but very well written. If you like comics, put this on your list, you wont be disappointed. If you are curious and want to check it out, maybe hit up your local library and see if they can hold a copy of the trade paperback for you.
Above: The cover for the Walking Dead #50 by Charlie Adlard
Thanks for reading
Marc!
Cast your mind back 10 years.
Where were you in the dawn of this millennium? Such a big deal was made of the year 2000 coming to pass. Like we were all expecting the world’s problems would go away because we reached this milestone. We kept hearing about how this was a once in a lifetime event. This is all true I guess, considering humans are lucky to live 100 years! Unless you’re chanting words like “there can be only one” – then chances are you might have been one of the lucky people amongst the other 6 billion to see the millennium pass. There was a lot being made about the Y2K bug and New Zealand being the first timezone in the world to go down in flames because of it. There were even civil defense warnings on television, saying we should be “prepared for an emergency” with spare batteries, water and tinned food etc.
All that said though. Everything turned out pretty damn good really. For one, being the new millennium, cities around the world threw their budgets out the window to put on lavish displays, shows and performances to entertain the people ready to ring it in. I was 18 years old, and the drinking law had just been dropped to 18 from 21 just a month prior. My education had just finished up for the year and I was free from all study. It was like the stars aligned for me, and I was going to make the most of it with a genuine party effort. Not sure why, but the memories from that night still make me laugh. There was something intangible in the air. I was new to the city of Christchurch (1 year in) and was enjoying it. I had made some new friends that year, and we formed our own little group for the evening along with a couple of my other friends from years gone by.
The night ended up being quite an epic one. Christchurch came alive. It’s a flat city, and very pedestrian friendly, so people were in the central city in full force. We are very fortunate that the New Years period down here is over summer. I can’t imagine what it would be like celebrating in the cold. A lot of occurrences went down to remember the night by. Including convincing my friends that it was a good idea to catch a cab to New Brighton. One of Christchurch’s beaches. The idea was to fully experience the New Year / Millennium we would see the sunrise. We make our way out there by cab, but the wait was quite a while. Half of the crew was asleep by the time the cab arrived. After the trek out there, we notice that basically everyone from the central city has ditched the partying there, and continued onto the beach. EVERYONE had the exact same idea. Of course they did. It was like something from the opening scene of Baywatch. Hundreds if not thousands of people on a strip of beach, where you can hardly see the actual sand due to the abundance of human beings. I think there was an hour to go before the sunset was due to come up, so we found a spot to settle into for the wait. I don’t know about my friends, as my memory is a little hazy, but I fell asleep. Around this time the weather turned from an OK morning to slightly rainy. Once I awoke I noticed it had gone from pitch black darkness to slightly grey. The weather was so bad that everyone missed the sunrise as it was too gloomy.
Add insult into injury? Sure. This was compounded by the fact that so many people needed to catch a cab back to their home that there were none whatsoever free for the journey back into the city. There were a lot of taxis in the area. None were available. After a very long walk, possibly an hour to an hour and a half later, in the direction of the city centre we stopped at a bus stop and noticed that the timetable was due to start in 15 or so minutes. We waited for the bus from that point. It arrived, packed completely to the brim. We barely fit in. For a couple of bucks I found space in a baggage part of the bus to sit in for the ride back. It was such an insane ending to a massive night/day. We were all tired and completely pissed off at each other by the end of it. Though now that its all done and passed, I’d say it was probably one of the highlights of my life.
How so? Well, it introduced me to to new things that would help change my direction while in the city. One was the Dux de Lux. I can’t believe it took me a year before I found the place, but it is now THE only place I go drinking in Christchurch. If you want to drink fine brews (it is its own micro brewery – as well as serving the traditional beverages), eat good seafood or vegetarian food, and just have a great time. This is the place in Christchurch you need to visit. Plus they’ll cover your sports if your into it, and bands play there too. Win!
The other introduction was Adam. Who was the replacement at a local Subway store for another Canadian dude that I knew working there. I had met Adam a couple of times before, but he was scheduled to work the busy shift that new years night. We went in early to say hi to the guys working that shift that evening. Adam mentioned he was due to get two hours off and would be hitting the Dux de Lux later on as his flatmates worked there. It was close to where one of my friends apartment was. We invited Adam back there first, and then all hung out at the Dux afterwards. Had it not been for the timing of that moment, I’m not sure there would have been the opportunity to hang with Adam, and I would not be making this comic as it is right now. I’m very thankful for all of it.
It’s hard to imagine that was ten years ago. Scarily enough, months after that night, I still had people hitting me up on the street who had remember a conversation I had with them on the night. It was just one of those nights I guess. Heh.
Above is one of the panels from one of my new comics. You will get to see the page soon hopefully.
Thanks for reading
Marc!
January 2nd already! Damn this year is going by quick!
Heh.
Hopefully if you are reading this, you survived your New Years celebrations and emerged into 2010 intact. New Years for me was quite chilled. It was nice, but also weird. Ended up heading out to Piha, a remote beach on Auckland’s west coast. It is not far away from the city, but the journey out there is quite arduous. There is only one road in, over a range of hills, and the roading is narrow and windy the whole way. It takes a lot of concentration to navigate it. Knowing all this, I knew it would not be a messy night for me, as I would have to navigate back home safely in the dark a drive that I had just found difficult in the daylight. Once out there, we hung with some friends of ours who live out there. I’m quite jealous of that in some ways. It’s a beautiful spot on this planet, and they were living out there. Able to take in the natural forrest or the beach any time of the day. The trade off of course is, they have to make that drive for any events in town. A small price to pay I guess.
After a decent catch up, and a couple of quiet beers we headed into the township to see what activity was happening there. We stopped in at a local watering hole grabbed ourselves a quick drink as the countdown began. It was quiet, there were people around, but a cold wind coming off the ocean wasn’t making it a very welcome place to be outside. Eventually the clock counted over and we were all ushering in the new year with raised glasses. A siren starts whining over the small town, like an air raid siren. It’s right on midnight. We just kind of shrug it off like, oh well, they’re celebrating the arrival of New Years.
Our party decides that it might be a good idea to see what kind of activities might be waiting for us down at the beach, so a one minute car ride later we arrive on the beach front to see little activity. Not on the beach itself however. A few houses close by are in celebration mode, but there are mostly just drunken teenagers on the beach itself. The mood of the evening took a dramatic turn as we look to North Piha and see a gigantic forrest fire raging up the mountain range. It was like “Shit! Where the hell did that come from?”. It was now extremely obvious to us why the siren was alarmed before. Being a small town though. The first response is really only one small fire truck, and the extra support would be a 40-50 minute drive away. With the coastal winds pushing the fire out in an ever expanding direction, it was certainly a buzz kill.
My wife and I decide that the night is pretty much over from there and after a quick excursion back to our friends house we make our way back home sort of reflecting on the weird turn of events. The fire was reported in the news the next day. From where we were it looked like there was a lot that was burning up. It turns out that officially it was 8 hectares that went up in flames, and it took fire crews and two helicopters equipped with monsoon buckets to help get it under control and eventually taken care of. Sounds like it was some idiot with a flare gun that had started that mess. Fired it into the air, but then the embers started it all.
Like I said, it was a weird one. I’m going to follow this post up with another one soon about New Years ten years ago. Which was a night that was not only epic for myself and a small group of friends, but helped set me on this path for this comic series. It is a bit more up beat than this post. Ha ha!
Any New Years story you’d like to share with me? How were your celebrations?
Thanks for reading!
Marc
Back in Auckland. We just arrived back today from a couple of days excursion down in Acacia Bay. Which is in the Taupo area. It was an awesome break. It’s nice to escape the city sometimes and check out a new place. Get away from some of the things at home and just chill back with a cold beer in hand. Lake Taupo is beautiful. The water was amazingly clear. We ended up visiting a Department of Conservation site which gave really lovely lakeside access. There were maybe 8 other people there with boats and kayaks, as well as a couple of ducks to keep everyone company. The bay was surrounded by pockets of native forrest. I wish I could have gone for a swim, but I wasn’t prepared to do so. Unfortunately the next day the weather turned on us, so that possibility never eventuated. Not to worry though, the main point of the trip was to just have a couple of days with a change of scenery, and in that case, mission accomplished.
We came back to Auckland to see in 2010. I’m not sure just this minute what we’ll be doing to see the new year in? I’m sure we’ll find something to do though. I might go and see that Sherlock Holmes film soon maybe? It could be alright from the looks of it. Avatar was OK. The effects and visuals were pretty stunning, and the plot while cliché, was good enough that you were immersed into that world. For a piece of fictional escapism I totally enjoyed myself.
Next mission? I have to start page 3 on this webcomic. 2010 is approaching and I have to get some work done so everyone will be able to read this stuff as of next year (just over a day away).
Hope you all enjoy the New Years celebration. Be safe out there.
Thanks for reading
Marc
Merry Christmas everyone!
I hope you’ve enjoyed the Cold comic. That has finished up now. I’m now working on the follow up, made for the web purpose story line. Which should be making its debut some time in the new year. I’m just going to build a bit of a buffer up before I start putting them up. I’m excited for people to see it though, as it will be in full colour! Not only something new to look at, but a new challenge for me. The digital process is making it easier to turn a page out faster. Probably 4 times faster than what I would have if I were doing everything in pencil. That is amazing isn’t it? I’ll give you a release date on the webcomic series some time soon hopefully.
This week was an interesting one. Last Saturday I was out with a group of guys on a stag party for my friend Leo. At the tail end of the evening we were moving from one drinking establishment to another and on the way I lost my footing as I transferred from the pavement to the street to avoid some people. I basically caught my foot in a pothole of some sort and twisted it and landed on my ass. It was very painful, but like the idiot I am, instead of calling it quits I limped on to the next bar and hung out for a while before eventually resigning for the evening. The next morning I was barely able to walk. We went down to the emergency clinic and I had an X-ray. Thankfully nothing was broken. It was just a bad sprain. A few days on crutches and icing the foot would eventually help it calm down, though it is still sore and swollen. Looks like it will be a while before that bruising will go down.
The wedding went down on Wednesday. It was awesome. Everyone had a great time. All the best to my man Leo and his new bride Suriya.
Otherwise, finally got to seeing Avatar yesterday. Everyone is right, that is quite the visual spectacle. Some of the concepts with the creatures on that planet was cool. The colours were nice and trippy too! Ha ha!
Anyway, I had better get on with my Christmas day. Wishing you and yours all the best.
Happy holidays, and thanks for reading!
Marc