Keep smiling and don't make eye contact

Well, that's something I don't want to repeat in a while.

Last night was a ~surprise~ 60th birthday for my dad. Me, being quite dull and unadventurous would have settled for a nice meal out, or a quiet dinner party - but my brother decided this wasn't quite cringeworthy enough so we had a 60s theme party. Needless to say after watching a load of my parents friends get drunk and dance the night away there's little I can say other than "Nice to see old people enjoying themselves", keep smiling, and don't make eye contact with any of them.

I'm not quite sure when I turned into a dull snob about such things - probably about the time I decided I didn't want to drink wine by the bottle. That and the fancy-dress snobbery years of LARP has developed.

In other news, off to London later, and I'm still happyhappyjoyjoy about having some photos in Alternative London Magazine - it might not be one of the "big names", but small minds... Tonight's plans include the gig in Camden, then I've booked a 1am coach back. I'm not too worried about whether I change my plans or not as it only cost me £2 - though if I am going to spend 2:40 on a coach I hope I can sleep on it.

Avril Lavigne pass now confirmed for Monday which should be amusing, and in between doing all the photos I actually have some "proper-job" work to do. Not sure I like this anymore.

On the train...

Well that was a superb gig. Superb in the sense that SBA were the best I've seen them, Scary Bitches were - well - Scary Bitches and The Ghost of Lemora were their typical wisecracking self. Just a shame that the train home is full of tw*ts.

I'm not quite sure why the SBA gig did come together, but all the elements seemed to be right. They looked comfortable, they looked happy and the music just seemed to flow. I'm sure this was helped by the fantastic crowd response, but I'd hold to a claim that they made the atmosphere as well as fed off it. Virtuous.

Scary Bitches I've seen a couple of times before - and I hold to the idea that they'd be better if the audience were sitting at nice tables, with waitress service, and had just eaten a lovely meal. They're funny, engaging, clever... for the first 20 minutes. Then it all goes a bit downhill. Powered by iPod mind.

The Ghost of Lemora could be described by someone being quite unfair as "Swifty and a microphone; an identifiable vocalist and a couple of session musicians they've roped in to pad the stage out". The quips flow as quickly as the beer, and I bet their friends find them terribly clever and amusing - just that I'm not sure how many other people do. The music is ok - it's reasonably well produced, in places even slick, just slightly hollow and I wonder if they're a goth band or an Indie rock outfit with a monotone wardrobe.

Photos soon, should I survive the journey. Big thanks to forbinproject, westernind, jfs and feistyredhead for being there when I needed them; hat off to ant_girl and mister_ed; good to say hello to blankinfinity finally and hello to the various Northerners and Southerners I met (list too long to mention).

Oh, and I am king geek.