SUPER SONG SUNDAY // The Strypes

This band came on my radar after their performance on Jools Holland's Later show a few weeks back and wow they have just gone on to bigger and better things. The Strypes are a teenage band from Ireland. The rhythm & blues band are made up of boys who range from the age of 15-17!! That's just mental in its self. Since they performed on the John Peel stage in Glasto over the weekend they are being played numerous times on radio and some of their set was replayed on Radio 6 Music this morning. They are just pure bluesy rock n roll - a younger version of Saturday night's legendary headliners, The Rolling Stones, many have said over the last few days. The band has such excitement surrounding them at the moment and I am so looking forward to seeing what they do as they continue to rock the music world. I also discovered last night while looking for the Strypes' upcoming tour dates, that they will be playing Reading fest this summer. Woooohooo! I will definitely be going to watch them in August.

Listen & enjoy :)

WALKING ON A SUNNY AFTERNOON // Welsh coastal path exploring

On Monday I took Hendrix (my dog) to have his hair cut in Aberaeron. I thought that it might take an hour or so but when I went in their, at one o'clock, the woman told be that he'd be ready at 4! Instead of going home and coming back again I drove in to town, parked by the sea front and went for a walk on one of the many coastal paths in the area. I walked the four miles to Aberarth and back. The path was really empty and I only passed a few old couples and their dogs as they enjoyed their holiday by the sea. I arrived in Aberarth before I had even realised as I was just thinking about things the whole way there but on the way back I was so relaxed and just enjoyed the walk. The air smelt of seaweed and salt, the only sounds I could hear were the waves in the sea and the wind blowing the grass - peace!

I do like going to London for weekends or just a couple of days but there is no place that makes me more happy and comfortable than just open spaces such as fields & the sea. I do like people and love to be around friends and socialising but I'm one of those people, and I'm certain that many people are like this, that just needs to be on my own from time to time. Even if it's just a few hours, I need to just chill by myself, I might not do anything constructive, I might just sit on my bed and think or read but I can just reassemble and then I'm OK for a couple of days. Walks are my main thing. I love them. Especially around where I live, you can go on a 2, 3 or even 4 mile walk without seeing a soul except for a few nosey cows and some scared sheep. I am so happy that I'm now able to go back and do some speed walking and potentially some cycling after a year and a half. You have no idea how happy I am about this!

Oh, and also, If you ever get a chance to visit Wales come to the West. There are soooo many utterly awesome coastal paths around the area that have some of the best views you could probably find anywhere in the world. Also you don't have to be an experienced walker, the paths range in difficulty. The one I did on Monday is very easy and is mostly flat the whole way. However, if you go to the path that starts on the other side of Aberaeron that takes you in the direction of New Quay then that one is more difficult with steep hills to climb and rougher terrain but the views are just magnificent.

SUMMER ADVENTURES // London visit

Aloha.

Last Wednesday I arrived in Paddington, London (from Carmathen) at around 9pm where Hollie was there to meet me. As I arrived so late we just headed back to Hollie's house, where I was staying until Sunday. She lives towards the end of the Central line (tube) so not that far from central London.

Thursday we got up fairly early and headed in to Holborn to meet our friend Laura for lunch. We were heading towards My Old Dutch pancake house where they have the most amazing pancakes known to man! I had a pear and cinnamon pancake, Laura had an apple and cinnamon one and Hollie had lemon and sugar, all of these had some vanilla ice cream on top. Wowza! After we were filled to the brim with pancake we headed towards Waterloo where we were going to the IMAX to go and Watch the new Superman Film - Man of Steele. It was really awesome and the 3D was actually insane! It was genuinely like you were in the film. If you ever get a chance to go and watch a film in an IMAX theatre please do it. We were all shattered after the film for some reason so all three of us headed back to Hollie's house to have a chill, eat some Bran Flakes and sleep in preparation for our next day of adventures

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Camden, Notting Hill and Portobello Market were on Friday's agenda. Camden was our first stop and Laura had never been there before so we went there to show her the iconic London area. The place is filled with stalls selling band t-shirts, knock off Nigel headphones, jewellery and is filled with hippies, rockers and hipsters! While we were there i bought two prints - one of Springsteen and one of Jimmy Hendrix. We soon finished in Camden so we grabbed some lunch and made our way in the direction of Notting Hill.  

 

 

Notting Hill has to be my new favourite part of London. It reminds me of one of my favourite parts of New York which is SoHo. So calm & relaxed and unlike central London nobody is rushing and shoving you out of the way and running for trains that will reappear in less than 2 minutes! The houses, oh the houses! They have to be some of the nicest houses I have ever seen within a city. If I ever win the lottery I will purch myself in the multicoloured, ivy covered beauts that are Notting Hill houses! We went into an awesome book shop which was filled to the brim with books, magazines and comics (awesome!) and then made our way through the market in Portobello.

My mam has every Springsteen record except for my favourite - Darkness on the Edge of Town. There were numerous record stalls there and the last record in the pile on one of these stalls was Darkness so I grabbed it! The guy said all the Springsteen records had gone up in price since his sold out, 5 star Wembley performance which is understandable! I was sooo happy to find it though :) after having a look around we headed back on the central line to Hollie's house and on the way we said bye to Laura as she headed home. We finished the evening with delicious spaghetti bolognese and the 'Truman Show'.

Saturday was much more of a chilled day with myself watching the Lions beat the Australians in the morning and Hollie and I heading to the nearest town to look around in the afternoon. We popped in to the travel agents and while we were there we picked up some travel brochures. Hollie and I spend most of our time, actually almost all of our time, talking about where we want to go, what countries, when and what we'd like to do there. If you don't dream then you'll never do, that's what I say! We grabbed a delicious red velvet cupcake and later on we shared some Oreo milkshake - yuuum :) Before we walked back to Hollie's house we popped in to a really cool boutique type shop called Source. There were so many awesome things in their and Hollie pointed out to me an awesome poncho style rain coat, bright pink, which was on sale from £45 to £15 - bargain. I couldn't pass up the opportunity as I think it'll be awesome for Springsteen next month if the Millennium Stadium roof'll be open and for V & Reading festivals later on this summer. Great find :)

 

 

 

The rest of the evening was chilled and I headed home on the 9:30am train from Paddington to Carmarthen while watching Woody Allen's awesome film, Manhattan, and reading my book. Myself, Mam and Dad went out for Sunday lunch when I arrived back in Carmarthen and then we called in with my grandparents on the way home and had an awesome surprise :)

It was a cool time in Landaaaan.

SUPER SONG SUNDAY // Biffy Clyro

It is very rare for me to find a band today that I actually truly love but Biffy Clyro is one of them. The Scottish rockers have been around the British & international rock scene for a while now (first album released in 1999) and rightly so. Their 2009 album, Only Revolutions, is when I really got into them as hit singles such as Bubbles, Mountains & Many of Horror, became know to myself along with millions of other people worldwide. I also fell slightly more in admiration of their heavy rock sound after hearing their cover of Weezer's Buddy Hollie - it is truly awesome ( please youtube it!!). Myself and my friend Nicola absolutely love Biffy and we are so excited to see them in Reading festival this summer - it is going to be epic as they're headlining on one of the nights! Simon Neil along with the rest of the band seem like top men and genuine, which is a quality that is rare in today's charts.  Also, the fact that Biffy's front man, Neil, named Springsteen's Streets of Philadelphia as one of his most influential songs growing up just adds to the whole band's appeal!

Enjoy :)

MUSIC // Vinyl Collection (a bit of it)

It happens every time. Once I've been to a band's gig, their music is all I listen to. Day and night. As predicted it has happened again. I must have listened to Springsteen's Darkness on the Edge of Town album from start to finish, without skipping a single song, about six or seven times now! I'm trying to ease myself off Springsteen for a while because I don't want to get sick of the man, which I personally don't think is possible, but I don't want to risk it! However, before this easing commences I listened to a few Springsteen records my mam had upstairs. Our house has so many CD's and vinyl that there is actually no more room for anymore! There's vinyl on shelves, boxes, cases and it's the same with CD's. Listening to vinyl is so much nicer than CD. I like the crackling in the music and the sound the record makes when moving on to the next song. Today, if you go and buy vinyl from the latest bands they cost soooooo much. I saw Justin Timberlake's Mirrors in Urban Outfitters last week and it cost something like £24! Craaaazy!

I decided to take a few pictures of only a handful of records that we keep up in the loft.

BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN // WEMBLEY STADIUM

Let it be noted in history that the 15th of June 2013 was one of the best nights of my life. It was the night I saw Bruce Springsteen for the second time in my life (mam's 7th time) and the night that he sang an acoustic version of Thunder Road and the whole of the Darkness on the Edge of Town album.

We left for Wembley Stadium early afternoon and with a bit of running, we managed to get an earlier a train that allowed us to arrive there an hour or so before we were due to. When walking down the queue in order to join the back of it we thought that it was already pretty long at 3pm however at about 5pm we looked behind us and the line seemed to be going on for miles! About half an hour in to our queueing the heavens opened and oh my word, we got soaked. My jeans were dripping and my converse felt that they had become temporary ponds for the evening as every time I moved I could hear the squelching of buckets of rain move with me. At one point I took my cons off and managed to ring water out of my socks. The thing is, nobody cared because we were going to see the Boss perform in Wembley for the first time in 25 years!

We were actually much  closer to Bruce than what we thought because by the time we were in the stadium we were by the barrier of the main crowd (not the golden circle) and mam said that's the closest she's ever been to the main man. He came on just after seven and the rest spoke for itself. Within the three hour set Springsteen performed without stopping. He performed hits such as Born to Run, Shackle and Drawn, Waitin on a Sunny Day and Dancing in the Dark. my second favourite performance of the evening was of Adam Raised a Caine which included an awesome guitar solo by the Boss. My favourite and one performance that I will never forget was the last song of the mammoth set - Thunder Road which was performed acoustically. It was just amazing, I know I've said it a million times but I just can not tell you how awesome it was. Thunder Road is my all time favourite song and when Springsteen was singing it (I know this sounds a bit weird) but I had to close my eyes on occasions just to take it all in! Wow.

After the performance we went and bought a hell of a lot of Springsteen merchandise - three t-shirts, a bandanna and another poster to add to the ever increasing band posters that live upstairs.

What an awesome night. Next month we'll be queueing outside the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff to see the Boss again. My mum, brother and I are planning to get there really early to be one of the first in the queue so we can be right in the front of the golden circle. I am already super looking forward to it!!!

UNIVERSITY // cheerio Block J, Hello Summer

Friday afternoon at 4pm as we walked out of Founders Lecture Theatre summer officialy began. That was our last lecture of first year! Woooowza how time has flown, like seriously. It's still a strange feeling knowing that we will never step foot back within Block J, my home for the last 10 months. Block J was the perfect place to spend my first year because it wasn't like your traditional flats it was a three floored open building with 17 people all mixing with each other - a perfect way to make some of the coolest friends! While packing on Friday evening it felt super strange that within a few months we'll all be living in our respective houses and paying rent and bills etc but I am looking forward to decorating my room. 5 people live in my house (including me) and literally 10 seconds, or even less, across the road from us our friends live (yaaaay) and then on just the next street our other friends live. Our block have decided that during freshers we're going to sneak in to block J and just see who's living in our beloved block! Well, maybe . . . !

Block J you have been pretty awesome man but now it's all about the Cherrywood!

Sulley saying see ya later Reid :)

UNIVERSITY // #BlockJFamilyMeal

Last night most of the block (14 out out of 17) went out for our (almost) termly leaving meal. Our first year of university has almost come to an end as Saturday we will all have to be out of our rooms and on the the way home to our respective corners of the world. I know I say it all the time but the year has flown by. We've already finished first year of uni, done our exams and have just started our courses for second year. It actually feels like I only sent my UCAS form away last week! I have to admit that I have met some awesome people that I know I will be friends with for a very long time. It's strange, you get put in a house with people you have never met and sometimes people just click and others, well, they just don't! With everything that's been going on this year (back) I sometimes feel that it has been a wasted year because I have not been able to do much, join sport clubs, societies, go out etc but then I think actually no, I have met some awesome friends and learnt a lot not only academically but about how to survive - buying food, washing etc! It hasn't been all rosy though, on occasions, usually at the end of term, when you have a 3,000 word essay, a 2,000 word essay, journals to finish, multiple quizzes to do and revision all in the same week or so, then you start to tare your hair out but once their done it's all good. I am really looking forward to next term when things will be even more awesome.

Here are some pictures of us out last night.

Oh, and by the way, who comes to the last term of uni with only sparkly converse as a going out shoe? Yup, that would be moi.