The marketing power of blogging *hic*?

Very irreverent marketing blog gapingvoid.com made an irresistible offer a while back - free wine. Sure, I fell for it. And you're too late.

Well the darn bottle showed up this morning (detoured from my house to my office by DHL). I have not had a chance to try it yet - will have that pleasure this evening, most likely, but such an endeavor deserves a blog mention. After all, that was the point, wasn't it?

Read about it at the Stormhoek wine blog, where freshness matters.

Down home and down here

A few days back from a second gig from Richmond Fontaine at the Railway in Winchester. The first was last September - we'd soaked up the Post to Wire album after it was willingly foisted on us by Uncut magazine. The concert was memorable for its intimacy (we were pretty much on the low stage with Willy and Co), and a great performance. I'd love to say that there were many converts to the Richmonds that night, but the venue is so small that there weren't that many people there, albeit it was packed.

A repeat experience July 14, with some new material from The Fitzgerald in a warm up to the Guildford festival. I stood in exactly the same place - could have picked up Willy's guitar pick and handed it back to him if he dropped it. Another great gig, with a storming start, a slightly off middle and a brilliant end which overran by some half hour as the band were summoned back to the stage after thinking it was all over. I am now almost reluctant to see Richmond Fontaine in a bigger venue, for fear of losing the feeling that they were playing to some mates in someone's front room.

These are part of a series of gigs organised under the SXSC banner. Oliver and Richard indulge their own concert-going passions by organising their own gigs, the theme being somewhat alt-country. They seem to be regularly selling out the back room at The Railway. Oliver exhorts people to "keep telling people about our shows", but I'm not going to, as I want to make sure I can get a ticket.

The Wilson Genius

In an e-mail just after Glastonbury, best mate Chris (he and I went to Glasto together) declared his conversion to raving Beach Boys fan.

Another friend writes:

An addle-witted autistic savant singing out of tune in front of his own covers band didn't quite cut it for me on TV, maybe you had to be there. I wish he'd just left us the records to remember him by.

From a purely mechanical point of view, it was probably irrelevant that Brian was there in person or not - he added little to the performance (although there were some falsettos which could only have come from him). Yes, it's sad, he was like a rabbit caught in the headlights. You get the feeling that every performance, the Wondermints turn on the power switch, shove in a floppy and boot him up.

But he wrote and arranged every single note of what was an awesome performance. Emotionally, the fact that he was there was huge. It's the difference from being a tribute band (Illegal Eagles, Whole Lotta Led, Bjorn Again, anyone?) to being Brian Wilson and his band. Rock God personified.... on the stage. He had already done enough to earn all the plaudits the crowd could give him, and they did. The Wondermints are amazingly good at the material, respectful but not sycophantic. I counted 8 layer harmonies. The lead guitarist had a Carl Wilson badge on his guitar strap - nice touch.

Go and see Beethoven's 9th played by the Berlin Philharmonic. Stonkin'. Then put Herbert von Karajan in front - bloody hell. Then put Beethoven himself at a piano centre stage, noodling. You betcha.

The girl in front of us crying through "God Only Knows", the dudes on surf boards on the shoulders of the crowd and one of the legendary bastions of ornery Chris credo crumbling to dust in front of my eyes. Ah, f*ck it, you had to have been there.