Cometh the month, cometh the man

As 2005 rampages towards its inevitable, logical conclusion (an inappropriate drunken pawing at a Hogmany party), we draw ever closer to Rocktober - the month of my birth. I will be a quarter of a century old this year, and I still have the brain, thoughts, sexual desires and hand-eye coordination of a high-voiced acne-ridden 16 year old. We men never fully grow up, do we? It's sad really - women my age are thinking about babies, marriage, buying a house, and here I am wondering what Playstation 2 game I want for my birthday (The Warriors, if you were wondering), and whether or not my chocolate cake should have a He-Man made of icing on it, or an Optimus Prime.

I'm a fucking a child, basically.

But enough of this maudlin nonsense, what I really want to talk about is gigs. Oh yes. Gigs. Due to my inability to get time off to go back to Glasgow for Instal, I've been keeping my eyes peeled for some hot shit down here in sunny London. Here's what I've found:

• 26 October - Rhythm Factory

65daysofstatic & Youthmovie Soundtrack Strategies

Not only are 65daysofstatic releasing a new album, but they are fucking touring too. Ahhh. Having only heard about them at the beginning of the year, they have quickly become one of my favourite bands. Get yourself along to one of the other UK shows (or this one) for a heavy dose of post-rock breakcore nonsense.

• 31 October - Scala

Patrick Wolf & Friends Halloween Spooktacular

Patrick is supporting Bloc Party all over the land, but if you want to see him headline this seems to be your only chance for a while. The Bloc Party dates are all sold out anyway, I think. Expect him to be dressed as a gay Robin Hood-esque goth while he belts out his angsty electro-ballads. Probably.

• 04 November - Cargo

Minotaur Shock, Radioactive Man & more

Folktronica is such a dirty word. But hey, if lazy journalists can use it - so the fuck can I (and I can split infinitives with profanity too). Minotaur Shock is fucking awesome, and is supposedly named after a discredited type of therapy that they used to dish out to mental patients during less enlightened times. The head doctor would charge into the lunatic's room, gibbering, with a minotaur mask on. Yeah, that'll cure them. Radioactive Man, too. That's all I gotta say.

• 04 November - Overkill @ Elektrowerks II

Mistress, Trencher, Charlottefield, Modeselektor, Tim Exile, Phil Collins 3, Sharkattack, Ceephax, Shitmat, V/Vm, DJ Scotch Egg, The Gasman, Chevron, Ebola, Mully & Bunglegushcore, Miss Hawaii, Cutting Pink With Knives, Ommm, Romvelope, D/J Rupture

Jesus Cunting Christ. That line up makes me want to weep with joy. Almost every one of my favourite (at the moment) electronic artists (ok, so VSnares and Jason Forrest ain't there, but don't be nitpicky) are playing this gig. I'll really only be going the Minotaur Shock gig if I canny find someone who'll go to this with me. I reckon this could kill the last vestiges of adequate hearing I have left. Jesus...just...Jesus.

• 05 November - Camden Barfly

Robots In Disguise & more

The 2 chicks from the Mighty Boosh (Electro, Nanageddon and probably another couple of episodes too) will be dishing out their brand of punk-funk to the drunken Camden bastards. Lovely.

• 14 November - Trash @ The End

TIGA! Erol Alkan will probably be there too

If ever there was a time to make an effort to go to Trash, it would be this night. It will be oh so very trendy. And gay. Very very gay.

• 17 November - Koko

Squarepusher & Luke Vibert

Having never seen Squarepusher, I really should try and make this. I'm just worried he'll only play stuff from his most recent album (Ultravisitor), which I thought was shit. Luke Vibert is cool though.

Now, going by my track record I reckon I'll make it to one, maybe two of these nights. Why oh why must I be so fucking shite? Because I'm a fucking wean trapped in the body of a slightly bemused adult.

Come on, birthday. Come on

Attention Whoring Worldwide

What the fuck is going on in this world? Seriously? What did people do before God blighted us with the dull fuckery that is Myspace? Have you seen this shit? "My e-penis is so much bigger than yours - I have 144 friends". But how many of them have you actually met, dickbag?

I canny talk. I've just started a Myspace page. Yet another repository for lists of my favourite films and music, pictures of me in 'uproarious' situations, links to pages of people whom I DO NOT KNOW and occasionally links to, wait for it... actual real life friends. Gasp.

Friendster is bad enough, but Myspace lets you fuck about with the layout of your page. There are literally millions of identikit emo-bawbag's pages filled with shitty pictures, bad, bad embedded mallcore MP3s and impossible-to-read black on dark blue text.

But you know all of this, because you have a Myspace page too, don't you. Every fucker and their pet spastic has a page. It's going to hit critical mass at some point in the near future - every Myspace user is going to be friends with every other Myspace user, wasting away years of their lives exchanging poorly written comments with one another while drooling over their keyboards. "OH MY GAWD, U R SOOO HAWT IN DAT PIC"

Maybe I'm getting a bit old and jaded, but these social networking things are really starting to grind my gears. I have no use for them whatsoever - I don't use them to keep in touch with mates (I use phones and email for that), they're basically just more ammo for a future stalker. But I will continue to sign up, I will continue to 'add people' to my friends list and I will continue to write painfully unfunny comments on the pages of people who I wouldn't shit on if they were on fire. I will continue because I am just as big of an attention whore as everyone else. I need more online friends than my other online friends. I need to validate my existence by counting the number of people who have viewed my profile.

So here, here you fucking go -
http://www.myspace.com/bape_monkey

Add me you cunts.

NORMAL SERVICE WILL RESUME SHORTLY

In the meantime - have a look at this happy fuck. He loves his job.