30 Days – Days 12 & 13 – “No compliments and artist support”

Yesterday’s thing didn’t warrant a whole entry on it, as it was a load of shite. Instead I’ll include it in today’s post.

Something you never get compliments on.

Kind of question is that? I don’t spend my life bitter at some seemingly obvious talent that nobody’s picked up on or do good deeds but hide them from everyone. The list of things I don’t get compliments on comprises pretty much everything, the same as with everyone. This was a question for unappreciated housewives, as such I’ve not much to say. Moving on…

A band or artist that has gotten you through some tough ass days.

Don’t we all have that music we listened to as moody young teens? I remember having Linkin Park’s debut album on repeat for months at a time, particularly while reading the His Dark Materials trilogy. Have a listen to Johny aged 13:

I used to do the whole lock myself in my room and listen to a hundred different CDs thing, but it wasn’t as much about finding comfort in them as they simply sounded good (back then at least) and it filled up my cell and made it easier to block out everything that existed outside of it. This may have something to do with the fact I didn’t really listen to music with the most soulful, thought out lyrics. To be honest this is one of those posts that might have been better with a little bit of planning beforehand, I know for a fact that in a few hours time I’ll be doing whatever and another song will pop into my mind that I should have added to this. Anyway, Johny aged 10:

Then my balls dropped, I found a love for bass and the dirties that came along with it. Johny in the first couple of years in high school:

Amongst all that was the trend of listening to a hundred different local “DJs” who were really a shower of wee fannies that had downloaded some music software from Kazaa along with some separate vocals and instrumentals and squashed the two together into some truly horrific creations. At the same time many would create disses to various rivals and victims. These were made back in the days before things like Skype or even YouTube were big, so practically no-one had good quality mics. Because of this the vocals were tinny, had a tendency to distort and sounded awful. That didn’t stop anyone, even though in retrospect it really fucking should have. As the Germans try to forget about the nazis, Scots try to forget about the people that created stuff like this:

Back when I was fifteen or sixteen, we would sit in someone’s bedroom, twelve of us in the one space, listening to that shit through mobiles or whoever had bothered to make a mix CD with all the current scheme hits on it. I don’t know what came first, the drinking or that music. Came (aha!) in handy (ahaha!) to use the beat as a metronome for a bit of the auld underage shagging back in the day though. Good times!

Running through the years is a vein of older dance and hardcore tracks stretching back to the beginning in the late eighties. Rock music was in there as well, and I do like a lot of it, but it’s more serious and aggressive than what I usually listen to. Listening to it is a singular experience, there’s no such thing as good happy rock for me. I’m a moaning faced cunt at the best of times but it doesn’t extend to my music. Give me a rave track and I want to get up and dance, put a thousand people together and play that same song and for as long as it lasts there’ll be a kind of unity to things. Scooter before Slipknot basically.

There was only one person I relied on to cheer me up if I felt like shit, cool me down if I was angry, or needed a laugh in general, and that was Billy Connolly. Ever since I was a kid I’d collect any videos, tapes, CDs and DVDs I could with him in it. The man’s hilarious, and gives off the impression that he honestly enjoys what he does and treats the audience as something more than just a ticket to a paycheck. I’d post a couple of videos of him, but I think I’ve had enough. Go look on YouTube for him, you’ll be watching for about an hour at least.