Back to Reality

OK!!!! We're back on track! We're home and back into the swing of things. Gigs a plenty coming up, a couple at the Globe Theatre and at the Black Box. Stay tuned for details.

I'm going to post a few pics of our trip to the USA, there's a few from Martha's Vineyard, Kentucky, Chattanooga and Atlanta.

Here's some shots at Martha's Vineyard of me getting attacked by a shark at Jaws Beach and the immediate area (State Beach, Sengekontacket Pond, Edgartown). Some of you may recognise it...

More Amity Island Adventures

Had a blast yesterday. We caught the bus to two other little towns on the north side of the island - Oak Bluffs and Vineyard Haven. Beautiful little seaside townships. Oak Bluffs has quite bizarre architecture, all the houses look like fairy tale gingerbread houses. It looks like it is all put on as part of a theme park, but it's actually all real, people live in them and tend to their quaint little gardens every day. Vineyard Haven is more of your classic seaside town with lots of boats and fishing stuff around, as well as some more alternative style shops and cafes. Very nice place.

On the way back to Edgartown, we hopped off the bus at a place called State Beach and Sengekontacket Pond. More Jaws trivia - this is the place where all the summer beach scenes were shot and where the shark swam under a bridge and into the pond/estuary to chomp someone. I ran into the water like an excited little kid. I thrashed about as if being attacked by a large rubber motorised shark. Karen took some photos (will post when I can get the shots off the camera). The water was deathly cold, so I couldn't stay in very long. Upon reflection of the film, most of the people swimming in the water all had chattery teeth, I now know why!!

Anyway, we're off to the other end of the island today to a small fishing village called Menemsha and a place called Gay Head. The coutryside looks to be a lot more rugged and wild, so it should be an interesting day out. No doubt more Jaws trivia and locations will be discovered, so please be patient with my silly movie fan ravings.

da dum... da dum... da dum...

Life on Amity Island

Life on The Vineyard, as locals call it, is very relaxed. We arrived yesterday on a small 8 seater aircraft from Boston, very cool. The view from the small plane was amazing and it was quite an experience to take off from an extremely busy international airport in a plane the size of a van. We must have looked quite the sight queued up with various giant Boeings and Airbus monsters on either side of us.

We got a cab into Edgartown to where we are staying - The Victorian Inn - and were immediately charmed by the quaint beauty of the place. Small one way streets with gorgeous shingled buildings and houses nestled amongst almost fairy tale like tree lined streets. This is the town that Spielberg chose to shoot most of the island scenes in his film Jaws. In fact, the place looks exactly as it did in the movie. The only things that have changed are peoples 70s hair and clothing fashions, and the cars are a bit more modernerer.

We spent a good part of today walking down to South Beach, about a 6 mile round trip. We chilled out on the beach, quite literally. The sun was warm, but the breeze was very cool and the Atlantic Ocean was probably about 1 or 2 degrees. FREEZING.

We're just about to head off for dinner to one of the many restaurants here. We're just going to walk around and see what takes our fancy. I'm sure the Italian restaurant up the road might get a look in, I'm hoping it is actually Italian cuisine, and not 'American' Italian ie: deep fried lasagne with bacon and sugar frosting. Oh well, if it is, I'm sure I'll manage to have 2 or 3 helpings. :)

Stay tuned for more Amity Island caperings...

Sugar and fat

Ok!!! We've had a ton of sleep and we seem to be adjusted to the new timezone.

We're just about to head off to Martha's Vineyard where we'll be staying for the week. SO looking forward to chilling out and doing pretty much nothing for a few days, perhaps going for walks, eating, getting attacked by rogue great white sharks, reading, eating, sleeping, eating etc...

Just had breakfast. A very different experience for us as we're used to having a piece of vegemite toast and a coffee and that's it. Well, when in Rome - coffee, fruit, toast, muffins, waffles with maple syrup, glazed donuts and more coffee. My arteries are hardening as I write this.

More news when I have more to report! Cheers!

You Ess Eh?

Well, we're off to the USA tomorrow! Very excited! Just took the cat to the cattery :( and am going to get stuck into the housework. I'll be taking Murray to the kennel :( early in the morning then we're off.

We'll be touching down in LA, get on another plane and fly to Boston, where we'll sleep for a bit. Then we'll be on another small plane heading for Martha's Vineyard where we'll stay for the week. Martha's Vineyard is a small island just off the southern coast of Cape Cod in Massachusetts, right near Nantucket. Anyone thinking of a funny limerick? Anyway, Martha's Vineyard is similar in size to North Straddie, and for the movie buffs out there, it is where the original Jaws was filmed.

After our stay there, we'll be off to Kentucky to stay with friends I haven't seen for years. We'll be staying with them for the Memorial weekend and then we'll be off to Chattanooga for a couple of nights. Looks like a groovy little town, lots of arts and live music. Looking forward to that!

Then it'll be a week of madness in Atlanta. We're VIP guests of the Busse Knife Group for the duration of the annual Blade Show. There'll be a lot of huntin/fishin/shootin characters there, as well as a plethora of other personalities that can only be found at an event like this. It's going to be an awesome adventure!!!

I'll be sure to keep this blog updated as much as possible during our trip ie: whenever I can get to a computer.

Look forward to seeing you all when we get back and shredding all of your ears with awesome guitar music!

Here's some guitar gear and some artwork...

Music, Art & Knives

Just found out that the track Enigma Miss was aired on FM102.7 in Melbourne last week. There seems to be a fair bit of interest picking up around the place for the album. Awesome!!! Don't forget, it's all available in iTunes.

If it's a good old fashion hard copy CD you want, you can buy it from:

Sydney: UTOPIA RECORDS
Melbourne: MISSING LINK RECORDS
Brisbane: ROCKINGHORSE RECORDS & KILL THE MUSIC
San Francisco: AMOEBA MUSIC
Sunshine Coast: MOSHPIT MUSIC

or directly from me - robstanley72@gmail.com

On the artwork side of things, all the stuff for The Busse Knife Group is completed. We head off this coming Saturday for Boston & Martha's Vineyard, then it's off to Kentucky to visit friends, then to Chattanooga for a few nights and then on to Atlanta for the BLADE SHOW. Can't wait!!!!! Here's a couple of cool Busse knives...

Globes and Guitars

Performed at The Globe Theatre in Brisbane last night. Great venue, great sound and great bunch of bands playing. Here's a review followed by a bit of artwork...

The Globe Theatre - May 16 2010
I've never been to The Globe before. I'd heard good things about it, great sound and such. It used to be a movie theatre, but with all the seats taken out, with a big sloping floor down to a nice big stage at the front. The whole thing is underground, literally, so volume levels aren't an issue. A great PA system with a great engineer who knows how to drive it, gave this gig one hell of a sound.

Hate Disciple
An all out metal onslaught of fast alternate picking riffs and quick drumming. Two vocalists gave the music an interesting texture. One of the vocalists was extremely drunk, so drunk in fact he fell off the stage. These guys also had two nice big pull up banners on either side of the stage with some cool graphics and logos printed on them, which gave the band a great look.

Cilikis Progressio Project
An instrumental 3 piece with a musical flavour that pays homage to the instrumental guitarists of the 80s and 90s. A lot of Satriani style guitar riffing and legato scale passages with nice inventive melodies, backed up with a VERY solid bass and drum bed. Nice big sound and a lot of fun. This was their fist official public performance, so hats off fellas, great job.

Death to the Witness
I have to admit, as I was performing directly after these guys, I didn't see much of their gig, but I certainly heard them from backstage while I was warming up for my set. Big screamo hardcore sound, fat guitars and bass with cool drumming holding it all together.

Rob Stanley
As usual, I was crapping my trousers, but once I was set up and the sound check was done, something came over me and I completely relaxed and got into it. I put forth the challenge of having Lasagne Man first up in the set and it went down a treat. Ran through all my songs to a great reception after each, and before I knew it I played the last B chord at the end of Doorway and that was that!

Embrace Eternity
These guys roped up a huge hanging banner behind them and it set the tone straight away for the performance. No fuss, no shit hardcore melodic metal. Lots of stage presence, great performing from all the band members and a charismatic vocalist that kept the audience interested the whole way. Nice dual harmonising guitars with good solid bass and drums. Nothing super fancy, just tight and ballsy. Great stuff!