2004-04-01..4:14 p.m.

I will try to make this short and sweet and will fail. That is my promise. Let�s see how we go.

Point the First. The reviews have officially been sent in and my editor (heehee) gave me some amazing feedback in which he claims I possess an ability to make him feel like he was there. I don�t know about that, but they�ll be published on the Pennyblack site, making me a for real Music Journalist, by tomorrow.

Point the Second. Please keep in mind I�m having to restrain the wild urge to run around my office screaming gloriously and tickling people. Did I tell you about the Monster Crush? Moreover, did I tell you about actually getting off on Sunday with the Monster Crush? Did I tell you that my position as Mere Mortal is under great threat by even the most tenuous of associations to said Monster Crush? After not hearing from the Monster Crush at all on Monday (ok, because I was on uber high and very horny and thus the sound of his voice would have probably sent me into gooey giggles and Victorian hysterics), I received a text from him Tuesday referring with treble entrendre to our conversation about Tongue Tongue in the Tick (hee!), which I couldn�t return because I have NO CREDIT AT ALL on my phone. I did not worry. Not this chick. Because that way the cucumber-like chill factor is set in place. Sure I might be dangerously close to cuticle gnawing Then yesterday I got another. And then today I not only got a text, but he called too while I was outside having a sneaky fag! And then I called him back and he�s not working the Rats tonight, but will be picking me up after the show so I don�t have to, um, walk home alone. And he wanted to know if I�d be up for some Saatchi viewing next week. Which I do.

Jumpy! Jumpy! Joy! and Giggles!!! I�m cackling orgasmicly on the inside. My face hurts from the mad smiles.

Point the Three. I went to see The Black Dice last night, really interesting; not trouble getting in whatsoever, which I was relieved about as it was my very first Assignment, not in-house. I was rather tired by the end of it and so some of the finer nuances probably would have gone un-noted had I not overheard several people enthusing excitedly as they headed to the tube. That alone caused me to run through the show again. As well, I did get a chance to talk to one of them afterwards and talk briefly about their tour, which put some things into perspective, at least insofar as piecing together influences and �roots�. They played at this �not music� music festival last year or the year before in Ontario somewhere, which confirmed my speculation that their music is more of a Performance. Art. than vague noises and spliced sound bites. Completely different to what I�m used to writing, so it�ll be a fair challenge and one that will likely send me tipping into academic mode. He�s given me his email address which I plan to take full advantage of.

They had two supports, Fursaxa and Bardo Pond.

Bardo Pond were awful. And by �awful,� I mean teethgrindingly terrible. Primarily blanket noise that went nowhere and did nothing. I actually started reading my book half way through because I needed to escape into the relative sanity and calm of the TRIFFIDS. That�s something I have NEVER done before, and while slightly embarrassed about it, it was that or leave entirely. Their one near-saving grace was the chick-lead whose voice was lovely, and who played a beautiful bit of flute. But it just got completely suffocated by distortion and insoluble static. Blech.

However Fursaxa was excellent; a one woman show. Very Mum-sy and a little Chan Marshall. It was almost a religious sort of experience, her being so intrinsically wrapped into her music that there was a vast, almost tundra-like, distance placed both between us the audience and her the artist, and her the artist and her art.

Haha � short and sweet.. Happy Thursday otherwise.

Tripping down the merry lanes of la-la-land, thinking �birds and bees doin� their thang, that�s coo� yo�,�

****meep