Must break blogging seal...
Blogging is like exercise, once you get out of the habit it's really hard to get back in; but while you're doing it regularly it feels as normal and as refreshing as a cup of coffee in the morning.
So sorry for the endless Twitter feed, I will get back to regular real posts I swear. At the moment I'm trying to get my life back into a regular routine after the craziness of the breakup, move, endless working hours, mid semester assessment round and generally just trying to find time when I'm in my house and not working. Blogging will resume with normal regularity in line with cooking for myself.
A couple of weekends ago I had an amazing weekend where I flew up to Brisbane, hung out with my nerd peeps, hit up GenCon, played some games, drank some pints, painted some miniatures and then ran the hell away. There was drinking Scotch and talking sci fi in guplor's basement, playing of Red November at O'Malley's and just general geeky good fun.
For those who hear endless stories but have never met him that's Daniel (WhizzFizz) on the right trying to hide behind his arm.
Yet again the best event of the weekend has to have been the Reaper Miniatures Paint and Take and this year they brought ChronoGuard meaning I just *had* to paint this rude little maid number. And yes, I did spend significant time shading in her nipples... Tweakable! She's now sitting on my DVD shelf being dwarfed by my collection of Maid Cafe Costume Party Collection figurines.
It was sad that I missed the rest of the con but I'm not sad that I came home to Sydney because instead I went to DefQon1, a 20 000 strong outdoor rave on its own island. Which was awesome. Now I could have used a few more of my crew but nonetheless it was without a doubt logistically the best rave of my life. So many of my favourite acts were there that it just couldn't be missed. Easily 10 of my favourite top 20 DJs all in one place spanning a lifetime of electronic music fads of mine; hardcore, darkcore, hardtrance and some good old fashioned hardstyle. The only way I could have been more pleased is if there was a Happy Hardcore tent. Oh and maybe if Lab 4 reformed just to come out and play.
One of the things about raving in Sydney is that they're into trance and other oddities and shuffle which I am not naturally inclined to. Surround yourself with 5000 other hardcore stompers and I feel much more at ease, everyone's in black phats and wifebeaters and the back half of the tent is dancing in time. Ahhh that homely feeling of fitting in. I even found amongst my traditional randoms are couple of cute queer raver chicks recently turned 18 and everything I hope to find at such events but rarely do... they weren't that trashed, they knew what DJs they wanted to see, they were happy to chill out on the couches during downtime between acts and one of them even came with her Dad who is obviously a raver from way back. He and I had a giggle at Public Domain and he asked me to look after them on the train home from Penrith.
But regardless I got to go a bit crazy at Evil Activities, enjoy the old skool stylings of Public Domain including I don't know how many tracks I haven't heard in 10 years including Here's Johnny and Apotheosis, see The Prophet twice and discover new local talent in Dexi vs Daniel Valerium. Obviously Endymion were awesome and totally what I was in the mood for but I'd seen him only recently and so instead spent a lot of his set checking out Proteus, though sadly Proteus seemed to have attracted every arsehat trashbag in the venue who had no respect for dance space so I ended up running away. Art of Fighters and Neophyte were also both amazing crunchy stomping goodness and Neophyte ended with Army of Hardcore followed by a rendition of "I Did It My Way" that still had me dancing through the exhaustion and overworked muscles.
I danced all day apart from a small break in the chillout zone meeting randoms and remembered the following few days that once I was a fitter little candy raver in black who could get away with these things... whereas my yuppy alcohol fueled Inner West Sydney ways don't really look kindly on all day exercise in 30 degree heat. My calf muscles tightened so much I couldn't walk the next day, I'm getting back into regular long runs before the next dance event.
So apart from the sort of wary experience I've had in the past raving in Sydney where you are forced to catch a train to the middle of nowhere while the fluro clad sit on one side of the train being eyed off by the bogans (and sadly there was no dance off) the logistics were just amazing. It took us all of 5 mins to get onto a bus despite the huge crowds and they swept us away to the train station and a waiting train. The security were good but not intrusive, the facilities regular and the food and drinks pricey like at any festival but easily found and regularly placed. I thought the choice of merch stalls was a bit weird - not a single candy or phats store in sight but otherwise it was all great, easy to get to, easy to get out of, safe, fun and with endless stages of amazing music.
This was the first time they've done DefQon out of the Netherlands and it sold out. They were so impressed they're planning on bringing it out again and I can only hope they continue to use the Regatta centre as a venue because the hour long train trip is worth it for an islandised wonderland of endless stages and well organised facilities.
So sorry for the endless Twitter feed, I will get back to regular real posts I swear. At the moment I'm trying to get my life back into a regular routine after the craziness of the breakup, move, endless working hours, mid semester assessment round and generally just trying to find time when I'm in my house and not working. Blogging will resume with normal regularity in line with cooking for myself.
A couple of weekends ago I had an amazing weekend where I flew up to Brisbane, hung out with my nerd peeps, hit up GenCon, played some games, drank some pints, painted some miniatures and then ran the hell away. There was drinking Scotch and talking sci fi in guplor's basement, playing of Red November at O'Malley's and just general geeky good fun.
For those who hear endless stories but have never met him that's Daniel (WhizzFizz) on the right trying to hide behind his arm.
Yet again the best event of the weekend has to have been the Reaper Miniatures Paint and Take and this year they brought ChronoGuard meaning I just *had* to paint this rude little maid number. And yes, I did spend significant time shading in her nipples... Tweakable! She's now sitting on my DVD shelf being dwarfed by my collection of Maid Cafe Costume Party Collection figurines.
It was sad that I missed the rest of the con but I'm not sad that I came home to Sydney because instead I went to DefQon1, a 20 000 strong outdoor rave on its own island. Which was awesome. Now I could have used a few more of my crew but nonetheless it was without a doubt logistically the best rave of my life. So many of my favourite acts were there that it just couldn't be missed. Easily 10 of my favourite top 20 DJs all in one place spanning a lifetime of electronic music fads of mine; hardcore, darkcore, hardtrance and some good old fashioned hardstyle. The only way I could have been more pleased is if there was a Happy Hardcore tent. Oh and maybe if Lab 4 reformed just to come out and play.
One of the things about raving in Sydney is that they're into trance and other oddities and shuffle which I am not naturally inclined to. Surround yourself with 5000 other hardcore stompers and I feel much more at ease, everyone's in black phats and wifebeaters and the back half of the tent is dancing in time. Ahhh that homely feeling of fitting in. I even found amongst my traditional randoms are couple of cute queer raver chicks recently turned 18 and everything I hope to find at such events but rarely do... they weren't that trashed, they knew what DJs they wanted to see, they were happy to chill out on the couches during downtime between acts and one of them even came with her Dad who is obviously a raver from way back. He and I had a giggle at Public Domain and he asked me to look after them on the train home from Penrith.
But regardless I got to go a bit crazy at Evil Activities, enjoy the old skool stylings of Public Domain including I don't know how many tracks I haven't heard in 10 years including Here's Johnny and Apotheosis, see The Prophet twice and discover new local talent in Dexi vs Daniel Valerium. Obviously Endymion were awesome and totally what I was in the mood for but I'd seen him only recently and so instead spent a lot of his set checking out Proteus, though sadly Proteus seemed to have attracted every arsehat trashbag in the venue who had no respect for dance space so I ended up running away. Art of Fighters and Neophyte were also both amazing crunchy stomping goodness and Neophyte ended with Army of Hardcore followed by a rendition of "I Did It My Way" that still had me dancing through the exhaustion and overworked muscles.
I danced all day apart from a small break in the chillout zone meeting randoms and remembered the following few days that once I was a fitter little candy raver in black who could get away with these things... whereas my yuppy alcohol fueled Inner West Sydney ways don't really look kindly on all day exercise in 30 degree heat. My calf muscles tightened so much I couldn't walk the next day, I'm getting back into regular long runs before the next dance event.
So apart from the sort of wary experience I've had in the past raving in Sydney where you are forced to catch a train to the middle of nowhere while the fluro clad sit on one side of the train being eyed off by the bogans (and sadly there was no dance off) the logistics were just amazing. It took us all of 5 mins to get onto a bus despite the huge crowds and they swept us away to the train station and a waiting train. The security were good but not intrusive, the facilities regular and the food and drinks pricey like at any festival but easily found and regularly placed. I thought the choice of merch stalls was a bit weird - not a single candy or phats store in sight but otherwise it was all great, easy to get to, easy to get out of, safe, fun and with endless stages of amazing music.
This was the first time they've done DefQon out of the Netherlands and it sold out. They were so impressed they're planning on bringing it out again and I can only hope they continue to use the Regatta centre as a venue because the hour long train trip is worth it for an islandised wonderland of endless stages and well organised facilities.