alt title: sending love out on the radio, radio!

Man, bloody late Auckland gigs lulling me into a false sense of security; ticket said "doors open at 8:30" so I turned up at a perfectly acceptable 10:00 just as SJD was starting his set. Completely missed James Duncan's support set; rather annoyed. & Boy, Galatos was PACKED! Funny thing about SJD gigs, he does a fair whack of half-full gigs for about 18 months, and then he releases a new CD and all of a sudden the sum total of bFM's listenership GOES UTTERLY SJD-CRAZY, packed gigs, all tracks at the top of the bFM top 10, critical acclaim etc etc etc. WELL, I was a fan when he was still underground, and much as he fully deserves more kudos (and possibly piles of money, drugs and girls) than he gets, I don't suffer packed gigs gladly, especially with drunk & rowdy guys teetering into me, & being jostled by short talky girls that want to duck between the legs of the scrum in front of them. One guy (politely making way for a jostly short girl to get through) stepped back just as I was drinking my wine, smacked the glass right into my gob. He was apologetic, I waved it off and made out my pain to be far worse than it was. Oddly enough, when I was fed up enough to stride through the throng, I discovered it was far more civilised closer to the front. Also, two glasses of wine and the Heather-grumps dissipated. A third glass and I was happily tiddled.

So anyway, I LOVE LOVE LOVE hearing new songs from my favourite artists. I'd heard one WONDERFUL foot-tappy song a few times at other gigs, mentioned it to SJD once and he said something along the lines of "oh, we'll have to release it then" to which I mused that I might overdo my listening and get tired of it (OK, I confess, that kinda happened with Bad Karma, mainly because I listened to it a buncha times in one sitting to work out the words). Then about two months later I was sleeping through my clock-radio alarm (as usual) when my subconscious heard the opening strains of said song. That's all it took, words can't express the squee of being awoken by a song that you don't quite remember, but know you love. I leapt out of bed & dashed into the lounge to dance along to the stereo, still in my jim-jams and possum socks. I watched the video for I Wrote This Song For You (for verily, that is the song of which I speak) about 12 times the day I discovered it was online (and probably about twice that since), and it STILL gives me happy tingles. It's totally SJD's Song 2 (well, except that it's no. 3 on the album). But I digress. Where was I? New material...

OK, so the new songs are a way more eclectic bunch than the last album's fare, it seems like SJD just woke up one day and thought "oh, I think I'll try something different now" and waded off into the sea of Pop. Gradually steering back on topic (y'know, to the actual gig): he's performed (and rearranged) a few of the songs right from the last album release, and they sounded a lot like the songs on Southern Lights. New songs (and rewrites) were gradually introduced, and progressively more different. And (ok, see? back on the gig now) he played about five songs I hadn't heard before (oh, delight!) and they're all a Brand New Direction and Poppy as Anything, while still having his logo well and truly etched into the lining. As a result, every one's a winner with me.

My only gripe (well, aside from the initial grump-inducing squash) was that the sound seemed quite slushy, and all the cute little details typical of SJD's stuff got lost in the wash. Granted, it's not a proper SJD gig without technical problems (which may optionally include forgetting the words to a song), but sufficient technical difficulty for this particular gig was already covered with the absent Sandy Mill - awesome backing singer - having a baby around about the time the encore was being played. While her singing was missed, I'm pretty happy to forgo the gospel choir in such circumstances.

Anyway, I'm not really sure if it was the sound guy or the venue. I've never been to Galatos before & it's very....boxy. Lots of nice velvet curtains though. If there was anyone there that I knew, they were all jammed into the big boxy bunker in the manner of bowling skittles - not particularly conducive to socialising. Not that I'd be talking through this particular gig, but even after the encore finished there was a massive bottleneck past the bar as everyone tried to cram out the front foyer at once - again, not particularly conducive to socialising. I managed to introduce myself to Russell Brown (ooOOOoo, interweb celebrity!) as he left the building, but I was moving in the opposite direction to the fray, so I didn't linger long enough to say something intelligent. Probably a good thing, three glasses of wine and all that. I'm not sure how so few drinks made me so happy, although to be fair, I was pretty high on the Disco Inferno as well.

SJD with James Duncan
July 19th, 2007
Galatos

Rating: Number One in Heatherland, and everywhere else until such time as the hype dies down. Here's to the next album release, sometime in 2009.
Earworms: I Am The Radio, Disco Inferno, Jesus, I Wrote This Song For You, So Long, Black Is A Beautiful Colour (generally all at once)