Legends of the Sun Pig

Disappointed and annoyed.

First of all, I didn’t book my ticket early enough, so I was stuck up on the balcony. The Fox theatre has a fabulously sumptuous interior, but the balcony seats are crappy nevertheless: cramped, uncomfortable, cold, and far too far away from the stage.

Secondly, the ticket said 19:30 (7:30PM, actually, because we’re in the US), but the New Pornographers weren’t on stage until 21:45 because of the two support acts. Imaad Wasif was on first, and produced an amiable blend of stoner prog rock with alt-country elements, but I was feeling impatient by the time the Dodos came on, and just plain bored after two hours of music I didn’t come to see. The Dodos’ intensely drum and percussion-based music is something I would lap up under other circumstances; but as a second support act I would gladly have paid a higher ticket price to have them removed from the bill.

The worst thing, though, was the sound, which is the worst I have ever experienced at a gig. It was muddy and indistinct, and it sounded like they were playing at the bottom of a well. Which was actually the case up on the balcony, I suppose. The only thing I could hear clearly were Kurt Dahle’s drums. I literally could not make out most of the words they were singing. I don’t know if this was an artifact of the New Pornographer’s sound setup, or because of the acoustics at the Fox, but it was an enormous let-down. I love their crisp melodies and bright voices, but I just couldn’t hear them. When they started playing “Sweet Talk” — one of my favourite songs of theirs, and impossible not to include in the set, given the byzantine décor — I almost wanted to cry at not being able to hear the layered vocals.

Finally, I’m annoyed at myself for not doing anything about this. Throughout the concert, I noticed people getting up from their seats on the balcony, and walking out. I suspect that these folk knew better, and were heading downstairs for the general access floor area, no matter what their tickets said. I’m annoyed that I just sat there and didn’t even try to blag my way past the ushers. What’s the worst that could have happened? That they said no and sent me back to my seat? What’s the best that could have happened? I might actually have enjoyed seeing one of my favourite bands.

Note to self: don’t put up with shitty seats. Note to everyone else: avoid the balcony at the Fox.

Set list:

1. Sing Me Spanish Techno (TC)
2. Up In The Dark (T)
3. Myriad Harbour (C)
4. Crash Years (T)
5. The Laws Have Changed (EV)
6. Jackie, Dressed In Cobras (TC)
7. Adventures In Solitude (C)
8. Twin Cinemas (TC)
9. Jackie (MR)
10. All The Old Showstoppers (C)
11. Go Places (C)
12. Moves (T)
13. Your Hands (Together) (T)
14. My Shepherd (T)
15. Use It (TC)
16. Silver Jenny Dollar (T)
17. Mass Romantic (MR)
18. The Bleeding Heart Show (TC)

Encore:

19. Challengers (C)
20. The Slow Descent Into Alcoholism (MR)
21. Testament To Youth In Verse (EV)

MR = Mass Romantic, EV = Electric Version, TC = Twin Cinema, C = Challengers, T = Together

Sweet little gig. Dan Le Sac’s big beats sounded awesome in the small Paradiso venue, and Pip’s rhymes carried more weight in person than they do on disc. Watching him perform Angles live, putting on different hats and glasses as he switches points of view in the song, added even more emotional weight to the song, and left the audience subdued… but not for long. The second part of the set built up to a huge finale that had the whole room jumping and getting “nice and sweaty.” The recorded version of Letter From God To Man has an enormous, spiky and angular outro, and Dan kept it spinning for a long time — just what the crowd wanted.

Set list:

1. The Beat That My Heart Skipped (Angles)
2. Sick Tonight (The Logic Of Chance)
3. Magician’s Assistant (Angles)
4. Look For The Woman (Angles)
5. Stake A Claim (The Logic Of Chance)
6. Angles (Angles)
7. Last Train Home (The Logic Of Chance)
8. Snob (The Logic Of Chance)
9. Get Better (The Logic Of Chance)
10. Thou Shalt Always Kill (Angles)
11. Great Britain (The Logic Of Chance)
12. Letter From God To Man (Angles)

Encore:

13. Back From Hell (Angles)

To people in the UK and US, Dutch politics can look like a confusing mess, but fortunately we have Peter-Paul Koch to explain it all.

In the web development world, ppk is well-known for his web browser compatibility tables, founding Fronteers (the Dutch professional organisation for front-end developers), and more recently his work on mobile browsers. But he is also a historian, which shows in articles like his amazing dissection of the new <time> element in HTML5, and the introductions to Dutch politics he has written over the last couple of years.

Since the fall of the Dutch government two weeks ago, ppk has created a separate blog in which he is writing lots of great stuff about Dutch political history, the political parties in play for the upcoming general election (there are many), and the ups and downs of the race itself, such as last week’s local elections.

If your Dutch isn’t good enough to read the native news sources, ppk is definitely the best source of background on this highly entertaining political contest:

• Dutch politics — a primer for foreigners (ppk Dutch politics home page)
• Political Quirks (ppk Dutch politics blog)

“The arrows. What they mean is, you control who you are by moving forward, never back; you move forward. That’s what I do. That’s what we’re going to do.”

When we moved to the Netherlands in 2007, I regularly had to explain to people that I wasn’t moving back. Our decision to emigrate to the Netherlands was influenced by my childhood in Limburg, but only in the sense that it had given us knowledge and experience of many desirable aspects of Dutch culture and lifestyle — not in the sense that I was trying to return to a “home” with which I had some kind of preternatural affinity.

We didn’t sell our house in Edinburgh immediately when we moved. We had intentions of renting it out, but nothing ever came of that; we ended up selling it just a few months later. But in those months, I stayed there whenever I went back to Scotland as part of my job at Skyscanner.

My first trip back was horrible. The house felt hollow and joyless: stripped of our presence, but haunted by our old furniture. When I visited the Mother Goose Nursery, that bright and happy place where Alex and Fiona had spent much of their early years, I found that most of the staff we had known and chatted with almost every day were gone. Some had moved to different nurseries, others had quit the profession altogether. It was like someone had cut out its heart, and, by association, also a piece of mine. When I went out for pizza with my friends, the city centre of Edinburgh itself felt oppressive and threatening. Everything had changed. And by everything, I mean me.

I have continued to work remotely for Skyscanner for the last two and a half years. I have been back to Scotland regularly, and fortunately none of the trips have been as bad as that first one. Most of them have been great, in fact. Despite not being a very sociable person, I do thrive on contact with my most excellent colleagues. Spending a couple of days in the office, swimming in the pond, always energizes me. But I miss Abi, Alex, and Fiona when I’m away, and the days leading up to a trip are distorted by anxiety about leaving them. (I’m not good with departures.) Also, although remote working can be peaceful and distraction-free, it can also be lonely and impersonal. Over time, the lack of day-to-day contact was building up and making me feel invisible and ineffective.

So this is my last trip back to Edinburgh for Skyscanner. I’m starting a new job with Sogeo Company on Monday.

But just as my first trip back to Edinburgh after moving away was bad, this last one is difficult, too. I think it’s because although I am still employed by Skyscanner, I have moved forward already, and being here is being back. It isn’t the energizing experience it used to be, because I’m not trying to carry that energy back with me. Conversations with friends and colleagues feel strained, because I’m ending my involvement with something they are still right in the middle of. I’m an outsider already. Everything had changed. And by everything, I mean me, again.

Going back is not what I do. Most of the time this manifests itself in little ways, such as the being more interested in hearing my favourite artists’ new albums than in listening to their back catalogues; or a lack of inclination to scour social networks for people I haven’t spoken to in years. Other times — like now — it emerges as the feeling of alienation I’ve described above.

The quote at the top of this entry is from The Watchman by Robert Crais, and is spoken by the taciturn Joe Pike. Pike defines himself by his forward motion, and has red arrows tattooed on his deltoids as a symbol of this commitment. I don’t like needles, but I’ve never felt a stronger urge to get some ink than I do right now.