One Hell of a Year- Part 1

I know I just made a post, but I had a thought that I could do a sort of personal blog, still focusing on music, but in the context of my personal life. Like a diary except online, where all of you can read my deep dark thoughts. All like, 10 of you... This decision has kinda just come off the heel of me thinking I need to write more and what better way to do it than to tell strangers about my life.

So it's been a kinda crazy year. I've been doing my last year of school, I turned 18 (legal drinking age, woop), I've grown a lot, and my music tastes have grown with me. It's actually been a really good year for music, international acts don't often come to South Africa but this year quite a few did. Lets see... There was The Red Hot Chili Peppers in Feb. They were really good. They are truly solid live. However it could have all been an illusion due to altitude sickness. We had really shitty seats, quite high up. The one bummer was that they didn't play Scar Tissue. Die Antwoord opened for them but I feel like I'd be lying if I said I saw them live, 'CAUSE THE WERE SO FUCKING FAR AWAY!!!

Then in March there was RamFest 2013. Most people will say they went for Bring Me the Horizon and Rise Against, but I couldn't care less about BMTH and I left before Rise Against. Now that may sound extremely lame, me not staying for the headliners, but I had a fucking crazy time! I went for Pendulum. They are probably my favourite DnB group and they were pretty much the only reason I bought a ticket. Now for all of you who don't know RamFest, it's a 3 day fest with 3 stages. The Main Stage with mostly rock and metal acts. The indie stage (Don't know what it's really called, couldn't be bothered to even care about that stage), it's more like a tiny ass marquee than a stage. That's where all the up and coming bands play. All the ones who can't draw crowds but kinda knew a dude in management who was like, "yeah sure man, I can get you a set at Ramfest!"... cute. Then there's the Electronic Stage which is where I was the whole day. Well there and the beer tent. Now not that I don't love rock and metal, I really do, but the bands on the main stage kinda sucked this year and so for me it was all about the Electronic stage, which was AMAZING! This is where I first learnt that the more crazy you dance, the more free drinks you get. Even if you're a guy.

Then April was Metallica. Holy shit that was an experience. I've always loved Metallica and I know that the general consensus on the internet is that Metallica sucks, but I love them and always will, so... There. They played a solid set with all the classics and this time I know for sure I saw them, 'cause I was in Golden Circle. After moshing, partying and what not, one of my friends decides to drag me along to the front of the crowd where we can see better. The front is usually empty at these kinds of shows as Metallica were so loud it hurt. But due to a fair amount of Alcohol it didn't matter really. However, my friend ditched me so for most of the second half of the concert I was by myself, but don't think that that was a bad thing. It was what helped make the concert such a spiritual experience for me.

Let me explain. Before this, my Grandmother had been suffering for a very long time with cancer, and a few days before the concert, she tragically passed away. However, my family being the forever supportive and UNIMAGINABLY loving people they are, postponed the funeral 1 day so I could go see Metallica.
Now back to the concert. There I am, alone in golden circle with quite a lot of space around me, the unbearable loudness keeping everyone away from me and all of a sudden, I feel quite overwhelmed with emotion. Love for my family and Grandmother, love for this music, this insane realization of where I am and then sadness from my family's loss. This is when they play  Nothing Else Matters, and it becomes too much. This was the first time I cried about my Grandmother. Through tears and sweat and pain and anger and sadness and love, I scream the lyrics along with the tens of thousands of people around me. I cry and it helps. It was Metallica that helped me come to peace with my Grans passing, and it is when the song ends that I wipe the tears off my face and a man in a trench coat, with long hair and tattoos comes up, puts his arm around my shoulders and says to me, "Tonight, you're a fucking legend."

I did see other bands this year, honestly I saw better bands this year, and in later posts I'll talk about those too, but it was at Metallica, along with thousands of other people that I TRULY felt the awesome and overwhelming power of music.

Thank you for the read, Plug in Your Head
Xtian Zzyzx

Me and Monstercat

Holy shit... It's been a year since my last post. Alright, time to fix that. I can't honestly tell you why I haven't posted in such a long time, one could argue that it's because I've been busy with school work, my thriving social life (yeah right), or any number of things that could suffice for a good excuse. But to be honest, I was just lazy... Am just lazy. But I've decided I'll try post a for a while and if it gains any interest I'll start it up full time again!

Now here's the tricky part, I have no idea what to talk about, see when I do these things I like to talk about music that's new to me, but I've discovered so much music in the last year I have no idea where to start! The thing is, (now I'm not sure if it's just me) I can go from listening to Deep House and EDM to Classical to Swing to Hip-Hop to Metal in the space of a day, and that does in fact happen to me all the time, 'cause I don't listen to music depending on my mood, I kinda listen to music depending on the mood I wanna be in. So now, I'm listening to EDM 'cause I kinda had a downer of a day and I wanna be more up beat. So I guess... Let's talk about that.

EDM, being Electronic Dance Music, can come in a variable smorgasbord of forms, from House to Dubstep. From Disco to Drum n Bass. Now there is this kickass YouTube channel a friend of mine showed me a while ago called MosterCat Music. They are an indie record label who sign some pretty amazing producers, and it never ceases to amaze me how many types of EDM these dudes cover!

For me, it all started with a song called Flight, by Tristam and Braken.  My friends showed it to me and I think they came upon this song through a gaming YouTube channel (I can't say which one). Anyway, they played me this song, and it starts out with a phenomenally catchy melody which slowly builds up til the drums come in. This melody gets stuck in my head so easily it's fucking ridiculous!

Now this is not Dubstep, nor is it Drum n Bass, this is... Wait for it... Seriously it's good... Drumstep. ugh. Now despite the lack of originality in the naming process, Drumstep is quite an awesome thing. Now all Drumstep is, is DnB, only half time.

This new love-child of Dub and DnB was my first experience with Mostercat. After that I found that they have some really great playlists on their channel with music (divided into genre) from all their signed artists. Now if you have the internet speed and cap, I totally suggest checking these out.

Now I'm onto the more varied stuff. They release albums of all the best recent music from their signees and what separates these albums from other Electronic mix albums is that it doesn't stick to one genre. It really does go from DnB to Disco to House to Dub. It's crazy but the weirdest thing is that it all works! It's mixed extremely well and the flow from one genre to another isn't disjointed.

So I guess if you really wanna know what's going on with music lately for me that's it... Seeing as that is literally what I'm listening to right now. The albums by themselves are good but from what I've heard they aren't amazing. What's really good are the playlists on the YouTube channel. So go check them out!

I can't pretend to like this post. Honestly I think it's shit. But I know that with time I'll get back into writing these and they'll be good. In the mean time just pretend to like them. It doesn't even have to be a very good effort at pretending to like it, but these posts are fueled by my misguided ego and it's notions that I'm a decent writer.

So tell me what you think of Mostercat Music. Recommend to me some of your favourite Electronic music, or hell any music at all. I read all the comments. Also if you want me to talk about something you're into, tell me.

Thanks for the read, until next time, Plug in Your Head.
Xtian Zzyzx