Live at Kensington Roof Gardens

Kensington Roof Gardens is a fun place. A little oasis of heaven 6 floors above the streets of London, tucked away near Kensington High Street. On this occasion we were heading here for some live music. For a few months every Friday they are hosting live sessions with new and some more established bands. Arriving at 7.30 we grabbed a couple of bottles of wine, stage side seats and settled in to be entertained.

First up was Mila Falls, a young poppy act that reminded us of a bit of Cher Lloyd / Robyn hybrid. It was purrrrdy cheesy, so obviously I loved it. My favourite tune was Radio, managed to find a pretty decent sounding recording.

The act after Mila I can't actually remember, so they can't have been great. It was Gary Phelan we were here to see...and here is the man himself

Ok better picture, less artsy!

Gary specialises in rock/pop/indie and belted out some awesome ballads and anthemic stadium type tunes. His last indie fused with hip hop went down pretty amazingly and was awesome. This is my favourite Phelan tune

The last act up were a foursome called J.U.K.E of Jukeboxx (the website states both) they started off well in my book since they opened with an A Capella version of Stooshe's black heart. They did play some original stuff but the crowd went slightly crazy when Blackstreet No Diggity came on. You can download a free mix tape including this track on here

After we headed to the club and some more wine and celebrations of Gary's awesome set. All in a night's work!

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Notting Hill Carnival

As soon as I returned from Munich, I was volunteering at the Notting Hill Carnival as part of Team Macmillan's float. I have never been to the carnival before and I've heard mixed reviews. Luckily it was Sunday where we were to attend, which is the less raucous (dangerous) of the two days.

The day started at 10am where we dressed the float and got the sound system going. The DJ started with the carnival beats, which are great. What we couldn't foresee at this time was how often we'd be hearing these songs...with not knowing the words at the beginning I would at the end.

The 'walk' was easily slipped into as soon as realisation kicked that it's more of a shuffle of varying speeds. The float companions were La Trinity, a band from Trinidad who had very different moves to me. They know their comfort zone and they stick to it. Yes this is bending over and shaking what they have got. Fair play...

hours and hours later when we arrived in the main Carnival area I had not spotted a rum punch or jerk chicken stall, plenty of Red Stripe and hamburgers but that's not what it's about, so I freed myself from the float and headed off in search of food.

This is when the appreciation really set in from being in the middle of the action to where the people are. It is a surreal thing seeing all the gorgeous shops of Notting Hill all boarded up. If I go next year I'll probably do the Monday when people are in full regalia, as I must say I love a bit of Carnival beat!

Small police presence...

Rum, Rum as fast as you can

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Radio 1 Hackney Weekend 2012

This weekend the BBC put on two days of free music at hackney marshes. As local (ish) residents we managed to wangle tickets. We were attending on the Sunday where Rihanna was headlining. Saturday night was headed by Jay-Z.

The weather has been nothing but awful in the last few months. Rain rain rain. Apparently the wettest June in 100 years. Hello global warming. Therefore outfit selection is crucial. Hunter Wellies were a must, as was the new lacey white number I bought the day prior.

Boots, black tights, jacket...not exactly summer attire.

Dress - Warehouse
Jacket - Zara
Boots - Hunter
Bag - Michael Kors
Shades - Ray Ban

On arrival we were ticket checked no fewer than 4 times, and had to go through airport style security. Seriously?! Eventually we got in and headed to the one extra tent. In there were a boy band, so cute their voices hadn't even broken yet. We pulled some wicked shapes laughed our heads off then darted out. 

The first act we were going to see on the main stage was Plan B. I can't say I'm a massive fan and I couldn't have named any of his tracks beforehand - and cant remember any now! He had a beat boxer on stage in between songs, he was really getting the crowd going, we loved it...honestly this beat boxer was better than Plan B, so we took the opportunity to catch up with some other friends we had met...

...and check out the mud situation

One of the acts I was really looking forward to seeing was Jessie J. Her tracks are so catchy and some of them are on my running playlists - much fun. She also seems like a gorgeous person. We were looking forward to seeing the outfit! She didn't disappoint, belting out all the hits from Man Dem to Price Tag and Whose Laughing Now. Finally we heard the opening notes on Domino. Cracking summer tune. The party had started.

Not sure what happened to this pic, but I like it

Next up was Tinie Tempah, Florence and The Machine and Lana Del Ray in the New Music arena. In between this we popped to the food vans for some much needed, over priced, terrible food. After Florence we decided to go to the Dance Tent, for the first time that day where David Guetta was pressing play on the Mac to deliver the tunes. It was honestly one of the highlights of the day. Dance music isn't really my thing. Don't get me wrong I like some David Guetta tunes, but they are all the ones with vocalists and a catchy hook. Just 'doosh, doosh, doosh' isn't for me. Maybe it was the mud or the shades inside (a tent) but we really got into it. It was almost a shame to have to leave and meet our new friends who were hooking us up for Rihana.

Tinie getting the crowd going

Lana Del Ray looked hawt

Serious 'do and eye liner

Flo looking like she would have a boob incident any second

My David Guetta pics kind of suck...

When we disappeared for the aforementioned over priced food we got chatting to one of the security guards. He was a marine and this was the first time he had worked a concert. He said he would hook us up, we kind of took it with a pinch of salt and thought we'd try our luck but didn't hold out much hope. At the allocated time we went to meet him at the platform that was directly opposite the stage and raised above the crowd where the camera crew were and also some guests with special requirements. When we caught up with our man and amazingly, he came through. We were waved straight up onto the platform and the view was cracking. We did a little victory dance and then realised we were out of drink. C (for Crazy) was dispatched to the bar...

Hello view

Ri-Ri's set up

The woman herself. Hot (but no Beyonce...)

When we had been 'downstairs' with the masses for every other act that day it wasn't that busy and we got kind of close even for people like Florence who we thought would be packed. The crowd for Rihanna was no joke. I don't know if all the other tents pretty much shut down but it felt like the whole of east London had descended onto Hackney Marshes. The crowd was insane. Cue another victory dance...picture flailing limbs, high tenning (five just wasn't enough) and general hyperactivity.

Thank god we're not down there

As soon as Rihanna came on the air was electric. You cannot recreate an atmosphere with photos or videos. They do not do anything any justice. The first track was Only Girl in the World. Amazing. She did some of the best hits including my favourite, What's My Name. I made a video of this moment...which when I watched back I had completely ruined by my dreadful singing. Honestly when you're there you can't hear yourself and think you sound amazing. On reflection I wanted the sofa cushions to swallow me up and make it stop. It's unfortunate because otherwise I would share!

The Umbrellas came out for all the right reasons...the song. Electric

The pièce de résistance was when Run This Town came on. Our new best friend (who had seen the show the previous day) Whispered 'this happened last night' at which time we speculated until we needed to no more. Jay-Z comes out on to the stage and the crowd literally went wild. If you thought there were a lot of cameras in the air before (from our vantage point we had a gorgeous view of this) the whole crowd was one big phone screen. Although I captured some footage and photos I was determined not to see the whole thing through a small screen and just focused on singing and dancing very enthusiastically. Serious shapes were thrown. What a work out.

Ri-Ri and Jay-Z

Ohhh Snap

The final song was We Found Love. Again my 30 seconds or so of video is just me singing, like a wild woman. I love the tune and it's another on my running playlist but live? Oh My. Next time I run and that comes on I will literally have goosebumps. Amazing.

As this wrapped up we heard England had gone into penalties, cue some spontaneous EN-GER-LAND, EN-GER-LAND chanting, especially when Italy missed. Honestly I think the euphoria would have been too much for us had they won. A bit of a come down that they crashed out of the Euros, but what did we expect?

Overall, that's what I call Sunday's...
Thank you BBC Radio 1.
Thank you Hackney

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It's my job OK?

Working in music I am lucky enough to go to some great events. Last Thursday was no exception. We were hosting a gig for promo producers and clients. The bands? Daytona Lights (see here) and I call shotgun. The former? Poppy indie, the latter electro indie. It was to be held at the Borderline on Tottenham Court Road. Luckily I didn't have to worry too much about the organisation so was just able to arrive and enjoy myself (apart from a small bit of filming work).

The Daytonas did a great set and really got the crowd into their stride. Fish & chips were then served...an not even the canape cone kind..the proper chippy portion kind, 300 of them.

I Call Shotgun did a great set including a cover of Nelly's Ride Wit Me. The great way to spot a brilliant cover? Know you recognise the song but you aren't able to work out what it is for ages.

One of the best parts of the night (aside from the music) was the photo booth such a good idea and talking point. Judging from the photos I seem to have been in it much more than I care to remember...

Getting used to where we need to be...

So I guess we broke the lens in the last one

With some of the Daytona's

Prepping

Plenty of beer wine and champagne ensured sore heads the next day, it's a hard life, but someone has to do it.

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Ciro's Pizza Pomodoro

Hands down my favourite restaurant in London (so far...). I have been here a few times each time with high expectations and I have never been disappointed and it is only a stones throw from Harrod's. For my Birthday evening, I knew where I wanted to go early on...so booked in November. You never can be too careful and I did not want to miss out (if you want to go to Ciro's on a Monday evening in mid January or another obscure time even for a table of two I would advise booking to avoid disappointment.

Now, rule number one of a good blog? Take lots of representative and enticing photos. Therefore it is not a good idea to drink white wine, red wine and cocktails beforehand and completely forget/end up with everything out of focus. I did manage to get one of the highlights - the garlic mushrooms.

I've also got my Caterina pizza in there - admittedly there is a lot of shadow going on.

The rest of the evening was spent quaffing delicious red wine, dancing around the table and generally having a fantastic time. Every night of the week they have live music. I was absolutely thrilled the soul singer on for the evening was my absolute. She was accompanied by a male vocal and together they literally blow you away. I particularly enjoyed my rendition of Stevie Wonder's Happy Birthday while I had my cake with a huge firework.

Just go here. That is all. Book and go, thank me later.

Atmosphere: 5/5
Food: 5/5
Drink: 4/5
Overall: 4.5/5 - I'm only deducting 0.5 as the wine is good, but standard.

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