Flashback Friday.. Maximo Park - 'Apply Some Pressure'

Last night I went on a night out to see some friends and, as per usual, we ended up in Planet - a rock/metal nightclub for those of you who don't have the (dis)pleasure of living in Wolves.

I remember three things.

1. My friend going to the toilet and mysteriously disappearing into the abyss of space and time.
2. The DJ playing a really strange alternate version of The Smiths 'This Charming Man', which I now can't find.
3. This song being played for the first time in an age and my re-realising of what a belter it is!

Maximo Park are one of those bands that are capable of producing some really fantastic songs, yet still manage to pass under the radar of being memorable. Especially, it seems, in recent years, as I can account for myself not investing time and effort into their music since their second album, 2007's Our Earthly Pleasures (I'm beaming 'Listen. Now' into your subconsciousness!), and their following albums, Quicken the Heart and The National Health passed me by completely (cue a task for later!), but odds are that, whether you realise it or not, you probably (really) know the ins and outs of at least one Maximo Park song.

Which, in regards to that, is most likely this one, seeing as 'Apply Some Pressure' is probably the most known of Maximo Park's songs back in their heyday, as it pretty much encapsulates all that puts Maximo Park in the higher tier of 00's popular indie bands. The song is catchy and punchy, the lyrics - witty and confessional, and it becomes apparent in some of Maximo Park's other songs that singer and lyricist, Paul Smith is an intelligent poet.

Maximo Park are currently on a European tour, to support The National Health, before coming back to the UK and then jetting off to Australia!

http://maximopark.com/

http://www.facebook.com/maximopark

https://twitter.com/maximopark
http://soundcloud.com/maximo-park-1

Just one of those days..

That's what yesterday was.

I woke up in an epic mood. Got invited for a day trip to Birmingham with the guys from the band and mutual friend's of ours but turned it down because I wanted to write up a contribution to The Guardian. They advertised a link via Twitter asking for thoughts on the legacy of iconic British punk band, the Sex Pistols to commemorate the Jubilee (35 years ago they unleashed 'God Save the Queen' on a coinciding and infamous jubilee boat trip ).

But first, I wanted music on my iPod.

I left my Japanese Voyeurs B-Sides CD ripping onto iTunes whilst I took a shower and came back to find that my computer had entirely crashed and would now not even turn on, with the CD stuck inside. Now that requires fixing.

Left the house to buy the 2:54 self-titled album only to find nowhere stocking it (I resorted to good ol' reliable Amazon), when I my aunt rang me whilst up town to say there were job vacancies at TK Maxx. I enquired, and the woman that I was speaking to had absolutely no idea what I was going on about. So I got on the bus home when my aunt txt me to say that the jobs were for their distribution centre so I'd have to go there to get a form -_-

I then attempted to write the article at my Nan's (I could write many a detailed page on this topic but was contested with a pretty short word count), and accidentally deleted more than half of what I'd actually written because I was looking at the wrong count.

It was just one of those days and I was close to pulling my hair out!

Luckily, I was due to see a group of my friends up town for our weekly get together and, I won't lie, got intentionally rat-arsed just for the hell of it. It was a good night even though we just ended up doing frequenting our regular haunts - Varsity (a pub where the band played), Babylon (cheesy '80's/ '90's music with 1 playlist), Planet (charmingly dingy rock/metal nightclub), along with a bar called Numa.

A sucky day turned into a great night (from what I remember)!

My Mom has the Jubilee weekend off so we may be venturing out to do something interesting.

Also, not sure if you'll see that Voyeurs review any time soon, given that the disc is stuck in my desktop. If they can't salvage the disc, I'll cry (it was a limited run, number 231 out of 250). Ah wells.