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Festi Madness

I have just bought the three day ticket for the Bilbao BBK Live! This means I am already attending to one festival this year, even though my inttention is going to three (at least).

So I can say I am seeing Coldplay live!! Because this is one of the bands comming to to Bilbao for its festival, that lasts from the 7th to the 9th of July. Also the Black Crowes have confirmed their attendance. Nothing more we know about the line-up of the festival, except a few rumours: people talk about Green Day, Radiohead, Soundgarden or Linkin Park.

But this is not the only music event in July. In fact, it is a very busy month. After the Bilbao BBK Live, we find probably the most popular festival in Spain, that has already published its great line-up: I am undoubtely talking about the FIB heineken in Benicassim, that will receive wonderful bands such as Arcade Fire, Arctic Monkeys, The Strokes or Portishead (the whole line-up here). The event will take place from July the 14th to 17th.

If after these two events you are still not tired of music festivals, you have a date in Benidorm in the Lowcost Festival. As its own name says, its tickets are the cheapest you will find because the three days ticket only costs 60 euros! But the acts' quality is not 'low' too. From the 21st to the 23rd of July you will enjoy the best music now, specially focused on the alternative styles. Ok Go, Crystal Castles, Standstill, Lori Meyers, Dorian, Supersubmarina, Maika Makovski, Goose... (complete line-up here).

These are the festivals I am hoping to attend to, but if you don't have enough, on my next post I will talk about a lot more taking place in Spain and out that I don't think I am going, (economic reasons, you know xD), but that I undoubtely would like to!
So... to be continued :)

Sources: fiberfib.com/festivallowcost.com/bilbaobbklive.com
               youtube

30 Seconds to Mars and Kanye West - Hurricane - Madrid MTV EMA 2010 Mira los nuevos videoclips y vídeos de los programas de MTV en MTV.ES

Yesterday the guys from 30 seconds to Mars came back to Madrid, as they already did in the MTV EMAs last month. They performed live in Vistalegre in  front of 11.000 people. It's been weeks they have bought this tickets, the same as in Barcelona, where they have been sold out. So if you want to see the american group, headed by the also actor Jared Leto, you must resign yourself with the videolink I wrote above of the post, where the band appears in Puerta de Alcala performing their hit 'Hurricane' with the hip-hop artist Kanye West. Enjoy it!

Source: abc.es/mtv.es/me myself and I
picture: usonica.com

The London socialite Tara Browne, heir to the Guinness empire and son of a member of the House of Lords, died on 18th December 1966. On this day, forty four years ago, Browne had a traffic accident at the age of 21. As they say,  Browne drove his Lotus Elan car through London's South Kensington at high speed and  he ignored a red traffic light, colliding with a stationary van when he tried to evade a car coming towards him. 

He was good friend of the Rolling Stones and The Beatles. One of the members of this last band, John Lennon, was inspired by this sad event to write the song 'A Day in the life', which lots considers Beatles' best. The song is specifically written after Lennon read the story about the accident published in the Daily Mail on January 1967, that included the forensic report.  Paul Mccartney finished the composition, adding the central part and the orchestrial details. The last part, on the piano, is played by five people in three different pianos.

John Lennon said about inspiration arrived to him to write the song:  

"I was writing A Day In The Life with the Daily Mail propped in front of me on the piano. I had it open at their News in Brief, or Far and Near, whatever they call it. I noticed two stories. One was about the Guinness heir who killed himself in a car. That was the main headline story. He died in London in a car crash".

 Here you have the lyrics of 'A day in the Life', closing theme of "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band":

I read the news today oh boy

About a lucky man who made the grave

And though the news was rather sad

Well I just had to laugh

I saw the photograph

He blew his mind out in a car

He didn't notice that the lights had changed

A crowd of people stood and stared

They'd seen his face before

Nobody was really sure

If he was from the House of Lords.

I saw a film today oh boy

The English Army had just won the war

A crowd of people turned away

but I just had to look

Having read the book

I'd love to turn you on

Woke up, fell out of bed,

Dragged a comb across my head

Found my way downstairs and drank a cup,

And looking up I noticed I was late.

Found my coat and grabbed my hat

Made the bus in second splat

Found my way upstairs and had a smoke,

and Somebody spoke and I went into a dream

I read the news today oh boy

Four thousand holes in Blackburn, Lancashire

And though the holes were rather small

They had to count them all

Now they know how many holes it takes to fill the Albert Hall.

I'd love to turn you on

Source:  youtube/thebeatlesbible.com/rttnews.com

             picture: the beatles bible

Hundreds of fans dissapointed in Madrid

Yesterday, the outrageous Lady Gaga performed live in Madrid, in the city's Sports Palace. Thousands of fans brought together to be present at this special appointment, attired like their idol with  psychedelic costumes and glasess or Pepsi tins on their wigs.

They were very excited with the concert they were about to attend to -and for which they paid from 90 to 130 euros per ticket-. What they didn't expect was that some of those ticket where null. When they figure out the swindle, people asked for explanations  to the security staff, provoking some avalanches at the  queue,  so the Police brigade had to establish order.

It seems that some of the tickets sold by the non-official online stores where just copies of eight of the original tickets, printed in a very similar paper and with the same serial number. Apparently, the pages that sold this illegal tickets were viagogo, gesticket or seatwave, among others. 

Some of the affected fans, by D.Sinova. - elmundo.es

 Even though yesterday 4000 people were estimated to be affected by this fraud, we know that about 400 or 500 people were really inconvenienced. Now they want to know where can they claim for compensation. CECU Madrid has provided an e-mail for all of them (info@cecumadrid.org), but it is not completely clear to whom can they ask for responsability. The webpages seem to wash their hands of it.

At least this incidents teach us something: we must check more than once what we buy, specially online, even if Lady Gaga's face appears on it.

In the end, I leave a video of Stefani Germanotta, Or, in other words, a very young  Lady Gaga -not yet gaga maybe- very  different from the one we know now. Hope you like it!

Sources: youtube

http://ecodiario.eleconomista.es/

http://www.abc.es/
http://www.elmundo.es/
Picture: el mundo

Freaky Holiday

Now that there is a long weekend getting close, some of you might have some plans in mind. But if you don't, this post could give you some original ideas for next week's short holiday, if you are one of those lucky people who can travel. Television, cinema, music and art are the inspiration source for these routes we suggest, so if you are fan of something, pay attention.

United Kingdom is home of most of these tours we are presenting. The first of them, probably the most famous, has as main characters a music band well-known all over the World. You'd probably guessed we are talking about The Beatles.

The Fab Four's tour starts in Liverpool, the city where the band was created and the four members were raised. There, there are lots of agencies that take you around the most representative places of the Beatles' life, but you can look for them yourself if you are travelling low cost. There in Liverpool you should not miss mythical places as the Cavern, the Beatles Museum or Penny Lane.

You can also visit Albert Dock, from which you can see Chavasse Park, that many people compares with a 'yellow submarine'. Ten minutes from there, you can visit the Beatles Museum. In Allerton (20 Forthlin Road) lived McCartney family and that was the house where the Fab Four started training and compousing. 20 minutes from there, in Mendips, we can find John Lennon's house.

But to enjoy the real beatles' atmosphere you have to go to the best pubs in town, yo have to go to The Cavern, where they were discovered and performed live for the first time. And you should take a look to the Casbah Coffee Club, in West Derby, 'where everything started', as McCartney himself says. And if you are looking for accommodation, you can also sleep inside that atmosphere, because in Liverpool there is a hotel dedicated to the band. It is called Hard Days Night Hotel and it is totally recommendable, except if, as we said, you are travelling low cost ;)

And obviously, you should take a train or bus to London, where the band became phenomenon. It is very well known that every Beatle fan in London reproduce in their own way the legendary picture of the band in Abbey Road. So the first and unmissable visit is, precisely, this zebra crossing, probably the most famous of the world. If you go with another three friends, ask someone to take the photo. And remember, Paul appears barefoot! So act in consequence.

You can also leave your signature near this crossing and visit Paul's house and EMI labels studios, because there is all nearby. You should take the Saint Jons Woods Station exit in the tube. If you are still not full, you can go to the Madame Tussauds Museum and enjoy the reproductions in wax of the Beatles.

But if you need a change, London offers lot of thematic tours. If you ar a fan of Harry Potter's for example, you can take advantage of what the English capital is preparing. Even though the saga is finishing, the admiration for the books and films is rising, so lots of routes are being created for the little wizard's fans. The studios where the films were recorded, in Leavesden, Heartfordshire, will become a thematic park by 2012. But, for the moment, you can visit some of the outdoors that appear in the films.

Fans all over the world go to London to visit the sets where their idols were. They try to pass to Hogwarts at the platform 9 and 3/4, ubicated at King Cross tube station; they visit the zoo, where Harry spoke to a snake on the first film; they look for Berkshire and Privet Drive, the place where harry's aunt and ancle live...

But to know where Hogwarts exactly is they have to travel a bit further. That way they would discover such beautiful places like Oxford, the Anlwick Castle or the Gloucester Cathedral.

For detailed information:  http://www.londonforidiots.com/harry_potter_tour.html

St. Christ Church, Oxford

Bodleian Library, Oxford

If you are not really into magic, don't bother, there is so much to do next week. If you like music you can visit the recently opened British Rock Museum, also in London. If you like reading, you have tours about your favourite books. As we have seen it happened in England with Harry Potter, Stieg Larsson's Millenium has its own tour in Stockholm. And the teen saga Twilight has made a small america town become popular just because the love story between Bella and Edward takes place in it. Forks, the rainy little town in Washington, unknown before the Stephanie Meyer's novels is not the only one to handle new visitants. Also Volterra, in Italy, is receiving new tourists thanks to this new fashion of visiting what we see and read in films and books.

But don't you ever think  it is a new trend. TV series and shows have always have fans following them even to where they are filmed. One of the biggest phenomenons ever was the tv show Friends. Everybody in New York had to visit the outdoors that appeared in it. And, like the legendary Central Perk didn't exist, chinese made a reproduction in Beijing. There are some other tours about series noways, for example, one about Gossip Girl and a even virtual route of Lost.

But maybe the most weird of all, is this tour that takes us around the graves of the most popular music idols of History. Jim Morrison in Paris, John Lennon in New York, Michael Jackson in Los Angeles, Elvis presley in Memphis, Brian Jones in London...

Source: youtube / turismito.com / google (pictures) / londonforidiots /

Guitar Hero

Famous guitar player Paco de Lucía sold out all the tickets available for his concert in Bilbao. It will take place the next Wednesday, 24th of November, at the Auditorium of the Euskalduna Jauregia.

The great guitarist will be accompanied by Antonio Sánchez, at the second guitar; the flamenco dancer (bailaor) Farruco; the flamenco singers (cantaores) David Maldonado and Duquende, this last one discovered and sponsored by Camarón himself when he was just 9 years old; Antonio Serrano, playing keyboard and harmonica; Piraña, in charge of the percussion and Alaín Pérez, at the bass.

De Lucía might be used to having this kind of success because along the tour he has got sold out nearly in all the concerts. Sevilla, Valencia, Avilés... And now Bilbao sums up to the list of cities that appreciate the art of this athentic Guitar Hero.

Source: elcorreo.com / adn.es / youtube