How the mighty do fall....

And fall hard sometimes they do. Case in point: Chris Cornell. He is currently the definition of the the law of diminishing returns.

Now I am a big Soundgarden fan. Superunknown is one of my favorite albums of all time. His vocals are simply amazing for a rock singer, how he can hit those notes I will never know. See Flower below:



Soundgarden were one of the original Seattle bands that stuck around and made it big. They produced some incredibly heavy music, but in a way that wasn't clichéd like much of the hair metal 80's bands. They instead played Sabbath and Zeppelin infused heavy rock with increadible wailing vocals from Cornell. They produced 4 full length albums peaking with the afformentioned Superunknown, before and acrimonious split in 1996.

Cornell embarked on a solo album (Euphoria Morning) which was very stripped down and a departure from the Soundgarden sound. It contained a few gems, although nowhere as good as his two previous solo soundtrack contributions Seasons (Singles) and Sunshower (Great Expectations).



He then made the bizarre decision of joining the members of Rage Against the Machine to form Audioslave. They subsequently made three albums together, which were quite frankly, rather bland. They subsequently broke up Rage became, comically, an unintentionally ironic relic by touring their greatest hits.

Cornell then released a fantastically average solo album, which was most notable for carrying a rather serious cover of Michael Jackson's Billie Jean, as well as the theme song to the James Bond movie Casino Royale. He then went on tour with that fantastic bastion of alternative music: Linkin Park. I remember thinking at the time that Chris Cornell had hit rock bottom.

I was wrong

Chris Cornell "Part Of Me" (produced by Timbaland)

I mean what is he thinking? If it was 5 years ago and every blimmin song on the radio wasn't produced by Timbaland, it could (possibly) be seen as a departure. But plain and simple Chris Cornell has sold out. He is using auto-tune for god's sake. It is very, very, very sad to watch the downfall of a previously great singer, reduced to using the same techniques as Cher and Chris Brown. He has even sunk to chauvinistic lyrics.

Clearly, Cornell, while being the frontman of Soundgarden, was definately not the creative talent. I fail to see how he can come back after this.... I need to see this amazing performance to heal!

Northern Walkway

Myself and my better half decided to celebrate our national holiday by tackling the Northern Walkway here in Wellington.

And wow what a walk. We got the train out to Johnsonville (thankfully it was the first day it was running after a month and a bit of upgrading), and began the 16km trek. I imagined that climbing Mt Kaukau at the start would be the most difficult part of the walk. However, it was relatively simple and by the time we got to the top we were able to soak up the 360 degree vistas of Wellington. The scenery is truly breathtaking, we not only got to see Wellington in all its glory from the highest point, we also got views of the South Island. (Unless you are a master walker I would suggest going the way we did, its basically a climb straight up from Khandallah if you go from that side.)

We naively thought that this would be the hardest part of the walk. We were wrong. We descended straight down Mt Kaukau into Khandallah and down into the Nagio Gorge. This lead onto what was most definately the hardest part, clmbing from the bottom of the Nagio Gorge up to the top of Wadestown and the Tinakori hill. It's fair to say that by the time we got to the top we were fairly spent. Having said that there are some beautiful houses in Wadestown. Dreams are for free, the houses certainly are not.

Once we got to the Tionakori hill we had a closer view of the city of Wellington, and the near full stadium, complete with a crowd sung rendition of Wonderwall (England must have been playing). From there it was straight down into Thorndon and back home. All in all a beautiful walk and if you have a spare half day I definitely recommend it. The town belt walks around the city is one of the reasons I love Wellington so much. The fact that you don't even have to walk 45 mins and be right in amongst nature makes living here truly worthwhile.

Hopefully the memories of the views will far outweigh the sore legs we had the next day.

Get of the bandwagon, put down the anvil

Well I have been slack but very busy.

Anywho, a few weeks ago now I ventured to the Town Hall to see the Arctic Monkeys. Now of course the Arctic Monkey's have a hell of a lot of hype behind them. Their debut album was the fastest selling debut of all time. Not to mention some massive hype generated by that giant musical tabloid known as the NME.

Despite the hype they have managed to release two cracking albums, with the second, Favorite Worst Nightmare, managing to break the second album curse and actually be slightly better than their debut.

I was therefore pretty interested to see how they would shape up live. I had seen reviews saying they are known for blowing through a set without barely a word to the crowd, or indeed a breath. Lets just say I didn't leave disappointed. The gig was at the Wellington Town Hall, which is a beautiful venue and is usually really good for sound. That night however, the sound was slightly below par. I could have been where I was standing, but despite this I proceeded to have my mind (and ears) blown.

Having the balls to open with a B-side showed that they aren't afraid to mix things up. The setlist was as follows

• 'Da Frame 2R'
• 'This House Is A Circus'
• 'Still Take You Home'
• 'The View From The Afternoon'
• 'Dancing Shoes'
• 'Dangerous Animals'
• 'From The Ritz To The Rubble'
• 'I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor'
• 'Pretty Visitors'
• 'Brianstorm'
• 'When The Sun Goes Down'
• 'Leave Before The Lights Come On'
• 'Go-Kart'
• 'Crying Lightning'
• 'Fluorescent Adolescent'
• 'Do Me A Favour'

Encore

• 'Red Right Hand'
• 'If You Were There, Beware'

They played three new songs, 'Dangerous Animals', 'Pretty Visitors' and 'Go Kart', which will be on there new album they are working on with Josh Holme from Queens of the Stone Age. You could definately see the Holme touch on the songs, quite a bit darker than their previous material.

The Monkeys did not dissapoint. Their was some banter between songs, but mainly it was all about the music. They didn't do the old "save the famous single until last", they played I bet you look good on the dancefloor right in the middle of the set, leaving their encore to be A Nick cave cover (pulled off quite well) and the lesser known If you were there, Beware as the last song.

Some of the songs sounded slightly looser than I hoped, but it was their first gig for over a year, so I will forgive them. Overall a top gig, and I am definately looking forward to the new album.
4.5/5

Makara

Went, on a bit of a wim, for a drive out to Makara today. What a beautiful place. I had been there once before e few years back, but it was pretty wild and not very nice. Even though it wasn't so flash in the city today, it was actually really nice and calm out at Makara. I left my beloved and our friend on the shore and went on the ritual McCarthy 'lets have a good old explore' (thanks for bestowing that on me Dad). There is a gun emplacement right up the top, but I decided to turn back halfway, as I knew the other two would be saying "where in the hell is he"! For next time then.

It is an amazing view form up there though, beautiful views of the Malborough sounds, as well as Kapiti Island. Quite a sheer drop to the shore as well, and it certainly wasn't a good day to have a southeast breeze at the back! I was hoping to get some kind of view of where the wind farm is going out there, but from as far as I got you couldn't see anything.

All in all a good afternoon out. Makara is only about 30 minutes drive from the CBD and its quite a beautiful drive out so I thoroughly recommend it. Possibly not though if there is any kind of a westerly!

2009: Bring it on!

Well it is 2009 already. As far as resolutions go, i'm not big on them but I do have a few 'goals' for the year (which you could argue is exactly the same as resolutions but I digress)...

Get married (!): Wow how quick the time goes, but it is now less than a year until I marry my beloved one. I honestly can't wait, and am really excited about hitting Europe again.

Getting fit and healthy: 2008 was really a year of two half's in that regard, but it finished quite well so this year I plan to keep it going.

Explore beautiful Wellington: There are so many amazing walks that I have already done, yet there are so many more to do. My next one to do is walking the wind turbine to the red rocks. I would also like to knock off the tinakori hill and make it up to the massey monument amongst other things.

Write more: I started this blog last year and it was a bit of a slow start but I aim to do it a bit more reguarly this year.

Read more: I tend to read a large amount of non-fiction in newpapers, and history, but I have quite a few good books I would like to get through.

There are a few more but that covers the main ones. It is going to be a frugal year of savings for us, which is fine, the things I have listed above are mainly free, with the exception of getting married!!!

To borrow a cliche 2009 looks to be a year of change for the world and New Zealand (hopefully not too much at home). We only have about a week and a half until old Commander Cookoo banana's goes into retirement and Barack Obama takes his place in the White House. An extremely momentous timen sure, but let's not expect too much too soon for Obama it will take a while for him to get his eye in.

But some good music beckons for the start to 2009, I'm off to the Arctic Monkeys this week at the town hall (a great venue) so I will report back soon, but I am looking forward to a crackin concert......