the armada is here and so is the storm

On Wednesday, Fowlers Live gave birth to a new heavy metal group: The Armada. On Thursday, I went to see them. Now before everybody rushes off to email me that somebody has hijacked my LJ account or phones the police to report the existence of a new Pod Person, I had a reason for wanting to see them. You see, the front man of this group is Jeff Martin, the very same individual who was the front man for the Canadian group The Tea Party, who produced one of my all-time favourite albums (Alhambra). And judging from the immediate audience response when he segued into Inanna during one of the pieces, a large number of the audience was also there for the same reason. Unfortunately "creative differences" vastly understates the reasons for why The Tea Party broke up, and there is a large residue of anger and frustration there, which is probably why Jeff formed a balls-to-the-wall power metal group – he needs to let loose this anger and he does, by the bucket load. For example, that segue was immediately followed by Closure – and in his words "that door is permanently closed." The Tea Party is no more. Anyway, since I never got to see The Tea Party live, despite a large number of local performances (theoretically I was doing my doctorate whilst simultaneously working in one or two jobs at the same time and only discovered them after they had broken up. [Which is a pity; they were very very good live by all accounts]), I went to see if I could see something of what I missed, especially since I knew at least two other people going that night. And I did, in part. Jeff Martin is a virtuoso guitar player and much of his ability showed through, even at 120dB. However if you were going to see the Jeff Martin of The Tea Party or even Exile and the Kingdom you will be very disappointed. [1] Perhaps later, after he has released his pent up rage somewhat, he may once again drift towards the middle-east fusion that was the hallmark of The Tea Party, but at the moment it is a very bad place for him, and it's probably a pity that he is still haunted by it (and will be for a very long time). Of The Armarda itself? Solid power-metal driven by an expert guitarist with quite a few demons to burn, ably supported by quite impressive bass guitar and enthusiastic drumming. Lots of energy. Lots of rage. Lots of inner demons being let free. Not really my cup of tea, and it has quite a way to go to replace my favourite heavy metal group (the classically-trained Spanish group Dark Moor). I doubt I shall make the effort to see them live again, but it you are a metalhead, it is probably well worth it to make time to see them live. [1] Although I do think it was unfairly raising fan's expectations somewhat in the first place to open with a belly-dancer doing her stuff before The Armada came on stage. Although Marianthi [at least I think it was her but I've only met her a couple of times socially] was quite appreciated by the audience irregardless.

they're throwing [CENSORED] at us now?

I was going to do a mini-review of Walter Jon Williams new book Implied Spaces, at least until I realised that anything I said (or wanted to quote) would probably be considered a spoiler. Even commenting that I'd love to include some of the ideas in A Certain RPG™ would be giving too much away just by naming the RPG. But I will (include the ideas, that is, rather than give too much away), particularly the [CENSORED] and [CENSORED]. So I'll just say: read it and enjoy. Disclaimer: I have yet to discover a WJW book I don't enjoy. I particularly reccomend the Divertimenti (The Crown Jewels, House of Shards, Rock of Ages) and Metropolitan (Metropolitan, City on Fire) series, and once ran a large science-fiction campaign based entirely on his Napoleonic naval game (Privateers & Gentleman), without the players once realising what I was doing. And in the spirit of competition, if anyone wants to guess the name of the game and the two items censored, there will be a prize of some sort. Although if a non-Australian gets it I may have to rethink the nature of the prize. Entries close in a week or so.