the step inn – helenthura.com

March 29, 2009

Sunday again

Yet again it is a Sunday morning and I am on the deck with the laptop. Thinking back to the week it has been and thinking ahead for the coming week. Another week at work, we have been trying some new processes, paring our working hours back to a more reasonable 37.5 (what we have been doing has been excessive). I’m trying to balance my life out again. I’ve been really slack in the cooking department. I need to start walking to work again or getting a bike so I can cycle.

Monday night at SES was spent doing knots. That is one thing that I am grateful for my years as Guide as I have no problem what so ever with them.

Wednesday night, I decided at the last minute to head out to the Troubie to catch Coby Grant, Rhiannon Hart and Georgia Potter. I’m glad I did. Coby Grant was a very nice discovery and of course it was great to finally catch a set from Rhiannon Hart as I have read a bit about her in the street press over the times. Georgia Potter, well really there is nothing to say there, a great set as one would expect and the perfect music to get you through the rest of the week.

Friday at work, we made hot dogs as one of the interviewers was shifting to a promotions job downstairs. Was really great to see everyone pitching in to help make the hot dogs and generally taking some time out of the day to have lunch. Friday night I had a great night. The Red Eyes, Dubmarine and The Cool Calm Collective were playing at the Step Inn. I took no camera, no handbag, just me. I missed the first half of the Cool Calm set which is life but I would have loved to have caught it. I spent the entire night dancing and feeling really free. More free than I have felt at concert in a long time. It was a great night out.

Yesterday I got up a *little* later than I normally do on a Saturday. A trip to the markets at Kelvin Grove picked me up some fruit and veg for the week along with a hot chocolate and a mini “pizza” for breakfast. I look forward to the KG markets each week as that is here I can get the best hot chocolate in Brisbane. I think the stall is run by the Blackstar Coffee people. They offer a white, milk and dark hot chocolate but each week they have different flavourings. This week they had white with lime, straight dairy milk and dark with peppermint. The previous week they had white with rosewater. I have had the white chocolate the last two weeks and oh my they are soo good. I’m hoping they have the dark with orange or the white with lavender next week.

I had a very leisurely read of the paper and then took some assorted photos. I tried to start read Far from the Madding Crowd
by Thomas Hardy but gave up. I love how he describes the scenes but I just couldn’t get into it.

This morning, I did some weeding in the garden, some more planning for my upcoming trip to Melbourne (I’m going from April 7 to April 12). Can’t wait. I had so much fun when I went to Melbourne in 2007. If you have any suggestions for must visit places, please leave a comment.

Now it is about time to start organising my self to head to my parents and then onwards to the Farm to see Granddad.

January 6, 2008January 7, 2008

Soul Food

The gig last night was quite possibly one of the most soul enriching gigs I have been to since the Misery and Redemption Fun back in August. I started to write some notes about the music of the night but that is not what the night was about. It was about this eclectic mix of people enjoying a really fine night of music that all falls under the wide Reggae umbrella some was on the Hip-Hop end, others were more on the rock end and others moved about the middle. I ended the night having been exposed to a wide range of people and really just had a really good night. It was also a night of the Watussi shirt as well.

I had a poke round Newstead on my way into The Valley scoping out some places I want to take photos of, walked round the Valley/New Farm observing the street life or more likely getting some exercise since the last week of rain has killed the morning exercise. Another night in The Valley. Another night at the Step Inn. The stage lights at the Step Inn work ok for your standard rock band with three or four members, however when you start putting reggae bands up there with perhaps six, seven, eight members the light just doesn’t work. It means that you get a number of decent photos of anyone who is in the centre front of the stage and the success rate diminishes as you move away from that. Back to photos and music though as that is what we are here for.

Shisha.
A jam band that was there just to provide some background music. A guy jumped up from the audience with a Sax to join in, after a while, I realised that I knew him. It was Jonathan Sri. He was three years below me at school but we were both in the various bands at school together, although then he was playing Clarinet and I was able to hit him on the head from where I was sitting with my Bassoon (sigh I miss her). Was nice to be able to catch up and do the required high school gossip exchange/catch up. Back to Shisha, it was fun stuff and a good start to the night.
Shisha

Cool Calm Collective.
The horns section never appeared and keys lady was late. It worked though (of course). Some of those lyrics are stuck in my head again. A nice change to Don’t Mess With The Dragon that I have had up there since April. This was a “shot that I have wanted to take for a while” and given the light I am pretty happy with the result, band framed by crowd.

Georgia

De Jah Groove.
Having seen this guys a couple of times in the last few months I had a photo planned. A photo that I have attempted to take the last few times but have not been happy with the result. I was prepared for it this time. The photo was going to be Dave throwing the Shekere up in the air. I was waiting. I was 99.9% that it would happen. However they didn’t end up playing the song so I didn’t get the photo. I was talking to Dave afterwards and mentioned it, he told me that it was on the set list and they just didn’t play it. Next time I will get it.

Harl

Grass Roots Street Orchestra.
GRSO were something. It was reggae with some hip-hop elements and I really loved it, which bowled me for six.
GRSO

GSRO

1:10am, the music is over and the instant mood swings security guy starts kicking anyone out who is not in a band. We all promptly step outside and some of the Poetikool Justice and some other guys start a beatboxing circle after a long while someone decides to take the next step and some words, it was really impressive. More chatting and then it was time to bid the St Pauls Terrace farewell.
jam

A crowd shot
crowd

The rest of the images are located in a gallery here.

January 3, 2008January 4, 2008

A Very Voodoo Christmas

Quite a few Saturday nights ago , Mum joined Matthew and I at the Step Inn for A Very Voodoo Christmas. The reason? Cactus Cadillac were playing their second gig, I had missed the last one as I was in Melbourne and Mum didn’t go. This gig though was very much a family affair with numerous friends and family of Cactus Cadillac along for the ride 🙂

I like the Step Inn in theory, I like that they are booking a very wide range of shows from folk to dub to pyschobilly and everything in between. I have a love/hate relationship with the lights though. Sometimes they are excellent, sometimes they are good, other times they are crap and it changes drastically between bands on a night. Cactus Cadillac were the first band and they had dim blue lights on their faces but normal sunlight lights at waist level. For the other bands though it moved to just normal sunlight lights as the whole lighting which was focused at the very front of the edge of the stage which meant that most time band members were in the fall-off, whilst the instruments were in the full light. It was interesting. That is why most of these photos are just photos and nothing more. I would take red Zoo lights over patchy lights any day.

Cactus Cadillac.
Cactus Cadillac is fun. They are boys who have slept on our floor numerous times over. Whilst Carter may be my primary little brother, Tom and Yuki are round often enough as well that they are just part of the family. I enjoyed the set, it was by no means mind blowing it was only their 2nd gig and Carter was distracted by the cricket on the TV at the back of the room apart from that, they are doing what they enjoy 😀

The Dead Ringers.
I only saw a little bit of this set as I went over to Tounge and Groove at West End to see The Chocolate Strings (damm great music) with Clare as her farewell before she headed to Washington DC, where she will spend the next 9 weeks or so as an intern for Massachusetts Democrat Congressman, John Tierney. Jealous? yes. The Dead Ringers were a band that I found on myspace looking for local alt-country bands so I was surprised seeing them at a Bad Moon Show but they do have a fair bit of rockabilly elements in their alt-country.

Foghorn Leghorn.
Some nights you just need some Ska to keep you going and Foghorn Leghorn are always there to provide. They have this absolute cracker of a songs about Emo kids and cheering them up, there is actions that go with it, it is pretty darn amusing.

The Bad Moon Company.
What do you if a few songs into the set the double bass gives up the ghost? You become a rockabilly covers band whilst people attempt to fix the double bass. You get it working, you go back to playing your own blend of rockabilly/pyschobilly. Then the double bass croaks it again, repeat steps from before. It croaks again. You play it to the best you can. Everyone goes home early because it just doesn’t want to work. That was quite sad as I was looking forward to a big night of Bad Moon Co goodness.

To see the rest of the images from the night go here – A Very Voodoo Christmas

November 19, 2007

Rock-Bottom Jackpot

Friday day. Another day in the office. Answering the phone. Doing the mail. Typing up quotes. Answering the phone. Chasing suppliers. All that fun stuff that fills my day between 8am and 4:30pm each day.

Friday night. Another night in this not so sleepy city. Relishing that sometimes mellow, sometimes rock reggae sound floating out into the night air. The DÃ© Jah Groove boys were in town to release their debut album Rock-Bottom Jackpot and had pulled out two of the staples of the local scene The Cool Calm Collective and Heavyweight Champions and an up and coming band The Colour who were mighty impressive.

The venue was of course The Step Inn, in some sense the little train that perhaps just could of the Brisbane venues. It used to be the Shamrock, a place on the fringe of the “The Valley” which was more of a shall we say public bar establishment than a place to go to see fine live music. The last year though the Step Inn has really “stepped up” and became almost a go to venue. They play host to a wide variety of bands from pyschobilly to reggae dub to metal and I have a feeling that after we all stop saying, it is still the Shamrock, we will realise what a treasure it just might become though it has a lot of work to go yet in improving the venue.

It doesn’t have the nicest lighting mostly due to the design of the stage and the room in general. The lighting though does change a lot depending on the band that is playing which is a lot more than can be said for some of the other live music venues round The Valley. Friday night though I was at the extremes ISO 3200, lenses wide open round the 1.8-2.2 stop and my shutter staying at 1/200 because other wise there was no hope in hell of getting crisp photos because unlike some of your more folky acts. Those boys like to move around a bit. Back to the show though. It was a nice night, talked to a few people, missed catching up with some people who I had wanted to say hi to, running into some girls from Caloundra the other weekend, taking photos and enjoying that sound. I have to give it to the DÃ© Jah boys for playing a nice long set which will stay in my little memory box for the weeks to come.

This is one of my favourite tracks off the album – One Drop High. Enjoy.
[audio:09%20One%20Drop%20High.mp3]

some photos of course. The rest are over here in a Flickr set