Music I've been missing – Placebo, You Don't Care About Us

One of my favourite bands is Placebo.

I first took note of Placebo when I saw the Taste in Men video clip on Channel [v] in 2000. I was enchanted by how attractive I found Brian Molko, and that he looked more feminine than the woman in the clip.



I received Black Market Music for Christmas that year. I played it a lot. They were a darker band than I was used to. I was intrigued by the band's alleged debaucherous lifestyle - so far removed from my own - sex, drugs and well, rock n roll. I enjoyed the moody, introspective, sometimes repetitive lyrics and Brian Molko's whiny voice. So many people dislike Placebo for these features.

Back then, and sometimes still, I was drawn to effeminate looking men with long hair. Brian Molko was right up my alley.


In January 2001, two friends (including Lucy) and I went to the Big Day Out where Placebo played. The day before the BDO, we met Placebo at the now (sadly) defunct Gaslight Records in Bourke Street Melbourne. We queued in the 35 degree heat for around four hours to meet them. It amused me that the goth-types were wearing long PVC coats and Doc Marten boots in that heat. There was a wedding photoshoot happening across the road at the famous Italian cafe Pellegrini's. I expect the photos have some of the queue for the Placebo signing in the background!

Placebo signed my Slave to the Wage CD. I was very excited. We saw them play at the Big Day Out the next day, right before Powderfinger.

After the Big Day Out I decided to get serious about Placebo. I bought Without You I'm Nothing and their first self-titled CD. I bought all of their back catalogue of singles from Ebay. I loved the artwork on each single.

My favourite song of theirs is You Don't Care About Us.



I love the beat of this song. The speed of it makes me drum my hands. And I'm no way near musical. I also love when the band are forced to swim with the shark in the clip.

Other favourite songs are Soulmates, This Picture, Without You I'm Nothing, Meds, Infra Red, Commercial for Levi and the cover of Robert Palmer's Johnny and Mary. I have their video clip collection and really enjoy the stories each clip tells.

I have seen Placebo play live twice since the Big Day Out in 2001.

The second time I saw them was at The Palace (also defunct) in St Kilda in 2003. My friends and I queued for ages to get a spot near the stage. The crowd was rough, drunk and smoking (cigarettes, not smoking as in 'stylish'). This concert was the scariest concert I've been to. I remember going to the bar to get water between the support band and Placebo, and some girls wouldn't let me back into my spot at the front. My friend picked me up and put me back at the front! There was a lot of moshing. I held on for dear life at the front – sometimes to the barrier, and sometimes to a guy I didn't know – and hoped that I wouldn't faint from heat exhaustion. I had a bottle of water placed vertically down my jacket so my boobs wouldn't get hit. The security guards were worried about me so they gave me a lot of free water, so that was a bonus of being so red! The crowd moved so much that my friends ended up at the back of the venue. I rate it 60 percent terrifying and 40 percent exhilarating.

The other time was at Festival Hall in 2006. So-so. The security were heavy handed, confiscating a guy in our row's camera. We were sitting so far back that I doubt the photos would even be evidence that he saw Placebo. I got really sick after the gig, and I put it down to being in that closely confined venue. They've toured twice since, but I chose not to go because both subsequent times was at Festival Hall and once was mid February.

I am driving 300 km tomorrow and so I think I'll be revisiting the music I've been missing – Placebo.

I like Placebo's old stuff better than their new stuff, though.

The weekend just gone/still going

I'm loving this loooooooong weekend business.

My weekend started last Tuesday at 5:00 pm when I went to eat burgers, drink beer/vodka lime and soda, see Bran Nue Dae at the cinema with two friends. The movie was bizarre. Filled with messages (sometimes stereotyped) about Aboriginal and white Australian culture, and sexual innuendo at the same time. In parts I sensed bitterness. There was a great cast - Jessica Mauboy looked stunning, and Deborah Mailman played a great drunken harlet, and Missy Higgins was really ocker. I don't know though, I didn't feel immersed in the movie.

Wednesday - Friday was camp, and I'll dedicate a separate blog post to that.
I love this restaurant - it's got modern Asian food.

Friday night I had dinner at Tom Phat in Brunswick. I love this restaurant - it serves modern Asian food at a great price. I ordered the twice cooked duck in plum sauce with Asian greens, and for dessert I had coconut icecream with mango and banana crumble - yum! My Mum was down with two of our friends, and we laughed and laughed, so much so Mum was crying! It was a lot of fun - I love spending time with Mum, she is one of my best friends. And our other two friends are a scream - I enjoy being able to discuss anything with them, and there never feels like there is a generation gap between us.

Saturday, the four of us shopped til we dropped. I almost did drop after being so tired from three days at camp. But like all good shoppers, I have stamina, and managed to walk the entire giant shopping mall and then some. I love shopping. I particularly love finding bargains.

I was very happy with my purchases, especially the MacBook Pro which I've been eying for ages. And now I have it, it's as wonderful as I imagined it would be. Of course, I probably didn't need to buy a MacBook Pro, per se, I could have make done with a middle level PC. But since I bought my iPod Touch and iPHone, I've fallen in love with the asthetics of Apple's products. Using it makes me feel like Carrie Bradshaw.

Like this.




Writing this blog on my MacBook, sitting on my bed, makes me feel like I'm writing a proper newspaper column, just like Carrie did. Except I abhor her collection of beige bras. For someone so fashionable she wore the yuckiest bras most of the time, and exposed them underneath her fabulous fashions. I recall she sometimes even wore the bras as a standalone piece, AS OUTERWEAR. Gosh.

An example.



I would NEVER do this. I may expose a pretty pink bra strap under a dress, but not the WHOLE GODDAMN BRA!

Anyhow, I digress.

This is my MacBook, it features the draft of this very blog post. And so a new love affair begins.



I purchased a Catherine Manuell Design laptop case so my MacBook's home is as beautiful as it is. I love Catherine Manuell's luggage collections.

I had to google the instruction for taking a screen shot. My case is the black and white one with the flap, sort of in the middle of the page.



And I also have a collection of brushes and wipes in a little beauty case so I can wipe my vaseline from the MacBook and brush dust (ie, dead skin) away. It's quite a hassle being me, but more so interesting!

So as I mentioned before, I went to my friend Alana hen's night on Saturday. Alana and I met when I started at the department store back in 1999 - she was the first person I met on my first day (aside from my manager). She showed me the ropes. Her sister also worked there. We became friends, and we both moved away from the country, and it's only in recent months that we've met in person again.

I went to the hen's night only knowing four people, but departed having made some new friends, which is really nice. Everyone there made me feel very welcome.

It was a 1920s flapper theme, and everyone dressed up! I love it when everyone follows the theme.

There were a few games - popping balloons with body parts, a quiz about the hen from her partner's perspective, and lots of great food made by her family and those slushie machines filled with daquiris.

At 11:30 pm, the stripper arrived. I'd never seen a stripper in real life before. It was a little awkward, I found, and I sensed Alana and some other girls felt his closeness awkward, too. It was a lot of fun, and I did have a big giggle when he came to me and asked me to rub his bum, but I declined oiling him up with baby oil.

Most of the girls at the hen's night headed into the city to a nightclub after the stripper festivities. I haven't been to a nightclub since the last hen's night I went to in 2006. Wow, things have changed. Girls wear NOTHING now, it seems. I enjoyed myself there more than I anticipated, probably because I was with a great group of people and I got in amongst it on the dancefloor, dancing to some songs I actually knew.

I had a thoroughly good time, but didn't get home til 3:00 am and though I only had half a daquiri and the rest soft drink, I felt pretty ordinary yesterday.

Here are some pictures from Alana's hen's night. We all looked stunning!







Today I've been pottering around my suburb doing groceries, buying supplies for my computer and reading magazines. Tonight I will cook, for the first time in eight days - how I miss cooking! And tomorrow I aim to 'shop my closet' - as in clean it out and find some gems I'd forgotten about and pack the stuff I don't wear off to St Vinnies. The Big Day Out is happening - though I'm not going I will hear it from my place, well it will be a mix of that and the Hottest 100, for which the number one sing has already been leaked. I am liking this 'me time' too.

This is the life - long weekends should happen every month!