Meeting Barcelona

This trip was hanging by a string several times. First it was so difficult to get tickets to see Muse at Palau Saint Jordi, but I managed; then some greedy catalonians decided they'd much rather have a tennis tournament on the day of the concert at the venue, and changed the date of the show. Still, Barca was too much of a dream, so we flew over despite all the unluck that was haunting our every move, and had a blast. As for Muse, we have tickets for the out-of-this-world Wembley stadium in London, 2010. Touché!

The Worldonfire, Oceansize @ VK, Brussels

Die Vaartkapoen, known as VK club, is located in quite the dangrous neighborhood, despite the fact that it is 30 mins. by foot away from Brussels' center. When walking the streets of Molenbeek, you barely see any belgian faces. You can hear a police siren every 10 minutes passing by outside. Although we were warned, we still thought it was better to get a hostel nearby, so we could walk to the club.

The club fits about 300 people, yet it was only half-full. VK has been host to bands like QOTSA, Incubus, RATM and Deftones, while upcoming shows in november include Mando Diao, Clutch and Kylesa. The support band, The Worldonfire, seemed quite cool - made up of somewhat emo-looking teenagers with a good sense of rhythm, somewhat post-rock, somewhat melodic, at times kind of screamo vocals and an overall dynamic presence. While I spent my last cash on merch, Oceansize were setting up their instruments. No star business here, these guys take care of themselves. Their tourbus was parked right outside the club, their bass-player was selling the T-shirts and albums before and after the show.



Oceansize rocked us out with a few songs from the upcoming album, two songs from the EP Home & Minor, one from Effloresce, one from Frames and several from Everyone Into Position. I think they diserve to be much, much bigger, and perhaps the place to see them in the right light is the UK. It was way too short, I dont think I've nearly had enough at all...

Poetry in Ghent

Sometimes a few hours can mean so much, expecially when there are no walls. No mental bricks, no cultural prejudice. Just a uniting language and the desire to share yourself exactly the way you are. And an invisible fine-tuning to similar radiowaves, which brought about the golden spark. She just about wrote it all, so here is my point of view...



When I met Suzan in a casual restaurant in Sofia, she managed to convince me in just a few hours that I'd fall in love with her city. Everyone loves their cities, but there was more to that obviousness this time. She spoke about belgian musicians, and how they had free shows there before they became famous, about modern artists and the freedom to find funding for artistic ideas. We jumped from plain conversations to sharing very quickly. Somehow I knew that instant I was going to visit her very soon. I was eager to travel this autumn, after my summer vacation to Prague failed due to the horrible summer flu. So when Oceansize announced a date at the VK club in Brussels, I bought tickets straight up. We arrived in Belgium one day before the gig - a perfect opportunity to spend 24 hours in Ghent. The locals claim it's more alive than Bruges, less chaotic than Brussels, and less snobby than Antwerp, lol. And scattered with hundreds of bycicles, as the main means of transportation.



Indeed, poetry is everywhere in Ghent, you just have to look close - on pavements, walls, around the canal that gives the town its remarkable romantic note, in elevators and in the wind that brushes your hair. So when you take leisurely walks, beware, for it can be contagious. When we arrived, it was cloudy. I was prepared to meet the rain. On the way to the center square, the sun came out and suddenly Ghent looked like shiny chocolate wrapping - the kind that really stimulates your appetite on different levels. We had delicious lunch in a huge student cantine, beef steak with belgian fries and brussels sprouts. We passed by Suzan's favorite bookstores and tasted the local alcoholic specialty - liqueur so sweet, you'll never know how and when you got drunk...



We were lucky to have someone show us all the beautiful cafes. We sat in the place Suzan went to read and enjoy some great coffee, near her university. It will sound like a tourist clichee, but I swear I had the most delicious brown chocolate tart there that I've ever tasted anywhere in the world. A moment of true happiness for a chocolate junkie. And while we were discussing life in different aspects, we won ourselves some listeners...



Afterwards we marched into one of the cult music stores, as planned. It was nessesary to leave this ritual for the end of the day, because I knew we'd spend hours inside. Suzan showed me some cd's of successful local pop-rock bands, while I bought two favorite albums at a great price - David Bowie's Heathen (for the amazing artwork) and Radiohead's Ok Computer - finally the orginal album in my cd library. I still preach the theory that if you fall in love with an album, simply downloading it from a pirate blog just isn't cool. Go out and show some respect for the artist by paying for it, even if you do it after some years...



And thus, slowly, the day started coming to an end. Our time had passed in laughter and a serious intake of positive energy. We spent one part of the evening wrapping up the conversations we had in Sofia a month before. The future is looking bright in our separate mindsets. And when our paths meet again, we will have the answers we seek now, and time will have cleared the clouds on the horizon. Miracles happen every day.

4 days of music and laughter in Brussels

In short, we formed a group of 12 keen adventurists, bought tickets for Wizzair and off we flew to the Charleroi airport. I was slightly tempted to walk through the escalator tubes of the Atomium...

Most of the spots we saw are listed here: places to see in Brussels, the only thing this site forgets to mention is the concert hall Ancienne Belgique, which is a great place for heart-filled contemporary musical experiences. It has a capacity of 2,000 people, and is said to be one of the best concert halls in Belgium, with perfect acoustics.

I was greatly impressed by the Atomium, of course, by the Palais de Justice, by the Museum of musical instruments (which is an absolute must for every music lover; you get a pair of earphones and are guided through the most amazing sticks, strings, drums, keys and any known instruments of any culture that were designed to make a sound), the Rene Magritte museum-house, the administrative center of the EU with the government buildings, the Royal Museum of the Army and of Military History, etc. It was impossible to see everything we wanted only in four days (there's only so much walking my pair of feet can take), so we'll have to see the rest next time, which I'm sure won't be so far in the future. And, we'll definitely come back for Bruges.

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My general feeling of Brussels is that it's quite a contemporary city, not so historically rich as other places, yet diverse enough for anyone of any culture or background to fill their empty internal spaces. In terms of food you can find everything, however my main dish was mostly chocolate-covered belgian goufrettes, hehe. It was amazing to see that 1/3 of the population of the city are foreigners, mostly Islamic and African, and the locals like to cross the street on a red light and don't excactly drive as consciously as in other western european cities. You also get a healthy dose of rush-hours and street-chaos so you can remain with your feet on the ground.