Never Say Die 2010 Paris Review

Heads up, this is going to be a relatively long post as I had quuuuuite an adventure in Paris. But feel free to read it. Includes my adventure there, walking into the XXX part of Paris by accident and seeing one of the bands walk into Europe's biggest sex shop, the gig review and much much more so feel free to read and share.

Let's roll...

After waking up bright and early on Saturday morning I told myself I needed a nice big breakfast to kick start my travel to Paris for Never Say Die tour 2010. The hyper little child I was poured myself a nice big bowl of cereal, only to realise I was out of milk. Not even this could ruin my day.

I was off to see seven of the most kick ass hardcore bands that the UK, USA and Europe had to offer:




You can check out my previous post here:

http://studentaroundtheworld.blogspot.com/2010/10/never-say-die-tour-paris-this-saturday.html


If you read my other post you'll know I was planning to sleep on Paris Station floor, which didn't bother me as I've done this type of thing before. After proudly putting on my favourite Your Demise Megan Fox tank top (pictured below), my already ruined 3/4 skinnys and converse, I picked up my close to dying rucksack and packed my camera, hoody, blankets and triple checked that my train tickets were in my bag.

My Megan Fox / Your Demise wife beater

After living in Strasbourg for just 7 weeks, I had just about settled into the laid back French culture and the quieter life style. However, the second I got off the train at Paris de l'Est station, I could see life here was completely different. It was almost like something out of a film; the busy side walks, the constant honking of car horns and the general rush of this completely different style of living. I had two hours before doors opened  at 16:00, and rather than tour Paris and look at all the wonder monuments, I decided to just try and find the gig. 20 minutes of walking and asking for directions, and constantly checking that my possessions hadn't been pickpockted, I arrived at the gig place and my excitement reached a new level.

Ten minutes later my stomach reminded me of how hungry I was, and decided that I also needed to withdraw some money as I planned to buy a ton of merchandise from the bands. Now being Paris, I assumed there would be cash points everywhere, but I must've walked for about 20 minutes before I actually found one.

Now this is where it get's interesting,
As I began my search for a cash point, I walked past a ALL SEX MOVIES AND DVD store. Of course, being the immature lad I am, I giggled and thought 'Oh Paris' to myself. As I looked further down the street I noticed that there were hundred's of these types of stores. It had seemed I had walked into the XXX section of Paris. On both sides of the streets, for several streets there were shops with the big three red X's printed everywhere. The words LOVERS, SEX, DVDS, TOYS printed everywhere. My fragile little mind couldn't handle it.

As I continued walking, still in search of this non-existent cash point, I recognised Your Demise (one of my favourite bands and one of the groups playing Never Say Die) walking on the opposite side of the street to me.

Then I saw them walk into EUROPE'S BIGGEST SEX SHOP. I tried to snap a picture but had no luck, so took a few pictures of the area I was in;

All I can say is, if you still think Paris is supposed to be the romantic capital of the world. guess again.

Some of the sex shops in Paris

More Sex shops in Paris

I only snapped two photos because I didn't want to look like a huge pervert, and actually found a cash point right after taking these pictures, so decided to head on over back to the gig to join the queue.

After about half an hour more in the queue, and less than 20 minutes until the doors opened, I was approached by two French people, one carrying a big video camera and the other a microphone. In French, they asked if I wouldn't mind doing an interview about the general music scene for a website. After replying in some sketchy French that I was English and it would probably make a better interview for them if they interviewed someone else, they told me we could do the interview in English.

So has the interview began, the interviewer asked me a question in French, so naturally I decided to answer in French. About 3 minutes later I was thanked and told I would be given a flyer later where I could watch the interview online, along with other interviews and footage.



So WATCH THIS SPACE FOR THAT INTERVIEW.




Anyways, let's get on down to the core of this post, NEVER SAY DIE 2010.

Now let me just mention, as I said in the intro, my bag was already filled to the brim with other clothing and blankets as I thought I would be staying on the station floor. Naturally, as I entered the venue, I headed straight over to the merch stand and bought some of the sexiest merch EVER. Most of these aren't online so I snapped up as much merch as possible. Pictures of Your Demise's 2010 merch below!

Your Demise Justin Bieber t shirt

Your Demise shorts

Your Demise Varsity front

Your Demise varsity back

Your Demise varsity back logo

The legend of a guitarist Stu also threw in a free CD for me as I spent so much on their merch!

As you can imagine NONE of this fit into my already packed rucksack. The zips on my bag didn't budge. A little disheartened that I would have to stand with my bag the entire night, I asked Stu if he had seen a place to leave bags and coats etc, but he said it'd be fine if I left all my stuff behind the merch tables. I was extremely grateful for this, and headed off to the floor for We Came as Romans.

These guys were amazing. I'm usually a little sceptical of bands with one screamer and clear vocals live, but these guys pulled it off sensational. Unfortunately, they were limited to how many songs they could play, as were many of the bands, due to the other groups that were playing.

You can check them out here:

http://www.myspace.com/wecameasromans


Next up were Your Demise. I was beyond stoked for these guys. And needless to say, they destroyed it. Although I was gutted it was such a short set list, I screamed my heart out, and even had the microphone for Burnt Tongues. Needless to say, I came out with a bloody nose and a busted lip that would not stop bleeding. I went over to say thanks to Stu at the merch desk for the awesome show, who shook my hand and congratulated me on my bloody nose. I also asked drummer Tailbee if I could have one of his drum sticks, to which he game me a snapped stick that he had played with.

These guys are a safe bunch of lads and I strongly suggest you check them out:


http://www.myspace.com/yourdemise


Every single one of these bands were superb, and I URGE you to check them out. I will post them in the order they played (excluding We Came as Romans and Your Demise who I have already mentioned)


After Your Demise;

War From a Harlot's Mouth - http://www.myspace.com/warfromaharlotsmouth
Emmure - http://www.myspace.com/emmure
Bleeding Through - http://www.myspace.com/bleedingthrough
Comeback Kid - http://www.myspace.com/comebackkid
ParkwayDrive - http://www.myspace.com/parkwaydrive

If you're a fan of hardcore or metalcore I URGE you guys to check all of these out. They are incredible.

I know a few of you were expecting to see some photos from the gig, but 1) My camera was in my bag and 2) I was far too busy in the pit to be taking photos.

Afther Parkway Drive played their final song, I headed on over back to the merch stand to pick up all my stuff. Here I met Your Demise and War From a Harlot's Mouth :D I decided to get my free Kids We Used To Be album signed by Your Demise. I decided to get my bag, which was ruined from trying to fit all my stuff in, also signed. After thanking all of them for the show, I wished them luck with their Birmingham, England gig that they were off to the next day.

After an incredible 6 hours of music, 2stepping and generally screaming my heart out, I was just about ready to collapse. After 20 minutes sat outside lent against a lamp post appreciating the fresh air, I soon spotted the two people that I had had the interview with. I explained my situation to the young woman and asked if there were any hostels or hotels near by that would hold me up for a night that were cheap. She reminded me that this was Paris and I forgot how dear this city was.

She told me to wait 2 minutes as she went other and talked to her friend. Turns out he lived about 30 minutes away and said I could crash at his.

Although at first I was worried that I would miss my train in the morning and therefore be charged to take another, I decided it would be stupid of me to pass up this offer. I quickly agreed and headed back to his. I was extremely grateful not only for the roof above my head and the make shift bed I had, but also for the chance to speak a hell of a lot of French with him.Looking like an absolute state, he decided to take a picture of me using my hoody as a blanket:

After a great night's sleep, and an extra hour asleep because the clocks went back, I packed up my things, said thank you to my new friend for his incredible hospitality and left his place, en route to the Metro to return to the train station for my early train.
After a poor start (I left his place via the wrong door and as I couldn't re-enter I had to jump the fence) I soon found the Metro thanks to his instructions and arrived at Paris de L'Est station for my return home.

As you can imagine, I soon arrived back at mine and collapsed in bed, after an exhausting, yet incredible time in France.
Here's a picture of all my stuff I bought / got signed:

Signed CD and bag drum stick, shorts, varsity and tee shirts

Tailbee's drum stick - Your Demise

Signed CD

And there we have it. If you read it all, then you're a star! If you just looked at the pictures well, I hope they entertained you!

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How to increase traffic to your blog with Google searches

OK guys, so although this post may not be directly related to travelling, in this post I'm going to tell you one way, that successfully worked for me, to increase traffic to your blog.

Now, this certainly isn't going to bring you 5000 million viewers over night, but if done correctly, you will see a steady rise in your traffic.

Ok I'm going to try and make this as simple to follow as possible as it can be quite confusing.



Now, I know a lot of you are having trouble with making your blog Google searchable. The computer and coding literate amongst have tried added Meta tags to your blog in order to increase traffic. Although I have tried this myself, I haven't noticed much on an increase and have been told that Google no longer uses Meta tags to make it searchable.


Step one. The first thing you need to do is to visit http://www.google.co.uk/addurl/ and add your blog page URL into the URL box. Underneath this box there is a comment box. Now here I just wrote a simple description of what my blog was about. Keep it short and sweet. No need for more than one sentence.
After filling in the Captcha click submit and you're blog will have been added to a list for Google to crawl.


1) Next up we need to open http://www.google.com/webmasters/ 



2) Then sign in with your Google account.

3) Next you need to click the ADD A SITE... button which looks like this:

4) A small box will appear - Enter your URL here.

5) After clicking Continue,we have to verify that we are the owner of this blog.

6) Here there will be 4 options in which we can choose how we want to verify our site. However, the only option we are interested in is the META TAG. Now we should see a code which looks a little something like this:

Picture of code

<meta name="verify-v1" content="z6MLWEMxLvMFcoVNvGPKOMvAn1oJBKem+eTEpZ1F/DU=">

                                                                                                Actual code ^

7) Now after we have copied this code (DOUBLE CHECK YOU HAVE THE ENTIRE CODE COPIED) we need to go to the Dashboard of our Blogger, then select Design > Edit HTML.

Now, we nee to look for the <head> tag. This is only a few lines down in the coding so shouldn't be too difficult to find. The easiest way to find it is to bring up the Search function, with Ctrl + f and type <head>.

The Meta code needs to be pasted IMMEDIATELY AFTER the <head> tag.

Once you've pasted this code, simply Save the Template and go back to the Webmasters Account, and click Verify to Complete the verification process.

8) If you've done everything right, you'll see that your site is now verified. HOWEVER, KEEP READING as we're not done just yet.

SIDE NOTE - DON'T REMOVE THE META CODE AFTER VERIFICATION. IT MAY BE USED BY GOOGLE AT A LATER DATE.

9) Now you should see a list of verified sites (Most likely just one, your blog) on your Webmaster tools homepage.

10) Click on your site, and you'll be taken to a dashboard of that site.

11) From here you need to click Site configuration, then Sitemaps.

12) On this page you need to click Submit a Sitemap and it will ask you to enter the sitemap of your blog. As you can probably see, the first part of your blog is already there and you only need to enter the second bit;



feeds/posts/default?max-results=500


Overal all, it should look something like this

http://www.yourblog.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default?max-results=500

13) So Submit your sitemap there and within the next 24 hous, Google will start to index the contents of your blog!

Now, give it several hours (I gave it 24 hours) and return to your Webmaster tools. On your dashboard, on the left hand side there should be a Your Site on the Web button. Expand this and you can see data gathered from Google searches! For example, Google will crawl your site and show you the keywords found on your blog!

If you've found this helpful and used it guys, simply Tweet this The button is located below the post title.

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The best way to learn a language?

Just thought I'd provide a little update on perhaps the best way to learn a language. Now obviously this varies from person to person. Some prefer hours and hours of countless grammar revision and making notes, others prefer attending university lectures and studying their asses off. Me?

I prefer going to bars and simply speaking the language with the locals. See my problem, is I have a complete lack of confidence. I tend to other think things, and become incredibly nervous when I have to speak French. However, after several drinks, alcoholic for Dutch courage of course, I find my nerves disappear and speaking French becomes so much more easier.


BIG TIP: If you make the effort, so will they. The French here appreciate the fact that although I'm English, I am complete alone in their country and speaking their language. Because of this I have had so many free shots of alcohol it's unreal. So try it guys. Go to a bar. Meet the locals. Speak French the way they do, and soon you'll find that as you become more confident, the ability to speak and foreign language to the natives is a lot easier.

Apologies if there are any spelling mistakes, I've been 'using' this method today, and after several shots of free Patis (A well known French liquor,) I do feel slightly drunk ;D
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