The wobbly video is up – It’s in HD but you might have to view it on Youtube directly to see it.

Thomas Truax is a strange sort of man, but that’s no real surprise. We have struggled through the rain to see him and are excited when we see him lurking by a merchandise stand. He wears a black suit with an 80s cut and loose hair. We stand about dripping.

He seems confidently enshrined in his own little world full of self-invented instruments and references to unknown women in gigs. The crowd laughs half in politeness and half because he’s charming. He is also American, which surprises me. I don’t know why – maybe my notion was of an eccentric Brit – the Dr Who Matt Smith of music.

Three songs in, he leaps from the stage, guitar in hand and strolls into the audience, singing and strumming. “How odd,” I think, neither here-nor-there on the matter. He suddenly leaps from his guitar-filled wander, dives towards the door and bursts out with a clang. I potter off towards the toilet, coincidentally in the same direction (or maybe I’m just nosy and won’t admit it) and bump into the brown haired ticket-selling girl on the way.

“Where’d he go?” I ask.

“Oh, it’s his thing,” she tells me, waving ticket stubs about. “He runs up the stairs, and round the back. There’s a secret ‘No Entry’ door by the toilet which leads onto the stage.” I peer up the stairs but he is long gone. I continue on my toilet hunt, suspecting I must look like a stray fan hopelessly following Truax around the building. I see the secret door. It is a bit dull for a secret door and very nondescript, which probably keeps drunk people out. Such is the way of the secret door.

I take shaky video footage because my arms tire easily as I try to hold them really high. He finishes quickly and I eagerly ask him if he will play Wicked Game, a good 80s cover and the first track I heard by him. It’s no doubt an irritating request at the end of a gig to be asked to play a specific song. “Were the rest not good enough?” I half expect as an reply, but he smiles and tells me that he doesn’t have the right pedals.

Afterwards, everyone clears and feeling bold and drunk I grab my camera and leap on stage. Perhaps if I am arrested I shall tell them I am a blogger. That will fix things.

Bob discovers I have not been told off or frowned at in any way and jumps up too. I spin the ‘Sister Spinster’ around; it’s a smaller version of his first instrumental creation, a clanging beat-producing wheel with spokes, but I’m terrified of being that idiot who broke it and avoid pushing it with any force. The tapping noise it makes is exciting enough. This is the closest I’ve ever come to steampunk, and it’s lovely. There’s also a briefcase filled with a xylophone, with a lightbulb on a string hanging from the top. Wikipedia won’t tell me the invention’s name but it’s fantastic nonsense. I tap out some notes on the xylophone and admire the lightbulb. It’s brilliant and is my favourite bit. Glee glee glee.

We stomp back out into the rain. I rather like Mr Truax. Bob smiles all the way home. He took some lovely photos despite the red lights – you can find them here.

I am a rhythm-deaf ginger kid with sausage fingers. We are not famed for our musical prowess (save perhaps Johnny Rotten and Florence). I borrowed a Ukulele last week and have been eagerly practicing chords. “What is a bar?” I keep asking.

I have been learning Noah and the Whale’s 5 Years Time. Wholly unoriginal. Today I have been also learning Ben Kweller’s On My Way which may not be a most fantastic song but means I am learning rhythm (in some capacity) which makes me very happy. Soon I might sing along garishly.

It is very easy to poke fun at Nicholas Cage, but I am not one to sway from such a practice.

I saw Kick Ass yesterday – and when I say yesterday, I mean around Saturday but I have been distracted from writing about it by other more unimportant things. Kick Ass is a perfectly good film to accompany a Friday night of gorging on popcorn, which was main our goal of the evening. Cage, generally known for wearing the same expression in such films as Lord of War and many others (that I have not seen but many claim to have done), appears at one point. I leapt in my seat. Glee, thought I, it’s Cage! I will be able to write a review – a hilarious anecdote explaining why Nicholas Cage is rubbish, and how even I would make a better and no doubt far superior actor.

He plays a thin faced beige-wearing father with an eagerly acting daughter, a bit in the realm of Leon‘s Natalie Portman but with a higher neckline. It’s a strange film from the production company behind Layar Cake that borders on Fox Searchlight’s version of not-particularly awkward indie (say 500 Days of Summer) and in the same sort of way there’s lots of faux awkward scenes that aren’t at all so.

Undoubtedly the worst parts were the painful advertising swipes of Pepsi cans and Pepsi-filled phrases hitting the screen. We collectively shuddered.

The mystery is that Nicholas Cage is in no way irritating. It’s all really quite pleasant once you get used to it, and for some reason they’ve also stuck in some South Park-style Jewish accents throughout the cast – which may in fact be typical New York – which makes it all quite snigger worthy. As intended, it’s a jolly, and escapist feel-good film with no risks attached to watching it and in this way I feel barely warrants a review because it is as good as you’d expect. It’s is appropriately accompanied with a good music-filled ending as the genre dictates and unlike Bruce Almighty’s “that’s the way the cookie crumbles” they’ve also pulled off the one take-away quote: “With no power comes no responsibility” now popping up on a mass of social networks.

The biggest downside? There was a 2.0 joke which I laughed at. It was shameful but I reveled in it.

I am a minimalist who can’t do minimal (maybe I just masquerade as one). I am also a perfectionist, but shit at it. Perhaps I am just indecisive. Anyway, although I have some bits to add, it’s my new layout made in some capacity by me. It features a frowning dog.

Do say Hello to him, he doesn’t have a name yet.

The products of yesterday: my frowny egg cress head. He is only small and feeble because the kids needed the big shells. Why does cress smell so bad? It’s stinking my desk out and has been relegated to the windowsill which suits both of us better.