Birthday week. A good week indeed. A 2 day break from school is always welcomed, but when it coincides with my birthday, even better. Here's what I got up to.

School. Full day actually, so nothing really much happened. Yishi got me 2 cakes from hummingbird bakery. A little too sweet for my tastes, but it was good nonethelss. During the night, my housemates brough in a cake for me, which was really sweet of them. I really didn't expect it at all.

Here is was. I had a short PBL session in the morning, and then basically studied the rest of the day, until dinner time when I met Debra for dinner at Sway, some semi-posh restaurant. Twas a nice dinner, and generally a good time to talk. I had crab and fish risotto, which was not bad, and Debra had some salmon thingee.

In the middle of the day Michelle came over and brought along another cake from Patisserie Valerie. Nice cake.

And then at 2115 I went for swing while Debra went back for her reheasals for Beautyworld. Florrine and Xinwei called in the middle of swing to wish me a happy birthday. Had a nice talk with them. I also found out that some of the swing people went for tea after swing so I followed them.

This was a free day, and I did some work in the day time, and then in the evening went for SWOT. After SWOT, I went with Shoujie to Ronnie Scot's jam, and my goodness was I impressed!

The jam started about 2300 with the house band playing a set first. This was not bad at all, quite standard stuff with the pianist and drummer doing some good interaction. After the first set, the jammers came on.

First change of drummer was this guy who was WICKED! He was taking every opportunity and opening the pianist threw at him, and responding with many sick synchopation and beats. I have to say the way he places all his accents were really exciting, and kept me really glued listening to them. The bassist missed most of the openings, which I thought was really sad, because he had fantastic solos, but argh, such a waste! Then some Russian saxophonist came on, and he looked abit odd. I think people were skeptical if he could play well. In fact, when he started his first tune, he was slightly out of tune, ala Ornette Coleman, and everyone in the audience was looking around a bit concerned. But then when he went into the solo, he showed that he could hold himself well. In fact, Shoujie found out after that he was really into free jazz, which I thought was really cool, except he didn't respond as well to the band compared to the drummer, so I find it difficult to believe he plays free jazz very well. But otherwise, he was quite an exciting player.

And then a new bassist stepped up, who was just as good, and in fact took a few more openings than the house bassist, but still not as much as I would've liked. There was another 2 pianists as well, who were not bad at all. All of them could hold their own solos really well, not complaints there, it's just the interaction I wasn't as impressed with. Another bassist and a couple of drummers then took the stage, and they weren't anything particularly exciting. In the end a violinst came up, and she couldn't do it well at all. Anyway, I went off when the violinist played.

Overall, a great night of good music, and I'm rather inspired to go there to jam one day. In terms of band interaction and holding rhythm and walking, I'd be able to compared well to anyone of the bassists there, or actually might be a little more exciting than them. In terms of solo no way I can compare though. Really need to work on this more to jam well.

Got home at 0230.

Woke up late, at 1300 I think. Replied some facebook wallposts, and then during the evening, went for dinner with Joyce, Denise, and Joanna Tan, who was in London. It was a nice time at Pearl Liang at Paddington. It was a nice restaurant, fairly priced and good food.

Had school today. I full day basically, btu at night, I went with Jordan and his brother Justin to Troy bar. MY GOODNESS! I was totally blown away. This wasn't your usual jazz bar. They played fusion and quite heavy beats, and basically jammed on simple progressions. But THE BAND INTERACTION!!! Every single player was into it, the drummer was crazy doing all kinds of synchopation and beats, even going into polyrhythms. The bassist followed really well and they were so tight, even with improvised changes to the rhythm with every other cycle. The keyboardist was using really lush tones, and had sick lines in his improvisation. The sax player also was killer. The guitarist was a Fillipino, and he was smokin! Basically ALL of them were really responding to each other, and I was really impressed with all of them. They were so tight that some of the times the other players would pick up an extended drumroll within 1 beat of it!

Had great chats with Jordan and Justin, and came out of the bar drained from all the energy flowing around. If you want 1 jazz bar to visit, go for Troy bar at Old Street station. You won't be disappointed. Too bad it also starts about 2200-2300, a little too late for my normal days.

Went to Thorpe Park today with Zhongmin and company, and Mingjie. Had a great time on rollercoasters, and a less ncie time on the rides like Vortex, Zodiac and X. Those made me feel really sick...by the end of the day when the park closed I was feeling quite dizzy. We managed to take some really funny pics on the rollercoaster though, and had a good laugh. Met Zhongmin's friends, mostly year1 medics. Met his friend, who was from Singapore, with a tongue & navel piercing, wore blue contact lenses. She's doing communication and psychosocial science at UEL, and besides the fact I think she looks good, I find her interesting.

Didn't join them for the post-park party to celebrate Zhongmin's birthday, but instead went home to take an hour nap, after which I went with Ian and Michelle for a swing event, which was not bad. 

Played for church (this is why I didn't join them for the party last night). 

School for a full day, then went to watch Beautyworld musical by KCLMSS, to support Debra and Chermaine basically. I shan't review it, but interestingly, my biggest complaint wasn't the singing nor the acting. hah. 

Now it's really time to have no-life and study hard. Which means probably no blog for a long time.