First things first, I want to just apologize for the lack of content in recent weeks. Basically, ever since I went to New York I’ve been swamped with work, and very recently just got given six essays to do. Joy of joys, I know. But as well as being swamped I have now decided that I’m just going to post blogs about the main vlogs I put up rather than the lazyvlogs as the lazyvlogs generally tend to lack content, whereas the vlogs have content.
So here is the first proper vlog since returning back from New York! …Well, besides the “I Am Back” video, that was just an update.
So there you go. I’ve known Luna Kiss since last year when I filmed them for a TV production at my college, to start with I had so much on my mind that I didn’t even take notice of the music they were playing right in front of me, but later that day I went to add them on Facebook and thought I’d listen to their tracks and I was blown away. After that I just talked to some of the members in general, mainly Wil and Ross and I ended up attending quite a few of their gigs and forming a slight friendship with them. Then in July they did a gig in a car park and I got my poster signed and also purchased the very first album. And by that, I mean, I was the first customer! I always remember that day.
Now, I get asked to help promote them and get word about about certain events and such, for example, this vlog helped get word out about the new track that’s coming out on the 21st May. It’s lovely to establish friendships with people like musicians or film makers! And also any other type of person obviously!
But yeah, here are the bands information if you feel like checking them out!
I left United Kingdom on the 24th April to go to New York and film a documentary with my university group. It’s safe to say it was the best experience of my life.
Here is part one!
Here is part 2!
Firstly, I would like to stress that this was my first time flying, and I was amazed by it! I had been warned by my friend that take off was perhaps the worst bit, but I wasn’t bothered by it at all. Maybe that’s because I was sat back listening to Pink Floyd whilst looking out the window. The whole seven hours were something I would never have imagined experiencing. I enjoyed and cherished it.
New York is pretty much how I imagined it…but it was also so much more than I imagined. When I left the station and arrived at Madison Square Garden for the first time, I was overwhelmed by the traffic, buildings and the scale of everything, but oddly, it didn’t seem different. I went through the whole week feeling like I belonged in New York. Everything, despite how different to the British culture, felt so natural. However, this was only Midtown, where I was welcomed by fumes, busy streets, litter, and a somewhat, “grey” feeling lingering over me. There were also people multi-tasking to the max! I saw a man crossing the road and continuing to walk whilst reading a novel. I saw a woman riding a pushbike with her head tilted enough to clasp her mobile phone between her head and her shoulder. I saw a skateboarder cruising through busy traffic. One night, I did wander around Times Square alone. Something I was advised not to do but did anyway. And I have to say, it really isn’t as bad as everyone makes out! Sure, keep your wits about you, keep your hands on your pockets, walk fast and if possible walk around people not through them. But I didn’t witness or experience any type of violence or mugging.
An Aerial Shot of Midtown.
I did venture down into Downtown and Uptown. What I loved about Downtown, the traffic of people and automobiles were far less and you could really just walk around the area and take it all in. It was cleaner too, and felt very warm as opposed to the gloomy, gritty feeling you get when you’re in Midtown. A place I went to Downtown was Ground Zero. In my vlog it clearly shows I had an emotional experience. I never would have expected the size to be so immense. The pictures didn’t seem that big at all. I’m on about the sheer width of it, I knew the height was going to be massive as it was a skyscraper, but the width just threw me off. I was glad to have experienced seeing it. However, my favorite area by a long shot, was Uptown and Central Park. Uptown, like Downtown was less busy then Midtown and looked so much cleaner and welcoming. And Central Park was just amazing to walk through. The greenness of the grass, the mountains of bedrock, the lovely little lakes, and the social culture occurring around me. I would happily live in Uptown. In fact, in Britain I don’t feel comfortable at all going out for a jog in my area. I’ve tried it before a few times and I always ended up running through a woodland because I just don’t feel comfortable, with Central Park though, I felt really comfortable, so comfortable that I had to hold myself back from actually jogging in my heavy clothes. It was just the perfect environment for me.
I also went to the American Museum of Natural History…eventually after being directed to the Metropolitan Museum of Art first. But, despite it looking nothing like how it did in, ”Night At The Museum” I still spent as long as I could looking through the exhibits and just enjoying myself. Sadly, I missed a few exhibits I think because the museum announced that it would be closing in the next ten minutes at 6pm, despite the fact that my ticket said it was valid until 8pm.
All in all, I visited a few more places and I am glad to have experienced New York in the way that I did, with friends and also alone. I would gladly love to go back to America, I now have a craving for it and I miss it already. I just don’t miss the jet lag that comes with it.
Maybe someday I’ll go back to America and experience another state.
Hahaha, LOOK! It’s me as a small boy with a funny looking face!
Literally ten minutes after walking into the house, I decided I should do another lazyvlog and keep you all up to date on things…but not before flaunting my new red shirt around in your faces. It had to be done. Although, don’t worry! I wasn’t really photocopying money, that’s impossible to do…and illegal. Don’t be a silly, stay away from Jail. That will now be your new motto to live by, and you will pass that quote down to your grandchildren, and they shall pass it to their grandchildren. It’s a known fact, I know because I’ve been to the future.
Anyway, besides the red T-shirt, the dog chewing wood and me pretending to photocopy money, I showed you a bunch off photos from my childhood. It’s brilliant isn’t it? Our parents put pictures of us up from when we were kids and leave them there for years and never take them down. They completely ignore our current avatars or pictures from the present day and just stick with the past!
Anyway, I suppose that could be seen as a rant in someway, so I can say, “rant over” and move on to saying goodbye, because I have quite a few things to do tonight.
Sort of, making plans for the future and sorting money out type of plans.
If you like seeing photos of your blogger then I suggest you head over to my Razzi page and go and have a look at some of the photos there, they usually serve as a photographic look at something I did that day, so it’s interesting! I guess.
Also, if you haven’t already then head on over to my Facebook Fan Page and keep up to date on the latest videos from all my channels and some news!
It was such a busy day today! In terms of currency!
DOLLAZ
Basically, with going to New York next week, I need to start getting my money sorted, so Alex, Ian, and myself all ventured to town and got some quotes from two cash conversion places, one being a post office, we ended up going to the pub to have a meal, a drink, and a talk and discussion about which one would be the best place for us to go for. After about an hour and a half, we decided and had our money! Then went back to college to flash it at our group and continue with “work”.
Now I have lotsa dollars and have been told countless times how expensive New York is, and that there is VAT to add onto the prices, whereas over here in the UK we don’t get that. I don’t really understand it all so I’m going to choose to ignore it all and just purchase things that look cheap. Sounds like a plan to me!
Also, I have a big plan up my sleeve too, if you’re a person that lives in New York and are going to be anywhere in Times Square then you may want to keep your eyes peeled for a post explaining what’s going on! It involves finding notes from me in places! Might be fun!
Anyways, I’m going to go and add some annotations to that video above, get some coffee and watch TV!
Do you like music videos? Or maybe even British accents and words being spoken in a British way? Then this post is for YOU!
NEW MUSIC VIDEO
So today, I had a shift at Starbucks, a trial shift to see how I feel about working in the environment and how they feel about me working there. It went well I believe, however, like always I tend not to get my hopes up in case the answer is no. Other than that, I spoke about the men’s hatred of shaving with a blunt razor…honestly, you girls don’t know what it’s like to snag hair from your face with a really blunt razor, it hurts!
Other than that I urged you to go and check out the brand new solo cover from Matt Bate, which was directed and edited by me and can be viewed right here Seriously, go check it out, I’m actually quite proud of it! I haven’t been proud of something I’ve done besides my vlogs in a long time!
ACCENT SURVEY
Now the accent part, my friend Llamangoes4eva told me about an accent survey thing she was told to do a while back, and I was currently looking for a topic to do a vlog on as I had the house to myself. So I went for this! Hope you like it!
Er…hi. *clears throat* I’ve been a bit absent haven’t I? On the bright side you have lots of content today!
CHECKING PACKING
This video was as it says really. I was sorting out my packing because I’m trying to get the big and important things packed away before I focus on clothes and the like. Although not after stuffing my face with easter eggs. I still had a bad throat in that video…I still do! I should really pop some pills to help it. Also I mentioned Matt Bate, because we were planning a meeting to attend to discuss some top secret production. that we’d be working on together.
MATT BATE!
Obviously, the next lazyvlog to come forth would no doubt be something to do with the meeting. Well, we had the meeting at Starbucks and discussed some bits about the production but mostly talked about each other and got to know each other better. We got along brilliantly, he said it was because he watches most of my vlogs and seems to have picked up on my personality through them. I have to admit, it was pretty cool to hear.
After our meeting we went to his house, he showed me around, and then we started slowly setting up the room where we’d be filming, this is where the Lazyvlog started. Bless the guy, he thought the words I say when I introduce a vlog was, “Hey Bears” instead of “Hey Bailers” so now I have a nickname! “Bear” Beautiful isn’t it?
T-SHIRT!
And finally today! I got my custom T-shirt in the post on Tuesday and had mean meaning to do a video whilst wearing it, but on Wednesday I was resting from the filming…which went well! I’ll link the final product when it’s completed! But it’s basically a music video for Matt Bate performing a solo cover of a song. It went so well, this is actually a production I’m proud of, I haven’t been this proud of something in a long time, and to think I did this with just me and the musician!
Me...as a bear.
Other than that though, I’m trying to sort my online identity out, I want to draw more people to my channel, and make YouTube friends, because out of my 300 something Facebook friends, only at least four people like watching Vlogs so my marketing feels somewhat wasted there. But big plans for New York advertising!
That’s right, it’s nearly Easter, and to celebrate, I focus a vlog about the origin of the word, Easter!
I knew that I hadn’t done a vlog in a while, so I felt I needed to get something going, even if it was just a short one. As it turned out, this was a short one, although the outro ended up being longer than I had hoped, but still, it kind of worked!
So what was it about? I’ve always been interested in why Easter is called, “Easter” and I’ve always been confused as to why eggs and rabbits were used on the day as I never saw a reason for them to be related to the death and rebirth of Jesus. But after some research, it finally all makes sense! And now hopefully it all makes sense to you guys too! Unless you already knew…then whatever…go eat your eggs.
This video is me and my sisters puppy just howling pretty much and me talking about how I did well at my Starbucks interview yesterday. I was pleased!
Anyway, like the vlog, this post is quite short, but I hope to be uploading more frequently soon.
Dog swimming pool was the result of me having a huge craving to do a lazyvlog, despite being bed ridden all day. I literally only left my room when I had too. The night before I had started to feel drowsy and my head and stomach were hurting, then I went out to the surprise birthday meal and had a curry, which probably didn’t help matters, but I ended up waking up the next day with achy muscles and a really sleepy state of consciousness. But look! It’s a dog swimming pool! The puppy loves it, as the mud probably shows. As for the reason for hiding away from everyone, it is a confidence issue yes, but it’s also just me being anti-social in a way I suppose. I have nothing against my sisters boyfriend, but as always with new people, if I’m thrown into a room with the new person I feel awkward, especially when I need to make a good impression.
I was also playing around with the quality and uploading settings yesterday and today too, because I have seen iPod vlogs uploaded onto YouTube with 480p quality, but when I uploaded from my iPod onto YouTube, the video would be automatically compressed and then uploaded in 360p and it wasn’t making any sense. However, this morning I did one and I tried importing the video into Final Cut Pro and exporting and uploading from that…it worked! So I’m now happier that I haven’t wasted money on a horrible quality iPod!
Anyway! Today, I am indeed waiting for a T-shirt, it could be here today or it could be here tomorrow. but the design is a Kelly Green shirt made by American Apparel and SpreadShirt are designing it! I think I’ll go for a vibrant red one next time though. Or a green…what the hell, I’ll just order the whole rainbow spectrum!
B3NB4IL T-Shirt Design
Remember the blog the other day? This one? Where I talk about the back of the head situation? I’m actually thinking about making a Tumblr at some point in the future allowing users to post pictures of the back of their heads in artistic or simple ways, and then set them tasks to complete if they wish, which would most likely be similar to 30 Seconds To Mars’s Echelon army where they encourage fans to promote them. It’s all still being planned! And I need more fans too!
So if you class yourself as a fan, then head over to some of these links and share them about a bit!
Okay, I feel like I haven’t updated this blog in a while…even though it has only been a few days since the last one, but still.
That video is pretty much me walking, talking about the damn hay fever that can effect one in five people in Britain (Source: http://www.aaircharity.org/media/Key%20Facts.pdf) although I didn’t actually state any facts in the video. Also, I spoke about the old railway track that use to be on the very path I was walking on.
I also talked about my T-Shirt that I have found out today, just before typing this up, that it has been dispatched! I’ll be sure to post a lazyvlog about it, but to clue you in on the details, it is a “Kelly Green” …green, with my “B3NB4IL” logo and anime character graphic on it. It was originally going to be a bright, vibrant red, but I thought I’d go with green after debating about colours with various people. Hopefully it should be good and comfy!
That’s all in the latest video anyway, the other video, basically I just threw the camera out to record myself driving, I did one the other day which you can view here, but despite doing really well before the camera came on, I stalled the car constantly once the camera was on. But the latest one shows that I can now start the car without stalling! Basically, the other day my Mum was trying to explain to me how to get the car started, but the way she was saying it was different to how my Dad explained it. But now I’ve got the “bite” and clutch control almost sorted, I can now pull off! To those of you who don’t know what the clutch is, that’s a “stick shift” or “manual” car.
Well, I was intending to do a proper vlog this week, but my sisters boyfriend is staying round til Thursday, so unless everyone heads out for several hours then I can’t really do one, which is annoying.
