Can I audition to be an asshole please?

OH Satan must be delighted. We, the people of Norn Iron, have sucked on his nether regions and are now hosting an event so divorced from reality that we carry headlines about people "auditioning" to be in the audience!
Yes, you read that right, if you or your brain dead, semi-literate, and certainly not self-aware friends wanted to be in the audience for the MTV European Music Awards on Sunday then those who were not Belfast City councillors (oh how ridiculous is that? Belfast City Council invests in music so old aged has-been political non-entities get free tickets) had to audition to get one of the "extra" 120 tickets.

No doubt it was a carefully planned PR coup (when I'm not writing I work on an in-house PR team...so shoot me!) to have several hundred people who do ot care that the "audience member" criteria was to behave as a dick for the media in a desparate (well no-one offered a kidney or their first born child, so not that desparate then!) bid to be close to the 'stars' or be on TV.

First thing to get clear: fuck off you brain dead numpties! Just fuck the way off! That you would even audition to be in the audience is stupid enough! To be photographed and quoted in the news admitting to the world that you have no sense of proportion...just what were you thinking.

Can you imagine auditions for hard rock and metal gigs:
Q1 - Can you drink beer?
Q2 - Do you own at least two tour t-shirts
Q3 - Have you ever, under the influence of Jagermeister or Jack Daniels sang out of tune
Q4 - Do you understand that Justin Beiber's life should be forfeit in any civilised society?

Yes - big news in Belfast! Justin Beiber is to play at the MTV EMA event in the Odyssey Arena! Grab yer shotguns friends, we get to hunt a 17-year-old that is as manly as a Bangkok ladyboy. Ohhh, he's had several squilion losertube views, so he must be the NEXT BIG THING! No talent? Check! Pretty boy cheekbones? Check! Soccer mum and teeny audience demographic market secured? Check!

NI Music Week is actually a great initiative Belfast City Council has undertaken. Even if hard rock and metal is sidelined as usual, at least it is promoting Norn Iron acts. MTV EMA might get one set of foreign journos to hear something that doesn't have a drum machine or choreographed miming...well I am a dreamer!

Let me, as All Hallow's Eve fades into All Saint's Day (stolen from ancient Celtcic traditions by the church because ancient Celts were rocking out and having too much fun!) explain what is coming up in this week and coming weeks.

On Tuesday the NI Music Awards will see Stiff Little Fingers be accorded the title 'Legends', a title all punk, rock and metal fans should already know they have already attained. On the same night, the nice guy of Guns 'n' Roses, Duff McKagan, will bring his Loaded back to the Spring and Airbrake.

On Friday The Answer, Therapy?, and La Faro will be at the Ulster Hall, rocking it to its foundations.

If you want to chill out a little on Sunday Stormzone are having a listening party at the Diamond Rock Club, Ahoghil for their latest SPV releae Zero to Rage.

On Monday 7th Turisas and the Devon Townsend Project will be destroying the Ormeau Road.

Then on the 10th Manowar will be fighting then world once more, bringing the Black Wind, Fire and Steel to the Mandella Hall.

And that's not to metion Dimmu Borgir, Cynic, Black Stone Cherry and Fish.

Not that the "Bureaucratic Capitalist Whore Cowards", to quote Bill Hicks, would ever consider something as risky as having an actual proper live rockin' act on stage; Therapy? got away with it, but then Metallica played "So What" (and I shouldn't have to tell you about those lyrics!) and frightened the advertisers.

So with TV approved "audiences" and global entertainment "reporters" coming from across the globe thank you for reading my rants; get to gigs when you can; buy the CDs, back local talent and never, ever, stop rockin'!