Storm Ridden

This Spring is the moment of the British rock bands - Bastille and the 1975 to name a few personal favourites. Independent bands are always my port of call when looking for new music and Storm Ridden are latest Brit-band to step into the spotlight. Based in Wolverhampton, Storm Ridden is a four-piece who are influenced old school rock like Black Sabbath with an added a pinch of blues flavour, creating an eclectic style of music that is difficult to place. This band is proving that rock 'n' roll music isn't best left to the oldies and with the right amount of modern touches, is still totally relevant. 

The group are made up of lead guitar Ryan, bassist Luke, drummer Alex and vocalist Tom and were formed in the Summer of 2013. Tom has a really unusual voice which really adds to the uniqueness of the band - I really love his vocal style as it's unlike anything I've ever come across before in the modern music scene.  The guitar is spot on, with some really catchy riffs. The bass nails a focal part in the intro In The Summerhouse and drums add a strong rhythm to the songs, giving them a heavier edge. Storm Ridden play the kind of music that fans of heavier rock 'n' roll and even metal are bound to love but those who are into to a more current vibe will enjoy too. 

It's not for everyone, but for you guys who love old school tunes and are on the lookout for new band that will conjure up nostalgic feelings of the glory days of rock yet still keep things fresh, you should definitely check out these guys.

Check out their video for In The Summerhouse below

You'll enjoy if you like

Black Sabbath ♦ Guns & Roses ♦ Iron Maiden

Check out their Facebook
& Soundcloud

♣

September so far...

... has been rainy. Very rainy. It's made me quite fearful of stepping outside of my door, but I'm going to have to overcome that phobia soon as my third year at uni is just around the corner. It's kind of really scary to think that in a years time I'll be a proper grown-up, looking for a proper job. Yikes. 

It's probably just as scary for you guys starting uni too, it's a huge step up from school or college. You're probably nervous about workloads, deadlines and of course making new friends - maybe my advice will help you on that front ...? But seriously, just be yourself, have fun but above all, work hard. Yes, this sound quite boring but if you want to have a great time you've got to keep on top of your studies. It's not as hard as you've heard, promise! You can do it.

I couldn't choose which colour, so I got both ♦ My inspirational advice to all freshers starting uni... ♦ OOTN for Tori Kelly, ßclick the link! ♦ My bro baked - so good ♦ Funny-face speccy-twonk ♦ Rubicon Mango Swirl ice cream

Hope you have a super September ♣  

instagram.com/alicebambino

I'm listening to ...Nina Nesbitt

A lot of you may know Nina Nesbitt, aka singer/songwriter of Stay Out and Ed Sheeran's latest gal pal. And I'm girl crushing hard.  

A while back, I heard Boy while browsing Youtube and presently shoved it straight on my iPod - and I'm ashamed to say I kind of forgot about it. Recently I heard a familiar sweet voice on the chart show - and there was wee Nina was her latest hit Stay Out. Needless to say, my love affair with Miss Nesbitt was well and truly rekindled. 

18 year old Scottish Nina has already supported both Ed Sheeran and Example and is now making her own waves in the music scene, so far reaching an impressive 21 on the official chart with Stay Out. What I find shocking is that her 2012 debut single Boy only reached 139 on the chart, I mean what?! This song is amazing, the lyrics are deep and sparkling with emotion and of course her beautiful voice is totally addictive. Seriously, I've had this song on repeat so much I'm surprised I haven't broken it. Check it.

I love Nina's style in Stay Out, it's right up my street. Also got some serious hair envy. But yeah, the music. Still acoustic  folky and upbeat, it's literally just the perfect getting ready, chilling out tune and I love the fact that she gets ID'd in the vid. Some verisimilitude, I like it! 

She tackles the issues that most of us girls go through, but she spins them into insightful and enchanting songs with innocently ethereal vocals. Plus, she's a total style icon. Definitely one to watch, and perfect music for Summer. You will love. 

You'll enjoy if you like

Ed Sheeran ♦ Gabrielle Aplin ♦ Ellie Goulding ♦ Belle and Sebastian 

Big Bang Alive Tour London ♥♪

BIG BANG!

Where do I begin? I've been waiting for this for years, and it was hard to believe that it was finally here. One of my very very favourite Kpop groups Big Bang came to Wembley Arena in London, and of course I was going to be in attendance.

The tickets arranged so prettily 

This year has been crazy for Kpop; if it wasn't surreal enough that Psy is now an international star, imagine how it weird it felt being just metres away from the guys I thought I'd only see through a computer screen. Incredible.

There was a slight hiccup, a few songs into their set the steward who had shown us to our seats came over with two other girls and starting speaking to Alex. I assumed she'd made a mistake so ignored this, until I noticed Alex picking up her things. Apparently, the woman had made a mistake and took us to the wrong seats, ours were the other side of the arena! I was raging, as we had to run around other side of the building, missing most of Fantastic Baby in the process. Luckily, our rightful seats were in the exact same place, just the opposing side. Phew! We had a great view.

I was pleasantly surprised to see that they had a live band,  and were gracious enough to introduce the members towards the end of the set. The encore was definitely the best I've ever seen; consisting of a total of four songs. Taeyang finished the show by singing a snippet of All I want for Christmas is you, complete with topless dancing ;)

GD & T.O.P singing Knockout

Taeyang - Wedding Dress

I love how you can hear me going 'what's he saying' in this one :') 

Apologies if my squeals damaged your little ears

Seungri's attempt at the English accent was atrocious, but so cute and funny!

 Here he is teaching us how to dance to Fantastic Baby. You may also notice Taeyang has a bit of tissue stuffed up his nose, that's because he got a nosebleed mid-song, the poor dear. Still carried on like a pro, looking just so professional as you can see :')

♦

To sum up, Big Bang's concert was without a doubt the best show I've ever seen, they performed brilliantly and really interacted with us VIPs and made us never want to leave. They promised they would be back, and I seriously cannot wait for that.
You can guarantee I'll be there ..♣

Pink & White Candy Cane Nails

Hello bubalas! 

Haven't posted for a bit, I've had a mental couple of weeks, and I'm setting sail for another one tomorrow. Phew, uni is incredibly tiring. I'm excited to interview the head of events and entertainment in the city Wednesday, but of course I'm very nervous, so wish me luck :)

I'm in the process of writing a post on my 'unwearable' shirt, so look out for that within the next week or so. Like I say, there's rather a lot going on. On top of all my work, it's Jack's birthday on Tuesday, so I've had to get myself organised for that. Perhaps soon I'll get some sleep :')

Hope you like the nails, they are kind of like my candy cane/rock summer nails but I've opted for the more traditional pink and white. Cute, no? I'm thinking about doing a Christmas version, red white, green and gold maybe? Hmm ...

Hope you have a stupendous week ☺
..♣

Chillin' in the dark

I'm so white.

Hello my little lovelies! Serious flash going on here, it was rather dark. My face is like a ghost's. I've had a somewhat inspiring week at uni, you see, over the holiday I'd been having a crisis about my future. You know the kind; freaking out about what you'll do after the degree - but my lecturers have kind of indirectly made me feel better about things, which is nice ☺

Jack called this picture 'Bot Blasting'  :')

Cardie - H&M, Tee - Red or Dead, Jeans - H&M, Boots - Hypnotic

You may have noticed I have a bobby pin attached to my tee. It might look a tad strange  but I find it one of the most convenient and useful places of keeping them - they are always there if you need them and you need never take them off, I often just shove them in the wash on my tops. Handy, no? :')

U-kiss - Break Time, U-kiss Only one, G-Dragon - Shine a light CD & DVD, SHINee - Hello (signed), United Cube - Hyuna, 4minute, Beast & G.NA, G-Dragon - Shine a Light book

What I've been listening to... ♪

At the moment, I've mainly been cracking out my beloved Kpop. It's cheering me up through the post-summer blues. Here's my collection of Kpop CDs, I haven't bought a new one for quite some time aha. The last one I got was my United Cube CD, which is a compilation of singers and groups from the entertainment agency Cube. My friend and I were lucky enough to see these artists in concert up in London last Christmas, it was truly amazing! I won this signed SHINee album ages ago through Arirang radio competition.

 Don't you think Kpop CDs are so much prettier? You should see the inside of them

Anyways, hope you've had a great weekend ♣

GD says 'Get Yo Crayon!'

Just a quick music post about one of the most stylish guys I know - it has to be GD.

I've mentioned G-Dragon before, but for those of you who don't know, he is a Kpop star who sings as part of the amazing group Big Bang and also as a solo singer.

 Along with many other Kpop singers, he influenced my style in many ways over the years, so I really want to show you guys his latest MV, Crayon.

GD once again has blonde hair, this time with a tint of ice blue. I'm loving it! To me, although I love all the different colours and styles he's experimented with, he's never looked better than with blonde hair. Hawt.

This is just a fun, care-free song with a hilarious video that is guaranteed to put you in a good mood. It's perfect for a party, or getting ready for a night out with your friends. Actually, it's perfect for the club, but I think it's very unlikely I'm going to hear it in any nightclubs round here soon :')

Personal style favourites in this vid are the distressed camo jacket, shiny black jacket and rainbow striped jacket. I like jackets. G-Dragon rocks the metro-sexual look like no other.

Image from G-Dragon's twitter @IBGDRGN

What do you think of GD's latest tune? And of course, what do you make of his unusual style?

♣

What I'm Listening to .. Of Monsters and Men

Did anyone else read the book Of Mice and Men at GCSE? No? Well it doesn't matter, because this band has nothing to do with it.

They're actually an Icelandic six-piece folk band, which admittedly doesn't actually sound that appealing, but trust me, you'll love them.

Great styling too, don't you think?

Chances are, a lot of you will have already heard their debut single, Little Talks, but if you haven't, you need to right now. What I like so much about this song is that it's good, proper music, it's utterly catchy without the bleeps and bloops you get in 'songs' to these days. I think it actually has a kinda ska feel to it, because of the brass instruments used.

I also love the music video. I happened upon it whilst channel flicking the other day and was entranced - it's deliciously gothic and reminds me of that book, Where the Wild things are. I'm drawn to weird things, so I immediately jumped on Google and looked into the group.

The members are: Singer/guitarist Nanna Bryndís Hilmarsdóttir, singer/guitarist Ragnar "Raggi" Þórhallsson, guitarist Brynjar Leifsson, drummer Arnar Rósenkranz Hilmarsson, piano/accordion player Árni Guðjónsson, and bassist Kristján Páll Kristjánsson, but they also recruited trumpet player Ragnhildur Gunnarsdótti into the mix for their 2012 tour. Props to anyone who can pronounce their names. 

Here's a live version of the song too, how beautiful Ragnar's voice? Swoooooon 

Trumpet solo! The music industry needs more trumpets, fer serious.

I only wish I'd discovered them sooner, I've been looking for some new music to listen too for quite some time so I'm seriously gonna get their album! Incidentally, if you guys are listening to some cool jamz at the moment, drop me some names, my iPod needs something fresh. 

☺

You'll like this group if you enjoy:

♦ Mumford and sons ♦ Ellie Goulding ♦ Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros

Chucking another song out to you, Dirty Paws.

Their album, My Head is an Animal, is out now.

Wireless 2012

Yoyo! I am soooo tired, as this weekend was my first ever festival - Wireless :) 

The headliner was none other then the amazing Rihanna and everyone was of course super psyched for her set, but all the other acts on the Main Stage were great too. We saw: Cher Lloyd, Pitbull, Rizzle Ricks, Labyrinth, J Cole & Jessie J. We would have wandered off to have a look at the Pepsi Max and Unwind stages, but we were so tightly compacted we could barely move (like sardines). Plus, we couldn't risk losing our place :3

Jacket- Peacocks, Crop- Republic, Skirt- H&M,
Tights- Henry Holland , Boots- Hypnotic, Necklace- Jack's mom

I honestly didn't think it would be as muddy as it was. As a naive festival virgin, I made the mistake of wearing boots that had a hole in them, as I figured it wouldn't matter if they got wrecked in the crowd. My toes were swimming in mud all day and my feet looked zombified when I took my tights off. No joke, they were disgusting.
The weather was crazy- I've never seen it so erratic, it went from heavy rain to boiling sun. I had once laughed at those wearing the funny little plastic ponchos, I now realise they are necessary, and I desperately wanted one. I apologise :') 

Amazingly, that jewel stayed on my face all day.

My favourite performances were Cher, Jessie J, Labyrinth and of course, Rihanna. I didn't really rate Pitbull if I'm honest as a lot of his songs require the featuring artists to be there or they're kinda a bit, ahem, crap. So when Ne-yo came out to sing Give me everything with him, we all went mad! To his credit though, Pitbull did get the crowd going and people around us seemed to know the words to his songs, so props to him (:

As you know, I've already seen and loved Cher in concert before, and she did not disappoint this time. I'm really proud of her as it must be nerve-racking to perform on the main stage before greats like Rihanna, and she did an excellent job. I also went to Jessie J's concert last year, and she surpassed the performance she gave, which i didn't think was possible. Her voice is honestly incredible.

 I have a lot of pictures but most of them are kinda blurry, so I'll just share a few with you :) 

Labyrinth! I loved his shirt

Rizzle Kicks

J cole

Jessie blasting

The queen ;)

There were so many cool outfits at Wireless, but Alex and I couldn't help but notice quite a few 'Cheek Offenders' Not a good shorts to bum ratio. 'Nuff said.

So yeah, here's my Top Tips for surviving festival season:
♦ Bring wellies. That's wellies, not Toms, like some unfortunate souls decided to wear

♦ Bring a water-proof mac/poncho. It's England, it's going to rain.

♦ Wiggle your way through. Instead of obviously pushing through the crowd and pissing people off, wait for it to loosen up a bit and wiggle your way through the gaps towards the front. It works.

♦ Don't not vacate your space for anything. You would not believe how many people at the front were being carried out, presumably because they felt sick. Okay, obviously if you're literally gonna puke or give birth or something, that's different.

So that's my festival experience. I could write more, but I've kinda written an essay already. I'm off to rest and munch my ultimate comfort food, noodles and soy sauce. Nothing beats it ♣

Check out ... Kyla La Grange

It's not easy to find proper music these days. By proper music, I mean instruments, not computers - and voices, not auto-tune. Sure, it serves it's purpose in a club when you just wanna let loose and dance, but if you're anything like me, it doesn't quite cut it when you just wanna chill to something a bit more, er, meaningful sounding. Enter Kyla La Grange.

It was her style that drew me in first. Known as the 'Watford Witch,' she looks so grungy yet glam and I absolutely love her hair, it's exactly how I'm wanting mine right now! According to an interview in Company mag, she has her mom to thank for her rockin style - she borrows her mother's old '70's clothes and weird pendants. I hoped that her tunes would live up to her cool image, and luckily, she delivers gold with a gothy sound. She has raspy yet sweet and strong vocals over her melodies. She kinda reminds me of Kate Bush. 

The Kyla songs I've listened aren't exactly perky, so it's not really the kinda vibe for a party, but it's perfect for winding down with your iPod and indulging. It's just the right amount of darkness and catchy-ness, so will appeal to most, especially if you're an Adele fan and like sad songs. I'm totally a fan of her, she's helping to usher in the new age of real music.

This is her latest single Vampire Smile, which she says was written about someone she really liked so much it was driving her mad. Ouch, love hurts. Check it, it's not as Twilight-y as it sounds, it's cool :)) Her album, Ashes, is out on June 30th.

Let me know what you think of her ☺

Cher Lloyd rocks up Birmingham

Sorry for the lack of posts, my boyfriend's house was burgled and my laptop was stolen, along with lots of other things :( Luckily everyone's fine, which is the main thing :) I'm using my sister's laptop at the moment because I have to show you guys the pictures of Cher Lloyd's concert last night at the HMV Institute in Birmingham :D

Alex and I queued from about quarter past three, got aching legs and hips but it was so worth it as we ended up right at the front! I've loved Cher ever since I first saw her on the X Factor and seriously have been looking forward to this concert for ages.

She looked amazing in a sheer skirt (which I thought was similar to my veil dress) hotpants, a grey bralet and a cute hat, accesorised with a spikey necklace and long cross chain. Her voice was amazing; so unique and note perfect. She is so talented, my videos aren't great qualtity, but I'm sure you can find some fancams on Youtube :)

Also, I should point out that the support acts were great to. The first was a band called No Lights At Lockdown, check them out on Facebook :) I'm not actually sure what the other twosome act were called, as they didn't really introduce themselves as a band or anything, but the girl had a nice bralet on :3

Alex has some good photos of what we wore for the wonderful event, but I'll have to add them to this post when we get hold of them ;D For now, here's my stylish new tour t-shirt and my awful selca's taken in my mirror as per :']

Tour t-shirt, how cool is this?

New creepers!

Sorry about the crazy amount of pictures , but hey, you guys needed to see these!

I'll try to post as much as possible but I'm not sure when my beloved laptop will be replaced, so forgive me if I can't yeah? Much love to you all :3

 Oh yarr, and Happy Easter (:

T-Shirt - Topshop

Skirt - H&M

Creepers - Ebay

Watch - Jeremy Scott for Swatch

Bracelet - Pandora