After the recent success of the Cigarettes After Sex gig, I thought that maybe the upcoming Hans Zimmer concert might be worth popping along to.
I’m not a huge fan, but if the tickets aren’t too much, then…
Ah. Terrifying.
I wonder what’s left on offer?
Maybe not then.
Who in earth is buying tickets at that price?
Bishopscourt residents and digital nomads, I guess.
I’ll be honest. I wasn’t sure what to expect from last night’s concert at Grand West.
Texas band Cigarettes After Sex were in town (and they are again tonight), and while I love their music, I’m far from their target audience.
Except, do they actually have a target audience? Because it seemed to all intents and purposes that they were just there last night to enjoy playing their music. And maybe that’s it: the age of the audience stretched from 12 to 70, and so while there might be some demographic or other to whom their music appeals more than another (it’s white, mainly female, teenage and 20-somethings, if you want to know), I don’t think that the band really cares at all.
And that’s fine.
I don’t think I’ve ever been to a concert that’s had less band interaction with the audience. Literally “This is our first concert in Cape Town. We really appreciate you all coming along”, halfway through the set, and “Thank you, Cape Town. We love each and every one of you”, at the end. And that was it.
But that was also fine.
It left more room for the music – which is what I was there for – and (as I mentioned above), clearly what they were there for, too.
No flashy lights, no colour. Just a lot of spots, white LEDs and all of the CO2 that they could muster. They began playing in a light “tank”, with dry ice walls lit between them and the audience, but those came down early on, leaving light beams picking out the band members in front of a huge screen full of monochromatic images and videos of moonrises, sunsets, grasses, clouds, rain and snow.
This was very simple stuff, done simply.
And then for the big finale – Apocalypse – a couple of MASSIVE glitter balls which filled the place with dancing, shimmering stars for a couple of breathtaking, spine tingling minutes.
Randall and Jacob never moved from their respective stations, while lead singer Greg Gonzalez occasionally marched down to the front or out to the wings of the stage and offered up his guitar to the audience like some sort of subservient soul looking for praise or recognition, as he delivered the final riff of a song.
It might all have seemed rather emotionless, and yet it was weirdly, deeply spiritual at the same time. Outwardly cold, and yet completely captivating. I was entranced, and I could have spent literally hours just listening to their music. And I think that they could have spent hours just playing it for us.
Tejano Blue and Nothing’s Gonna Hurt You Baby were memorable, while Dreaming Of You was surprisingly rocky and upbeat, before Apocalypse brought the house down (as much as something that slow, gentle and profoundly beautiful could break anything other than hearts). And then Opera House as a single track encore was just gorgeous.
So, after all my wondering before the evening began, am I now more sure of what I got?
Yes, I suppose so.
All in all a rather odd, but really incredible performance that will live long in the memory.
tl;dr – Help my friend’s partner out by donating towards her medical expenses after she had a stroke aged 24, and then was hit by a brick during a taxi protest by donating here and sharing this post.
It’s not often that I ask my readers to consider helping out with a charitable cause.
There was that one, of course, where we were able to make such a massive difference to a young lad’s life.
We were even on CNN. Incredible to think that that was 13 years ago now.
Can we do something as big again?
I play football with a great bunch of guys. I’ve mentioned this before. One of those guys is Andile.
Here’s the story of his girlfriend Saffron, and how you might be able to help her out.
These are words from her physiotherapist, Jennifer.
Saffron is a lovely outgoing 27 year old young lady who suffered a massive stroke in October 2022 that left her with severe paralysis of her right side and unable to use her right arm or leg.
Through incredible hard work with her therapists, she regained the ability to walk again and even started going to the gym. In June 2023, after months of work, she started getting some movement back in her right shoulder and elbow and could even close her hand a little bit.
On July 26th 2023, Saffron suffered a setback when she had a significant seizure. This was due to the scar tissue in her brain causing a short circuit. She was immediately put on anti-seizure medication – which she has to be on for life.
On Saturday, August 5th, 2023, Saffron and Andile were driving past the IY township in Hout Bay, when the thugs that were participating in the taxi strike violence threw a brick at their car. It entered the passenger window and hit Saffron on her head – right over her new skull implant. It shattered the implant and caused a new bleed on her brain. Saffron had to have immediate emergency surgery and the broken plate had to be removed.
After her second surgery, Saffron continued with intensive therapy and was able to start walking within 6 weeks. This took a huge effort, as the second injury damaged her brain further and really impacted the movement in her right arm and leg.
In October 2024, blood tests showed ongoing cellular inflammation despite Saffron being otherwise healthy. Finally, she got a diagnosis – Takayasu’s arteritis. This is a rare, incurable autoimmune condition that causes inflammation in large blood vessels, clot formation and strokes. By starting large doses of steroids, she was able to slow damage, but will sadly have to be on medication forever. The treatment also has significant side effects and it has taken all Saffron’s courage and determination to continue her fight to recovery.
At the moment, Saffron is still requiring a combination of Physiotherapy, Occupational Therapy, Speech Therapy and Biokinetic Therapy, which adds up to about R25 000 a month. Medical aid has not been covering any of this for the past year, which has depleted all our previously raised funds. Saffron still needs all these therapies for at least another year, if not longer.
Her boyfriend, Andile, has never left her side, and is now adding to his health goals in support of her. As a cyclist, he is dedicating his ride in the coming Cape Town City Cycle Tour to raising funds for Saffron. I will also be doing the cycle race to bring awareness to patients who have had neurological injuries.
If you would like to support Saffron in her recovery, please consider donating a few rands for every kilometer of the race. It is 109km in length and follows the beautiful Cape Peninsula.
As her physiotherapist, I have been very honored to have worked with Saffron during the past 24 months. There is no-one more deserving of our support to assist her to overcome these setbacks.
Thank you for considering a contribution to help this gutsy young lady. All donations will be used strictly for medical costs.
Here’s the link you need.
https://www.backabuddy.co.za/campaign/cycling-for-saffron
I can vouch for Andile, Saffron and backabuddy (the local equivalent of JustGiving or GoFundMe).
Every little helps: even just sharing this post or their website link on your social media.
Foreign currency goes a LONG WAY in South African Rands. Just saying.
So… please… go for it.
Help out financially if you’re able.
Share this post on your social media and maybe someone who sees it will also donate.
Thanks, all.
Woke up to news of Stage 6 (six) loadshedding and the sound of a spotter plane and fire helicopters overhead.
This isn’t good.
The Stage 6 loadshedding is “retribution from the Government for the VAT increase not going through in the Budget speech”, according to some online pundits. But this seems a little silly to me. The Budget speech was postponed four days ago. Why wait until 1am on a Sunday morning if you are a vindictive ruling party wanting to make a point? Who – apart from the most weird of tinfoil hat wearers (see above) – is going to put those two and two together to make four? Far more likely is that the power grid – held together with vinegar and brown paper borrowed from Jack of the famous nursery rhyme – fell over when someone forgot to tie the string properly.
Others online suggested that the loadshedding was somehow the City of Cape Town’s fault, arguing that “Cape Independence can’t come soon enough”, while conveniently forgetting that a massive 0.26% of the 58.64% of voters who turned out, actually supported that idea in last year’s election.
Either way, any way, whatever: it’s a shlep being without power for 12 hours a day. Again.
The fire is on Table Mountain, probably about 4km from our place, but it’s heading up and away from us at the moment. “African prayer groups” was the wildest conspiracy theory I saw for this one, but why not “retribution from the Government for the VAT increase not going through in the Budget speech”? Cyril’s place is literally 1km from where it mysteriously started in the early hours of the morning.
Either way, it’s far from sorted yet, and the spotter plane is still circling overhead, endlessly spotting.
The best way to get around these problems is to try and ignore the drone of the plane and the lack of electricity, and go to the gym. And so that’s what I did. And it was as I left the gym that I thought I saw the silhouette of a woodpecker in a tree in the back garden.
As you do.
But no, woodpeckers do have a rather distinctive shape. So I wandered closer to investigate and yes:
The old bird proof/ID photography policy thing worked well here. Get any photo first, no matter how bad, and then try to work from there. That’s what this is: the first bit. I gave up on the work from there bit, as I was knackered from the gym.
And that’s a female Olive Woodpecker (Dendropicos grisocephalus). Not uncommon, apparently, but a first for me, and certainly a first for me in our garden. The male was there too, but he didn’t hang around for a hastily taken photo like his missus. She was also gone pretty soon afterwards (probably as retribution from the Government for the VAT increase not going through in the Budget speech), but a nice spot and one to watch out for again.
I’m looking forward to an afternoon of napping and football watching, now that the odd morning is done.
None of the horses that we wanted to win, won.
And that was quite annoying.
At first, it was just a bit annoying, but then, as the sequence continued, it got more and more annoying.
Not even this guy could relieve the gloom, as he was squeezed out just as it looked like he was about to break for the line.
Thankfully, there was good beer and good company, because the rest was – as I may already have pointed out – rather kak.