Three years ago today, the first Busted album was released. Random info for you all.

28.09.05

There is a new video message up on sonofdork.com (in the little TV screen on the main page bit). :-) Oo, and they're in Kerrang. KERRANG I TELL YOU!!! A pop band in Kerrang..!!!! I'll be buying that tomorrow, so scans will be up soon. I will be making a Son Of Dork website as well, but since sonofdorkonline.org is taken, I ought to think of a more original name. :-p

Ooh, and about the tribute CD: I have loads of emails, but I'm trying to sort out permissions before I reply to them all. I will reply when I have everything sorted out though, and I'll make a list of people and songs so far. Thanks everyone for your interest so far, I'm still looking for more though!

26.09.05

Time for a Johnny Panic plug! Their single, Automatic Healer, is out TODAY so go buy it! CD1 includes brand new tracks Prove It and Up All Night, and CD2 has an amazing acoustic version of one of their best tracks, Coming Up Roses (you can hear the album version on the non-Busted radio.blog. :-p). I know this isn't anything to do with Busted (apart from the fact Matt is friends with the lead singer - fact, people, check either Busted album thank yous if you don't believe me, ha), but they're one of my favourite bands right now and they deserve to do really well.

25.09.05

Wow. Can you believe this site is three years old? It's unbelievable how far the website has come - it started out on Freewebs with pretty much no layout, with me having barely any experience in web design. It was just another Busted fansite really, that I wanted to build up to be one of the best. And look where I am now. I want to thank each and every one of you who has visited the site, and I honestly appreciate every single message I receive with good feedback.

Obviously January this year was a bad patch for all of us, and I really had no idea what to do with this site. I wanted to keep it going, but then I wasn't sure if it was worth it. But in fact, since the Busted split on January 14th (two days after my birthday, can you believe! Bah!), this site has become even more popular than it already was. Which is pretty weird, but also amazing and.. I don't know, it's just strange, ha. I love you all, and I'm sorry about any times that I've unintentionally offended anyone, because it's the last thing I want to do.

So, thank you all so much again, for making this website and all the hard work worthwhile. You're all blimmin' amazing! Here's to another great year celebrating Fightstar, Son Of Dork's and soon Matt's success! Bring it on.

PS. Click on 'gallery' at the top. Still got LOADS to add, but it's a good start. I also have some Son Of Dork exclusives coming your way, some of which are up on my Son Of Dork page - click on the link about their old bands, and you'll find some info, and an exclusive mp3 of a performance by Steve's old band. Oo.

23.09.05

SONOFDORK.COM IS OPEN! It's a pretty snazzy site so far, I must say. So far on the site, you can find the news that was already on the site, band biographies, lots of new diary dates (been added to the schedule page), and.. AND A CLIP OF THE TICKET OUTTA LOSERVILLE VIDEO! Oh yes.

Holy Moly has reported on their weekly mail out that James was spotted outside Strongroom in Shoreditch on Thursday night talking on his mobile. He also appeared to be talking to a gossip magazine to say that 'James who-used-to-be-in-Busted' (ie. himself) had just been spotted going into a recording studio with his new band. Hahaha.

Oh, and there is a promo CD of Ticket Outta Loserville on eBay. It is currently £51, ridiculous! Haha, why can't the record company send me one? :-p Instrumental version of it, ooo.

21.09.05

Sorry I didn't update before now, I've been so busy today.

If you're a fan of Son Of Dork, are 18+, and can make it to London this Sunday (25th), then read on. There will be a daytime recording for TOTP at the BBC Television Centre, and as well as Son Of Dork (who sound like they'll be the final performance), you can see The Happy Mondays, Ms Dynamite and Starsailor among others. Doors open at midday, and PHOTO ID is required at the door to prove you're over 18. Only a limited number of tickets are available, so make sure you call 020 8576 1227 as soon as possible if you want to go. Full info is here, thank you to Chelly for that.

20.09.05

A picture of James and Matt from a nightclub on Friday night was posted on the Busted boards.

I'm glad Matt's got rid of the facial hair lol, I didn't like it that much. I like his new hair as well. It's nice to see him looking in good health again.

Also, thank you to everyone who has already expressed an interest in the Busted tribute CD (keep 'em coming!). I am going to have to look into permissions and so on for recording songs, so that we don't break any laws with this. I have spoken with Emily, and she thinks that you only need permission to cover songs if you are going to sell it for a profit. Obviously, CDs will be sold to cover the cost of the CD itself and postage, however I am going to look into this properly, because I don't really want to sell the CDs for just £1 or something each if a lot of work has to go into it. I will sort something out.

19.09.05

Sonofdork.com is almost open! It's got a bit of info, a lot we've heard before, but it mentions an exclusive TOTP appearance on October 2nd! The message board is also now open.

Fifteen people have said Son Of Dork definitely aren't supporting McFly. Three people claim they have. Believe what you wish, but I know which side I'm on lol. Apparently loads of people thought Famous Last Words (who ARE supporting McFly) were Son Of Dork though... hahah.

And now for something perhaps a little different. MY PLAN. Oh yes, ladies and gentlemen. Click here to read alllll about it. That is, if you're curious. :-p

PS. To whoever said 'you mean transpose, not modulate', aren't those pretty much the same thing?

18.09.05

Okay, I don't know whether Son Of Dork are supporting McFly or not. Two people have said they did last night and tonight, but I've also been told that they didn't, so I don't know what to believe now, ha!

I'm also cooking up a plan. It's not definitely going ahead yet, but it's going to involve Busted fans and microphones. And some instruments. Watch this space..

17.09.05

Son Of Dork are in next week's Smash Hits as well - but subscribers get it a week early. So a huge thanks to Jennifer for scanning it for me. :-)
Page 1 | Page 2 | Picture of James and Matt | Picture of James
Fightstar 'too rock' hahaha. Oh dear. Bits of good info though.

A few people have let me know that the Birmingham gig has been cancelled. :-( I don't know what's going on! Argh. So while I'm on the subject, I'm going to cover a few issues that have cropped up in conversations or in the forms.

So some people have asked me how Son Of Dork can tour when they haven't released anything yet. Granted, they've only been performing two songs at the pop festivals so far, but they have written their album, and recorded most (if not all) of it. Fightstar, for a relevant example, haven't got an album out, yet they've done plenty of tours already. All bands have to do months of touring in order to be merely noticed by record companies, and when you're in an unsigned band, you really don't have a great deal of money. Unless you're James Bourne (or similar), in which case you don't have a great deal of problems with either money or getting noticed. It usually costs £1000s to record an album, so you probably can't afford to make one until you've got a deal with a record label, and then there's the album artwork, the final producing, the distribution, just to name a few things that will set you back another substantial amount of money. And as I've already mentioned, before that, there's a lot of touring going on to get signed and generally noticed. And unfortunately, so many bands don't get noticed anyway, because a lot of A&R people* are, quite simply, idiots. :-p

Sorry if that was a bit rant-ish, I just wanted to clear a few things up and give a bit of an insight into how the music industry works.

*These are the people who sign the bands to their record label, they're always looking out for new talent, but many of them go for who will earn them the most money rather than basing their opinion completely on talent. That is how the music industry works, and it's shit.

16.09.05

Hmm, I'm not sure what's going on. Katie emailed me to let me know about another Son Of Dork gig at the London Garage on October 13th. However, if you go here, it says that it's been cancelled. I have no idea why that is.

But to lighten things up a bit, Son Of Dork will be on CD:UK on 8th October, for an interview AND the video, eeee. I'm expecting that the music channels will have the video by then, though.

And that texting for the live single is a bit cheeky! I only just got round to ordering it. 'thanks for pre-ordering your live Son Of Dork single, your pin number is [series of numbers]. Please check WWW.SONOFDORK.COM on 07.11 to download.' Yeah, thanks. I paid £1.50 to hear it now. :-p Haha.

15.09.05

Nice how the premiere of the Son Of Dork video for Ticket Outta Loserville was only shown to McFly fans at the first gig of their tour last night. :-( (just to clarify - I am NOT having a dig at McFly fans, it's just the fact that most Busted fans want to see it, and a lot of Busted fans aren't McFly fans, so you know, bit unfair..)

Little Son Of Dork cards were given out as well, with the following message:-
'FANS ONLY: GET YOUR EXCLUSIVE DOWNLOAD. Son Of Dork have recorded an exclusive live version of the forthcoming single TICKET OUTTA LOSERVILLE just for their fans. To order this download for you PC, SIMPLY TEXT SODLIVE TO 81330.'

Texts cost something like £1.50, so get downloading. Scans are here and here, courtesy of the wonderful Jin!

I want to see the video, baaaah. Don't suppose anyone, like, videoed it on their camera or something? Hahaha.

15.09.05

Click here and scroll down to 'World's best-selling new artist'..

Son Of Dork have their 4th gig lined up in Birmingham, at the Carling Academy 2 on October 5th. Tickets will go on sale on September 17th at 9am, and the gig is for over 14s ONLY. Time of the gig will be 7pm-11pm. Thanks very much to Tian for that info!

Brendan from Wheatus has also posted on wheatus.com about writing a song with James for Son Of Dork, he seems quite excited about it actually. You may not remember, but around last October I think it was, James mentioned that he was excited because he was working (or planning on) with Brendan as he's a huge Wheatus fan, so it's nice that they've been able to get some stuff together. :-) Credit to Graham for telling me about that!

There's also a short article in Sneak (thanks to Gemma for letting me know about this), basically saying that Emma has been spotted with her ex, Alex Zane, and it questions what's going on between her and Matt now. Who knows, their business etc, I just thought I'd post about it.

14.09.05

The four soundcheck videos are up, Eddie's Song and Ticket Outta Loserville are coming soon! Here's the lowdown on each part, around 3 minutes each.

Part 1 [download]
Not that interesting, Steve plays a bit of Blink 182 - Dammit on bass, and then Dave or Chris plays it on guitar. They play some other random bits, then Danny starts getting the drums set up.

Part 2 [download]
Danny still sorting out the drums, Dave plays something on guitar which I vaguely recognise, but I can't put my finger on it. It reminds me of The Used. James starts setting up, got some really good shots of Danny. James plays another familiar song that I can't think what it is, then they all play the start of Eddie's Song together.

Part 3 [download]
Most of this is them soundchecking Eddie's Song. They start it again and play some of it while James soundchecks his voice, then after a while, it's Steve's bass and James's voice on their own, then guitar. And then a random outburst of the intro of Sum 41 - Fat Lip on guitar lol. And something else. Some more decent shots of Danny, too.

Part 4 [download]
Eddie's Song again, this time they play most of it. And then the Simpsons theme tune is put in for good measure. Ignore the last second, I stopped the video-ripping too late so it caught the first band that were on lol.

By the way, James - HOW drunk were you last night? You spoon.

13.09.05

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MR. JAMES!! Can you believe he's 22?!

I've made that Son Of Dork page, it has basic info about each band member, pictures, audio, video and lyrics. Click here to see it!

12.09.05

YAY, I've got my Son Of Dork videos on the computer! I'm gonna put them on a CD and give them to my mate to upload tomorrow, because my computer keeps disconnecting when I try, grrr. There are 6 files in total, all between 11mb and 30mb: Eddie's Song, Ticket Outta Loserville, and then the soundcheck in 4 parts. So look forward to them tomorrow!

I'm going to make a temporary Son Of Dork page (it'll turn into a proper site) with all the video and audio links on, so you don't all have to search through this page for them. I think I'm going to get sodonline.org as a forwarding domain, and the site will be hosted on this domain.

11.09.05

Click to download Ticket Outta Loserville from Hit40UK (the studio version). Thank you to the staff at jamesbournespain.com for that! Also uploaded the interview, courtesy of Yaara. :-) Thanking yeeee!!

I've scanned the Son Of Dork article in Sneak - I found a couple of other scans, but they're not that great quality. So here it is, big enough to read, plus the Fightstar article on the next page.

I also found a random Son Of Dork (well, Free At The Dee, but it has more on SoD than anyone else lol) article here. James comments on Charlie in Fightstar (first time I've seen him talk about them, Oo) and also about a possibility of working with Matt again. Hurrah!

Talking of Matt, there are two rumours going round. One is that he's writing a book, but I have NO idea if it's true. He is also apparently performing on Record Of The Year this year. This could be true, as the previous winner always performs, but obviously as Busted won last year and then split, they can't do it. So we'll have to wait and see!

10.09.05

Ooooh. I knew Son Of Dork were in Sneak, but no one said much about it, so I assumed it was just boring stuff that we already know. However, I've just been told that there are exclusive pictures from the Ticket Outta Loserville video! So I'll try and get that tomorrow and scan the pics. Thanks to Lydia for letting me know about that!

Questions have been answered up to September 4th, I'll do this week's now heh. I've also just uploaded my pictures from Free At The Dee. I only managed to get three (well four, but the other one only has James's legs lmfao), because I was recording the whole thing on video, plus everyone was going mad, so I had to literally hold my camera up and pray. I should have got the guys behind me to take loads for me, bah. They're on here anyway, there are a few to come as well!

Another thing I've just uploaded is the video of Undesided performing Johnny B. Goode with Matt on Busted's last tour. I was uploading it for a friend anyway, so I thought I might as well post it on here - click!

And End Up Like This is possibly going on the Ticket Outta Loserville single, eeee. <3

09.09.05

Oooooh. Hit40UK has put up a couple of pictures that we haven't seen before. And some info, most of which we've seen before - but there's the truth about how they got the name Son Of Dork. I was right about that, woo - it's from a scene in the film Problem Child (if you remember, I googled 'Son Of Dork' to see if there was any significance and found that).

08.09.05

Chris has sent me a live video of Son Of Dork for you to download - scroll down and click on 'free' and then it should go to a page, and you have to wait about 40 seconds or so before you can download it (a big link should appear at the bottom after the 40 seconds). If it doesn't (like it didn't with me the first time), then I think it's because the server's busy or something, so try again later.

Also, non-Busted/SoD/etc, click here to email a pre-written letter to Tony Blair regarding the G8 meeting next week. It covers some important issues, so please do it. :-) Thanks.

I'll be answering questions this weekend, as usual I'm slacking haha. I need to prioritise things and schedule my life properly - don't worry though, I won't be closing this site because I love it too much. <3 Ha.

06.09.05

Thanks to Lucy, who has told me that Ticket Outta Loserville will be aired (the recorded version) for the first time ever this Sunday on Hit 40 UK (hit40uk.com) any time between 4-7pm (oops, I didn't mean to put the wrong time before haha). :-) Make sure you're listening! Apparently they're going to be on Radio 1 next week as well, someone said they're going to be performing, Oo.

I've updated the non-Busted radio with some awesome songs, ha. In case you're wondering where the Fightstar song is, it's now on the Busted radio, and I'm going to put live versions of Son Of Dork - Ticket Outta Loserville and Eddie's Song on that, too.

05.09.05

Kachookee from the busted.com has very kindly recorded SoD's set and interview from Free At The Dee from the radio, and you can download it here (or here ONLY if the first link doesn't work). Thank youuuu. <3

I'm going to try and get the videos up tomorrow. Still not sure what to do with the soundcheck videos, cause although you can't really see much, there are some really good shots of Danny, and they're just playing random things. I'll see what's worth uploading though.

04.09.05

Eeeeeeee, I just got home!!

I was actually quite worried in case for some odd reason, SoD weren't going to be on before we were going to leave (and we ended up leaving earlier than planned anyway) but they were on at 2pm, being the first band to be aired live on the radio.

Around 12-12.30, there was a big black strip across the stage so we couldn't see much, but there was a band doing soundcheck, just playing random things. Suddenly I saw long platinum blond hair, immediately recognised him as Dave, haaa. Except I wasn't 100% sure it was him, cause I couldn't see his face for ages. Anyway, I videoed pretty much all of their soundcheck (I think people were giving me funny looks cause I kept yelling 'OOOOOOOH I think I see Steve!' lmfao), even though you can't see much cause of the black strip. You see a lot of legs, hahaha. And there's a few really good shots of Danny banging away. They played some Blink 182 (Dammit - and I think that was a song they all played together randomly during the soundcheck), Sum 41 (Fat Lip), Danny played a bit of Are We The Waiting (Green Day) on drums, and Steve played a bit of American Idiot on bass. I can't remember what else, but Sophie and I were still only.. well, 97% sure it was SoD behind there LOL, but then we heard the intro of Ticket Outta Loserville, weeeee. And they played quite a bit of Eddie's Song, which I vaguely recognised.

In the actual set, they only played Eddie's Song and Ticket Outta Loserville.. they were on fourth, and all the bands before them had played at least three songs so I hoped they might have added another to their set. They were very good though - I videoed the whole lot, so I only got about four pictures or something, but Sophie managed to get quite a few. :-) We'll have to send films away though, so they'll hopefully be up in a few days.

Anyway, fantastic weekend! We left straight after Son Of Dork, went on some of the rides, and then it was home tiiiime. And that's my account of today. :-D

02.09.05

Sonofdork.com is up! Nothing on it yet, but you can see the release dates of the single and album (7th and 21st November respectively). Sorry if I miss any news over the weekend, and I'll see you on Monday! I'll hopefully have decent pictures/video of Son Of Dork to share as well.

So a quick request - could someone please record Son Of Dork's set from Free At The Dee if it's broadcast on Sunday afternoon on Northsound radio? You can tune in here or here. Thanks! :-D

Anyway, I have just done an interview with Mr Michael Raphael, who wrote Can't Break Thru and End Up Like This with James, and is currently working with Son Of Dork. Thought some of the interview would be of interest:

You are in a fantastic band, Neve. Why did you break up, and how did the re-union come about?
.............
About 4 years after Neve broke up James Bourne used to always ask me to re-form Neve because he is a major fan. I started thinking about the possibility of a Neve reunion and what that could mean. So I called the lead singer and asked if he would be interested and he said 'Book it' so I booked a date at the famous Whiskey a go go on the sunset trip in Hollywood and it sold out quickly, It was a great night.

How did you meet and end up working with James Bourne?
I met James in L.A. because once again James is a diehard Neve fan. James came over to my studio the first time we met and we wrote a song called 'Can't Break Thru' which I produced and was later remixed by the Busted producer. 'Cant Break Thru' appeared on the Busted 'Present For Everyone' CD.

James has mentioned that his current band, Son Of Dork, have Gil Norton producing their album, but taking a glance at your myspace, you seem to have something to do with it, too. How involved are you with it?
As far my involvement with 'Son of dork' I have two songs going on the cd, which I wrote with James in London. Let me just add the son of dork CD will be the best thing you ever heard come out of London in a long while, it's freakin amazing!

Who has been your favourite person to work with?
James Bourne for sure, We're like best friends now.

Those are from the main interview, and then I asked an extra question regarding End Up Like This:
I also have a question more for myself than for the magazine. When did you write Can't Break Thru and End Up Like This with James? Just to clear up a lot of speculation, particularly over End Up Like This.
Well 'Can't Break Thru' was written before 'End Up Like This', like I said before 'Can't Break Thru' was for the second Busted cd. As far as 'End Up Like This' James and myself were writing that for a different artist and it leaked out through my web site. We wrote that in 2003 and it was never meant to be heard but apparently it testeed very well, Maybe that song will end up somewhere down the road, who knows.

If you're interested, you can read the full interview here. :-)

Also in Fightstar news, they are to release a new single at the end of October called Waste A Moment (played live at the Barfly under the name of 'Run' apparently). It will be on 3 formats - CD, DVD and vinyl, with brand new tracks for b sides. Exciting stuff!

01.09.05

Eee, it's September. I've updated the Son Of Dork picture page - added about 100 pictures! Again, a huge thanks to everyone who has contributed - for a band that's done two gigs so far, that's quite a lot of pictures! Haha.

On Sunday (at the Aberdeen gig), I will be wearing a bright pink jacket with black zips all over it (not sure what underneath - either a black tee or a black/pink striped vest top), black/pink trousers and bright pink trainers, ha*. So if you're going, watch out for me and don't be afraid to come and say hi! I don't bite. :-p And it would be awesome to meet anyone who comes on here hehe.

* I don't plan what I wear every day, it's just I'll only be taking one outfit away with me other than what I'm wearing when I leave, so that'll be what I'll wear on the Sunday. :-p