"I'm scared of everyone so I must be a liberal"

Last week I enjoyed the shambling misanthropy of Dylan Moran, as he wheeled around the stage on the final London date of his Monster II tour. The content of much of his wine and cigarette fuelled ramblings (although the cigarettes seemed to be waved around rather than smoked, and the wine glass stayed almost full throughout the performance) was as old as the hills (foreigners, the difference between men and women, Brits abroad) and may have given Moses cause to smile when he caught Sinai's latest stand-up act, in between parting the Red Sea and growing a beard, but rightfully shouldn't have raised much of a titter from the audience at the Palace Theatre in 'London's glittering West-End' (it's the way the neon of strip joints and kebab shops glitters across the surface of newly laid vomit on the pavement). But there is something about Moran's delivery, including his surreally inventive way with words (to him, children are "midget drunks") and the curious intimacy he strikes with the audience, that makes his act almost consistently funny - plus I'm always going to enjoy watching an outspoken misanthrope banging on for an hour and half. He's good-looking too, apparently.

Closer to the end of the week, as Matt has once again beaten me to reporting, Gomez played the Hammersmith Apollo. Another very good gig - Gomez seem to look exactly the same as they always have done: like physics undergraduates. They also sound exactly as they always have done, which was perfect, because live, they sound great. There was one problem with the evening though, which is often a problem with gigs. I was standing fairly near the stage. During the more upbeat numbers, I glanced forward jealously at the people in front of me, dancing, moving around and generally making the most of the opportunity to drink in the atmosphere and enjoy themselves. And I tried to, but it just wasn't the same - because standing dead in front of me were two blokes standing stock still with their arms crossed. The inflexible wall of T-shirt meant that I just couldn't really get into it. After a few songs, with our frustration increasing, Claire and I weaved forward, this time ending up only a couple of metres from the stage. But, yet again, we were unlucky enough to be stuck behind two skinheads, who, although within gobbing distance of the stage (to use their own value judgements), appeared to be paralysed. I remember a similar frustration seeing Moby a while back - his music is, of course, much more dancey than Gomez's. Everyone around me was moving and dancing, except for two hairless builders, standing as if frozen by the rig lights and simply staring resolutely forward. I don't have a problem if people want to watch a gig motionless, or gently toe-tap from the sidelines - I've done it enough times: but not right at the front. What's the point of them just standing there? Why don't they stop blotting the atmosphere, in a shaven-headed-over-sized-Ben-Sherman-shirt sort of way and slouch off outside and chat with the touts (I'm sure they have about the same level of interest in the music)? That way they can let me, and everyone else down at the front, get on with enjoying slightly tired student-blusey-rock, which I did, immensely (having again ducked forward past the second immovable wall).

And, talking of skinheads, I'll leave the last word to Dylan Moran, chatting to a trio of them: "Hey you know when you're doing your usual threesome thing you do of a weekend, and the moonlight's bouncing off your heads and your arses and everything, does that not get a bit confusing?"