mouselle

Right..I'm off to bed!

 

I'll set tomorrows homework now as I'll be at work and too busy to set it tomorrow!

 

My favourite Mika interview/interview answer is.........

 

The now usual 100 words or less please.

 

Students are encouraged to use links/pictures/quotes/etc

After long consideration, this has come up as my favourite- it's not really an interview, but still gives me a lot of insight into Mika.

It's Mika at the BBC, doing a soundcheck, and I just love how Mika is absolutely all about getting the sound perfect, and is very pedantic about it.

The onlookers, no matter how many times the same song fragments are repeated are just wanting it to go on each time, and are feeling interrupted, even though the purpose is the soundcheck, not the song! They also can't help singing along, and it's just gorgeous!

I love Mika because-

It only took one viewing of the Grace Kelly video to get me to buy his album - this is unprecedented in my life!

He is an example of how I would like to live, and only occasionally get to, - where the world is fascinating and full of love, being in a state happiness is the normal way to behave. It's about being high on life! It does not matter if no one else understands, or shares it, but it is also infectious. People like being around happy people!

He gave me ten months of an internal Mika radio, where only his songs are allowed, and I still get about 25% Mika, which will do until the next album!

He gave us (fans) so much time during his Aussie visit, that I have not heard of elswehere, and we were so stunned! We appreciated it but stood silent and stunned, for too much of it. I wish he could know how much his efforts and his visit meant to me, that I could never express it at the time, but the impact will last my whole life through.

His kindness, and his joy in receiving gifts, large or small. His happiness with Happikali's gift of the animal necklace, and the bag I made, were genuine and amazing. We were so happy, he was happy.

He inspired me to the best 3 month period of my life, when I got so high on creativity that I spent 8 to 12 hour days working on my project, and was in a euphoric bubble of happiness the whole time. Before, I did not know I could be so happy for so long. Now I know how to do it, I can re-trigger it any time, and that's so much to be thankful for, that I can never re-pay it.

This is far too long, but you tapped a gusher! I have been visiting the MFC each day, but for less and less time.

I appreciate this positive thread, and needed to add to it! Thank you!

I love coming across all this stuff that I've never seen before. Interesting article, lots of stuff I've heard many times, but still has snippets that are new to me...

And for me, it has been a long time between reads, so -

thanks Chickadee!

I've had an OK from Soy & Kelz already .... not yet from Liz, Teegs , DC, Jols or Mouselle .... soooo.... let me know ??? Even if they are posted ... & you don't want them to be ... we can always delete them ... up to you guys ... !!

Hi Happikali!

Yeah, I still visit this thread every now and then...

Mostly I'm just looking at news - my 3 hours a day has shrunk to half an hour - real life is real busy...

It's nice to see those pics again, so count me as happy!

Hi to everyone, and hugs to all:biggrin2:

You said before you went on tour with LICM that you expected your view of it to change, and that you wondered what you would think of it in a year or so. You thought it was like having all these presents to show people that you had not yet unwrapped.

So - what do you think of LICM now?

Ok, just trying o clarify what has happened to my question about Over My Shoulder.

My question is 'Why are you never 'tired' and 'lost' when playing OMS live?

There was a discussion as follows:

Are you sure? i thought he played it once. (This part is in relation to a question about Your Sympathy)

i swear i've seen a video where he had a cellist too?

That was Over My Shoulder

 

(I think you mean that ... He played it at Koko..)

He sung it at a few more gigs, for an example Somerset House, so it wasn't only at Koko:naughty:

So my understanding is, that while Mika has sung OMS at various gigs, he has never sung 'tired' and 'lost' during those performances.

(I have just re-checked his youtube performances at Koko (with cellist), Trabendo, Somerset House, Troubador. He also performed it at Toronto and Munich, but the youtube vidoes are incomplete, so I can't tell from them.

I've also re-checked the Milan concert audio.)

If anyone has tracked down a live performance which has a tired and lost Mika, I'd love to know about it.

I was so excited last week when I saw the Relax video on MusicMaxs new music show! And a bit stunned, as every other single has had released dates anticipated for weeks before (by us), and this was just out of the blue! I was so happy!

And also,-

I didn't quite make it within a year, but I have finally reached 200 posts! Yippee!

I went to two of the Australian concert, one in Sydney and one in Canberra. They were both fantastic! Rob was having a muddled time in Canberra, forgetting the words to a song, introducing the wrong next one, and tripping over things! It was fun, recognising that he was trying to give the same show as Sydney, but failing utterly!

Mika...

Did you ever have to do chores like your own laundry and dishes? or did your siblings/mom do it all?

Did you walk to school?

What's your fav outfit?

do you have an ipod? what songs/artists are on it?

If you could change anything about yourself what would it be?

 

hmm i'll think of more later

He mentioned once in an interview that he is of the generation that has a thousand songs on his ipod and he plays them on random to get a mix, so he does not think of artists by their albums. He said that in relation to an queston about how big a Queen fan he is, and said that the first Queen album he had was a greatest hits one.

What's on your rider?

 

 

(For those who have never heard of a rider, it's the list with backstage requests by artists. 'The little red rider book' is an absolutely brilliant collection of what people want in their dressing room. (It varies from socks to lots of alcohol to ironing boards. ))

A radio duo once got hold of the bag of goodies, or the list or something, and found a carrot and an apple and a drink... (I think that was after a European show last year. ) They were talking about it on air.

If I had more time or a better memory, I'd go hunting for the originals.

Hopefully I've said enough to ring some bells for others.

I have a few questions -

Do you play exactly the same notes/keys on your piano every time for a song, or do they vary with your mood? (I'm not sure if I'm clear, but I think the trills and flourishes might vary, while the melody stays the same)

What is the first language you spoke?

Why are you never tired and lost in concert? (about Over My Shoulder. It's my favourite part of the song, but never is sung live.)

Hi ya'll,

***The Kanga Express arrives, and decants Mouselle in a pile of glitter!***

just popping in for a quick hello!

(and a quick quote from Mahatma Ghandi!)

"Be the change you want to see in the world!"

If you want a happy MFC, then BE the happy MFC.

If you are here and reading, then you ARE the MFC.

If you whinge about the way its headed, then you are on that road too!

Be contrarian, go against the flow if you have to, and turn it to the way you would like it to be!

So, smile, be happy, and giggle with bliss, and if you don't want the ugly bits to affect you, then start by pretending they don't. It's surprisingly effective. When people see you happy, it does nice things for them too. (ie Mika)

Yes, you have a right to whinge - it's more than pointless, its another sign (to you, if you choose to take it that way) of 'where the MFC is heading!'

If you want to blame someone, blame me - I don't mind, and if it helps you get over whatever you need to get over, then go for it.

Give me a good blaming, then see what has changed in the world. (answer : Nothing!)

So, giggling I go, and roll in glitter, cos that's where I like to spend my time!

Please come and join me...

*** Gives a loud two-finger whistle and runs singing "Love Today!' through the Aussie house until the Kanga Express arrives again to take her away!***

...

when/if i meet Mama P, I'd love to ask her why she got Mika into music. Did Mika show an interest in singing long before his problems at school? Or was it random? What made her decide it?

Mika has said that he was trying to play the piano like his sisters, and his Mum actually found the teacher to teach Mika piano. (It was part of the 'what to do with a bored Mika' situation when he was taken out of school.) But then when Alla found he was dyslexic and could not sight-read music, she concentrated on his singing instead.

It must be one of the gifts of fate that a music teacher found advertised on a music shop wall should be an amazingly gifted person who could give Mika such excellent training!

Also signed!

What a funny review.

 

I like the stickiness too.

 

But your million dollar question is one someone should really ask the Big M. He must drive all his friends and family nuts as he hatches another of his sticky numbers...

Lol! And he says he forced his family to listen to all his songs!

I can't work out when this was written - presumably about a year ago, but it made me laugh a lot! :roftl:

Ignore that the reviewer is not a fan- it's well written and amusing. If you check out the link, there are pictures to go with the jibes.

http://music.guardian.co.uk/pickardofthepops/page/0,,2066227,00.html

This week Anna Pickard watches and picks apart... Love Today by Mika

Lights up. The video begins. In a radical departure, the usually flamboyant and ostentatious Mika stands still, calm, pensive.

For approximately 0.8 seconds. And then he's back to normal.

In what looks for all the world like a deserted munitions factory, the flamboyant Mika, who has seen fit to dress his entire backing band like a punnet of tomatoes, starts his three minute Freddy Mercury impression (for people whose only experience of Freddy Mercury is the 30-foot statue of a man pointing to the sky outside of the We Will Rock You musical).

Certainly, if Freddy was the undisputed King of Pointing To The Sky, Mika is a worthy contender for the crown, as he does point skyward very well. He is also very good at pointing at himself, which he does every time he says the word "me".

I make a point of mentioning the word "me", as I'm afraid once the singing bit starts, it's pretty much the only word I can work out. Love me, love, love me, he keeps repeating, as repetitive patterns of lights flash behind him in carefully timed rhythm. Love Mika. Love love Mika. Must Love Mik...

Stone me! The clever swine has raided the prop cupboard of the National Association of Evil Geniuses and stolen all the visual aids from their How to Hyponotise The Populace Into Carrying Out Your Dastardly Plan seminar! As if to prove the point, Mika is suddenly joined by a small troop of bouncing victims.

Or "dancers", as I think they might be known.

It starts with some vogue-ing silhouettes that promise a classy David Fincher/Madonna-style production, but 60 seconds in, that's out the window and all Mika's stage school friends in stripy neon Primark jumpers are skipping about in very happy fashion. Bounce bounce bounce.

I'm not quite getting the overall concept for this video. Oh look, here's a burlesque dancer. And a lamp post. Maybe it is a street-burlesque concept.

Whatever. It seems like what looked like a deserted munitions (or custard, whatever) factory at first has now turned out to be a theatre, and it's looking ever more likely that Mika and the Kids From Fame have taken over their school amphitheatre and declared that they're "going to do the show right here!"

One of them has dug out her Halloween burlesque costume, and she's excitedly trying to insert a piece of street furniture into her leotard.

We move to a "café" set left over from their ground-breaking premiere of EastEnders: The Musical at the end of last term.

The stage school posse sit around looking studiously bored, including the burlesque lady, who has dismounted the outdoor lighting solution and is busily acting out ennui.

Suddenly another chorus kicks in. Mika picks up a chair and waves it in the air. On cue, everyone starts dancing - as is always the way in Drama School, very little excuse is needed to get up and start flailing about like a fool. I know, I went to one.

The collected luvvies are wilfully uncoordinated in their eye-burningly bright outfits. Watching them all collectively jiving resembles nothing so much as that moment at the toddler's birthday party when the birthday boy, having eaten nothing but Skittles all day, suddenly goes peaky and throws up in the trifle.

And all the while, the catchy-as-crabs single bounds along, working its way further into your brain with every passing moment, even, and I can't reiterate this enough, even if you CAN'T work out what the damn words are.

I think I've figured out something about being up a tree? In love with a bee? Having a dodgy knee? But apart from that the only thing I'm sure of is the line "Channelling a bugger with a big moustache, big moustache, big moustache" which even now is swimming round and round my head like an eel trying to pleasure itself orally.

The kids from Fame are having a simply marvellous time. As well they might, you never know when that Hollywood agent might be sitting in the stalls, just looking for someone who looks like Fred Astaire (if Fred Astaire had survived solely on a diet of uppers, Diet Coke and pureed Cheshire cats).

In a moment of unparalleled surrealism, a small, mousey-blonde child gets placed inside a giant cake, and re-emerges seconds later as a big, fat, pudding-bowl-haircutted bloke in a pink dress.

And that, my friends, is why you should never try to eat your way out of a Hormone Cake.

The song is coming to an end, and as the curtains part, the Mika's willing stage school pals are trying to give us a message, communicating only through the medium of ginormous letters. What are they trying to tell us? What word are they trying to produce? Vole? Velo? Evol? Aha! It IS an Evil plan, I told you! Typical actors, though. They may be able to emote, but they sure as hell can't spell.

Eventually, after trying all the permutations possible, we discover the word. Apparently, it was LOVE they were having so much trouble with.

And with one more nod to his 70s influences, this time in the shape of the Ministry of Funny Walks...

Mika is gone. Gone, but not forgotten, as those of us left behind are left with the chirpy-falsetto, fluffy, happy-happy pop song stuck on loop for hours, days and weeks to come.

Mika's evil plan is only just beginning. Within several months of first contact, millions of people will be forced to love, love Mr Mika.

OR will have cut their heads off in a last-ditch attempt to end the happy-Mika-brain-worm.

One or the other.

Watch it here.

And don't say I didn't warn you.

Speaking as some-one who carefully cultivates and feeds the 'happy-Mika-brain-worm', and re-instates the 'chirpy-falsetto, fluffy, happy-happy song stuck on loop' whenver it threatens to fail, I am so glad Mika songs are so 'sticky'.

But I do notice Mika apologises for it every now and then.

My million dollar questionis how he gets one song out of his own head for long enough to write another...

Ed: means the editor added his own comment/reaction to the article after the reporter wrote it.

This editor seems nicely supportive of Mika!

part 1 is here

http://mikedolbear.com/story.asp?StoryID=1484

I will post my current mood as a song

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-xVb1qsPCw

Poooor Freddie!

It must be hard for you, especially if you have to wait to be contacted during working hours, and the crazy Aussies are hassling you before breakfast!

This is why Mika's afraid to come to Oz.

I'm just amused at the contrast! On line we are rabid fans. He gets here, and we all stand 5 feet away and stand dumbstruck and adoring. We're about as rabid as sheep!

Thanks for posting! It will be interesting to see what effect it has for Mika!

Nice to be reminded again! I have such a great time here! MFC forever!

Hi Mouselle! I thought of you when i saw that the Matchbox 20 tickets had gone on sale.

Did you say James Blunt is coming to Australia? I must admit I've been ignoring poor James while all these mika gigs have been on, haven't even been reading the myspace bulletins, that's probably why i missed it. do you know if they are sold out?

 

Oh and I didn't mean to be rude! Hello fellow Mikamites!

I think it probably is sold out, but have a look on ticketek and check...

I only knew because I have all these people earmarked and have a membership for ticketek and ticketmaster, so I get emails..

Oooooh, I am having the irrational urge to buy ticketssss. Simply based on the fact that that song (all versions, although his the most because of the added "Where?") was me and my friend's "song" for like ... the past 5 years. Buuuuut the tickets cost $133 ... holy crap!

yep, hence the 'gone wild!' Especially as Joe and Matchbox entail Sydney visits. And then Matchbox again in Canberra, which I found out about later (grrr) but could not pass it by...

I'm feeling very broke!

As per usual Mouselle!

Hey, watchoo talkin' about! I never did nuffin till Mika! It wasn't me, twas his bad influence! He made me do it!

I bought the gear after I heard the live in Berlin and Milan audios, and I could not bear the thought that Mika might come and go and leave me without one of my own. So I got what one of the guys reccomended. That was the first concert I ever recorded, but now I've got the gear , I can't let it go to waste, can I?

Another off topic

If any of you have ever seen an ecstatic toddler/kid turning them selves upside down in knots and paroxysms of laughter, then imagine a 6'2 lanky teenager doing it on the couch next to me! Yes, Good News Week is back, and I was laughing as hard at the wriggler as I was at he jokes he was finding so hilarious!

It's a Good News Week, Someone dropped a bomb this year,

Contaminate the atmosphere...tum tum (forgot the words!)

Hang on ... Joe Jackson ... does he sing "Is she really going out with him?"

yep. That was his big hit...

My husband liked him years ago and spread the joy to me, and we've gone to every concert he has ever done in Australia. It's lovely and easy to get tickets, even weeks after they go on sale, but the concerts are great, because everyone there is a hardcore fan. Bob Geldof too, we've gone to every concert he's ever done here. (I don't like Mondays! lol!)

So, yes, I will be going to other concerts this year, and would be really happy about all of them if I wasn't making insane comparisons all the time. Torturing myself is definitely happening, and I could even stop it if I decided I wanted to...

(Any one who wants audios of any of them, let me know. I will probably be wired for sound!)