Avril Lavigne Showcase at Madrid. Review + impressions inside

Hey guys, whoa, it's already been some hours since the concert and I still can't believe it, I can't believe I saw Avril from so close!!! Do I need to say she's gorgeous?

Well, where to start... it's so difficult to explain with words what I felt yesterday, probably you need to feel it yourself to understand it.

Yesterday I woke up pretty soon for being me, at like 10am, and I already felt nervous (if i have not been nervous at any point during the weekend...). I had breakfast and then I didnt know what to do, the time to leave for the concert felt years away.
At 3:30pm my father drove me to the train station, and by 4:15pm I was in the line for the concert. It took 20 minutes by train to the Atocha station, but once there I had to walk quite a bit to get to the Price theater. When I got there, I was surprised by the ammont of people already making line considering it was still 4 hours left for the concert. I was surprised, and I was disappointed, cause I wanted to be the closest to Avril I could, and I was afraid that wasn't going to be possible. I said to myself: I should have been here earlier. Anyway, I had 4 long hours ahead, waiting alone (cause my friends were coming later, at like 6pm). Luckily I had been talking with someone from Avril Bandaids by Messenger, and I recognized him there, so I got someone to talk with (Hey Khalil and your friends!). We played some cards, so it wasn't so long waiting. Two hours later my friends arrived, and by that time, the ammout of people behind us, was like three times as much as we had in front of us in the line, so I felt a bit better.

When the time they opened the doors was coming, I started feeling really nervous. My hands shook, and my heart beat so fast. And we had still an hour to go!
They opened the doors, we gave them our tickets (which they didn't give us back, so pity I would have loved to save it as a souvenir) and I ran towards the stage lol. A guy stopped me and told me not to run.... I slowed down and then ran again, I got to the stage, and I was really close!!!! I mean, I had less people ahead than I had had in the line!
Well, it was around 7:15 and we were standing right in front of the stage, the lights were on, and there was some background music (one of them was "God Must Hate Me" from Simple Plan!) I was so excited just to see the drums with the pink skull, it looked beautiful. She was supposed to come out at 8pm, but it was already that time, and there were only some guys on the stage tuning the guitars. I met an 11 year old kid that was with his parents and was a real fan of Avril. We had a cool conversation. His mather liked Avril a lot too! They were cool.
Everytime we show a little shadow, the lights moved, or whatever, we thought it was a sign that Avril was just about to come out! And I was freaking out!

And then at 8:30pm, Tony Aguilar, a guy from "Los 40 Principales", the radio channel that organized the concert, appeared. When I saw him, I didn't know who it was, and I thought he was going to say something was wrong, and Avril wasn't going to be able to sing or something, I was really scared. When he started talking I knew everything was alright as I recognized his voice. Minutes later Avril was finnaly on stage. How many years I had waited to see her with my own eyes, I couldn't believe that time had come, I was unbelievably happy!
Quickly they started playing, the first song was Girlfriend as I expected. The crowd started screaming, the atmosphere was perfect, and Avril was cute!
When she finished singing the first song, I looked at my friends and I was like: OH-MY-GOD. That was sick, I wanted more!

She sang one song after another, as if she were on a rush, so the concert only lasted 30 minutes, but it was definately intense!
I think it was after Complicated, she said: "Buenas noches" (good night in Spanish), thanks so much, and she left the stage so quickly. The crowd asked for one more song, so she came out again and sang I Can Do Better, and left again. It was over. See ya next year Avril!

When the concert finished, I was sweating, and I couldn't talk, but I felt happier than ever, my dream had come true :)

Even though we only heard 4 songs from The Best Damn Thing on the concert, I want to share my thoughts with you on tbdt. I have to say I was a bit tired of hearing some songs, over all Girlfriend, and maybe I felt the quality of this last album was lower compared to her previous albums. This is talking rubish after attending the concert. Avril herself said this album was fun, hell it is, I enjoyed the concert cause I had much more fun than I had ever had in my life, I was losing my voice singing the songs along, but I couldn't care less, I was having fun, real fun, because the songs are meant to be played on a concert, and the album sounds much much better live than it does on the cd.

THE SONGS

One of the things we had been debating about had been what songs she'd sing. Well, I have to say I loved the selecction she made. Either that, or the whole album is awesome live. And maybe added to the fact that that was my first concert, it was the most exciting time of my life. I sang, I screamed, I danced, I jumped... enough to say that I lost my voice after the concert.
Her voice sounded perfect, it was sweet and energic, she didn't sound tired as in some concerts. She looked happy, while she was singing, she smiled her crew like: "oh gosh, these guys are great!" a couple of times.

These are the songs she sang:

Girlfriend.
Sk8er Boi.
Everything Back But You.
My Happy Ending.
When You're Gone.
Complicated.
I Can Do Better.

Songs Review:

Girlfriend:
I was tired of this song before the concert, they have it on the radio every 10 minutes, I felt I had listened to it way too many times, so on my Windows Media I always skipped it when it played. But the concert started with this song, and it made me jump. God, the rhythm is just so intense and vibrating, you gotta love this song! It's definately the new Sk8ter Boi!

Sk8er Boi:
I had never been to an Avril concert before, so I loved the fact that she sang some of her "greatest hits", that way I kinda fixed the fact that I missed her previous concerts on Spain!
What can I say, this is one of my all-time favourite songs, and Avril seemed to enjoy singing it, so I'm very happy she played Sk8er Boi, cause I loved it.
It was cool that she played the guitar while she sang this song, reminded me a lot of the video-clip, when she's on a car :)

Everything Back But You:
During this song, Avril came really close to us, she standed a few feets away from me!!!! My friends got to touch her hand, but I couldn't :( Anyway, I enjoyed this song a lot, it was the song she sang I liked the most. I love the lyrics, and she not just sang it, she lived it. A++ for this song.

My Happy Ending:
Just like with Sk8ter Boi, I loved to hear this song, some of her best stuff, it was just incredible how it sounded, and the concert was just getting emotive! Maybe getting us ready for WYG? ;)
He played the guitar in this song too.


When You're Gone:
The whole theater went black, and we heard the first chords from the song, which everybody seemed to recognize as the crowd started screaming. Lights on, and Avril singing with a perfect, sweet and emotional voice. I couldn't help it, and I shouted: "I love you Avril!", though she didn't seem to hear me.

The most beautiful moment on the concert, there are no words to describe how this song sounds with Avril's voice. Simply amazing.


Complicated:
Again, I was so excited to hear this song. It sounded great, better than it sounds on Let Go, you know... Avril's voice is much more mature now. And guess what? It was incredibly fun!!!

I Can Do Better:
This is the last song she sang, and we knew it, I was feeling I was losing my voice, but I kept screaming lol. The dancers (Sofi and Lindsey) came to the front of the stage with Avril. When I first saw these two new girls on Avril's band, honestly, I thought they were lame. But they're really cool! This song is really catchy, and the dancers make you feel like dancing too!

VIDEOS












(I have more videos, but I think it's enough with these. You can also find more videos from the concert on Youtube)

I got the tickets to see Avril! YAY!

Omfg, I'm so excited, I finnaly got the tickets!!!!
I learned yesterday that you didn't needs to be called to go get the tickets, you could just ask for them. I was so nervous and kinda angry with myself for not having gone there yet, and I was afraid they could have no more tickets by the time I'd get there.
Anyway, as I knew I'd do anything to see Avril, I woke up at 8am today in orderto be in Madrid at 10am going by subway. It was the longest hour of my life. When I finnaly got there, it was a big building from Prisa, one of the most influencing companies in Spain. Once there I had to wait again for the guy to come back from wherever he was at, and he said they had tickets left!!! Whoooooa! I was so relief and excited at the same time, I was going to see Avril!!!! (Well, I am, actually)


This is the ticket:

It starts at 8pm, they open at 7pm, but I'll be there around 4pm to get a good place for me and my friends. I wanna see Avril from close!
I'll take my camera, and my number one target is to get a photo with her.
Either way, it's gonna be the happiest day of my life for sure, and I won't let anything or anyone ruin it!

Seeing Avril next week! (& more)

Wow, long time no posting, sorry guys (I mean those who read my blog, assuming somebody actually does read it lol)

Well, so many things to say, many cool stuff I didn't talk about in my blog (I should be killed for that), but here I am again! I'm still alive! (I'm sure somebody will feel upset after hearing that ^^)

A few headlines on what I've been up to during these past... two months? (last blog entry was on April 4th, wow):

- I studied (or so I think), let's say I went to school :D
- I kept taking my chess lessons and went to a couple tournaments (did it quite OK)
- I met an american friend of mine in Madrid.
- My aussie teacher/friend left back to Australia.
- I got paid 250€ for doing a job on a website.
- I bought the 360 wireless steering wheel and Forza Motosport 2 (I should make a review of the later)
- I met quite a lot of new cool people.

And that's pretty much what I did. School year finished today (yay), so I'm done with year 11th, my average mark is 8,5/10, I'm not particullary proud of some of the marks I got, but considering I've been totally lazy, I can't complain. Next year is the last one before college...

As to what concerns directly to this blog post, I'm unbelievably happy cause I'm seeing Avril Lavigne next week!
Allright, not 100% sure, but most likely I'll get to see her at least for a few seconds, first time I see her, it'll be worth it no matter for how long I see her.

The thing is, it's not a concert, it's more of an album presentation, and it's kinda private stuff, so you can only get in if you're VIP (I'm not VIP, at least as of yet), or if you have an invitation. A spanish radio channel is giving the invitations, it's like a draw, I asked for mine already, I just need to cross my fingers and hope I get one!
If I don't, I'll make sure I'm there by the time she passses by to say something to her hahaha.


And this is everything by now, I promise (I think I said this last time too lol) I'll keep my blog more updated from now on.

Updates, updates and more updates

Hey dudes! How is it goin'? Damn, it's been 2 months since my last post, I'm sorry!!

I gotta admit it, I've been to lazy to post anything, and then I had exams, God, the most stressful term I've ever had.

Well, there are a few new things, like I'm taking english lessons with a native (australian) teacher. It rocks, my accent is turning a bit aussie, mate :D

My exams went OK, and I'm currently on holidays, I'm sleeping a lot, I missed that :D

Yesterday, one of the Messenger team bloggers (Nicole) organized a meeting with messenger users, as you can read here. I had to stay awake till 1am, but it was worth it (I stayed awake till 3am finnaly :P), she's really nice, and it was very interesting to talk to someone working on Microsoft.
In the link above you can read some of the things people said to her, most of them are from my conversation!!!

I quote (she made up new names):

SpainGirl says:
Hello from Madrid!

(I'm sure it was me, cause I said it was too late for european users, I lived in Madrid)

InternationalPerson says:
If there is another one of these next time can you change the time so I don't have to be up at 3am?
Nicole says:
Sure thing, is 4am better j/k yes we will have them at different times.

This was me as well, but I'm sure someone else requested that too.

Billy says:
what's ur job exactly?
Nicole says:
I am a program manager on Windows Live Messenger

Literal quote from my conversation:

(1:47) Javier Soto: what's ur job exactly?
if I may ask
(1:47) Nicole *help: I am program manager
I work with coders, tester, designers, marketing etc to design features

So it was me again lol.

Billy says:
I wish worked on Messenger
Nicole says:
You can! Finish college and then apply here: http://www.microsoft.com/careers/
Billy says:
Great! Will I get to work with Bill Gates?
Nicole says:
Although Bill works at Microsoft he doesn't work on Messener specifically.

This was from my convo as well, this is what I told her:

(1:46) Javier Soto: im 16, and i like coding, i wish i could one day work there :
:P
(1:46) Nicole *help: well I don't actual code I work with coders though
(1:47) Nicole *help: well you can work here one day... make sure you go to college and then apply :)


(1:48) Javier Soto: u work with mr. bill too? :)
(1:48) Nicole *help: will Bill Gates works at Microsoft but not directly on Messenger he is very high up

Again more things we talked about. It was very funny when I found out that most of the things she quoted in their blog were from our conversation!!

Simon says:
messengersays blog posts are the crazietest posts i ever read lol
Nicole says:
is crazy good?
Simon says:
absolutely
i mean, really funny

From my messenger convs log:

(1:44) Javier Soto: :)
(1:44) Javier Soto: messengersays blog posts are the craziest posts i ever read lol
it rocks
u guys have a lot of fun there
(1:45) Nicole *help: is crazy good?
(1:45) Javier Soto: yeah :)
absolutely
i mean, really funny
(1:45) Nicole *help: I am glad you like them :)

Geek says:
How many people are talking to you?
Nicole says:
The most at one time was about 22. It is very hard to manage 22 flashing windows at once
However hundreds of people added the MessengerBloggers email address today. Maybe people are shy

(1:41) Javier Soto: how many people is atm talking to you?
(1:41) Javier Soto: half messenger users
lol
(1:42) Nicole *help: the most conversation windows I have had open was about 22 or so
(1:42) Javier Soto: it's not that much
(1:42) Nicole *help: although I close the CW down between each IM to try and keep track of things I have replied to
(1:42) Javier Soto: okay

Again!!!

Judy says:
This was great will there be more of these sessions in the future?
Nicole says:
Yes. Stay tuned to MessengerSays for the details

(1:43) Javier Soto: so, sorry for asking again about the future but
are u gonna do this again? :P
(1:44) Nicole *help: most likely
(1:44) Javier Soto: cool
(1:44) Nicole *help: We will post details on MessengerSays

At the end there was something funny:

(2:07) Javier Soto: ( just curious, do u guys use windows vista? :P)
(2:07) Nicole *help: you are joking right! of course we do :)

So this was it. Don't blaim me for getting on well with people in MS ^^
I promise I'll be more active in the blog from now on

I'm buying the 360 steering wheel, so I'll sure post about it!!

So long no blogging

Hey there!

So long no talk, how ya doin'?

I've been very lazy lately to post something, but at last I decided to make a blog entry and tell what I've been doing these few weeks!

Well, the most remarkable stuff I did was the update we made in our computers (my brother and I) and the new monitor my brother got himself. Apart of that, I have to say that I've been very obsessed with chess this time (and still I am). I'm taking classes since October or so, and I kinda like it pretty much. I won a trophy in a tournament!! I was the third in my category (people below 18).

The update consisted on new motherboard, new processor, a new graphic card and memory ram for the new motherboard (which is DDR2 instead of DDR as the old one). The Motherboard as you can see in the pic below is an Asus AM2...., the processor an AMD64 AM2 3500+, the graphic card an ATi X1300PRO PCI-Express and the RAM memory a 1GB module at 533Mhz.

And here I leave some pics of all that :-)

The Wide 20,1' screen.

Playing Gears of War.

The components we bought.

The new components almost plugged in.

The Trophy.

Ah! And almost forget, I also got a digital camera (I didn't have one yet!) and since the old video camera got broken, we bought a new one.
For the 360, we got two new games: Fifa 07 and The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. Both great games.

I hope I can be more active on the blog now, there's a lot to tell! This year is going to be full of great stuff when it comes to computers ;-)

< /2006> <2006>

Yesssss, the new year is here, with hope and a lot of things to come. The best luck for this new year if you have been good, and three red lights for the bad ones!

[STORY] SIMO was great, an amazing experience

Well, it's here, it took some time to write it, but this is basically what I did during on Saturday and Sunday November 11th and 12th.
As I said in a previous post, I was in the SIMO, a big computers and technology exhibition in Madrid, hosted in a place called IFEMA.

I went on Saturday morning, at about 10:30 local time, with a couple of friends. I walked through all the pavilions (from now on, when I say pavilion I mean the different buildings where there were stands, with products, etc) to see what there was in each one. It took about two hours, since there were a lot of them, and they were so big!
There was a big place with Mac stuff: Mac G5, lovely screens, iPods, etc. In the Toshiba stand, they were showing the possibilities of the HD-DVD, they had LCD screens with movies in High Definition, you could also buy a HD-DVD drive (the cheapest was 800€)

Me

Anyway, I have no doubt the best pavilion was one entirely dedicated to Microsoft. Good job Microsoft, you did a great job. They shown there: Windows Vista, Office 2007, Flight Simulator X and a lot of stuff of the xbox 360 that I'll detail later.

Windows Vista

There was even a place for Windows Live. They were showing the possibilities that the new Windows Live environment gives the user (Live Mail, Windows Live Messenger, Live Search, etc).
What you see in the photo below is a fight between two guys inside a Messenger dress. Quite funny, it was making a lot of noise, you could hear it from any place of the pavilion, people laughing, shouting...

Windows Live Stand

The XBOX 360 was the star of this pavilion, with a big stand full of consoles in Samsung Screens, showing Pro Evolution Soccer 5, Fifa 07, Gears of War (without any doubt the great success on SIMO 2006) and Viva Piñata.
Moreover, every half hour a great guy made a kind of conference about the new devices that will come out for xbox 360, as well as showing the people that didn't know the consoles, the multimedia possibilities it brings to the general public (the commonly called "casual gamers"), as the option of seeing photos, listening to music, etc.
I have to say he made a great work on showing how great the console is because of these little details. He shown the camera, the HD-DVD device (not connected, cause there was no dashboard update yet), the wireless wheel and the new headset.

One curious details is that the consoles were not normal consoles, but debug consoles, as shown in this image:

There was another pavillion called "iLife" (doesn't it reminds you of Apple stuff?), where there were basically consoles. Sony overall had PS2s with Guitar Hero, Buzz and other games like that. They made some tournaments as well, I participated on one of xbox 360 Dead or Alive, I wan the first match, and lost the second, but I took many magazines that were there for your disposal :P
But the queen of this pavilion was the Sony Play Station 3. Don't get me wrong, you couldn't play it, you couldn't even touch it or get any close, it was inside a crystal box looking beaty next to the controller (the "sixaxis").


Well, and this is it. I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed that day. I'm looking forward for next year SIMO, I hope studies allow me go.

I played Nintendo Wii

Yesterday was a big day, one of those days you don't forget. I visited Expo-Comic, a convention about comics and video games (actually there were 7 square meters dedicated to them out of the 400 square meters available). I honestly don't give a damn about comics, so I spent all the 5 hours on the Cultura Otaku stand. They had 2 American wii's in two 32 inches Samsung HD televisions. The games they had were (appart of Wii Sports): Zelda Twilight Princess, Trauma Center and Dragon Ball Z: Budokai Tenkaichi 2.

I played myself Wii Sports (Bowling) and Trauma Center.

Well, remember I own a xbox 360, I didn't plan on buying a Wii, but the experience was amazing. I had read the Wiimote didn't work that well, that it was buggy, that it took a lot to show on the screen what you made with the hand, that your movements wasn't represented on the game accurately. All lies by Sonyers. Playing = Believing.

On the bowling game, which I played the first, I felt what you feel when you touch a console that hasn't been released on your territory yet, a console that will revolution the consoles world. You feel important.
Wii Sports bowling is a simple game, like all of the Wii Sports games, but it's so addictive! You start playing, and after a few seconds, you forget you have a Wiimote in your hand, and you feel you have a ball, and you get into the TV. You actually do control everything, you feel you are controlling everything in the game.

I saw Zelda Twilight Princess, and well, despite I haven't played any Zelda games in the past (N64 Zeldas), I didn't like the game. In my humble opinion it's too much button-pushing oriented, and less Wiimote moving actions, but like I said above, Playing is Believing.

Trauma Center was probably the best of the games I saw. It's realistic, let me explain myself, it doesn't work exactly like real life, I'm not gonna be a medician for playing it, but it's realistic in the way that you get nervous when you are saving lifes, like in real life. The pointer in the screen is very sensible and accurate, if your hand is shaking, the pointer will vibrate in the screen, and it'll be hard to make the surgery.

Well and that's all. Wii is out in Europe, a friend of mine got it so I'm looking forward to going to try it with him. Anyway I felt very glad to have been able to try it before it were released.

You've seen tons of pics of it, but I leave a couple I made:

The top cover. (with the GameCube controller ports)
The Wiimote receiver.
No disc tray, like in PS3.

3Mb of Internet Connection

Yeeeeeeeeah, this is one of those great days when you download anything you find just to see how fast it goes. I got a 3Mb update, which is 3 times what I had before (one poor megabit). I download now on average at 320KBps, it's amazing, I only downloaded at 90-100KBps before. And I got my high-ID on Emule back!

Gears of War booked

I phoned yesterday the shop where I'm buying Gears of War, and I reserved it. They'll phone me on friday to tell me there are available units, and I'll go to get it.

I was already sure I was gonna buy it, but after testing it in the SIMO, I'm so surprised, I need to get it.

Back from the SIMO

I'm just back for the second day in the SIMO, I'll tell you about it in a future post, I'll tell you all I saw / did, and I'll post a lot of photos. Keep an eye here!

SIMO starting this week

SIMO, a Spanish electronics show in Madrid will be starting this week, and it'll last until Sunday.

It's the biggest thing about that we have in Spain, there will be a whole building for Microsoft, they'll have xbox 360s with Gears of War, and they'll maybe show Windows Vista (which recently went RTM)

I still have no invitations, I always get them eventually, though if I don't I'll buy them for 10€ (their official cost).
Last year I went with my friends once and with my father the second time the day after. This year I don't know what I will do. Anyways, I'm really looking forward to it.

I'll post about it, and will leave photos here, don't worry about it :)

New keyboard + Mouse

Today is a happy day, I just got to myself a brand new wireless keyboard + mouse from Microsoft.
Only 30€ for a cool and great pack. I'm very happy with it, it's the first one I got without wires, and my previous mouse was a ball one!

Now I can even connect it to the 360, and type the names of the songs I'm saving into the hard disk with the keyboard and not with they 360 controller.

This is the keyboard:

LOL, just kidding, this is the keyboard and the mouse: