2022 In Music

 

Hi everyone it's 5 days before Christmas so what better time to celebrate the best music that 2022 had to offer (you can read my 2021 blog here and I'll list previous year's blogs at the end of this one). This year I finally managed to get back to some gigs, fell in love with some film soundtracks and found some new artists to listen to. So without further ado here is 2022 in music.

Yungblud - Yungblud

I'll start off with my first gig since 2019 and also my favourite album of the year which is Yungblud's self titled album. He released the lead single The Funeral back in March and I loved it (it's my joint favourite song of the year) ahead of the album that came out in September. As expected it covers issues very relevant to us at the moment from mental health I Cry 2, gender identity The Boy In The Black Dress and some songs that are pure joy such as Tissues. He's also released a couple of stand alone songs such as The Emperor and I'm A Mess with Avril Lavigne. 

I saw him supported by Nova Twins in March and he was absolutely fantastic and well worth the wait to finally see him. I have tickets for his Wembley and Brighton shows next year so make sure you check back in!

Nova Twins - Supernova

This album is an absolute cracker. Full of fire, energy and guitars. My favourite tracks on the album are KMB and Cleopatra. I saw them live in March when they supported Yungblud and was blown away. I have tickets to their Brighton gig next year and can't wait to see them again. 

Encanto Soundtrack

My final nomination for the album of the year is Disney's Encanto soundtrack. I loved the film it was so colourful, fun and surprisingly emotional plus a hilarious Capybara - what more could you ask for? The 'big' song that's come off of the soundtrack is everyone's favourite earworm We Don't Talk About  Bruno but my favourite songs were actually Surface Pressure and the joyful Columbia, Mi Encanto.

My joint favourite song of the year with Yungblud's Funeral was Lady GaGa's Hold My Hand from the Top Gun: Maverick soundtrack (you can see where we're going here ...) When I found out that my favourite singer was going to be on the soundtrack to the sequel of my favourite movie I was so excited and the song didn't disappoint. It's a classic power ballad with a GaGa twist and fits the film perfectly. I saw the film 4 times at the cinema and multiple times since at home and I genuinely think the song (as well as the film being amazing) contributed to this. And yes I am tempted to write a blog purely about how amazing the film was .....

In July Luke and I finally went to the long awaited Chromatica Ball (my blog of the day is here) and predictably she was amazing!

And yes she finished with Hold My Hand as the encore complete with monster hand *paws up*

The other gig that I went to this year was The Killers in June with Vana. As with the Chromatica Ball it was postponed from 2020. It was such a fun show, they featured the best songs from 2020's Imploding The Mirage and of course other favourites such as All These Things That I've Done, Shot At The Night and of course Mr Brightside. 

These are my favourite songs of the year -

Machine Gun Kelly ft Willow - Emo Girl

Mod Sun - Rich Kids Ruin everything

Gayle - ABCDEFU

George Ezra - Green Green Grass

Royal Blood - Honeybrains 

Mehro - Chance With You

Bring Me The Horizon ft Sigrid - Bad Life

Motionless In White - Cyberhex

Taylor Swift - Antihero & Bejeweled

I hope you guys enjoyed my review of 2022, I'm excited to see what 2023's music brings us!

Love Jen

XxxX

PS Here are my previous music review blogs -

2021 In Music

2020 In Music

2019 In Music

2018 In Music

2017 In Music

2016 In Music

Eos' Guide To Christmas Part 3 - Christmas comes to agility and I found a boat I liked 🎄🐾

 *Woofles, squeaks & butt wiggles*

Hello again! Jenni said I should post some photos that she took of me at agility this week. I go to The Big Barn and a nice lady called Angela runs the classes, she has two Border Collies too and they're nearly as ball obsessed as me!

The lady who owns the barn had put a Christmas frame up and Jenni made me pose in it. 

I think I look very festive

They had a tree outside too so I had to pose in front of that too.

This is Jenni's tree in her room, I told her that it should be more colourful but she told me she's something called a goth so it has to be black.

Today Mummy, Jenni and me went for a walk at the harbour and we found a boat that's always decorated for Christmas called Mr Toad. 

Here I am with it

I wish we could have Christmas trees at our door but Daddy said no just like Auntie does

Thank you for reading!

*Lick* Lick* Lick*

Eos

2022 In Plane Geeking

 

Hello everyone! It's been a packed 2022 airshow season with the returns of RIAT and Airbourne along with trips to Duxford and Headcorn's shows. So what better way to celebrate a fantastic year than to continue in 2021's tradition (you can read that blog here) and share just a few highlights of the season. 

My YouTube channel has a compilation of my favourite moments of the year or you can find some individual moments listed through this blog.

First up was the Platinum Jubilee Trooping The Colour in London on 2nd June. I've been to Trooping The Colour before as well as the RAF 100 celebration back in 2018 (with the iconic Typhoon '100 formation' but this was on another level. The atmosphere in London that day felt absolutely magical and I genuinely don't think we'll see the like of that again. 

The BBMF Hurricane, Spitfire, Lancaster, Spitfire and Hurricane

A400M Atlas and C17 Globemaster

Lightnings, Voyager and Typhoons

I thought the Typhoons might do some kind of special formation and they didn't disappoint!

The video is here- 

Later on in June I had Duxford's Summer Airshow, Goodwood Festival Of Speed and the Headcorn Battle Of Britain Airshow (you can read about them in more detail here).

Duxford took place on a chilly, drizzly day so it meant that not all the aircraft were able to perform, but we did get a flypast by the Red Arrows on their way back from Belfast.

We also got to see the fantastic Rich Goodwin with his 'Muscle BiPlane' (more from him later at Airbourne).

His normal take off .....

We saw the P51 Mustang 'Contrary Mary' 

It was also the only time I saw the Norwegian Vampire this year. 

In formation with the MIG 15

You can see full highlights here -

I saw my first full Red Arrows display of the year at Goodwood where they debuted their 'Jubilee Presents' flypast.

Flying the Red, White and Blue

Some footage of their display -

A couple of days later Dad and I had a second attempt at Headcorn Airshow after last year's wash out. It was absolutely perfect airshow weather with blue skies and a couple of fluffy clouds to frame the aircraft nicely. The show was opened with Headcorn's resident Dakota.

The Battle Of Britain Memorial Flight sent their Hurricane -

We had a Battle Of Britain dogfight with a ME109 Buchon and two Spitfires.

Having vanquished the 109 (back to 'Duxenford' according to the commentator 😆) the Spitfire pair put on their own display.

My favourite part of the show was seeing the B17 Flying Fortress 'Sally B' and it was the only time I saw here this year. 

Some more highlights from the show -

In July came the big one ... RIAT returned! Dad and I camped from the Thursday - Sunday (over the record breaking heatwave and I still managed to avoid getting a tan #GothGoals). I'll only share a couple of photos here as I have a full blog detailing everything. 

Thursday is arrivals day with aircraft passing over us every couple of minutes on their way to land as well as their practice displays.

Rolls Royce Spitfire

The fantastic Swiss F18

Lots of arrivals -

Dad and I went into the show on the Friday which is the 'shorter day' and I much prefer it as it's quieter and you can move around and see the static aircraft without being squished!

We got to see the arrival of this very rare A4 Skyhawk 

The Swiss F18 'Turning and burning'

The RAF Typhoon landing after it's display

Friday was the first glimpse we got of the amazing Korean Black Eagles display team.

Check them out here -

Another performance I really enjoyed was the Austrian air force's 'Quick Reaction Alert' which saw a Hercules intercepted by two Typhoons who then had a 'dogfight' 

We had a visit from the Airbus Beluga aka the world's most cheerful looking aircraft

One of my favourite photos of the weekend - the RAF Typhoon lighting it's afterburners!

You can see highlights of all 3 days here - 

August saw the return of my hometown airshow Airbourne! I can't tell you how much it meant to have the Red Arrows shooting over the crowd or the warbirds thundering along the seafront. You can read my full blog here.

The BBMF made a welcome return

My favourite photo of the show

The Faiery Swordfish made it's first Airbourne appearance

The Spitfire created a vortex

Not to be outdone the Typhoon made some vapour

Airbourne had some great formations of different participants with the Typhoon and Spitfire performing a routine and The Blades and Chinook arriving together. 

The best of the action -

The final airshow of the year was Duxford's Flying Finale (blog here) which, like last year, was a beautiful Autumn day. We were sat on the end of the runway which meant I was able to get some nice photos of the planes coming in to land. 

Hurricane

Thunderbolt

Sea Fury

Wildcat

And of course a Spitfire

Duxford had a real coup in booking the Swiss national team the Patrouille Suisse at their only UK show of the year and they were predictably excellent.

Another highlight of the day was the final display of the season by the RAF Typhoon

 with it's 'Blackjack' paintwork reflecting beautifully in the late afternoon sunshine.

. 

It was an absolutely fantastic airshow season from getting my photos published during Airbourne to the thunder of warbird engines to jets shooting over my head at RIAT. I must also thank everyone who's watched the videos on my YouTube channel, some of them have multiple thousands of views which is small beans to most YouTubers but means the world to me. 

Until next year Jen The Plane Geek is over and out 😎

XxxX