Shalom
Well the last two days of our euro venture were a bit of brain stress. Our flight to zurich was excellent and i cant say anything but good things about swiss air. It was raining when we landed but when we finally got all our bags etc we went and met marc (our swiss promoter) and headed to the hotel to freshen up.
Once fully freshened we went to the venue and sat about for a bit. We'd only had two hours sleep the night before so we soundchecked half asleep and then did quite a bizzare interview with a nice lady called christine. She got us to compile a playlist and do introductions for each song for the radio show, should have a copy of it soon so will stream on site asap, if that's allowed.
Eamon and alex went for a walk in the rain and alex fell down a hill, he's ok though, just a bit muddy. Support band the strivers were very kind and friendly and let us use they're equipment. I was somewhat deranged form lack of sleep by the time we took the stage, the feeling soon passed though and we had good gig. The crowd wasn't particuarly large but all there seemed to have a good time including the strange old small grinning dancing lady at the front. She reminded me of the mysterious midget in the red anorak in nichols roeg's Dont Look Now. This gave me the fear slightly. We got quite pissed afterwards, something of a habit these days, and stumbled into a taxi back to the hotel.
Next day we took the shuttle bus and got in line to check in at the airport. After another highly pleasant flight with swiss air we arrived in brussells. No-one had come to pick us up from the airport so we jumped in another cab and made our way to the sheraton hotel.
Now.. no-one was directly to blame for the completely major balls up that transpired at the sheraton but getting into our rooms was like milking a fish. I wont bore everyone with the minor details but someone had fucked up along the way and because of the inhuman way these hotels are run it took a lot longer than it should have to sort out. We managed to get beds that night but our keycards suddenly stopped working at 12 the next day. On enquiring as to why this was a whole new can of worms was opened and we realised we still didn't have authorisation to stay there even though they'd let us stay there one night already. Go ask GOD. Phone calls were made and faxes were received and it looked like everything was sorted out. Was it fuck! I'll come back to that later..
The gig itself was nice. A good room with good sounding loud speakers. Saw a bit of jenny lewis and the watson twins.. very nice. Saw a bit of emiliana torrini... also very nice although she talks quite a lot and even if her accent is very endearing, when you realise you've only seen 3 songs in 20 minutes it drags a little. We had quite a healthy crowd to start but they slowly depleted towards the end. I guess there were a lot of female solo artist fans there and given that we were the last band of the night it gave everyone an excuse to leave. Belgians do things in a very elementary way, with lots of rules. So we got chucked out of the venue after a while and went back to the hotel.
We still had to pick up keycards for our rooms as the other ones had stopped working earlier in the day. But now there were different people on reception and they had no clue what was going on and still reckoned our room hadn't been paid for. He was right and i suddenly knew what had happened. Luckily the veils tour manager let us use his card for a guarantee and we managed to get to sleep.
That, however wasn't the end of our corporate hotel nightmare.. On checking out this morning we were accused of damaging a lift and destroying and possibly eating some decorative easter eggs that had been handcrafted by some master choclatier. This was bullshit. All we'd done is go to bed. A very frightened looking woman told us that we had to pay €150 and that they had cctv footage of us vandalising an elevator... oh but we weren't allowed to see the footage. My tongue lodged itslef very firmly into the space between my lower lip and my chin as i stared at her. Eventually a man showed up and looked at us and said "This is not them". Id seen various members of the veils falling around the lobby before making their way to the bar the night before. "Were they wearing hats?" I said. Affirmative. It seemed we had our culprits but i didn't let on. "So we dont owe you 150 bucks and we can go?" I said. "Yes" they said without even an apology. We flew home- end of story.
Slightly long for 3 days but i had to get that out of my system.
DO NOT GO TO THE BRUSSELLS SHERATON IF YOU LIKE TO BE TREATED EQUALLY.
Wednesday, 12 April 2006
Saturday, 8 April 2006
bologna, 8th april
Bonjourno!
Italy is bellissimo! The sun is shining, the birds are singing and the beer flows like wine! This is our fourth and final show of our mini italian tour. It was raining in Milan and the gig was sparingly attended. Those who were there seemed to have a good time though. On to Roma next and it was a long old drive. We got to experience a bit of italian radio as our van annoyingly has no cd player. Choice artists of the moment seem to be dickie ashcroft and the androgynous, unnecessary sylable adding indie of placebo. There is one dj here who has the annoying habit of putting a song on only to fade it out a minute later and do his own rendition with accoustic guitar and bongos. How he has avoided a sacking is beyond me. The venue in rome was lush, we were playing the second date of a two day festival called 'strange days' supporting berlin kitcsh two piece Stereo Total. You may recognise one of their songs in a sony dv cam advert. We had a splendid dinner round the corner and then played a goodun. The friendliness of the romans after the show was astounding, they were giving us pot! Whilst readying ourselves to leave, an obviosly drunk lady from Stereo Total told me our songs are too short. "Is it because of your parents?" she said. Fuck knows what the hell she was on about. Another long drive faced us the next day towards turin but once again the scenery alone was enough to keep us entertained. We were all a bit grouchy when we got to the venue but the show was very enjoyable none the less. We aired versions of a couple of new songs which was fun and again we were given pot by those present which definately eased the pain. The hotel in Turin had been erected purely to accomodate winter sports fans for the olympics just gone, and the rooms did have a locker room vibe to them. No smoking, no TV.. now whats that all about? Had a good drive to bologna and dropped off part time tour manager Andrea on the way. He was one fresh dude.
Looking forward to tonight, and to travelling to switzerland tomorrow. Ta-ra for now
Italy is bellissimo! The sun is shining, the birds are singing and the beer flows like wine! This is our fourth and final show of our mini italian tour. It was raining in Milan and the gig was sparingly attended. Those who were there seemed to have a good time though. On to Roma next and it was a long old drive. We got to experience a bit of italian radio as our van annoyingly has no cd player. Choice artists of the moment seem to be dickie ashcroft and the androgynous, unnecessary sylable adding indie of placebo. There is one dj here who has the annoying habit of putting a song on only to fade it out a minute later and do his own rendition with accoustic guitar and bongos. How he has avoided a sacking is beyond me. The venue in rome was lush, we were playing the second date of a two day festival called 'strange days' supporting berlin kitcsh two piece Stereo Total. You may recognise one of their songs in a sony dv cam advert. We had a splendid dinner round the corner and then played a goodun. The friendliness of the romans after the show was astounding, they were giving us pot! Whilst readying ourselves to leave, an obviosly drunk lady from Stereo Total told me our songs are too short. "Is it because of your parents?" she said. Fuck knows what the hell she was on about. Another long drive faced us the next day towards turin but once again the scenery alone was enough to keep us entertained. We were all a bit grouchy when we got to the venue but the show was very enjoyable none the less. We aired versions of a couple of new songs which was fun and again we were given pot by those present which definately eased the pain. The hotel in Turin had been erected purely to accomodate winter sports fans for the olympics just gone, and the rooms did have a locker room vibe to them. No smoking, no TV.. now whats that all about? Had a good drive to bologna and dropped off part time tour manager Andrea on the way. He was one fresh dude.
Looking forward to tonight, and to travelling to switzerland tomorrow. Ta-ra for now
Tuesday, 21 March 2006
NYC MOFO
Aaaaah, we're finally in new york city. Austin was good but im a man of the north. I like to feel those arctic winds on my face and breathe the cold air. We had a great day in the studio on sunday, i wont say too much but it was a lovely place full of great gear and a ping pong table. We went on quite late and seeing as we had a 0640 flight in the morning we couldn't be bothered to sleep so we just stayed up. There was a storm over texas that night, sheet lightning and more rain than ive ever seen. The worst of it had passed by 4 but when we came to fly there were still some bitchin looking clouds above. It was something of a white knuckle ride getting that bird up in the sky and it didn't exactly settle down either. The stewardesses were very relaxed though so we knew everything was ok, it just didn't help being so deprived of sleep. We touched down just fine and got to our hotel on the lower east side. Being in new york seemed to give us a all a new burst of energy despite the lack of sleep so we stepped out, grabbed a slice of pizza and took a stroll over chelsea way. Found a great clothes shop called Dave's where i managed to replace a pair of gloves id lost in oslo. Bought a new bass as well which i'll be playing today. Its all black and shiny. Today we have a lot to do. a virgin instore at 3:30 followed by a sirius radio session. Finally this aftershow party where there'll be lots of drunk english people. I couldn't feel more at home.
Monday, 20 March 2006
yee.....ha
Alright? ive not had the time or the energy to keep a regular account of our time in texas but id just like to say that we've been having a blast. Our final performance at yesterdays Moshi Moshi label party (not the japanese restaurant) was a real stonker. We ate steak afterwards. All in all the trip has been a huge success for both brakes and esp who gave it there all for their first ever amewrican shows. They've got to be a lot more tired than me thats for sure. We're doing some recording today and then we're off to NYC tomorrow.
Take care ya'll.
Take care ya'll.
Saturday, 4 March 2006
homestead
Yo Dudes
So this whole touring solid malarkey is taking a break for a week and a half to allow us to re-charge our batteries. The last gig supporting editors was last night and now we're all back home wondering what to do with ourselves.... except for tom whose gone hiking in the highlands.
Bristol was the first regional editors show we did and once again we'd managed to be late. A third band- Kubicheck!- had been added to the bill so we forfeited our sound check and let them go ahead. There were a few additions to the touring crew, given that they were taking the same pa system to every venue. We didn't quite get the chance to get to know them that night, everything was rushed and a bit frantic. Eamon had forgotten to bring his cappo on stage and the rest of us were a little dismayed when he suddenly bounded off stage mid set to fetch it. I thought he's gone to puke. Nice to see alex from clayhill there although i couldn't find him after the gig as it was such a squeeze, sorry mate.. i tried. Nice to see stroudie ben too who gave us all packs of columbian ciggarettes that probably gave me this awful cough. That night there were men and women screaming violently at each other in the corridors of bristol travelodge. Someone threatened to call the police and they quitened down after about an hour.
Southampton next and we arrived in good time. It was a big old hall with a steinway in the dressing room and automatic doors back stage. The audience were useless, we gave and got nothing in return. It was a mildly crushing experience. Apparently upon eamon giving the editors boys a shout out and tom and alex dropping into a couple of bars of 'Munich' for a laugh, someone in the crowd turned to their fellow gig-goer and said "Oh! Is this them already?". Knowing that made it all seem ok again.
It was off to Norwich the next day and i had a good feeling about it. Waynne put his foot down and got us there pretty damn quick. I don't think id been in that part of the country all that much so it was nice to have a look, very flat isn't it? Lots of cedars too. The gig itself was in the university of east anglia union. There wasn't much to do between duties so i practiced my juggling. I'm getting pretty good, perhaps my dreams of becoming a clown could be realised soon. The show was really good for us, a very enthusiastic crowd and quite a few fans of our own were present and singing along.
It was raining in Manchester. There was nothing particularly memorbable about the gig but we a had a good old booze up afterwards in big hands. There were lots of rounds being bought. I managed to spit a cork into some girls beer, she wasn't happy but she gave me the beer on the promise that id buy her another one if i saw her again, and i will. It was the last night for Kubicheck! who headed off to support Futureheads on a secret club gig around the uk. Good luck to them!
Ah, a day off in Glasgow, what sweet bliss. Following a much needed night off we were excited for Barrowlands. Id not played there before but had heard so much. It was bloody freezing in there and our dressing room had the distinct feeling that a murder had taken place in it. Gig was a funny one for us, bit iffy sound on stage but apparently it was a goodun. I'll happily stand corrected to some of the reports on this very forum. It was just nice to play in scotland again.
Leaving Glasgow was as painfull as always but we know we'll be back soon, possibly playing some other places than tut's too! Dundee anyone? Back down to the newcastle accademy it was. We'd had a good time there with belle and sebastian. The acoustics are pretty spot on in there so we were encouraging waynne to crank it, not that he needed any encouraging. Eamon got the name of the record shop where we'd done an instore that afternoon wrong, i'll apologise on his behalf as it was a very good record shop and everyone involved was very nice. So that's RPM records Bridgegate (i think), Newcastle upon Tyne.. biggup. Good gig for us though, loud and ballsy. Russell from editors made us aware of a surprise they'd been planning for us the next day. OUr minds BoGgLeD!!!
So we hit the midlands for our final show with editors in the same venue that we'd started our tour with B&S. One big euro tour circle of lurve. It was an ealry gig as there was a club night afterwards so the whole thing went quite quickly. The surprise still hadn't been revealed by the time we were due onstage. We were having a real blinder of a gig and we could see the end in sights when suddenly the lights went pink. "Thats funny" i thought, they'd been blue for our set the whole tour, why would they change now? It was all revealed once we stared NY PIe when 3 members of editors and radio and television's edith bowman came onstage in pantomime horse and cow costumes led by there guitar technician rich. It was certainly a surpirse and i didn't quite know what to do at first. There was this disbelief and then i got the joke and couldn't stop laughing, completely missing loads of notes with distraction. It didn't matter... it was fucking funny and i cant wait to see the photos, what a cheeky bunch! There was much boozing and revelry afterwards and the corridors were busy with guests. We stayed as long as we could and then we made our way back down to brighton. We had no-where to leave our stuff so matt eaton of the hanbury arms and brakes guest singing took us in for the night and gave us guinness.
So this whole touring solid malarkey is taking a break for a week and a half to allow us to re-charge our batteries. The last gig supporting editors was last night and now we're all back home wondering what to do with ourselves.... except for tom whose gone hiking in the highlands.
Bristol was the first regional editors show we did and once again we'd managed to be late. A third band- Kubicheck!- had been added to the bill so we forfeited our sound check and let them go ahead. There were a few additions to the touring crew, given that they were taking the same pa system to every venue. We didn't quite get the chance to get to know them that night, everything was rushed and a bit frantic. Eamon had forgotten to bring his cappo on stage and the rest of us were a little dismayed when he suddenly bounded off stage mid set to fetch it. I thought he's gone to puke. Nice to see alex from clayhill there although i couldn't find him after the gig as it was such a squeeze, sorry mate.. i tried. Nice to see stroudie ben too who gave us all packs of columbian ciggarettes that probably gave me this awful cough. That night there were men and women screaming violently at each other in the corridors of bristol travelodge. Someone threatened to call the police and they quitened down after about an hour.
Southampton next and we arrived in good time. It was a big old hall with a steinway in the dressing room and automatic doors back stage. The audience were useless, we gave and got nothing in return. It was a mildly crushing experience. Apparently upon eamon giving the editors boys a shout out and tom and alex dropping into a couple of bars of 'Munich' for a laugh, someone in the crowd turned to their fellow gig-goer and said "Oh! Is this them already?". Knowing that made it all seem ok again.
It was off to Norwich the next day and i had a good feeling about it. Waynne put his foot down and got us there pretty damn quick. I don't think id been in that part of the country all that much so it was nice to have a look, very flat isn't it? Lots of cedars too. The gig itself was in the university of east anglia union. There wasn't much to do between duties so i practiced my juggling. I'm getting pretty good, perhaps my dreams of becoming a clown could be realised soon. The show was really good for us, a very enthusiastic crowd and quite a few fans of our own were present and singing along.
It was raining in Manchester. There was nothing particularly memorbable about the gig but we a had a good old booze up afterwards in big hands. There were lots of rounds being bought. I managed to spit a cork into some girls beer, she wasn't happy but she gave me the beer on the promise that id buy her another one if i saw her again, and i will. It was the last night for Kubicheck! who headed off to support Futureheads on a secret club gig around the uk. Good luck to them!
Ah, a day off in Glasgow, what sweet bliss. Following a much needed night off we were excited for Barrowlands. Id not played there before but had heard so much. It was bloody freezing in there and our dressing room had the distinct feeling that a murder had taken place in it. Gig was a funny one for us, bit iffy sound on stage but apparently it was a goodun. I'll happily stand corrected to some of the reports on this very forum. It was just nice to play in scotland again.
Leaving Glasgow was as painfull as always but we know we'll be back soon, possibly playing some other places than tut's too! Dundee anyone? Back down to the newcastle accademy it was. We'd had a good time there with belle and sebastian. The acoustics are pretty spot on in there so we were encouraging waynne to crank it, not that he needed any encouraging. Eamon got the name of the record shop where we'd done an instore that afternoon wrong, i'll apologise on his behalf as it was a very good record shop and everyone involved was very nice. So that's RPM records Bridgegate (i think), Newcastle upon Tyne.. biggup. Good gig for us though, loud and ballsy. Russell from editors made us aware of a surprise they'd been planning for us the next day. OUr minds BoGgLeD!!!
So we hit the midlands for our final show with editors in the same venue that we'd started our tour with B&S. One big euro tour circle of lurve. It was an ealry gig as there was a club night afterwards so the whole thing went quite quickly. The surprise still hadn't been revealed by the time we were due onstage. We were having a real blinder of a gig and we could see the end in sights when suddenly the lights went pink. "Thats funny" i thought, they'd been blue for our set the whole tour, why would they change now? It was all revealed once we stared NY PIe when 3 members of editors and radio and television's edith bowman came onstage in pantomime horse and cow costumes led by there guitar technician rich. It was certainly a surpirse and i didn't quite know what to do at first. There was this disbelief and then i got the joke and couldn't stop laughing, completely missing loads of notes with distraction. It didn't matter... it was fucking funny and i cant wait to see the photos, what a cheeky bunch! There was much boozing and revelry afterwards and the corridors were busy with guests. We stayed as long as we could and then we made our way back down to brighton. We had no-where to leave our stuff so matt eaton of the hanbury arms and brakes guest singing took us in for the night and gave us guinness.
Friday, 24 February 2006
at least all travelodges look the same....
......so you feel like you're coming home every night...aaahh. Yes, we've 9 days of UK fun ahead of us, playing many of the same venues we did on the belle and sebastian tour.
The last 6 days have been tiring but fun. The drive to Oslo was long and snowy and it was dark when we got there. We shuffled like penguins along the icy pavements being careful not to fall over. Of course the next day i fell over and hurt my knee quite badly. Had a bit of a limp for a few days but its ok now, just a bit of bruising. Feeling cold and sorry for myself i went into oslo centre and bought a jumper. When we re-grouped later that afternoon it transpired that eamon had also bought a jumper. Managed to get a good round of bowling in before the gig. Ten pin is quickly becoming brakes' sport of choice, definitely for these winter months anyway. The gig was a hoot, id say as good if not better than stockholm.
We made it just in time the next day in Copenhagen, the venue was huge and very beautiful in a thirties style, lots of black and white tiling and symmetry. Watched editors from the balcony which was closed off to the public. They were very loud but apparently not as loud as us, i was impressed anyway, their songs are growing on me and the light show is very pretty.
The next day, in Bochum, we did not make it in time, well we got there when we were suposed to go on. The promoter wasn't too happy and the crowd were a little impatient. We'd been given a dubious map you see and it had got us very lost. Eamon eventually got the directions from an art school. I broke a string which stressed me out even more than i was already. We just about scraped through i think.
Eindhoven reminded me of Groenigen with its big market square and old churches. We had a bit of time to spare so on failing to locate a nearby bowling rink, we opted for a nice coffee shop and got stoned. A little too stoned perhaps as none of us said much for the rest of the day. Tried out some new intro music of Sun O, an american apocalyptic noise ensemble whose album that tom bought is specifically designed to be played very loud and very bassy. We thought we'd see if we coud make the audience hallucinate before our gig. Gig was ok, we was a bit stoned innit!
Back to blighty the next day and we just made it onto our designated ferry that was running late anyway. We were disappointed once we got to the Astoria to find that Richard Hawley had pulled out due to illness. So we took his slot and played a blinder. I was somewhat daunted at first having not played there before but i got into it once id reminded myself that it was a speck of a venue compared to the hammersmith apollo.
I left shortly after our set to go and watch some friends of mine, The Young Playthings play at the Metro club. They were sweet and it was good to watch a band who weren't editors or belle and sebastian. Other than the chalets, they were the only band ive seen in the last two months. Going to see Silver Jews in glasgow in april so ive got that to look forward too.
The last 6 days have been tiring but fun. The drive to Oslo was long and snowy and it was dark when we got there. We shuffled like penguins along the icy pavements being careful not to fall over. Of course the next day i fell over and hurt my knee quite badly. Had a bit of a limp for a few days but its ok now, just a bit of bruising. Feeling cold and sorry for myself i went into oslo centre and bought a jumper. When we re-grouped later that afternoon it transpired that eamon had also bought a jumper. Managed to get a good round of bowling in before the gig. Ten pin is quickly becoming brakes' sport of choice, definitely for these winter months anyway. The gig was a hoot, id say as good if not better than stockholm.
We made it just in time the next day in Copenhagen, the venue was huge and very beautiful in a thirties style, lots of black and white tiling and symmetry. Watched editors from the balcony which was closed off to the public. They were very loud but apparently not as loud as us, i was impressed anyway, their songs are growing on me and the light show is very pretty.
The next day, in Bochum, we did not make it in time, well we got there when we were suposed to go on. The promoter wasn't too happy and the crowd were a little impatient. We'd been given a dubious map you see and it had got us very lost. Eamon eventually got the directions from an art school. I broke a string which stressed me out even more than i was already. We just about scraped through i think.
Eindhoven reminded me of Groenigen with its big market square and old churches. We had a bit of time to spare so on failing to locate a nearby bowling rink, we opted for a nice coffee shop and got stoned. A little too stoned perhaps as none of us said much for the rest of the day. Tried out some new intro music of Sun O, an american apocalyptic noise ensemble whose album that tom bought is specifically designed to be played very loud and very bassy. We thought we'd see if we coud make the audience hallucinate before our gig. Gig was ok, we was a bit stoned innit!
Back to blighty the next day and we just made it onto our designated ferry that was running late anyway. We were disappointed once we got to the Astoria to find that Richard Hawley had pulled out due to illness. So we took his slot and played a blinder. I was somewhat daunted at first having not played there before but i got into it once id reminded myself that it was a speck of a venue compared to the hammersmith apollo.
I left shortly after our set to go and watch some friends of mine, The Young Playthings play at the Metro club. They were sweet and it was good to watch a band who weren't editors or belle and sebastian. Other than the chalets, they were the only band ive seen in the last two months. Going to see Silver Jews in glasgow in april so ive got that to look forward too.
lie back and think of england
well, here we are at the end of the mammoth "first bit" of our spring 2006 tour with t'editors, and a mighty fine jaunt 'round europe and scandinavia's most eye wateringly cold places it was, too....props to the stockholm massive, in particular..........moving on, london last night (get well soon, mr. hawley) was a triumph for all brakes-involved personnel, if somewhat slightly marred by a lovely review of editors on page seven of today's independent which chose not to mention brakes one little bit!! the cheek!!! anyway, we had the last laugh......symbols and base? did you GO to school????
also must just mention the new GO-Kart Mozart record - "Tearing Up The Album Chart".....had to check it out after seeing them at Hammersmith (and digging Denim, previously)......and it's brilliant. deranged, but brilliant.
righty....i'm off to my bed.......bristol tomorrow, then some more, then manchester, then skiing in the cairngorms on our day off!!! woo!!!!!! hope y'all are well...........byeeeeeeeeeeee!
tom
x
also must just mention the new GO-Kart Mozart record - "Tearing Up The Album Chart".....had to check it out after seeing them at Hammersmith (and digging Denim, previously)......and it's brilliant. deranged, but brilliant.
righty....i'm off to my bed.......bristol tomorrow, then some more, then manchester, then skiing in the cairngorms on our day off!!! woo!!!!!! hope y'all are well...........byeeeeeeeeeeee!
tom
x
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)