RECENT TOUR DIARY:

Fall European Tour 2003 was fantastic, best tour yet, other than the last few days of it when I got the flu or strep throat or somesuch.  Below is a mini tour diary of sorts...

The shows were:

South England (with Diane Cluck)
Sun Sept 28 - London, Arts Cafe- (A great begining. Sold out, with excess people hanging out outside to hear the show. Great to see Grandmaster Gareth, and the Halls and other friendly faces! Stayed at the house of our new friends Masha and Tim, where there were also lots of other new friends, who have been having a weekend-long house-warming party, unfortunately for us weary travellers who only wanted to sleep off our jetlag and get a well-rested start on our non-stop tour. Hope we didn't seem ungrateful for the hospitality. Guitarist tripping on acid jamming nonsensically in the basement right below the floor we are lying on, till neighbors threatened to call the cops about the noise at 3 am. People freaking out crying on Special K in the hall. Alcohol thrown around in people's faces. Laundry hamper full of puke. General student party madness, and none of them could figure out why the travelling rock band only wants to go to sleep! Ah yes, we are back on tour for sure. 22 more shows to come, without a single night off! Woo hoo!)
Mon Sept 29 - Bristol, Cube Cinema (We could only play with 2 people on stage at a time, due to local sound ordinances. We showed up late, having been stuck in traffic the whole way from London, and hit the stage immediately. Diane was great. The lovely theater really is a perfect space to hear her haunting songs in. Sold out show again! Two members of Movietone were in the audience!!! This made my week, I love their music, though after the show I stupidly told them how much I love their album "Night and Day", realizing afterwards that the album is actually called "Day and Night". They offered to let us stay at their house!!! Also saw Maddy, the wonderful woman who had put us up last time we were in Bristol! Sadly, we had to run immediately afterwards so Gareth could drive like hell for a couple hours on the dark roads and let us make it in time to catch a middle-of-the-night ferry to Ireland. What would we do without Gareth? Most of my looking forward to being on tour is looking forward to riding up front with Gareth, listening to obscure 60s albums and talking, eating crappy gas station sandwiches, occasionally smoking one of his cigarettes.)

Ireland (with Diane Cluck)
Tues Sept 30 - Waterford, The Kings Venue (We were up basically all night, driving and riding the ferry, arrived about 7 am and booked ourselves into a bed-and-breakfast to finally get some real rest. The venue was small, only about 25 people there- a real bring down after two sold-out dates. I must have had a bad Guiness, cuz I couldn't sleep from stomach pain, and ended up puking in the middle of the night.)
Wed Oct 1- Dublin, Whelans (A good set, a full house, and when we announced that we needed a place to stay for the night there was practically a riot of people wanting us to stay with them! Many were drunk, or insane, or annoying, or all three. Finally after weighing our many options we went to a lovely lass's house and hung out with her and her friends (who have a band called The Things) and all was well except that when we left in the morning Diane had forgotten her favorite boots there. Gone forever apparently.)
Thu Oct 2 - Cork, Half Moon Theatre (The was billed as "Artrocker Versus Antifolk night", meaning that Diane and I were double-booked w/ two garage rock bands, Gin Palace & The Hells. Gin Palace kept making stupid comments about Antifolk during their set, trying to play up the "versus" element of the night's advertising, but when Jack, Anders, Gareth and I hit the stage we fully avenged ourselves and I think it was safe to say that Antifolk won the battle though there really wasn't one. After the show, Diane, Jack and I had a great time staying at our new friend Griffen's apartment, I met her the last time I was in Ireland and then saw her again in New York on New Year's Day so it was cool to cross paths once more. Anders and Gareth weren't so lucky as there wasn't enough room for all of us at Griffen's place and they ended up with some loony drunk who apparently sent Gareth into a near-suicidal frenzy - normally the coolest guy on Earth, Gareth almost drove all of them off the road just to get the guy to shut up!)
Fri Oct 3 - Myrtleville, Pine Lodge (A much needed rest even though we arrived just before sunset - returning to the beautiful coastal Pine Lodge, we spent an hour or two walking around the beach before even going inside to say we'd arrived. We really needed the little break - I'd been feeling musically stagnant, and everybody else was having their own issues too. Not many people in the audience, I let things stretch out a bit, with Diane on stage during most of my set, playing Gareth's harmonium while he napped upstairs, we got loose with feedback and long leisurely segways, improv jams and impromptu arrangements, a nice change of pace. Sadly we couldn't spend the night in the Lodge's beautiful upstairs rooms but had to pull another all-night travel to catch the ferry back over to England.)

North England (with Diane Cluck and Misty's Big Adventure)
Sat Oct 4 - Liverpool, Soundclash@The Magnet (A great venue, a great set by everybody, including the fantastic full line-up of Misty's Big Adventure who blew everybody away. During my set we did a long "Last Time I Did Acid" in which the soundman got into the act, adding fucked-up echo effects to my voice at unpredictable parts in the ending monologue, so that nobody including us on stage had any idea what was going to happen next. Jen and Andy from London were in the audience and it was great fun to hang out with them at the bar after the show. I had to take a bit of a walk afterwards to buy a new phone card to call Rachel with, but I ended up with a good one. Anders decided to stay with Jen and Andy at Andy's folks' house in Liverpool, while the rest of us drove to spend the night at the Misty's-friendly house in suburban Manchester that had been so hospitable to us on the last tour.)
Sun Oct 5 - Newcastle, The Dog & Parrot (We've been getting spoiled by sold-out UK shows on this tour, so it seemed like a disappointment to only have about 70 people in the audience, but the venue was a cool little upstairs room that felt quite cozy, and we did a good version of our Stereolab cover for an audience member in a Stereolab shirt, climaxing with me somehow falling on my face during the ending feedback freakout; I must have tripped on a patchcord! The audience was talking a bit during Diane's set but totally shut up when she played "Monte Carlo" - it was a magical transformation, you could have heard a pin drop, I guess they must have recognized the opening chords from the Antifolk Volume 1 comp? Maybe they didn't realize at first who they were seeing? Odd the different things that get reactions from people in different areas, a mystery from night to night.)
Mon Oct 6 - Leeds, Royal Park (Another sold-out show - this tour has been a strange step up for us in the sense that we seem to have solidified a genuine cult following in England - a great feeling that everywhere we go there's about 100 enthusiastic people who want to come see us! Despite the cool, punky basement space we played in tonight, our energy felt lax somehow, nobody was moving while we were rocking as hard as we could on our band songs, quite different from our last Leeds show with Schwervon when we had audience members throwing beer and jumping on stage and screaming and dancing - well, mostly it was that guy from great garage band The Real Losers! He showed up tonight and gave me a great tape of an Acid-Punk 60s album I'd never heard - The Night Shadows! Diane played an awesome set, playing a couple amazing songs I hadn't heard her do in a while, like No Threat- some of the audience was yakking a bit while she played, those suckers really missed out.)
Tues Oct 7 - Manchester, the Star and Garter (This was a bit of a logistical fiasco, in that the club had not realized I was bringing Diane and Misty's and had already booked three other support acts, so Jack, Anders and I didn't hit the stage till pretty late by UK standards, and some people had had to leave to catch their last train home,etc, which I felt particularly awful about since it was 9 pounds to get in. But still a packed venue and musically a very good night, people requesting my Will Oldham song just having heard of it thru word-of-mouth, pretty flattering. Ended the set with a big freak-out jam on that Stereolab song again, with Misty's on stage, Lucy playing saxophone is what made it for me. I was nervous because our last show in Manchester with Herman Dune had been one of our best sets in recent memory, I knew there were expectations that we weren't going to meet, and as far as I'm concerned we didn't fully meet them; but all told it was still one of the better sets of our tour so far. Audience enthusiasm REALLY helps.)
Wed Oct 8 - Leicester, The Sumo (This was a smallish show by this tour's England standards, maybe 60-70 people - it seems like Leicester is destined to be a relatively low-attendance area for us, though it's still amazing to me that we've been having as much of an attendance as we have been on this tour, since it's basically our first real headlining tour without people on the bill like Kimya Dawson or Herman Dune to ensure wider interest like we've had on the prevous tours. Closed the set with what I thought was the best "Springtime" we've done in a long time, that song has not been coming together like I felt it should on the couple times we've played it on this tour, and it felt like it hadn't bounced back from the crummy version I thought we did in Paris last June. Paris felt like an aimless mess, but the couple versions so far on this current tour have been feeling TOO controlled, even with Misty's and Diane joining us on stage. When I play any of my solo songs I basically know exactly how the songs will go- there's not much room for surprises, and I rely on the handful of "jammier" songs like Springtime or Vampire Bats or some of the cover songs to keep myself excited about new possibilities each night. When Springtime or Last Time I Did Acid or any of the other looser songs start to feel like they're calcifying into predictable forms, I start worrying that I'm in danger of becoming some kind of pre-scripted musical theater instead of being completely open on stage and letting things come alive for real. But tonight there was unexpected cool feedback stuff happening, and my mic fell over so we ended it all unplugged and acapella; it's the happy accidents that really make performing worthwhile. I was really happy, but afterwards Diane said she thought it was the worst version! I guess I just liked it cuz I had more fun; it might not have particularly been the best version to listen to.)
Thu Oct 9 - Birmingham, The Rainbow (Diane left for London this morning to fly home - can't believe the tour is going so fast! It's been so great to play our songs together every night, wish we'd gotten to write more collaborations. She was such a good addition to these nights, I'm so glad she came with us. Having a blast hanging out with Gareth and Lucy and Sam and all the Misty's crew, and staying at Lucy's place in Mosely once again. Feels like a second home! past couple days we've listened to the first Can album over and over till we had worked out a way to cover "Outside My Door" which ended the set tonight, as me and my guitar and my big guitar monitor all got knocked off the high-ish stage during the final distortion paroxyisms. Wish I knew how to wring more sound out of my guitar in such moments without breaking it and things around me. Feels like these frenzied moments are probably only exciting visually - if I listened to a tape of one of these performances I think the guitar sounds would still be too weak and unvaried compared to what I want it to be. The idea is to throw open the floodgates but there's only so much I know how to do. Strings break, my fingernails break, my hands bleed, the guitar is knocked silly so it barely stays in tune anymore, and the sound still feels like it's not unfettered enough. Do I need to finally learn a real scale or two? Learn how to play a "real" solo? Or just buy more pedals? Using an amp would certainly help. Lou Reed, Ira Kaplan, Jimi Hendrix, Thurston Moore, Andre and David Herman Dune, Mike Rechner, I meditate upon your guidance! After the show we pull yet another all-nighter; Anders heroically drives Jack and I down to London, we find the car rental place about 4 am after getting totally lost in South London where nobody roams the streets except wild foxes!)

France/area
Fri Oct 10 - Paris, La Guinguette Pirate (4 am, London- Anders, Jack and I manage to sleep in the hatchback of the car for a few hours, parked around the corner, untill 8 am when the rental place opens. We return the car with no fuss, happily! Ben Ayres comes down to meet us and takes us to his house in the nearby neighborhood of Tooting, replenishes our merchandise supply with a box of CDs from the Rough Trade office, serves us tea and coffee, gives us our Eurostar train tickets and sends us on our way to our show in Paris. When we arrive we find two drivers waiting for us! There's been some kind of mix up. Anyway it is great to have a driver! We go with BP, a great guy from Lille, who races us to the venue since we're late... it's Paris' famous floating venue, a "Pirate Ship", we've seen shows here before but it's quite a different experience to be actually playing music while the whole place is lurching around on the water! I break a string seemingly every song I play, Jack does his solo songs to cover me while I change strings each time. Not the most "professional" performance I've done to be sure. What's wrong with my guitar? Some of the audience knows Jack's stuff from his set at the Mofo festival last June! A guy in front keeps yelling for "more punk smashers!" I show a few low budget videos too but realize after the show that there were more people crammed into the back of the audience than I'd realized who almost certainly couldn't see the artwork at all, feel crummy about this. Afterwards Jack and Anders seem to disappear and I get annoyed at having to run around making sure I've gathered up all of Jack's stuff etc. Jack leaves to go to some "exclusive" club with Benoit, our friend from Mains D'Oeuvres - Ha! What "exclusive" club is gonna a let a pair of guys like Jack and Benoit in?!?)

(more Fall 2003 tour-diary details to come)
Sat Oct 11 - Nantes
Sun Oct 12 - Bordeaux
Mon Oct 13 - Toulouse
Tues Oct 14 – Lille, with Herman Dune
Wed Oct 15 - Liege, BELGIUM
Thu Oct 16 - Dordrecht, Pop Centrale, HOLLAND (with Herman Dune)
Fri Oct 17 – Lille, with FRANK BLACK
Sat Oct 18 - Evreux, France

England again...
Oct 19 - London, Frieze Festival@The Victory Services Club (63-79 Seymour St)
Oct 20 - London, ULU, with British Sea Power