Bonjour! Welcome back. Sorry we’ve been so lazy on the bloggery pokery, it’s because we’ve been BUSY.
Yes, that is right. Busy making the sounds that will soon be gracing your ears. Busy recording and practising and practising recording and recording practising. Busy on business like your husband who is actually sleeping with his secretary but claims that he’s on a weekend conference in Bridlington. Busy recording grime tracks under the pseudonym Biz-E. This is all true.
Sequence of Some Events as follows:
On Friday we travelled to Paris to play our first ever gig in the abroads of Europe. This involved getting up at 4.30am to drive to Folkstone, where we then drove onto the Eurostar and promptly fell asleep. The following experience was hugely surreal and most disconcerting: Imagine falling asleep in your vehicle and then awakening to the sensation of movement, only to find when you open your eyes that you are surrounded by a blank and static scenery which is completely unidentifiable for a good fifteen drowsy seconds. Pair this with a crick in the neck and pins and needles down your left leg and life is confusing enough already. “Ouch” you think to yourself sleepily. Once you have worked out where you are you turn to stretch out your left leg and at the same time realise there are some giggling strangers whispering and taking photos of you. If you hadn’t done so already then it’s at this point you really start to wonder what the hell is going on and indeed if there’s any point to life at all. It then takes a further fifteen seconds to realise that these strangers are actually Wave Machines – also on their way to Paris to play with us at La Fleche d’Or – and that you’re not in Calais yet. Discombobulating stuff.
I read in the paper the other day that drinking 3 cups of coffee could make you hallucinate, we put this to the test in Paris whilst suffering from sleep deprivation but alas it wasn't to be.
After the Eurotunnel debacle the French leg of our journey got off to a smooth start, driving to Paris and finding the venue with relative ease. You may already have looked at the photo above, I certainly have, and I can tell you this was taken after we’d soundchecked but before we’d seen the Eiffel Tower. Here is a photo of the Eiffel Tower, you’ve probably seen it before but I hadn’t, as my family always used to holiday in Bridlington. I don’t know why.
We found this monument thing in Paris, it was quite tall.
After a stagger around the city we returned to the venue to have some dinner. I got the biggest piece of chicken which I think was fair enough considering I gave my drinks tokens to the others, I’m not drinking at the moment due to a bad case of not drinking you see. Some friends from Paris turned up as well as some people from good old Engerland, thank you chaps for coming. Also thanks to all the lovely Parisians who made our night so pleasurable, it was truly a great gig and we will happily come back and play songs for you anytime you ask, as long as you pay us. After the gig we stayed and danced the night away and then returned to our hotel, the incredibly named Mr Bed City, and slumbered away in a room smaller than a portacabin. On the way out of Paris the next day we got lost because the road signs are crap and made it to the chunnel with barely fifteen minutes to spare.
Next.
That same night two tired Simons and myself managed to drag ourselves out to Be@Proud Galleries in Camden to see the Wave Machines again. We only did this because we love them and I only mention it to give me the excuse to use this photo:
Tim Wavemachine and his wonderful jumper getting involved with the burlesque show, much to our amusement.
A little bit more.
For the next few weeks we will be hiding in a farmhouse in Oxfordshire doing the post-production on our album, which we have finally finished recording. The talented Graeme Stewart is helping us with this, and when I say helping I mean doing it for us. Graeme works with Radiohead and is therefore cool. So far today I have listened to the same song repeatedly for six hours and then another song for a further three, and in all honesty I’m feeling slightly insane. Nothing new there though. Here is Henry playing a guitar owned by Thom Yorke:
Henry wouldn't let go of the guitar for fully forty minutes and in the end we had to bash his head in with a cudgel and then prise it from his lifeless fingers before throwing his body in a ditch near the A40.
Tomorrow…
…we are playing with White Lies at the Tunbridge Wells Forum and I’ve gotta say well done to the boys for achieving number one slot in the album chart on the first week of their release. Niiice!
This is great:
Vodpod videos no longer available.
That is all for now, we are about to drive home and prepare ourselves for an emotional reunion with the White Lies boys.
Night gorgeous,
Fred x
PS. I’ve never been to Bridlington. New gig dates confirmed and up on the myspace.
THE RUSSIAN CLUB 