What The Fuck!!!

Germany is a great country, full of nice people. But why do they insist on giving this man a career!!!
In much the same way that ive never met an American who voted Bush, ive never met a German who would admit to liking David Hasselhoff!! (im not sure which is worse actually!!)

Im not sure if he`s ironically taking the piss out of himself or if its just over the top!!!

Look Ma, I Can Fly!!!

So, you know how it is. You're at work, you have an hour to kill. Maybe you go shopping, maybe you go for a drink.....I decided to do a base jump from a 630ft high building.

That shape is me by the way!!! Its basically an 11 second freefall from the roof of the Sky Tower in Auckland.
And it is brilliant!!! They bring you up top. Strap you into a harness. You walk the plank and 3,2,1....Jump...Gravity takes care of the rest.



























If you want any more info then check out www.skyjump.co.nz Everyone should try this at least once!!




Check out this guy, not every day you see a viking in a food court is it!!

YES, YES, YES!!!!!!!

Football Fever!!!

So here it is, the new Home Jersey that the mighty Reds(Thats Liverpool to you not in the know) will be wearing this season



Im sure this means less than nothing to most of you but hey as ive said before...Its my blog

All Aboard for Sams Town!!!

So here is the album artwork for the new Killers album!!!

AAARRRRGHHHH!!!!!! No More Air travel!!

So, here i am. Auckland, New Zealand. Long Travel day. Nice - London-Bangkok-Sydney-Auckland. 40 hours after i left the hotel in Monte Carlo and 4 airplanes and 14,000 miles later im at my hotel in Auckland. Left on Mon.........Its Weds afternoon now here....and its winter as well. At least the winter here isnt that cold. But lucky me, i dont get to see a plane for 3 whole days. Actually i really like Auckland, had a blast last time i was here a few months ago. So im really looking forward to the day off tomorrow and show on Friday.

Last Call!!!

So, my final show with Kanye is over and done. There is always a bittersweet feeling when a tour ends. You are excited for the next project and still sad that another one has ended. Its almost like the last day of school!!! Just back from a good night out at a club in Monte Carlo, lots of beer and cheerful goodbyes. Hopefully we will all see each other and work together again
Heres a couple of photos from the show tonight. Notice the lovely view from directly in front of the stage.....ie behind the trees!!!


























Also since it is the last night, here is a little vid of my favourite portion of the show. This is the part where Kanye shows his true personality........he plays a selection of his favourite songs including Aha's Take On Me!!! Complete with a little dance....Makes me laugh every time!


And heres me with the boss at the after party

So thanks again to every one involved in the tour, its been a blast.
See you out there again!!
Me, ive a 26 hour flight to New Zealand to look forward to. Talk to you all in a couple of days
TTYS

Exciting Times!!!

This is prob of no interest to anyone out there but hey its my blog!!!
This is a video preview of the latest Tony Hawk video game which i will no doubt pass many, many hours on the bus on the next Killers tour playing

Fake Tales

Here is a look at the new video for Arctic Monkeys "Fake Tales Of San Francisco" from The Rotherham show back in April. Out of all the video shoots ive done lights for this is the first one ive ever seen in full. Bizzarre!!!

NICE!!!!!!

Now ive played a few places in my time where the view of the stage is slightly restricted, maybe theres a balcony?? Maybe in an old theatre there is a pillar but this is re-godamn-diculous........

This is the view from behind the desk at todays Nice Jazz Festival in the South Of France. Not sure how effective the lights will be against those trees but hey, we'll give it a go. At least the view from the hotel is nice!!!

On another note today is my last with Kanye as im back to Arctic Monkeys tomorrow after 15 days, 8 shows, 16 flights and something like 20,000 airmiles. So a big thanks to Kanye, Atrak,Tony,Joi, Marisa, Don C, Ibn, Barry, Pip, Nancy, Ants, John, Derek, Bryan and Sondra. And all the crew from the Feb-April Tour(8 weeks, 45 shows, 70,000 miles and once around the world. (Hot Dog, Becky, Sully, Doug) who didnt make it back this time around. Hope to meet you all again sometime down the road. All the Best.



Kanye West Touch The Sky Tour 2006
Feb
19-21 London Hammersmith Apollo
22 Cardiff Arena
24-25 Dublin Point
26 London Theatre Royal
28 Birmingham NEC
March
2 Milan Alcatraz
3 Zurich Xtra
5 Berlin ColumbiaHalle
6 Cologne Palladium
8 Rotterdam Ahoy
9 Paris Le Zenith
10 Brussels Ancienne Belgique
12 Barcelona Razamatazz
16 Auckland, St James
20 Brisbane Convention Center
23 Melbourne Festival hall
26 Sydney Horden Pavillion
29 Adelaide Thebarton
April
2 Sydney Opera House
5 Yokohama Blitz
6 Tokyo Studio Coast
9 Honolulu Blaisdell Arena

July
11 Johannesburg Coca Cola Dome
14 Capetown Belleville Velodrome
16 Rotterdam North Sea Festival
17 Lisbon jazz Fest
19 Vienne Cotes Du Rock Fest
20 Stockholm Jazz Festival
21 Pori Jazz Festival
23 Nice Jazz Festival

"Burning Down The Highway Skyline..On The Back Of A Hurricane"

So heres the scoop on the new Killers album as announced today on NME.com The full tracklisting is:

'Sam's Town'
'Enterlude'
'When You Were Young'
'Bling'
'For Reasons Unknown'
'Read My Mind'
'Uncle Jonny'
'Bones'
'My List'
'This River Is Wild'
'Why Do I Keep Counting?'
'Exitlude'

I recognise a couple of these from various stage of completion on last years tour.

I got the surprise of my life this morning when i woke up to find a Swedish woman straddling me........now before youre minds run to the gutter. I was asleep on the plane and she wanted to get out and not wake me!!
Not the worst way to be woken eh!!! I think i awoke with a start and a very puzzled look on face cos she couldnt look at me for the rest of flight!!

The Glamour!!!!

Anyone who says I must have the glamorous job has never seen what I just did. They've never had to dig around they're bag looking for 49 swedish kroner to buy a wrap or else you have to break a 50 euro note and get change in Swedish coins which is useful for the next 15 mins. But then again they also don't know the joy of realising you have 51 kroner : ) Its the little things isn't it!!!

Chaos Week!!!

This is an image ive seen too many times this week. The sun rising at another airport. The pattern since we got back to Europe has been- Up at 4am. Flight at 7. Connection at 11am. Get to gig at 3pm. Show at 10pm. Hotel at 1am. Leave at 4am. Repeat ad nauseum. This week we've seen Amsterdam(twice), Rotterdam, Munich(twice), Lisbon(twice), Lyon(twice), Stockholm(twice) and Frankfurt airports. Oh well, could be worse...
I could have a "real" job : )
its been a pretty busy week hence the lack of postings...also due to lack of wireless at the shows. Here is a couple of pics from the show in Portugal earlier this week. The show was in some sort of gardens attached to a stately home. Was a great show and we were staying in one of the nicest hotels ive stayed at for some time






























So on we roll to Vienne in France. After a long connection in Munich. We arrived to discover 9....yes 9(sorry di i stutter!!) pieces of luggage had been lost (Including mine) so i had to spend a day in 100 * heat in a pair of jeans as my shirts were in Munich!!!! Got my bag back eventually but some have yet to be so lucky!! The venue was an old stone ampitheatre. Not the best show of the tour but the crowd seemed happy nonetheless.




























This is a picture i took yesterday as we flew over the alps from Lyon to Munich. Kinda Nice Eh!!!
So here i am at another airport. Stockholm this time. And before you say anything, yes i was just here. 2 weeks today to be exact. Oh well. Luckily Stockholm is one of my favourite cities in the world. The people are very nice and friendly. We played at the Stockholm Jazz Festival last night. Its now 8am and im waiting on a plane again. The show took place on a stage on the waterfront. Do you like the boat in the background??


Also on the bill was Jazz legend Maceo Parker, who played a great set.


Good show all round really, especially Kanye seemed in a great mood. Stopping the show to encourage people at the concession stands to down theyre beers in one is not something he does every night!!!

So that leaves me here at the airport again. Luckily i dont mind today as im heading home for about 30 hours. Change some clothes and off to France again on Sat night for my last show with Kanye before heading to Australia on Monday with Arctic Monkeys again. Time flies when youre not sleeping doesnt it!!!!
Ta Ta For Now!!!

Travel Madness

Well hello from the North Sea Jazz Festival in Rotterdam,Holland.
Long travel day yesterday saw us fly 12 hours from Capetown to Frankfurt the 1 hour to amsterdam then drive to Rotterdam. And off to Lisbon, Portugal at 4am in the morning tonight after show finishes about Midnight!
A pretty cool feature saw a camera mounted on the rear fin of the plane so you could watch from outside. This is us somewhere over the Sahara desert!!













And this over Germany!! Slightly different landscape!!













And heres a bit of video of landing the plane. As you can see i get really bored on long flights. I watched Crash, Failure to Launch and Firewall and im still bored you ask?? Says a lot about the movies(Except Crash) if you ask me!!!


And when we were collecting our bags i saw the weirdest thing ive ever seen on a luggage belt!!


Yes, that is a russian mortar shell.....How strange!!

When Baboons Go Wrong!!!!

This is a clip from our trip to the Cape of Good Hope a couple of days ago!!
The Baboons are trying to get the food in the kids hand!!!


These guys initally came running towards us with teeth bared and while me and two of the girls stayed still and let them run by. Our sound guy Ants showed his true colours by running to a nearby car and grabbing a small child and putting him into the car, getting in himself.....and locking the door and leaving the dad outside!!!!!

Cowardice over Heroism i reckon!!!!

Strange Signs Of The Southern Hemisphere

Here is a couple of the stranger things i saw in South Africa


Now i know air travel isnt 100% safe but is just silly.
And i thought you could buy this legally in Amsterdam.

And as for this, well im not even sure i want to know what it is but apparently they sell it in Capetown coffee shops.


BIZARRE!!!!!!!

Capetown

So here is a couple of photos of the show day in Capetown. The Show was at an old cycling Velodrome. You know the ones with the high sides everywhere

.













Here is the only view of the world famous Table Mountain i had during my time in Capetown,












This is a painting in the Hotel room as the mountain was covered in Fog the whole time i was there...Oh Well!!


Check out this guy though!!!

THE KILLERS!!!!

Well today was the day that The Killers announced the title of the new album thats gonna be out on Oct 2nd app!! Drumroll please for "SAMS TOWN"
Check out a snippet of the new single which will be out in sept!!!


Should be good!!!

Day Off In Capetown

Here i am at Cape point in Capetown on our day off today. This is the most southerly point in Africa as you can see from the Pic. the next strecth of land south of here is the south pole!!
At the top of the hill there is a sign post with the distances to major cities posted on it. check it out!!

We spent a nice day driving around most of the area, the scenery here is amazing.



we also saw some pretty cool animals today. Penguins, Baboons, Ostriches.


Anyway thats enough of that for today. im sitting in a bar called Sauls updating this as its got food, beer and free wireless. Things that our hotel doesnt have too much of.

Check This Out!!

This is brilliant! God bless You Tube!!!!

Joburg

Hello There from Johannesburg, South Africa. Just met up with ny old touring buddys in Kanye West and Crew. Had a long travel day yesterday. 11 hour flight from London to Jobo after a 7 hour bus from T in the Park to Sheffield, Train to Manchester and a flight from Manchester to London, then straight onto a bus to the venue to start work. Here is a vid guide of the stage. Big place, holds about 20,000 people and was a good show. Asides from having spot ops that couldnt hit the stage, which was 60 feet wide.


Was a def challenge to try and remember the show and all the cues having not done this one for over 3 months and with no rehearsal.
Heres a shot of the man himself in action

Festival Madness!!

Well that was a whirlwind weekend at the Oxegen and T in the Park festivals. Always crazy days doing gigs at home. Always so many people to meet up with. Was fun tho. Oxegen on Sat was like being in the trenches in The Battle of The Somme, rained really heavily all day but never dampened the spirits of the crowd. A massive crowd turned up to see the boys in action, making it a perfect 21st birthday for our guitarist Cookie. BTW Nick also turned 21 this week. Weather was a lot better at T and the crowd were the usual great Scot crowd> Same bill at both festivals saw about 70 bands in action with the likes of The Strokes, We are Scientists, Feeder, Kasabian, Milburn, Arctic Monkeys, Hard Fi, Kaiser Chiefs, Red Hot Chilli peppers, James Brown, Franz Ferdinand and The Who amongst the many rocking the masses.




Heres Roger Daltrey in action during "My Generation"











And A trademark Pete Townsend Windmill in full flow!






















Heres the boys on stage at t in the park and i guess you've really made when you have you're own Scottish whiskey!














But my performance of the weekend goes to The Godfather of Soul- Mr James Brown.
So thats it for Arctic Monkeys for a couple of weeks, next up Australia. As for me i will speak to you soon no doubt as im currently in Heathrow airport waiting to fly to South Africa for a couple of shows with Kanye West.

See Ya!!!!

Accelerator Festival

So here goes sweden then. We did two shows as part of the accelerator festival in Gothenborg and Stockholm. Yesterday saw us playing with Death Cab For Cutie, Regina Spektor and Hot Chip. I got to meet Peter Buck from REM which was kinda cool, he was playing with his side project Robin Hitchcock and The Minus 3.
Today in Stockholm saw us take to the stage after sets by The Spinto Band

And The Raconteurs

And Jack White came by the dressing room after the show to speak to the band, seems like a very nice chap!!
Bizarrely we are staying at a hotel inside stockholm airport tonight as you can see from this photo taken through the lobby window, Yes that is a jumbo jet you can see.

Anyway, time to get on the bus to the hotel for a few hours sleep before an early morning flight to Dublin and the Oxegen Festival where we will be joined by The Who, The Strokes, Feeder, We Are Scientists, Editors and about 40 others bands and approx 70,000 of my closest friends. Itll be nice to be home, even if it is only for a day.
G'nite ya"ll