Muddy Madness!!

So it begins again, after what felt like 15 seconds off. We're back on the bus for the first time in over a month. Feels nice for a change from the planes and hotels i've spent the last month in.

Just 3 festival shows this weekend. First up was the Frequency festival in Austria. Which saw us playing alongside the likes of Franz Ferdinand, The Prodigy,Kaiser Chiefs and a great show from The Editors, a band whose album ive loved for a while but was the first time ive seen them live. If havent heard "The Back Room" , do it NOW!!!

Great setting for a show. Right in the middle of the Slazburgring, which is a racing circuit high in the Austrian Alps.

Here is The view from Pole Position!!!

Next up was Pukkelpop in Belgium. I like doing gigs in Belgium, they are always extremely well organised and they look after you really well. Good Bill today featuring

Mondo Generator

HIM

And Of Course This Lot...Otherwise, why would i be here!

Also got to see and experience the awesome Daft Punk, who were absolutely fantastic.
So, on we go Holland. This was a fun day despite the Torrential downpour of rain that hit a few times during the day.

But to save us from boredom there was a theme park called Walibi World right next door.

It had a rollercoaster called Goliath in it which i have to say was pretty damn good.


Unfort it was stiil raining which made the long line seem even longer, but the band were well protected thanks to theyre new outfits!!

Of course there is only so long in a day that you can ride rollercoasters in the rain. So you need to find other ways to interest and motivate yourself. Such as....

Why, Building a tower of chairs...

.........And then destoying them of course!!
Also today i got to use the new ESP pre visualisation suite. Basically you sit in the front of a computer screen with your lighting desk and program virtually then walk into the venue and pop the disc into the dek and away you go with your show.
Heres a comparison between a screen shot

And the same look from the show

Pretty damn close i reckon!!

And app some bands played today as well

Amongst the better ones were one of the bands helping to redeem Canada from the musical horrors theyve thrown at us in the past.

Broken Social Scene


And my vote for band of the year....

MUSE!!

How that amount of noise can be generated by 3 people is beyond me. See them now or miss out!!!

Tokyo to London!!

So here i am back in London. 13 hours in a bucket seat is no fun, even for someone not very tall like me. I can only imagine the hell that exists for the people who are over 6ft tall.
So travelling by plane has changed a bit in the last week. After all the madness we were seeing on CNN, Fox and Sky News, i was quite pleasantly surprised that the Japanese hadnt gone to the extremes of banning Hand Luggage although the liquid ban was in full effect. While the line was a little longer than usual for check-in it wasnt as bad as i thought it would be. Ive seen worse.(Dublin airport every bloody day!!) The only good thing that came out of all the confusion over baggage allowances was that they seemed to do away with all excess baggage charges, so i managed to get my extra bag of free globe stuff (19 KG) that i accumulated all the way home for free, in addition to my regular suitcase.

So after the show in Osaka we left for Tokyo via the Bullet train. Supposedly the fastest train line in the world. It reaches speeds of over 300km/h


I bought a funky new camera too. It lets you take 3 photos and then stitches them together to form a wide panoramic pic like this one of of Tokyo and the one at the top of the page.

This picture kinda sums up Tokyo for me.
Will we have a river or a freeway?? River or Freeway??
Lets do both!!

So onto the gigs. First one in Osaka is a little weird as its a typical Japanese crowd. After a song ends they cheer and clap really loudly but then stop pretty quickly so they dont miss anything that is said on stage. This can lead to some uncomfortably long silences, especially when Jamies guitar rig decided to stop working and its also Kind of redundant since they cant understand whats being said anyway. (Although there has been plenty of crowds in English speaking countries that couldnt understand Alex because of his accent)



Second day in Tokyo was much more like a regular crowd.
It still makes me laugh to see Japanese kids singing along at the top of theyre lungs to songs thay dont understand.
Double gig for me today as our good friends in We Are Scientists were also there.


As well as Arctic Monkeys of course


And here is another strange sign i saw!!
This was on the hairdryer in my room in Tokyo. I often wonder what someone has done to make a company put stickers like "Electrical Device-Do Not Use In The Shower" on theyre products. This one seems quite particular. Makes you wonder what "The" other purpose is doesnt it!!

Skate Madness

Anyone with even a passing intrest in skateboarding will have probably heard of Danny Way and Bob Burnquist.
For those of you who havent they are a couple of pro skaters who like to take things to ridiculous extremes. Theyve had abit of a friendly rivalry going for a long time and are always trying to better the other.
It all really moved up a gear after Bob Burnquist looped a full pipe for the first.

Danny Way built his mega ramp at Point X Skate Park in the desert in Southern California.

So Bob did the Loop Of Death by removing the Top section of a Full pipe!
Danny does the first MegaRamp Backflip on a skateboard!

So Bob does a front flip!


Danny then decides to ramp it up a notch by jumping the Great Wall Of China


So Bob responds by jumping off the edge of the Grand Canyon (with a parachute)


The latest is that Danny has just completed the highest bomb dive, from the topof the guitar outside the Hard Rock Las Vegas. Thats over 80feet(almost 9 stories) high for anyone who has never been there

Bob has recently pulled off the first sideways barrell roll on a skateboard but although its on his new DVD, there is no footage on youtube.com just yet

Anyway i know this has nothing to do with anything but these guys deserve to be seen by more than just skaters, simply cos of how easy they make it all look.

www. dannyway.com www.bobburnquist.com

Land of The Rising Sun!!

So here we are in Japan! Land of sushi and really well organised gigs!
Everything runs like clockwork here. Its pretty crazy!! After a 10 hour flight in Japanese person sized seats we arrive in tropical heat in Japan. Easily 100 degrees today!!

Today we spent the day walking around Osaka. Went to the palace as you can see above. Pretty interesting. It was built over 400 years ago by Hideyoshi Toyotomi. Its 8 stories high and has a museum inside with some displays of armour and swords and general facts about the castle. App the biggest single piece of stone weighs 135 tonnes.
Thats bloody heavy!!
They also had a kinda cool model recreation of a battle.

Inside they had a range of Kabuto. Which was the traditional head piece worn by the ancient Samurai warriors.
Some were very ornate...such as this one

Others looked more like frat boys should be wearin them with straws coming out of them!!!

After that bit of culture, we decided we needed to see a bit of modern japan. So off into downtown Osaka we headed.

It is a bizarre place. There is lots of people rushing everywhere. Makes Times Sq looks laid back.
Neon and Fluroescent light everywhere, but its still quite inviting. Has some of the best streetlights known to Man though!!

After some more sightseeing. We decided it was time to check out another thing Japan is famous for....Video Game Arcades!!
After a round of Time Crisis 4 it was time to give the local equivalent of slot machines a go. Its a game called Pachinko and it certainly provided me with a laugh. The basic idea was apparently.....You start with a pile of small ball bearings and you launch them into something that looks kinda like a vertical pinball table. If you get enough through the "Oyster" you get to spin the wheel and thats app how you win!!

So you win...and you get...more ball bearings. After accumulating about 6 or 7 trays of these i decide to leave and i have crazy japanese ladies insisting i stay as app im on a winning streak. This goes on for about another 45 mins and i eventually leave with 13 trays of ball bearings. I get up and some guy comes running over, takes the trays and weighs them. He then gives me a receipt and points me to a desk. The girl behind the desk hands me some tubes of coins and i start to realise that this may have been a waste of time. Its then pointed out to me by Nigel (AM guitar tech) that the coins are actually gold plated. Then another guy shows me out through the back door of the arcade into an alleyway and points me towards a small unmarked hatch. I start to think we are about to get beaten up for our Gold. Im shown to put the tubes through the hatch. As soon as i do. I am handed a wad of notes. App it is illeagal to gamble for money in Japan, but you can win a prize. So you win the gold and the club immediately buy it back from you. Very Bizzarre!!
From an inital stake of 1000 Yen (US$8), i won 46,500 Yen (US$ 400)
RESULT!!!

That should cover any excess baggage costs ive got flying home and it paid for my new camera!!

Anyway tomorrow is a show day. So off to work we go. Summersonic festival featuring Linkin Park, Metallica, Placebo, Daft Punk, Massive Attack, Muse, Secret Machines, My Chemical Romance, Deftones, Fall out Boy and We Are Scientists amongst others.

I think thats enough for today dont you??

Down Under!!

Heres a couple of pics from around Sydney last night, That is the Harbour Bridge.
And here is the Opera House.


Here is a shot from the Aussie Rules Football Game we went to a couple of days ago


And BTW im proud to say that venues now have to put up signs because of me :-)

Strange Signs Of The Southern Hemisphere...Pt 3

More strange signposts from Down Under!!

This is like a one stop shop for terrorists

This is actually a rental car place where you can rent dodgy cars to go off roading in.

This however is exactly what it says


This one however confuses me. I know it should be a pedestrian crossing but i just keep seeing Michael Jackson

Strange Signs Of The Southern Hemisphere...Pt 2

A couple of weeks ago i showed some pictures of unusual signage in South Africa. Well, 3 weeks later..back in the southern hemisphere and theres more..
This one is at Adelaide airport, i dont know about you but i never want to be on a plane that lands in the position on this arrivals sign!

This one is in Melbourne, Welcome to....

And this one, well im just baffled. Some ex pro Aussie-rules football player paid a lot of money to have the front of his house made to look like this..Yes that is his house and Yes that is Pamela Anderson.


Very Strange!!

Christmas Comes Early!!

I know what you are thinking...No i havent just been on a Sat morning game show and won a prize pack. This is my haul from a little trip we took this morning.
We were invited down to the warehouse of skate company Globe and were basically given free reign to take whatever we wanted.



This consisted of about 5 pair of shoes, a couple pairs of jeans, a pile of dvds, a pile of shirts,some hats, a deck, trucks, wheels and a complete Tony Hawk setup Falcon 4 board from Birdhouse. And a nice rolling bag to carry em in!! I reckon i walked away with over a grands worth of merchandise. and that was just me....There was 15 of us who went, resulting in some very full vehicles returning to the hotel. God knows how much the excess baggage will be!! But i dont care!!

A couple of people were revealing themselves to be quite useful on a board. I`ll leave you to guess who this blur of action is!!


So, a big thank you must go out to Matt and all the people at Globe who allowed in to rape and pillage their warehouse
CHEERS!!!!

Hilarious!!!

For any of you who know your Family Guy. Remember the scene when Stewie does his version of Rocket Man??
Here is the original version featuring William Shatner!! This is almost as bad as the Hoff!

And Here is the Family Guy version!!

A Sad Day :-(

Its very rare that i complain about missing something while im away on tour. Im missed gigs by my favourite bands, birthdays etc etc
But this weekend i missed the first European skate demo in prob 10 years by Tony Hawk. Big Deal for me!!
I was lucky enough to see him skate a demo in LA last year and meet him, so i guess i shouldnt complain too much. Still i couldnt help feeling like i wanted to be at home for a change. A very strange feeling for me!!

Antipodean Chaos!!

Well then. Now that we`re over the jetlag etc Its time for an update from the last few days

First up St James in Auckland. Old delapidated theatre but a good one nonetheless. Pretty good show, crowd were loud and very up for it. A sign of things to come i think!! After a couple of weeks off i think it was time to relearn the tunes for a few people.

By the way, here is a photo of the building i jumped off from the air so you can see just how big it actually is!!

So onto Perth we go. And guess what i got to see?? Thats right, another airport at dawn, Love It!!!

This was a crazy show, multiple stage invasions helped along by useless security but pretty funny really, especially the girl who decided that she wanted to stay on stege so badly that she would try and knock out our tour manager when he tried to make her leave. Unfort i didnt get any pics of it!!

Since ive been kind of sick the last couple of days, i wasnt going to go near the aftershow party but im glad i did. Perth has some very strange people you know!! First up was some guy who we thought was trying a little too hard to look like Alex but wasnt quite right so we thought we should help him and colour in his missing sideburns for him!!

After that a girl who insisted on telling us her life story about how she is with a guy bout a month and they are getting married in a few weeks. But he's out having sex with some girl that night but its ok cos the other girl works in a sex shop!!!
Fair enough!!
Since she didnt have a ring we thought the ubiqitous sharpie should reappear!!
Attn Fact Fans!! App Perth is the most remote major city in the World (The nearest city is Adelaide which is 1500 miles away). I think this picture helps that arguement. I took this only 2 mins from landing at Perth Airport. App this stretch of road continues for 400 MILES without any sort of turn in the road.
So anyway thats enough of that nonsense. Talk to you all in a couple days....And remember...
DONT HASSLE THE HOFF!!!