Twitter / decliningwinter

Monday 22 February 2010

In The Recovery Position Part 1 -The English Leg

Followers of our twitter account will have seen reference to the various and varying disasters that accommpanied us on our recent trip abroad. We are now back (almost) in one piece. I think personally i may just lay low for awhile. Anyway here are some ramblings from the inner workings of the thing that still calls itself my brain.


Having set off for Birmingham on a freezing cold day, the inherent bleakness of the run in to that city is something quite to behold. Do they have the most pylons per square inch of land? We played in what was a Hawaiian themed bar (the bar of choice apparently was booked). The show went fairly well until we realised we had been shorn of an iphone and 130 euros in cash. We thought it was simply the usual casual misplacement until a member of our entourage all of a sudden went pale and recalled a conversation he heard outside the bar where a member of staff was heard to ask another "how much is 130 euros worth?" hmmmm. investigations are ongoing

Welwyn Garden City was perhaps the most preposterous gig i've ever done. I've played gigs where 'no-one' was there. 'no-one' meaning a handful - 10-20 or so. This was literally no-one. No paying customers. We played to the promoter, 2 of his mates, the sound guy, the one man support act. I suppose it didn't really help that the promoter had left the main entrance to the building shut with the light turned off. The night ended in farcical circumstances with the soundman confiscating the promoters guitar as insurance against non payment. The rest of us simply made do with having a penalty shoot out competition in the big empty hall.

Possibly one of the worst positions i've ever found myself in was playing in front of 60 or so real people at the Wilmington Arms the following night in London, the only thought racing through my head - "how do i get through the set without vomiting?" What initially i had down as pre match nerves erupted into what could only be a horrible sickness bug. I'm never normally sick in the street in front of horrified commuters. I'd managed to get on to the stage but i was on auto pilot and as the set wore on felt worse and worse so the set was cut short to save the dry cleaning bills of the front row. As the final note rang out i headed straight to the dressing room to return to my preferred position of that evening - throwing up. I apologise to the several old and new friends at the gig i was hoping to catch up with.

After that it was a nightmare two hour journey through the night to a travelodge. Then on to europe. How will our heroes fare? Tune in to the exciting next installment to find out....

1 comment:

  1. Wow.... Could it get worse?
    Tune in next blog! I personally can't wait.

    We once had well over a thousand pounds stolen in Dublin at the end of a tour. That was well fucked. Some gypsy kid. The loss of the iPhone must hurt too. I hope the rest of the tour had nothing worse than a few more sick bandmembers!

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