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26-04-03
:: Andy Kent
Let the games begin!! The Vines, us and the rocket scientists
across the UK. A pack of Australians surrounded by their
English crews, warm English beer, ginsters snacks, and
a sold out tour. Anything is possible.
The starts to these tours are always fraught with danger.
These dangers range from being slapped with an excess
baggage charge that can and has run into the thousands
to faulty work permits to broken down vehicles. And
no we weren’t disappointed. 1 broken bus, 1 broken
bass amp ,1 vandalised replacement vehicle (rock and
roll does strange things to some people) and a tour
routed with the aid of a blindfold and a dart board
. Nothing a ‘gronking’ rock show can’t
fix.
To be continued……… |
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29-04-03
:: Davey Lane
Well, five days in and as ever, I’m over the moon
that it’s possible for me to spend my time playing
guitar in a band with my mates on the other side of
the world. Already the three cities we’ve visited
have fascinated me no end. Andy, Russ, Tim, Chris (our
ever faithful stage technician) and I made a bleary-eyed
entrance at Heathrow to be greeted by our tour manager
Johnny Haskett, a charming gentlemen with the the most
brilliant pair of sideburns I’ve seen yet.
The first stop was Norwich. I was severly tempted
to make a quick detour to Cambridge and try to find
Syd Barrett, but I hear old Roger doesn’t take
too kindly to being stopped in the street so I thought
better of it. The show went really well despite us
all still being rather jetlagged, and it was great
to meet up with the Vines and Rocket Science chaps
once again. Glasgow was a blast, the Barrowlands was
such a cool place to play, the Scottish folk love
rock ‘n roll so that was quite fortunate for
us, we never expected such an enthusiastic reaction.
The Vines have been playing well, and they have some
cracking new songs, one in particular called Amnesia.
Wolverhampton was a rather late night for us all.
I had a larf singing many a Supergrass song with the
Vines lads ‘round the band room piano, later
indulging in liquid refreshments in the hotel bar
with our friends Steve from Manchester and Kit from
the Science, so it was just as well we had a day off
yesterday! I went looking for records but didn’t
find much, but the architecture of these towns alone
is enough to keep me interested so I shook my hangover
just wandering the streets looking around. So now
we’re on the road heading to Newcastle, I’ll
keep you all updated real soon, thank you and good
night! |
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30-04-03
:: Timmy Rogers
Hertfordshire Haiku
Packaged sandwich
Munitions nutrition
As ever, where art
The free house pub
Ducky? Half hour sets most
often, search, destroy, invite over and steal wallet.
Writing songs to add to Aust. Compilation, titles
“Mr. Kermode and the Million Matches”
“Vampires” “Who knows what they
do at night” Used to be a come on in boy now
I’m a fuck off man” and “Tales of
Pornographic Oceans”
Listening to: Little Feat bootlegs, Hard Ons newy,
Black Flag “first four years”, Pretty
things, Discharge, Minor Threat, Rancid, Bobbi Gentry,
and as ever, Ruby’s voice in my head
Refuse to take this tour lightly or safely, lucky
and have a body to waste in the pursuit of some kind
of enlightenment. |
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06-05-03
:: Andy Kent
Played the famous 5000 seat 'Brixton Academy'
The big london show, and boy is it big. Went well, some
girl had an epileptic fit due to the strobes. London
is the place where your ex-girlfriends hairdressers
vets second cousin boyfriends mate will accost you for
a drink. Or your bro and his lovely new girl could acost
you either way have your wits about you, it could turn
into a big night............................
It was a big night and an early start off to the hollyhead
and the irish ferry to DUBLIN! From the fry pan into
the fire! My mate jimmy is the bomb. A top show and
a farewell to the Vines lads and their nice crew. Cheers
lads. Back on the ferry early (can you believe it has
a pinball machine on it?) and back to London for a day
off. THE ONE AND ONLY FULL DAY OFF!! Later......
AK |
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| 07-05-03
:: Rusty Hopkinson :: Photo Journal |
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Glasgow
Barrowlands - A beautiful venue in the
heart of Celtic Territory. Bought a Brinsley
Schwarz bootleg and a slightly dodgy mobile
phone from the Barrowlands Markets before
retiring to the dressing room in time
to snap a shot of these three lovely men
preparing to rock the house like no one
else can. The night ended with fire alarms,
a glasgow wedding and kilted men at a
hotel on Sauchiehall Street at 3am. |
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Wolverhampton-
A quiet afternoon in the bandroom of the
wonderful Civic Centre. This is the first
in my self portrait series and features
Andy Kent in deep discussion mode with
the utterly fab Jamie from Transcopic
Records and Tapes whilst Davey plays Arnold
Layne on the acoustic. My ugly mug's in
the left hand corner and my brains been
tuned by some fine purple haze. Hence
my faux-art wankery! |
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Our
kid Stevie Shaw- Manchester's number one
You Am I fan, ex-merchant seaman and king
of having it large. With Stevie's gentle
prodding we embarked on an evening that
would end at sun up with Void on the stereo
and cheap dry white on the palate. Thankfully
we had a day off the next day and a fantastic
Biryani from "the Standard"
helped deflect the pain that only class
A fun can bring. |
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Stevie
Shaw regales Timmy and stage commander
Chris "Toph" Hough with tales
of debauchery on the high seas.
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| 09-05-03
:: Rusty Hopkinson :: Photo Journal #2 |
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Our
kid contemplates the difference between
Gordons and Burnetts gin whilst davey
lane and Graham look on. The green, gold
and red wristband is from a bunch bought
buy me in honour of the fact that we are
just around the corner from Alton Ellis's
excellent Alltone Records, home of a vast
array of great rocksteady sevens. |
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Brixton
- You Am I benefactor and beautiful human,
Graham Coxon, shares a joke with Tim before
we head out onto the stage for a fun set
at the Brixton Academy. I think Davey
is still reeling from Graham showing him
how to play "Alone Again...Or".
The upstairs bar is jammed later with
all manner of ligging high and low-life.
My personal highlight of the evening was
being told by Gem Archer that "Rusty"
was a great name!! |
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Me
and Chris in the equipment van on our
way to Glasgow, Chris concentrating on
following Johnny Hasketts travelling circus
whilst I busy myself with a copy of Private
Eye in a vain attempt to look like a Liberal
Democrat voter. |
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BBC
6 INTERVIEW
Download
the complete BBC
6 interview with Tim
and Andy
chatting with presenter Tom
Robinson.
The lads chat about the new compilation,
current and previous tours, recording
and songwriting.
Tim
also performs Hourly,
Daily (Part 1) and Heavy
Heart (Part 2) acoustically. |
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BBC
6 Interview :: Part
1 :: 6:41 mins
BBC 6 Interview
:: Part
2 :: 7:12 mins
BBC 6 Interview
:: Part
3 :: 3:32 mins |
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16-05-03
:: Andy Kent
Great show last night, Shepard's bush empire,
despite onstage sound problems. A good friend was buried
in Fremantle cemetery today. I hate being away when
crap like this happens.
Really enjoyed 'the pieces' from Indiana, USA. Great
to go on after such a catchy sophisticated band.
Got pulled up by Colin from BBC Scotland about comments
made on the site about the Barrowlands Market in Glasgow.
I Colin, must watch what I write. Russell
is bugging me to finish up so we can go round the
road for a 'slap up'......mmm whats a slap up you
ask??? I'll leave that up to you.
AK |
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19-05-03
:: Timmy Rogers
Prima donna here, in Studio North London with Mike Pelonconi
doing extra tunes for the compilation – Mr. Kermode
and the Million Matches, and What They Do At Night,
with Hate Yer Damn City as a possible b-side, or Letter
To Gene. Finished with Evan t’other night, met
Anita Pallenberg, Dave Gilmour and my personal favourite,
Cass outta the Senseless Things. Evan’s band cooks,
and he’s in top form; we’re talking ‘bout
doing a record with him mid-year. Not just piss-talk
either, we even talked of it sober….fancy that.
Last show tommorow night, meeting up with Noel, Gem
and Liam again which’ll be beautiful. Mike Peloncoli
is truly sweet and in my opinion a great engineer, fun
and diligent, enthusiastic and has good stories. Still
can’t sing, dunno, I’ve had a lotta years
trying, still feels good so I’ll keep on. Meet
up with my girls in Madrid in 4 days after goin’
up North to meet my bruvva. Ruby can count to 12 and
I miss her and her mum unbelievably.
We’ve been knocked around the past coupla weeks
over here cuz a very close friend of the band and former
flatmate of Rusty and Boonge’s Michael Lock died.
It may seem insensitive to write about this here but
for anyone who had the pleasure of meeting him, you
knew you were touched by a very special, passionate,
intelligent, simply beautiful man who we’re going
to miss horribly. Every gig we play from now will be
with him in mind, my deepest, deepest condolences to
his family and friends; I know how that crooked smile
could lift you straight up.
My drink of the tour: Gin,
neat with a squeeze of lemon
Record of tour: Evan’s
and Lucinda Williams
Acquisition: Dischargs
t-shirt, a present from my lovely room-mate David
Personality: Stevey Shaw
of Manchester, Ian MacLagan lookalike, 24 hour racounter,
Honorary cousin
Gig: Second Shepherd’s
Bush with Evan
Hope Davey fills in with stories of our Small Faces
tour of the East End by Wayne, our mate and family acquaintance
of Mr. Marriot - truly moving and mesmerising. I need
footy. Carn Kangas. |
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| More
Pics.... |
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| UK
Tour Highlights :: Davey Lane |
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After
we finished the Vines run, we had to find
some new touring buddies. And here are
some of them, clockwise from left; Josh,
Evan's bass player; Devin, the drummer
from the opening band The Pieces; Vess'
The Pieces' guitarist and singer; moi;
Andrew Charles; Heidi, bass player for
the Pieces; and finally George, Evan's
drummer. A brilliant bunch of blokes and
lady they were! |
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Rather
self explanatory really, me on the Helter
Skelter on Brighton Pier and it was bloody
freezing! |
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Here
are the 'Kings Of Rock' outside the Brighton
shop that was kindly opened in their honour.
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We
recorded 2 new songs whilst in London,
here Andy and Tim bring their dulcet tenor
tones to the party.... |
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The
successor to Joe Meek's throne mixes down
the track that will banish Telstar from
the hit parade forever! They gave it two
thumbs up on Juke Box Jury! |
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A
studio as it should look, with them nice
guitars all over the place.
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Some
of the nice little bits and pieces Mark
had in his studio - from left to right;
an Echoplex echo unit, once owned by Pink
Floyd, a Phaser thingy that once took
pride of place in John Entwistle's studio,
and EQ units from respectively Abbey Road
and Decca Studios. Whoa, history overload
dude. |
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Our
good mate Wayne kindly took us, on one
of our days off, on a tour of East End
London. See, it transpires that Wayne's
dad's best childhood mate was a little
fella by the name of Steve Marriott (for
those of you who are uninitiated, Steve
Marriott was the pocket-sized, iron-lunged
singer for the mighty Small Faces). Wayne
often humbly recounts Steve stories, usually
while Russ, Tim and I listen intently
with our jaws to the floor. Here is the
council block both Steve and Wayne's dad
grew up in with us doing our best 'scruffy
little London geezer' impressions. |
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Here
I am basking in the sunshine that is the
famous Itchycoo Park...
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And
here I am outside Abbey Road, the place
where so many of my favourite songs were
recorded - Ebony & Ivory for one.
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Recreating
scenes of my heroes from pictures or movies
is quite a favourite pastime for a nerd
like meself. Here I attempt recreate the
scene from 'Syd's First Trip' where Syd
Barrett is sitting against the Abbey Road
wall as Pink Floyd sign their EMI contract.
Oooohhh, how obscure of me!
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Some
geezers enjoying a drink. From L-R; Thomas,
our Who-loving friend from Germany, who
did me a copy of an awesome Deep Purple
gig on DVD (cheers!), Stevie Shaw, who
even wrote a song about our on-tour sheninegans,
and a lovely Scottish gentleman by the
name of Andy, who plays guitar in the
band Travis. |
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Jamie,
the Transcopic records chap, the guy we've
got to thank for finally getting a You
Am I record the release it justly deserves,
Russell and I, this was about 5 minutes
after we walked offstage so we look suitably
tired!!!
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Here
is a luvverly photo our 'label manager'
(ha ha ha ha) Graham Coxon. I think this
has been the most surreal tour I've ever
been involved in. Being taught Love songs
by one of my guitar playing heroes and
'label manager' was one thing, but the
night Tim and I met both Anita Pallenberg
and Dave Gilmour (!) has to be one of
the best/strangest nights I've ever had.
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Here
I am sharing a sneaky can of warm Stella
with our stage man Chris, even though
I "don't agree with that in the workplace"!
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It's
goodbye from me and it's goodbye from him!
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