it's so weird, especially as last time we didn't have to rehearse very much, you just end up touring for like 2 and a half years so everything just gets discovered live which is great and natural and you don't have to try and remember how to play songs!

Anyway, enough moaning, it's lots of fun really, great to be back with the band again, reunited, it's a honeymoon period all over again, we're all getting each others names tattooed on our bums. that's love.

I'm getting a general idea of what my schedule for the year is going to look like which is good, it is nice to be back to this kind of work. I've enjoyed living and recording and preparing but playing live is the best part really. Apart from writing really it's the only thing that makes sense and gives you piece of mind. Also I can't believe I get to travel all over the world again, it's fucking amazing and this time I'm going to appreciate every second of it.

I'm watching troy, it's a bit rubbish. 

The receeders gig was so much fun last week, i think we did good as a band and it was nice to see pens again, if peggy sue was there it would have been like the old days. (stef & amelia used to be in look look dancing boys if you recall) Men were excellent and JD and band were as kind and cool as ever. I read a review of the gig & it's strange, I'd totally forgotten what the media world is like, they were reporting on the live show and gave their own interpretation of what I was trying to be, like the fact that I was wearing a t-shirt and leggings meant I was trying to be a punk and that last time they saw me I was like a 50's hollywood movie star (which is actually cool because that is how i would love to look but probably looked like a scruffy version of one in reality, but seriously did actually appreciate that compliment) anyway i'm sitting on the floor at home wearing pyjamas right now so maybe i'm trying to be a grunger tonight, and i am on my laptop at 23.00 on a friday night watching troy so perhaps I'm actually a nerd cyber geek. who knows, i think we're allowed to be whoever aren't we? i think people worry too much about putting labels on everything, i've always found that's where a lot of media types struggle, trying to find labels for jars. i would rather just eat what's in the jar, wash it up and put it in the recycling and not give it too much thought really. Mind you that's when you know someone's a really good journalist, when the writing is original and interesting and relevant I guess.  Mind you thinking about it, it's unfair to say media types because a lot of people try to do that, maybe we all do. I remember getting a really backhanded compliment from this guy once who didn't realise at all that what he said was offensive, he was like 'for a female artist...(note - this sentence is never going to end welll) i think you're doing so good.' It's like, thanks for saying i'm doing well, that's lovely, i mean despite the fact that i'm a woman i can actually be a musician and songwriter, how fucking crazy is that? doesn't happen much.

kate bush, bjork, bikini kill, le tigre, sonic youth, cyndi lauper, regina spektor, diana ross, marianne faithfull, laura marling, joni mitchell, x ray spex, yeah yeah yeahs, she & him, bratmobile, gossip, sleater kinney, the shirelles, pj harvey, vashti bunyan, the vaselines, shrag, tiny masters of today, the thermals, strawberry switchblade, the pains of being pure at heart, vivian girls, mika miko, peggy sue, pens, supercute, the trachtenburgs, emmy the great, siouxie & the banshees, holly golightly, aretha franklin, millie, lulu, kimya dawson, joanna newsom, long blondes, helen love, nina simone, ella fitzgerald, billie holiday, cat power, brenda lee, lydia lunch, beyonce, quasi, lily allen, amy winehouse, courtney love, feist, brigitte aphrodite, soko, carole king, dolly parton, i could go on but what is the point.

Anyway that was a ramble, the gig was so fun.

Here's some photo's of me rehearsing with the guys in the studio, I'll probably put them in a folder too cause they look nice...

I'm in the studio, mixing & blogging. I'm blogging to let you know about a new blog, bloggeldy blog.

Kathleen hanna - 

I'm trying to think of something of cultural interest. Has anybody been collecting the guardian decade photo's? I've enjoyed that.

How about this...it's supposed to be a secret...might be fun to go to and see all the postcards and you can buy the ones you like on the 21st of this month same place.

Also, coming in highly recommended, the book I'm finishing off right now...

ok, back to work.

x

Japan i love you & I can't wait to come back!

x

Ok, so some people have been getting irritated that I keep 'advertising' & recommending things in blogs instead of telling you that I had beans on toast breakfast.

To be honest, I would rather read something that someone had recommended me seeing/hearing/going to that might fill my day after my daily blog reading instead of wondering what brand of beans they were and was it on white or granary? But without further ado...

I didn't have beans, my bread was moldy so I had grapes and then rivita with philadelphia cheese & a slice of salami. Not as bad as it sounds, really it's not. There's your london lite quote right there. 

The other most trivial piece of information I can think to tell you, I got my fringe cut.

oh and I bought a printer. whoopee.

Erm, so seriously

I've come up with an idea for a documentary, i need to find the people that the documentary will follow, i wonder if I should just post adverts in local newspapers up & down the country. Does anybody know anything about video cameras?? I want to get a decent one that's pretty simple to use but does a good job. I don't know anything about them, there's so many different types. If anyone could give me some advice on where to go with that. It doesn't have to be totally pro, I want to be able to actually use it. Just a good starter camera, I want to shoot short films & documentaries on it... help anyone?

Erm, what else, I'm not back in the studio yet, I went to the edinburgh fringe & I saw this really cool light & sounds show called power plant, ( not advertising/recommending here, just letting you all know how good this actually was, you don't have to go & see it, though to anyone interested if you did go and see it, it would be fun!)  So it's called Powerplant & it's showing at the Royal Botannical Gardens, I don't know if they have any other shows in the country but I'd like to find out, I wouldn't mind going to see more stuff like it. It was really beautiful & weird & It was cool to see something that you had no idea how it had been made, put together or even thought of. It was completely out of my realm. It was all in glasshouses with exotic rare plants, my favourite room was with these huge plants and mirror balls and grammar phones with the needles scraping over bits of saw & turf instead of records. There were lights shooting through trees that made the trees shadow spin round & up & down, giant exposed roots with strip lights fusing on & off & fire & neon lights on fans & feathers playing strings & more things I just can't explain.

I also read this amazing comic book, I've got into those recently, they're good. It's called The Last Man, it's really good.

I think there's about 4 in the series and I just read the first one, so i need the rest, now you know what to get me for christmas.

The most important thing I have to tell you is if you remember ages ago I posted a bog about a little girl called tilly who lost her hands due to Meningococcal Septicaemia, her family are trying to raise money so she can afford a new pair of hands, the charity is 'give tilly a hand' and they are auctioning on ebay now.

I gave them an exclusive signed photo and decorated my own pair of hands & it is now being auctioned on ebay...it's only just gone on today so it's only at £1.04!

this won't help much so please please please bid on this item for as much as you can and help tilly get some new hands! this is so important.

That's all I've got.

lots of love

kate mash potato

x

here's some news, 

the best band ever, release their new single today,

get it here...

it's really brilliant.

other than that i don't have a lot of news, i'm taking a break from the studio while bernard goes on a sunny holiday, so i'm back to that on the 20th. it's going well and it's getting there i think. it's pretty exciting & scary all this recording a second album. i have no idea when you'll be able to hear any of it at the moment.

i'm trying to think of any other tips i have, erm i'm reading catcher in the rye and then i got day of the triffids to read after that. i watched 28 weeks later which i thought was pretty good and the original invasion of the body snatchers which is also good. very scary.

oh i know, i went to a birthday party yesterday that was spanish/salsa themed and ate the most amazing food and there was a mariachi band, getting a mariachi band to play at your birthday party is a really fun thing to do so do that!

i had one more thing to say and i can't remember it...

shit, erm. i don't know. 

oh it's come back to me, harrow has an outdoor cinema screen on the green!

it's the most amazing and most cultural thing to hit harrow since trinity. go check it out if you live there.

happy summer holidays.

x