its been a while maybe never since I have actually written anything on here worth reading but if anything changes that it will be a link to this band I was told about a week ago.  they are called or should I say he is called Darwin Deez.  Its been two years since a band has had an effect on me (Arcade Fire), thats probably the first and last time they will be put in brackets in a sentence.  I don't know what it is and the bands who do it don't know what it is because they very rarely repeat it after they wow us, but there's a romance to some music a certain je na sa qua that you can't quite put your finger on.  All I know is that I have been bored and even annoyed with music over the last 24 months that I have found myself listening to comedy talk radio on my headphones as soon as I leave the house instead of music.  Its not that I don't love music, its just that its so rare these days to find something new that competes with what has already be done.  So once you have listened to your classic tracks too much what is left but to turn to a different medium like comedy to keep you entertain whilst on the train.  I'm listening to Darwin Deez whilst writing this and it reminds me why I love music.  I've played it to close friends of mine some like some don't, but I just feel I need to write this because its made me feel when you think theres no more good tunes/bands to come there are, so dont worry.  

hello, we have 5 pairs of tickets to give away for our Cardiff Barfly gig on Friday 31st of July. All you have to do is send us a message telling us who these dressed up men are. first 5 correct emails win the guest list.

good luck.

Innercity Pirates xxx

Fancy hanging out with a few musicians from Cardiff called Innercity Pirates? Well we wanna hang out with you. The only way to make this happen is to give you guestlist to any of our gigs, in this land that the Queen calls home. We will hook you up with free CD's, badges, exclusive MP3's, booze, tours of our 'Tour Ambulance' and anything else you desire, that we can provide to you on the night. If you would like to win this Innercity Pirates Lottery, all you have to do is:


- Send us a message telling us you you want in

- Turn up

- Get some randoms to sign up to our mailing list

- Help us drink the rider

- Give out some free badges

- Chillax with the band

- Blog your ass off

- Get your mates in on the guestlist

and last but not least enjoy yourself...


Send us a Myspace message or an email to ian@superdarkmusic.com

"Feifel went there, the Pet Shop Boys told us to go there, Clint Eastwood showed us it and now we're going there! We've just come back from Texas where we played the SXSW (South By South West) festival.

Here's what we got up-to...
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THE ROAD TO RUIN
Just like christmas in 88' no sleep and an early wake up call for us today, the Megabus was calling (pretty much Santa's sleigh for all bands in their early stages who are playing America), we made it, it was close but we made it to the bus after a heavy weekend. Once I had listened to everything that the Super Furries have ever recorded x2 on the journey there, we arrived at Victoria Coach Station. We then concord the usual hustle and bustle that London delivers when your trying to carry suit cases through the underground and made it to Shoreditch. The reason we went to this part of town was to meet a man called Pedro Ferreira (producer of the first Darkness album, sold 5 million copies). We talked about going into the studio with him to do the album and we really got along, gonna record with him after Texas as we felt he new what sound we were looking for. After a couple of brews at the meeting we got “the goo” (Irish term for wanting loads of booze) but we held back as we had to go to Greenwich for a magazine interview. Once we'd talked about the music with the mag we did a few photos in the Greenwich Foot Tunnel (20,000 leagues under the Thames) for the piece. 



It’s ten to twelve now and we have to get the train at 5am, so we will love you and leave you.  I will write more tomorrow on the plane on our epic ten and a half our journey to the US. Goodnight

Russ Pirate x
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RED EYE
3am in the morning and still a little cheery from the night before, we forced ourselves into the shower, not all at once! Then got the earliest train or latest train EVER, depending on how you roll. As we traveled through London to Heathrow there were party animals still out in the streets from the night before, we were a little tempted to join them! Once we had arrived at the airport, we did the usual take all your clothes and get frisked business, then went shopping for new shades... essential. We mastered our Rebel Without a Cause look at the Ray Ban stall then went to the departure lounge (Dave made a great "Face" in his Full English).



Bands were everywhere in the airport, you could spot them a mile off, skinny jeans, ironic t-shirts etc. The plane Journey was fine apart from the fact that it was longer than Godfather triology, the fact that they had Leathal Weapon and a good wine list though (also lethal) helped a lot.



When the plane landed we caught the bus to our car hire place only to find that they didn't accept our credit cards. Did some re-calculating on the credit card front and we were away and only took us a mere 4 hours. So by the time we had left Houston, it was 10pm. Our manager Ian took a while to get used to driving on the other side of the road, when I said getting used to I mean he did half the journey on the wrong side of the road. Not to worry though because at one point he fell asleep at the wheel... which made up for all the driving errors! We then realised maybe we should stop for a little sleep. Woke up at 2am outside a petrol station and then headed to the hotel. We arrived at 4am, red eyed and completely exhausted but all is well now and was worth the effort. The sun is shining and were going in to Austin to buy new equipment. Good times all round.



ICP x
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COYOTE UGLY
Thank god for air-con because its hot over here. Today we played with the Gallows, Juliette Lewis and Dannananana Akroyd, the show really well, lots of industry types there which was great. They had a "Dirty Photo Booth" in the venue where lots of people had taken photo's of themselves naked, so me and Dave thought we'd get involved, we WILL put the pictures up on our myspace as soon as we get to a scanner.



Me and Dave managed to catch Cage the Elephant who played an acoustic set outside on a rooftop, had a chat with them after and seemed really nice. Later on in the evening we went to a random bar and it turned out to be a Coyote Ugly bar. There were girls dancing on the bar while you drank, Steph got up on the bar and had her picture taken with one of the girls.



We're doing a bit of site seeing today before we go back to the festival, there are some beautiful lakes and rivers here so were going to find a nice spot to have a bit of food. Everything’s going really well and were not sure if we want to leave. peace 'n' pizza. 

Russell & ICP x
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BAND MEETING
We had a band meeting today, pool side before we headed to the festival. Discussed that we're over the moon that Peavey (our instrument sponsor) and Clash Magazine (who have been championing the band for ages) payed for us to come here. It's quite surreal playing in Texas, keep pinching ourselves to make sure its actually happening. Makes all the hard work worth while once things like this happen.



Things for the showcase on Saturday are looking up, a few A+R people have been in touch with our manager so fingers cross we can get someone to release the album over here once we've recorded it in May. It's been great for networking over here, we've met loads of press folk and radio people. It's like everyone you speak to is in the music business so its been great for making contacts and friends. Once we scraped our skin off of the sunbeds at the pool-side band meeting, we headed to the festival. Pretty much like Camden but hotter in more than one way, tattoos everywhere and bands playing in every available square inch. Bumped into Glasvegas who were lovely as per usual, they were walking down the street with an entourage of interviewers when we next saw them, standard. Things we found that they frown upon over here are, drinking in the street, taking your shirts off, weeing in public, j walking, pretty much all the activities we enjoy doing in Barry.



Quaffed a load of pizza yesterday and managed to get a hot dog at the end of the night, asked the tender if he had crisps and he said yes, Pepsi or Sprite?... which was weird, so we got Sprite 'N' Vinegar Walkers. 

There are such things as killer ants as well, its not just the title of a B movie. Our manager got attacked by biting ants when he crossed over 6th Street, now he has ant love bites all over his pins. Bumped into Huw Stephens last night, he seemed like he was having a nice time, big smile on his face.  

We're playing with the Gallows today so we were up last night rehearsing an acoustic cover of their song Orchestra of Wolves. Literally getting out the car now to go to the gig and get breakfast (pizza and Mountain Dew). So will love you and leave you.  

Peace and fornicating. x
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LET LOOSE IN TEXAS
HEY HEY HEY! (grough voice) 
We headed to the festival in the evening after taking the day off to look at the local sights and have dinner in Patsy's Cowgirl Diner!







The first band we saw was Future of the Left. After getting a bit lost trying to find the venue we asked a bloke where it might be... turned out he wasn't sure which band to watch, so he tagged along to the gig (random) in the Aces Lounge. Future of the Left were awesome :D Highlights of the set were The Academy Always Is and small bones. 
We then left the Aces Lounge and went on a mission to get in to the Metallica show which was at Stubs. The que was MASSIVE but we managed to get in as we had our "artist" passes. Missed a few songs but the ones we heard were AWSOME. Highlights of the set were Master of Puppets and Sanatarium.  
Deffinatly our favourite gig :D!
Then we met our manager Ian at Mohawks where a Saddle Creek artist was playing, Adam from Two Gallants... he was pretty cool and had a voice which reminded us of Connor Oburst.
After a few drinks we went onto the venue roof to check out The Hold Steady who were playing on the terrace. Whilst being outside we met two women who had fake moustaches on. .. of which, after a few Malibu 'n' Cokes, I rocked one all night. It turned out they had a website and they went around giving out moustaches and taking pictures of people wearing them. I managed to get two just incase I wanted to wear one at the gig tonight
Late of the Pier were playing in the Aces lounge so we headed back there. We turned up only to find the sound man packing all the gear down.... GUTTED :(
I asked around and it turned out that LOTP had cancelled which was disappointing. I spoke to a few people in there one of whom turned out to be involved with the Canadian version of SXSW which is NXNE (North by North East) which is based in Torronto.
I am pretty glad that some of the people I met gave me cards with their names on... as American measurements of alcohol would of make it pretty hard for me to remember them.
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SHOWCASE & PARTY NIGHT
Final day of the festival yesterday and our official showcase, so it was the climax of the week. We went onstage at 8.30 to a good crowd, third song in and the people were dancing. So hot onstage in Austin, so it was a very sweaty gig... Steph's fake mustache kept falling off because of the heat. Steph was pretty much on every square inch of the venue, she spent most of the gig on top of the PA speakers. The songs got a really good response from the crowd, with loads of people singing Let's Go (D.I.S.C.O), after the gig they said they had heard it on BBC 6Music. Once we had finished the show we did a video interview with our new pals Matt and Ian for Clash Magazine. Once that was done, the sambuca starting flowing.



We bumped into a festival regular at the show called Beans on Toast who we spent most of the night chatting to. He also runs club nights in London and has invited us to play his new one, which should be great fun. We got a good cameraphone snap of him Guerrilla giging with Frank Tuner. After the Clash Magazine show and a few sambucas later, we stumbled up the main festival drag looking for anything to eat. Some random guy started chatting to us and he thought that I was German (my Welsh accent must have got lost in translation), so me, Matt and Ian (Clash Mag guys) decided to pretend that I was German and they were my interpreters. Had a decent conversion in German with this guy for about 10 mins, even though I don't speak a word of the language. The guys then got a taxi straight to the airport and I wondered the streets looking for a cab, finally got one back to the hotel at 3am and crashed out straight away. Festival has been amazing and would recommend going if you get the chance. 

Good evening, good afternoon and good morning depending on your sleeping pattern. We have just got back from the land of laughter and all night giddiness also known as Ireland. The tour started out the same as all tours do, ambulance wouldn’t start and it was snowing. As I was loading Dayzee (our converted ambulance tour bus) I dropped some sterling... here's a lesson for you, don't try and pick up pound coins in the snow because they may turn out to be cats eggs, and yes they were.  Once I had washed off the post whiskas from my mitts we headed out. 

Most men and even some stranded folk would not drive an ambulance when there is smoke coming out of the dash board that contends with most Cheech & Chong outings but we did as we needed to get the ferry to Ireland and thus play our shows. We were 25 minutes away from the port when we broke down. For the 15th time this month we called the RAC. We had already driven through what looked like the north pole on christmas day with one windscreen wiper and a smoke infested cabin.  Once the RAC turned up and tweaked the bus for us, we then raced to the port. Don’t ask us how but we managed to get the ferry and celebrated by kissing our managers head and screaming "we made it"!!! Not sure if you've been on a ferry that leaves the dock at 2.30am but it’s no Glastonbury. 

We made it to Ireland which was an accomplish in its self and woke up at about 11 am with our manager muttering nonsense whilst he drove through the snow towards Galway in southern Ireland. Once we realised it was the burning the oil that was making our manager talk about swimming squirrels and flying elephants or as he liked to call them "big nosed fat grey pigs" we stopped for a break on the side of the motorway just outside Galway. Just as we brought him back down to Planet Pirates he then spoke to soon and I quote "the bus has been smoking for a few hours but at least it hasn't caught on fire" which was followed by "what's that smell" which was then followed by "how the fuck do you get this fire extinguisher off the wall". Once I rocked the fire extinguisher like Egon from ghostbusters, we waited for the RAC man (again). During this time we found Dave the drummer’s phone in a puddle of oil and mud which he was not too pleased about. Plus (note to self) Ian our manager doesn’t like fire extinguishers fired at his face when he's delirIous and stranded.  The RAC man couldn’t get us to the gig in time so he booked us a taxi and we met Pedro Pio (the saint of travel   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pedro_Rodriguez_(theologian) who's name was Peter, we prefer to call him Peter Van because he looked after the Lost Boys aka us. The guy was such a legend, once he realised our ambulance needed an ambulance he offered to lend us one of his big taxis, so we were saved as we could do the whole tour in it.





We had a great time in Galway, drinking sambuca and playing to a very receptive crowd. Onwards to play Cork and Limerick, both gorgeous places in the land of giddiness (check out the pictures and videos that are inlayed). Once we made it to Dublin first stop was a radio station called Phantom FM, lovely people there. They played our single Let’s Go (D.I.S.C.O) and we performed a live version of Compani-animals for them.



The show we did at the Academy that night in Dublin was grand as lots of friends that we met on the last tour turned up to the show, so it was a brilliant time of laughter and boozes. We were asked to DJ at the clubnight at the venue after we played, they probably regret asking as a new dance floor is gonna cost them a lot! We dropped the classic pissed party tunes, Tricky by Run DMC (good documentary about Run DMC and their effect on the mid 80's rap scene here   http://ninjavideo.net/video/14515  worth a watch),  Money For Nothing by Dire Straits and every dance floor repairers dream song, Kiss by Prince. Our manager Ian was so consumed by the pre prog rock and the 80's rap that he didn't realise the van we had hired had been locked in the car park so we had to stay the night in Dublin.



I (Russ) had to stay in Dublin for two more days to do some interviews and more importantly drinking, hung out with a band called Codes (http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewProfile&friendID=27204619) nice guys, they are gonna be big and have just finished a tour with Keane. The rest of the band drove Peter Vans taxi back to Galway and the AA towed the ambulance back to the UK for us. Not before the AA truck broke down though and the band missed their ferry. All in all its been a fun week and a good start to this years tour experiences. We’re playing with a band from Dublin called Fight Like Apes (http://www.myspace.com/fightlikeapesmusic) for an XFM live session at Camden Barfly this month which you can catch on the radio in London or online at www.xfm.co.uk.  Then were going to the US on March 17th to do six shows which should be amazing, were doing one with the Gallows which were looking forward to. Now that we've done the blog its back to washing the booze and sweat out of our sunday bests and catching up on Eastenders. There’s some new photos up, music and videos to come soon to ya lovely people.


Love Innercity Pirates xxx

R.I.P Dayzee, may you rest in Tour Van Heaven x

Stoke was a bit of a blur. It took us ages to get there in Happy Daze and we had a bit of a detour in London to pick up "The Womaniser". No ladies I'm not referring to Dave, but Russell's new guitar pedal. I've never been a massive pedal geek but even I was taken in by the charms of this badboy. It's the Sean Connery of the pedal world and even has a strange, colour changing circle. Imagine an evil Lord Of The Ring's eye located in an effects unit… Anyway after trying to negotiate Stoke's one way system for the best part of an hour we finally got to the venue and jumped right on stage. Luckily we had time to get a sound check and the crowd seemed into it. Also we have to give a shout out to The Control who played an awesome set…

 

The night ended up taking a wrong turn though. We encountered binge drinkers pissing against our van and I nearly got arrested for streaking. It wasn't even proper streaking, I had my pants on and everything. I'm so glad they weren't my Homer Simpson "Emergency Pants" I have to break out when it's laundry day. At least I could have redeemed some sense of pride if I'd got arrested in a nice stripey pair, the thought of being carted into a van wearing baggy black boxers doesn't bear thinking about. Especially when said pants have the words "Mmm Beer" on them.

 

I think we all learned a valuable lesson after Stoke, never get too drunk whilst on tour. By the time we got to Southend everyone was feeling rough, however these feelings soon vanished when we got to Southend and saw ADVENTURE LAND. After some disappointing Fish And Chips we headed straight to the white knuckle factory of fun. Apart from Russell who "needed a lie down". Lame.

 

Next gig is Zoo Thousand in Kent. We're on just before These New Puritans which should be cool. Then it's the Hadouken! Tour and studio………