Be qwuiet. Be vewy vewy qwuiet!

That's what we're going to be for a little while. Because we're on sabbatical for a month or two. (Make that two.) You see, we've been working pretty damn hard for the last few years, and don't get me wrong, we've loved every minute. But now we are taking some time to rest, 'cos we want to be balanced individuals who sometimes sleep in our own beds for a while and play xbox and go to yoga classes. So we're taking some time to recuperate and get our creative drool drooley again.

We know you understand!

We're wishing you a wonderful holiday season - make it restful! And we hope to see you, where'eer you may be, in two thousand and ten.

2009 Summer tour photos


Well, we've hit home soil after another month in the europe. Johannesburg is bitterly cold and I am missing summery Berlin and my bicycle. But of course, home has those inexplicable comforts that come from understanding the place through and through. My apartment is still the same artist's hovel it was when I left it, (more junk than furniture) and the fridge is just as bare. My family's embraces are snug as ever and although my niece's vocabulary and feet are growing, she's still so cute you want to squeeze her to death. And my bed. My own bed! It feels like vanilla pudding every time I lay my head down. Home.

The summer festivals in Europe were awesome. They were the first we've ever been to outside of SA [and SXSW in Austin, which is something else entirely] and honestly, they were monumentally impressive. Latitude and Secret Garden Party in the UK were so creatively put together that your eyes wanted to pop out and roll away. I couldn't believe the amount of effort and ingenuity that went into every stall, every stage, every game, every costume... It felt like walking around inside a Victorian 9-year-old's theme park dream. There were stages for literature, political debate, theatre, cabaret, poetry, comedy and of course... the bands - so many great bands! Oh what heartache to miss Regina Spektor and Thom Yorke at Latitude. Let us pause for emphasis here... We were THIS close. So close you could practically smell them. But alas, Regina played on Friday and Thom on Sunday and we arrived and left on the Saturday smack between them. Yes, it is just like my mother said. Life isn't fair.

But we DID see St Vincent, Passion Pit and Scott Matthews, and they were all 3 great great great. At Truck festival I was eating a curry outside on the grass when a wondrous folk ruckus lured me into a tent and there, amidst terrible technical difficulties, I discovered my new favourite thing: Frederick Stanley Star. They are definitely best experienced live on stage, and if you ever get a chance to see these guys, [I think they're from Wales] do it.

Haldern Pop in Germany was a cosy affair with a glorious line-up - we watched Bon Iver, Grizzly Bear and Andrew Bird - where we played to the most wonderful audience. The volume of their response was actually rather overwhelming, and I reckon it is an experience we'll recount to our grandchildren one day when we need to convince them we're cool enough to play checkers with. We had been told that it was a festival catering for and frequented by music enthusiasts, and no way were we let down!

Berlin Festival took place at the old Tempelhof airport - apparently the first of it's kind in the world [or in Europe? or the biggest of it's kind? I don't know... something impressive.] And although the sound inside the hanger where our stage loomed was pretty much apocalyptic, the setting was incredibly cool. It was most definitely what they call retro, and we were all picturing ourselves, brown overcoats on top of our brown undercoats, sensible shoes and hats, waving goodbye to loved ones flown away by pilots wearing those cool leather caps and flappy scarves. Only it was shrouded in a haze of neon light and electro beats and our fantasies kept getting confused.

Oh, I should mention that Michael RAN after our set at Taubertal to catch the tail end of Flogging Molly on the main stage. And then he accosted them in their VIP room later that evening swooning like Pepi Le Pieu [how the heck do you spell that?] where he gladly drank their Guinness and politely declined a puff of their hash before floating away on a fluffy pink cloud of Irish-folk-punk adoration! [Another sad note to add here - The National played the day after us at this festival, and we missed them too. I could have cried, but I'm trying to do that less these days.] Oh, I should mention that at Taubertal The Maccabees were wonderful! I highly recommend you check them out. And we played a great acoustic set in a cute little outdoors living room where the sound desk was a portable touch screen [imprrrressive!] and the audience faithfully followed every note [even after they started getting drowned out by the bleed from the rock band on the big stage and the torrents that fell from the sky mid-way.] Good times.

And now this blog is very long. And so I will also tell you in short that we had a great week+ off in Berlin, which involved riding bicycles and swimming in lakes and looking at surrealist art and taking touristy photographs and scouring the weekend markets and picnicking in the parks and buying cute second hand clothes and going 'ooooh' at the Blue Man Group and eating inhuman amounts of Vietnamese curry at Hamy, [for which I am sure we will eventually be made to pay penance because the food was just too good for the price.]

And that, I think, is enough for now. We had a grand time. I hope you can tell. And hopefully we'll get to do it again next year.

to anyone who might have ended up at the wrong venue last night, please accept our sincerest sorries. it was a right-royal cock-up and we only found out that we were in fact playing at a different venue at midday. no point in poking fingers in any directions. but i shudder to think of anyone missioning across london to hoxton hall only to find that dear reader isn't there. so if that's anyone of you... we're so sorry. we hope we can make it up to you soon.

sorry for the long overdue update... we've been on the road for 2 weeks and i haven't had any time to sit down and write. right now i'm sat in the nightliner in the sweltering tuscan sun waiting for the technical crew to come pick us up and take us to the stage where we'll be playing tonight in fucchecio, italy.

annoyingly enough, johannesburg's very own monte casino has done me the disservice of rendering all the buildings i see around me kind of kitsch. which of course they most certainly aren't. but since the whole of jozi has been built up with crappy tuscan look-alike cluster homes, everything i'm seeing looks fake to me.

our headline tour of germany went really well. we were so surprised at the numbers of people who turned up at our shows just to see us. in berlin there were around 400 people at the lido. it was really cool. germany is starting to feel like a home away from home for us now, and we're slowly but surely growing our german vocabulary. today's new phrase: halt deinen mund! (translated: shut up!) most useful when you're on a bus full of boys.

of course, at the moment we're trying to learn some italian too... but so far all i can say other than the general niceties is:

"grande orso bianco". or "orso polare". that is, the great white bear.

after our headline tour in germany we hopped on this big black bus with our label-mates, Get Well Soon, and after one week we feel like brothers and sisters. so far we've visited reims and bourges in france, nijmegen in the netherlands, and ancona, rome and bologna in italy, with more shows in france, switzerland and brussels still to come. all of our socks are stinky and our eyes are a little bleary from 7 nights of moving-bus-sleep, but we have happy in our hearts.

maxi and elizabeth from GWS have been joining us on stage with the violin, guitar and trumpet, and then i get to sing on stage with Get Well Soon for their song 'if this hat is missing i have gone hunting'. which is great fun. check them out here:

www.myspace.com/youwillgetwellsoon

i will try to write more soon. sound-check time...

over and out!

i thought i would post this correspondence on our page to try and alleviate the concerns of those who this might have offended...

hi diana

thank you very much for your mail, and for passing on people's concerns to
me. i completely understand where you're coming from, and i would never
advocate the harming and killing of animals for their fur. the hat was
something we picked up at a second hand shop for the photoshoot, and is
certainly not new, nor something that i would ever generally wear. in fact,
i felt very uncomfortable wearing it.

perhaps i should have thought it through more thoroughly, in terms of a
message it might have sent out. but actually, i felt that it would heighten
the concept behind the photoshoot - which was that darryl and i were two
sinister characters who had come into the forest to chop down the trees and
do harm to nature, but then the trees had got their revenge on us and tied
us up. in fact, a photograph from that shoot was used in a newspaper
protest against the chopping down of the very forest where we took the
photographs.

is there anything i can do that would help to alleviate the concerns of
those who this has upset?

most sincerely,

cherilyn
dear reader

....

Dear Cherilyn,

I hope that this note finds you well. As you may know, PETA is the largest animal rights organization in the world, with more than 2 million members and supporters dedicated to animal protection.

We're writing today because we've received several calls and e-mails about media photos on Dear Reader's MySpace page in which you are wearing a hat that appears to be made of real fur. Please know that animals killed for their fur endure immense suffering. Most fur is exported from China, where there are no laws that protect animals on fur farms. Foxes, minks, rabbits, and even cats and dogs are routinely beaten, electrocuted, and skinned alive for their pelts. Please take a moment to watch an undercover investigation of a fur farm here: FurIsDead.com/feat/ChineseFurFarms.

With so many stylish, cruelty-free alternatives available, there is no reason for anyone to wear real fur. We hope that you will join the many compassionate celebrities—including Charlize Theron, Eva Mendes, Natalie Portman, Shirley Manson, Trent Reznor, and Tommy Lee—who have publicly sworn off fur.

I can be contacted at 323-644-7382, extension 28, or at DianaM@peta2.com.

Thank you for your consideration.

Best regards,

Diana Mendoza
PETA

monday morning after.
on saturday michael and i drove home from cape town.
far is an understatement.
that drive is kinda like an extreme sport.
and we ran out of petrol in the middle of nowhere.
which luckily enough we were able to laugh about.
because we were a mere 2km away from colesburg.
child's play i say.
imagine if that 2 was a 22.
holy moly.
that's my new expression.
it is lame.
but i can't help it.
it just pops out.
all the time.
holy moly.
mackerel would be better even.

we had a great time in cape town last week. it's really nice to be back in south africa and playing shows to some familiar faces. although the buffet in the back sure ain't as good ;) an apology for the late show starts in the cape. we didn't mean to cause sleep deprivation. it is officially a fallacy that things happen later in cape town. well at least on week days they don't. and we did. and we had some annoyed fans. and that is bad. please forgive us. we promise to be punctual next time.

this week we have our last two SA shows before we fly out to europe again. i think they'll be good fun. you should come along. pretoria on wednesday and jozi on thursday. details are in the relevant spaces that are not blogs. because that's how it works.

the video for 'dearheart' is nearly ready. goodness knows it's taken long enough! so keep your eyes open for that one. and see if you can spot the stunt double/understudy. that'll be a fun game! :)

well... speak soon. i desperately need a nap. if only...

If you'd like a listen, just go to http://www.cityslang.com/e..cards/dearreader/dearreade..r_en/ to visit a special cyber space where you can stream our whole album. Woop! :)

our album came out in germany yesterday! YES! great news. we're so happy that it's finally out in the world. however, there has been a slight problem with the SA release and it will be delayed by about a week. :( but no fears, it should be in stores a week monday. we'll keep you posted.

we've been having a great time touring over here in europe. the snow is falling thick and fast and we've been knocking each other out with snowballs every chance we get. though i must say that snow is much more fun when it's on the ground than when it's busy falling on your head. :)

right now we have a few days off doing odds and sods in berlin and then we have shows in london next week before we head home to SA. We'll be playing shows in jozi, durban, cape town and stellenbosch in march, with our new album in the merch box, and we can't wait!

i will write more very soon.

but for now... don't forget to replace why with funny!

:)

cheri
dear reader

Greetings from Sascha's chilly splitter van. I'm bundled up in a duvet as we drive through snowy Austria. We're headed for Vienna, where tonight we will play a 'secret' show live on one of the coolest radio stations in Europe - FM4. And that's what's blasting through the speakers right now. Some great tunes. And the news in English. Which is nice. Since our German doesn't stretch much further than, "One cappuccino to take-away please" or, "That's disgusting! You're an arsehole!"

We arrived in the North a little over a week ago. We stayed in Leipzig the first weekend, in Fritz's [he's our soundguy] flat. It was a really quirky place in an old building that almost succumbed to a fire. It still has the original heating system - old pottery fireplaces that need to be fed wood and coal. We rehearsed in a FREEZING band room sans pottery heaters. Or heaters of any kind. And then we played our first show at a little club called Sweat. Since we were the headliner, we didn't really expect more than 10 people to show up. 100 people did. And we had a great time.

Then we drove back to Berlin and met up with Sophia, the band who we played support to all last week. Sophia is mainly a guy called Robin Proper Shepherd. The 'proper' in there is very cool and very strange. He's an American living in London who usually plays with a rock band. But this time he was touring with a string quartet. Which is beautiful. Robin is very excitable, very knowledgeable, and says, "You know what I mean?" a lot. We had a great time with them on a big sleeper bus. We felt like Real 'Proper' Rockstars. 70's ones. Because the bus looked like it was pimped out back then. As novel as the big bus was, what with the kettle in its kitchen, the playstation in the lounge, and the big bad window in the front, so we could see the treacherous black ice out stretching out before us, it meant 3 sleepless nights for me in my top bunk. And that made me very grumpy. Apparently it takes about 4 nights on a nightliner to get used to sleeping that way. Go figure.

We played shows with Sophia in Berlin, Hamburg, Cologne and Brussels. In Berlin we were so nervous we could've pee'd in our pants right there on stage. But then after that first scary one we got over ourselves a bit and started to have more fun. In Hamburg we played an in-store performance at a gorgeous little record store called 'Michelle's'. We had done a bunch of interviews and then we had to zoom over to the store which was on the other side of the city. When we got there there were about 60 people waiting for us. We had exactly an hour before we had to be back at the venue and on stage for the Sophia show. It was so strange to realise that those people had come to the store specifically to see us. Kind of unbelievable. We played 4 acoustic tracks, and had a bloody good time of it too, but then we practically had to run off stage and out of the place to rush back to the other show. [Which, by the way, was also really cool.]

Brussels is gorgeous. It's all higgeldy-piggeldy - the buildings are all different heights and different colours and different textures. It feels like a friendly little Paris. We played in a famous little jazz club called l'Arche Duc. It was really tiny. A lovely art deco masterpiece. And there were only 10 channels on the desk. So we played with the drums un-mic'd and a bunch of things in mono. But it was really good. A wonderful intimate vibe. We managed to squeeze in a walk to the famous square [which looked like a movie set from a period movie] and some belgian waffles before we put our lame asses to bed. Lame as in pathetic, not numb. 

More later...
Tchuss!

i am snatching this interval of forced idleness to write a blog. busy doesn't begin to describe us at the moment. our new album is released in just under a month on both sides of the equator, which is so very exciting after such a long wait. i would rather let the details remain the work of the world outside of this written asylum. but suffice to say, almost all the hours are all accounted for from now until the month of march arrives.

we had some visitors from germany last weekend, and we were discussing the fact that nobody ever visits museums in their home town. on tour in november, we went with our friends to the british museum in london. they admitted that in over two years in the city, they had not been to one museum. similarly, anne told us that she had not seen any in berlin since she had moved there. on sunday morning, we took our winter-skinned friends to the hector peterson museum in soweto, and i realised just how little i know about the details of our country's incredible history. i had never been there. neither have i been to the apartheid museum. or constitution hill. or robbin island. i realise that i'm not exactly making a ground-breaking point here. but going to that museum was a really moving experience for me. and i will now endeavor to see more like it.

i try so hard when we're traveling to learn about the cultures we're visiting, to attempt simple phrases in new languages. i make more effort than i've made to really understand the cultures that live and breathe in the city that i call home. when i wanted to take our guests to a restaurant in soweto for dinner, i was met with loud 'no's in all directions. doom-sayers whistling to the same tune; after dark? are you crazy? it's dangerous.

and as much as i understand the need to be cautious, and as much as i realise we would stick out like throbbing thumbs in that context - an easy target for anyone who did want to do harm, i can't help thinking - people live there. people. not monsters. not animals. thousands (millions?) of people call soweto home. when darkness falls, my fellow countrymen cook their meals. they watch their televisions, listen to their radios, read their physics textbooks, toss under their sheets.

we shuffle along these invisible lines, avoiding each other, trying to hide our unease whenever those paths cross. we're all so afraid of each other. surely if we're serious about building a nation that is truly unified, we need to swallow the lumps of dread in our throats and leap off the bridge? (jumping off bridges is rather prominent in my consciousness of late. all will be revealed soon.) fear is a poisonous fuel. and i don't believe any good ever comes from using it to drive our decisions. unless it's in the giant effort of overcoming it.

sorry if this is a little soppy. i feel somewhat affected by watching obama's inauguration speech this morning. and it's good to know that my heart isn't completely hard. cool has never really been my style, and i've been just a little too jaded for my own taste lately.

one last story before i sign out.

last week tuesday, i was driving back to the northern suburbs after band practice. i was doing my usual bit - driving really slowly up to red lights so that i would only get there when they were green, constantly checking my mirrors whenever i did have to stop. i was listening to mutemath rather loudly to keep me awake. about two kilometers from home i was caught at a robot in a dark and secluded spot. usually i would have paused and driven straight through. i didn't. i was thinking, 'it's only 22:30. not late enough to get my fine reduced should i get caught running the red.' i was distracted. i was sleepy. my ears only heard the crash after i turned my head and saw the arm that was searching my passenger seat through the broken window. time stopped. we looked each other in the eye. he was only a kid. seventeen years old. pimply. with a sick feeling i immediately understood what was happening. gear one, go! i dragged the boy with me a meter or two before he managed to get his hand out of the hole in the glass. he was gripping a yellow rectangle. what was it? i drove home shaking, my body pumped with adrenalin. i couldn't help but cry. fifteen minutes later my father accompanied me to the police station to make a statement. it was more than thorough. going through every tiny detail with the large bear of a cop was rather therapeutic. i was lucky. he could have had a gun. he could of been a they.

the bear asked me what the boy had taken from the car. i racked my brain. the yellow rectangle... hannah had returned the books i loaned her. it was a book.
"what was the name of the author?"
"i don't know..."
"and the name of the book?
"the book thief."
pause.
laughter.
"really?"
"yes, really."
more laughter.
"the book thief! surely not!?"
my father googled it on his cellphone and showed the bear a picture of the cover.
we carried on with the incredulous howling for a while.
the bear's colleague didn't understand. i told him again. he smiled, pretending to get the joke. but he didn't.
i wondered if the boy got the joke. i wondered if as i sped away he read the text on the cover and saw himself from a different point of view. a book thief. pouring all of that energy into petty robbery, making a pathetic waste of his life. did he recognise a smile from the universe, a chance to change it all? or did he just curse how useless a book was? it wouldn't buy him bread. or glue, to take him away from it all. did he throw the book in the bushes? did he take it home to kindle the fire? did he read it?

we'll never know. either way, it's a pretty funny story. can anybody tell me if it qualifies as ironic or not? alanis morrisette screwed up that concept for my generation. well, at least that's what my seventh grade teacher said.