Hi all

We sold out of these El Sol tour t-shirts in Spain but have printed some more as we think it is a design classic worthy of you, our fans. They are two colours handscreened on tight fitting (no baggy crap) white t-shirts.
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We toured Spain in 2005. It was the time of our lives. We were pretty excited to be invited back in Jan this year to support the US band The Smithereens and do some headline gigs of our own in support of our second album 'El Sol'. The following is a tour diary. The time on stage is actually pretty minor when on tour ie an hour each day out of 24. The rest is spent mostly sleeping, travelling, thinking, drinking and waiting.

15th -16th JAN.

Bruno books us a cab for 2.45pm Thursday 15th January Australian time. Our flight is for 6pm so we are being sensible. I ask him change it to 3pm as just need a few more minutes after running around all day. Cab arrives at 3.45pm so already the stress level is high. We had forgotten about the Sydney taxi changeover time at 3pm (here's an idea: try staggering the changeover time!). We also hadn't planned for the slowest cab driver in the world. She does 40 in a 60 zone until we ask her politely to speed up and we are shouted at. She also has the push/pull technique of turning the steering wheel and the accelerate to the back of the obstacle in the lane in front and THEN look to see if there are other lanes empty. Nevertheless we arrive at counter with 2 hours to go.

Band is beautifully packed with no waste. No filler all killer. Fairly stressful for everyone to get it so tight but we are at the desk of Qantas and ready to go. Qantas lady weighs it and gives us the news – excess weight will cost us $4900.

“70 kilos over at $70 a kilo is $4900 and that's even though I did you a favour considering you to be a group”. I resist the temptation to make jokes about us 'not being a recognised group in our time in Australia, but who knows how history will judge us' and instead try to use the technique of overwhelming logic; a blitzkrieg of rationalism and repeating the word 'group'. “We are a group.” I say. “We, or I actually, bought the tickets as a group on the same flight for this group of ours called The City Lights and I paid for the group on my credit card speaking to the one travel agent about our group booking and we have arrived at the counter as a group; what arbitrary, fantasy computer rule says we are not a group?” I am a bit of a ranter when presented with bullies, idiots or the powerful and this lady is the trifecta. I am immediately disliked by the lady.

“No” she says. “If you are a group your itinerary would have you listed together. Three of you are a group – Bruno, Graeme and Harry - but you are separate.” I grab Bruno's itinerary and point out that his name is actually listed individually contrary to her words of five seconds ago . I do the same for Harry and Gra. Of course this makes no sense to the lady nor does it make her stop for a breath and show compassion that there has obviously been a mistake made by someone else and the innocent victims should not be the ones to have to cope with the mistake. Unfortunately she is the forceful, straightshooting type that speaks confidently causing untold suffering to millions even if presented with overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Like the Pope on contraception you might say.

Fortunately lovable drummer Graeme steps in and sensibly asks politely if there is anyone else she could speak to. I am amazed she immediately agrees. We have hope. She comes back with a new limit. So, 20 kilos x 4 (ie 80kg) is now 25 kilos x 4 (ie a 100k limit). A few minutes later it has become 30kg x 4 (ie 120kg limit). We say nothing. Gra kindly offers to send 15 kg of cymbals and snare drum home. I offer to buy $400 worth of kilograms. So to recap: we were once 70kgs over. Our limit has gone up by 40k so we are still 30k over. We will send 15k home. We have offered to pay for about 5 kilos. So I still fear she is going to say we are 10 kilos over and will therefore owe $700 more....instead.....it's all fine. No need to pay a cent. All fine. Good to go. Not $1100, not $700, not even my offer of $400......I want to scream.

I don't want to scream with joy but with white rage. Some people would see this as a massive favour. I see it as a power tripping psycopath's quiet afternoon. We are obviously a touring band. We have just one bag of clothes and very little equipment but she originally came up with the arbitrary – BY DEFINITION GIVEN OUR BILL IS NOW $0 – and completely random figure of $4900 to scare the shit out of us. For what? Why? We had to jump through emotional hoops and signals I don't understand. The plane leaves in about thirty minutes now and we are really stressed out.

Gra now has the unpleasant job of finding a taxi to send home his gear to his wife who will collect it at the other end. No taxi will take his gear which is sort of understandable given that if a terrorist had failed to get his bomb through security he would obviously send them home to his wife to put back under the bed for next time. So he runs back inside asking for help that comes in the form of three different answers each time he asks such as help desk who send him to lost property etc all down endless corridors and claiming to be closed etc. Eventually he finds somewhere to leave it until his brother can pick it up the next day which is a pain in the arse for his brother too. He sprints and just makes it to the plane as they are shutting the door as it is incredibly important that the door gets shut on time as the plane is just about to sit on the tarmac for an hour.

As we sit on the plane I think about capitalism and how it is so efficient to a certain point and then it inevitably fails. I conclude that it starts off well when companies are new and they start sensibly and watch costs and get excited about making a profit and offering great service and being good, no, the best at their job and watch excitedly as the company grows. Take the air industry. It started slowly and found its feet and offered incredible service and worried about safety and comfort and enjoyment and was heavily regulated and then after a point the original owners are dead and the company is a public floated share company and managers and directors in particular have no new ideas but by definition to achieve 'growth' must not just make ten billion dollars like last year but have to make 11 billion dollars and try to push the number of flights to a ridiculously high and dangerous number or strip assets and make it private equity (whatever the fuck that means) or cut costs and exhaust staff and eventually the dream is pretty horrific. Government is bullied into privatising airports to complete the horror of flying. Airports look run down and flying is pretty miserable. Throw in people trying to blow up planes and flying is getting bleak.

But nonetheless I begin to cheer up immeasurably even though I sit by myself (not part of the group remember) as I look forward to movies and a beer.

In 24 hours flying (between a few hours sleep here and there) I watch 'In Bruges' – really good. Ending a bit weird though – a bit unbelievable. But the script, acting, dialogue and plot twists are brilliant. Also see 'The Rocker' – enjoyable life affirming underdog romp. 'Baz Luhrman's Romeo & Juliet' – can't stand it and turn off after ten minutes despite a million people telling me how great it is. 'Step Brothers' – Ok. Probably more fun for them to make than for us to watch but still a fan of Will Farrell. 'Tropic Thunder' – almost great. Robert Downey Junior is a genius. 'How To Lose Friends and Alienate People' – slightly off the mark and bit unrealistic. 'Vicky Christina Barcelona' – really enjoyed it even though not normally a fan of Woody Allen. Also a timely film given we are heading to Spain and a good talking point for the band about why we love Spain so much.

The film is good for showing the contrast between extremes of culture and the madness that can come from the despair of a life devoted to love, passion and art (Spain) vs the desperate pointlessness of sensible but uptight puritanical materialism (United States). We all vote for Spain of course and also agree that eating well as the Spanish do (while drinking beer) is so life affirming and it is sad how much Australia is about drinking and not about eating. Eating well is the foundation for a balanced life. Cheese in a can or potato in a packet or eating alone in a car is death. In addition, in our whole time in Spain we do not see one fight nor one shouting madman nor packs of men with their shirts off. It is winter sure, but the point is it's possible to be drunk without being a tool.

But I digress. We touch down in Madrid after a quick stop at Heathrow (London) and obligatory sprint through endless corridors and up and down stairs to connecting flight. It seems we out-ran our bags after the threat of flight closing!, flight closing!, flight closing! and again as the doors shut I wonder why the rush as we sit on the tarmac for half an hour. But yes, alas, our bags do not make it to Madrid until 24 hours later. Heathrow is a really badly run / designed airport and I read in the English papers on the plane to Madrid they want to make a third runway which means people's houses will have to be bulldozed. This is to cope with the hundreds of thousands of extra flights the private company that owns it insists it needs to survive. Anyway, by contrast the new Madrid airport is brilliant.

We are met by label and taken to hotel. We have no warm clothes (it's winter)– well Harry does – but we head into town, find a nice tapas bar and eat and drink and are in bed by 6pm for a quick snooze before going out on Friday 16th January Spanish time. Alas, we don't wake up again until Saturday. For the next few days until tour starts we check out the sites and bars of Madrid.


Wed 20th Jan

See The Smithereens in Madrid. They are really great. We have an excellent night on their backstage beers and I do a phone interview and then we all do a live interview at Radio 3 in Madrid. Meet a hilarious American rocker named Mark Tortorici who is also doing an interview. We go to bed drunk and happy.

Thu 21st Jan

We meet in the lobby at midday for 4 hour drive to Valencia to support the Smithereens at Club Mirror. The hotel is great. The opera house nearby is spectacular. I like the venue very much. It is pretty big and has a good backstage area. We soundcheck well and we play really well. It feels great to be finally playing. We get along with the Smithereens and have a great night.

Fri 22nd Jan

We drive 3 hours to Zaragoza after a midday lobby call. Very civilised. Zaragoza is really cool and beautiful. There is a massive and beautiful cathedral in the middle and the city has a great feel to it. The venue is La Casa del Loco and again I like it. The DJ wanders off after soundcheck and accidentally leaves 'Fire and Ice' on repeat. It is about an hour or two before he comes back and we are pretty over the song you might say. We play really well on a sweaty stage - on stage sound fantastic - and sell lots of albums and t-shirts and sign loads of things. We have a great time.

Sat 23rd Jan

We drive 3 hours to Bilbao. Bilbao is spectacular and in Basque country. The hotel is very cool. We all go for a walk to the Guggenheim which is staggeringly fantastic to look at. The gig has been moved to Bilbo Rock and the venue seems excellent: tall and skinny with a high stage. The grumpy lighting guy dampens my mood for a bit (apparently we were late) but the soundcheck is good, the backstage nice and well stocked and eventually the gig really rocks. We sell loads of t-shirts and CDs and have a top night watching the Smithereens. We farewell them as they are off home. At the end of the gig Bruno, Harry and I head out with some Basque citizens. The walk home is eye opening as it is a bit of a disaster zone with kids running wild but we make it home. Harry has a nightmare but he can't remember what about.

Sun 24th Jan

The drive is to Castellon and it is 6 ½ hours so we are up at 9am. Last time we played Castellon it was a really cool cavern style rock club called Ricoamor. This time it is in the Auditorium of the Congress of Castellon which is a sit-down theatre in a modernist building. We are interviewed by a couple of gorgeous ladies from the local TV station. Souncheck is a bit rough though as we practice new songs we haven't played for a while to extend our now headlining set. The gig goes really quite well as the room is full, people seem into it and we play well. We have to do 2 encores which is very tough for us as we don't know enough songs. But we rock hard and love it. We head to the hotel for a delicious and civilised dinner with David our champion Tour Manager and his girlfriend.

Mon 25th Jan

The drive is to Valladolid and is another 6 ½ hourer so we are up at 9am again. Valladolid is absolutely freezing so I am a bit apprehensive about the gig. We freeze on the walk to dinner and I am worried about getting a cold as I notice the first bit of green spit (sorry to be disgusting but it is THE sign). On finally getting into the venue Sala Porta Caeli I relax as it is really warm joint with a great vibe. Low stage, enthusiastic, tight crowd right up the front sort of gig. My voice is definitely starting to crack a bit though. We play really well and do a top encore. We head back to hotel and drink late.

Tues 26th Jan

Heading back to Madrid and I am feeling the onset of sickness. We check back into the original hotel - the Anteneo. There is a good vibe as we head out for a few beers before the gig at El Sol. The band does a good soundcheck but my voice is definitely going to go tonight which it does just a bit. We play really well particularly last few songs and encore. The soundman loves it, we love it, we sell a few more CDs and Ts and head out to bar Tupperware to celebrate the end of the tour. Bruno's jacket almost gets stolen but using his best spidey sense he catches them and swears at them in Spanish and they give it back. A great night. We all agree we want to come back to Spain as soon as possible as we love the country so much.

We have just returned home from Spain and again we had the best time. Thanks to the label, the Smithereens, our Tour Manager David and the people of spain. PHOTOS ARE UP NOW. Will post a diary soon. x

and yes we are playing with the legendary SMITHEREENS.

Hi all. We are proud to volunteer our rock services to support the Joe Strummer Tribute night at the Hopetoun Sat 16th August. We will be playing songs off El Sol, Escape From Tomorrow Today and some Clash and Joe Strummer numbers. It will no doubt be a one off and a great night. Do come.
TCL.

Hello Spanish amigos

Bittersweet Recordings have released El Sol. It has brand new track order with bonus tracks.....stay tuned for tour dates.

get steady
everyone out
never let you go
here to stay
got the news today
anyone who is anyone
grand pacific son
take a picture of the sun
end of story (Spanish version)
the cost of living (Spanish version)
spy theme 3
you aint heard the last of us

Hola to all our Spanish friends!
Our label in Spain - Bittersweet Recordings - is set to release El Sol in April this year. It will come with 2 never before released tracks and a different track order to Australia. Stay tuned for further details and tour dates as they come to hand.

hi everyone - we have finally posted our new video for here to stay. it was played on RAGE last friday and it is now on youtube and below if you missed it. Filmed and edited by the band and friends' of the band (when on stage) - it shows a slice of life on the road in Spain. Check out the club el sol where we half got the name of the new album. Enjoy!~