wow 

that was a long three and a half weeks.

played all sorts of gigs in various permutations of jape in various countries.

highlights were many, some included..

*hanging out and getting to play with lisa hannigan and crew in some incredible venues. the RNMC in manchester and Shepherds Bush Empire were both incredible. 

*playing six songs live on czech t.v and then getting interviewed in czech and having a translator.

*hanging out at jools holland show.

*meeting up with matty b, after both of us had been on crazy long train journeys.

*breaking into an apartment in Berlin.

now it's back home and i am so glad to be back because i have been really itching to do more writing..

it's like there are two people living in my head, one that wants to make crazy weird electronic shit and another who wants to make slower more human stuff..

i need to find the right balance..

i have never written this many songs for a record before so i don't know how it's gonna turn out.. i just want it to be good.. i'm trying to set the level of the songs at a high level..

the music industry is sort of fucked at the minute and my take on the situation is to completely ignore that fact and try to make a record i can be truly proud of, without having one ear on what i think a label or whatever wants to hear..

even if i end up writing poems on the back of beermats for pints.

thanks to all who came to button factory the other night.. it was really fun, and to the girl who sang streetwise :)

i thought i mis judged the africa day set with roscoe and should have played more beats driven songs.. i don't know what i was thinking really, trying to be cantankerous in some sort of a 'neil young' way at a family fun event day - it fell on it's arse :)

but as nico sings, 'don't confront me with my failures, i had not forgotten them'

big love

i will stick up a few demos soon

from RANTIE EGAN

p.s playing in ROISIN DUBH, Galway on Friday 29th May can't wait. And also a Galway surprise for saturday.

hey i'm doing a short set at road records on fade street in dublin, tomorrow saturday 18th. april 2009 to celebrate international record store day.

come in if you are down that way..

there's gonna be a lot of music and stuff happening in record shops all over dublin tomorrow so it should be fun afternoon.

xrichie

hey there,

i'm happy to announce that i will be doing support on the upcoming UK tour with the very talented lisa hannigan and band.

i will be playing these shows with my beautiful guitar (1944 gibson) and a lot of new songs and i look forward to it very much.

the dates are

Apr 29, 2009 Aberdeen, UK Lemontree
Apr 30, 2009 Glasgow, UK Òran Mór
May 01, 2009 Gateshead, UK Sage 2
May 03, 2009 Manchester, UK RNCM
May 04, 2009 Birmingham, UK Glee Club
May 06, 2009 Sheffield, UK Sheffield Memorial Hall
May 07, 2009 Portsmouth, UK Wedgewood Rooms
May 09, 2009 Exeter, UK Exeter Phoenix
May 10, 2009 Oxford, UK O2 Academy @ Oxford
May 11, 2009 Bristol, UK Fleece
May 12, 2009 Brighton, UK Komedia
May 13, 2009 London, UK Shepherds Bush Empire

p.s forgot to say session we did at rte a while ago is up now.//. the two new songs are very sketchy and in fact one called, 'downpour' probably won't ever end up anywhere else..

http://2fm.rte.ie/blogs/studio_8_sessions/2009/03/choice-award-winner-jape-in-session.html

cheers



thanks so much to damien and rte

xrich

hey jape won choice award last night..

i was pretty 'excited' when i made the acceptance speech and forgot to mention M&E my cohorts.. sorry dudes.. i will make it up to you on skype..

other than that had a good night, met the singer from the script and he was cool to my da, thought the other bands were great and watched the last waltz VERY late at night..

thank you to everybody for all the nice words and comments, the judges and organisers of the award and especially glen, ross, neil, gareth, phil, cillian... i'm sure there's more i'm forgetting.. my phone is buzzing away here..

love

richie

hey there folks

i have been pretty away from here for a while, been focusing on getting new tunes together.. we have been jamming a bit, and there are about four tunes together which i am extremely excited about.. they sound much different to the other stuff but i'm really happy with them.. on a good buzz with the music at the minute so gonna keep working hard to get new album together, hopefully before summer it will be written and i reckon i want to record it in a studio this time maybe..

also they put interviews on cluas of all the choice award nominees, mine is here

http://www.cluas.com/indie-music/Interviews/tabid/106/EntryId/944/Choice-Music-Prize-nominee-Jape.aspx

i started a twitter account too, it's www.twitter.com/richiejape and i haven't made up my mind if it's an ego stroke too far or a handy way of keeping in touch with people, but i'm gonna keep it.. for now..

look after yourself and enjoy the beginning of spring, a lovely time of year

xrichie

hey there if you would like to vote for jape in best irish male category of the meteor awards

go here

http://meteormusicawards.meteor.ie/Categories.aspx?id=4

meanwhile here's another male nominee from the international category, it's anthony and the johnsons

hey there,

there's an interview i did for really cool online magazine called ,'epilogue' here,

http://www.epiloguemagazine.com/featurejape.html

also happy to be nominated for a choice award.

mmm, i had more to say but my mind is gone blank.. i have been re-wiring my home studio with insert leads and everything :) it's a pretty crazy configuration at the moment, incorporating a four track cassette recorder and a space echo and moog filters.. i'm getting into external fx chains in a BIG way..

talk soon

xrichie

hey there

a bit late but ritual got voted number 1 irish album in 2008 on the nialler 9 blog

www.nialler9.com

i'm happy about it because it's the irish blog with the coolest tips about music so it's great to get some votes from the readers of it.. thanks a lot if you cast a vote for it..

at the moment i am working on/ writing a new record, it's romantic and psychedelic and quite a bit more dreamy than the others so far..

i want to play a lot of small gigs and try out new material..

in other news, kanye west!! gave a big thumbs up to johnny kelly's , 'the seed' which i did the music for..

http://www.kanyeuniversecity.com/blog/?em3106=218707_-1__0_~0_-1_1_2009_0_0&em3298=&em3282=&em3281=&em3161=

it would be nice if he could email me some tom samples..


one more thing here is johnnys making of 'the seed'.. it's unbelievable how much hard graft went in to animating this!!

http://www.vimeo.com/2425610


happy new year to you all..

love richie

hey folks anybody coming down to the gig tonight please come early..

whole thing has to be over by ten thirty and the first (amazing) act the vinny club will be on at 7.45

jape will be on stage at 9pm

also if you wanna download phil lynott single to make it get to number on for christmas... haha yeah right.. no serious.. you can do it in next couple of days ... from 19th. december onward basically..

you can do that on itunes or else with that downloadmusic.ie service where they text it to your phone..

cheers

xrich

hey there everyone,

i'm very pleased to say i had the opportunity to work on the music for the unbelievably talented johnny kelly www.myspace.com/johnnyakelly for his short film entitled, 'the seed'.

you can check it out here,

http://www.nexusproductions.com/938/the_seed.mov

and read a bit more about it here

http://motionographer.com/2008/11/27/johnny-kellys-seed/

i think that johnny is so talented and i am really honoured to have put the music to this piece..

also there is an indiecater compilation called an indiecater christmas with a little throw a way ditty that me and david kitt put together down in dingle called, 'i will cry this christmas'. it's sort of a cry into your cracker sort of a buzz.

you can see that here

http://www.indiecater.com/

and then also i'm gonna be on the dave fanning show tomorrow (wed 3rd. dec 08) on 2fm talking about a classic album that i like.. i chose 'knock knock' by smog..

hope you are all well

love

richie