It’s like a return to my early days. Last night we had a real club spirit, on and off stage. People were noisy and we had to work to get them with us. Half way through the set I asked (something I never usually ask) who in the audience knew my first album – maybe 20% of the audience. So, I asked who knew my second album – another 20%. I mean, perhaps they didn’t all understand, or hear, but it didn’t matter – I realised that I had to give everything I had to get the whole room with us.

At the beginning we had a bit of a technical difficulty: On stage there was a very loud buzzing sound, as if a bumble bee was stuck in the monitors. For the louder songs it wasn’t such a problem, but it could’ve been for the fourth song in the set, which was Unlike Me – a tender song and needs tender loving care. I thought that the buzzing sound was heard by everybody in the room, so I made the executive decision to announce to the audience that we had a technical issue that needed fixing and there would be a 5 minute pause in the show. I walked off stage but the band stayed and jammed around a bass line from Serge Gainsbourg’s ‘Melody Nelson’ album, my favourite. It was perfect. These are the things that never happen during any bigger shows. There’s always too much organisation and people involved to let those spontaneous events come about. As it goes, I was told that the problem was only on stage – no one could hear it out front and, though no one knew exactly what it was, it could be managed, but not put to rest. But, apparently, it was not effecting the audience or the recording.

My Austrian promoter, Alex, and his wife, Anita, were with us since we arrived in Linz for the first show. They were the ones to help get me to see Dr. Chen. Alex has a company called Audio Toasters. They have a mobile recording studio, which can pitch up outside a venue and split all the instrument channels which go to the front of house desk, so that they have a direct signal from the entire band, recording the concert as if it were a regular studio session. When the gig is finished they can print and package up to 300 CDs to be given or sold to the people who saw the show. Last night, Alex, with the technical expertise of his business partner, Patrick, did just that as a demonstration to me, with the view that we could do it again in the future for the fans to walk away with. After the show, they invited us into there little control room on wheels to listen to the sound quality that they had captured. I have to admit, it sounded a lot higher quality than I was expecting – though I didn’t really know what to expect. We heard a couple of tracks, which is weird when you’ve just walked off stage. After a few songs, Alex gave us each a CD of the gig. I haven’t heard any more since then but I intend to.

After writing that last sentence I realised I could be listening to it right now. My speakers are set up and the music is on. It still sounds good, although I have to say that I prefer listening with everyone else, so we can talk about what needs work. However, what’s good about this is that I get to hear what the public hear… sort of – I shouldn’t discount the work of Franko, my front of house engineer, who has his part in beefing up the sounds with EQ and the occasional effects.

Back to gig itself. It was a real rock n roller of a show. We played My Life As A Duck in the middle of the set, which we haven’t done for a long time. I used the sing-along moment as my opportunity to jump off stage and explore the room. The club had a bar running all the way down the room. That became my temporary stage for conducting the peeps in their choral endeavours. I also picked up someone’s full glass of beer next to my feet and downed it one. If that person is reading this, I hope the barman saw and you got another one for free. My apologies if not. But it was worth it, for the entertainment value, don’t you think?

There’s a lot more I could say about the show but it time is ticking. I’m about to meet the gang for dinner.

We arrived in Krakow an hour or so ago (the drive from Dornbirn was 15 hours) for our two Polish gigs, tomorrow and the next day. It’s great to be in another new country, once again!

Bye!

Chunglee Wingchun

These gigs in Austria are a lot smaller than what we have been used to for a long time and that is a really great thing, as I explained yesterday in my previous tour blog entry. Last night was the smallest so far. It reminded me of playing gigs with my first band a the village hall near where I grew up. Nonetheless, the audience was still fantastic and we made it a great show. There were some very funny moments, as with the night before, in Vienna.

The bus left from Jenbach, this morning at 8am and we have now arrived at Dornbirn, which is not in a built up area at all. In fact, we are in what appears to be in the middle of the Austrian country side, just on the foot of Bregenz Forest Mountain. Just outside our bus is a mountain stream, with clear, fresh water rushing down hill, giving that “shhh” of white noise, that we all resonate with in ways that we can’t understand, but somehow seems to calm us. The air is clear and spring green trees create a translucent emerald city, which immediately relaxes all the senses. In case you didn’t get it yet, I am very happy to be waking up in a natural surrounding. As much as I love cities and the excitement they offer, in truth, I grew a country lad, and often does my heart yearn to be within the un man-made landscape. And there is one main difference between city and country side: when I arrive in a city it immediately starts asking something of me. Because it’s all made by man, there is so much ego attached to each different city (or town) with it’s ‘history and interesting things to do and see, discover’. But when I come to the country, it asks nothing of me. It’s almost as if it say’s, ‘just be’.

Of course I like the balance between to the two, but these days – in fact, for most of my adult life – I tend to spend most of my life in the land of the hand made.

Last gig in Austria tonight.

I have nothing else to add, your honour.

Winston

We’re in Austria. Less of us now than we were, but we’re here.

Last time I wrote a tour diary I think I was in Germany. I don’t remember exactly and I am not on line to check. It’s been to long to back track and give a review of every gig. All I can tell is that it’s still going; Ça va, ça va. However, there are changes in the camp. With the end of the German tour I am sad to say that we have lost Medi on the drums. He was getting pretty anxious to get things moving with his own music for a new record so, early on in April, he announced to the band and crew that he would be leaving at the end of the tour. Although we all knew is was coming at some point this year, we didn’t expect it quite so soon so it’s still a shame to see him go. We’ve played together in this set up for 4 years now and  he’s been on both records. But all is well and I totally understand why he has to get moving with his new record. We do still have one more gig, in New York on May 14th, which will be a good celebration of what we’ve achieved over the last 4 years of playing together and 5 years of hanging out and having a of fun. So, it’s not a goodbye but, rather, just another chapter. We all remain good friends, which is the most important thing, for sure.

So, it begs the question, who is on the drums for us now? Well, let me describe Olivier as a very tall chap, resembling the shape of Jacques Tati or John Clease. He is an old friend of Daniel and Medi from Nice. In 2006, when I (re)met Medi, during my travels through France. Olivier and Daniel were in fact the rhythm section in Medi and the Medicine Show, and for one week, I was supporting their band at Le Pompei in Nice. I guess you could say that’s where it started, so it’s funny to see how things turn around. The mood is good and this tour (Austria and Poland) we are currently doing, seems like a perfect one to have him join us; these shows are smaller, in a more club environment (which is just great) and for that reason, we are not using in-ear monitors, since we don’t have Nico with us, so back to stage wedges, plus we have also lost Jay on lights for this tour, so it really is like back to basics. However, our tour manager, Loops, has taken it upon himself, using his years of experience in the field, to be our lighting man, which is great because he knows the show. It couldn’t be more perfect for refocusing on the band, the music and it’s survival. I have to say that so far, two shows in, Olivier is doing doing a fantastic job. He has clearly been busting his balls, learning all the music – the transition has felt quite seamless, with the obvious kinks that we have to iron out.

Last night, we played in Vienna, after our first concert in Linz the night before. Danny (keys) didn’t get his passport back in time from the US Embassy (we’ve all had to apply for a visa to play in NY, which is quite an operation when we are all on tour, but more so for the English guys because we don’t have identity cards like normal Europeans) so he missed his flight and the Linz show. That meant it was even more refocussing that we had to do, but I think it worked out for the best. The music didn’t seem to suffer and it was fun for me to go back to playing parts on the piano that I had assigned to Danny since he joined in December. I was just happy to be able to be there playing, which i have to thank Dr Chen for. The night before when we left Paris for Austria, I decided to do a few body stretches in my hotel room, before getting on the bus. However, I over stretched and the next thing I knew, I could stand up. I made it to the bus and we all made to Linz, where an appointment was made for me to meet Dr. Chen. I am told that he is the best Doctor of Chinese Medicine and I have to say that he proved. I can’t say that the 15 needles he stuck into my back were comfortable but that night, I was on my feet and able to do the show. I stayed that night in Linz for a second session, which pretty much put me back to normal, before driving to Vienna. Oh, the joys of touring!!

Me, I like all these changes and challenges.

For some people, or perhaps even a lot of people, change can be very difficult. I think I thrive on it though. It keeps the flow of new energy going and also keeps people alert to where they are and what they are doing. With new people comes new relationships, comes new ways to behave, which inevitably creates the opportunity of discovering something new about ourselves. Or, perhaps not discover, but remember aspects of ourselves. I’ve always given a rule in my life, whenever I worked for other people in a job that wasn’t necessarily working directly in music, or art (like when I worked at the cinema, ripping tickets, or in the music studio café, cooking breakfast and lunch) and that rule is that I only do that job for a maximum of 18 months. After 18 months, it’s time to move on and do something else. So, when I stopped working in the cafe, I noticed that a lot of the rehearsal studios in the same building of the cafe needed some serious paint work on the walls and I persuaded the boss, Viv Broughton, to let me touch up the place, which he was more than happy about. I wasn’t very good at the beginning but I got better, with the help of lots of advice from predominantly male musicians, who also fancied themselves as painters and decorators. I decided to give my new job a business name: Paint, Init. During my paint works, I would make a sign for everyone to see which said CAUTION: WET PAINT, INIT!! and each time I finished a wall, I would sign it at the bottom simply with “Paint, Init”. It was the only business card I could afford a the time. I didn’t get paid much but I didn’t care. For me, I enjoyed the peace of mind that came with the work. Sometimes, I would listen to talk radio. I remember it was also a time when I was discovering the crazy world of Tom Waits, with albums like Bone Machine and Mule Variations; they still remain as two of my favourite albums of his. I was also given 5 albums of Autechre, by one of the members of a band called Simion, who rented a rehearsal room there. I got massively in to the electro industrial world of Autechre and often listened to it while cycling through the city on my bike. It seemed like a perfect sonic illustration of what I was surrounded by.

There is so much more to say and stories to tell – a great one about “Paint, Init” and how it ended – but I’ll have to come back to it another day. Soundcheck soon. Tonight we are in Jenbach. It’s a small town, right in the middle of the mountains in the west of Austria…. I think. This morning, I took a little walk in the town and stopped for breakfast in the only cafe I could find. The sun was shining and the air was clear, so I ate on the terrace. On the table next to me there was a middle aged couple. It was 11am as I ordered a coffee, they were just ordering two more long pints of beer. By the time I had finished my food, another guy, sitting alone with his dog and rollup cigarettes was in the middle of his third pint of beer. I felt like a bit of a light weight, just ordering coffee. Inside the cafe, where I payed, was full of mostly older men, smoking, drinking and playing card games. There was a real atmosphere. It was apero time, for sure.

I want to talk more, but I really have to go now. Let me just say that the last two nights have been great gigs in really cool venues. The audience in Vienna was priceless, with heckling that I haven’t experienced for a long time; I had lots to work with on stage. Tonight, the venue is quite strange with a distinct lack of lighting – I feel a little bit like we have come back to school and are about to do a nativity play – but I think we will still have some fun. It’s gigs like these where we get to play around and find new things in the music that we don’t discover on the bigger, slicker shows.

Under and in,

Over and out,

Charlie

Long days, small crew, I saw more of the Big Apple than I think I had ever seen, including movies. People were what made the experience so memorable. That started with the crew of about 8. We all met on a windy street in the meat packing district at 8.00 on Monday morning, greeted by smiles, coffee and hot ham and cheese bagels wrapped in foil. Throughout the two days of shooting I got time to talk to all of them and it felt like a mini family by the end. But it wasn’t just the crew I spoke to and that was partly thanks to the role I played in the film, as a photographer.

The director gave me an analog reel Canon camera, like the one I took with me to India to make a photo story, and he gave me a bunch of camera rolls and said ‘take pics of what you see’. That gave me a good excuse to approach people in the street and ask for their portrait. I was amazed at how obliging everyone was, especially for New York.

It’s really city for sure. One of my favourites.

Charlie

Our last German show in Munich (Munchen) was cool. A great end to the tour. Afterwards I went out to meet the people. Everyone was very nice and polite. In fact, I’ve been very surprised by actually how polite German people. I’m not sure if it’s polite or shy. They are always very timid when asking me for a photo/autograph. I wasn’t expecting that.

After the show in Munich we were all sad to say goodbye to Thomas Peter, my old friend and photographer (Reuteurs) who joined us for this tour to make a daily photo journal on Facebook. The feedback there has been for his fantastic has proved it was worth it. We hope he’ll be able to come again. He caught some shots of us live that I have never seen before.

Tonight we played at the Artefacts festival in Strasbourg. 12,000 people were with us and, despite it being a festival with a lot of other acts, it felt like there were a lot of people there for us tonight, who not only knew the songs from Hobo, but Running Still too. That was a nice welcome back to a French festival. Also, it was in a Zenith, the festival, and the lights that they provided were super strong tonight. Every time I looked around at the band I could hardly see them for the brightness of the lights in my eyes. And often, I saw the people in the front having to cover their from the intensity. On a few occasions I used my shadow to help some people from going blind. You see, I’m not just a singer.

We have new tour manager join us tonight called Loops (that’s how he is known to us so far anyway). He is a very big guy with a very big beard and when he arrived he had hair on his head. However, after the show tonight, I realised that he has exactly the same beard as Franky Franky Franky, who is not playing with us but has been on the tour to work with Medi on new songs (plays bass in his band and he is a dude). So, as a joke, I suggested that Loops shave his head like Franky Franky Franky and he calmly said ok, going straight ahead with the procedure; in the shower room, Franky with the clippers, literally taking off all the hair his head. And now they are like two of a kind. I wonder if this fashion will spread.

That’s all from me,
Chunkle

What a great show!! I already love this city. There’s a vibe which has the mixture of being creative, friendly and relaxed and it all showed tonight. When Jay, my lights man came backstage after the he said to me “there was such a cool energy tonight in the room – people really listening and  letting you come to them”. It might sound strange, but the differences between audiences are so subtle it’s hard to always accurately explain in a concise way what they actually are. People ask where has the best audiences, in which country? But for me it’s nearly impossible to answer that because it changes, not just from country to country, but city to city, and even in each city I might have a totally different public from playing there once to the next. There are so many factors.

Anyway, this night was a beautiful one. I came off stage relaxed and like we had really pulled something off. In fact, I had: my shoes. During I don’t know which song, I felt the need to free myself and let my pink socks be exposed to the naked elements of rock n’ roll. They even found themselves moving through the crowd until I climbed onto the shoulders of an innocent, tall man, who bounced me around the room as I played master of ceremonies, conducting the sea of people chanting with voices of angels. When my carrier man had finally returned me to the stage Thomas (photographer) noticed him walking back to his friends and holding his back in concern. People always tell me how much taller I am than they expect, which means heavier too. At 79 kilos (12 stone) I hope I didn’t break that dude’s back. Still, I didn’t ask him to bounce up and down.

——————-

New day. We’ve arrived in Munich (Munchen).
The last night of the German tour tonight. It was a long drive last night from north to south. I awoke at 11.30 just as we pulled into the venue, called Backstage Werk. The food that was laid out for us all was just bloody fantastic! As we all got off he bus at the same time, the whole team ate together (except for Daniel who rarely wakes before 2pm) – it felt like eating at summer camp around the benches, all chatting and chuckling at each other’s stupid jokes, mixing up languages between French, English and German. The weather is good. Blue skies and a light warm sunshine. I might try to spend a few moments out in it today; see if I can finish writing those songs I started.

Written by Charlie W.

Two nights ago we played Hamburg. What a hot n’ crazy gig that was. The room went a long way back from the stage, with a low ceiling of industrial pipes and the floor packed with people all crammed together like tinned sardines. Looking at everyone from the stage, it was like a carpet of heads. Eventually, at the end of the show I rolled around on that carpet. You might have seen it within the pictures that Thomas Peter took and we posted on Facebook. There was a good one of me surfing over people. Not all the venues we play are suitable for stage diving, but that place had the great feeling of a little poky club, where we were all in it together. In fact, it was so hot towards the end of the set that I was gasping for water. When taking my drink I saw a lot of people looking just as thirsty, so we handed out bottles of water to everyone. I say handed, but actually I was just throwing them out. One bottle, I threw with perhaps just a little too much force, which almost took somebody’s head off.

I had some technical problems at the end of the show. My ear monitors stopped working. When I returned back on stage for the second encore to play She Went Quietly, I did it without the ear monitors, which was pretty weird, as the sound from stage was like a swimming pool; I was drowning in reverb. And then, in the most intimate part of the song where I almost stop playing the piano, something happened which was beyond my control and took me by surprise: my body decided that I needed to release some unwanted air and a burp erupted out of nowhere. Fortunately, I caught it before it became too triumphant and proud and I think, and certainly hope, not so many people noticed. I think this is a problem that every singer gets, particularly at the beginning of a show (not long after eating) but I would never have expected it to get me on the very last, and most tender song. That’s live music for you!

Since yesterday was a day off, we really made a night of it afterwards. I couldn’t tell you when we finally slept. It was great fun to have a night out in Hamburg. The last bar had some very cool electronic music playing. It was contagious – we had a good old boogie for hours. And yesterday/last night we stayed in an amazing hotel. One of the most creative hotels I have stayed in for a long time. It’s called Michelberger (http://www.michelbergerhotel.com/#/de/rooms). My room had an entire wall of books. But I don’t mean one on top of the other. No. The back cover of each book was actually screwed into the wall, one next to the other, so that the cover of each book can be seen, opened and read, if one should want to read any of them. If you go to Berlin (which I recommend to anyone) then stay in this hotel. It’s too expensive either, at about €60 per night and, given the quality of the place, it’s good.

As they in Russia, mus’ go!
Charlie

It’s been just over a week since I wrote my last blog, when we were in Brussels for the rescheduled gig. Since then we’ve been to Switzerland for two shows: Caprice Festival and Le Metro in Bale (known to us Brits as Basel). After that we began the German tour, starting in Stuttgard, followed by last night in Köln.

Caprice festival was an incredibly well organised event; the decor both backstage and out front was full of interesting details which gave a really special atmosphere to the whole thing. After the show, the head of the festival invited me and my crew to their VIP area, which was raised at the back of the arena, facing the stage. That’s all I was expecting, but in fact, behind it there was a labyrinth of different rooms, also decadently decorated, constituting a restaurant, a club with several bars and finally the gateway to an incredible listening/viewing point of the stage. Earth, WInd & Fire was playing. I watched for a little while but it didn’t really turn me too much – they were a little bit too stuck in the cheese of the 80′s for me and with a lack of melody there’s only so much jamming in the same key that I can listen to, despite how good the rhythm section might be.

The next night we found ourselves in Bale. Le Metro is a venue in the basement of a hotel and Casino. The idea sounds good but the combination of having a venue in a casino and in Switzerland makes it more bureaucratic than we’re perhaps used to. Before doing anything else we all had to hand in our passports to prove our age. In order to get to backstage from our rooms meant foraging through a maze of underground corridors and doors needing keys, which we had to wait for. It felt like a scene from Spinal Tap. However, the show was a good one and the audience were great. There were some stairs for the public, close to the front of the stage that ascended to a viewing balcony and went all the way to the back of the room. During In Your Hands I had fun exploring it and singing to the audience from the back of the room.

The following day we drove to Stuttgard to begin the German leg of the tour. Opposite our rather crappy little hotel was a small but pretty active skateboard park. As soon as I got out of the bus and heard the sound of wheels and plywood hitting the concrete I was taken straight back to my days as a 7 – 14 year old, skating wherever and whenever I could, when I wasn’t playing piano, that is. In those days, when someone made a new ramp, I was always the kid that tried it out first. I often gained injuries from that approach, but I liked the thrill of being the first to christen our new and very homemade monument of joy and peril. So, arriving to this in Stuttgard, in a moment of nostalgic inspiration, I took my guitar and sat in the middle of the skate park and continued the writing of a couple of new songs I’m currently working. Subsequently, my reason for not writing a blog for a while is that I have had a serious hunger to compose some new song. I’m like a cat that has to cough up a fur ball. I obsess over it every free minute I get, which makes sitting down to write anything else, including emails a challenging task. However, today, I felt the need to catch up on what’s been happening this last week, before the diary escapes me.

The first Germany show was bloody fantastic. It’s not easy to put my finger on how German audiences are uniquely different, but it’s certain. I think it gave us all (band and crew) a new boost of energy to experience their response to the show. I should also mention the incredible venue in Stuttgard! Wagenhallen: an enormous warehouse which I am told used to be a bus depot, then taken over by squatters and then formed as a collective, inhabiting all sorts of unusual an interesting creative ventures. According to Jay, my lighting man, when the tour bus arrived inside the building, next to where it was parked, there was a huge pile (as big as the bus) of what he thought looked like general bits and bobs of objects without use. Within two hours a small team of men came  and removed the whole thing. It seemed they were needing it for some theatrical event that day.

The venue itself where we played was at the other end of the building. Our dressing room was my favourite bit: A large country-like room, with a big round wood burner. It created a lovely peaceful atmosphere that took me back to my childhood days, when we lived in a farm and had to heat the house in the same primitive way. Just a few days earlier I was complaining of how it seems impossible these days for to escape air conditioning (acclim.) – a singer’s biggest enemy on the road. Its literally everywhere I go and drives me crazy; hotels, dressing rooms, taxis, trains, planes. Everywhere is air conditioned. I cannot escape it. The process the air goes through though, is such that leaves it dry and hard on the throat. An eight hour trip to New York, for example, always leaves my vocal chords suffering, unless I make sure I permanently have hot water to drink. Consequently, walking into the backstage of Wagenhallen with the burning wood naturally cleaning the air, as well as heating it and perfuming the room with that camp fire smell was immediately calming to me, which set us up for an amazing gig that night. The public was more than we could’ve expected. There was magic in the room. At the back of the big square was a bar. I climbed up onto during In Your Hands and ordered myself a pint of larger at the same time – an inspired moment, if I don’t mind saying so myself and the beer tasted just great! After the show, I went out to chat to what people there were left hanging around. A lot of them were asking why I didn’t play this song and that song, until I eventually decided to grab my guitar, climb the bar again and play the ones that we’d missed out in the set.

And yesterday, we arrived in Köln. The greeting from the promoter was, once again, very welcoming, with an incredible spread of good homemade food, using all organic meats. Although, I am experimenting with avoiding meat right now, just to see how it changes my physical feeling on tour. But that wasn’t a problem in this case. There was plenty to choose from.

It was a pretty relaxing day, in build up to the concert, with the obligatory filmed interview, which posed interesting questions for me to ponder and then reply to. The feeling before going on stage was good. All the band were relaxed and ready for the 2nd German gig. Conclusion: another great show; audience fantastic. I threw in several more songs than was written down on the set list, playing two encores, the second one starting on my own with She Went Quietly, followed by Boxes. Then I decided to play I’m A Man, requested by Nico, my monitor man (we didn’t play that song for LONG time). The band had thought the show was over when I started SHe Went Quietly, leaving the backstage for the dressing rooms and removing their in ear monitors. When they heard me start the I’m A Man, they had to run back on stage, only just making it on time to start playing at the right moment. What a bunch of professionals!

And that brings me back to the today, here in Hamburg, in what was once a Nazi bunker, but now selling pianos on the ground floor and a music venue and nightclub on the top floor.

How strange the twists and turns of time’s arrow.

I think tonight will be one to remember.

Over and out,

Winston