April Mini-Tour

In mid-April we set out for our first English tour, albeit a very short one taking in Sheffield, Lincoln and Brighton and a lot of A-roads. Considering our travel woes on the Germany trip, everything went as planned this time, giving us plenty of opportunity to snoop around museums and record shops, which involved trying to pick up a Tangerine Dream album in every city (successfully I hasten to add).

Sheffield museum.

The venue for the evening: Dada, an excellecnt little bar with a great selection of beers and ales.

The Lincs2Nepal Vegetarian Café served us great food during our brief stay in the city, including a delicious cottage pie.

Experimental Sonic Machine who played a bit like this, both bemusing and enthralling passing people:

Decibel Place Gallery and Performance Space in Lincoln, right next to the Castle and the Cathedral, and our venue for the evening. Run by Dex of Tape Noise, this felt like an important place in the local music community, an accepting space for artistic endeavour.

Lincoln Cathedral.

After a long drive from Lincoln, we arrived tired in Brighton, the parking situation being incredibly awkward until a friend recommended a certain road which proved to have a free spot to stick the vehicle for the night and, luckily, not too far from where we were staying. That evening's show was in support of Boduf Songs whose first EP I've always considered a great influence on my song-writing circa 2005/2006 and Jessica Bailiff; a privilege indeed. The gig was at the Green Door Store, a venue hidden in the bridge arches under Brighton Railway Station.

Matt Sweet of Boduf Songs.

Jessica Balliff

...and meeting with old friends. It all got quite drunken later on and I managed to concuss myself on an black painted post down a poorly lit street. However, within minutes I was fine as the healing properties of Guinness and Matmos kicked in.

With exceptional hangovers the next morning we sort solace in the Wall That Drones, next to the power hub near the Lanes. Afterwards there was much record buying (Tangerine Dream / Popul Vuh / John Martyn) and a short relaxing sit on the stony shores of Brighton beach before a Queen sing-along fuelled drive home to Southend-on-Sea.

A big thank you to all the promoters, audience members and dear friends who we met on this trip, hopefully we'll be through these cities again some day with new songs.