Monday, October 6, 2008

1st October

1st Oct 2008.

Here we are on the ‘autobahn’ 172 km from Regensburg. Tonight we play Munich but before Munich we must spend a few hours in Regensburg. Robert has a photo shoot there. So while he is off posing and preening we shall be running around town drinking coffee and seeing the sights of this wonderful city.

We are now deeply in tour mode. The days and nights blur. What is real and what is not, and days in the van and lack of sleep and one petrol station after another and it is all getting a little crazy. Our next day off and chance of rest and stabilization for
ourselves is in Berlin. Till then we swing with the circus and the shows we play are all the better for it. Frankfurt last night was a winner. Hamburg amazing.

New songs are coming into the set and we are also developing a ‘visual’ style on stage. Robert is telling the lighting operators at each show to only use 6 white lights and no more. This is causing controversy and the lighting operators keep talking of washes and colour wheels and backdrop lighting and Robert gamely rejects all of this insisting on only 6 white lights. It is a battle.

Celebrity Watch. Still no one.

So Munich tonight. Rumour has it that it shall be recorded for local radio. Robert is working on a new song that has developed over the last week or so – we play snatches of it in soundchecks. It sounds a little like ‘Song From Under The Floorboards’ by Magazine I think. Robert says lyrically he is aiming for T. S. Elliot circa 1909 – a sick inner city malaise captured in music. There is a bit of early period Franz Ferdinand (circa November 2004) about it too. The title seems to be “I Am Not What I Seem’. But then I could be just mis-hearing him.

That is it for now.

Post Munich Show.

Very happy with our performance. The songs are shinning.
The beer is flowing and we get to meet some fabulous folk.

1 comment:

James Todd Phillips said...

Hello Adele & lads,

Enjoyed the Frankfurt show (on me b-day) naturally... thanks for tossing my request envelope around stage anyway. Didn't really expect to hear "To Reach Me" (don't know if it's ever been in Robert's /The Go-Between's live set), but "Spirit" made it worth it. I still enjoy picking & grinning"To Reach Me" in hopes Robert will sit in with me sometime at the Scottish pub in Karlsruhe...

Nice touch, playing Grant's "Quiet Heart". And Glenn was uncannily Grant-like on the strings as well: the the triplet-intro to "Spring Rain" gave me chills.

Hope you're "enjoying" the road. I remember it well...