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Manchester, Bridgewater Hall I
31st October 2011 | Larry
Glycolactic what?
31st October 2011 | Juliet
My morning mission is to locate and purchase a Glycolactic Radiance Renewal mask.
Dave’s mission is to find the ultimate white shirt for stage, but not one that balloons out at the waist. Being a slimline low fat band, the fit of the shirt can be tricky…
We leg it down market street and do Selfridges, Harvey Nics, DKNY, Diesel, and despite many what Dave calls “almost“s, it’s just not there.
“Come on, keep walking,” says Dave, as we ascend yet another silver escalator into yet another stratosphere of consumption…jogging now, up the escalators…
I heard that rock drummers use the same amount of energy as a footballer in a premium league match. (source: Radio 4)
So how does Dave keep fit? This question has probably intrigued many of you.
Here are Dave’s tips:
1. Go to the gym on gig days. It sorts you out. Also do bench work and weights daily at home.
2. When not on tour, Dave goes running with his faithful hound on the welsh hills. Daily.
3. Juice a lot. Dave scattered some kale seeds and it took over. He has a power juicer that can deal with it. His flat leaf parsley crop is copious. He now plants his kale with more space… (tip: when eating greens, add lemon juice, it helps the body use the iron…)
4. Dave’s tour diet: Fruit in the morning. Then a mixture of cereals. Then yogurt on top and low fat milk. Then if still peckish some poached eggs on toast. Tea or coffee….(if it’s real cappuccino etc.) Pre sound check afternoon soup in catering, and bread and real butter dipped in aforementioned soup. During soundcheck a big juice. Proper with sour and green things and loads of ginger. It has everything that’s left in the veg and fruit basket…even the unwanted celery. Celery is good for you and all that…it runs on stage to meet Dave between songs. Dinner in catering. And a dash of pudding sometimes. Post show mega plate of carb rich pasta etc. Dave doesn’t drink much alcohol. Maybe a sherry at Xmas….
We have now walked/jogged about 3 miles through the streets and shops of Manchester…
Space NK has the Glycolactic mask. Mission accomplished. And ready to return to base camp. But Dave is still without his shirt… inspiration hits…Zara….”Hmmm,” says Dave. And there it was, the shirt for slimline drummers.
Dave will be wearing this tonight. In his fish tank. He would like some stick-on fish on the screen but so far none have been acquired. Instead there are ghoulish ghostly things… it’s Halloween..
Liverpool Philharmonic II
29th October 2011 | Larry
Residing at the venue for the day
29th October 2011 | Juliet
Soup: leek and potato
There was a big aftershow at the hotel bar last night. Lots of staying up chatting till the early hours. Orchestra table were on Pinot Noir… Andy Diagram and Joe Duddell chewed the musical fat till 7am…
Some fans came from as far as Barcelona and Portugal doing an overnighter in Liverpool via Salford. Ricardo combined birthday celebration with getting to see James live. Happy day….
There were friends and family from all over the North West and beyond..
And there were lots of comfy brown leather sofas to chill on. Thank you band-friendly hotel people of Liverpool. Sorry for keeping you up (all night).
So now it’s Saturday and we are out the hotel and residing at the venue for the day….so much time to discuss set list possibilities and the effect of shuffling a song…if you move that one this happens etc etc…. Time to rehearse and tweak arrangements, vocal harmonies etc…Mini rehearsals everywhere…and horizontal bodies napping.
Larry is slogging, blogging photos in wardrobe.
Meanwhile Vinny is organising a major card game competition in dressing room 2. Cross-legged on the floor he and anyone free gets to play.
The set list is finally organised. The Shining finally gets an airing 3rd song in and very beautiful it is too…
We travel briefly overnight on the bus to Manchester for a DAY OFF. See you Monday for more soup and stuff…
P.S. For Neil and others who care for soup: there are two finely tuned soups which have been forgotten in these manoeuvres:
Tomato and basil, peppery with a kick.(Nottingham)
Thai sweet potato (in Liverpool on Friday)
Also in Liverpool the juicer lost its nerve and blew a gasket…to the smell of burning plastic. (Now replaced). Juice of the day for American Chris’s sore throat: a fistful of fresh ginger, 2 whole lemons, 2 pears, 1 apple, small beetroot. He drank it and said “……..man…….”.
Liverpool Philharmonic I
28th October 2011 | Larry
Can someone PLEASE get rid of that Vulture?
28th October 2011 | Juliet
Choirboy Ben of The Manchester Consort’s take on Liverpool I:
Still reeling from last night in Nottingham, we board what has become the ‘bus of dreams’ for Liverpool (nothing magical or mystery about it though) at RNCM – everyone is especially pumped about this one, it feels a bit like coming home for a lot of us.
For the first time on the tour we actually arrive on time (bus of dreams). Sound check goes well – we are loving the sound here, a great hall. Feels as though everyone is going to pull it out even more for this gig.
Each day it feels as though we’re improving, and connecting more with the band and the orchestra – communication is better (we can see each other in the choir, which makes a massive difference) and everything feels more immediate.
Got to mention the catering – food makes us singers happy, and I don’t think we’ve ever been treated this well! That counts generally as well, the band, orchestra, and crew are all absolute legends and couldn’t be nicer to us. It makes for some amazing performances when you feel this good.
There is a piano in our dressing room. Dangerous. We annoy the orchestra hugely (haha) with our covers of James songs – it seems to be the only thing we can play at the moment, it’s taking over our minds! Tori is breakdancing, Ellie is doing ballet. And people say we can’t dance…
There’s a massive fridge full of beer in our dressing room, but it is padlocked.
Dust Motes is a special one for us tonight – we return to dreambus singing ‘there’s a vulture…’ at the top of our voices.
We’ve got one more here tomorrow – we’re gonna miss you when you’re gone, Liverpool. It’s been emotional. Peace X MCRConsort
Nottingham, Royal Concert Hall
27th October 2011 | Larry
Riders: Nurse Ratched, Nick Cave and Jim Morrison
27th October 2011 | Juliet
Saul would like to say that certain members of the band took on an appropriate elegance given that we were in the hometown of Paul Smith. He who is elegance personified.
We are now on the bus heading west to Liverpool for two nights.
Saul has returned without his Cillit Bang and is looking forlornly at the sponge by the sink. “DON’T go and see Contagion,” warns Dave.
Last night in Lookaway a guy ran on stage dancing and was pulled off by the bouncers. Tim went off stage to get him back in. The guy said he had been drinking like Richard Burton.
Riders was played for the first time on this tour. First time since 2007….This song is based on a dream that Tim had where he was with Nurse Ratched, Nick Cave and Jim Morrison. He told the choir as they tried it out in Glasgow.
James would like to thank the audience for being prepared to listen on the new arrangements and also knowing how to let rip and party on Medieval and Say Something…..
Larry said the Nottingham audience were the most in-time clappers so far….Big thank you Nottingham…
There is no soup today. There is sleeping and there is shopping.
26th October 2011 | Juliet
We are now parked up in Nottingham at the football stadium after our second night on the bus. The London boys have been dropped at the station and we are waiting to get into a hotel.
The bus is old and sticky, very sticky. The loo is worse than the Northern Line train to Bolton.
Saul is talking returning with rubber gloves and a large bottle of Cillit Bang (or Waitrose’s Essentials version?). We’ve just gone to Brian Clough’s exec suite in search of a usable bathroom.
Rooms are not ready yet but the nice people at the hotel agree to make us poached eggs on arrival. Finding a diner in the UK at ten to 11 is not easy. They bring us jugs of cranberry, orange, tea and coffee. That’s hospitality.
There is no soup today. There is sleeping and there is shopping. Today is DAY OFF.
Dave picks up some ‘3 for 2’ cucumber wet wipes to share whilst out and about in sunny Nottingham, and goes to see the movie Contagion….
I challenge all your great poets and writers
25th October 2011 | Larry
Words fail me!!!
Scotland!! I challenge all your great poets and writers to find the words to portray the deafening noise that greeted us tonight.
Thank you!!
