S*T*U*F*F* Reloaded

We’ve just played a TV performance for “Canal Plus”, concluding the European phase of the tour. Strange, and an inevitable come-down after last night.
The final show proper, in La Cigale, was destined to be a highlight show, and it certainly lived up to its hype - the venue is so beautiful, and it was outrageously [...]

Every tour has to have a “worst show” - and it will be hard to beat the appalling nightmare that bestowed itself upon us last night. Something happened to JB’s midi controller which put all of his keyboards just shy of a quarter-tone sharp. The racket was hideous, from the very first notes of “Radian”. [...]

Flat landscape. A canal. A solitary wind generator gracefully turning in the sunshine. It must be Holland. I slept for a long long time… almost forcing myself to avoid facing the longest trip of the tour… a mammoth 14 hour drive from Milan to Amsterdam. In fact, as we left at 7pm last night, and [...]

Such a miserable day is not conduisive to taking long walks in Milan. The sky is a mottle of stained greys, rain hardly even having the energy to fall. I decided, looking at the map, that Stazione Centrale was close enough to venture towards, perhaps with the vague notion of picking up something to eat [...]

What a gig last night - one of those life-affirming shows that remind me why it was so good to do this for a living. You could tell from the start that the audience were along for the ride - every tiny change in mood or tempo would have them cheering and swaying… fantastic. JB [...]

So here we are, on the cusp of the tour proper. After 2 shows in London, which were pretty good by London standards, as the crowds can be a bit on the cool side. Last night (Saturday) was the first time the set has felt under control, and the right “shape”… at least Nico and [...]

When your tour bus bathroom has a heated floor, crocodile-skin print wood-panelled walls and a porthole revealing a virtual aquarium, you just know things are going to be OK.
In the past, I have come to associate tour buses with the curious perfume of nicotine-infused cushions and portable toilet fluid, a foul and heady concotion [...]

I’m on the train from Edinburgh to Glasgow Queen Street. I can barely guess how many times I’ve made this journey in my life - way back in student days, a long time ago, it seems. I went to meet my mate Ian Hartley, from both those days and these, for some very fine sushi [...]

I’m going to try really hard to be disciplined about writing during the Air tour… which is now more than I bargained for in the beginning, in that they’ve asked me to stay on for the full world tour. It transpired to be a lot more complex gig than Leo or I had originally thought, [...]