NOVEMBER 19th, 2009: (FINAL) POST 8 : END OF TOUR- Last show of tour in Munster with Hammers/Resurrectionists, Goodbyes, Flight home. Munster, Deutschland, Versmold, Toronto Airport JUNE 28th-30th, JULY 1st, 2009

Well this is it ladies and gentleman, the final post of the dolcim 2009 European tour. Thank you to those of you that stuck with it until the very end. I know it took me 6 months to complete, but just like I said I would, I finished it.
I hope you enjoy the last post.
I hope you had as much fun with the tour journal as I did. If anything, it's pure documentation. so here we go:

POST 8: END OF TOUR
JUNE 28th MUNSTER

After we cleaned up the venue from CMAR, we all went back to the ulbrich house to rest up before we had to leave to drive to munster.
Since we didn’t have the van anymore, we had to pack all of our stuff into jojos van and lars’s stationwagon.
We headed off to munster. When we got there, we met up with some of the alpinist guys because they are from munster. I walked around and took some pictures. There was this river right next to the venue and some people jumped in and started swimming in it. I guess it was pretty clean.

There was also a railroad track that ran right alongside of it and this huge crane structure.

The resurrectionists played first. Fast, intense, emotional. Their live show has gotten better every time I have seen them play.

We went next. It was really sad. The whole show I kept thinking about how it was our last show of the tour. So on the last song I just let go. It was pretty fun.
Sacha took pictures for me.

After we played, sabine and everyone gave us hugs. It was really sad.

Then it was time for Hammers to play!
They rocked out.
By this time, I had heard their songs enough to start to know the words.
So I was singing the lyrics and sacha noticed and pushed the microphone towards me for
“is this the freedom, you created!!!?”

It was fun. After the show, we hung out for a bit. Then I wanted us to all take a picture, since it was going to be our last time we hung out all together for a while. So as I set the camera up, we moved the lights around and put them under us. Then I don’t remember whose idea it was, but we all took our shirts off. And then we took this picture.

resurrectionists, hammers, and dolcim munster Deutschland june 28th, 2009

we said our goodbyes to the hammers guys and we all headed back home.
We slept like rocks that night.

The next day we spent packing, and getting our stuff ready to leave. Later that evening, we took the Ulbrichs out for a meal, it was the least we could do to thank them for taking care of us for so long. It was great.
I took a picture of amelie and leia with a huge polar bear!

amelie, leia, and ice cream polar bear

The next day, we had to take all of the trash from the 3 days of the festival to a dump. There was a whole trailer's worth.
It was weird, and creepy.
As we were leaving, I took a picture of this tin man, apparently telling us to piss off and never come back.

yes the tin man is giving us the middle finger

When we came back, jojo and neils came over to have breakfast with us and hang out one last time before we left. I really wish bjorn could have come but he had to work.

We also rented a car, but we had to be driven to the place to pick it up.
So we had to head out.
We said our goodbyes to sabine, lars, amelie and leia. Thank you guys for letting us stay in your home and stink up the place.

It was really sad to leave because we had been there so long.

Lars drove us to the car rental place, and we said our goodbyes. Thanks again for everything lars.

We drove the car to a small city near the aiport and rented a room.
It was classy. There was a massive window in the room, that I found opened all the way up. It was probably the easiest place for someone to commit suicide. Weird.

We ate at this crazy expensive sushi place, and just farted around. If I remember correctly, we just watched japanese television. The next morning, we drove to the airport and returned the car. it was much less complicated than actually getting the car.

after waiting around for our flight,we got on. I spent most of the time reading murakami and watching films that had been out for a long time, some were good, and some weren't.

We arrived in Toronto, and it was just like we had left, clean and sterile, with cool architecture.

The pictures end where they began, in the toronto airport. The last plane ride home was sad for me. I was planning on staying in europe longer, and seeing some friends I didn't get a chance to see. But as they say "there's always next year."

We all arrived safely at the airport in Nashville several hours later and back to our lives.

This concludes the dolcim european tour journal. thank you to everyone involved, the bands we played with, the promoters, our old friends and and the new friends we made along the way.
Thanks for reading.

Until next time...

-sean conley

THE END

OCTOBER 14th, 2009: POST 7: CRY ME A RIVER DAY 1, 2 and 3 Peckeloh, Deutschland. JUNE 25th- JUNE 28th, 2009

POST 7: CMAR 2009

THURSDAY June 25th

 We had driven back from essen the previous night, and the next morning we had to get everything ready for cry me a river. So we went to the venue and moved some things around. The rest of the day was spent getting groceries and drinks for the bands.

FRIDAY June 26th Cry Me a River Day 1:

I remember waking up to Jimbo telling me that Michael Jackson was dead. It was 6 in the morning, and he had gotten a text from Neils. We got up and had breakfast. And to honor MJ, I played his greatest hits on my ipod while Jimbo was cooking vegan potato salad. This didn’t last long, as soon as Lars got home he tried to throw my ipod out the window. He’s not a Michael Jackson fan.
Before we knew it, it was time to go set things up. So we got the place, and started putting together the stage and putting the tables together. I filmed a little bit before anybody got there. The stage construction took a while but Justin was small enough to get under the tables and put things together. Slowly, people started showing up. A group of guys from England came, and they put their tents together. After making trips back and forth from Lars and Sabine’s it was getting close to time to start. People started coming in packs and before we knew it, there were cars and tents everywhere. I hadn’t seen anyting like it since 2 years before at the 2007 cry me a river. We set up our merch in the greenhouse looking room, and other bands started following suit.

Then our friends started to arrive. Some of the guys from june paik came. Then Johannes came with Verena. Johannes stayed with me in Nashville about 6 months prior. It was great to see him again. The rest of the afternoon was like this, seeing old friends, some who I hadn’t seen in 2 years, some who I had seen when I was in berlin in December 2007. There were groups of people scattered all over the place. I found myself walking back and forth from each one.

I walked out and saw sebastian, who I hadn’t seen since I stayed with the thruls in December 2007. soon enough it was time for the beginning of cry me a river 2009. I got a good spot next to the stage and started rolling the video camera.

Our friends hammers from Manchester went on first.

They were followed by alpinist from munster.

me and goliath went on next and played the most intense brutal set we had seen in all of the shows we played with them. They were incredible.

After that, dolcim played. It was so hot on the stage, it made it difficult to hold notes.

the third memory still had not shown up yet so battle of wolf359 went on next, and the crowd was finally broken in and people started crowdsurfing.

Third memory arrived and played next.

Trainwreck played last and ended the 1st night of cmar 2009.

Afterwards, we were all hanging out and drinking together.

Lars and sabine left to go back to the house, and Justin and I decided to stay and hang out, which meant we would have to find a place to sleep. We ended up back in else’s van. We couldn’t get away from that van, even when we weren’t on tour. I didn’t sleep well. I used the first aid kit as a pillow and slept in my clothes.

SATURDAY: June 27th Cry Me A River Day 2:

The sun rose and woke me up. Justin got up soon after. We walked out of the van and saw this:

bottles and trash everywhere. Ulli was already up, and we just decided to start cleaning. So we spent a good while picking up bottles and trash off the ground. Then we named ourselves the CMAR clean up crew, and wanted to have t-shirts made.

People slowly started getting up and then Jenny came and started making breakfast. There was a looong line. It was one of the best breakfasts I have had in my entire life. Second to the one we had in Copenhagen, denmark on the cease tour in june of 2007.
I ate a little bit of everything. Amazing.

After that, we had to rearrange some things. Then we cleaned up in the stage area as well. We made sure our merch was set up right. Before we knew it, it was 11, time to meet up for mini gold. Matt was in charge of getting everyone together and scores and whatnot. We had a lot of people who wanted to go and not enough vehicles to take them. So some decided to walk. I took Elsa’s van and drove all of the stragglers up there. Once at mini-golf, I took a lot of pictures and some video for the CMAR dvd.

I watched Sacha and Andy play hacky golf with their putters, and walked around watching people’s games.

I had to drive the van back to give it to Elsa so I left. I made a couple of trips back and forth to the house with sabine. And I went with her to run some errands and pick up drinks.  Daniel from Hammers drew a flyer for our final show in Munster, and i found another one hanging up as well.

After we had everything ready, it was hang out time until the evening.

As the sun set, it was time to start.
Ghostchant went on first.

They were followed by Ghostlimb, which contains 2 of the same members from Graf Orlock.

Danse Macabre went on next and people started to crowdsurf.

June Paik played a shorter, but still as intense set. So good.

Louise Cyphere went on an played an amazing set. Very tight and well rehearsed and everything sounded really good.

I was so tired from running back and forth from set to set, I barely had enough time to eat before another band went on. It was hectic. During Zann’s set, I couldn’t get to the front. All of the other times I managed to sneak through the crowd. Also, my battery on my video camera died.

Graf Orlock went on, and I was curious to see how they pulled off trouble their sound live, with the movie clips and everything. I was impressed, they were on point. It was so hot in the room that condensation was collecting on the ceiling and falling down like rain. SO many people in a small room. The crowd was so amped. The vocalist crowsurfed through the crowd.

One of the most anticipated reunions ever, Shikari took the stage. The guitar player had a very interesting set up, with a tiny amp balancing on top of his cab. As they hit their first note, the crowd went apeshit. People were jumping around trying to get on the stage and some people were so excited they couldn’t stand it. Shikari played like they had never broken up, it was crazy to think they hadn’t played in 10 years. Each song was as intense as the other. There were so many camera flashes. Halfway through their set, they were so loud they pushed the circuit breakers until they shut off. All of the lights in the building went off. This just added to the crowds excitement. When the lights did come back on, it was like an intermission. They played another round of songs nd sure enough the lights went out again. I was physically drained from the day of filming and Im sure everyone else was as well. The vocalist at one point during the set said “ Thank you all…for bringing us back together.“ The crowd went nuts. It was great for everyone to be a part of it. They played their last song, and the drummer left the stage and went outside, because it was so hot in there. He returned, and after everyone wanted them to play more, they ended the night.

We hung out in the merch room as kids bought all kinds of stuff. I sold quite a few of the kafka on the shore tapes and did some trades as well. I got a picture with the guys from the third memory.

Afterwards, we all hung out again together, knowing that this would be our last night, all of us together. It was bittersweet. Justin and I once again stayed and ended up sleeping in the van. I got even less sleep than the night before.

SUNDAY June 28th Cry Me a River Day 3: goodbyes

 I got up the CMAR clean up crew (me Justin, and ulli) cleaned up the place again. This type however we knew that it would stay clean. After we had breakfast, people started leaving. It was sad to say goodbye to all of my good friends and all of my new friends I had just made this summer. But it was okay because we said we would see each other next year and we had that to look forward to.
Before everyone started going their separate ways, I got everyone together for a picture.

After that picture, the june paik guys started to leave. I got a picture with Johannes and Sebastian, the thrul brothers.

I wanted to get a big picture of everyone before we all left so we all got up on top of the beat up van and posed for a picture.

We said goobye to the battle of wolf and me andgoliath guys, and they left.
Then it was just us, like before everyone had gotten there. We spent the day cleaning up the place and taking down the stage and putting stuff where it was before.
We left the building, knowing that we would all return in a year and do it all over again.

NEXT UP:
POST 8: Last post of tour journal. Final Show in Munster, Goodbyes to Ulbrichs, Plane back home.

SEPTEMBER 14th, 2009: UPDATES, APOLOGIES, AND EXPLANATIONS, POST 6

So i have to start off again by apologizing. Long story. The short version is that I have been hosting off of a server that I wasn't supposed to for a long ime, and well, they finally found out and kicked me off of it. The funny thing is that they didn't take my site down, they just wouldn't let me update and upload new information to it, hence why the site hasn't had an update since early july.

I was trying to decide whether or not I was going to continue the site, or if I was just going to give up and quit. Then I thought of those of you guys who I met in europe along the tour, who said you were following the tour journal, or that you liked the journal. So thanks to you guys, I have decided to finish what I started. Therfore i bought hosting space, and a domain.

it is now seanconley.net, but seanconley.tk will be forwarded to this address, so either one will work. I will pick up where I left off with the tour journal and finish it up, and then slowly update whats been going on over the past 2 months.

so without further adieu:

MONDAY JULY 13TH, 2009: MOL and ANTWERP, BELGIUM, VERSMOLD, AACHEN, and WARENDORF, DEUTSCHLAND, STEENWIJK, NETHERLANDS (TRASHFEST) DUSSELDORF, MULHEIM, and ESSEN, DEUTSCHLAND (JUNE 14TH-JUNE 24TH)

MEGA POST 6:

MOL, BELGIUM

We got off the ferry in Calais and had a 2 and ½ hour drive ahead of us. I called niek and told him that even with catching an earlier ferry, we were still going to be about an hour late. We got into Mol and found the venue. The answer to the question from the previous post is yes, but we were late.

There were a lot of people there, all waiting on us. Niek was really nice, and said that it was alright and not to worry about it.  It was good to see him, it had been 2 years since we had seen him last.
After loading the gear in, Justin set the drums up and we put the cabs on the stage. I set up merch while the first band was setting up.

Millions of them played first, with the singer from am I dead yet? And it was a solid set.

And then midnight souls played.

When we played, there wasn’t a 3rd microphone so I made one out of a cymbal stand which was awesome. Below are pictures I found on a website:

It was an awesome show and there were so many people there, especially for a matinee show. Everyone was really nice!

I found this picture from the venue page on the internet. someone put our stickers on a urinal, kind of cool. After the show I skated at the skatepark down the street.

Then niek took us to his restaurant that he is the co owner of. It is an amazing place. Niek treated us to an amazing meal. It was quite a spread of stuff.

dolcim and niek in mol, belgium june 2009

Thanks for everything Niek.

ANTWERP, BELGIUM

We got into Antwerp and it was raining. We drove around a good while looking for a parking spot, and we finally found one. We walked to the bar De KULMINATOR, which is where matt had been several years ago. He wanted to get some beers there but the bar didn’t open until 5. So we walked around the city.

I thought the name of this skate shop was clever.

The city was definitely touristy, but the architecture is quite amazing. We followed the streets towards this massive church tower,

and that led us to this town square area. In the center there was this fountain statue.

Almost like clockwork, every 5 minutes there would be a group of people, whether it be young Belgian kids on a school trip to old French people with a tour guide, all staring at the church tower and then going in front of the fountain. I noticed all of the tour guides spoke different languages. The rain didn’t seem to stop anyone, which I admired. I have to admit though, the architecture was pretty impressive.

We ate at this Italian restaurant and then left and headed back to versmold.

6/16 AACHEN, DEUTSCHLAND

The next day it was time to return the van. We cleaned it out and put all of the equipment back at lala house. Then we headed out for aachen. Since we didn’t have the van we had to cram in Lars’s Volkswagen. It was cramped for the whole 3 hours.
We got into aachen pretty early. The place used to be a bomb shelter. It was well underground, and their was a massive submarine door into the place.
Pictures(stairs and poster)

 We loaded in and then found the room with the food. Jenny’s vegan cuisine was insanely good. There was so much food.

There was a lot of time before the show so I went around aachen and took some pictures and put some stickers up. 

As I was coming back to the venue, I found our old van. Apparently the ramming speed guys were driving around in the van that we used 2 years ago. Madness.

cease upon the capitol 2007 tour van 2 years later

Coming up for air went on first and played fast and intense.

2 songs into our set, I broke my E string. Ive never broken a string at a show and it sucke.d I didn’t have any e strings with me, so I used the bassist from coming up for air’s bass. Thanks a lot.

Ramming speed from boston played last and tore the place apart.

After that we packed up and lars drove us the 3 hours back to versmold

The next day we went to town so I could get some bass strings. After that, we went to the skatepark. Skating was pretty fun but it was really hot.  

WARENDORF, DEUTSCHLAND
Friday we took a trip to warendorf.

We met up with jojo at his house and then walked to a  bar and played pool. I am awful at pool and Justin kicked me and matt's ass.

Jojo and lars played a version of german street pool, where there aren’t any rules. I wished we would have played that way, it looked way more fun that our game.

It was finally Saturday, the swimming day! Lars had asked us if we wanted to join the family for some swimming and Justin and I agreed. Justin even bought a pair of swimming trunks at the grocery store for the occasion. Matt decided to stay and study for his MCATs. Before we headed out, I took some pictures of the sun setting outside of the ulbrich house.

We headed to the swimming place in munster. When we got there, it was much like the YMCA. We walked in and paid. I got a killer discount by showing my student ID, it pays to be a student sometimes. We got a little plastic coin, which we found out later was used for the locker to hold our clothing. The whole thing was rather confusing for me and Justin. You wore this bracelet around your wrist that had the coin inside of it. I put it in my pocket because I thought it might fall off of my wrist. After changing we headed into the place. We met up with lars and he took us to the slides. We went on the blue slide first, which took us outside, and then back inside. This slide was awkward because it shot you into other people. The red slide was the most fun. It was at the top and completely enclosed. After going down this a couple of times, I reached into my pocket only to find that the bracelet was gone. Great. Sabine helped me explain to the guy that I had lost my bracelet and he stopped one of the slides, while lars Justin and I went and looked for it. I felt incredibly stupid. Someone ended up finally finding it. After that, Justin and lars and I went to the hot tub area, which was nice and relaxing. We pretty much swam in every possible thing you could in the place, outside, inside, wave pool you name it. It was eventually time to go. It was a good time.

6/21 STEENWIJK, NETHERLANDS (TRASHFEST)

After a day off, we headed to the netherlands. we arrived at the venue. This was the 4th day of trashfest, so there was trash everywhere. We arrived at 11 in the morning but didnt play until 2. So we got our merch out of the car and set up our table.

the guys from hammers were nearby so we talked to them throughout the day. The weather was awful. Sunny for 10 minutes, then pouring rain for half an hour, back and forth all day. It was time for us to play so we loaded in and set up. After we got the levels right, the 2 sound guys told matt to turn down. So we played a quiet set. i dont have any pictures of us.

hammers went on and rocked out.

In between bands, we sat around waiting for the weather to get better. It was finally sunny enough for me to walk around the city and take pictures. right outside of the venue there was a valley and small river where a bunch of sheep lived.

The city was pretty cool. There was a church tower at the back of the square.

I walked around the center square and found an American Tennessee steakhouse.

"a nice place to meat" indeed. I walked around the square until i found the end.

After walking around, I came back and we loaded up our stuff. Then it was time for kylesa to play. I had never seen them before and wasnt that familiar with their music but they were definitely impressive. The whole day all of the bands were really quiet because of the sound guys. But kylesa brought their own sound guy so they were good and loud.

kylesa

after their set, we packed up and headed back home.

DUSSELDORF, DEUTSCHLAND

We were very productive on this day. we drove to Dortmund to return matt’s head we rented. Then we drove to dusseldorf because there is a beer that is only served in a bar in dusseldorf and matt had heard about it and wanted to drink it. We followed the gps to the bar and Justin and matt drank it.

Lars and I felt a funny vibe from this place and decided to leave them to their drinking. We were hungry so we walked around looking for a place that sold pommes. We found a place, oddly enough called chickato (chicken and potato put together). We ate our pommes there and then walked back to go get the car. Our friends Hammers were playing a show in Mulheim that was less than a half an hour away in Mulheim so we headed out to go see them.

MULHEIM, DEUTSCHLAND

We arrived in Mulheim, and the venue was awesome. A big place with stickers and graffiti all over everything.  As we walked in, Daniel from Hammers came up and talked to us. As it turns out, a band dropped off the show so he asked us if we would play.  We didn’t have any of our instruments, but we figured why not? I talked to Daniel for a good while about touring and music and things. Before I knew it, it was time to play. I grabbed a quick bite to eat, and then walked into the room where we were playing. It was a room with a stone floor and brick walls.

People piled into the room. I said “Hi were dolcim, and we weren’t supposed to play tonight, but we're going to play anyway.” We didn’t play very well, but considering the circumstances, I thought we did okay.

After we played, fargo went on and it was a fun set.

Hammers went on last, and kicked some ass. It sounded really good in that room and they were very tight.

 I discovered a room in the place that was huge and there was a projector hooked up to a game system people were playing Mario kart. All in all it was a really fun night.

6/23-the next day bjorn called and wanted to go skateboarding. so i met him at the skatepark in warendorf. some skating went down.

nollie backside flip

we skated for a bit and then i fell and tore a hole in my jeans. bjorn showed me where he worked and we skated some more. blah blah

bjorn was nice enough to take some sequences.

thanks for skating with me bjorn!

6/24 ESSEN, DEUTSCHLAND

The next day, believe it or not we had a show. Since we didn't have the van any more, Jojo took us in his van. We arrived in essen and loaded the gear downstairs. i went stickering.
the bands that played that night werent really our thing so we spent most of the time outside. we played our set, and i spent the first 3 songs struggling trying to keep the speaker cable in the cabinet. apparently the input on the back of the amp was loose or broken. so that sucked, but oh well.

Lars and matt were busy being emo.

After selling a couple kafka tapes to fabian from erode releases, we packed up jojo's van and headed back home.

Stay tuned because UP NEXT is POST 7: Cry Me River Festival!
Pictures of all of the bands on both days and behind the scenes.
The tour journal is almost over.
There are only 2 posts left!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

FRIDAY JULY 3RD, 2009: FERRY to the UK, BRIGHTON and LANCASTER, ENGLAND. GLASGOW and DUNDEE, SCOTLAND, MANCHESTER and ASHFORD, ENGLAND, FERRY BACK from the UK (JUNE 8TH-JUNE 14TH)

THE TOUR JOURNAL CONTINUES!
FINALLY a post! yes i know. some of you might have been wondering. but we are all alive and well. I want to begin by apologizing for the lack of a single update over the past month. The circumstances were out of my hands. Let me explain: While leaving the UK, my flash drive which contains over a years worth of information was accidently erased by someones computer. i could not therefore continue to do updates on the site.
We are now back from tour, and I was able to get my backup of my flash drive and had to copy all of the files back onto the drive to get back to square 1. Therefore, I am going to continue the tour journal and finish what I started. I think it would only be right.

SO HERE WE GO:

POST 5: We left versmold at 6 in the morning and headed to the Dunkurque port to catch the ferry. 
It was a long drive. When we got to the city, we drove through and found out we were at the wrong port. scheisse! We hurried our way to Calais but by the time we got there we had missed our ferry. We had to wait another hour to get on the next ferry.

as the ferry left the port, the calais coatline was pretty.

It was an hour and a half ferry ride so we had some time to kill. I went up and watched the ocean. the sound of the waves are quite peaceful.

I hadn’t been on a ferry since I was going to malmo 2 years ago. I watched the seagulls use the breeze coming off of the ferry to glide along.

As we pulled into the port, the seagulls started to land around the people, looking for crumbs. The cliffs of dover were quite nice. 

We got off the ferry and as soon as we drove out of the port, we were on the left side of the road. We drove straight to ashford and sam, Derek, steve, rob, and chris greeted us. steve, rob and chris make up meandgoliath! It was great seeing sam and derek again. we said goodbye to sam and the 7 of us got in the van and hit the road.

UK TOUR WITH MEANDGOLIATH

BRIGHTON, ENGLAND

The first show of the tour was in brighton. The venue was called the hobgoblin and it was awesome.

Meandgoliath went on first and sounded great!

they were followed by the fall of efrafra who played a slow and melodic set:

After the plague sermon, we played a sweaty set in the dark.

  the turnout was incredible. A great start to the UK tour. after packing up, we walked back in the rain to jay’s place. The next day we got up and walked down to the beach, which was literally 5 minutes walk away from jay’s place. You could see the beach right outside of his apartment. It was the first time I had seen an English beach. There are pebbles over the sand.

After that, we packed up our things and headed to lancaster.
Thanks for everything jay.

LANCASTER, ENGLAND

We got into Lancaster and pulled up to the venue. it was called the yorkshire house. It was on the 2nd floor, so we had to bring up the equipment up. Steve has an 8X10 cabinet so that was fun. It was a 4 band show so we had some time to kill after setting up merch so I decided to walk around the city a bit.

Lancaster appeared to be an older city, so the architecture was quite interesting.

I saw some signs that mentioned a castle so I followed them and found this.

I made it up to the castle as the sun was setting.

I walked around the castle and took some more pictures. it was quite a sight in what seemed like an unassuming city.

After walking past the castle I found an interesting bridge structure.

i made it to the bridge in time to catch the last of the sunset.

The temperature dropped quite rapidly so I made my way back to the venue.

Meandgoliath went on, and the lights in the background were awesome. The turnout was disappointing but we still had fun.

After we played we headed back to thom’s house. There wasn’t a place in the street so we had to park in an extremely narrow alley. So narrow I almost got squished against the wall helping matt direct the van into it. damn.
After a hot cup of tea in the morning, we headed out for Scotland. thanks thom.

GLASGOW, SCOTLAND

The drive to Scotland was epic. I was ecstatic.  

We stopped off at a rest place to get some food and played hacky sac for a bit.

Scotland was awesome. Glasgow expecially. We drove into Glasgow and found a parking space down the street from the venue. It costs some money to park there so we went to sainsburys and got some food and came out and hung out at the van until 6.

We were able to get a parking space right in front of the venue. The venue was downstairs, a lot of them. We moved all of the equipment and set out the merch and everything.  We met craig, who helped put the show on with his friend phil, who we met also. There was some time to kill like always so I walked around Glasgow for a bit, and bought some stickers and a flag in the train station.

When I got back, craigs band Citizens was setting up. They played their set, and it was quite refreshing. It reminded me of the type of music my old band velo played.

Then meandgoliath kicked some ass.

we played and and i had to represent so i wore my mogwai shirt. we were in their hometown.

then we loaded up the van, and like a game of tetris it was a tight fit.

Then we headed back to craigs house. Unfortunately, there wasn’t a lot of room at craigs place so some of us had to split up and go to owen’s house.
Chris, matt and I stayed, and craig and his roommate cooked amazing vegan fajitas. While eating, we watched several episodes of Extras and went to bed.

The next morning, we had a lot of time to kill, it was only a 45 minute drive to dundee. so craig told us about this vegan restaurant called mono so we drove there. It was a record store as well. in the spot where we parked there was this sign.

After we ate, I wanted to go and see Buchanan street, which knew about because I knew a bit about the city. I found it the previous day walking around. As we got there, there was this magician, for lack of a better term, who had just started a show. He was American, oddly enough.

We walked around and ended up at the royal concert hall.

my memory card was full, i had taken over 1,000 pictures. so i went into a store and bought a 4 gig card. after that I went and bought a Scotland shirt. After walking around Buchanan street, I wanted to try to go see Caledonian university.  I almost studied in Glasgow at calendonian several years ago but it didn’t work out. It was too far of a distance to walk so we headed back to the car and decided to drive to find it. After routing it in the gps, we drove to it. I was extremely disappointed when we got there. It wasn’t anything like the pictures. But the gps took us to the main office I think. I don’t know how big the campus was. Oh well, we did see these buildings on the way there.

We left Glasgow and headed to Dundee.

DUNDEE, SCOTLAND

As we got into Dundee, it took us forever to find the venue. Our UK navigation system was telling us to turn in different places and down what 1 way streets. The English guys had been there before but couldn’t remember exactly where it was. So we drove around the city a bit. There were tons of hills. We got to know 1 street in the city pretty well because we drove down it so many damn times. At the top of the hill, you could see some tall buildings and the sea in the distance.

We got to the venue, called “the balcony bar.” It was a relief to have a venue where we didn’t have to go up or down stairs. We loaded in, and then I went around the city and took some pictures.

The show was awesome. great turnout, great people.
Meandgoliath went on first and put on an awesome show even though chris broke a string on their last song.

Afterwards, owen’s band year at sea went on, very melodic and their singer had a beautiful voice.

then we played, and I wore my scotland shirt, and being half scottish myself I wore it with pride.

kaddish went on and tore the place to pieces. where have you guys been!?

After the show, we loaded up the gear and we all got a picture together.

year at sea, kaddish, meandgoliath and dolcim dundee, scotland june 2009

then we went to owen’s house. It was a really nice house. one of the houses where they have new carpet and you have to take your shoes, you know what im talking about. definitely the nicest place we stayed on tour. The next morning, we had to leave pretty early to head out to peay’s bay.
Thanks for everything owen.

PEAYS BAY, SCOTLAND

holy shit. sorry italy but peay's bay scotland is the most beautiful place I have ever been to. After we left owen’s place in Dundee we headed to the infamous peay’s bay. The English guys had been talking about it all tour, and how it is a ritual after playing Scotland to go there. On the way there, we passed a cloud making factory.

We drove to the bay and parked. I have to say that it was met all expectations and was definitely worth it. It is one of the most beautiful places I have ever been to. We had to walk down some stairs and the ocean was to our left, which was breathaking anyway.

we walked down a path and through a little cave and when we came out there was this place that seemed hidden from the world.

To the left there was a stone wall and their were boats laying in the sand in this harbor. As it seems, later in the season, the water fills that entire place up and the boats are afloat so you can take the boats out. There were some people working on the boats in the sand. We walked along the beach area over some pebbles and there was this rock wall. We climbed up the wall and walked across it until we got to the edge.

After this, we went on the other side of the wall, and there was a little shore area. Matt, chris, steve and I saw this awesome rock formation and we wanted to go explore it. Derek, Justin and rob all stayed behind. We walked to the formation and it the wind had weathered the inside out.

While inside the rock formation, we decided to start a band, so we needed a band photo.

We walked past the rock and there was a cave, perfect for another band photo.

and there was this cliff wall. Matt and steve decided it would be a good idea to scale the wall. So we all climbed up on top of it.

After getting on top of that, I noticed there was a cliff on the other side of this so I went over to take a look at it. The cliff went out and had an amazing view of the coast.

It was a straight down drop though.

We hung out up there for a while, and the wind was blowing. it was amazing.

i could have stayed there for several more hours, but we had a show to play that night, so we had to leave. I cant wait to go back there.

meandgoliath, derek and dolcim peays bay, scotland june 2009

 

MANCHESTER, ENGLAND

We got a call on the way to Manchester and found out that our Southampton show was cancelled. We honestly were surprised though because there were a lot of shows cancelled on our tour, actuall about 1 every country we went to. but it sucks because the guy contacted Derek to set the show up, and then cancelled it. Whatever. on the way we saw the angel of the north.

We got into Manchester pretty late, and had to hurry and get all of our equipment in. The venue was really interesting. i later named it satan's asshole, which seemed fitting. There was a bouncer at the door, and if you didn’t have an orange band on your right wrist, you weren’t getting in. as we brought the 8x10 bass cab in, the sound guy said "you guys aren't planning to use that here are you?" no idiot, we just brought it up 2 sets of stairs to stare at it. he was a douche.
The show was really rushed. we played in a tiny room and there were skeletons in the floor and spiderweb stuff hanging down. it looked like a haunted house with the lights turned on.

i went to walk around the city a bit to take some pictures, but it was really fucking sketchy. i was out there for maybe 10 minutes, and this cop drove by and jumped out of the car asking me and a group of people if they had seen a tall dark man running around. what the hell? while walking back to the venue i did stumble across a protest of naked bike riders.

we found out that minus the bear played in the big room next to it 3 days before. the sound guy told meandgoliath to start playing when there wasnt anyone in the room and then had chris turn down. but meandgoliath killed it anyway.

the son of a bitch of it all is that after each band played, the sound guy played this shitty industrial techno louder than the bands were playing.

we played an alright set.

after we played, daniel from hammers band caraway played. they only had 20 minutes for their set because the show had to be over at a certain time.

we met some of the hammers guys after the show and they were top notch dudes. since the show got cancelled we decided just to make the drive back to ashford. it was a long fucking drive. matt drove through the night and me and derek stayed up with him. we got into a traffic jam that lasted an hour and a half, it was brutal. the sun came up as we drove.we got into ashford around 5 in the morning. matt was a trooper.

ASHFORD, ENGLAND

we slept well into the afternoon. I walked with chris to go pick up his glasses in town. Ashford is fairly small but right neighborly. On the way back, we went to the local skatepark. Yeah! I got to skate the mini ramp for a little bit.

After we got back, we ate breakfast/lunch and then headed to the woods. it reminded me of Tennessee because of how green it was. Derek, sam, and steve had created a nice little nook in the forest. They had also built a swing.

We cooked vegan sausages and hung out.

dolcim, me and goliath, sam and derek ashford england june 2009

then the sun set as we walked back to the van.

later that night we watched super troopers and hung out.
The next morning, we hung out for a bit, and then we had to leave to try to catch an earlier ferry so we could make the drive to Belgium for our show.
It was sad saying goodbye, but it was nice because we all knew that we will see each other at cry me a river. the UK our was incredible. Thanks to chris, steve, robo, derek, and sam. we had an awesome time.

FERRY BACK FROM THE UK

we left ashford and drove to the dover port. we got there an hour early so we could catch an earlier ferry so we could get to the show in belgium on time.

i reviewed all of the different types of money i had. i got some jaffa cakes as well. oh jaffa cakes, how i missed you. my friend doug from london showed me the miracle that are jaffa cakes 2 and a half years ago when i visited england for the first time and i have been craving them ever since.

while on the ferry and justin and i went out onto the deck.

we arrived in calais and had to book it to get to Mol...did we make it on time?

Stay tuned to find out in post 6 with Mol and Antwerp, Belgium, versmold and aachen deutschland and much much more!

 

MONDAY, JUNE 8TH, 2009: WIEN, AUSTRIA; BERGAMO, BOLOGNA, and CASSALMAGGIORE, ITALY; SWITZERLAND, BESANCON and NANCY, FRANCE,
(MAY 30TH- JUNE 7TH)

POST 4:

WIEN, AUSTRIA

On the drive into Austria, I found the biggest chair I have ever seen.

The city was pretty nice. We didn’t get to see much of it. We were running late as it was and then it started raining. We went through a big storm that was tossing the van back and forth as i drove along. it wasnt until we pulled up to the venue that we noticed this:

yeah, a pebble or rock hit the windshield during the storm and cracked it.

The people in austria were very nice. We played with a band called gungatz who were locals in wien. they went first, and then we played, after that, Mike Scott from England played. 

gungatz

mike scott from england

We had a long drive ahead of us to italy so we decided to leave after the show and start the drive. We drove several hours through the night and slept in the van outside of a gas station. I wrote a short story there the next morning.

BERGAMO, ITALY

Italy is by far the most beautiful county I have ever been to. I have never been and neither had Justin so we didn’t know what to expect. We drove up into the mountains and through a series of extremely long tunnels. Then we hit the mountains. Damn.

When we got into bergamo, we found Paci Paciani, the place where we were playing and met andrea. He showed us the place. It was a big warehouse with a stage.

We unloaded, and set up our distro and hung out for a bit, and then people started showing up. Then more people. By the time the first band, suinage played, there were about 60 people there. After that, movie star junkies played.

suinage

movie star junkies

 after we played, we were followed by local heroes the infarto, scheisse!

the infarto, scheisse!

They were amazing. Definitely check them out. The show started pretty late so we didn’t end up getting back to andrea’s place until 4 in the morning.
The next day, we were going to play pisa but it got cancelled. So andrea and nat from infarto, scheisse! Showed us around bergamo with their friend tom, who is from Australia. We went into citta alta which means top city. We took a tram up this hill until we got to the top and there was this fantastic little town area with shops and all kinds of stuff. Very beautiful.

we said our goodbyes

Thanks for everything andrea!

 Josh do it!

BOLOGNA, ITALY

We headed out for Bologna with our friend mauro. we walked around bologna, and there were some very historical buildings. Really cool city.

Mauro went to his show and we hung out in the city. After the show, we stayed in a city about an hour and a half away.

CASALMAGGIORE, ITALY

We drove about half an hour to casalmaggiore and it was this old horse stable. One of the biggest rivers in italy was several hundred meters away. We set up there and then drove to Parma to get some things.

the infarto, scheisse went first and played a brutal set, and nat ended up in the rafters.

then we played

after the show, we had to say our goodbyes. thanks to gianluca, fabrizio, nat, mauro, and ivana. we miss you guys!

infarto, scheisse! mauro, and dolcim casalmaggiore, italy

it was hard to leave italy behind, but we left that night to get a head start on our driving. It was a 7 hour drive to besancon. I drove several hours into the night and we were trying to find a gas station to sleep at. I took an exit and we had to pay a toll, which is what we have been trying to avoid. The tolls through italy have been killing us. There was a gas station located right off the motorway, but after paying the toll, there wasn’t a road that led to it. We were just about out of gas and were driving and taking different roads but none of them led to a gas station. We found a gas station that look closed but it was a self serve so we got some gas. As we were leaving, an Italian police officer stopped us. I had to show my driver’s license, international driver’s license and a bunch of information for the van. It ended up being just fine but it was 2 something in the morning. We left and I kept driving. I noticed silhouettes of these huge mountains. I found a gas station, and we parked the van and slept there for the night.

Matt drove the next day and we drove up through the mountains and the views were incredible.

We got stopped by border patrol and they wanted to see inside our van and asked us where were going.  We continued to drive through Switzerland and the Swiss Alps.

 

BESANCON, france

As we drove into france, I wished I would have studied more French before I left. We got into Besancon around mid-afternoon. we had to kill time so we walked around the city.

Listening to conversations as we walked around, it was nice to be back in france.

we met up with our friend joss who is in hiro and runs impure muzik and hung out with him for the night. The next day we went around the city again and hung out by the river.

Then we went to the hiro practice space and loaded up their gear into our van. The roads were extremely small so maneuvering the van was really hard. we went to les passagers du zinc, the venue and unloaded our gear and went downstairs into a cave, similar to the place cease played in Dijon back in 2007.
We played, and then Hiro played.

after the show, i walked around the streets in besancon.

NANCY, FRANCE

the next day was the worst day of tour. we found out in the morning that our trier show in belgium got cancelled. Then, as we left to head out for Nancy, I was turning onto a street and i turned to sharp and clipped the side of a curb with the back side of the van. scheisse.

i felt horrible. we werent sure how much it was going to cost to fix. this on top of the windshield. Then, as we arrived in Nancy, we got out of the van and Joss had gotten a call and said that our Lille show, the very next day was cancelled. 2 cancelled shows in one day and i dented the van. awesome. we were all feeling like shit. so we did the only thing we could do, we started drinking. the first band, the machinist played.

then hiro played

then we played the best show of tour so far

we said goodbye to our friends in hiro

hiro and dolcim nancy, france

thanks for everything joss.

after our show got cancelled, we decided to head back to lars and sabine's house so we could get things figured out. the next day we got the van situation figured out. we are now cool and heading to the ferry to go to the UK!

upcoming shows:

UK TOUR WITH Me and Goliath

monday june 8th in brighton, england at the hobgoblin with Meandgoliath, Fall of Efrafa, The Plague Sermon

tuesday june 9th in lancaster, england the yorkshire house with MeAndGoliath

wednesday june 10th in glasgow, scotland at the Admiral Bar with Meandgoliath, Black Channels, and Citizens

thursday june 11th in dundee, scotland at the balcony bar with Meandgoliath, Year at Sea, Kaddish

friday june 12th in manchester, england at the KRO bar.

Saturday june 13th in Southampton at King Alf's with Me and Goliath and Markovsky

 

SATURDAY MAY 30th, 2009: PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC; BACK TO BERLIN; AND DONAUWORTH, DEUTSCHLAND (MAY 25TH-MAY 29TH)

POST 3: The drive to Prague was extremely long, or maybe it just felt long because we had to take backroads the whole way. The drive itself took about 4 hours but it was a one lane road for the most part. It felt like we were driving into the center of the earth. We went up through the mountains, at times it felt like the van wouldn’t make it. Then we went down into the valleys, and all of a sudden there was a huge city.

PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC

Driving into Prague, the road system was pure chaos. There was a lot of construction going on, but I wouldn’t say that was the problem.No roads were marked with signs or anything. We actually drove down a 2 way street that turned into a 1 way street. There were roads that I turned down and then all of a sudden we were on train tracks. Boah was?! We found the place, and went around Prague looking for an ATM because we had to get Czech Koruna. 26 koruna are equal to 1 euro.

It’s a very beautiful city.

but what is going on with this city?
We played with a local punk band and a performance band called mossy ruru.

2 of our shows didn’t work out so we came back to berlin. We talked to daniel and he was nice enough to let us stay with him again. He was our tour guide and navigation system as we drove all over Berlin. We went to some places I had been to before and also to some new places.

BERLIN

me and karl marx	tv tower

I have to say that I feel like I know berlin pretty well now. we went to the soviet memorial, which i had been to before, but it was in december and freezing and it got dark. it was nice to see it on a beautiful sunny day.

then daniel took us to an old church and then to the Siegessaule and daniel and i skated in front of it.

Daniel had told me about a skatepark down the street from where the van was parked so while he was in class I went and checked it out. It was huge, but it costs money to get in so I did not skate there. But, I did go down the street to this train station spot where I skated with a group of about 15 skaters. It was a lot of fun.

Daniel, thank you so much for letting us stay with you for an extra two days, we had a lot of fun and appreciate everything you’ve done.

DONAUWORTH

We made the 6 hour drive to donauworth. matt had played here with cease in 2006. we loaded our gear onto the 2nd floor. the place was really cool. ulli from june paik set the show up for us and was really awesome. he cooked chili for us and took really good care of us.

the show was made with late notice so we were the only band, but it was alot of fun. thanks to philip for running sound!

then we stayed at a 3 story house and slept on the top floor in a room full of mattresses.

thanks for everything ulli!

we are now on our way to AUSTRIA, and then to ITALY, and then FRANCE!
upcoming shows:

5/29 wien, austria benefit show for a squat

5/29 wien, austria benefit show

5/30 BERGAMO, ITALY

5/31 PISA, ITALY (CANCELLED)

6/2 CASALMAGGIORE, ITALY at argine with the infarto, scheisse!

FRANCE!

6/4 BESANCON @ Les Passagers du Zinc

6/5 Nancy @ Soap Box Club

6/6 Lille avec Hiro, et Rataxes

don't touch that dial....

post 4 coming soon.

 

MONDAY MAY 25TH, 2009 : HANNOVER, ROSSWEIN, BERLIN! MAY 22nd-MAY 24th

POST 2: 2nd time with access to the internet. the tour is going pretty well so far, we have been playing at some really cool places.

HANNOVER

was awesome, and the hospitality was amazing. thanks to andy for everything.

ROSSWEIN

was really fun. we drove into town with the resurrectionists leading in front and their was a skatepark right outside of the squat.

BOAH WAS?

BERLIN...

was a good time. daniel came and i hadnt seen him since i was in berlin a year and a half ago. berlin was like i remembered it, awesome. but we were walking around and matt and i both got frisked by german police and they patted us down and checked our bags. it was intense. before the show, there was a protest out in the streets. i cant actually put pictures up of the people in the prostest because some people are trying to find out who they are. some protestors were on top of a building shooting off fireworks.

then the resurrectionists played, and we went on after them:

it was sad however because it was our last show with the resurrectionists. the next morning we said goodbye, and the resurrectionists headed back to versmold.

resurrectionists, dolcim, and friends BERLIN

we are currently in berlin staying at daniel's place. we had a day off after our show last night here and we spent the day with daniel.

we are now heading to prague, czech republic.

upcoming shows:

5/25:prague, czech republic

5/28 donauwoth, deutschland

STAY TUNED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

MAY 21st, 2009 : WE ARE ALIVE. TORONTO AIRPORT, FLIGHT TO FRANKFURT MAY 13TH-MAY 21st

i haven't been able to get to the internet for over a week. i am plugged into someone's internet in hannover right now. here are the updates:

POST 1: we flew out of nashville wednesday morning, and landed in toronto. none of us had ever been to canada. we had a 5 hour layover in the airport. there wasn't a lot to do in the airport, so i hung out with t-rex. there was also this interesting structure that was an echochamber.

i didn't go to sleep the night before so at this point it had been about 32 hours since i slept. everything looked like this.

we flew through the night and landed in frankfurt at 7 a.m.

we walked around to get our bags, and then rented car, but it took about a half an hour to find it downstairs.we got a little lost but made it to versmold and got to the ulbrich family house. i hadn't seen them in 2 years, amelie and leia are so big now. we gave them our shirts! i also spraypainted all of the cd's for the full-length.

i read to amelie and tried to unicycle, which is a lot harder than it looks.

amelie had her 5th birthday and she got a new bike!

the sunsets in versmold are beautiful.

justin waited in the cornfields and i approved.

then i unpacked my tetris bag and justin put the records together.

we played our first show last night (may 20th) at lala house with lars band the resurrectionists and we will be playing the next 3 shows with them as well. its awesome.

today the tour has officially started! we are now on our way to hannover.

upcoming shows:

may 20th: versmold, deutschland at lala house

may 21st: hannover, deutschland with the resurrectionists!

may 22nd: rosswein, deutschland

may 23rd: berlin, deutschland

we are currently in hannover, and about to play a show at sturmglock, and tomorrow we go to rosswein and they have a skatepark. i have a skateboard on this tour as well!

more updates very soon! stay tuned...