Oh it's time for FUN. EH? ISN'T IT? EH? YE

                Right. I’m supposed to tell you about the photoshoot we went for, aren’t I? That’s the kind of thing that usually turns up on here. I tell you about the horribly early morning that only took its toll at 9PM yesterday, when I looked at my phone (goodbye, horology for the unenthused) expecting it to read ‘late into the night’ when in fact it read ‘you just bombed the town of Circadia’. 

                I tell you about the journey up. Five of us facing forwards in a car, having a puffy-eyed laugh, rather than rattling about in the van with the threat of a cymbal stand in a face-hole looming its chromed head at every red light.

                Then I say that we arrived at our destination, in a kind of ‘phew’ tone. A feeling that even this description of that phenomenon has managed to induce a little. Don’t ask me how it’s done. And there’s the bare sarcasm, layered thickly like the similes that often appear here, too.

                Then a funny thing that happened. Something relatively small but humorously magnified. Ed was worried about something in a sandwich, or Trewin realised he’d left his washing on a goat so we had to rush home. Something like that. Nothing like that really happened. It was literally a normal day with very little adventure. The photoshoot was fun and we’re very grateful to Rhona for doing it for us. We’re either getting more professional or more boring. I see no evidence of eitherTHERE’STHATSARCASMAGAIN(hee hee ho, mateys!)

                So we’re back in it now; back in the actual description of events rather than an attempt at having fun with the format. We just drove home. That’s literally it. We said loads of funny things and talked about the shortcomings of various Hollywood franchises. People in a car. You know how it goes. Imagine times you’ve been in a car with people (not that time you parked around the back of the industrial estate because your divorced friend said she really wanted to try it but needed someone there in case ‘something goes wrong’ and then you realised that in fact you have a fear of gloveboxes so you vomited all over her skirt and she had to drive you to the hospital because you were starting to retch your leg bones up around your ribs and through your dribbly, bile smeared lips) I’m really out of ideas and still very tired have a nice weekend I’ll let you know how we get on with the new material next week.

Happy Mothering Sunday.

Tim

[intentionally left ironic]

‘Brrrrr’, said Binky.

‘Grrabbabararabrabrbatatat attt tatt tata ttatat.’

From Our Van in Vanvana by Van-key Moon.

So our delicious van – the van that took us to Croatia and back with nary an issue but how best to express its apparent love for us – started throat singing like Frankenstein the other day. Five minutes down the road from the house, it was. We were due at our Hoxton B&K gig in about three hours.

                We drove home. What to do?

                Take it to a friendly garage?

                Money. Time. Fear.

                Rent a van.

                Frantic calls.

                ‘Yes, this is van.’

                Trewin and Ed went with themselves in Ed’s car. Jeb and Seryn took the wholly sensible step of going inside the house while we waited. I sat very still and silent in the broken down van and stared into space.

                I heard a rumbling coming up the hill. Diesel.

                Trewin beamed from the open window.

                ‘You’re going to be so excited…’ he said.

                Ed and I have a history of giifting large and valuable amounts of time to the video games Tekken II and Fifa. I go round fairly often – usually an hour or two before rehearsal or something – to relentlessly thrash him to within an inch of his life. Eh? Eh? What’s that, Ed? Oh sorry I can’t hear you over the wall of servers separating your response from this indeleteable wall of text. Should I redress the balance and say that you’ve won, like, one game in six months? Should I, Ed? And that was even before we found out that the controller I’ve been using is a bit dodgy? Hmm? Eh? Yes, I’d love  a coffee.

                …so we discover that there’s a PlayStation in the back of the van. The van with plump and bulging leather seats, pregnant with hours of inactivity.

                Ed 

n

i

p

s home on my instruction to get the games, delaying our departure by about six minutes. A harmless sacrifice, in my opinion.

                ‘Where’s Ed?’ asks Trewin.

                ‘Erm… dunno. I think he’s dropping his car back.’

                I run away from the conversation.

                I literally don’t care about anything but playing video games in the back of the luxury van at this point. We decided that Binky (the name of our regular van, if you don’t yet realise this) should never know that we’d been out whoring, and that it would be disrespectful to denigrate her out of earshot, especially considering our history with her, so we reign in our praise on ‘Overlord van’, as I shall now call it.

                Overlord van was literally a dalliance. A costly, baroque dalliance. Think of it as nothing more than the lunch-hour activities of a city-bound banker or politician. You know – the self-proclaimed moral arbiters of society.

To remain happy in the Rick Parfitt we shall have to flick that switch we all have and reorder our memories. Force feed our brains the food that makes the remembered imaginary.

                So the trip up there was good.

                Then the gig. Lovely. Great stuff from Groves and Amy Studt. Thanks to all of you who came down to see us and thanks to the good people at IAM for putting us on. We were really pleased with the turnout. If you didn’t come then I ask you: What the hell else were you up to on a Wednesday? Fishing? Where were you going fishing in the centre of London? Some pavement? No, no, no. This doesn’t add up at all. I refuse to believe your harmful concrete lies.

                The gig was fun. I pretty much destroyed myself. That’s always a good thing.

                So – in, out, play on the PlayStation.

                Little story simplified: Ed was winning. ‘Someone get out and help me park, please.’ ‘OK Trewin, but don’t turn off the ignition because I’m winning against Tim and I never win. Turning off the ignition turns off the games console. I’m literally just about to win.’ ‘OK.’ Brum brum brum. ‘OK that’s good.’ (turns ignition off) ‘Oops.’ ‘Oh Trewwwwwiiiiiiiiiiin!’

                I promise, that’s all from mine and Ed’s little obsession. I just couldn’t leave that little bit out, as I often say.

                So then we went inside and did the usual, wrenching up my favourite landscape with the usual means of tectonic transit. Big green bottles and tinnys and candles and cigarette making apparatus and snacks springing up everywhere and everyone laughing and planning our next move towards total world dominance. Release dates, etc.

Release dates.

I outlasted everyone, again. Everyone. I ended up finishing my wine and dismantling prematurely discarded fag-butts to craft glorious machinations of charred health on my own at sun o’clock in the morning. Mmmm. Good?

                Morning. Everyone’s happy. Drive home.

                No games, please – I’ve forgotten how to use my eyes.

                And then it was home. Bacon sandwiches, tea, and a lingering feeling of a job well done.

                Well done.

                More soon. The new songs at the gig were just a taster of what we have in store.

                Be well, and enjoy your Friday - you never know when the next one might be.

                Tim

               

Blog entry number: Dalmations.

Where are we, then? What are we up to, eh? Are you hungry, are you? Are you hungry for more? Are you? I am.

Where are we, then?

Well, we signed off on one or two things last week. That’s good. Nothing like ‘OMG Phoria are whatever big now’ kind of stuff, but really good and exciting stuff nonetheless. We’re proud and happy to be working with everyone we work with which is a great position to be in and we feel very lucky especiallyinthisphaseofourcareer, which we can only hope is the early phase. Imagine if it isn’t. Imagine if this is the late phase. Imagine.

Go on.

Shit, isn’t it.

I mean…that’s it. The waterwheel just keeps spinning. I didn’t know it had it in it. Still the music pours out of the speakers, still there’s a frequency that needs tweaking, a spread that needs balancing, a trinket that needs placing just on the edge of the mantelpiece so despite the comfortable chair and fine whisky we’ve laid on for you there’s still this little sense of urgency in your chest demanding that you don’t let the little thing fall off despite our telling you specifically not to touch anything before we left the room to go and find our special lubrication provided to us by a time travelling future gravel-as-auto-erotica entrepreneur.

That’s where we are. That’s how we’re trying to make you feel. Don’t touch it. We left it there on purpose. It won’t fall. Or will it? Your synapses are telling you it will. But will it? No. Trust us. Oh, hang on…

Repeat.

Repeatitagain.

We’re on this list, which is good. Very nice people at Gigwise. They’ve been really supportive. We like them. The whole list is great and it’s lovely to be among those names.

If you trust their opinion, here’s the facebook page of our next gig in London. Get it up on your feeds and that and hopefully we’ll see you there.

Sez has started pumping out playlists for everyone to get their well-used little ears around. Here’s one.

This week?

Sort more stuff out. Keep everything moving. Build a house out of litmus paper.

It’s Monday, and I’m sorry for that. If anything big happens, I’ll call you on a dog's bones.

Tim