I don't know if we're going to party, or fall down in a heap on the floor.

Is it excitement?

Is that what this is?

It's a curious combination.

What do you feel?

Where do you think our lives are, right now?

On the release of Display and Bloodworks, there was apprehension – how will it be received? What will it mean for us? etc. - but here, with Volition, there's none of that. No doubt at all. Any sense of anything left undone (narf) has fallen away. Maybe that's all that had to happen, but I know I didn't anticipate feeling like this.

As you may have heard, Jeb's not playing with us anymore. Doubtless that's part of the rare-pet-shop of feelings that surround tomorrow's release. He'll still be around (meaning he'll poke his head out of his bedroom door when he hears the kettle boiling) but he's changing his focus, for now. Is everyone happy? Something like that. Is everyone sad? Something like that. Suddenly, Volition makes sense.

So now two of the most bizarre years of everyone's lives are coming to a close. What is there to say that doesn't put us at some removed point? What is there about our alienation in this that can allow us to connect?

That peculiar heightened state of pure joy, perhaps, tinged at every edge with sadness at the end of things.

And isn't that what we're all about?

Roll on tomorrow, with its mountains of words and heaps of playlists and airplay.

Roll on the next few weeks, with gigs and interviews and movement and all that stuff. And all their surprises.

They've just called me to practice. Literally, at this moment. See; everything keeps going.

So I'd better go.

Have fun, listen to the album tomorrow, and remember what my girlfriend often tells me: nothing is as big as it seems from your own point of view.

Tim

Pick it up.

We've been away.

The album got done, so we packed up and shipped out. Our faces had become to each other like the lost keys you keep scanning over, but never actually see and recognise. We saw more of each other's noses in that time than we did of walls. I don't even consider the guys as people any more - they're now just cardboard cut outs with loudspeakers attached, repeating the same stuff over and over again about reversing the car to get off their leg.

So we span in our various directions, for a while. Sure, we had a party or two, but all work stuff has been getting done over Skype and messenger services and things. It's been that kind of time. All briefs and contracts and mock-ups and things like that. You know, the gleeful stuff.

We've all been away on our respective desert islands, biking around the countryside, sitting in front of screens editing videos or other music or personal projects; scrubbing tiles in an underground kitchen somewhere - slinking our psyches into the shredder of life to try and take some of the thatness away. 

Consider our last few weeks a weekend with the kids at a leisure park, where only once or twice has it been necessary to duck behind a tree and take a phone call from Louise about the Marchester account. Tell them it was sorted on the twenty-third and I'll get Bill to call the contractors about upgrading the roofing.

We're very lucky to have a number of very good people doing things like releasing the singles and sorting tickets at gigs and things and all that monkey hair that turns to mush in such precious brains as the band members'. Thank you here, monkey hair manipulators.

So PRAISE THE CEILING we're meeting up in person today for the first time in ages to sort out some last bits of peripheral artwork, and really get some more of it done, yeah? Everyone's going to be happy about that.

Trewin will sashay into the room two hours late, big sunglasses on his face, one arm out to the side, asking what the fuck we want him for – he's got a car waiting, he's got other things to be doing, and who are we?

Seryn will be sat in the middle of the floor, cross-legged. In his right hand will be a toy train and it will be flying through the air. It will be making a “brum, brum” sound.

Jeb will have his PC set up in the lounge, and will be rocking backwards and forwards. His eyes will be red from coffee and strain, and he will be muttering to himself. Something about aliasing. He will look pale and ill.

Ed will be hoovering, checking behind the back of the sofa Jeb is sat on, and asking Seryn to make sure all the play-doh stays on the table, please, because he's not going to scrub that out of the carpet if someone steps on it.

I will probably be sat in the corner. Alone. Speaking to the floor. After a while the others will look at each other and ask “When's Tim getting here?”

And after ten hours we will looks at a picture that we no longer recognise and collectively shrug and say “Alright then.”

-

So Volition's out on 3rd June, and we've had a few singles out and all that. Thanks for your support on this, all. We're really glad these things get such good responses and we're really glad people like them.

We've got to get back into the swing of it all after this little break. Spring is here. It's time for drinks outdoors, yes? It's time for “fun” in the “sun”, isn't it? Isn't it? That's what we're supposed to be doing, isn't it? Those are the rules, aren't they? That's what it's all for in the end, isn't it? Five minutes in the British sunshine, eh? 

Eh?

Isn't it?

It's Thursday already. Wednesday seems like it was only yesterday.

Pretty slick stuff, I insist you'll agree.

Now get out there and kick your life in the chutney without fear of losing your shoe.

Me

Don't ask; I'll tell.

One night down. Who knows how many more to go?



We know it's Köln, Hamburg, and a couple of nights in Berlin. Is that difficult? Is that really so difficult?



We haven't gigged in six months. How was last night? Edgy. Sweaty. Dark. One of the good ones. One of the adrenaline fueled ones. One of the ones that remind you of your first times out. What are the songs? I swear I knew them. Run it on. They're in the back of your brain, somewhere. There's a wire running from that place to your fingers. Open that gate and let it run while your sense of self goes somewhere else about three inches over your head and all you can feel is your heavy legs. Ignore your distrust. Just play.



Madness.



Come off and say hello and sell.



The road's always dark. Even in the day, it's grey.



What is it? Aren't you excited?



Maybe. Just let's get a little rest. I don't have time to speak.



The room's a carved out cavern. Stone faces and figures and winding stairways to standing room and strange, black iron cliffs. Fairy lights and chandeliers and one of those giant mirrors that can't have been made to reflect anything in its entirety. It takes in everything and belches it back and it mingles. Curry and strawberries.



So it's underground as we wait. Kick our heels and slip on suspicious leather backstage sofas and smoke. Food? We're not co-ordinated enough, and besides I'm so nervous I could throw up a lung and besides: this headache.



What are the songs? I knew them last night. I must know them, somewhere. I can feel them a little more, tonight. I can sense what they feel like; how they look. Hmm. We're playing them, I think. We've got a little more verve...



...woah woah woah. Don't hold on to it. Let that stuff go. Let it flowwwww. That's it. You're falling down a cliff with boulders coming down on top of you. If you grab a hold of anything, you're two-dimensional. Get your skin ripped off by the wind.



No blunt nose. A knife through time at the front of my face. Get us in. Get us booked up. Berlin, tomorrow. Hamburg hostel tonight. Pack it up. Send it on. Admittedly, wait for the bar to close. It's only an hour.



The beds. We've been here before. Get to the beds. In through the stupid sequence of doors. Every hostel has them. Swipe or click or press or code or DNA sample. Get to the beds. Up in the lift. Feel like you're falling. How is everyone? Good. Everyone have a good gig? Good.



Click.



The door opens.



Hot air.



What's the hot air?



“GNNGNGGNGWWOOOAAOAAHAHHHH.”



…



...what's that?



It smells.



It gusts in your face.



“GGNGNGNGNGNGNWNWNWHAOAOAHHH!”



Six beds. Five for us, one for...some other. An innocent fellow traveller.



Trip over his things. Tree roots.



Slink under these covers.



His throat has its own echoes.



“GnNGn. GnnGNGh. GNBBGBGBGNGNGGNGNNGWWOWOWOOAOOAOAOOOOOOAAAAHAHDAR”



You can feel it in your ears. It rattles your pants. The intake of breath slips your duvet off each time.



Four hours of darkness get away.



I get a little sleep and wake up enough to hear the boys in fits of laughter and sunrise dough-eyed insanity.



“Oh God.” they said. Seryn cackles. Jeb takes it less like fun. The tallest. The most likely to snap. We're desperate. We're desperate.



“I'm going to sleep in the van.” said Ed; paragon of silent practicality.









“GNGNGNGWWWOOWOWOWOOOOOAAAHHH.”



No problem. Just like any other day, but longer.



"I can't do this." someone said.



The rest of us laugh.












Tiny little objects that make up the whole. Tiny little situations that come together to form the trip.



Like when I skated across the pavement on dog crap and the rest of the band convinced me I smelled like shit for the rest of the night. That was good. Crouched down in the shower with a spare toothbrush, cleaning the grip on my shoes even though I can already see that everything is clean but now here I am soaked and laughing and cleaning invisible animal stink off my stuff. Hamburg hostel save me now...



The smell was never there.



These things are great.



The gigs. Or the hosts. Or the strange hours spent in German industrial estate cold, where there are vans that sell alcohol, and you can see the whole city reflected in the river while the party starts. Or 4am sing-offs with strange Scottish tourists in smoke-thick cafes. Hallway sleeping. Strict adherement to parking regulations. Smiling. Time off. Ripped clothes. Packed shows. Backstage stretches and labyrinths. Curiousness. Funny technicians. Meaningless telephone numbers and venue hunting. Wrong turns, and laughter.



Tiny little memories that don't cohere, yet. But a great feeling of warmth and comfort and work.



And then home. And recording and a great gig, last week, in a church that was too easy to shrug without looking. Oh, yeah. Here with the choir and strings. The fucking massive light show looks nice.



If you need me, I'll be backstage with a glass of water.



So Melatonin is out, too. It's getting about in the press and that and on the bloggys and the playlists, which is nice. Got to keep hinting at what's to come. And who knows what that is?



We do. We've heard it.



We've heard it all.



You've just heard the single.



You haven't heard the whole thing, have you?



No.



No, you haven't.



See this?



Believe it or not, it's my tongue.






Tim