HEY BABELFISH WHY DO YOU NOT EXIST YET

HYPERORGANISATION! Doing some translating for shows in Europe. Dear gods why did we not all learn Esperanto?

We need a few sentences translated into, German, Polish, Croation, Slovak, Hungarian, Czech, and Dutch. Can anyone help? you’ll be rewarded with guestlist if we’re passing near you, or an imaginary hot air balloon if not. I AM AWARE OF THE IRONY OF ASKING FOR THIS IN ENGLISH, INTERNET.

delgates pass yah? iggy azeeleyah yah? which ways the beach yah? etc..

Another day, another insane party show and glorious messy snapshot of  our active thriving colourful punka community that will probably slip away in mainstream music media’s Great Escape writeups. 

Don’t care tho. I was there, I survived and it was awesome

My favourite bit of the Alcopop vs BSM showcase at the Royal Pavillion Tavern for The Alternative Escape At The Great Escape (Mama Grp) 2013 was watching Fight Like Apes from the side of the stage with a smuggled bottle of gin 2009 style. Or the look on the security’s faces when Stagecoach did their traditional end of set destruction. Or realising that however tired I was, I couldn’t sleep before our set cos I LOVE EVERY SINGLE TELLISON SONG EVER.

Nah my favourite moment was that you all stuck around till stoopidoclock to see us and we played mostly new songs and it still felt like a victory gig. 

It was super awesome to see everyone I don’t see enough of and I feel bad cos I wanted to hang out with all of you and go do beach party bonfire times but we were zombified and then playing and then whatever beyond zombified is. Re-deadened. Exoghosts.

Nah my favourite moment was looking up from playing and seeing James, our valiant guitar tech, surfing the monitors on the front row, gaffa taping my pedalboard leads in with one hand and holding my mic stand up with the other with a PA speaker slowly collapsing on top of him and some guy sailing around peoples heads in the background

We heard some people got removed for crowdsurfing, which kinda sucks. Idk. Attitudes change, are you guys ok with people crowdsurfing / stage diving at shows? We kinda like it, but in the context that you’re all generally respectful caring people who pick each other up, AND yr all sensible / experienced enough to know that the front rows of capacity venues aren’t the best place to stand and check yr phone in shiny unstained shirts and dresses. It’s weird how different the etiquette is around the world. Crowdsurfing in the UK has this weird repressed vibe about it, like, it’s become a mostly banned taboo and that lends itself to drunkery prickery (yeh sorry, this is 99% a man problem) and shit getting unplugged and amateur security drama a lot more than say, Amsterdam or U.S. Suburb X. 

I’ve hung out with St Johns a few times at festivals and they really don’t care if facial wound no.70 comes from pissed dickhead or uncharacteristic accident, but I’ve also seen them treat way more people in kasabian Tshirts than statistically probable, so we’re kinda happy to trust you all to do yr own thing at shows (inserts ATD:I clip) as long as you STAY THE FUCK AWAY FROM OUR PEDALS. Plz don’t let us down. 

And, whatever the circumstances, if you knock someone over or otherwise crash into them, apologise. Even if they were stood oblivious next to you updating twitter right when the guitars come in and you got rebounded back of someone else, it’s still your antics that have tarnished their night/clothes/sight, and people that like the same music as you are the last ones you want to disappoint. Also, that’s how this couple we know met at one of our shows and now they’re in love, so, yknow, proof. 

Anyway, my favourite part of this years TGE was that I didn’t leave the venue all day and still saw more awesome than all other TGES combined. Thanks James and Jamie for being Good Crew and Jack and Kev for organising and you and you and you and yay 2013 none died BUT SERIOUSLY WHAT THE FUCK DID YOU ALL DO TO THOSE TOILETS JESUS CHRIST BRIGHTON THAT WAS DISGUSTING.

Next Weekend: Handmade Festival! Now We Are Festival! New input jacks on all our gear! Two of those are things that are happening xxx

GHOST RIB TSHIRT PREORDERS

URGH. So these shirts are gonna ship this week. We’re so so sorry to keep you all. We thought we’d found this awesome printing company and as soon as we were committed they turned to shit. Like, we’re kinda used to dealing with un-professionals, but this has been the longest most stressful stupid pointless head smashing email exchange of the last 12 months.  That includes the time we DIY’d Amercia.  

Aside from making us look like dicks in front of you folks for keeping yr money for so long, it’s messed up our summer finances; We rely on a constant roll over of merch, and having to wait so long for this has meant we’ve had to delay the next batch, which in turn has left us short for tour money, which affects this and then that etc. We have new stickers and badges and a rad champagne girls bottle opener key ring thing (you can’t open champagne bottles with it but that’s not the point here) but it seems shitty to put them on sale when yr all still waiting.

The moral of the story is, people are all useless and if you really want a shirt of a band, go make it yrself. No, really, there is no moral, just apology. I feel like, compared to a couple of years ago, we’re way better at being The Johnny Foreigner Shop, and one bad decision has put us back to the point where we’ll start getting receiving (justified) angry emails and it’s totally annoying. 

We do this cos we care. UH!, etc.  We changed tshirt maker cos we wanted to be able to make multi coloured prints on good quality shirts and not have to charge you guys more than a tenner. We moan a lot, but the whole idea of theinternetkillingthemonetaryvalueofrecordedmusic so bandshavetoputeffortintofindotherstreamsofincome is something we embrace; we want to take pride that our shit looks better than other bands shit AND we designed it ourselves. It’s how my favourite bands used to work, it’s how favourite bands SHOULD work, and it’s why we lose our shit when we see members of the opposite sex wearing store bought Sonic Youth and The Smiths shirts; cos we know that intangible, personal link in the chain has been replaced by commerce. RUINED FOREVER.

And argue forever about hipsters and cultural appropriation, but the reaction against that, that drive you guys have to wear a logo as a badge of something that you invest/believe in when the alternative is cheaper and easier to find and less likely yr colleagues to label you indie weirdo.. is what is keeping us all afloat. There are no savings or contingency plans, just a stream of microtransactions and trust till one of us gets bored. 

I wanna be in the kind of band where you’ll only meet like, half a dozen people in yr life that will have heard of us. But each of them has a different favourite song / story / tshirt. And each week wasted trying to explain to adults HOW TO USE WETRANSFER FOR FUCKS SAKE feels like we’re just annoying people and adding to the disillusionment that ruins that idea.  

So yeh, this is super frustrating and we sincerely hope this hasn’t put you off buying from us. (or any other punx band ((but mostly us)) 

xoxo

o that would be a rad sticker.