beheshtyplaysmusic

I play drums wrong.

There’s no instrument i enjoy more than the drums. Zilch. Ain’t no other instrument that makes me happier, in this whole gosh-danged world we live in! Doesn’t matter if it’s hip-hop hooks, guitar based indie melodies, california based noise-rock, prog-shit, i will drum the shit over it, and love it.

I had a drum teacher yo, for one year in year 13, and there’s one memory that has resurfaced. Several years of therapy later i feel i can share this with you. 

So i had already taught myself drums, had already played drums live twice at the academy’s. I had a shitty kit, and an even shittier electric kit. What’s so hard? Hit a drum, with a stick. Instant noise, yummy!

So there’s this thing called carpel tunnel… fuck. I do a thing with my hand where i force the stick to double/triple bounce as it hits the skin of the drum. It makes drumming fast much much easier, but builds a tension in the hand. It’s bad for you, or so said my teacher. There is a whole school of thought that believes the opposite as well, that if you adapt that technique, you can use it without damaging your hand at all. You can research that, cause the thing is i wasn’t particularly bothered either way. I went to the class to learn how to do it right, and i was the last class of the day, then my teacher would leave to go home, and i’d get behind his kit, and a few mates would come in and we’d jam. Piano, timpani, guitar and bass amps, wind-chimes, and the BEST FWENDZ IN DA HOLE WIIIYLLD WORLD!!!

That room was our oyster. 

It takes a while to learn to play drums ‘properly’, and i didn’t have the luxury of that amount of time to learn before our jams, so i’d have spent 30 minutes trying to play the proper way, and then the moment teacher was gone i’d go right back to forced bounces and ‘hurting myself’.

I’m gonna approach this theme later this week, but i’ve gotta head right now.

Have a listen to a little thing i do with electricity.

i have, very long-term, cleared a space for myself…

…in a room, i will likely find a space alone for myself. i enjoy the seclusion, and time that accompanies it. my old sixth form common room proved this to me years ago. lots of sofas and plenty of bodies, but i’d find my own space, possibly waiting for people to come to me. seems that the same is the case in music that im writing, although id make it clear that im not waiting for others to join me. so i’ve spent a long time writing music in one particular way, with the main focus being as adverse to hiding musicality and musicianship as possible… i now want to fill that space. to get as far away from the styles and forms i’ve become accustomed to with the people i’ve become accustomed to. i have no intention of stopping my older activities, especially as i still enjoy them all, but i do relish the newer opportunities and projects im yet to be involved in.

irony to me is that i’ve cleared this space in order to be murky, musically.

I have three friends i respect…

Shit ben, you really have out-done yourself here. How on earth can you come back from this without having offended almost your entire group of friends?!

First i’d like to define respect, in dictionary terms, so we know exactly what i’m raving about…

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respect |riˈspekt|

noun

1 a feeling of deep admiration for someone or something elicited by their abilities, qualities, or achievements: the director had a lot of respect for Douglas as an actor.

• the state of being admired in such a way: his first chance in over fifteen years to regain respect in the business.

• due regard for the feelings, wishes, rights, or traditions of others: respect for human rights.

• (respects) a person’s polite greetings: give my respects to your parents.

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Now being the big headed fellow i am, i’m going to explain how i personally feel it should be specified.

Respect is not a choice. To myself at least, i know that i don’t choose to respect someone. I don’t decide that they need to be respected, they have earned my respect. But even the term ‘earned my respect’ seems to imply some form of choice. That they did enough and i relented and was all like “fine have my respect!” We could go into a truly existential debate as to whether we can ever have a choice in anything, but i’m not particularly ready for that talk, especially not over the internet, a medium that i’m only just getting used to speaking my mind on.

When i refer to respecting someone, i mean that i haven’t had a choice in admiring them, or finding them fascinating. They are, thus i do. Like breathing and living. If you breath, you live. I may not want to respect them, but i do because they force me to. You may be part of a group or stereotype, yet capture my interest in a way i’ve never/rarely seen before. You have my respect whether i like you or not. You could be a total cunt.

I want to separate the idea that to not respect someone is for me to dislike them, or think less of them in any way. That might be the case, but i assure you that, in my mind these two things can be mutually exclusive.

Now when i say there are three people i respect, i have a confession in deciding to use the rule of three for aesthetic value. I’m not about to disclose how many people i find myself respecting in my life, and i most certainly don’t count them out on a daily basis. However, my aim in this block of text was to convey my thoughts that respect is something i’ve found to be misunderstood… possibly only by me. I’m curious to know if anyone has any thoughts on this matter, as my opinions on most things pretty much consistently stay in a state of goo-ey flux.

I will close with this… i have a friend who has spent her past few years moving around, busy focussing all her energies from project to project, and finding herself potentially in a place now where she might not know what she’s doing long-term. I should be speaking to her more, and i will be doing so. I use this girl as an example as i respect her (as corny as it sounds) for doing what she wants to do. For having the ability to do just that, and the crazy energy to commit to everything she does. It’s inspiring and it’s how everyone should be, but few are. If i could choose to respect her then i most definitely would, but as we have all read, i’m pretty sure i have no choice in the matter.

Night, Night, night.

Sunday 24th March, - Tour Over

London, Glasgow, Sheffield, Norwich, Birmingham, Nottingham, and Manchester, all in 10 days. Pretty epic playing on average to about 250 people a night, having people express their newfound love for our band. It’s been pretty darn fun I tell you that, AND we made a small profit on the tour, so a nice little bit of felt to line the cloth in our pockets, ay-oh! Made some good friends on the road, not least to mention the RADest sound guy that ever did live. Tommy, you the man!

As a band I’d say this tour has shown us exactly what we can be capable of, and how hard but worthwhile and fulfilling it is to go on tour in a very much ‘DIY’ style. THANK GOD WE DIDN’T HAVE TO BRING DRUM SHELLS, FUCK!

So, to fill you in. Nottingham was great fun, playing at the uni run venue ‘Spanky Van Dykes’ which was a blast, and where had a few ‘hang-loose’ gestures thrown our way on demand, and played to a room that started off almost empty, and filled close to the brim by track 3 of our set. Cool vibes and definitely a place I’d want to visit to see a band I liked. This however marked the end of the Theme Park tour. Shit. Ride’s over guys. Let’s go back to the roadhouse yeah? Damn.

Waking up to a shit-tonne of snow we had to drive our way back to Manchester where we had a gig organised with London based band, ‘Fiction’. I recon they’re pretty sweet, although maybe not so much live… just my opinion, although it may have just been the sound at Soup Kitchen. Alas, we started playing and only two of our friends had shown up, and almost none of the Fiction fan-base, short of the singer for Dutch Uncles. Incidentally, during the Fiction set I injected some of my classic bant into the band-crowd interactions, and it resulted in the guitarist introducing me to the singer for Dutch Uncles as an introduction into their next song. That was pretty darn amusing I’ll tell you that for free!! Approached them with a hand-shake “your music is darn good sir and I’m a fan!” I didn’t mention that his ear ring looked silly.

By song two of our set (which we were forced to do earlier than we’d have liked as our friends from London Grammar cancelled due to illness) our friends had all arrived bar one or two, and vibes were fabulous! I was socially lubricated, George sounded on form, as did the rest of the boys, and we were all feeling up for smashing it, sixth night in a row!

Coincidentally, we had a fan at the gig. A girl who had come to visit her mate in Manchester, but she saw us at the Theme Park gig in Birmingham two days prior… I had to take advantage of that on stage, there was no choice. C’mon guys, we’ve got ourselves a friggin fan!!!

Anyway, we got our 50 pounds from a promoter that looked way too tired and bored to give a shit about anything going on that night, and went on our merry way back to the Flint house to drop off our gear and de-brief. All is well with us, and we hope to be out again to play soon!

Now, I’m off on a delayed train back to Leeds to play the seventh gig in a row, but with my band Bestfriend. The New Roscoe is a venue no-one seems to know about, and is an effort to get to, but as long as ten people come, I won’t have any hassle from the promoter, and we’ll all live Happily, ever, after.

Happily, Ever, after.

Thursday 21st March, - It’s Been Bloody Busy

We’ve played three shows consecutively now, having to break through the awkward transportation barrier which arose around a broken gearbox in Jamie’s car, resulting in him barely getting it back from London to Manchester; going that distance with only third, fourth, and fifth gear is pretty badass. I shan’t go into the logistics behind the drama, but essentially the Glasgow gig we were chauffeured there and back.

Ok, Glasgow. Blew us away as to how hospitable a venue can actually be. Bearing in mind we were fed a two course meal, got a record  32 beers in our rider (and IRN BRU’s durr),  having plenty of time to sound-check, not being first on, and the crowd being great whilst we played, yeah over all hugely successful gig. Sold some CD’s, changed some lil kids lives forever… all in a days work really. I have a new appreciation for the unexpected combination of cooked chorizo, thinly sliced, over a green salad drenched in balsamic, as a full main course. We had local band Younger supporting before us, so being second on was handy as far as the crowd gathering. Myself and Jamie had a plan to go and dance with the audience whilst the Flints got on stage, but the music that was playing didn’t really suit. Who puts a fucking Foo Fighters ballad on before an indie show?! A small amount of slow dancing and Jamie pushed me on stage, not before pretending to be a huge fan of Châteaux to a group of girls, who laughed as I proceeded to climb onto the stage. Sound was good on stage, harmonies were good, general vibez were good.

*Cue the long drive back to Manchester courtesy of the fabulous Mrs Wiggan*

A second car arrived on Tuesday morning, courtesy of our good friend Niall Oulton. He was lovely enough to truant for us, all in the name of the indie cause! Now with two cars, all the gear can be taken, with all five of us, and it ain’t uncomfy!  On to Sheffield!

Sheffield was an interesting one. The venue was nice, although due to some leakage onto gear we were a little dubious. Free burger, quite a few beers, nothing in comparison to Theme Park’s fantastic rider of course, but that’s to be expected. There were a few people that were possibly enjoying our performance in some other-dimensional plain, but overall the crowd was pretty static, which I’d put down to it being in the heart of the Uni area, and all the students being back home for Easter. It seemed mainly older couples that had bought Theme Park tickets, so understandably they didn’t really care about any support act. FOGEYS!! *fucking grumble* Henry seemed keen to let me off my chain with some classic “stage bant”, something I’m pretty sure I carried out with professionalism. Only problem was again the lack of back and forth, and this was clearly reflected in our CD sales, as we sold one in total that night, where in Glasgow we sold much more to a similar amount of people.

“GAWD MOM THEY JUST DIDN’T GET ME JEEEEZZZZ!!!!”

Oh well guys, we had a whale on stage. Ate that whale up nice and good, and frankly they didn’t move to Theme Park much either, so we can move on, forgive and forget. Personally I like the industrial charm of Sheffield, so I hope we can give it another chance soon.

Norwich! You fucking surprised me. We landed here at about 4ish, to load in, and have very little communication with organisers or promoters, that usually come to you. Myself and Jamie went out for a stroll after loading to get some fodder, and I slowly started to hallucinate. This wasn’t down to the lack of sleep the night before whilst staying with our lovely friend Liv from BLESSA. Norwich… you either have no style, or far too many styles for my head to handle. I’m not referring to fashion, or music scenes, or anything like that. Buildings. Jesus Christ. It was only in conversation with Jamie where I was expressing how “out-of-it” I was feeling, when we realised just how many types of buildings you have thrust into such a small proximity. Tudor thatches, nestled shoulder to shoulder with building of stone spanning across at least 400 years, next to Victorian styled town houses, which was opposite a church that door-to-door would have been 2 very short seconds of walking, and all of this on the same small road as two huge council estate towers, the Waterfront venue, a modern cladded flat complex, and the canal.  We also established that Steve Coogan must live on that road as well.

The gig was awesome! Good crowd despite the 8.30 start. We definitely played our best there and the sound was good. There was a huge amount of audience interaction before, during, and after the gig, especially after the gig! People asking us all to sign their tickets and objects, posing for pictures with us, and cheekily trying to grab little pictures of us when we weren’t looking. Kind of taught me the value our fans have, not just in terms of the money we made selling our merch, but that there are plenty of people around that seem to really care about what we do, even if they only heard us that night.

I’d like to make it clear that seeing as the songs are not written by myself, I can be quite objective about everything that happens to us on this tour. No big head / ego ruling these words yo! This is something I’m trying to capitalise on, thinking with my music marketing hat firmly on. What would I be after as a fan of the music, seeing as I am truly a huge fan of the music. We have a manager that involves himself logistically in the band, and the Flints that write the songs. So, as far as my input goes… what happens in the practice lasts forever, yeah?

Anyway, we crashed at a good friend of ours in Norwich, directed there by her house mate (who happened to be friends with the guitar tech for Theme Park). We had a night of takeaway palava, and chilling out maxing relaxing all cool, and a good nights sleep!

And here I am. Sat on the sofa I slept last night, waiting for people to wake up and hit Birmingham tonight, whilst enjoying Niall’s incessant snoring, and worrying that their toilet door, has no apparent lock.

No. Apparent. lock.

Post-gig Reflection

So, the London date went pretty comfortably. We became a ‘gay-band’, or mused the sign on the wall of our shared dressing room, informing its occupants of the regular nature of the venue we were playing. Heaven is apparently the biggest gay bar in the world, when it’s not a venue. FABULOUS! *cue homo-wrist-flick*

Was introduced to the band we’re gonna be following around the country. Seriously chilled guys. The band set to play between us and Theme Park was called LULS, and I was ashamed to admit I wasn’t aware that they were on the bill, or for that matter that they were the other band following TP about on the tour. They kick some fucking booty with their music jesus! Imagine pop-punk, heavy orchestral inspired rock, and shoe-gaze indie, all pushed into epic collection of noise. Also good guys from the brief encounter we had.

Our set went pretty well, sound on the stage wasn’t fantastic, but comparing to the sound LULS got I’d assume we were similarly clear and powerful sounding out the front speakers. Had three girls scream at me through the majority of the gig, ending with them asking me to take my top off… on reflection not sure if it was ironic, or whether they were just horny school girls… regardless my shirt remained firmly on, but my ego decided it wanted to stroll around the venue for a bit.

Our manager was busy in Austin, Texas, organising a stand at SXSW Festival, which is cool as fuck. This meant that the band was on it’s own, something I was yet to experience in Châteaux, and yeah, nothing changed as far as the evening. It’s always nice to have someone else deal with the bureaucracy and logistics behind an evening like this, but we’re all big boys, so speaking to promoters, stage managers, tech managers, and sound engineers is part of the game. And no-one even remotely close to being an arse-hole, something fairly new to me, from my prior gigging experiences.

All in all, had a wonderful time, unfortunately had to grab that early 1AM coach back to Leeds to get involved in my studio sessions, have a good ol’ bitch about a certain member of our production group who isn’t getting a single track of what we’ve done, seeing as for over 60 hours of work we’ve put in he’s been to 0 hours. The guy can suck out, know what I’m sayin’? Two hours of sleep in the coach (free wifi on the megabus is amazingly convenient!) followed by two hours of sleep at Grimshaw’s house, before  going into college, having a cheeky progressive-metal band practice with my good pal Jack Beattie, and ending with me going back to Grimshaw’s house for a sleep till 8PM. Another studio session that evening recording the fabulous Edmund Jeffrey and Ali Wells, who were great considering they’d been drinking!

Back to the house of the rising James for 1AM, made toast, laughing at how people were taking pictures and filming Châteaux in London despite not knowing us, short of possibly the three tracks on Soundcloud if they’d done their pre-gig support research. Something I remember all too well during my 14 year old gig most weekends days.

US PLAYING and

US PLAYING SOME MORE

It’s now the morning after all of this, I’m sat next to James Grimshank who will likely read this in a few minutes, so I call him one ugly mother sir! (lol?) On my way back to Manchester tonight to see the family, and practice with the band to make sure that when we hit Glasgow on Monday night, we hit it SO HARD, like harder than a rock in Steven Hawking’s pants.

Steven, Hawking’s, pants.

Thursday 14th March

After a hectic day of preparing the logistics behind the illusive and coveted ‘tour cd’, awaiting master files that didn’t come until early this morning, I finally set off to the Mega Bus stop, where I found the bus to be half an hour late, not exactly helpful when trying to keep to a schedule. 100 discs to burn on a 5 hour coach journey from Leeds to London Victoria, I personally think it can be done. Writing this I’m currently on number 48. It was my idea to number the sleeves, which I’m quite proud of personally. Years ago I went to see Manchester band ‘WU LYF’ (before they were big, hipster much?) and purchased their vinyl that was exclusively kept to 100 copies., which were numbered To this day I remember that I’m #33 in what they refer to as the Lucifer Youth Foundation (or LYF). This kind of mentality seems to me fantastic to inspire fans to want to care about the band, and I know it worked with me, even after being betrayed by aforementioned band (most definitely to be saved for a story in it’s own right, so I won’t go into that here).

So yes, getting a lot of stares on the coach, it’s cramped and hot, people don’t want to tell me to move my box of cd’s that is taking up the seat room next to me. I know people like to go on (myself included) about how many awkward situations they find themselves in, maybe as a way to make light of it and ultimately move on from having to deal with the ghastly memories! Alas, I feel like more and more this is happening to me, I guess I’m just way more awkward than anyone else in the world that ever lived, ever. Probably.

Pretty psyched to be meeting ‘Theme Park’, the indie pop band that has so nicely asked us to join them for the second leg of their tour. They look cool as fuck, like really cool. No, I don’t think you get it… they look really fucking cool! Quite seriously I dig their tunes and if you don’t know them, you should YouTube the words “Jamaica theme park” and watch their music video. It’s cool dude!

Henry’s just mentioned that Lana Del Ray’s PR guys are gonna be coming down to the gig tonight to see us. One of those pieces of information you’re not entirely sure what to do with. It attaches with it a lot of expectation, and equally potential for disappointment, however the focus should most definitely stay away from the industry players, and simply on us being the band we are. I’ll likely have to make a very conscious effort to forget these people are there, especially seeing as our manager Ben has organised for some A&R guys to be coming down to check us out as well!

So we’ve got about an hour and a half on this coach, and I’m onto disc #53, this is do-able! Meeting with good friend and old music buddy Will Robinson in Victoria with the rest of the band, and get a much deserved drink before our 4PM sound check. We’re also fitting an interview in between sound check and gig.

Post-gig, I have an important studio session I have to be getting to on Friday morning, 9AM, so unfortunately I can’t be partying in London with the band and Will, it’s a 1AM coach back from Victoria, landing in Leeds at 5.30AM. It’s gonna be heavy, but should hopefully be able to catch some z’s. Then a day involving lots of studio time and general recording, followed by partying, assuming I maintain motor function. A weekend of practice with the ‘boyz’ of Châteaux, and then we’re off on the road Monday through Saturday, it’s gonna be heavy, but I have a feeling the BANT will flow like wine.

Rich, fruity, wine.