My Pet Junkie Northern Mini-Tour February 2005

On Saturday 19th February 2005 we packed ourselves, our trusty instruments and a several changes of underwear into a Peugeot 205 and ventured out of Hertfordshire for our Northern Mini-Tour.

After a journey accompanied by much singing along to The Mars Volta CD we arrived at Junktion 7 in Nottingham where we were to play our first gig.
After briefly taking in the delights of Nottingham (a city with much to offer, apparently including 'The Mother Of All Afros', right), we made our way inside the venue.

Here we are in front of the Junktion 7 skull and crossbones stage backdrop. Note the slightly gay hand positions we have all somehow unconsciously simultaneously adopted....that's band unity for you.

 

After playing a very enjoyable set for a great audience, we relaxed with a few drinks and watched Ed Tudor Pole's set. Despite touring with Ten Foot Tudor for twenty years, Ed seems to be best remembered by the younger generation for his 6 week stint presenting 'The Crystal Maze', as was demonstrated by the bloke at the front who kept lamely shouting 'Crystal Maze' every three minutes during Ed's set. At one point a girl shouted out 'show us your crystal balls' which was met with much laughter on Ed's part. He took it all in good humour - he was very charismatic and entertaining, and pulled off a blinding set, enhanced in the second half with an impromtu accompaniment by none other than Mr L. Camfield.
Ed was a really nice guy - he was staying in the same hotel as us, and he gave us a lift after the gig in his ancient (but very cool) car. In the picture you can see his battered guitar which appeared to be held together with parcel tape. Don't know who the strange chap on the drums is.
This is Leon when he came off the stage after playing with Ed.....as you can see, he is triumphant at the success of his improvised drumming skills yet slightly disturbed (or should that be 'disturbing'?)

When we arrived at our second destination, we discovered our name had been plastered all over Liverpool on back alley walls like the whores that we are.

'Primal Domination'...they were exactly as their name suggested. Amusing.
Leon and Stu chillin' in the hotel room. Leon is attempting to look like, as he put it, 'the intelligent one'. Stu is decadently squirting his can of deodorant into the air - no doubt Leon has farted. Just out of shot are three comatose hookers, ten empty bottles of Jack Daniels and the remains of a smashed television. Yeah.

Here is the venue we played at called 'Hev'n and Hell'. Conversely, 'Heaven' was the downstairs bar and 'Hell' was the upstairs bar. We were in the downstairs bar.

The gig went well, despite the technical problems of the band before us, and Leon was then upstaged by the hilarious Flat Felix performing an extremely dirty song about fathers sucking sons' cocks. Honestly, the youth of today...what is this country coming to?
On Sunday morning we checked out of our hotel bright and early and went for a quick look round Liverpool (and to make an essential purchase...the new Mars Volta album). Look at this charming image of Stuart and Leon posing beneath one of the landmarks of Liverpool town centre, the stallion. See how the proud stallion rears over them, a powerful masculine symbol of potency and virility....
But what's this? A close up of the stallion reveals a huge set of bollocks daubed with red paint. Leon is clearly awestruck with envy, whilst Stu has unexpicably morphed into Jay of Kevin Smith's 'Jay and Silent Bob' fame.
We braved the snow and the horrors of the M6 tollroad to arrive back in Hertfordshire by Sunday evening. We had a great time, and we hope to continue spreading the spandau across in the near future.