Tour Diary - Glasgow to Manchester

Rather than clogging up my news blog on my main site with a rambling tour diary, I thought I'd put it here.

Glasgow bus station
As usual my over neurotic self got me to the bus station in Glasgow an hour early, as if some helpful steward was going to spot me and say "Ahh, Mr Hughes, you are early! Would you like to relax in the lounge until your coach awaits you?", or more realistically, "Ah Mr Hughes, you are early! We have forfeited your ticket for this".

Anyways, I hadn't brought any snacks with me for the trip to Manchester for the first out of Glasgow gig, so I decided to load up on Chocolate and Water. I got two bars of your favorite capitalist planetary named chocolate bars, bottle of water and an Independent. The girl, with bright green hair, who was serving at the Station Shop noticed the badges on my coat and asked about them. After a brief wee chat (to the disdain of the rest of the queue), I left her with a receipt scrawled with details of Mischief Brew and the Underthepavement radio show. In return, my haul cost only two quid.

While waiting for my bus and reading about the super rich's tax havens around the world it occurred to me how rubbish I am at self promotion. Perhaps the girl with the green hair would check out Mischief Brew, find their myspace, then recognise me on their comments list and get to my music? Rather than sticking with this chance based future, I returned to the shop and gave her a copy of my CD.

Bus travel
The bus finally arrived and to my liking, it was empty by the time we were setting out. Last summer when I was doing this type of tour, I was mainly on MegaBuses, packed Megabuses, so this brand new National Express coach was a godsent. Lots of foot room, guitar room and no screaming kids.

I've just noticed that my hand written scrawl which is forming the basis of this tour diary is now going on about the reliance of upper order species on communities and relationships, but I think I'll leave that out for the time being. To sum it up, I'm pretty happy I've got a seat to my self with no one sitting next to me, but at the same time I'm a bit annoyed at myself that I am in the group of "not smiling at strangers", which I decry alot.

Last time I was on tour I took with me four books to read for the week, and finished 2 of them, the New York trip I took 3 and finished 1, so this time I've taken 1. And it's now finished halfway through the first bus journey. Bugger. "Curious incident of the dog in the night time" was the book and it was fantastic - as most people had told me, don't know why it took me so long to read it.

Manchester gig
I arrived at Manchester around 20.15 and headed to the venue for the night - The Thirsty Scholar. Luckily Al Baker and the promoter (Tony) were already there, so I didn't have to do the solitary bar fly thing this time. Al played first, doing a great set of old and new songs, joined by the singer of the Dole Queue for most of them. Highlights were Jesus on the touchline and This City's Song, both weren't played in Glasgow on Sunday night.

The promoter played next, again with Al's female singer. Starting off with an accapella version of Rage's Killing in the name of, it was a good set.

Then it was my turn. The first few songs of my set were plagued with feedback, crackly leads and general technical difficulties, but there were soon sorted and things went well. I had a heckler continually calling out for "New Order" in between each song, but I think I handled him well. The final time he called it out I replied with "I'm starting to think that you are calling out less for music, but more for a political ideology". Problem solved.

It was a standard pub crowd with pockets of people paying attention (noticeable by the cheers and claps after songs finishing) and folk out for a drink after the United game (noticeable by the talking through the songs). So, I decided not to play any slow/quiet songs.

My set was:
Never took the time, Daddy fought the law, On Our Own, First Step to failure, Huntsman (Chris TT),. Paradise, Punks

Short and sweet.
Post set, Al (who hadn't slept since Sunday) and I headed back to his flat via a Pizza shop. Crashed in front of the TV to watch some Frasier, followed by Mock The Week.

Now I'm sitting in a Vegetarian cafe called Fuel writing this and trying to submit an Abstract for work. Huddersfield tomorrow for the house party which should be good fun.