Dogs On Tour: Blog 1

Apr 30 2008 1:38 pm, Rikki Mehta

Day 1, Sunday 27^th April – Ruby Lounge, Manchester

Luciano, Duncan, Marc (our sound engineer) and me picked up the tour bus about 11am from Wembley. M & S stop for some healthy food at 1pm. On the road around Stafford after a painless journey so far, apart from almost running out of diesel due to a lack of service stations, a crash had just happened on the other side of the motorway. The idiots driving in the outside lane thought it would be a good idea to have a look at the crash and slammed on their brakes making a guy in a blue fiesta hit the side of our bus at around 60 miles an hour. We stopped and so did Mr. Fiesta and Dunc and I got out to have a ‘chat’ with this guy but he was an apologetic snivelling idiot so we let him off leniently. We met our tour manager just outside of Manchester and he drives us in. Unluckily we were swapping our brand new (slightly scratched) bus with The Maccabees and we ended up with an older truck full of fag ash from them.

Ruby Lounge is a pretty cool venue. It’s in a large basement that used to be an R & B club. Lot’s of character and a good PA. There we met Big Jim from Scotland who we’ve known for a few years as we got to know him on The Jim Beam tour with The Raveonettes. He’s helping us on this tour selling the merch as well as being our security. This is a guy who you want on your side! Soundcheck went ok except there was a bass trap on stage that wouldn’t go away.

Back to the hotel for a quick change and freshen up and off to meet some friends. One of them had a birthday the day after and so was already pissed when I met him. Had a few Staropramens in a bar called Common to lube me up for the gig.

Got to the gig and the dressing room was the usual arguing on the set list but it usually comes good in the end. Which it did tonight. A few more beers and a couple of shots and I’m nicely toasted. 9.15pm comes along and we get led on stage by our tour manager to a crowd of rowdy fans.

Gig kicks off with Soldier On and the fans were going mental singing along to all the lyrics. After the first tune sweat is already dripping off me and Johnny. We were playing well especially considering we’ve not played a headline gig since before Christmas and the crowd were making it easy. London Bridge starts giving the band some respite for a few seconds to fans clapping in time. This got the gig flowing in full swing. We dropped a couple of new tunes and they went down really well! Near the end of the gig my thumb started dripping blood which added a nice splatter effect to my guitar making it a true original.

The set finished with Forget it All and we marched off stage hot as hell and soaked right through. After a few minutes of the crowd shouting for more we went on with a new tune called ‘Act Like You Know’ which is a bit slower paced with piano. We then finished the show with ‘Wait’ and then ‘Tuned to a Different Station’ which wrapped the gig up nicely.

After the gig we got accosted by fans wanting pictures and merch signed whereas all we wanted to do was get fucked up! Off to The Roadhouse for some debauchery. About 1am and I’m slaughtered chatting to one of the guys from The Migs, who supported us, about Kyuss. We’re both massive fans. As the night goes on I’m losing the power of thought and speech and getting hassled by a friend who is complaining that all I do is swear at her. What she didn’t realise is that these are the only words that I can say!

Walk back to the hotel is a blur. Getting into bed – can’t remember!

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