News from our Foreign Correspondent

I write this to you from the bunk house of the illustrious, infamous and inimitable Old Bridge Inn, Aviemore as Graeme our engineer barks orders at the rest of the band through a half-cut last-night-drinking-for-four-hours-in-the-back-of-a-van haze. The last few days have seen the usual mayhem falling just the right side of disaster as we weave our merry way around the Scottish Highlands.

Inverness on Thursday was bananas. Thank-you to all who came and partook in the Oddyssey. We're still kinda learning the new material as we go so it's genuinely interesting to see what peoples make of the new tunage and some of said new musical exertions are rather enjoyable tae play an aw. I'm thinking particularly about Get a Grip. It's always a pleasure tae see the front row's wigs peeled back as the Samson releases the sub drop into the first chorus.

Yesterday, in a rollercoaster of fortunes, we had to cancel our Stornoway gig due to the ferry captain not fancying the weather much. The New Market Bar in Thurso leapt to our aide, providing us with a cracking gig, loadsa bevy and a healthy dose of mentalness chucked in for free. Serious thanks to Isla and Steve for making it happen, for sorting out voddy and jacky for Veronika and T Lo and for pouring vast quantities of spirits down our necks. Some thieving whammer stole ma phone but despite that minor inconvenience we aw had a belter of a time and got so drunk in the back of the van on the four hour drive to Aviemore in the middle of the night that some band members actually appeared to have lost the ability to perambulate on a couple of the inevitable bio-breaks during the course of the journey. Aw aye – well done tae Samson for staying sober and driving us. He pulled the curtain separating the back of the van from the cab over and refused to engage with our increasingly animated drunken antics – a sensible laddie.

So today – we're just sound checking for the gig at Old Bridge Inn just now. I don't really do much truth be told so I'm just rambling away here while everyone else does the hard work (Scruff Lee soldering and rewiring multicores, T Lo setting up his monitor mix and Jonny our backline tech trying to sneak in as many pints as possible in the interim). It is gonnae be aff the hook the night and not just cause you get it fae me (haha). We are expecting a fancy dress, halloween brigade of maddies and oddballs to descend on the venue in the next couple of hours literally spreading the brain fever like an army of deranged Igors (that's a quote byraway). So that'll be fun.

I'm away tae get ma zombie makeup on. See yehs next time pals.

Solareye