we went to see what was described to us as “Big Buddha”. how big could it be right? oh.

and the incense is not much smaller.

the only way to travel: suspended 200 feet over mountainous jungles.

china has some amazing trees. this one has grown a leg. and it has fallen in love with jordan.

The markets don’t stop. Like an amazing maze full of fabric & foods & whatnots. we tried an elongated donut & it was a good one.We went to a R-E-A-L buddhist temple……& i got a nosebleed from all the incense. (But it was amazing). H-U-G-E incense coils dripping from the ceiling, they looked like beehives.For a Humongous city, there is somehow intense nature everywhere. these are the trees we’re dealing with…..bearded trees. i look like an idiot in this photo.We took a real old shaky tram to the top of victoria peak. it overlooks E-V-E-R-Y-T-H-I-N-G. Look at these lovely boys & also the view.C You

Weird wurld!We’re so happy and lucky. We’re here in Hong Kong for a week to play a few shows for the music matters conference. www.musicmatters.asia.  This is the first time ever we’ll actually have time to really explore & get to know a city. Usually we’re in & out. I can’t believe we’re here. Our bodies are wobbly & very confused about being upside down right now.We flew over the arctic to get here.We arrived last night.Fought jetlag & explored a little.This morning we woke up really early & went swimming. we’re not divas, but we lucked out & there’s a friggin’ pool on the roof of our hotel.Now we’re going to climb some stuff & take a buttload of photos. I’d also like to eat some weird fruit & maybe throw up at least once : )

Today we go home!

Our final show was last night in Amsterdam. Everything broked – - but at least it was day 40 & not day 1. Our keyboard amp died & so we had to run them through the house pa. they sounded like little bugs buzzing around us…..which was a bit cute…..but not H-E-A-V-Y enough. we prefer them to sound like angry cats.

We’re going to clean up the van, return the van, and hop onto an airplane. we’ll also have to construct some last minute flight cases for some of our gear……the cardboard we brought them in has gone soggy. tape and fresh cardboard should be easy enough to find. 

Once we’re home, we have about 3 days at home - then we drive to Texas (25hrs) for sxsw. We have nearly 20 shows in 4 days. I will be jello on these 3 days.

 Thank you for following us on this adventure. it was the best time.

dd/mm/yyyy

The UK Was good. We were warned that it can be pretty cold, but we had some really good shows. Touring with MICE is fun. www.myspace.com/miceisaband .

Our 2nd London show was Kwazy. A buttload of people were there and there was a lot of  whistling. We felt almost as comfortable as we do playing in Toronto. We also met a reaaalllyyy good band from Whales called ISLET…..i cant find a web link…hidden gem i suppose.

After London, we took the Chunnel back to Paris. After the show, Moshe traded in his beer for a bouquet of roses and threw it into the crowd.

http://www.youtube.com/user/ddmmyyyy#p/a/u/0/Sb6Sy_Od4SU

British people are AWESOME!

A kind british bloke gave some of the guys lots and lots of sambuca shots at our first show in London. We got there early to find out the power had been out all day. I was trying to film the moment the power went on. At one point I stopped filming to erase some of the footage and the exact point I stopped filming, the power came on. The show commenced, It was a 4 band bill so we started late and things were really scrappy. We are playing all our U.K. shows with a great two piece band called MICE from Hereford, England. We are at their house right now on our second day off on this 40 day tour (hence the three blog posts in one day)

There was a dog on the roof of the venue in London:

Driving in England is pretty hard.

Railcars were a fun crew to hang with in Frankfurt. We watched this video of a love parade in 1995.

here is the link: Click Here

Love Parade drinking game: take a sip of your drink everytime you see someone wearing those round john lennon sunglasses.

In Bordeaux, we slept in something like a 17th century home.

Our home in Clermont-Ferrand.

Nantes was beautiful.

Rennes, France is twin cities with Rochester and does not have any trace of graffiti.

Le Grand Mix is probably the best venue we have ever played.

We played with a great band called BEAK>, Jackie O Motherfucker, and Jookabox.

It was an intense drive through the Swiss Alps. There were ups and downs….(because that is the shape of a mountain). Nice-View-Near-Death.

We ate Authentic Italian Panini’s, and watched television at a bowling alley.

After, Moshe got top score on basketball. 81 points. Jordan won enough tickets to get a cheap lighter with a broken clock in it.

We spent about 30mins in Florence. Everything looked like ancient and edible candy.

We got to the venue in Pistoia and it was right next to a prison. The prison kind of looked like a Sicilian resort, but it’s probably pretty frigged on the inside. This photo does no justice…..but it’s all i got.

The show was very encouraging and the crowd was extremely vocal. The silence that lives between the end of every song & the start of every applause was filled with Italian expressions that we gathered as complimentary. It was a very cool reminder that we are F-A-R from home. ALSO – We had genuine floppy italian pizza (similar to ninja turtles’ pizza) and some amazing pizza type thing (the bottom of a pizza is on the top as well).

Here’s us leaving Italy and heading back to France!

BORDEAUX

Back to Le Saint Ex.  A great little venue with a cave for a stage.  We met lots of great people like Vincent(see last post), Julien….etc <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

the sound was killer in this little cellar stage, and the band duo regatzi was a killer duo of loops and beats,

the time we spent there was unforgettable the city is unreal and pretty, the people are genuine and interested and took us on a walk through the market

CLERMONT FERRAND

Dan finally makes it!!  And there is much rejoicing.  yay. we played a really killer squat called raymonds bar there we hung out with some dogs and ate a delicious meal like everytime we are in france, the show turn out was awesome for a monday,

the art on the walls was pretty DIY punk aesthetic so cool

POITIERS

after missing our planned meet up with Dan Del Balso (he’s joining us for a portion of our tour) due to a rescheduled flight, we drove 1000km from Stuttgart to Poitiers.  Long drive; well worth it.

We played a huge venue called Le Confort Moderne with CLUES (ex-UNICORNS, LES ANGLES MORT).  CLUES are great and it was a swell night.