The Importance of Elsewhere

The second Camera Obscura tour of the United Kingdom is finished .The van is emptied of uneaten apples. The mosaic of crusty insects is lathered off the windscreen. The band return to their decreasingly normal lives. And dream or nightmare of America. Dire diary…

Leeds, The Aire
A ninth story hotel room, a view of the lochs. The beginning of our English summer. The only venue with effective air conditioning. Backstage and ever shy, a complex chair/curtain construction is erected to retain modesty at shower time .Monkey Swallows the Universe and everyone applauds. We shamble a little but tell ourselves the curse of Leeds is history.

Manchester , The Medlock
The Dry Bar doesn’t live up to its name. We share the dressing room with imaginary rats. Warm cheese is the taste of the tour. The crowd crowed appreciatively. Cursing the filthy state of rock and roll venues. The sweat dries in The Castle under the trickle of proper beer. Bridges are built. We need all the friends we can get.

Hull, The Humber
Seven necks crane to take in the Humber. We observe a disconcerting quantity of very short people, hesitate to say dwarves, scattered between charity shops. Our favourite eccentric of the tour marred slightly by the tissue issue .We are out-shambled. Always it is by bridges that we live.

London, The Thames
Six necks crane to take in our posters on the streets of London. Very grand. Francois’ frolicking makes us feel old. My keyboard module frolics right off the stage but is tougher than me. I applaud it. The presence of some old school friends in the audience re-conjures those obligatory- performing-in-school-assembly-nerves. Perhaps one too many gin and tonics for the successful re-creation of all 958 chords in Andrew Gold’s Never Let Her Slip Away.

Norwich, The Broads
The most surprisingly charm of Britain. We are wooed again by the beauty of the Arts Centre, and attempt to woo the crowd in return. The finest record shops of the tour manned by several characters from Nick Hornby’s Hi-Fidelity. Looking up at the rafters and down at the graves. It is flint. We salute you.

Colchester, The Colne
Again we dream, why can’t all music venues be like this? Disappointingly the pulpit is shut off so Francois can’t dance there. There is something sad about a building being de-sanctified. Our only home-cooked meal produced by a very quiet man. Bless you.

Cardiff, The Taff
A claustrophobic venue ornamented by an endearingly enthusiastic crowd, perhaps due to the rejuvenating effect of Francois and the Atlas Mountains on fine chaotic form. Wales apparently renames its local beer in my honour. Garlic overload.

Sheffield, The Sheaf
Everybody hums the entire back-catalogue of Richard Hawley songs to themselves whilst we are still 50 miles away from the mythical city. The leafy industrial beauty is never totally obscured by the ugliness of an empty club. Then the people arrived and all was pretty again.

Glasgow, The Clyde
Memories of the Truckers Café breakfast queasily subside.
The homecoming event, even for the homeless. I dine alone. The band perform a secret (C*ltic) huddle in the dressing room, orchestrated by Mr Pat Nevin. Overwhelming enthusiasm in the crowd throughout the entire concert. We try not to look surprised but apparently fail. Kenny fights the smoke machine because he is jealous of it. We take a bottle of whisky on stage to provide a distraction in any awkward gaps but there aren’t any. The manager sheepishly produces a plastic cup of flat champagne for everyone. We hardly shamble at all.


Aberdeen, The Dee and The Don
Outside the venue is littered with the corpses of suicidal pigeons. The worst ‘Italian’ restaurant ever; swipe the black pepper and run for the hills, I advise. See the sea. Francois and Victor sing You Shook Me All Night Long in their joyful, homoerotic, peculiar French way because it is the last night. We shamble again. It rains so much on the way home.

carey xx