A massive blog for you. We're back from our summer tour! We travelled 2500 miles over 17 days and had lots of fun along the way.
Our adventure started on July 30th when we drove from the T&S North Wales HQ to Guildford. We played at a lovely seated venue called The Boileroom.
Beforehand we had noodles. They were tasty.
After our spell-binding set we headed to Luke Leighfield's house in Southampton to get some beauty sleep.
The following morning we headed into Southampton to have an explore. We found a snooker place but they tried to charge us £22 for two hours (!). We decided to drown our sorrows in a nearby tea shop.
After our tea we made our way back to Luke's house to have some fun. We didn't have a gig to play that night so made the most of it by watching a film and by having a manly press-up competition (I think we did about 5 each). Rock on.
We rose nice and early the next day and made our way to Plymouth. This was pretty exciting because it was the first of 8 gigs we were doing with the super amazing Klaus Says Buy the Record. We also got to meet the wonder that is Paul Turner, who was travelling with us on tour.
Before that, though, we had more tea.
After our tea we headed to the venue and played the hits. The gig was pretty fun. We got our faces melted by the wonder of Klaus.Another day came and we made our way to Cornwall! After a few wrong turns, we arrived at the Leopalooza Festival near Bude.
After our set we left the site to give ourselves a rare treat. A real dinner! We splashed out on a pub dinner before making our way back to the site to see the lovely Luke Leighfield, who would be playing with us for the rest of the tour.
After Luke's set we found out that our sleeping arrangements had fallen through, which meant we had to sleep in our car! We had to squeeze all of our equipment and 4 people in our VW Passat for the night.
Feeling less than refreshed, we woke up and made our way to Truro to play at the Gig on the Green Festival.Our tour bus.
Fun on the see-saw!
And on the assault course!
After that we made our way to the second stage to watch Ice-Cold Idiots. This band had a combined age of 33! They played some original songs, as well as classics like Song 2 and Teenage Kicks. What more could you want?
We then made our way to our stage and set up. It was fun, despite the massive downpour that went on throughout our sets.
We celebrated with a group photo.
Once we packed up we made our way into Truro for some dinner. And another group photo.
After that we made our way to our free hotel(!). This was probably the most exciting thing ever.
We had an amazing sleep, which more than made up for the night before. We even got free breakfast! Yum.
After our morning feast we travelled to Exeter. We had some more tea. And cake!
After our tea-dosage we went to the venue to do our thing.
Klaus (Jon and Inigo) rocking out.
After the gig we drove through the night to Luke's house in Southampton for some sleep.The next day we made our way to Kingston. Before we went to the venue we stopped off at Banquet Records to admire their excellent CD selection.
Yummy.
After our set we drove back to Southampton again. This time because we had to help Luke with his photo shoot. This involved lifting pianos and sitting in the back of vans like the real men we are.
We followed Luke and his piano to The New Forest near Southampton, and then to Bournemouth beach.
After our manly work was done, we drove to Southend-On-Sea for the next gig. We got there just in time to enjoy the rides opposite the venue. Yeah!
After the gig we drove to Inigo's house/ studio for the night. It was amazing.
They even had a parrot! Yeah!
Next up was Brighton. We decided to get there reasonably early and have fun in Brighton. Those of you who have read our tour blogs before may remember that last time we were in Brighton we played mini-golf, where Fordy beat me in a sudden death after we were tied after 18 holes. We decided to have a rematch. This time I won! Yeah!
To celebrate my victory, we decided to go for fish and chips before we went to the venue.
The Brighton gig was a special one because Massimo joined us on stage. Although Massimo has played with us a few times before, we haven't seen him for a few months so it was nice to have him back.
After the gig we went to my Uncle's house near Lewes to sleep for the night. We love staying at my Uncle's house because he has a swimming pool! Despite the fact that it was freezing outside, Fordy and I manned it up and went for a dip. Check out our comedy diving poses.
Baywatch!
After our dip we got dressed and made our way into Lewes to celebrate Becca's birthday. We went to a place called Bill's for lunch. It was amazing.
After our feast we drove to Portsmouth to play our first ever BBQ! It was Paul Turner's private birthday BBQ. We played a special acoustic set under a marquee.
This was a bit of a sad day too as it was the last of our gigs with Klaus Says Buy the Record. Sob.
We waved goodbye to Jon, Inigo and Paul and made our way to Leeds to play with Gossamer Albatross at the Packhorse. This gig turned out to be lots of fun because the audience were super quiet and attentive.
After our set we dropped Kathryn off at the train station. She had to go home to move her things to her new Uni house in Edinburgh.The next day we drove to play another outdoor gig at the Belper Summer Alldayer.
Always wear sun cream.
After our spell-binding sets we drove into Belper to get ourselves a Chinese.
The next day we drove to Huddersfield for the last date of the tour with Luke Leighfield. We played a private party. This was a bit scary as we didn't really know what to expect, but it turned out okay in the end.
Luke looking dashing in Becca's hat and sunglasses.
After our emotional goodbye we drove back to the North Wales HQ for a couple of days. Our first day off was filled by a trip to Liverpool, and the second was spent having a fun day out at the beach. Most of the day was spent by playing Croquet and having long-jump competitions.
After our two days off we went to play at Telford's Warehouse in Chester. Unfortunately we don't have any pictures of this one because it turned out to be a goodbye gig for Kathryn, who decided to leave the band after the tour to concentrate on her uni work. This was a bit of a shock but we'd like to thank her for all the fun and adventures we've shared together. There's always room at the T&S table though so maybe she'll come and play with us again someday. Hope so.
The next day we drove to Northampton to play at The Labour Club with My First Tooth. It was almost a year since our last gig there, where we met My First Tooth for the first time. This turned out to be one of the highlights of the tour. The crowd were super and we got our third-ever encore! Yeah!
Then came the final date of the tour. We drove in convoy with My First Tooth to the Herne Bay Festival in Kent.Before we played we decided to have a quick round of mini-golf! Unfortunately we didn't have enough time to finish our game, but it was fun nonetheless.
After our set we had the customary seaside fish and chips before throwing some stones out to the sea.
It was then time to set off back home. But not before one last photo!
We drove through the night (and through the rain) back home. It was the end of another super fun and super successful tour.
We would just like to thank everyone who came to see us, everyone who put us on, everyone who gave us a bed/floor for the night, and all of the bands we played with (especially Luke, Klaus and My First Tooth).
We're hoping to do another tour in October/ November time to coincide with the release of our next EP. Keep your eyes peeled!
Thanks for reading,
Tim and Sam x
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