The Kills
MONDAY, APRIL 28, 2008
SKINNY DIP THE FUTURE, THIS UK TOUR IS NEARLY OVER.
i don't know what that means, my brain has all drained out. remind me where i've been? after moaning about carling i got some incredible letters from you, thanks for that. from one smoker to that next, and not that i wish you to smoke more or less or even at all, but look if they're gonna take your money and let you in for the evening, they should let you out for a smoke if you need it.
oh hurricano, this tour has been good, loud and spilling over. thank all of you so much for coming down each night, some of you coming down almost every night, all over the country. it's really cool. your letters after, are wonderful, thoughtful, long and beautifully written. we luv you too.
london was wild but i was so frazzled and nervous and excited, i couldn't move my legs. they had their own thing going on that night, unbeknownst to me. i tried to ask my legs "what's going on with you?," and they walked away like cracked sticks of honey, melting like an ice cream. (i just saw a woman driving a car gesturing like a street fighter howling like a wolf, and a black plane flew over) looking out the window.
what was i saying? oh my god i see roller coasters, dozens, wow, attention span of a rat...:$/ london, yeah, it was a long night. a wonderful but endless stream of noise and colour, big eyes and strange dances, mojitos, stupid fights, flashing lights, fuckers, and then nice things too... but when i say it was long, i mean long, like from here to rio.
and when we arrived in northhampton, i tell you it was a relief, because my legs started to work again and although i was shattered and half dead, i woke up in time to love that gig and make the most of it. sad to hear the soundhaus is closing down. thanks for being the host one last time and thanks to all of you who came.
slicing tiny slippery tomatoes in a moving vehicle can result in only one of two things: sliced tomatoes, or a blood bath of fingers. here goes nothing. on our way to portsmouth, i see highway stuff, cars, construction junk, sand bags, delivery men, stern moms in turtlenecks choking, lip biters wining, trash. i can almost see the water now except for the wooden fence getting in the way, couple places where some kids had punched holes in it and i can see through to sail boats and cranes and grey blue water probably real cold, half a castle looking thing, and the docks. now it's all hidden behind a massive sand hill. wouldn't it be nice to sit by the water and talk and drink wine? while the boats get bigger and box trucks roam the lots, i can see the grey steel naval ships like enormous hotels, that colour which blends into the sky, color of an elephant. friend of mine told me elephants know how to use video cameras. fact. x
so here in portsmouth, he says a pedophile owns that book shop down the road, and those in the know don't buy his books. and all there is to do on this street is get drunk and eat, neither of which i fancy tonight, but i took a walk and i can't see the water now but i can feel it, and i watched some laundry machines spinning and peered into the antiques shops, one with some fake paper money that represented how many satsumas it costs to buy somebody's soul.
and i was wondering earlier if i really look like myself?... you know there's these posters up everywhere around the venue and outside too of jamie's and my face, and some of them are pretty big like 3 feet tall, so i got a 3 foot face and i was trying to get into the venue and the bouncer stopped me and asked for my pass, which i've lost and i pointed at the 3 foot version of my face, 3 inches away from his face and said "that's me..." rather politely as well.... well he looked at it for a second or two and then looked at me and said "i need to see your pass".... so again i insisted on my face... and he insisted on the pass and it went on like this for some time, but i thought surely... a 3 foot face is better than a 4 inch pass, and so i'm wondering if i really look like myself at all or if i should delete this paragraph, cos there's far too many measurements in it.
and to top it all off, someone just tried to sell me a ticket to my own show. and it's' not the first time.
gig was good... and we leave now, headed back to london, red wine and weird tv and im wide awake, looking forward to getting back to the smoke and attending a birthday party at 3:30 in the morning.
which i did, and took the party on the bus to bristol... the next afternoon, the bus full of people... traveling down the moterway...
it was a blast... a 48 hour blast... a blast that ended in deep sleep all the way back to london again and fuck,,, the tour is over. i don't remember how it happened... but we had a great time. and thank you my perfect friends who came so far and endured so much :). xxxx i loved the gig too... it was like some surreal crash covered in face paint and tiny buttons with little fire flies... in my eyes and all things good and bad and all things in dreams of wild animals. let's have no regrets eh? life is good.
i leave now... packing and cleaning and doing things.... headed to new york in the morning.... speak to you from there.
x vv
TUESDAY, APRIL 22, 2008
BACK IN THE UK AND TOURING...
so... touring in england.... good times.... but tell me why, why is EVERYTHING owned by Carling?
Hey kids!, don't you hate it? Where oh where is the spirit of adventure? i know times are bad, but i'm turning up to venues i've played before, which weren't in the past owned by Carling... and er...they were better then... and now they all look the same, the decor... the ads...what a load of nonsense....
they've got it all sorted out, except for the smell of piss and booze that fills these places... maybe it's cos you can't smoke now that's it's so apparent, smells a little like school?...
maybe that's why although i can see yr having a blast... the nicotine patch isn't working... the furrowed brow, yes mine's the same, i'm furrowed....
annoyed, but love all of you none the less.... just.... i miss these venues having their own identity... and i don't want to turn my bluetooth on and download some rubbish music while i'm taking a piss in the toilet... no, would rather not. speak up. you deserve better that's for sure.
and for fuck sake, if i play one more gig while seeing, off to the side, david beckman smiling on a light board waving around a moterola razor 2, i'm gonna puke. we should all puke together.
i'm going to bed. love you, x vv
MONDAY, APRIL 14, 2008
PORTO, AND THEN HOME SWEET HOME...X
i woke up real early in the morning and we were still driving and i swear i saw deserts covered in white dust, snow... it was cold, little tiny round bushes knitted into the sand, all covered white too but when we arrived in Porto it was warm and you could taste the sea air and it was a little like summer out there except for no one on the streets and nothing open and walking in circles and quite a wind whipping the hair and we found a little restaurant and spent about 4 hours there, eating slow and talking. the gig was at Casa de Musica, an incredible building that if you ever visit Porto, you won't miss.
the whole thing is wild and you can lay on glass from quite high up and look down at kids out skateboarding on the hilly marbled ground all around the place. all as surreal as you could make a building without the thing falling right over, just walking through thought you might have a big slip.... they got copper box elevators and totally invisible glass hand rails... tiles from holland and kaleidoscope walls... you get lost all day all night in there....swallowed easy. we played at 1 in the morning in a giant red room, like all made of plug board and behind the stage a huge white curtain full of tiny light bulbs and everyone seemed to glow. after there was a storm. and we met people in closets with butterfly eyelashes and the rest and it was getting real late we checked into a hotel for 3 hours....to get cleaned up before our flight to london.
no sleep and landed... taxi ride i don't recall one bit, returned home to a frozen house... oh but, home sweet home, hot or cold, don't care. it's nice to be back in London.
xx vv
MONDAY, APRIL 14, 2008
CUTS AND BRUISES IN SPAIN...
and we zoom off towards spain, barcelona bound... and arrive around noon the next afternoon, only to check into something like a hostel off the ramblas full of loud blasting school kids on a trip drinking orange sodas, all of them covered in hickeys and cheap perfume and my room smelled of dime store after shave and was a depressing little hole so i said lets move hotels cos this one is bringing me down and so we did but not without a verbal nuclear war with the manager there... who hated us some how more than we hated him and oh god i just had to stand in the street and shut up because i suddenly felt as though the police were gettin called so bought a diet coke down the street and smoked outside the window and looked around a bit and then our film crew from london had turned up to barcelona and we sorted all the rooms out and went for a drink and discussed what we were gonna do for the Last Day of Magic video.
i'll keep details to a minimum cos some things must be a surprise and in fact i haven't seen too many of the rushes yet, but jamie and i have the cuts and bruises to prove the video was made and we worked all day and all night until 4 in the morning running round the streets of barcelona and it was a great deal of fun and the next day too, more filming and more fighting with hotels and this time the police were called because we made a little noise in the halls last night woke up some silly bitch who hated everyone and had the devil in her and couldn't take her angry twisted hands off the phone to the front desk. she called cos she smelled cigarettes, cos she heard foot steps, cos she heard tv, cos she heard me shower! oh, she was real lovely... next morning a police van pulled up and surrounded the film crew and demanded any tapes back from anything filmed in that shitty who cares about it hotel anyway and besides it was like 2 seconds of stuff we wouldn't use anyway but there was the hugest air of self importance going on in those barcelona hotels like nothing i've seen before, boy you'd think nothing ever happened there in like a million years and this all was like having a riot like a bomb going off, like a fireworks display happening in a room 603 and burning the joint down and priests coming to bless it all and the news crews rolling in the way they acted, im shocked it wasn't on the front page of the paper....
That night we played our gig in Barcelona at the Apollo and we loved it there. the crowds in spain are wild, so wonderful, so full of spirit, the whole thing was like floating around, like day dreaming so fun just don't want it to end and then it ends and then... the filming was done too and we really packed it in in barcelona big style... and headed for madrid pretty tired but wired and arrived for a photoshoot had my make-up done and got some really good coffee and did the shoot and it was easy, waking up and then jamie and i went and walked through madrid did a little shopping, more coffee, more walking, more coffee and then soundcheck and more coffee and more walking and then went to our favorite little seafood restaurant that's all old fashioned and beautiful inside feel like you're on a boat the way it is, except for you can see out over the street all the people walking and looks like broadway in new york, or maybe a little like regent street, no, more like broadway and smelled that way too and then we returned to the gig to do that and it went off a storm and then we went to see keiren hebden and steve reid play down the road, which was mind blowing, that steve reid can't take your eyes off him while he's drumming put me in a trance, then we packed up our things and hit the road to portugal
MONDAY, APRIL 14, 2008
ITALY...
woke up there, no idea where we were, but we found hundreds of horse houses.... confusing streets and little cafes... we were some 40 minutes drive from the center. in a sleepy daze, we kept walking following the signs for "centro", and needless to say, never made it, got lost, and got tired. jamie and i had to go to mtv and do an interview which was actually pretty alright, cos it was in a make- shift art studio and we got to draw pictures the whole way through the interview. if only they were all like that. ran into some people we knew from london and new york at the gig, familiar faces always welcome on a long long tour like this, so that was nice and we all chatted and for a moment i bar tended, failingly, as i know nothing about mixing anything, though the owner insisted and dragged me back there... i just stared at the bottles and at the thirsty people, and did nothing about it what so ever... but suck on ice cubes and and pose for photos on camera phones before running off and hiding in the shower.... a great gig though tonight...
MONDAY, APRIL 14, 2008
BOWLING...
as if the day wasn't jam packed enough, we met up with everyone at a little italian joint on the main street, then i convinced everyone to go bowling. we were terrible but made some friends there.... who took us to a night club that was empty, a totally questionable joint. we danced bit while the night froze over and then slept and the next day it was the gig at fri-son, a place which sometimes couples as a roller disco hall. good thing i have my roller skates with me. we played the gig and i took the skates for a spin after the hall cleared out, and we headed for milan.
MONDAY, APRIL 14, 2008
VIENNA, SWITZERLAND...
i like vienna, but i don't know it much. everytime we play flex, so that area i've seen, but you know you never have much time unless you get a day off.... but the gig was good though i was in some shockingly rancid mood, came out of the walls of my mind don't know why but i took it down the canal and walked 2 miles with nicola and tried throwing my curse in the sea for the trash fish to eat, as all day i watched the ducks diving into the sludge and beer cans in there, loving the slime when all the while there was more fresh water down the way, but they love the shit, so i thought oh well. think it worked but i went to bed early on the bus reading my book and thinking back to paris and it cheered me up but people of vienna, you were cool and we thank you, cos that was an incredible amount of you who turned up that night even knowing the words and that always gets me.
never spent too much time in Switzerland but wow, driving in through the crazy snow i tried to film it in the morning but it just didn't quite capture the awe... and then we arrived in fribourg this little tiny town... with all these mountain rocks and covered bridges and hills and oldness... little shops and jamie and i did a bit of a crawl through town after a vietnamese restaurant, happy they speak french in fribourg so the menu was easier less of a mystery meal and got some energy and walked the whole of the town, stopping off for a beer and then again later for table football in the back of an aqua blue bar, coffee and cognac which was good cos it was cold and we walked far, further than planned for hours and hours and i found the strangest thing. a wild croissant floating in a fountain. this thing was maybe magic or so i thought, and i have a photo for you here...
because it's not often you're walking along and see a real life wild croissant, jamie and i were thrilled.
MONDAY, APRIL 14, 2008
TOUR NEWS...
saw no sex in hamburg. didn't smell any money. went to an indian restaurant with a confusing menu. while smoking outside man smiled at me while putting big trash bags in his BMW i figured he was up to no good a girl asked for an autograph and the waiters took so long taking our order or bringing the food that i left the place before i ate and changed my clothes and the gig happened. i remember liking it a lot. we did a photo shoot that day for Zoo magazine as well, earlier on. we had a fruit and wine picnic on the floor of the venue it was over in a flash. then it was Berlin.
Berlin is alive and full of late night dives. every bar looks like someone's probably living there, sleeping there in the day, it's got a worn in feeling about it, but never worn out. the place we played felt enormous... i remember a sea of faces and incredible heat, people soaked in the sweat... that kind of thing, booze flying around, and standing out by the water after, getting a little freezing air on my face. the next day we went round Berlin. i tried for the 2nd time to visit the bauhaus museum, but as always, it closed the moment i walked in the door... I'd spent a bit too long at clemens tissi's gallery cuddling with a red dog with red eyes and a red nose, kissed him so much i got dog hair in my gum, cute thing sitting in a doggy basket amidst hedi slimanes furniture. it was a good day and a good walk, the start of the biennial for contemporary art. all the galleries open. except for the one i wanted to go to...
hours later i nearly got hit my the monorail jumping the fences in the grass trying to get to a big tower thing.... determined to at least see the city from very far up.... did see big big big man smoking cigar talking on the phone for an incredible long time, but of course, it was midnight by then and they were locking the doors to the tower.... so be it, the last bar open, met up with everyone in the crew for a glass of wine and taxi ride to the bus.... off to vienna...
FRIDAY, APRIL 04, 2008
SHOW US YOUR PICTURES...
hey everyone,
we've put together a postcard maker on www.midnightboom.com.
you can upload a picture and make a postcard and send it on to friends. pick a
kills song, pick a picture and away you go. it's really fun, i trust all of you will
take our word for it and have a go. there are some really cool ones up already.
lots of love, the kills xx
THURSDAY, APRIL 03, 2008
DIARY OF OUR LATEST TRAVELS...
the kills are headed to sxsw (austin, tx)... Oh Texas, here we come.
i gotta pack for texas, and i gotta pack for paris. it's gonna be a strange suitcase.
it's sunday and i woke up late... real late and threw myself in the shower to scrub off the blue lights and 2 days sweat, blood, tears, flamingo laughter...
and now im clean, on the
outside at least..... cars here!
wait a minute.... we already did that. sxsw was a like a lightning bolt, quick, precise, loud, and then over.
it was fun. i wore my lucky scarf, drank ice tea, dodged the texas sun like a deep diggin' groundhog. jamie and i played two shows and a radio thing and got the fuck out before sxsw really kicked off (good time to leave)... and then we were on a flight to dallas, sleepless, and of course, the lucky hat made of jewels and pigeon feathers, got us through dallas easy and we arrived in paris...mmm, somewhat confused, only to sit in a hotel bar for 13 hours near the airport and i did not hallucinate that bird on the patio... it was black and wore a little white hat, a white cone on it's head, and it laughed at me and then fucked off....
the bus picked us up, we drove to toulouse played our first show with The Gossip, who are amazing. not only are they the coolest fucking people in the land, but they are the greatest live band i've seen in a long long time, and it was a pleasure to get to share a stage with them every night, an honor. we screamed and hollered from the side of the stage like banshees. they blow my mind.... they blow my mind...
they break my heart.... but france was a long time ago. amsterdam?
what happened there? a bar floating along the water in the shape of a canoe?.... tattoos.... snow, rain, hail, heaven, hell, easter? and brussels... like blinking, and koln, how'd that happen?... and now sweden, we're in malmo.... and sun is burning me through the window on the 8th floor of the malmo hilton, a room that's been chain smoking marlboro reds for 20 years, turquoise carpet with a bad attitude, err and i am late for sound check.... and i have no internet so i can't fucking send this to you any way, but maybe someday from somewhere when the coast is clear, for now.... i gotta pack another suitcase. i hear tomorrow we take an airplane to a rocky plateau where dinosaurs once mingled with martians. great.
round two... of this update...
ok so we went to umea sweden... and i'm not sure why. let's say the whole thing was a fiasco and leave it at that. a technical fiasco, an emotional fiasco, a booze fiasco, bizarrely straight.... square with fuzzy edges fiasco... ok...yeah, i leave it that.
and stockholm... well stockholm saved sweden in my opinion... people were wasted and crawling around on the floor, people were screaming and wandering into walls, which cheered me up, but it was the first venue that actually had a bulldog security anti-smoking warrior wearing a bright sunflower yellow jumper with a gold badge around his neck and he meant business.... so we left sweden and drove to the ferry port in gothenburg, only to miss our ferry to denmark by 3 minutes and wait for the next one which didn't sail for 7 hours....
or 8 because a dude driving a massive truck carrying a most massive pipe.... like as big as a 747, got stuck trying to get off the ferry, jack-knifed in the parking lot and had to lifted straight by a small fork-lift man who was sweating....
Aarhaus was cool.... Denmark is cool, we arrived to the gig an hour after we were supposed to go on stage, all in all, we were in town for 2 hours and 15 minutes and didn't see a damn thing but a stage, a bottle of beer and a make-up mirror. then we drove to copenhagen...
which WE LOVE. The gig at Vega was cool. The people were kind and loud and fun and we stayed out late and saw the town. Today we had a day off. like gold dust. days off are few and far between, so we made the most of it, walked about 15 miles around copenhagen, made friends with some locals, bought mohair jumpers, drank wine by the water, looked for pirates, went to Floss, took baths, watched the news, read the paper, painted my nails and what else... er.... the night is young. Tomorrow we head to Hamburg. the european capital of porn?
someone told me today hamburg smells of money, that it's the richest city... in like the world.... I've been to Hamburg a few times... i don't recall this money smell she spoke of but i do recall a shitty hotel room on the Reeperbahn and outside those walls, the hand job hookers with pasty skin, the bulldogs in doorways with leather trousers and screens flashing video sex sex sex. Jamie and i took like a hundred polaroids and got threatened by every man with a mouth. anyway, i don't recall the smell of money... but i'll sniff around tomorrow and let you know.
that's it for now.
vv xx
THURSDAY, APRIL 03, 2008
AND FINALLY...
beth and i at our gig after party at Le Baron in Paris, moments
before she takes the stage for a second time in one evening. beth we
love you!
THURSDAY, APRIL 03, 2008
AND MORE...
nathan models The Kills Cheap and Cheerful t-shirt and the beer
soaked glove i found on the floor of the venue. nice.
THURSDAY, APRIL 03, 2008
...
jamie stage invades the gossip's gig and rocks out (with his huge
marshall stack). we refer to this as "crouching jamie, hidden beth.
THURSDAY, APRIL 03, 2008
MORE PHOTOS...
nick, hotel, and teresa, keeping it real in Dallas outside the
airport.... before a 13 hour
flight to Paris. We look happy here, but all that will soon change.
THURSDAY, APRIL 03, 2008
...
familiar faces.... and our cat friend
POSTED BY THE KILLS AT 4:36 PM
THURSDAY, APRIL 03, 2008
PHOTOS...
money i won at pool in texas
POSTED BY THE KILLS AT 4:50 PM
- 15 Aug 09 - 20:00 - Route du Rock Festival - Saint Malo, France
