| 24.07.2003 
Returning home via Cologne
We spent the night in lovely Karlovy Vary, a touristic hotspot
near Sokolov. The day after we got a tour through this city
full of hotsprings, and we drank some of the distasteful water.
Anyway it is supposed to make you healthy so there we took
off on our way home in sound shape. It was a little bit too
far to travel in one day so we booked a hostel in Cologne
where we could reflect a little - and finally drink without
worrying about staying in shape for tomorrow. We found out
Cologne is a terrible city to go out, so we ended up in a
funny Spanish bar somewhere downtown. By that time it was
already clear to us that we all had the time of our lives.
We matured as a band, now knowing we can handle pretty much
every situation on stage. We were also very happy to see crew
and band function as a perfectly drilled team. Juri and Thijs
can build up the entire backline while we are warming up somewhere
else, and we would be thrilled to see Sjoerd driving us to
any corner on the planet. The six of us have been feeling
free as a bird for more that a week. Thanks everyone somehow
involved for making this possible.
23.07.2003
Rounding up in Sokolov
The four friends following the band on tour with their airconditioned
Renault proved very helpful by helping Thijs and Sjoerd (who
had his passport in Thijs bag when he lost it) get to Liberec
to pick up the bag Thijs forgot at McDonalds the day before.
Lucky or not, the police officer who helped us out was very
friendly, and after an hour or so doing paperwork, the now
infamous grey bag was back in our hands, including passports,
credit card and lipgloss. It was a pretty long drive to Sokolov,
in the west of the Czech Rep., and it took some time to find
out which venue we would play. When we got there, we were
surprised to see the
poster they made to promote the show : the Teletubbies
would lure all little girls and boys of Sokolov to the Velvet
club for sure - smart thinking! We played there with the band
we like to refer to as the Czech Hot Chili Peppers, with an
excellent bassplayer. We played after them, squirting out
our very last drops of sweat, pushing out our last piece of
energy. We had the most fun time ever on stage, in a little
concrete shed at a busstation somewhere in squalid and poor
Sokolov.
22.07.2003
Lost and found in Nove Mesto
The exhausting schedule is starting to break us up a little.
We arrived at Club Mendl in Nove Mesto nad Metuji only to
find out Thijs lost his bag with pretty much everything valuable
that could fit in a bag like that. He forgot to take it with
him after breakfast at McDonalds in Liberec - 300 km from
where we were. Anyway, the impressively competent Czech police
recovered it, so the show in Nove Mesto could continue without
too much stress. The
show was okay, we had a small, young crowd who seemed
to appreciate what we did. It did become very obvious to us
that after 7 shows in a row it becomes pretty hard to keep
your concentration. We took it easy that night, and we were
lucky to get sleeping places and a good shower in the venue.
21.07.2003
Punk in Poland
We woke up at 11:00 after a good long rest. We had some time
to see Prague and watch the breathtaking city. We met Ralfs
mom who happenned to be there at the same time, and we had
lunch together at the Legends bar. That was just what we needed.
That night we would have to play in Sieniawka, Poland, just
across the Czech border. We had quick but tasty dinner at
Pavels house, who guided us to this tiny village, mostly living
of bordertourism. This was going to be a punk show, and boy
did we feel like playing the punk way! The venue was a converted
house with a big backyard, where the 'Dutch' soccerteam proved
unbeatable against
the Polish team that afternoon. We finally got to see Noisession,
a great Weltschmerz-core band who also played with us the
two days before. We had the best time on stage ever. The little
distraction from the Polish beauties made everything perfect.
The rest of the night is history. Ask us later!
20.07.2003
Guru Music Club, Prague
After a weird afterparty at the Kyjovksy Festivalek, we were
woken up by the festival organisation at 08:30. It took a
couple of hours to get over this shock, but we did. We were
a little flabbergasted to see the mess on the festival field,
and people picking up their first beers before 9 AM. We arrived
at Guru Music Club in Prague in the late afternoon, just before
finding out that apart from promotion, nothing was organized.
We were dreaming of playing the ultimate show in Prague, but
there were little people, no food, just enough water, and
most of all, no place to sleep - at first. It was interesting
too see how we managed this little situation as a group -
and with thanks to everyone who helped us out, we had a pretty
okay show and we had a roof to sleep under and some food
in our stomachs. It turned out fine after all, like everything
always seems to turn out fine. Did we mention Pavel is our
hero? Well, Pavel is our hero.
19.07.2003
LioM playing open air festival in Czech Republic
So there we were, all fresh and well-fed people, entering
Czech Republic - eager to dive into new adventures. And adventures
it became! After some searching we found the Kyjovski Festivalek
grounds, right in the middle of nowhere. This festival may
be regarded as the world's best party kept secret in the dark
woods of northern Czech Rep. Like a mini-mini Lowlands it
had everything to offer : many different bands, local food,
toilets, first aid, etc. The bands were good, or at least
weird - when we saw a big fat naked guy playing tuba and thought
we had it all, a guy with no legs or arms (well, maybe one
hand) was lift up stage and started playing guitar with his
metal band. Respect!
We played in the same open truck in front of about 400 people
as the second last band, when
the sun had already set. Obviously the entire crowd was
drunk after a whole day of drinking Gambrinus beer, dancing
on our music. Although it's pretty hard to find out how Czech
people actually feel about something, we like to believe people
liked it. Anyway we went asleep pretty late that night, just
to be kicked out of the house we slept in shortly before nine
that morning. It took some time to power up after that mild
shock, but after shower and breakfast in Rumburk and coffee
in Prague, we are finally waking up now.
18.07.2003
Living for Dresden
Driving to Dresden was quite an adventure. We had a small
carcrash like touring bands are supposed to have. Our driver
Sjoerd was a little bit too focussed on the toy tyrannosaurus
we pasted near the stearing wheel to see the breaklights in
the car in front of us...anyway there's just some minor paint
damage on that car, our van had no damage at all. Took some
time filling in all the paperwork. After a couple of more
traffic jams we arrived at a fantastic place called Riesa
Efau. We had good, beanless food this time, which we felt
as an extremely positive thing after hanging out in our own
gases that day.
We played with local heroes Sonority Subunit, who also organized
the whole thing. They rocked, and we tried to rock as
much as we could too. Think we made some friends over
there! We stayed in a huge appartment, and were pampered like
rockstars! We owe a lot of thanks to the Sonority Subunit
gang.
17.07.2003
Breaking wind in Hamburg
We're getting the hang of touring! We were in Hamburg yesterday,
where we played Fundbureau with local rock'n roll heroes The
Rodeo Five. We had a good
time on stage, though Ralfs throat was starting to ache.
Maybe we gave a little bit too much of ourselves the day before
in Rotterdam. Anyway he's on a tea and honey diet now, so
we hope everything will be fine.
The Fundbureau cook made great chili for us. We will never
forget the amount of gas that left our bodies the day after.
We stayed in a cool appartment with matrasses and a shower.
We would have liked to see more of Hamburg but we had to leave
pretty early to go all the way to Dresden. More on that later!
16.07.2003
Tour starts with a blast in Nighttown main hall
The kickoff for our European tour has been a blast. We opened
up for Nada Surf in the main hall in Nighttown. A
lot of people showed up before we started, and everyone
seemed to be really enthusiastic about the performance. We
admit we were a little nervous about the gig, but the tension
was pretty much gone after the first song. Nada Surf fans
are cool, openminded people and appeared to be good translators
(the translation for Fruit Fly was quite amazing) as well!
We can only hope to have better shows this next week.
15.07.2003
Band and crew getting prepped up
Today is tuesday, and it's time to get prepped up for going
on the road. Roman is picking up the new merchandise, Ralf
is off shopping spare plectrums, cables, strings - and some
food for the journey, hopefully. Thijs just returned from
a relaxing holiday in Spain yesterday night, so he's pretty
busy getting his clothes clean and dry. We heard ticket sales
in Nighttown are going well. Our hearts and minds are filled
with joy and high expectations!
14.07.2003
Jaromer CZ show replaced to Sieniawka PL
We had to make some slight changes in the tourschedule. Our
show in Jaromer (CZ) was cancelled, unfortunately. We will
now perform in Sieniawka (PL), which sounds like good fun
as well!
06.16.2002
Liom supporting Nada Surf in Nighttown
We are excited to announce LioM will be opening act for Nada
Surf on july 16th - which will function as a kick-off for
our European Tour starting the day after. We share the Nighttown
main stage (cap 1500 or so) with a band that we respect very
much (as songwriters as well as an independent band). Tickets
are EUR 12,- and availabe at presale addresses. Be there on
time, because we will start at 21:00 sharp.
26.03.2003
Roman to drive Face Tomorrow around Europe
Our drummer Roman will be driving our homies from Face Tomorrow
around Europe in april. Roman will lead them through pretty
much every European country. Hals und Beinbruch to Face Tomorrow
and Roman! While Roman is arranging shows for our own European
tour, the remaining members will continue working on a whole
bunch of projects.
21.01.2003
LioM to tour Europe this summer
The LioM boys are going to have a swell vacation this summer.
This vacation goes to the heart of Europe, where we will rock
out festivals, basements and tiny bars. Or at least, we got
a couple confirmed gigs for Czech Republic. Our gentle throats
will be soothened by the wonderful beers...so visit the tourpage,
and help us out for the bunch of shows we still need to make
this thing worthwile. Wow. |
