Doc's diary and Frenzal Rhomb blog
Entry 09
2001-10-19
Well good afternoon to all of you lovely readers out there.And welcome to one more gripping edition of Frenzal's tour diary le Europe. Today we'll be discussing Switzerland, and the effect of strong beer on young gentlemen whilst there; Frenzal Rhomb's triumphant return to Germany will also be dealt with. And we'll also have a chat about an anomaly in the land of Frenzal - the rare day off.
Went to Switzerland, played, got drunk. Went to Stuttgart, played, got drunk, went to Essen, had a day off, got drunk. Played show in Essen, got drunk.
Sorry for the brevity, but I'm having a little trouble remembering details. More news as it comes to hand, or mind.
Lindsay
Entry 08
2001-10-18
Okay gang, it's Lindsay back again, this time with tales from the fabled land Italia. We did 4 shows there Milan, Pinarella, Senigalia and Cuneo, the last two shows supporting Spanish cabaret-ska joke of a band, Ska-P, but more about them later.
I spent most of the first day walking around Milan with Nissim, Useless I.D's merch guy, doobie-roller and all-round great partymaker. It's a pretty fucking nice looking place, lots of old buildings and young ladies and gentlemen. And of course pigeons, heaps of fucking pigeons. Except here in Milano, they haven't been relegated to the role of winged-vermin, instead they are quite the tourist attraction. These guys run around handing everyone, including us, bags of corn to lure the pigeons all over our bodies for happy snaps, and then charging 5000 lire for the priviledge (don't have a heart attack though, 5000 lire is only about 5 aussie bucks). Once again, pics are coming soon, scouts honour.
Upon arriving at the club we met up with our old friend, promoter-extrordinairre Sergio. We met him last time over here with Less Than Jake, as he made us feel very much at home, and also tried to sell us every drug under the sun. As strange man, big on heart and promises, but a little smaller on delivery, he nevertheless welcomed us back again like lost children. Another intimate show today, but Sergio promised that it would only get better.
And he wasn't wrong either. Pinarella, a seaside tourist mecca in the summer, a freezing ghost town when we were there, came alive that night, hundreds of rock 'n' rollers coming out for their dose of Israeli, US, and Aussie punk rock. A very fun show, and party time in Club le Flap afterwards. rock, booze, and vomit were the winners that night my friends, we even set a new record for the capacity of our back lounge nightclub, 27 people cramming into a space meant for 4. But even that wasn't enough for the Americans, who decided they had to get the full Italiano seaside experience and go for a midnight dip in sub-fucking-zero temperatures. Good for them, I went to bed. The next day was Senigalia, and our first show with Ska-P. Now, where do I begin. A three hour sound check? That's a little much I feel. A Keyboard riser? I mean really. Only TISM can get away with that. But it wasn't until we saw the show that it became apparent how much of a joke it all was. Costume changes, lame-arsed cabaret ska that made even the wiggles seem deep and important. It all seemed just that little bit contrived. They'd also been advertising the show as starting at 10:30, which was just before they went on, which didn't help our opinion of them. Nevertheless, got very drunk and enjoyed ouselves.
Ditto for the next night. Lots of booze, a crap headlining band and much fun to be had at their expense. And that was it for Italia. All in all a bucketload of fun, and it'll be great to get back there.
Once again, I promise to get some photos to you soon. You've got to admit, trusting me with any sort of technology is a bit of a bad gamble at the best of times.
Talk to you all soon, All my love, Lindsay.
And remember - trust me, I'm a doctor
Entry 07
2001-10-17
Good evening there kids, come gather round the fire while Uncle Lindsay tells you a story. This story begins in Hamburg Germany, stop #6 on our world conquering tour of Europlace.
There was unrest afoot today, things stirring on the streets of Hamburg. Everywhere we walked there seemed to be police congregating, setting up barricades and doing all manner of police-style things, and looking rather tough and yet handsome in the process. Upon our first query, they told us that it was some sort of remembrance day for world war 2 today, and there were some people who opposed the day, and rioted in this opposition, hence the police presence. But we couldn't work out which side was which. Was it a day of mourning for the Holocaust which was being rebelled against by Nazis? Or a day of saluting the heroes of the war, and coming under fire by anti-nazi protesters. In short, who were the goodies and who were the baddies. Well it all became very clear once it all started up. Tons of punk rock kids, anarchists and suchlike were running around the perimeter of the police fence shouting and chanting, loosely translated as "Fuck off you nazi racist arseholes", or something to that effect. It was a pretty amazing feeling to be in the middle of all of this, and we got some tops photos, which hopefully you'll all get to see soon, if I can find an accommodating internet cafe.
The Show was tops, everyone got drunk (well, almost everyone) and we pissed off to Berlin for the next show. Berlin was wonderful, the beautiful people at Fat Wreck treated us as kings, plying us with the strongest, most hallucinatory coffee I've ever had, as well as arseloads of CD's to hock for crack once we get home. The show was a rather intimate affair, but all was well and everyone had a ball, and off we set for Munich.
Deep in the heart of Bavaria, the Munich show was fucking tops! Much Jagermeister was consumed and we even had some old friends drop in, namely the guitarist of Gordy's first ever band, the decidedly metal Desecrate. A very humourous affair, much nudity and funny litle asides about the Germans penchant for eating their own poos. We're really going to have to make another full length video sometime, so you can all share the mirth.
That's it for Germany for a while, we're giving them a break for a few days while we explore Italy and Switzerland. But more on that later on. Sleep well my friends, and I shall talk to youi again very soon.
And remember - trust me, I'm a doctor
Entry 06
2001-10-16
Well hello there you wonderful and universally attractive people. And welcome to another update from the crazy, zany (and a little bit kooky) world of Frenzal Rhomb in Eurotown. Obviously I've been very lazy with this, and I'm writing about things that happened over a week ago, so my apologies if this true-to-life chronicle descends into the nadir of ill-remembered stories and outright lies.
Our second show in the Netherlands was in Snaek, and we awoke to find ourselves in the middle of a sleepy, quiet, and freezing little canal-riddled town. Sleepy and quiet that is, except for one particular person. We had just opened the door of our bus and looked out to the startled and annoyed faces of a few passing bicyclists when a crazy local jumped on the bus, screaming deliriously in her local tongue. Apparently she was the town crazy, and kept us entertained for whole minutes as she rambled on about not being crazy, being crazy, not having any family and friends, having two kids and lots of friends... and hitting her head on the ceiling. Don't worry, it's all on video, and I'm sure you'll one day all be treated to it.
The show itself was billed as a festival, by that they meant 4 bands were playing, instead of just us 3. Can't quite remember the name of the first band, as the heinekens had kinda got to me by that early stage, but I'm sure they were tremendous. Once again a bunch of people turned up, and everyone played above par. We also introduced a new friend of ours; Mr Hernando Hernandez, who graced us with his presence on stage to sing the beginning of Never Had So Much Fun. Many thanks to him for his continued support, and we're sure he'll rear his head again somewhere on the tour. Video footage of his moment of glory will I'm sure be available to view very soon.
Well that was Holland, Tomorrow we explore the wondrous land of Germania.
Cheers to all, Lindsay Frenzales.
Entry 05
2001-10-15
Hey there kids. Well, it´s finally happened, we´ve hit the skids. 5 days without a diary update. Well you can stick it up your collective arse. I´ve been busy. And besides, it´s pretty hard to find a computer when your in the middle of nowhere in a country that you´ve been too stupid to try and learn the language of. But in any case, here I am, at your service as always, and I will try to remember back far enough to chronical the last few days with some accuracy. I apologise for any slander, innuendo and outright lies that make it into this entry.
So we madeour triumphant return to London. Well, highbury really, but I think it´s near london, full of poms and stuff. The show was sold out, and we sold 1400 pounds of merch, which is about 40000 aussie dollars the way things are going these days. A bloody fun show too, heaps of cunts stagediving, including myself. It was an important show tonight, because the boss had sent his spy, the lovely Nanette from Fat Wreck Berlin to make sure we were doing him proud.
We were also blessed tonight with a deluge of friends and acquaintances. Kym and Stamma from our beloved hometown of Newtown, Gordy´s old bandmate James and his collection of Gold-coastal chums, and our very good friends Kaffryn, Lil and Al from Household Name records who had brought along the young upstanding English citizens from Lightyear, who were in charge of backstage hygiene and decorum. After the show Jason walked backstage to find them hard at work tidying up in their own special way, which incuded replacing all the cups of beer with their own piss. Jason didn´t see the usefulness of this and doused one of the young scallywags in a cup of his own man-beer. Well that was the beginning of the end for Jason, who very soon found himself being chased around the club by 5 drunken and very nude englishmen brandishing cups of piss. Jason ran to the bathroom, no doubt to load up some return-fire, leaving the boys of lightyear standing poised (and rather de-clothed) in the middle of the cocktail bar next door, full of well-dressed businessmen sipping margheritas. A sight to behold. Although none of us had quite the foresight to take photos.
The bus raced through the night, across the English channel by Ferry, and through France, through Belgium, and finally to rest in Tilburg, in the heart of the Netherlands. Actually, I´ve got no idea if Tilburg´s in the heart or not, it just sounded nice. Obviously before Bob, our heroic driver could even pull the bus to a complete halt, some of the more curious-minded in the entourage had raced off to find those ´special cafe's´that serve coffee and those ´special cigarettes. The gig itself was in this massive place that was playing host to three different events on the night. Us in the middle room, a band comp in the small room and a massive drum +bass+ecstasy party in the massive room. Backstage was the stuff dreams are made of, as long as those dreams involve clean showers, hot dinners and enough booze to choke a horse, or in this case, 6 Aussies, 5 Israelis and about 8 Americunts. The show was bloody tops, everyone having themselves a real ripper of a ball, I ended up on top of halfd the cunts with my guitar still around my neck, playing something that hopefully sounded like the end of "Get fucked you fucking fuckwit".
After the show we of course had no choice but to mix ourselves novelty oversized vodka and oranges and make ourselves known to the dance party. Hundreds of wonderful people, all in various stages of chewing their faces off, dancing like dickheads. We offered nothing different in the dancing stakes, although I had to go back to my bunk when I had a little bit of trouble focussing on all the handsome young Netherlandinese. But the party continued on for the various bands, culminating in an impromptu dance party in Club le Flap, a fair amount of which is on video which I'm sure you will all one day see.
Okay, enough for now, but much more to come when I can be bothered blessing ýou lovely people with more tales of mischief, mayhem and maelstrom from this tremendous part of the world.
Your humble and courteous messenger boy,
Lindsay Frenzal