I'm in the desert. The Qatari desert to be precise. In a flat - all on my lonesome. The flat belongs to my older brother who flies buses. Airbuses to be precise. In fact he's flying one now to Moscow and has left me on my lonesome in his flat in Doha. A strange part of the world. A city that seems to constantly be in rubble. Rubble surrounded by 6km shopping malls and crawling with cars bigger than minibuses and gas stations which don't even need to list the prices of gas because gas is so dirt cheap out here. There's no culture here that particularly excites me. I'm bored. I don't have a guitar and I've been singing into the voice recorder on my phone and the poor quality on the playback is making me trash things as quickly as I record them.
I haven't blogged in a while because life has been too fast and exciting to actually sit down and write about it. I've had two bouts of flu. But more importantly, since October, I've recorded a new album. An album that I enjoy listening to. The guitar sounds real and loud (I had two cabs - 6 speaker cones in total) - my effects pedalboard was steaming after each session and my fingers are still raw. The vocals are more mature, a bit thicker and more voluminous - it's been a long hard slog these 3 years on the road and in the studio, but I feel like I've come on musically in ways that I hadn't realised. I feel like I'm in a band, and I love being in a band. A proper band. Where if one member is ill or unavailable -we cancel the show. There's no dep players. No compromising and doing the gig acoustic with just Howey and myself or solo. We have a sound. A collective sound. A sound that needs to be right every time. The album we've layed down really celebrates this sound.
Ok I've just read the last paragraph back to myself and it sounds like I'm trying massively hard to big up the new album - I'm not, I'm just in love. New love - you always talk too much about it to people who don't wanna hear about it. The last song you write is always the best one - probably because you haven't played and heard it to death yet (insert ranting about 'Taxi Man' here). I'm excited. And the previous paragraph is probably the reason why I've stayed off the blogging for so long - cuz I was scared I'd just channel my teenage excitement into every word and put off the serious readers among you. The music is new. It celebrates the rhythm section. The beats are creative but steady. I'm a geniune sucker these days for monotonous and creative 'tom-heavy' beats. I find I can play and sing over them with more freedom. I'm listening to Neu! at the moment actually - completely by coincidence. 'Can' still features heavily in my playlists as do the Banshees. My lyrics book is filling up. I'm a happy girl. Something has opened up within me and it's spilling out all over the place (metaphorically guys...).
Right. This blog has probably told you everything and nothing at the same time. I'm still everywhere and nowhere. I'm off to the homeland of India tomorrow to hang with my rents and my grand rents. Next year is gonna be a big one. I might actually learn to write as things happen...
Till then,
Nicky x
