TELAFONICA

i've put an mp3 of the demo for nothing ventured up on our virb site. it's the long version - i edited a version down to just over 4 minutes which is what has been played over the last couple of weeks on fbi and 2ser. obviously this is still in the development stage, but i think the foundations are all there. david and celli, you might recognise the actual song, i've tried it in a number of guises over the years, but i'm pretty sure you'll agree that this one actually works!

i am going to tell you what to listen to in a blog. (www.myspace.com/visitthemiddleeast) 'the darkest side' is one of my very favourite songs at the moment.  It is by 'the middle east'. another of my very favourite artists is tazio and boy. they are from france. and they are wonderful. soy un caballo are from Belgium and are also currently one of my most attracting musical forces. all readers are now obliged to recognise the greatness of these music-creators. thankyou. p.s. obviously, none of them come near to the quality of music produced by telafonica.

so telafonica can now truly be called a multi-media act - covering everything from cutting edge electronics to downhome diy handcrafts. if anyone is interested in buying one, please make contact - very attractive terms can be worked out!

i got a copy of this is the new thing that we did on departure lounge from trevor - i'm trying to work out where i can post it (hopefully on here somewhere). doesn't sound too bad at all (though the male singer is too loud!). i have pretty much got a close to final mix of everything for the new album. having listened back to them over the weekend, there's still a few things i'd like to fine tune, but it's pretty close. i'll post them all up on archive.org in the next couple of days. cell and david, can you listen through with a fine tooth comb. and we still need to work out a track order. i've played around with sitting blending the edges right up as the second track, and it seems to work ok. it gives it a lot more energy. my only reservation might be that it a bit much having an 8 minute, mostly instrumental minimalist track starting the album, but i think it might work. if this is the new thing comes right after it (with the rain sounds as well) i...

so we've come across a problem. i've spoken to the booker at the excelsior, and there isn't actually anyway around the licensing laws that the venue comes under - under 18s just aren't allowed in after 8pm, regardless of what guardian etc might be with them. so we are going to have to wing it without you, blake. that also puts a significant hole in plans for the new track - think you can learn it, steve? we definitely need guitar in manifesto dub, and nothing ventured. the others we can work around in one way or other - whether steve plays something or we use the pre-recorded bits sequenced in (eg one and one, send away). i guess we'll have to play around with it at rehearsal. the proposed set list is: one and one send away for the manifesto dub blending the edges this is the new thing smells like rain your hands nothing ventured

just for my own memory's sake (for filling out apra documentation later) - the set list from saturday week ago... one and one gem for the manifesto dub blending the edges send away this is the new thing smells like rain your hands another gig to add to the calender - this will be the first post steve. it's on friday, august 22 and happens at a night called mum which happens at the world bar, kings cross (http://www.myspace.com/loveyourmum) . what to do without steve is an interesting conundrum. i think i've run out of friends with a vaguely similar interest in music who would also be happy to twiddle knobs on electronic instruments. if anyone has any ideas, speak up! i've considered the possibility of not replacing steve at all and to spread some of the load around the rest - for example, perhaps bec could control the changes to the fx units which i currently look after, freeing me to do computer stuff. if that was then cut back a bit from what steve is doing, then...

well, last night went fairly well, i thought. as ever, performing felt tentative, but there was enough there that i thought it can be worked on. having instruments doing things helped give more visual interest and, by all accounts, steve's film was a great hit. i particularly enjoyed the chorus of voices, and felt i personally that i was able to sing more confidently than i often do. it would be nice to know how the levels of the voices versus the level of the music was out front - we sent them out separately to front of house and i relied on victoria to mix them at the main desk. hopefully problems of the voices being too loud relative to the music were overcome in this way, but it would be good to hear from someone in the audience to know exactly. i would definitely like to see the film of it - steve? any thoughts from anyone else would be excellent. i got a phone call this evening from trevor who hosts departure lounge radio on a saturday afternoon on 2ser. he has invite...

i'm quite excited - find a venue, ask for a show, then send e-mails to people who are your musical heroes and ask them if they want to play with you. the great things is, most of them say 'yes', and if they don't, they're really polite and enthusiastic and give you a good reason and then say to ask them again down the track. so i asked a handful of folks about our show at dirty shirlows in june, and so far meem has said yes, and also the e.l.f., who is darren from gerling in his solo guise. not quite sure how telafonica will go down in that company, but i think it will work. and for me, it's a killer line-up that i'm very proud to be part of!