TAMWORTH 2009

The Distance rocking out in theDiggers courtyard

Well the power has finally come back on - so now I can sit here and tell you all about our monster trip to the Tamworth CMF. I thought I'd come back home to some normal Victorian summer weather, and escape the Tamworth heat - instead I'd rather be back up in Tamworth to escape the 45 degree heat we have been getting down here!! The power outtage has been a good chance to get some sleep rather than sitting here writing my usual BLOG after a few hours sleep. Anyone who has ever been to the festival would know it really takes it out of you, and you need a few days to catch up. But of course it's well and truely worth it!

Speaking of tired - our crazy bassman Jim worked right through the night on the day we were due to leave to drive up there. No sleep - got home, grabbed his bag and jumped in the car for a lazy 16 hour drive up north, departing at 5am! Ouch! I'm sure you got lots of sleep Jim, with Rob chatting away on the 2 way radio all the way up there (who gave that radio to Rob anyway!!!).

Friday 16th Jan: Our 1st show was a 5pm gig in the Diggers courtyard.We had a bumper crowd packed in the venue for our very 1st show - it was unreal. We always love playing at Diggers and it was great to know we had two more shows there over the course of the festival. What a way to kick of the festival. There was one funny incident during our 2nd set - a fire alarm went off. "Evacuate the building NOW!". Before we knew it we were all standing out the front of the venue watching fire trucks roll up.

Bec reasurring the police that everything is ok

So the fireman went in to find that it was a false alarm. I'm sure if we thought it was real, you would have seen 5 blokes climbing over the roof of the pub to get their musical instruments out before the place burnt down.

Before I go any further I have to tell you all - A whole bunch of our close friends had flown up to be with us for the first few days of our campaign. Pretty darn special effort to come all that way to support us. Thankyou to Lee, Marie, Whitey and Wade for making our trip so much more memorable. We did the right thing by showing them a few of the sights and sounds of the town, (well I think most of them had seen it all before, but we had to make sure). Here is a pic of some the crew......

Wade, Lee, Gav, Mitch, Rob, Whitey, Marie

Note to Mark White - Whitey I have chosen to NOT put up the lovely photo's of you (and me) on the night before you left for home. They will of course come back to haunt you at a later stage (now go and rip someone a new $#%)........

Saturday 17th Jan: Our next show was at the Courthouse Hotel - 10pm till 1am - in the front bar. Not sure where to start to describe this show. Gav grew extra throat muscles for this one - it was just one of those nights. I think after we walked off stage at the end of the night we might have rated it as our best show ever!! Big call - but man it had to be right up there. The crowd went right off. Highlight of the night (other than hearing Gav sing 'Hollywood nights' like a man possesed), was to see our video clip for 'comin on fast' appear on the big TV's in the pub while we were on stage!! This show will go down in Distance folklaw.

Rocking the Courthouse!

Quote of the day: "Chip, I'm gonna come at you like a spider monkey!"

Sunday 18th Jan: Another late slot (10pm till 1am), but this time at the Services Club. I think we were starting to feel the effects of the last few nights gigs and the heat. It's hard to keep a lid on the fun and still keep the energy levels up, - being in party town central, it's a fine line between pleasure and pain. The money the alcohol companies must spend on advertising and promotion would be able to fund a US election campaign. Its just in your face every way you turn! But with Andy Gibb looking on we knew we would rise to the occassion...........Ok it wasn't really Andy Gibb or any Gibb or Bee Gee, but this guy did look like one of them - at least according to Gav! Anyway I wish I had taken a pic of that guy. Would have been great to support my story. I think most of pics from that night are pretty crap (Rowdy if you have any please pass them on) so instead I'll show you all a random picture of our friend Wade sleeping on the couch. He was tired.........

Monday 19th Jan: Now it started to feel like the festival was really starting. The road blocks were in place and the main street was starting to really fill up. Joe Maguires is a magnicient venue to say the least. I loved the feeling of playing to an audience that is in front of you and behind you. I think we had all wanted to play that stage since we first set foot in the place about 3 years ago. We had a great crowd turn up to see us play, and it was great to see people singing along to the songs they had been seeing on CMC. Here is a few pics of us playing..........

Playing at Joe Maguire's

Quote of the day: "Yeah Chip, I love the way they're talkin to you. Cuz they're winners. And winners get to do what they want. Hell, you're just a bag of bones. The only thing you ever done with your life is make a hot daughter. And that's it. That's it. That is it!"

Tuesday 20th Jan: Today we were playing at the Imperial, and also the TIARA awards were on at the same time. Unfortunately we were unable to attend due to the time slot of our show. Oh and Congrats to Jetty Road who won the 'best band' award. The Imperial Hotel has a massive stage - so it was great fun to jump up there. We converted a good bunch of people to the sounds of The Distance that night. Daz especially loved those lights right on his back all night - damn it was hot up there!

Imperial Hotel stage

Wednesday 21st Jan: Well Gav's throat hit the wall. Literally. Actually I think we found it cowering under the stage after our show at the Imperial hotel. After being sick for two weeks leading up to the festival it was always going to be a really tough ask to play all those 3 hour shows every day. So it needed a rest - big time. So we had to unfortunately cancell our show at Joe Maguires that night. Gav bought the local health food shop out of everything they owned. He even spoke to the Shaman master of vocals Kevin Bennett (the Flood) who told Gav some ancient mystical vocal secrets (basically said to stop talking!!!). So that was it - everytime Gav went to speak we'd give him the "shhhhhhh". Here is a few pics of us supporting Gav drinking his water......

Quote of the day: "I like to picture my Jesus in a tuxedo t-shirt, cuz it says, Hey I'm formal, but I like to party. I like my Jesus to party."

Thursday 22nd Jan: We were now deep into the festival. And today we had a show at one of the most rockin venues in town 'The Albert'. We were playing in the big marquee area out the back which was always going to be great. Today we sold our souls to the all mighty and powerful Mr.Jim Beam. Yes the marketing machine that is the Jim Beam girls came in and stole the show. Not only did they get the band to wear all their very fashionable Jim Beam hats, but they jumped on stage to pose with guitars and drums. If you walk around the bars of Tamworth during the festival its hard to not come across the promo girls. There are VB, Cougar, Bundy and Jim Beam girls in small posse's everywhere. When they come accross each other everyone runs for cover as a giant ninja cat fight errupts with samuri swords and nun-chucka's flying everywhere. Well that's what I like to think. I think the pics tell the whole story............

The Jim Beam boys rockin the Albert

Quote of the day: "What you lookin at old man, I aint no can of Jim Beam"

Friday 23rd Jan: Today we had been booked to play a show down the road at the Gunnedah services club. We had played the services club when we came up a few years back. Highlight of the night was our foray into Jazz Rap. I think you had to be there...........

Quote of the day: "I like to think of Jesus like a ninja, fightin' off evil samurai".

Saturday 24th Jan:  Back at the Diggers courtyard. Huge crowd. Gav's throat just getting better with everyshow after the night off. Well with that and a new special friend we like to call 'sweet sherry'. Nice girl that Sherry, can't thank her enough for getting us through the festival. Pretty crazy gal, you dont want to hang with her too much as things just get all crazy and funky. The type of crazy where your clothes come off real easy and you no longer speak english. So we made sure she only stayed for a little while each day (usually just the 1st set).

Here are a few pics from our 2nd show at Diggers.........

Sunday 25th Jan: And today we had another fantastic show at Joe Maguires. This time we had the added bonus of our friend John Kendall up on stage with us all night to play his fiddle and mandolin. John played on our latest record so he is no stranger to our stuff and just played along to anything we threw at him. Thankyou John we had a ball. Well not sure what he thought of us after having to sit for 14 hours in the back seat of our car for the trip home, but we got him back in one piece (thanks to many cans of Red Bull and tablets of 'no-doze'!)

Jim, Daz, Gav, John and Mitch (Rob is hiding!!)

Quote of the day: " I like to picture Jesus with giant eagles wings and singing lead vocals for Lynyrd Skynyrd, and i'm in the front row and i'm hammered drunk"

Monday 26th Jan: Last day of the massive campaign. We played at Diggers. But instead of showing you all pics of us on stage that you have already seen 100 million times - here are some random pics from our trip........

Quote of the day: "Dear Lord Baby Jesus, we'd also like to thank you for my wife’s father Chip. We hope that you can use your baby Jesus powers to heal him and his horrible leg. It smells terrible and the dogs are always bothering with it..."

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Disclaimer (for Baz): if you see a pic of a band member holding a drink, rest assured that photo was not taken before, not during, but after the show!!!

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