European tour diary thingie

Eurotunnel crossing. We went on a cargo train. All the lorry drivers were very amused, especially when Jona started taking photos.

Spot and Bob packing up merchandise at Southern, before we set off for Europe.

Beki helping Jona organise all the t-shirts for the tour.

Spike really got into the spirt of the tour and carved a Crass symbol on his head!

Filed under: Photos, The Last Supper

Belated thanks

Edinburgh. Thanks to Dod for the photo.

For the last nine days I have been trying to write a blog and putting into words how I felt when I performed the Crass songs again at The Last Supper in Bristol, Birmingham, Manchester and Edinburgh.

I am overwhelmed by the support and positivity of everyone that was there. The atmosphere was fantastic, the songs still powerful. It was truly an amazing experience and the band and I really enjoyed it.

I would like to thank you all for coming to the gigs, taking part, spreading the word and above all joining in the celebration of Crass.

I also would like to thank Beki, Bob, Gizz and Spike for all their hard work and their dedication. Thank you to Nathan and Helga for working non-stop doing the merch. Thank you to John and Jon for promoting it and looking after us so well. Thank you to Jona for always being there in the background and last but not least a special thank you to Allison, for believing in me, listening to my ideas about The Last Supper and making it a reality.

Filed under: Photos, The Last Supper

The Last Supper – Birmingham Photo Gallery

Hi all, This is Damon from Southern Records. Thanks to our good friend Tony who did some dogsitting for us, I was able to go to The Last Supper at Birmingham and take these photos. I hope you like them!

Sorry you have to click twice to get to the large web images. I'm looking into fixing that.

Filed under: Photos, The Last Supper

Photo from The Last Supper in Birmingham

Gizz, Steve, Beki, Spike, Bob. Click to enlarge.

Live radio interview tonight

I'm being interviewed by Peter Jones from Paranoid Visions tonight, live on www.nearfm.ie, you can tune in on the internet I'm told (just don't ask me how to do it). Show runs from 10.30 and 11.30 tonight. Listen in if you've got the time.

Meanwhile, for no good reason at all, here's a photo of me and Beki in Peterborough, waiting in the car before the final rehearsals we did there.

Cheers

Steve.

Show time!

Folks have been asking what time we're on and that so I thought I'd post all the details here.  The shows are all early, apparently venues these days put a second show on later (well, not a show, but a disco) so the live entertainment ends early.  Hope you all can get there early enough to see Goldblade or Paranoid Visions as well.  I'll be wandering about for the first hour or so after the doors open, so come up and say hello!

Friday 24th September Bristol O2 Academy

  • doors 7pm
  • 7:30 Goldblade
  • 8:30 The Last Supper
  • curfew 10pm

Saturday 25th September Birmingham O2 Academy

  • doors 7pm
  • 7:30 Goldblade
  • 8:30 The Last Supper
  • curfew 10pm

Friday 1st October Manchester O2 Academy

  • doors 7pm
  • 7:55 Paranoid Visions
  • 9:00 The Last Supper
  • curfew 10:30pm

Saturday 2nd October Ediburgh Liquid Room

  • doors 7pm
  • 7:30 Goldblade
  • 8:30 The Last Supper
  • curfew 10pm

Working on the set list with the band.

We are full of nervous excitement and really looking forward to it. Finally got round to get the photos on the computer. After our last rehearsals at Southern on the 8th September we sat down to sort out the set, while munching on veggie hotdogs. As you can see from the photos it was a real team effort and I honestly couldn't have done it on my own. Thanks Bob, Gizz, Beki and Spike for all your hard work.  We now have a great set list and are ready to go. (Though we did make some minor adjustments again when we were in Peterborough).

So bring it on.

Steve.

Lots of chin scratching going on.

Just a few days to go

Just a few days to go before The Last Supper tour starts.  Here's an interview I did with Manchester's Under The Pavement radio show.  Peter Jones from Paranoid Visions, who we are playing with in Manchester and Dublin, is also interviewed.

And a new photo of the band.  The pose might remind you of something?

Edit: just been told off for not introducing the band... sorry I did that elsewhere but it's certainly worth doing again.

Gizz Butt on guitar, Beki Straughan on vocals, me, Bob Butler on bass and Spike T. Smith on drums.

Thanks,

Steve.

Wanted

Filed under: The Last Supper

Rehearsals at Southern

Anyone who tells you being in a band isn't hard work, send them to see me.

Me, Bob and Beki working away.

Spike, he's the drummer. Hence the drumkit.

Gizz has got the songs all worked out.

Beki, Bob and Gizz have been working really hard. We all have!

Time for a lunch break. I'm off having a fag.

The mixing desk at Southern, where all the original Crass albums were recorded.

This is the wall outside the studio at Southern, I remember sitting here while we were recording Feeding.

Thanks to Jona for the photos.

Later,

Steve

What I’ve been up to

Right, I know it’s been ages since I last wrote anything but things have been really busy for the last couple of months.

It all kicked off with our first rehearsal which we were all really nervous about, but which went really well. Everyone had been working really bloody hard on the songs and I think it all went easier than we all thought it would be. There’s a lot of pressure riding on this Last Supper, we’re all acutely aware that we’ve got to get it spot on, and that can make you become over – perfectionist, if there’s any such word. (Can’t be arsed to look it up). Any way it all sounded bloody good to me, and contrary to Gizz’s worries, it sounds better with just Lead and Bass guitars. I’m not sure we’ll be doing Nagasaki Nightmare because it’s really sort of avant-gardy jazzy, fine on record but do it live and it sounds really empty, and we don’t want to cheat by using loads of sound effects and that. Also Beki was concerned about doing Eve’s “ying-tong-iddle-i-po” bits and I can’t say I blame her, I mean, couldn’t that be seen as a bit of stereotyping these days? Anyway we’ll give it a go, but don’t be disappointed if we don’t do that one - it won’t be for lack of trying.

It’s always really strange for me when we rehearse at Southern; singing the Crass songs in the room where they were recorded always sends a goose walking over my grave; I always half expect John Loder to pop his head round the door and with that toothy smile of his tell me to do it again. I don’t half miss him. Ah well no point getting all droopyfied about it.

A couple of weeks after that Andy T. came to see me which was really nice, I ain’t seen him for twenty-odd years, so of course we had to go to the pub for a catch-up session. We’d literally just had a couple of mouthfuls when my pager went off and I had to leave him there while I pelted up the boatshed. We had to rescue three blokes who’d gone swimming and couldn’t make it back because of the tide. Luckily a bloke on a kayak went out to them so they had something to hang onto but two of them were suffering from the first stages of hypothermia and when we got them into the boat they were shaking with cold and shock. Anyway we got them back safe, the paramedics came and everything was alright. Then I went back down the pub and carried on talking with Andy. It wasn’t till about half-hour later MY adrenalin kicked in and I got all hyper, and Andy mate, I’m sorry if I went on about it too much, but it was a weird thing to happen. Anyway that incident opened the floodgates and so far this year we’ve had 9 shouts and it’s not even the height of season yet.

So with all this dobby feeling inside me, it was off to London to go to a meeting with all the ex members of Crass (except Andy Palmer) to try and come to some arrangement about these re-releases. I was nervous, but feeling good, a nice sunny day, and looking forward to a good rational discussion of how to come to some agreement of how we can progress. Not a chance.

The same old, same old bullshit and bollocks that gets no-one anywhere but wound up and motherfucker was I wound up looking at a particular supercilious smirk which signified to me that the face concerned saw or sees this whole painful mess as some sort of sick joke or game. I’ve got the trembles as I write this. Fucking wanker pissing all over something really important to me and I’ve just gotta sit and swallow. The End. Result? Stalemate. Three of them don’t want the stuff released, and even if they did they would’nt want it to go through Southern, you know, the studio and label that helped us all the way. You know what, I hate to say it, but I’m ashamed to have had anything to do with certain twats I’ve known. One of them said if downloading was the only way people could get hold of Crass stuff then so be it. Nice, ay?

So you could say it didn’t go too well. I went home thinking fuck’em, I’ve had it with them, don’t want nothing to do with them anymore.

Couple of days later I walk in the pub and order a pint. The young bloke beside me with his back to me says “hello Steve, how are you?” and I’m about to say fucking awful when I see it’s James who’s been blind from birth and who has a photographic memory for voices. So instead I say I’m doing alright and he turns and goes on to tell me how he’s been listening to Crass and been liking some of it but not all because he can’t get all the words, and what was it like being ‘famous’ and it must have been exciting being in Crass and I must be really proud of it, and he’d like to come to one of the gigs and I said of course you fucking can and he got the joke and suddenly he pulled me to him and felt all over my face while he was talking and I suddenly had this brilliant thought which was yeah, Fuck ‘em. I know who I’d rather stand next to having a beer and it ain’t no poncified pillocks. It’s people who, without knowing it, knock you off your self indulgent, self-important perch and inspire you to do something, whatever that may be. Anyway after he’d finished feeling my face - he spent a moment or two feeling my ears as well - James said “I’ve been wondering what you look like” and I said what d’you reckon and he goes “you look like your music sounds”. The little sod. And he didn’t buy me a pint - so much for being ‘famous’ eh?

The last bit of news is I’ve been working on my autobiography with a mate of mine and it’s finished, so hopefully it’ll be out by the tour. Some skeletons being rattled in that little cupboard. Libel court here we come.

On a final note, I can’t reply to all the messages sent to me on Facebook, I’m sorry about that, but if I answered every one I’d be on this bloody keyboard for ever, so don’t think I’m ignoring you. But there are a couple I must mention here:

Steve Power, yes I remember you, didn’t you know Lu Vuckovitch? And Steve have you got any photos from Triptons/Robert Clack? If you have I’d love to see them.

Carol Greene and Cherise. Hello sis, thanks for the photo of the pub mum used to play piano in at Stoke, but I dunno if I can use it in the book due to copyright. I’ll try to get down to Barking for a catch up before the tour starts, but don’t hold your breath, rehearsals and that. All my love to you and yours. I’ll call soon.

I won’t leave it so long before I spill my guts on here again, thanks ever so much for all your messages, please keep them coming, I really enjoy them.
Till next time,
Steve.