Day 2...1st Show: Bordeaux

We wake to baguettes and warmth, search for and thankfully find our blessed van, then take France’s smooth & sometimes white (but always expensive) highways to Bordeaux. Our beloved gadget the ‘sat nav’ gets us to 'La Politique' safely and without error. We are greeted with sunshine, smiles and cool beer in green bottles. My vagueness is still with me and I awkwardly attempt to introduce myself and the band in broken french. Though everything is lighter in the sun, and to have arrived to such kind people, in such stunning surroundings is a beautiful thing.



The venue is a sifty bar/ 2nd hand clothes store with a stage and a couple of washing machines. La Politique is run as a collective, not for profit, by members of local bands (look up: Miniscule Hey, Good old days, Kid Bombardos). We pack in and sound check. Sweet. Then the call for food is heard and we experience our first taste of how bands are treated in Europe. Food? Homemade? Fuck yeah… It really was a great scene.




The weather is beautiful and we play some frisbee in the plaza. Where are you now? Super spinning yellow frisbee of joy?

We perform first due to sound restrictions later on, and although I am still feeling effects of fiendishness two nights prior, we play a pretty good show. It is a small, but receptive crowd who make us feel pretty good about ourselves. Merci. Monsiuer Botibol, a solo acoustic act, follows us with some cool shit. He uses a loop machine and a glockenspiel to great effect. Bien jouer!



Joe and Ian are all about the party and continue to an ‘indie night’ with M. Botibal’s manager. The rest of slowly sip Bordeaux reds at the venue before we all do a mission to ‘Miniscule Hey’s Flat. The French people continue to crank in the kitchen as we commandeer their lounge for the purpose of much needed repose. An early start and another long journey awaits us in the morning…