The bus took us up into the hills of Dornbirn – after our immensely Austrian day off – to a venue off the radar… out in the forest lives a rock venue… over a little bridge over a babbling river where trolls almost certainly used to live… seriously kinda out-there place – a wrecked but vibey piece of rock history – Conrad Sohm’s graffiti in the backstage is like a roll call of bands who have toured Austria… it was really cold, like really really cold now – and we huddled backstage in between soundcheck business to stay warm… the glorious Austrian hospitality continued unabaited – it was a lovely gig – at these old school venues it’s really nice to have some old material to lean on that’s a bit more raucous, born from hundreds of these kinda survivial gigs, to play… after the show, as the rock bus couldn’t come over the troll bridge, we had to drag the trailer to the bus by hand in the middle of the night… on the left of us, a sheer drop into a running river – with the bus pointing uphill – all hands on deck – we unpacked the whole thing – pushed it into place by hand, then re-loaded it… thankful that we hadn’t lost all of our worldly possessions into the freezing Austrian river… we were glad to hit the bunk that night – gigs after days off are always a little tough as you’re a little lazy and a little kinda rusty after just one day….

So off to Graz… a ridiculously posh venue – the total opposite of the spit’n’sawdust nature of Dornbirn forest adventure…..in the main room was an enormous organ, a classical place with busts of Schubert and Beethoven and Mozart etc – and in the lobby a seriously stern looking statue of a long dead composer looked on as we dragged Lamposaurus into the venue… backstage the promoter had laid on a loving selection of the usual, plus 3 Austrian hotties who seemed to have no purpose other than sitting there being engaging and inviting… (finally, somebody had read our rider: large pipe organ, some ham and cheese and 3 Austrian hotties)… after the fight club of the night before – this classical venue was a real treat – like – a totally different vibe audience-wise – like sat down kinda listening vibe… but a pleasure sound-wise for us… Graz is like an old money town – and this venue was like a piece of history – a really cool place for a gig – some of the audience were telling us afterwards they had their school proms here… it was a little like Rome – the venue had been custom built hundreds of years ago specifically for concerts – and as we watched Rachel do her thing before our gig we realised that the acoustics were so good in there you didn’t really even need a PA—although – to be fair – they didn’t have drum kits and six-string basses in the 1800’s… one thing was striking us as similar though – the Austrian hospitality – the crowds, having not had any Fink loving since 2007, were loving it, loving everything, loving the old stuff, loving the new stuff….we were getting very excited about a the BAS (Big Austrian Show) in Vienna….

Vienna was a delight – simple as – it’s such a beautiful city… it was freezing, misty, and the club was a big box basically with a great old rig….the crowd were awesome, really up for it, and the place was packed out – I can’t believe it had taken us so long to get to Vienna – but we’ll be back real soon….we gave ‘em a big encore as we knew we had the next day off – I managed to score a couple of tickets to the Fleet Foxes gig in the MuseumsQuartier, an immense old-complex that had been refitted to house like 7 huge venues – and in the courtyard were like 6 bars – so – gigs, operas, plays etc in all different halle – but outside lots of bars where they all mingled – great idea actually – again – the other great idea of serving alcohol hot came into effect – and I walked back to the hotel a couple of miles just kinda enjoying freezing my ass off as I walked through ancient Europe… to some people (Guy especially) the idea of going to a gig on your day off when you’re on tour sounds crazy… yeah – I guess it kinda does sound a bit obsessive – but – well – when what you do is also what you like to do and what you like to do when you’re chilling – it makes sense… the Fleets, like us, were all loved by the crowd…. I texted our 59show creative director with a little love… seeing the Fleets made me really happy about our show… okay – we’re squeezing into venues a quarter of the size, but they’re so vibey – something about kinda nice folk music gets a little lost in vast halle full of 1800 people… we’ve been seeing these Coldplay gigs around like the invite-only Cigalle show they’re doing in Paris – I bet they feel the same – arenas, I’m sure, have their plus sides (when we played San Siro stadium back in ‘08 as support for Italian giants Negramaro it was so enormous their tour bus could pull up to the back of the stage… we’re lucky if the bus can park outside the venue!!) but you must start to yearn for the intimacy, and above all, the vibe and sound of being squeezed together on a stage in a packed little venue – that’s the great thing about Lamposaurus in a way – even on the enormous stages like we had in Holland – having this arc of lights and projections allows us to kinda make our own stage within a stage, whatever the size or dimensions… so we’re close enough to vibe off it, but far enough away so that I can hear myself nicely, Guy is surrounded in a duvet of meaty bass, and Mr T can bash away til his heart’s content without ruining each others mix… that’s why Vienna was so good… we rocked it – right venue, right crowd…

The East awaits…

F