Sat July 24th - Coleford Fringe Festival

We played one of my favorite Heretics and Lovers shows to date last week as part of the Coleford Fringe Festival, what set it apart from other shows is the style of the show. I have a big love for 'Basement' style shows - no stages, no huge PA/sound-systems or lighting rigs (though we do like to use our own small lighting setup). Just us and the audience. Even before being in a band I was always fascinated by nature and the D.I.Y. ethics involved in these types of shows. I would happily pick to play on the floor over a stage any day of the week. Last week at the Kavern we wanted to take it one step further and indeed we did by setting up in the middle of the room. Chris and the drums one side, amps and the rest of us the other and the audience in between. I was nervous in the fact what if no one was interested, we would possibly look quite stupid, however in the end we were completely overwhelmed but how many people was in that room during our set. The middle - end of the set I literally could move anywhere because of the amount of people that were surrounding us. I had lost Chris and Rob in the crowd of people and watched as Andy was learning over his pedals trying not to fall or step on them. It was an incredible experience and one I want to re-visted over and over again. Below is a video of a new song we played from that show currently titled 'SunBear'. The video does go out of sync but you can get the idea of why this show was so fun to play. Thanks to everyone who was there and made it awesome.

Tour Notes

So to sum up our first tour experience.. it was 50% amazing and 50% bad, The only reason it was bad is due to the last two shows being cancelled, the two shows we did play were 110% amazing and way more better than expected... In the lead up to first date in Coventry, I was feeling a little nervous as we didn't have a clue as to how people were going to take to us, the people there really seemed to give it their all and even speaking to the promoter after the show he said he hasn't seen the audience go this crazy at one of his shows before. It is always a nice feeling to know we can play a show and have this sort of impact on the crowd, The same with Manchester too. The setting was an unusual one - A 'weatherspoon' type pub - We arrived at the venue which was full of Japanese football supporters, clearly not there for any of the bands.. We set up in the corner and hung about whilst waiting for the football to be over,with the bands sound checking before kick off and during half time. Japan won 3-1 I think so at least a couple of the football supporters who stuck around were happy. We played to about 15 people and the amount of positive and kind words said to us after the show was outstanding, it made for a truly amazing experience. We already knew before the Manchester show that Sheffield had been cancelled so we decided to hang out in Blackpool for a day which was fun, I wont go into details but if you follow us on Tumblr I'm sure you will of got the jest of stuff we got up too.. We made it to the lake district before we got told the Glasgow show had been cancelled. We were all pretty gutted, end of tour, time to go home!

For me and I think I can speak for the rest of the guys, both the Coventry and Manchester shows made the experience amazing and one we wont forget. Sorry to anyone who was expecting to see us in Sheffield and Glasgow (if anyone..?) hopefully we can make it there soon!

Thanks to the following for making the experience amazing: Davey Burch, his wife and the rest of JXC. Taylor Johns @ Coventry, We are Revival, Juinera, Alex and the music is free crew, Fly with Vampires, Blackpool 24hr Tesco's (we needed somewhere to stay) everyone who listened, bought our merch, built a human pyramid and downloaded Lungfish of the back of these shows..

June Is For Lovers

So we are hitting the road at the end of the month, for a small tour. We currently only have 3/5 dates booked and we are desperately seeking for the other two. It goes without saying hook us up if you can..we will play anywhere, anytime. Currently our dates are -

June 23rd - Taylor Johns House, Coventry
June 24th - The Oxford, Manchester
June 25th - TBC
June 26th - TBC
June 27th - Rockers, Glasgow

This past week we have been making sure our van will be tour ready via removing the seats and replacing them with beds, fixing all the problems we have been having with our cabs and guitars etc... moved into a new practice space and then moved back out again, which is a real shame because having somewhere which we could leave our gear set up on a permanent basis and come and go as we please just sounds...perfect! We are working hard as ever on the new record too, we will be finishing up all the loose ends this week before we concentrate one whats songs we shall be playing on tour. Below is a video of a new song which will be on the new record and possibly played on tour also, for now the track is called 'Polar Bear'.

Thanks to everyone who has came to our show's over the past few months, all of them have been truely awesome, espically the Two Pigs show. Hand's down my favorite Heretics show to date!

We have been busy writing our new record and it is taking shape nicely. It's always hard to tell which direction the album will take in it's early stages, the only way I can describe it is it's Angrier, Happier, Moodier, Lighter, Heavier. We are not sure how many songs will feature on this record, the idea is to keep writing until we have had enough and choose the best songs/ideas that will fit our record and it's concept.

People's reaction's to Lungfish has been amazing and the people who have heard the new songs which we have been playing live, their reaction has been even better.

We plan to tour the UK at the end of June, which we are still in the process of booking, so check out our myspace for all the dates and get in touch if you would like us to play for you. Email: martin.horne@attic-room.co.uk if your interested in booking us!

Lungfish Out, New Record Begins

It will be called Bear Songs, We are four songs down and we hope to demo a few during the summer!

Lungfish Download

Hey Everyone,

Lungfish is now available to download via our brand spanking new website: http://www.hereticsandlovers.co.uk - Please head over to there and check out what the site has to offer!! A couple of Credits due - 1. Thank You to Luke Beard for assisting us on all the artwork and website matters. 2. Thank You to Skye Portman for taking the time to take photos of us and letting us use them for Lungfish!

I hope you enjoy what you hear!

A lesson in loyalty

Tonight we played a show at University Of Gloucester's Park Campus.
we were all super excited about playing this show, as there were going to be camera crews, photographers and reporters attending as it was now quite a big annual event.
on top of that we had our whole lighting setup for this one, strobe and projector, was going to be epic.

so we unload the kit from the van as usual, doing stupid shit like riding on the cabs and tripping each other up, the sort of stupid shit you get up to when overly excited and super happy and had too much lucozade all at once.

as we start to get set up on stage, everything seems to be rushed, theres a weird vibe in the air, i just put it down to nerves i guess.
theres no sound check or even line check due the line up being so packed (badly organized show btw), so the lights go out and i start the set with the intro to 'Alter epos', andy comes in and we end up going through the ebow loop way more than we usually do, this was because we were waiting for chris to get on stage as he was setting the projector.
anyway chris eventually gets behind his drum kit and we pick up the pace and come into the main song. we play it perfectly, bang on time and beautifully as intended, one woman in the crowd finds it so atmospheric/emotional i think she started crying.

everything was perfect.

the ringing chords and ambient feedback fade out as the 'Alter Epos' ends and i start the intro to 'viking song (aka Feral Children)'.
its hard to explain exactly what happened next, but basically andys effects rig decides to give up the ghost, so me chris and tinny drag out the intro as long as we can, but andy is still on his knees trying to get his set-up going again, so while he is checking every patch and power lead, we decide to move on and play the rest of the song, as time is real tight.
i turn to take a glance at chris, his hand was covered in blood, im thinking 'what the fuck?'. i then make eye contact with tinny to see if he had noticed chris, insted the look on his face says it all, and it hits me.. this gig that we were all so excited about, had gone from epic to epicly shit in just a few miutes.
within one song we went from being in 'the best place on earth' to 'wanting to pack up and go home'.

we did struggle through and play the rest of the set, but the magic had long gone, and this brought down the sprits of us all, for the rest of the night.

it does make me think.
it makes sense why so many bands "give up".
but thats the thing, we do not just give up, we do not let a bad experience put us off.
the more i think about it, the more i see tonight as a good thing, a test.
it makes me realize how lucky i am to be in a band with such dedicated and amazing people. this is a real band.

Lungfish TV

Lungfish

Tracklisting
1. Alter Epos
2. Feral Children
3. Happy Doomsday

Release Date: March 15th 2010

"Over 20 minutes of beatuifully heavy epic post-rock"

2K10

1. Release Lungfish
2. Tour
3. Tour
4. Tour
5. Write LP2
6. Tour
7. Dont Lose Any More Band Members
8. Tour Tour Tour