The International Date Line

Wednesay 31 May, 4.30am (Dubai Airport, United Arab Emirates):
We have stopped at off Dubai on the way to South Korea. What with the end of the American Tour being closely followed by the beginning of the Korean Tour, by the time we reach Seoul we will have covered a distance of over 9,000 miles in less than a week and a half. Admittedly, our contribution to this feat has been mainly stuffing our faces, watching sub-standard Will Ferrell movies and getting lashed on free vodka, but it is an achievement nonetheless.

It is currently after 4 in the morning, we are sitting in an airport food-court nibbling weakly on pizzas, and Tony is amusing himself by trying to convince George that, by travelling from London to Dubai and crossing the International Date Line, we have actually managed to travel backwards through time.

“Yeah, mate. We will arrive in Seoul several hours before we left London. We are making time.”

“Riiight….” murmurs George, looking down at the table. In the absence of a pen, he is attempting to write out our itinerary in tomato ketchup in the hope that it might help him get his head round it. I don’t know what he’s done with the comprehensive itinerary I lovingly printed out for him back in Clapham.

“But…. hang on…. What day is it now? I’m confused.”

Tony is loving it. “Today’s technically Wednesday, right, for us, but in a while we’re taking a plane to Korea and when we get there it’ll be Tuesday. Yesterday. Time travel.”

“Hmm.. International Date Line,” muses George, staring down at the congealing sea of ketchup on his plate, brow furrowed. “I see…”. 

This could be a long night.

Chris Lightyear

Lightyears scoop “Best Pop/Rock Act” at Indy Awards

On Tuesday 15 May The Lightyears were awarded BEST POP/ROCK ACT at The INDY Awards 2006/07 (hosted by Virgin Radio).



Many thanks to everyone who attended the ceremony and flew the Lightyears flag whilst the band were in New York!

American Tour a success

 

The Lightyears’ US Tour was a huge success with a live radio session that went out across the country and two sell-out shows last weekend in Pennsylvania – thanks to everyone who came down and supported the band across the pond. We’ll be back!



The first part of Chris Lightyear’s American Tour Blog is now online . Who in The Lightyears’ entourage is being mistaken for a girl? Will the band be denied entry to the USA for bomb-trafficking? Find out for yourself on the BLOG page …


Lightyears hit the Far East



In just a few days The Lightyears go on tour to East Asia to headline The Queen’s Birthday Ball at The Grand Hyatt Hotel on Mount Namsan in Seoul, South Korea.



Expect tales of adventure and intrigue on the band’s return…

Sell-out #2 in Philly

Sunday 20 May, 10.30pm (World Cafe, Philadelphia PA):
After the drama and triumph of last night, none of us are quite sure what to expect of the gig this evening. We are supporting Seth Kallen at WXPN’s World Café Live in Philadelphia, and we’re knackered. It’s the last day of the tour and we have to fly back to London at 5.30am, which means not going to bed at all and driving to Newark Airport in the middle of the night. 

As a result, we are all pretty much bowled over when it turns into a gig to rival Milkboy. Another sell-out! There’s a real buzz amongst the audience, we sell a ton of merchandise and, far from dashing off straight after the gig towards the airport as we had planned, we end up spending nearly two hours signing autographs and talking to an enthusiastic group of Lightyears converts backstage. It’s a great way to end the tour.

On the way to Newark we stop for gas (sorry, petrol) and fall into a conversation with a portly chap in a trilby whilst queueing up to pay for our enormous sandwiches.

“Where you guys from?” he asks. “London,” I reply. “We’re in a band – just finished a tour of the East Coast.”

“Oh, really?” he says. “I’m a musician myself. I’ve played London a couple of times over the years. What kind of band you got?”

I reel off a quick comparison. “The Lightyears. Indie-pop. Y’know, somewhere between Radiohead and The Monkees. So where in London have you played?”

“Albert Hall,” he replies, nonchalantly. “With The Monkees.”

Danny is having an internal haemorrhage

Saturday 19 May, 2.30pm (WXPN Studios, Philadelphia PA):
We are in Studio 2 (A.K.A. “Paul” – the others studios are named John, George & Ringo) at the world-famous WXPN Studios in Philadelphia. WXPN is America’s most popular public radio station, with a nationwide audience of up to 5.2 million listeners. Next week they’re interviewing Paul McCartney himself in this very studio. Today, they’ve got The Lightyears. And we’re raring to go.

“So,” begins Matt Reilly, the show’s host, skimming through his papers, “you guys have turned down record deals with EMI, Virgin, Warner….. how come?”

This is not strictly true. In fact, it’s blatant misinformation. However, this is our first question on our first appearance in the American national media and I quickly conclude that “No, Matt. You’re wrong. Who on earth is your source?” is probably not the most diplomatic opening gambit. I answer the question with some general musings on our history as a band and direct the conversation deftly (if I may say so myself) towards the subject of Bon Jovi. We are currently in the heart of Bon Jovi Country and, since I spent a substantial chunk of my teens striving to be just like them, I decide it’s appropriate to pay the band homage today.

“We were inspired to write our first song by Bon Jovi’s Always, in fact. That and the wide-eyed expectation that writing songs would get us more girlfriends.”

We perform three tracks live on the show – Emily, Girl On The Radio and Gimme Some, the latter of which we sing a capella. Matt seems impressed, and does a stellar job of plugging our show tonight at Milkboy in Ardmore. 

WXPN is bloody fantastic. A great station with great DJs playing great tunes. We need more of this in the UK. I mean, the 24-hour Kanye West Festival on Radio 1 is fun and all, but they play such a wide mix of corking tracks here. I strongly recommend you tune in online at www.wxpn.org.

And… most importantly… the advertising has worked a treat. We turn up to Milkboy, tonight’s venue, and the place is heaving. A sell-out. The crowds up until now have been appreciative, but modest… but this – I mean, this is terrific. Standing room only! It’s thrilling enough when this happens in London, but to play to a capacity crowd three thousand miles from home is something else.  

Which is why the blood drains slowly from my veins when we get up on stage, strum the opening chords of the first song, and the sound is completely all over the place. Danny spent a couple of hours setting the sound-desk earlier, meticulously adjusting all the levels to achieve the perfect balance. Now, though, the vocals are barely audible, the guitar is bafflingly loud and the keyboards aren’t even in the mix. We all direct furtive glances at Dan. He seems to be poking randomly at the desk, looking utterly foxed, poor bugger. The mix sounds as if someone has come along, unplugged all the cables and then shoved them back into random inputs.

Eventually it becomes clear what’s happened. Someone has come along, unplugged all the cables and then shoved them back into random inputs. Danny is having an internal haemorrhage. Tony is papering over the cracks with a really quite inspired sermon on the subject of competitive sport, which is dangerous territory for a rookie to venture into in this part of the world but he seems to be pulling it off with aplomb. 

Eventually, after quite a painful period of improvisation (I’m not sure exactly how long it was but at I guess I’d say about four or five years), Danny manages to sort the problem and we’re on our way. And it turns into one of my favourite gigs of all time. Fantastic crowd, great venue, killer atmosphere. We end on Beautiful Band, with its extended, Pink Floyd-esque coda, George’s layered guitar loops fading slowly to silence. 

A night to remember, most definitely.

Chris Lightyear

“I’m sorry – we’re British…”

Tuesday 15 May, 4pm (Starbucks, 5th Avenue, New York):
The sun is shining, we are sitting in Starbucks on 5th Avenue sipping Mocha-Chocker-Latte-Macchiatos and the tour is going pretty swimmingly. We should be feeling fairly smug right now, but this isn’t the case. You see, if we were back in the UK right now, we would be dressed in tuxedos and necking free champagne at the INDY Awards Ceremony. Instead, our friends are doing the necking on our behalf whilst we sit nervously by our mobile phones on the other side of the Atlantic, waiting to hear whether or not we’ve won our category. We’re up for BEST POP/ROCK ACT 2007.

“I doubt we’ll win,” Tony’s saying, feigning indifference. He subscribes to the expect-nothing-and-you’ll-never-be-disappointed school of thought. “I mean, we’re not even in the country to pick up the award. They won’t like that.”

Tony’s phone rings. His indifference slips as he snatches at the phone and answers the call.

“Anna? Anna?! Are you there…? What..??! No, Anna, I  can’t hear a word you’re saying. Bad line. WHAT? Have we lost? Anna? HAVE. WE. LOST?” He puts the phone down. “Yep. We’ve lost.”

“What did she say?” I ask.

“Dunno. Couldn’t hear a bloody word.”

We all look at each other, deflated. Tony’s phone rings again.

“Anna? No, still can’t hear you. Are you drunk?! [long pause] Right. Hello. Have we lost? They’re just announcing it…? OK. Yep… no, you’ve gone again. Helloooo…? What? We’ve lost, did you say…?”. Tony turns back towards us, shrugging his shoulders. “Yep, we’ve definitely lo – what? Yep, hi Anna… OH MY GOD! YEEEEEEEEEES! WE’VE WON!!!!!!”

Tony is now galloping around the coffee house, fists raised in the air, frightening the natives. I hug George, triumphant. Danny is in the toilet (shows how much he cares, eh?).

“I’m sorry,” announces Tony to the room of bewildered New Yorkers, “we’re British. We’ve just won an award”. Cue slightly stunned, but warm applause. Oh, you’re British. Now we understand.

A few people stop by us on their way out and offer their congratulations. The staff do not, I’m sorry to say, offer us a round of cappuccinos on the house. Bloody multinationals.

Thursday 17 May, 9.30pm (Lion’s Den, The Village, New York):
We are onstage at The Lion’s Den – our second gig of the day. Our first show, which probably ranks among the more bizarre moments in our career, was an unplugged set at the Think Café. Well, I say “unplugged” – there was a microphone, but it was just that. One microphone. We all had to crowd round it in order to pull off our 3-part harmonies, which was particularly hard for me as I had to crane over my piano to reach it. This was just the kind of situation where having a slightly longer-than-average neck comes in strikingly handy (others include getting a premium view of the bands at Glastonbury, bird-watching and, er, grazing from the branches of tall trees).

The Lion’s Den is a prestigious venue in New York’s trendy Greenwich Village. This is our first fully-fledged electric show in NYC and we’re relishing the opportunity to rock out on a big stage. We haven’t played Never Coming Back in a while, for example, and it really seems to get people moving. There’s an interesting mix of hardcore LYs groupies, fans of the support acts and general Village types in the audience and, talking to them afterwards, it seems that British bands are really popular in New York at the moment. People dig our harmonies, apparently, ‘cos it reminds them of the Fab Four.

“You guys are like The Beatles, I’m telling you…”. No, love. Northern Monkeys, The Beatles. We’re Southern Fairies. Opposite ends of the scale.

Chris Lightyear

This man could crush me like a peanut

Monday 14 May, 1pm (Multi-tiered car park, Lower East Side, New York):
We have just arrived in the Big Apple and, after hours of searching, have finally located an appropriate place to leave the van. It’s a bit on the pricey side (Donald Trump would think twice before parking here) but at least it’s close to Pianos, the venue we’re playing tonight, and it seems relatively secure. The attendant parks the van for us and takes the keys away with him to his little booth. Bugger. Need our instruments from the back of the van. With trepidation, I approach the booth and ask to have the keys back. He is not a fan of this idea.

“Sir, once your vehicle is fully stowed in the parking bay, you are not allowed access until you intend to take your automobile away.”

Arse. I consider the options. This chap looks like one of the drug dealers out of Robocop, and I have a feeling that my green belt in Tae Kwon Do wouldn’t be enough to save me if I got on the wrong side of him. Some pleading, I think.

“I’m terribly sorry…. Bit of a pickle really. You see, we’ve just flown three thousand miles, and we have a show to play tonight, and it would be a frightful blow if we couldn’t make the gig. Any chance we could borrow the keys for just a jiffy?”

This man could crush me like a peanut. Luckily, he relents and lends me the keys. “Bring them right back,” he warns. 

In light of the attendant’s icy warning, you’ll be surprised to hear that – having removed our equipment from the van – we manage to LOCK THE KEYS INSIDE IT. Don’t ask me how it happened. Suffice it to say that there is a very expensive BMW parked in the bay above ours, and any minute now its very expensive owner is going to come back and want to remove his car. But he won’t be able to. Because ours is in the way, the keys are inside and we don’t have a spare set. The Robocop Drug Dealer is beginning to eye us suspiciously from his booth. I opt out of being the one to tell him what we’ve done, on account of some very important and time-consuming walking-around-in-circles I’ve just remembered I have to do outside on the street. Luckily, our host Dan, being a New Yorker himself, volunteers for the job. What a legend. 

Five minutes later and a group of attendants are doing everything they can to break into the van using a spade and what looks like an enormous unravelled coat hanger. Oh yes. The Lightyears have definitely landed.

******

Pianos is an intimate upstairs venue in the Lower East Side of Manhattan. We’re taking part in a quirky New York tradition called “Cross-Pollination”, where two acts who have never met (and, in this case, were until very recently residing on different land-masses) play a set each and then collaborate on a collection of cover songs. I like this idea a lot. It’s kind of like the rap-battles you get on the Detroit underground scene. Only, y’know, no one pops a cap in anyone else’s ass. Otherwise it’s the same.

We squeeze onto the tiny stage and play a highly-charged set which I think takes Cross-Poll’s regular punters by pleasant surprise. As always, our accents go down a storm and I do my best to use words like “super” and “wizard” when addressing the audience. The tunes we throw in from our early-2003 coffee house days, like Fine and Girl On The Radio, appease those in the crowd who have come here to listen to gentle acoustic music – but the biggest cheers of the evening are reserved for the new pop numbers like Sleepless and Don’t Want You. When we finish, Danny gives us a thumbs-up from the sound-desk, which is perched jauntily on the end of the bar. He seems happy, although this may be because he hasn’t been asked to leave the premises yet tonight (on account of being under 21), which for Danny is a major triumph. 

We make some new friends, several of whom join us for drinks in an Irish bar after the show. I have absolutely no idea whereabouts I am in the city. My sense of direction is questionable at the best of times, but it suffers most severely when I’m in a foreign country. We are supposed to be crashing with some friends up by Central Park, but somehow I end up staying the night in a small apartment in Queens which is, I think, quite a long way from Central Park. Hey-ho. Perhaps I need to invest in Sat-Nav.

The Future Of Sandwiches

Saturday 12 May, 3pm (South Street, Philadelphia PA):
A quick note about the food in this country – it’s bloody great. If you’re ever on the East Coast, make a point of visiting a food outlet called Wawa. Wawa represents the Future Of Sandwiches. You place your order via touch-screen technology and there’s pretty much nothing you can’t have. A thousand varieties of sauce. Endless obscure meats and toppings. One of the optional extras – I kid you not – is “lots of extra oil”. Extra oil?! This place laughs in the face of obesity.

Whilst I’m on the subject, if you ever find yourself in Philadelphia, eat Philly Cheese-Steaks. As many as you can. They’re splendid. I’ve had two already today and it’s only 3 o’clock in the afternoon. They come with “Cheese Whizz” which, disturbingly, bears almost no resemblance to actual cheese. It comes in an unearthly shade of yellow-orange and has the texture of extremely viscous baby sick. Definitely worth checking out.

Chris Lightyear

Secret gig in Pennsylvania

Friday 11 May, 6pm (Standing in the street next to the van, Riverton NJ):
This is a good start. The first gig of the tour, an unannounced show at Milkboy Acoustic in Ardmore, is just a couple of hours away and the van is leaking. Tony is doing his mechanic’s act and squinting inconclusively at the problem, opening and closing the bonnet, stroking his chin and so on. He keeps saying worrying things like “It’ll probably be alright”. Well, that’s good then.

Thankfully, we make it to Milkboy Acoustic in one piece. The van hasn’t exploded yet and, until it does, I think we’re all going to assume there’s no problem with it. The news of the secret gig has filtered through to our fans and it’s good to see some familiar faces from the last tour in the audience tonight. We play a relatively chilled-out set, throwing in a few acoustic numbers from the early days like Home For The Weekend and I Could Be. To save space on the diminutive stage, Tony is using a cardboard box for a bass drum. The Americans love it. I have a feeling some of them may have assumed this is just what we do in England.

After the show we are taken out for dinner by our hosts and a smattering of fans. I am in the middle of telling some of the guys that they must try London Pride if they ever come to the UK when I realise that they actually have it on the menu! London Pride! Awesome. The Americans order a bunch of those and in return I sample the local brew, Yuengling, which I have to say is rather fine. I am then served a stupendously large burger (the first of many on this tour). I go to bed feeling pretty pleased with myself.

Chris Lightyear

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