Music

Memoryhouse Tour Blog - Europe

by AUX staff

Last week we took an insane overnight cruise ship thing from the UK to holland. Looking out the room’s windows into the infinite abyss of blackness all i could imagine were sharks- lots of sharks. So we arrived in Amsterdam, and after a few bumps, made it over to the venue. After one van broke down, we were picked up by a pretty sketchy driver who was smoking a joint and blaring techno while driving us to the venue- Although we weren’t that surprised considering it was amsterdam.

We played a show with Toro Y Moi at a really cool venue called the Trouw, which is set inside what used to be a newspaper printing facility back in the 50s. Its this amazing huge warehouse, which has what must be one of the most unreal lighting and sound systems we’ve ever seen. Jamie Harley’s projections were out in full force that night, and looked better than ever. The one and only Vincent Moon came out to our show, a man who you will know from his Take-Away Shows filmed for La Blogotheque. He had some really kind words for us and it was really flattering, especially because he’s a filmmaker who we all really look up to.

After Amsterdam we travelled to Dour, Belgium to play Dour Festival. It’s this great big festival set in this tiny little village in the Belgian countryside. Everything about it seemed to be done with love and care, and seemed so home made. Al the signs were clearly made and painted by hand, the “artist village” was set in a big old school house, and all the local townspeople help out at the festival- its funny when a 70 year old woman comes to help you bring your gear inside.

We extended our stay in Belgium to head to Rock Herk, a small festival in the the Flemmish region, where we watched fellow Canadians Tokyo Police Club and Hole bassist Melissa Auf Der Maur play pretty bad-ass sets.

A note about Belgium- this place must have the most beautiful ladies in the world. I’ve been falling in love with every other woman I see. Its just not fair to the rest of the world to keep all them hidden here!

I’m gonna take this time to put this out there- we are not touring Europe in a van right now. We’re doing it the old-fashioned way (stupid way), and taking the trains everywhere. Picture 3 people carrying 10 bags, 4 of which classify as oversized, and 2 of which have the handles broken off. Its not fun, but for an amazing european tour, its damn worth it.

Festival De Affaire in Nijmegen, NL was probably the highlight of the tour for me. The amazing people who run this free festival were kind enough to put us up for 3 nights, and let us stay at the festival the whole time, even though we played only one day.

We extended our stay to check out some great bands and see some of our friends again. Fucked Up played this festival, in front of families and old people, ad Damian rightfully began the set with “I hope this isn’t as weird for you as it is for us”. Just to ensure it was even more weird, he spent 90% of the set walking around the crowd, talking to people during song breaks, yelling in their faces, high five-ing 6 yr olds, and climbing scaffolding (think King Kong, minus the damsel in distress).

On the Ruines stage, old dutch ruins in this historic park were transformed into a stage that hosted us alongside These Our Powers, Tokyo Police Club, Toro Y Moi, and others. We had a really great night hanging with our friends in Toro Y Moi and new friends in The Morning Benders- As Evan put it, It was a pitchfork-approved gathering, to say the least.

While we were in Nijmigen we recorded this live “acoustic” session in the oldest chapel in the Netherlands. It was completely un-rehersed and was our first time playing the songs like this, but you can still check out the video here.

We’re really excited to head off to Midi Festival tomorrow to play with Toro Y Moi again, as well as Vivian Girls, Memory Tapes and our friends in Yuck. In a couple days we fly off to America to play some big shows in LA, San Fran, Santa Cruz and Fresno, which we’re all really psyched about. More updates from Midi Festival and Cali will be up soon.