tour pt 3 of 4 - roamin in rome

Rome…. It’s one of the great centres of modern civilisations and for some reason all I can remember about it is just stuff to do with driving...

Everyone in the city drives round like they’re pumped full of amphetamines. Our van was fucked beyond the point of legal and we were trying not to get in any scrapes. It was hard. The police were standing on every corner like plumped up fascist peacocks.

We get to the the ‘free car parks’ and they turn out to be run by gypsies, each with their own little patch. You pay them 3 euros so they don’t smash your windows while you’ve gone. There was no space for the van, so we do the whole ‘when in rome’ thing and ram some trash containers out the way to make a space. Reverse, ram, reverse, ram, park, pay 3 euros, go to venue.

Venue was cool. One of those rooms with no distance between stage and audience. I like that. A sweaty business. My finger cut even wider and my guitar was grizzly smeared with blood, thick drops of it all over the stage, and the set lists, and maybe some of the people at the front. There was a 20 piece brass orchestra before us and a metal band after. It was busting with people. occasionally I saw stef stick his guitar over his head and wander into the mob.

On the way back to the hotel we dropped the guys off, and the van wouldn’t start. It was 5 in the morning. Things were a bit confusing. We were in the middle of the road, drunk, and didn’t really know what to do. We left it there. After 3 hours sleep we came back and it still wouldn’t start. I was hoping it would have fixed itself somehow, so I felt a little disappointed, not really sure what to do, how to get to Florence, or back to England, when there’s no parts for an ldv van in mainland Europe. We decide it’s a good moment for a cigarette. I ask for a light from a bunch of drugfucked drag queens that were sprawled out on the pavement still havin the dregs of their night before. I think they took a shining to the green and purple colours I was wearing. When I went back to the van they came over a few minutes later. After another minute or two it was happening….we were being push started by 5 drag queens, all giving our van their almighty strength. I thank them for that. Not just cos of their help, but mainly because it was one of those things that is never gonna happen again.

It was nice to hear the engine running.

We had to get to Florence to play a show.

It was late.

we decided not to switch the engine off anymore and keep it running.

For the next two days we pushstarted the van all round Italy.