3 planes and as many duty free smokes as possible, without a scratch, touchdown, SCOTLAND. first cultural barrier comes in an innocent airport cafe - we ask to throw some junk in the trash can - silence - waste bin? silence. Garbage? Silence. OH, you mean RUBBISH. yes. Sharon the very sweet promoter meets us and we get the car. Driving on the WRONG side of the road in a stickshift car brings some some hilarity to the sleep exhausted but super pumped wonderment vibe. Everything is ancient, every building made of gray granite, covered in emerald moss. Gig is in old abandoned train tunnels, brick arched rooms. Old locals speaking in Doric/Aberdonian, throaty olde Scottish code. They love techno, they love drink.
After dinner at the Tilted Wig.
GLASGOW
GPS-free drive is an adventure, sheeps, castles on distant hilltops, stone walls, the whole bit. OH yes, Orange Juice with pulp is called "With Juicy Bits" -- no pulp is "NO BITS". Dude in the parking lot comes ups and sez "Hay gouse Ey jost brooke oop widda me ghetto frand can youse sparr a cooople pance Eyam stronded" and is met with complete silence. "Doo yoose spake Anglish?!" After he leaves we realize he meant his girlfriend. Our performance was dominated by fog machine. Alls well, blast to check out the other cats - Gilles Peterson, Candi Staton, Aiden Moffat, Fourtet, Derrick May, but especially Kitchen Cynics, super humble man from Aberdeen; hidden Scottish acoustic treasure moss.
EDINBURGH
Ancient vibes again, medieval streets, trolls, Governor lives in a perched castle. Openers and local legends DOMINIC WAXING POETIC are brilliant, as they say here, hilarious super literate audience baiting post punk, great dudes. Discovery of Legendary Crust. Monumental hang with hallowed local music patron Dougie, who is retired from the IRS. He browses the internet via his television - at about 4am we check out this vid.
View of Edinburgh from David Hume's body grave.
