Battleships Tour Diary: Part Five

The final week of the Boy & Bear tour took us to some of our favourite places. On Thursday we played in quaint Adelaide at the nightclub HQ. We flew west and played Fremantle's Metropolis and finished the tour in Perth at the lovely Astor Theatre.

We arrived in Adelaide very early in the morning - the flights were just so much cheaper - but it became apparent we were a bag short, and it was mine. So with no clothes, no toothbrush and all my stuff somewhere else in the universe, I ventured into Rundle Mall to buy something to wear. Frustrating, but what a great excuse for a new wardrobe! We got a good look around some really cool streets before playing at HQ that night. Just about everyone described the place as 'a terrible nightclub, but a good place to see bands at'. After a good night we ventured back to where we were staying - a really lovely family looked after us in their large home in the Adelaide Hills - to find my bag delivered by Virgin Australia. Too bad I'd already been shopping!

The crew.

The next morning - about three hours after we'd gone to bed - we were up and loading the car for the airport. Playing in West Australia often means a long day and a late gig, as we didn't get on stage until about 2am in Sydney time, and Boy & Bear's set was about 3am in Sydney time. Having got up at about 4:30am in Adelaide, it meant we spent almost 24 hours awake by the time we got back from our Fremantle show. I have to say though that we had little to complain about as we got in to swim in the pool, watch some TV and relax, but the sound crew arrived in WA and had to start setting up, working all the way through the day on no sleep!

During one departure, whilst our bags were being scanned, our phantom 5th member and sound guy Karl was pulled aside to be asked about the contents of his bag. "It looks like you've got an axehead in your bag, sir". Karl's instant reply was "it's a 901, it's just a 901". Needless to say the security personnel did not know what a 901 was nor were they familiar with different shapes of microphones... admittedly; it does look a bit like an axehead.

The Metropolis in Freo is a great room, the second level, right over the stage gives a great view. Our green room there was in the main thoroughfare, so there we were warming up with bar staff excusing themselves through our huddle. We had a fantastic show and always love going to Freo because it's just a cool area. One punter came up afterwards to introduce himself as a flannelette connoisseur, perhaps that is a statement in itself of Fremantle. The Boy & Bear set seemed to really hit its strides in these last dates, I've really enjoyed watching their set and their new album has really grown on me. Dan managed to convince their monitors guy, Dickie, to don this pig head costume piece we found out the back... 

Appropriate gig attire.

We spent a great majority of our final night - The Astor Theatre in Perth - with Boy & Bear and Dustin Tebbutt. We went out for a bit of a last night dinner and it's safe to say we'll really miss the touring, even if our families will be happy to see a bit more of us for a change. It's like a good TV show ending, or finishing school. We realised we played 17 shows in 30 days; as a small band, it's not something we'd done before. It actually felt like we were really musicians, even if we're still working our way there.

Every tour we seem to learn more about touring life, even if it is just how to live with each-other. We've made some great friends, met some lovely people and really enjoyed the company of Dustin Tebbutt and Boy & Bear. We played in a lot of different places, from an old movie theatre to a soccer field and had a ball. Thank you so much if you came along to any of our shows, and a huge thank you for taking the time to read my little blog. Looking forward to seeing you soon, we're doing a couple of east coast shows of our own now if you're around!

Written by Jordan Kane Sturdee.