"... WELL COCKED!"

Hazy memories badger my mind as I sit here at the enquiry desk, trying to piece back together what has become a legendary weekend. Problem is, when you spend on average 21 hours a day in the same cold, flooding, stark rooms, surrounded outside by industrial decay and smoke-stained brickwork, you kinda loose track of what happened when and why. It’s perhaps fair to say that enough red wine to kill a brass band constantly imbibed over four nights can also have the same effect, and in conjunction these two time warping phenomena can completely disorientate, leaving one believing they are Napoleon, or God. Or both.

Anyway, three full days of recording (and a guitar solo on the Tuesday morning which made for an effective alarm clock) – its tough work, especially when you’re fighting of irritating illness and a hangover which has to break sometime. However, we’ve done well, and are now following the mantra ‘definitely 5, probably 6, hopefully 7’, depending on how the overdubs and mixing go, and how we’re feeling. The sessions were relatively smooth, with only minor rows and problems, with particular highlights being guest-star Jim’s amazing e-bow solo on Empire, the Piscos becoming funkier than I ever thought possible, and Andy letting his ‘filth’ side shine through with a vocal take than actually makes you feel dirty as you hear it. An epic adventure, which we have to validate only by making all the tracks sound as good as they can be, which will involve standing in a tent for hours probably. It’s in good hands…

Pete