The Subways

The Subways to play Hevy Festival!!!

Fri, 12 Mar 2010 12:00:00 GMT

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Kent�s Alternative Music Festival 6th - 8th Aug 2010

For summer 2010 we are delighted to announce....

Gallows, The Subways, Sepultura, Rolo Tomassi, Napalm Death, Polar Bear Club, Dead Swans, Lower Than Atlantis and Feed The Rhino announced for a new camping festival in Kent.

The team behind last year�s one-day music event on Folkestone Seafront return this summer with their first full weekend festival. The Hevy Music Festival 2010 will feature 4 stages of great bands, live extreme sports displays and the UK�s most exhilarating thrill-rides.

�With a brand new venue and some awesome plans, this year�s festival is what we�ve always wanted to bring to Kent - it�s going to be huge!�

�There�s some fantastic little festivals down here that offer a great family-friendly product. But we�ve always felt there�s a need in this corner of the UK for something a little heavier, and that�s what we hope to be - Kent�s alternative music festival. We�re really going for it too - with huge bands from all corners of rock, punk, hardcore and metal, insane extreme sports displays and some hand-picked, state-of-the-art thrill rides - everything on site is totally focused at the alternative market. And at just �69 for a weekend camping ticket, it�s seriously good value too!�

�Headlining the Main Stage on Saturday will be hardcore giants �Gallows�, supported by a meaty line-up including �Rolo Tomassi�, �Dead Swans� and �Feed The Rhino�. Brit-rock heroes �The Subways� will be second on the bill for Sunday, with the headline act still to be announced!�

�Legendary Brazilian metallers �Sepultura� will be headlining the Second Stage on Sunday, supported by grindcore pioneers �Napalm Death�. We�re also teaming up with Red Bull to bring you 2010�s greatest upcoming bands for the Bedroom Jam Stage, with �Polar Bear Club� and �Lower than Atlantis� already added to their Sunday line-up. Finally, the Local Heroes stage will showcase Kent�s finest homegrown talent between the main stage sets. If your band wants to join the line-up you can apply online at hevy.co.uk�

�Loads more bands will be announced over the next few weeks. Take a look at the website for more info (www.hevy.co.uk) and join us on Facebook to be the first to hear the latest news and announcements. Brace yourselves people, this is going to be epic!� - James & Claire, Hevy co-founders.

Weekend camping tickets cost just �69 and are on sale now at www.hevy.co.uk

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THE SUBWAYS SET TO ROCK WEMBLEY STADIUM WITH AC/DC!!!

Thu, 25 Jun 2009 12:00:00 GMT

The Subways are excited to announce that they've just been confirmed as the main support for AC/DC�s imminent stadium shows at Wembley Stadium this Friday and at Glasgow�s Hampden Park next Tuesday (June 30th)!

The band were added to the bill as a last minute replacement for Thin Lizzy, who were forced to cancel the dates following an injury to drummer Tommy Aldridge.

Unfortunately the shows are both sold out but if you're lucky enough to be going we'll see you there!!!

The Subways announce first run of European festivals

Wed, 27 May 2009 12:00:00 GMT

The Subways are pleased to announce the first wave of festivals that they will be playing this summer! Though the band are taking much of the summer to write for the 3rd album they will be making several Main stage appearance at major European festivals kicking off with one of Europe's biggest rock festivals 'Rock Am Ring' / 'Rock Im Park' in June!

The band will be warming up for these shows with the only 2 UK dates to be played this year, one in Bridgwater (Somerset) and the second in Derby. If you are desperate for your subways fix then get yourself down to one of these shows! But be quick as tickets are going fast...

Having played Reading and Leeds 5 times in a row the band have decided to take a year off from UK festivals but promise to return in 2010 with a new album/ tour and major festival appearances.

Summer 09 (so far)...

2 Jun 2009 The Palace Bridgwater - Euro festival warm up - only UK shows this year! 14+
http://www.wegottickets.com/event/49944

3 Jun 2009 The Rockhouse Derby - Euro Festival warm up - only UK shows this year! 14+
http://www.gigantic.com/gigantic/event_gce_11977a.html

5 Jun 2009 ROCK IM PARK Nurnberg
http://www.rock-im-park.de/

7 Jun 2009 ROCK AM RING Nurburgring
http://www.rock-am-ring.com/

13 Jun 2009 ROCK IN IDRO Milan http://www.rockinidro.com/

14 Jun 2009 GREENFIELDS Interlaken
http://www.greenfieldfestival.ch/intro/index.php

19 Jun 2009 EJEKT FESTIVAL Athens http://www.ejekt.gr/

12 Jul 2009 LES ARDENTES Liege http://www.lesardentes.be/2009/en/

15 Aug 2009 SZIGET Budapest http://www.szigetfest.co.uk/

22 Aug 2009 FREQUENCY FESTIVAL St. Polten http://www.frequency.at/

Europe (March/April 2009) - Part 6 of 6!

Sun, 19 Apr 2009 12:00:00 GMT

We had a day off in Paris before our Nouveau Casino show and so we decided that it was best to soak in as much culture as we possibly could! I found myself walking through a cemetary with Charlotte looking for Oscar Wilde's tomb. We found it after spending an hour or so getting lost after finding Edith Piaf's and Jim Morrison's. Eventually we found it. And it was covered in lipstick kisses!

It was extraordinary to see.

Our show at Nouveau Casino, Paris, was a hectic experience. We had lots of interviews to get through before getting a bite to eat and then jumping onstage. The show was part of a special five day run including the likes of Elbow, who we are big appreciators of, and so we felt like we had to do something more than usual. We ended up playing one of our most enjoyable shows of the tour. I managed to crowdsurf AND steal somebody's beer and not spill a drop whilst being carried to the front of the stage. This is the leap that started it all off!

The next show was in La Roche Sur Yon, which was also another incredible show. The audience were amazing and totally crazy. A ten out of ten without even trying!

We are definitely heading back to France VERY soon. This has been our best bunch of shows in France ever!

The next night was in Zurich, Switzerland. Back to Switzerland! Yes! And this was, I must say, the most perfect end to one of our most enjoyable tours. We were invited to take part in celebrating the winners of the Leave An Impression battle of the bands and enjoy lots of whiskey at the same time. But first they wanted to have a few words with us!

We took to the stage and THRASHED! It was after all our last show on this tour and we didn't hold back! The crowd went mad! At one point a fan crowdsurfed to the stage and had a little dance onstage before being dragged off rather unwillingly (and with a great struggle!) by four massive security guards! I was told not to dive into the audience because the gap between the stage and the barrier was too far...but I did it anyway!

I crowdsurfed to the back of the room, found a beer and took it from an audience member's hands and then crowdsurfed back to the front before drowning myself in it! I then coaxed one of the loudest screams from a crowd that we've ever heard before finishing off "Rock &Roll Queen" in classic style and walking from the stage with "Thank you!!" spouting from our lips to the audience!

Thank you, everybody, for such a wonderful tour! We're going to rest for a little while now and spend some time with our families and also think about our new album!

See you for the summer festivals!

Much love from The Subways!

William Lunn (Esquire)

x

Europe (March/April 2009) - Part 5

Sat, 18 Apr 2009 12:00:00 GMT

We had a day off in Mulhouse and I spent the whole day walking around the rather beautiful city centre, checking out the buildings and stopping off now and then for food! The next day we arrived at Mulhouse Noumatrouff and saw how cool the venue that we would be playing was. We wanted to jump around on the stage and not long afterwards our wish was fulfilled!

The audience were AMAZING! The venue was great and the show was full on and loud! We went out to meet our fans after the show as usual but this time we were presented with an easter egg!

I'm happy to say that it was GORGEOUS! And thank you very much! We love you for this!

The next day we had a show in Caen, and the venue was next to a quiet and calming wood! I took the chance to wander in blossoming nature and took some photos...

During the show the audience were amazing, even though I was having difficulty with my hands, having played so hard for this entire tour! I got angry at the fact that my fingers couldn't do what I wanted them to do and kind of freaked out! Though I felt better afterwards because it felt like such a release of energy. So thank you very much, Caen, for being so wonderful AND so understanding!

Our next show was in Le Havre, where we were treated to a rather lovely meal and on an extremely long table!

The food was almost as good as the audience, who were just incredible! People spilling from the moshpit and onto the stage, stagediving and catching eachother and singing along! What an atmosphere!

Three incredible and rather uniquely enjoyable shows! Thank you, Mulhouse, Caen and Le Havre! See you all very soom hopefully!

William Lunn (Esquire)

x

Europe (March/April 2009) - Part 4

Sat, 11 Apr 2009 12:00:00 GMT

After our last show in Czech Republic, we jumped straight onto our tourbus because we had a very long journey to Freiburg, Germany during the night. However, along the way our bus broke down (something to do with the engine!) and so when we woke up the next morning we realised that we were in a lay-by on the motorway still four hours from our destination with no hope of getting the parts needed to repair the engine! Luckily it was a day off, and so there was no real rush to get anywhere, but it still would have been nice to be in a hotel room with a bed and a shower and a lovely restaurant nearby! Eventually a pickup truck pulled up alongside us with all the necessary parts and our engine was fixed by a charming yet ultimately strange German.

Off we went! We reached our hotel at about 8pm and so a quick meal later we were all in our beds fast asleep, saving our energy for the journey tomorrow to...

...Basel, Switzerland! The venue was beautiful and massive! The people were beautiful and crazy! And at some point a young lady threw her bra and it landed perfectly on my guitar neck just as I was starting "Strawberry Blonde"! Thank you, but I don't actually wear bras! The gesture is much appreciated, however! As you can see, Josh was having a great time in Basel...

And I'm always trying to find some excuse to get closer to my fans...!

Our next stop was in Leuven, Belgium. Being the young adventurers we are, as soon as we pulled up to the venue I took my things inside and decided that this city was too beautiful to ignore and that an exploration was due! I was right in thinking that Leuven was beautiful, just check out these buildings!

I bought some chocolates for my beloved and a new Mac keyboard for my computer at home and then wandered back to the venue to begin soundcheck. Our bassist was onstage waiting for me...!

"Hurry up!", is what I think she was trying to convey here! The show was fantastic! We love playing in Belgium and the audience sang along as loud as they could! We really enjoyed the support band, The Rones, too. And you Belgians love to yell...

...which is what we love to see (and hear)!

The next day was the most exciting, because we were playing in Oostende for a festival by the seaside! It wasn't a gig ON the beach, but the venue was right next to it. We had a long day before the show, so I decided to wander up and down the shoreline taking in the sea air and the sun - and I also tried to find a restaurant that would serve after 2pm! It's crazy that nobody serves food after 2pm and before 6pm!! Either way, it was a lovely day...

The show was a short one - we were onstage for only 45 minutes instead of the 1hr 20 mintue set we are used to playing now - but it was still as enjoyable and still as challenging to get the audience to dance, especially since most of the people in the crowd probably had no idea who we were anyway! All in all, another fantastic three shows.

Thank you to everybody who came along, both in Switzerland and in Belgium! We'll see you all very soon!

Much love

William Lunn (Esquire)

x

Europe (March/April 2009) - Part 3

Wed, 08 Apr 2009 12:00:00 GMT

Our adventure continued into Warsaw, Poland, where we started our day with some interviews and an acoustic session live on radio! Here I am standing proudly outside the studio...

The weather was clement (I love that word), and the people of Poland were very polite and hospitable! Our interviewers were extremely nice! After our first few interviews, Charlotte left to do one more interview on her own whilst I was invited by Trojka to play three songs live on air!

I decided to play "Lostboy" from All Or Nothing and "Rock & Roll Queen" from Young For Eternity, as well as a Queens Of The Stone Age song called "Make It Wit Chu", which is one of my favourites! During "Lostboy" I suddenly got a fit of the giggles and tried my hardest not to burst out laughing...! I have absolutely no idea why...! Immediately afterwards we said our polite and sincere farewells to everybody at the station and made our way back to the venue to rock the hell out of Poland for the second time in our lives. The last time we were here we played Jarocin Festival, which totally rocked our world. This time, as you can see for yourselves, we were ready to rock Poland even HARDER!

And the crowd were maniacs!

We had no idea that so many people were going to show up at the concert, let alone be so damn loud and so damn crazy. Nearly every word to every song was sung along to by the crowd...

...and exactly the same could be said of Poznan! Once again we leaped onto the stage and started with "Kalifornia" to find that the whole room shook with all the bodies leaping into the air! And when I screamed "Klaschtier!" everybody raised their hands!

I hope my Polish singing was good enough for you, because you Polish people were certainly amazing to play to! We'll see you again very soon!

The next day we all woke up in our tourbus in Prague, Czech Republic! This was one city that we've all waited a long time to visit, and so as soon as I was awake and out of my bunk and into some clothes I found Ben (manager extraordinaire!) and Charlotte (four strings Cooper!) and we made our way into the centre of the city to explore. The first beautiful sight we encountered was that of the market square, which was surrounded by the most beautiful buildings!

We walked through the square and made our way through the streets that were lined with some of the more quaint and modest buildings in Prague to the bridge that crosses the river Vltava.

Ben knew of the castle (he'd been to Prague before on many a drunken outing!) and so we found our way up the hilly streets and to the gates where a procession was underway.

Brass bands were tooting their tunes and batons were twirled in honour of the many politicians stopping by - apparently only the day before we arrived, President Obama had been in Prague and the excitement was palpable! From there, at the top of the hill that overlooked the entire city, we made our way back to the venue to finish some interviews before playing what was one of the most exciting shows of the whole tour!

The Lucerna Music Bar was an interesting place. It was at least three floors underground (it was very difficult for our road crew to carry all our equipment to the stage!) and the stage was rounded at the front. As soon as we walked onstage it felt like we were surrounded on all sides by screaming, hot, sweaty and excited bodies! Before the show we were told that the Czech audience can usually be quite cold, so it came as a huge surprise to find that from the first song everybody began leaping about and hugging eachother and singing every word to every song and crowdsurfing like mad! This is far from what we would call a cold audience!

During "Rock & Roll Queen" I began to sing the lyrics in Czech but I found it an incredibly hard language to speak (almost as difficult as Greek!) and apologies to the audience for my bad Czech! In a most unusual fashion I dove from the stage THREE times - once to the left, once to the right and once in the middle! Praha had earned it!

These three shows were a massive surprise to us! We never expected so many people at the shows and we never expected such an amazing reaction! Thank you, everybody!

Much love!

William Lunn (Esquire)

x

Europe (March/April 2009) - Part 2

Fri, 03 Apr 2009 12:00:00 GMT

A day off after the Dutch shows was much needed and also much appreciated! We relished the chance of relaxing in the calming beauty of one of Germany�s most gorgeous cities, Passau. After circling the city and crossing the mountains that surrounded it a few times (our driver was hard pressed to find a route with big enough roads for our tourbus!) we finally made it to our hotel and checked in. The urge to go out and explore overtook us, and we decided to go into the city for a meal � our hotel was only just over the river at the edge of the city. Crossing the river to get into the city at sunset was a lucky moment, as we got to see some really beautiful sights�

After much searching we finally found a few restaurants that were open (it was a Sunday, after all!) along the river and I decided on a certain place that I liked the look of. It turned out to be a good choice, as the meal was one of the best I�ve had in a while! This is a happy face!

Good food makes a happy Billy! After such a good meal, walking along the river was the only appropriate way back to the hotel!

The hotel at night looked rather pretty, so I decided to take a picture for you all to see�

The next morning we set off on the road to Austria for our show at Posthof in Linz! Linz was also a rather beautiful city! We have been extremely lucky on this tour. The Posthof was a large venue and there were lots of dressing rooms and they all had beds inside so that we could rest our heads if we were feeling sleepy - but we were having such a good time that there really was no chance of us wanting to rest our heads. Before the show we all watched the fascinating vocal stylings of our support act, Trouble Over Tokyo. He is also English, though he moved out to Vienna, Austria six months ago and so we thought it would be great to have him play with us. He�s like a cross between Frou Frou and Michael Jackson � what a combination! Watching him filled us with excitement and we were all ready to jump on that stage and start rocking out!

During our show we truly realised how crazy the Austrians are. We were also happy to see that many people in the audience that night had seen us play last year at Frequency festival. The place felt like it was erupting and we were having a great time onstage. It was awesome to see the crowdsurfers and the beautiful flow of the dancing bodies in the circle pit!

I couldn�t help but take a big leap from the drumkit!

The next day we set off for Graz, where we would play at the Orpheum. Graz was also a beautiful city and the Orpheum was another beautiful venue! In the dressing room we had an old honky-tonk piano that was so out of tune it was painful to the ears! So instead of playing the piano we decided to sing songs with my guitar as accompaniment � as usual!

It would have been nice to have some piano thrown in there too though!

The audience were so loud!

We were beginning to believe that Austrian audiences (Graz in particular!) are one of the craziest in the world!

Our last Austrian show for this tour was officially labelled as Bregenz, but it actually took place in a solitary little town near Bregenz called Dornbirn. We opened the door of the tour bus to find a fast flowing river and, just on the other side of it, the venue, which was surrounded by trees and a steep slope from where the river was flowing. We crossed a bridge to the venue and decided immediately that a walk up the hillside outside the venue would be a great idea. I decided to take my acoustic guitar with me because at that moment there was nothing more beautiful to me than the idea of playing it whilst sitting by the river and watching it flow hurriedly downhill over the rocks. The river was helped along by large gradual steps that sloped down the hillside, and in one of my crazier moments I leapt from moist and slippery rock to moist and slippery rock (with my guitar in my hands!) and began playing songs to the trees and the sky!

I found a nice position in the middle of the river on some rocks and began rocking out before realising that the water was rising and if I also realised that if I wanted to keep myself dry then I�d better make my way back to the banks very quickly!

The show was the hottest show we�ve played so far on this tour. We were dripping with sweat and so were the audience! What an incredible place Austria is! During �Rock & Roll Queen� I crowdsurfed to the bar and the barman handed me a tasty shot of vodka, which I instantly downed! Then, after quickly stealing an audience member�s beer (thank you and sorry!), taking a few gulps and then pouring it over my head I made my way back to the stage to finish the song! What an amazing time!

Thank you Austria, and see you this year at Frequency festival!

William Lunn (Esquire)

x

***Charlotte's special explosive blog edits!!***

I don't have much more to add...Mr Lunn put it so well! I'd just like to say a big thank you to all the people who have commented on our myspace about the current shows! I'm amazed at the response we've had!

So...until Frequency Festival!

xxx

Billy Lunn Blog 1 (Europe March/ April 09)

Tue, 31 Mar 2009 12:00:00 GMT

We set off from England at 10pm the day before our first show - an overnight trip through the countryside of the UK, across the ocean and through France and Germany to Nijmegan, Holland! The next morning we were off the bus and into the venue and before we knew it we were onstage playing hard and fast once again. We do love playing to the Europeans! The venue was great (it reminded us a little of Manchester�s Academy 3 in England) and the people were even greater! At some point I managed to grab onto a metal girder hanging from the ceiling to swing from but the audience just pulled me down! That night I had many cuts and bruises to tend to!

These shows in Holland are going to be great fun!!

We drove all night to Rotterdam and woke up in the morning in the middle of the city � a walk around town was in order! Ben (manager extraordinaire!), Phil (Guitar tech Pip!), Charlotte and I ventured through the area to find some cake and meet some of the local folk!

I found a bookshop selling English copies of some Bukowski books that I�ve been waiting to read for a long time! These books are antidotes to The Lord Of The Rings, which is what I�m currently working my way through. And Rotterdam has trams! I love trams! The show was absolutely crazy.

Rotterdam sure does know how to SCREEEEEEEEAM!

Utrecht was a beautiful city to be in. Our tourbus was parked about a mile away from the venue, which was a great excuse for us to walk through the streets of one of the prettiest cities we�ve ever been to. Sound check was a doddle and afterwards I had a quick interview with a good friend of mine, Henk Kanning. We took the time to look around for a nice place to eat and found a quaint (cheap!) Italian restaurant down by the canal.

The show, as it has been these few dates in Holland, was a slow build and by the end everybody was dancing and going crazy. It�s just the kind of show that makes us realise how hard we have to work in order to get people moving their feet � but once they�re moving it�s a great feeling! As I dived into the audience during �Rock & Roll Queen� I was flipped over twice! The crowd were flipping me over end to end! Some more bruises to tend to after the show!

Thank you, Holland! We�ll be back very soon!!

William Lunn (Esquire)

x

Billy Lunn's Blog - Greece! (March 2009)

Sat, 21 Mar 2009 12:00:00 GMT

Charlotte and I were home for just under two weeks before setting off for the historically cultural expanse known as Greece. Ancient Greece has earned and is owed so many thanks from all of us for its striving invention of democracy, philosophy, secularism and its pursuit of intellectualism and free-thought. No country has done so much for the world of thinking human beings! And dammit were we looking forward to arriving! The others, those being our manager, drummer and a few members of our crew, arrived four days before our adventure to Athens - but were surprisingly synced up with the time differences having flown back from Australia! We landed safely after emerging from a really frightening storm. As usual, I kept my cool as passengers panicked and screamed around me, phoning their loved ones and signing their last will and testaments. Not really. But it was a little frightening!

Pulling up to the hotel in our transit van we were ecstatic to see that the lobby was full of teenagers - oh yes, we had a school trip on our hands. This clearly meant sleepless nights from all the noise and shenanigans that young reckless go-getters tend to make. But what the hell, we were all young once and it's not like we don't make our fair share of noise! The next morning we all woke (having slept just fine considering the door slamming and general adolescent humdrum) to the tune of our alarms and went to the lobby of our hotel to conduct in some interviews. And weren�t they just delightful! How lovely! We like Greece! A short expedition around the city was on the cards, regardless of how little time we had left before sound check! The Acropolis was a MUST! Until we found out that we'd arrived at the gate three minutes too late...! Damn! Still, check these out...

What a view! Athens is pretty nice too!

Ice cream from a great height! Nothing like it!

Amongst ruins that for once I didn't create!

No matter how much of a giant man thinks he is, he's nothing compared to the will of STONE!

Athens Olympic Arena!

These guys performed a routine that commemorated the many lost lives of unknown Greek soldiers! After seeing all this we headed by tram (my favourite mode of transportation!) to the venue. Sound check passed without a hitch (okay, maybe a few hitches here and there - but they were tweaked and sorted in no time at all!) and before we knew it we were on the stage and rocking out. And the place was packed! We were not expecting this at all. And they were crazy! As you can see for yourself, I tried my hand at some Greek...

It's all written phonetically so that my poor poor brain can handle it! After taking a leap from the stage into the audience and then making my way to the balcony for one final dive before we left the stage I couldn't believe how loud and raucous everything was sounding. The noise! Oh, it was BEAUTIFUL! Thank you, Athens!

On to Thessaloniki! We drove seven hours in a cramped van and checked into our hotel, only to realise that another party of schoolchildren on a trip were also staying there at the hotel. And then...ANOTHER completely different school of children came through the doors to check in also. There were hundreds of them! We headed off to the venue to soundcheck (this one actually passing without so much as a teeny tiny hitch!) and then we all jumped in a van to head to a restaurant that our wonderful rep, George, had booked for us! With a good deal of very tasty food in our bellies we walked onstage and kicked straight into "Kalifornia". Today my Greek was a little better, even if I did get a bit tongue tied at the thought of singing "Rock & Roll Queen" in such a difficult language! Once again the audience were crazy! One guy jumped on the stage only to be taken offstage by security thrashing like a lunatic! That's what we like to see! Greece, you have the SPIRIT!

We are definitely coming back! Thank you for two wonderful shows!

William Lunn (Esquire)

x

The Subways on ITV2's new sitcom FM!!!

Mon, 16 Mar 2009 12:00:00 GMT

Just a quick message to say check out ITV2 on Wednesday 18th March (10.30-11pm) to see a live performance of Shake! Shake! and some top quality acting in ITV2s newest sitcom FM about indie radio DJs, from the producer of Peep Show. Website http://www.myspace.com/skinfm

(Bit of plot from TIME OUT - 'It is awards season and Lindsay is a loser. Meanwhile Jane has a big night with one of the winners. Dom goes further - and does something unspeakable in a hat. Featuring Konnie Huq and a performace from the Subways')

Soundwave Festival - Australia! (Part 4 - Melbourne/Adelaide)

Sat, 28 Feb 2009 12:00:00 GMT

So after our Melbourne sideshow we were looking forward to a few days rest. On the first day of rest we all decided that a trip to the prison was in order! Everybody loves a prison! We took the tram (the greatest things on earth - if only London had the common sense to employ them on their jammed streets for the benefit of eradicating oh so many forms of pollution!) around the city to the location of Melbourne prison and paid our $20 for a good shouting at (the guards play in character, see), after which we were allowed to walk around and take pictures. It was incredible to see the conditions and the forms of deterrence that the prisoners coped with and the reasons for their incarcerations in the first place! Here are some of the punishments...

And yes, those are anti-masturbation gloves there on the left! Here is what inside the prison looked like...

I was locked up in the cell at the end on the right hand side...

And about time, too! Afterwards, we all took a (very long) walk to Lygon street where we treated ourselves to some fabulous chocolate! To walk the guilt and pleasure off, we made our way to a book shop (where I purchased some essential Christopher Hitchens, as well as a copy of the Koran! For educational purposes!) to meet up with Charlotte for some beers before heading to a wonderful restaurant called Little Creatures. The beer was mind-blowing ("THAT'LL BE FIVE MORE PINTS, PLEASE!") and the food even better! We loved it so much that we left our mark there on the blackboard!

The next day was the show! We were really looking forward to this performance at the festival after playing a not-so-fantastic gig at the sideshow. We took to the stage and rocked the FUCK out of that place. It helped so much having such an awesome bunch of Aussie's to play to!

We all left the stage on a high and went straight back to the hotel for some rest before waking up at 5:30am the next morning for our flight to Adelaide. The flight passed without any special events taking place (though I had already finished one of my Christopher Hitchens books - that's how good it was!) and we shot straight to the festival site to ready ourselves for the show. One thing that we did notice was HOW FRIGGING HOT the day was. So acclimatising ourselves was essential! We took to the stage and I saw that the audience were burning up, so every other song I made sure to throw a bottle of water into the crowd. We played facing directly into the sun and I could feel my toes frying in my shoes - what an unfortunate day to wear black rubber Converse pumps! The show was ecstatic. The audience really starting kicking off and with each and every song more and more people came over to see us play. By the end of "Rock & Roll Queen", and after throwing at least three more bottles of water into the crowd to cool the audience, I was yelling for dust to be kicked into the air in frenzy!

Beautiful! Thank you Melbourne and Adelaide! What scorchers!

William Lunn (Esquire)

x

PS - If you see this man, report him to the coppers!

***Charlotte's special explosive blog edits!!***

Thank you to the wonderful people of Australia for all the fun you've given us on this tour! Despite the heat, you've been an amazing audience for us! We're now all feeling a little sad at the thought of going home....and are already harassing our manager, Ben, for more Aussie shows! I love England....but i could definitely live in Australia!

I also had a lovely day off. There are only 2 girls out of 60 bands on this tour, so I decided that a day of girly shopping was needed in Melbourne! I spent the whole afternoon on Chapel Street. Mac and Sass and Bide, my two favourite places to shop, were only a few doors down from each other! Amazing! Though, after seeing Billy's pictures, i think i missed out on the trip to the prison. It would be worth it, if only to see Billy behind bars for a few minutes! ;)

So, today we head off to Perth. Only one show left on the Soundwave tour!

Thank you again.....

Love Charlotte x

p.s. If you want an amazing dinner, have Barramundi, accompanied by an Australian/New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc, followed by a Cherry Ripe....i've had that pretty much every day!

Soundwave Festival - Australia! (Part 3 - Sydney/Melbourne sideshows)

Thu, 26 Feb 2009 12:00:00 GMT

Another day in Sydney and another show yet to play before leaving for Melbourne! This show was with Alkaline Trio, Rival Schools and Saves The Day at The Manning Club on the campus of Sydney University. But before we get into any of that, Charlotte and I were involved in a rather relaxed and fun afternoon of interviews. We started with two radio interviews � the first one was with a lovely lady called Patience (from Aussie stars The Grates!) and a guy called James (who looked perpetually euphoric and seemed to switch erratically from lethargic and nonchalant to heavily enthusiastic and involved) at Nova Radio. Cue crazy antics and lots of fun and laughing. The second one was a long distance interview with a tightly strung and cartoonishly �wacky� male-female duo, who are probably best described as a sexed up version of Chris Moyles. Good or bad, you decide. These guys were based all the way over at a station in Adelaide. In between the hilarious but quite casual banter they constantly referred, with rapier-like tenacity and modern relevance to the English stereotype of the �hoity-toity� ilk, which probably went out of fashion along with the term �wooing�, slapping the raised thigh in reverence and codpieces. Adelaide�s airwaves must be alight with the fire of these two bright sparks� synapses flaring.

After the fun and games (and thank you and goodbyes!) we were driven to a rather special chocolate shop! We all shared a fondu (yum�!) and I had a white chocolate frappe. After recovering from the dual effects of nausea and joy from too much sugar and cocoa, Charlotte and I had our nicest interview of the day with a lovely lady from TV Hits! She was a sweety-pie, and her presence left us in a good mood all day! The show itself was amazing, even though we had three one-hundredths of a second to soundcheck with, after lots of carefree noodling around from Alkaline Trio.

(This is us waiting around at soundcheck!)

We�d just managed to get the sound right onstage when the first few people started to arrive and congregate down the front by the barrier so we left the stage for our dressing room. Fifteen minutes later we were back on the stage and rocking out. The room, by this time, was about � full and we thrashed into �Oh Yeah� and �Young For Eternity�.

More people started coming in and, when asked of them, they politely clapped along. There were more and more people arriving with each song, thusly raising the smiling faces factor twenty fold. As we reached �Turnaround� the venue was more than half full, and so I decided to get this place going a bit. I told Sydney to �move their hot sexy bodies� when the right time came�and they did! Fantastic! For a 30-minute set we sure did sweat. And thank you for a wonderful evening!

Our lobby call was 8am, which wasn�t at all as bad as the lobby calls have been on this tour. I even arrived early! Charlotte and some of our crewmembers were so astonished that they congratulated me. �But I�m always early�, came my response to this! Ha! The flight went quickly and painlessly, though at one point we did wonder whether the pilot was intending to completely miss the landing strip altogether or whether he was just trying to fuck with our heads. Either way we�re very happy he ended up landing ON the landing strip�just! Checking in at the hotel was swift and pretty soon Charlotte and I were back on the old campaign trail doing the odd interview here and there. Karen, our rep, drove us to the quaint and homely offices of Warners Melbourne where we indulged in talking about ourselves for four interviews (two on the phone, two on camera) before heading for soundcheck, only to find that Alkaline Trio had once again left us exactly three one-hundredths of a second to get our amps/drums/instruments onstage and set up, check our sound, and toddle offstage before getting back on again 45 minutes later. Half an hour longer than before! Yes! The show was interesting to say the least. Halfway through �Oh Yeah� my guitar strings went berserk and I had to find certain pockets of time within the song to quickly find which string was out of tune and then try to get it back in tune! By the time we�d reached �Shake! Shake!� I�d managed to get the git sorted and we carried on with our set (though after the show, Chris from Less Than Jake asserted it to me that there really wasn�t any discernible problem with the tuning with my guitar � not from where he was standing, anyway. Thanks for the assurance, man!). There was a group of extremely intelligent people of good taste and musical inclination down the front who decided to get fully involved with our show. Hands in the air, clapping along and willing enough to move their bodies when asked of them! Thank you, all you people, for making that special effort for us! I did try to get the crowd going with the odd mention of the rivalry between Melbourne and Sydney, but that only awakened restrained wrath and negativity. Duly noted for our performance in a few days! Though I do like to make light of how petty these national rivalries can be!

And Rivals Schools�How good were they!!! They just keep getting better and better. Nothing was going to beat that, not even bucket loads of beer, so we all headed back to the hotel for a well-earned sleep!

Thank you, Melbourne! See you at Soundwave festival!

William Lunn (Esquire)

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Soundwave Festival - Australia! (Part 2 - Brisbane/Sydney)

Mon, 23 Feb 2009 12:00:00 GMT

Waking up on the day of the Brisbane Soundwave show was a nerve-racking affair. Not because we don�t have as many tattoos on our arms or calves or because we don�t own as many black t-shirts as the other bands. No! But to face the Australians on the stage are prospects overwhelming and exciting - both as potent and formidable as eachother. We�ve flown thousands of miles down and across this glorious globular accidental planet we call Earth to play here and so we all wanted to do well. Nerves were tense in the dressing room�

As we walked to the stage, though, we geared ourselves up and readied ourselves in the only way we know how. Jumping about like mentalists.

As we took to the stage we realised the impact of playing at 1:40pm! It was as though we�d never played Big Day Out festival for the full month we did in 2006! �Starting from scratch� was the phrase that came to mind immediately as we picked up our instruments. We bounced straight into �Rock & Roll Queen� and the crowd reacted by raising their hands and smiling. Beautiful! Then I started the opening chords to �Alright� and we rocked through that, then we smashed into �Kalifornia� and by this time the heat had already crippled me as I hopped and leaped from stage to drum kit and skywards, from my side of the stage to Charlotte�s and back to sing verses and choruses. By this time we�d received no reaction at all for calls of cheers and screams. I realised I needed to wake them up.

�During this next song we�re going to break it down for you and, spirit willing, Brisbane, if you don�t start f*****g moving your f*****g bodies very soon I�m going to come in there and make you f*****g move, you lazy ****!!!�

I currently have no regrets about the expletives because it DEFINITELY got them moving. It definitely got them shaking and raising their hands in the air. Though I�m sure someone is bound to bring it up sometime in the future and I�ll more than likely wince at the wantonness of my cursing and profanity. Bit it did, like I said, work rather well!

And it felt like FINALLY they were having a good time. Granted, those sexy wonderful people down the front were smiling and having an awesome time throughout! And kudos to you, wonderful people! You kept us going!

After the show we got our rocks off in the signing tent and headed back to the hotel for some food and sleep so that we had enough energy and willpower for the 4:30am wake up call and the 5:30am lobby call.

Our transport to Brisbane airport arrived and we jumped in. After a (much appreciated) swift check-in at the airport we were in the skies and soaring to our next destination, Sydney! On arrival, we collected our baggage and joined the other bands and bundled onto the coach to be taken straight to the festival site. After much man-boy playing about, yelling at eachother, showing off and ogling at the girls out the window (some bands that consist of just boys really do tend to stunt eachother�s mental growth and capacity) we pulled up to our dressing room and enthusiastically disembarked to find solitude and comfort in our own designated area! We all made our way to catering to steal snacks before our show and I managed to finish my third book of this tour � Stephen Fry�s rather candid and entertaining early-years autobiography, �Moab Is My Washpot� � before heading to our stage to perform.

Due to the bottleneck situation at the gates of the festival (apparently the Australian security REALLY like frisking and checking through each and every item in your possession, even the folds in your underwear) we walked onstage to even less people than in Brisbane. Though we knew this might be the case, so we played like we were performing to 70,000 people anyway. Immediately our attitudes were on a high and we were bounding across the stage like we were leaping from the precipices of Everest. �Oh Yeah� was stormed through, and we thrashed our instruments to the sounds of �Young For Eternity�, �Shake! Shake!� and �I Won�t Let You Down�.

�Good afternoon, Sydney! You sexy f*****s!� I screamed.

The population of our stage was growing rapidly by the song and by the time we�d reached �Rock & Roll Queen� we had enough people there to raise their hands to look like a blanket of flesh! I got so excited I took off from the stage and JUST MADE IT over the barrier! JUST!!!

After our performance we washed off the excitement and made our way to the signing tent to get our rocks off again. Along the way we met our Warner reps for Australia�

�and bade farewell and made our way to watch the entertaining and energetic Funeral For A Friend (Welshboys from the home country! Josh and I are Welsh, as our Dad comes from Nantyglo, Wales) and the rather effortlessly exceptional and charmingly disarming Rival Schools. Our sound engineer even did their sound! This move is called "throwing the claw"...!

We met Rivals Schools after the show and they were lovely! Just lovely! Roll on tomorrow night when we get to support them at Manning Club in Sydney!!

William Lunn (Esquire)

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Soundwave Festival - Australia! (Part 1 - Brisbane)

Fri, 20 Feb 2009 12:00:00 GMT

So we boarded the plane for our second nine-hour journey across the seas to a whole other continent... It was 9pm and I was determined to get some sleep on this flight so as not to be totally whacked out of joint when we reached Aussie soil for the morning. I pretty much conked out as soon as my bum hit seat A row 46 (yes, that's a window seat!) and didn't wake up until we hit some rather sexy turbulence about three-quarters of the way through the flight. I'd had my fill of R.E.M. sleep and so I felt perky enough to watch some South Park and Alan Partridge on my iPod. I'd slept through the two complimentary meals and didn't really have enough energy in me to follow the intricate brilliance of Jeremy Brett's performances in his episodes of Sherlock Holmes. Those MP4's would more than likely have to wait another few hours. Our landing was successful (in that we hit the ground safely as oppose to plummeting uncontrollably for 30,000 feet) and we got through customs without a hitch - excluding the fact that there were about eight lots of checks to get through with a 'we've got all the time in the world' attitude from the people helping us get through them. But what the hell! It's sunny outside and we're alive! We'll get there eventually! That was the motto.

My hotel room stands 21 floors above everybody else out on the streets. Some would consider that 21 floors of silence and comfort - but as we all know, comfort can sometimes be boring. And I can't stand boring! So I and four other messrs from our crew - Stevey (Ice G tour manager/sound engineer) Gurney, Ben (manager extraordinaire) Kirby, Phil (Pompey rules!) Shenton and Phil (Bristol snarl, AKA Pip) Wilson took a walk to the centre of Brisbane to catch the bus to Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary! A $6.30 journey (return ticket!) later we stood at the gates of the sanctuary...!

Being part of the monster that is the rock industry we were kindly shown around the essential parts and were dutifully explained a few things along the way before heading off on our own and exploring. I made a new friend in Dudley the koala bear.

Dudley and I agreed to meeting up and having a drink after our Soundwave performance. Though he's more into hip-hop and R&B, which are forms of music I generally can't actually stand (I find them almost wretch inducing) but I'm not going to let that get in the way of our friendship.

We got to see wombats, tasmanian devils (these are favourites of mine! I've always wanted to hear their cry and see their yawn, as well as the physical posturing and the turning red of the ears for a long time!), kangaroos, emus, crocodiles, bush turkeys, monitor lizards, cockatoos, cuckoos, dingoes and snakes! A lot of people have often claimed to want to "walk with the animals". I do things differently. I prefer to "chill" with the animals!

Our bus ride back into Brisbane city centre was stunted and prolonged by the ever-increasing rainfall! Oh, but what beautiful rain! Warm and bulbous and refreshing and plenty of it! I remember when I was very young during one of my many trips to Australia with my family just standing in the rain and feeling cleansed and refreshed, like it was something to be relished and not avoided like English rain! Standing in English rain in a t-shirt and shorts would be hypothermia inducing! Once the rain had subsided and we'd finally disembarked at the bus station we'd all decided that a nice Australian beer was in order. A VB and a burger, to be precise. And a nice walk home amongst the statues.

William Lunn (Esquire)

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Adventure Japan 2009 (Part 4)

Tue, 17 Feb 2009 12:00:00 GMT

I awoke with a burning hunger! Food! I needed food! I called Ben (manager extraordinaire) Kirby and Charlotte (four strings) Cooper and asked what their plans were. They'd had breakfast the previous morning at this great sushi cafe where the plates are rolled around on a conveyor belt and you just pick and choose what food you'd like to eat.

Perfect! The food was lovely. They had free green tea. FREE! My kinda joint!

We then moved our sweet little tushies out of there and on to the streets to head to the venue! We'd played Quattros before but I couldn't quite remember the venue. I do remember being blown away by the audience reaction, I just couldn't remember the stage or the dressing room or what the actual venue outside looked like. I had no flashing bulb moments as we neared the outside of the venue...

...but as we walked out onto the stage for soundcheck a lightning bolt struck me! Not literally. I'm speaking metahorically. And it was the tiniest little detail that had sparked that flash of recognition! It was just this little jut of sponge covered railing that I'd walked out onto the last time we were here in order to make my way over the audience barrier and into the crowd! All the memories came flooding back, and with it came the excitement of the gig ahead!

We met our support band for the night, Scars Borough, and posed sexily for a photo oppertunity. Eventually someone came along with a camera and actually took a photo...!

First song into the set and the audience went ballistic! "Rock & Roll Queen" in Japanese is no easy task! But I mastered it well, and the audience enjoyed it. I think. Well at least they unserstood it. I hope. Yes, they definitely enjoyed it. Let's hope they understood it. At least they appreciated the attempt!

With just a few minor guitar issues aside, the show was AMAZING! And by that I mean the audience totally blew us away!

The next morning was a very busy morning! It suddenly got VERY cold outside! Ben, Rie and I braved the cold and literally ran across the road to get some snacks from Food Stall whilst Charlotte showed off her interview chops. Her main asset is that she smiles and looks like a hamster. A great way to steer clear of those difficult questions! We had a radio interview and a live on-air acoustic set to do, so we shot over to the studio in a taxi and the magic just fell out of us...!

After all the interviews (one actually involved me in a push-up competition on camera - I failed, spectacularly. At least I looked good...) we played what I thought was one of our best shows so far this year. No guitar troubles, a fantastic audience and I expanded my Japanese vocabulary so far that I'm now known as the Stephen Fry of the Shibuya district. Yes!

A celebration was in order! Especially since I was due to DJ at Hub any minute!

"Let's get some fish!" we all declared in a chorus of excitement! "Fish would be perfect! Yum!" And it was! So good, in fact, that the owner of the restaurant needed a damn good hug! And a photo with us!

You will now find, if you plan to venture to Kaikaya fish restaurant in Tokyo, a drum skin on the wall with "Dear Kaikaya! Thanks for all the fish, love Billy and Charlotte of The Subways" written in big black ink across it. It's officially the greatest object known to man. The restaurant owner was so polite that he felt obliged to drive us through the cold air of the night to Hub, where I was set to blow the DJing world apart. Like this...

Instead, I did this...

...and played one of the world's worst DJ sets. Still, there's nothing like ending a night by playing The B52's "Love Shack" at full blast with the bass shaking the very foundations of the room! They left in droves. It probably would have been better if I'd have called their mothers rude words... still, I dug it. I was dancing like a champion! And I think secretly they all thought I was incredibly talented. If they did, they didn't show it. In all fairness, our entrance to Hub was probably one of the most ecstatic receptions we've ever seen. Charlotte and I even found it appropriate to bow and curtsy. Strange, but incredibly heartwarming.

And so, Japan, we say goodbye to you!

Arigato kosaymas, and we will see you very, very soon!

All our sweet gentle love!

William Lunn (Esquire)

x

PS...

Are these not the coolest taxis you've ever seen?!

Adventure Japan 2009 (Part 3)

Mon, 16 Feb 2009 12:00:00 GMT

Each new morning that I've woken, I've prayed to at least one of the many Gods that people believe in nowadays, hoping that it was a reasonable time and that I'd had more than just five hours sleep. My room was completely dark and my heart sank. It looked like just another jet-lagged ridden slumber until...yes! Light! A crack of light shone through my curtain! I looked at the time on my bedside clock...10:48am! Ten hours sleep! I almost did a victory dance around the room! I was finally in sync with Japanese time! I celebrated by meeting Ben (manager extraordinaire!) Kirby for breakfast. We decided to catch the train to the Yoyogi shrine and look around for a good place to eat some food when we were there. After finding a buffet for a reasonably good price (and completely shredding the Japanese apart in terms of amount of food consumed in one short period..!) we took a nice relaxing stroll to the shrine.

Ben's map reading skills were ESSENTIAL...

After seeing some rather quaint and beautiful sights at the shrine, Ben decided to immerse himself in the culture and paid money (as one usually does for spiritual purposes these days...!) to clap his hands and pray. Though, as he stated afterwards, he was probably meant to pray for someone else's good will and luck and not his own! Still, charity starts at home! And if there is some benevolent force out there somewhere handing out good vibes and love, I'm pretty sure Ben is next on the list. He's been such a good boy!

Talking of good vibes...

This man sure does know how to hug. And he doesn't even ask for money!

With Ben's exceptional map reading skills we managed to make our way by train to the Japanese Imperial Palace, which hosted some rather beautiful gardens. It was a long walk through the gardens but was a real sight to see, as it totally contrasted to the hustle and bustle of the Shibuya district where our hotel stands!

Luckily enough this time there were no deranged Britons leaping into the moat surrounding the complex! I contemplated it, but I valued my dignity and naked form far too much to allow it to be exploited by the sex-hungry newscasters just waiting for us crazy English to do something wacky. Plus, i didn't want to be standing there, wet and shivering, when we had planned to go to the Kabuki-Za Theatre that evening to see a performance...!

Ben and I made our slow and winding way to the theatre via a car boot sale and a swift coffee and met up with Stevey (Ice G sound engineer/tour manager) Gurney and Charlotte (four strings) Cooper. We bought our tickets (a slow and painful process) and watched one of the most intriguing and immersive forms of art we've ever seen. Quite extraordinary and strange! Quite wonderful, too! We were so enraptured and captivated by the performance that we waited around outside the theatre after the show so that we could look around the gift shop (an even more of a slow and painful process!) and spend all our Yen!

Another amazing day in Japan! Rest, rest, rest! For tomorrow is our Tokyo show!

Until then!

William Lunn (Esquire)

x

PS....

Adventure Japan 2009 (Part 2)

Sun, 15 Feb 2009 12:00:00 GMT

I awoke on the morning after the Osaka show at a ridiculous 5am! I was still finding it rather hard to sync up to Japanese time due to the jetlag but I was getting there... slowly! We all convened (all being nine of us: three in the band, five crew and our charming and jolly Japanese rep, Shiho!) in the hotel lobby at 11.45am and made our way to Osaka train station to catch the bullet train (which we all decided looked remarkably like a freakily long and demented dolphin) to Tokyo! It was to be a two hour journey, which we were all quite looking forward to. I was looking forward to some Billy time, which meant strapping on my big swanky headphones and listening to the latest BBC 5 Live Kermode film review podcast. Though, as it happened, five minutes in (and this is no disrespect to either Mark Kermode or Simon Mayo, as I'm sure it had to do more with my rampant jetlag) I fell into a very deep sleep. The next thing I remember is waking up to see everybody readying themselves to disembark the train and, me being usual old me, I asked rather loudly and impolitely:

"ARE WE THERE YET? WHERE ARE WE?!"

I still had my headphones blaring, you see! After spending ten unbearable minutes hunting around Tokyo train station for a toilet, I made my way back to the group who were impatiently waiting in the taxi and we finally made our way to Excel Hotel, which stands 24 stories above the Shibuya district of Japan. The most adventurous of us, those being me, Steve (Ice G tour manager/sound engineer) Gurney, Ben (manager extraordinaire) Kirby, Charlotte (four strings) Cooper and Shiho the wonder rep all met in the lobby to catch the 5pm train to go and see Death Cab For Cutie play. This trip had been arranged for weeks and Charlotte and I were extremely excited! Regardless of how tired we were!

The journey was, as it always is with us adventurers, quite breathtaking - even if we were exhausted! Eventually, after much attention seeking, constant whining about having to walk instead of taking a taxi and the wanton and frivolous irritation from me, we arrived at the venue in one piece.

As you probably know, we're all really big fans of Death Cab For Cutie. If you haven't already heard, the last time we saw them play, which actually happened to be in Osaka during the Summersonic Festival, I sang along to my hearts content at the side of stage and wept like a baby to "I Will Follow You Into The Dark". Charlotte and I totally lost our cool when we met them last time and, after many a stutter, declared our love for and our influence from them. I also declared that "Title Track" is in my top three all time favourite songs, which it is, and Charlotte spouted that Nick is her favourite bassist, which he is!

During this particular show they played one of my all time favourite tracks - easily in my all time top three - called "Title Track". And we were totally amazed to get to meet them again!

The show was incredible. Amazing! Good luck for your future shows, guys!

As for us, we needed to get some sleep! Goodnight, Tokyo!

William Lunn (Esquire)

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PS - Here's hoping Rick and Gareth got back to their hotel in one piece! Those Japanese signs are a bugger to work out!

Adventure Japan 2009 (Part 1)

Sat, 14 Feb 2009 12:00:00 GMT

So we arrived at Heathrow Airport with butterflies in our bellies. We were extremely excited to be heading to Japan and Australia on this tour - and not just for the good weather! Our bags were packed and we all convened at Cafe Nero in terminal 5 and sank a few coffees and paninis before making our jolly way to the check in desk...only to find that the flight had been oversold and that four of our crew (of eight!) had been bumped off the flight! No seats for half of us! Apprently - and this is common amongst ALL airway companies, it is said by the patient and genuinely attentive but useless lady at the check in desk - it's pretty common for airway companies to oversell flights because 10% of the people who book flights either online or down the phone don't even end up bothering to turn up to the airport. On this occasion, however, all those who had pre-booked their tickets turned up to check in, which meant that British Airways was left with a pickle of a situation: a portion of people who had paid and arranged in good faith to be transported to Japan with their company wouldn't be getting on that plane...! But thanks to some magical managerial handiwork and confident persistence we managed to squeeze all eight of us onto the flight. Imagine that! Being able to barter and toil for something that had already been paid for and planned! Oh what lucky patrons we were! Thank you, British Airways, for being so generous! We were checked in ten minutes before boarding, which meant skirting through customs in Nigel Mansell fashion and not having the time to bounce from duty free shop to duty free shop buying, spending and splashing out like drunken horny aristocrats to our heart's content. One of our crew wanted a new iPod and I wanted to purchase Lost (seaons one and four) - not today! Darn it! And I was so looking forward to finding out more secrets about that damn island. No spoilers please, people! I realise I'm a little bit behind.

The flight was bearable, though my eyes felt like they were being scratched out by bull ants. I have a bad reaction to flight. Not just the sweaty palms and the realisation of a spectacularly fiery death at high velocities on take off, but just the circulated air that makes me feel like I've been kept in a high pressure cardboard box with no fresh air for what feels like decades. My throat goes dry and my eyes go so bloodshot I feel shame, pity and sorrow for the poor souls who manage to catch my gaze. My feet swell to the size of Andre The Giant and my legs are too long for me to get any appropriate amount of sleep without my joints seizing and aching like Tony Benn's heart at the thought of David Cameron becoming Prime Minister. Well, Tony, I feel your pain and empathise with you, you great man. We're both aching like bastards but you know what they say: the sweet 'aint as sweet without the bitter. That tendency to quote Tom Cruise films is something you'll find quite common with me. Apologies!

We arrived in Tokyo with a whoop and a cheer in all our hearts! We'd made it! Now all we had to do was wait eight hours for our connecting flight to Osaka... Some of us decided to look around the airport for the nearest bar, while others - that's me included in this particular group - decided that nesting our bonnets on our coats on the nearest set of benches and waving bye bye to the real world was for us. After a few hours sleep we eventually found that our flight was checking in and we hopped, skipped and legged it through the heart-warmingly polite and easy customs checks and onto our airplane. Cue some more reading (I've read two books so far on this tour and I'm now on my third! Classic!), sleeping and watching films before cracking down quite heavily onto Osaka tarmac! A good night's sleep and a hearty breakfast later we were ready to play our first show in Japan this year! The venue was BEAUTIFUL. The flooring looked more artfully potent and cooly modern than most English modern art - I'm looking squarely at you, Damien Fucking Hirst - and the people at the venue as polite and helpful as private care hospital staff. The audience were AMAZING! I hope my Japanese was understandable and my appreciation for such cheering and singing and respect from the audience quantifiable! The show was early - we were offstage by 9pm - so some food at a spectacular restaurant with spectacular food (though here in Japan spectacular food is pretty standard and English food is dog food compared, bar any Jamie Oliver endorsed/ concocted recipes - that man is the Leonardo Da Vinci of the English representatives of cuisine!) and spectacular company (that means you, Rie, and your charming and hospitable friend, Rob!) was in order. Then sleep. Precious sleep! Tomorrow we travel to Tokyo!

Regards and kisses.

William Lunn (Esquire)

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Germany 2009 - Billy Lunn's Blogs Parts 1 to 5

Thu, 05 Feb 2009 12:00:00 GMT

With us all having just had a wonderfully relaxing and thoughtful Christmas/New Year we looked forward to getting back on the bus and cruising through Europe and hitting the towns we didn't play on our rather large tour last year.

Strasbourg was the first stop. We had a wonderful time in France the last time we visited, so we anticipated these two shows with great excitement. Strasbourg was especially good when we came here last, though we played so loud that the desk kept shutting down! No problem with that this time! We took to the stage and went straight into the set with "Rock & Roll Queen", relishing the fact that the audience was dancing and moshing and jumping up and down straight from the first chord. Usually on our first show back after a little bit of a break we are loose and exhausted and it takes three or four songs for us to really get back into it but Strasbourg must have instilled us with a feverish need to fucking R.O.C.K.!!

Lyon was our second and last French date on this tour. The venue was awesome, and I took as many photos as I could during soundcheck so that I could say to our manager, "I wanna go back there the next time we go to France". We went straight into "Rock & Roll Queen" again tonight and the reaction was quite exquisite! We played most of the songs from both the "Young For Eternity" and "All Or Nothing" albums, as we did the night before in Strasbourg, and we relished every moment of it. At some stage a guy just waltzed (not literally) onstage and posed a question at me like I was standing next to him at the bar. Unfortunately I was midway through the intro to a song and managed to shrug him off and entice him to get back into the crowd. Questions after the show, please, if you would! Still, the candour was very thoughtful. I like to converse, just not midway through a section before I'm about to rock your asses.

Au revoir, France! See you very soon!

With love,
William Lunn (Esquire)

France/Germany 2009! (Part 2)

So we set off from Lyon, France, and eventually pulled up in D�sseldorf in our big red tourbus. The Zakk looked like a great place as soon as we walked through the door. We also met our support band for this tour, One Fine Day, and then soundchecked. As soon as we hit the stage and plucked our first chord the heads in the audience began bouncing, looking like a sea of hair and flesh and beautiful faces! It didn't stop for the whole show! Pure, unadulterated BOUNCING!

The same could be said for Lingen! Lingen, when asked or not, seemed to go absolutely seriously fucking crazy for the entire show. The Alter Schlachthof was a great venue as well! We even had a pool table backstage....! After the show we all congregated upstairs for pool games and lots of drinking. One Fine Day were confused with our English pool rules and, in turn, we were just as confused with their German rules. Cue a meeting of two cultures mixing together their rules and making one big beautiful game of international pool. A melting pot, if you will, of wooden sticks and balls.

Our first two shows back in Germany for 2009 and the audiences were AMAZING! Let's rock, Germany!

William Lunn (Esquire)

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Part 3

Bielefeld Ringlokschuppen was a LARGE venue. It was beautiful and the sound was absolutely fantastic! Onstage the ground shook and, with every cheer from the audience, our smiles grew wider. I dove offstage before we'd even made it to the chorus of "Oh Yeah" and found a platform where a very nice man stood beneath me and offered me his beer to drink! "Danke!", I said before taking a sip and then tipping the rest over my head!

Erfurt Stadtgarten was also a large and beautiful venue! We had a whole balcony to ourselves to watch One Fine Day from and the audience were definitely ready to go crazy. As I started the chords to "I Want To Hear What You Have Got To Say" the whole room erupted into a sing-a-long and I didn't even have to go to my microphone...the whole audience sang the lyrics for me! All three of us felt tingles going up and down our spines! To celebrate, I climbed the scaffolding at the sides of the stage and dove off backwards, hoping to hell that the audience would catch me - and they did! Vielen Dank!

We were definitely being treated very well, as Kiel Max also turned out to be another large and beautiful venue. "That balconies looks awesome!", I said as I entered the venue to start soundcheck. Everybody knew what I was thinking, and they knew that at some point during the show I would not be able to resist the temptation to Climb onto that balcony and dive off. I did. And it was VERY VERY high. There must be footage out there somewhere of it. If there is, please let us know! And once again the audience sang the whole intro of "I Want To Hear What You Have Got To Say", which sent tingles up and down our spines once again! I'm really digging this! It gives me a break from singing and it also lets me hear how good some of you are at singing!

Let the singing continue!

William Lunn (Esquire)

x

Part 4

Rostock Mau Club was much smaller than most of the venues we've played so far on this tour. Half the size, approximately, but that doesn't mean the show would be half as loud, half as crazy or half as HOT as the others. It was extremely hot, in fact! Each person in that venue lost at least half their bodily fluids in one way or another! A leap into the crowd proved much harder than I first thought because the stage was so low and the barrier was so high. I managed to get in there finally and it was like a sea of flesh and smiling faces. Poseidon was not smiling upon me that day though, as everybody fell beneath me - and I went with them. A shower of crazy people collapsing and sinking into the ground but....POP! Up we come again and I get back onstage to finish the final song! Very loud, very crazy and very hot!

Dresden Alter Schlachthof was a VERY large venue. We'd sold so many tickets that we were moved from a 900 capacity room to a 1,800 capacity hall and it sounded VERY loud. The show was going great! Cups of beer were being thrown in the air and there were dancing people as far back as we could see. T-shirts were thrown onstage and, at one point, I was so soaked in beer that I nearly slipped over onstage from the amount of beer that covered the floor. As we reached "Oh Yeah", I climbed the lighting rigs on both sides of the stage and dove backwards into the audience. I got back onstage, began to play the rest of the song and then... BOOOOOOOOOOOOM! No power. No sound coming from our guitars, bass, drums or our microphones. We all look at eachother onstage and wonder what to do next. Suddenly the microphones come back on and I decide to do the whole song from the beginning acapella style! I sang the guitar parts, Charlotte sang the bass guitar parts and the audience sang the lyrics. It was going SO SO SO SO SO well until the microphones suddenly lost their power once more and we were forced to leave the stage. We tried our best to finish the set but it just didn't happen! Dresden, we have unfinished business! :-D

William Lunn (Esquire)

x

Part 5

After our strange exit from the stage in Dresden, we were looking forward to completing a set that didn�t involve our equipment blowing up or catching fire. Lindau Club Vaudeville was also another really beautiful venue! We have been very, very lucky on this tour! It looked old and very punk rock with drawings covering the walls of the dressing room. At first the dressing room smelled of eggs and sulphur until we borrowed our bus driver�s jossticks and made the air smell homely and scented! The audience at Lindau were utterly fantastic! Singing along to the words whether they knew the lyrics or not! Lots of bouncing groups of people formed moshpits and hands clapped in the air. I even managed to crowdsurf to the bar during �Oh Yeah� and hi-fived the barman before he kindly gave me a free drink! Yummy!

Mannheim Alte Feuerwache was a beautiful old firestation that looked as though it had been converted into a venue. There were stone pillars and stone floors and even looked quite Roman! As soon as we took to the stage we were overwhelmed by the cheers from the audience and were so excited by the reaction once we hit the chorus sing-a-long of �Rock & Roll Queen�. We all had a lot of fun onstage tonight and were cheerily amused by one audience member who thought that the audience had only gone 6 out of 10 in terms of craziness. Very funny! I managed to crowdsurf to the sound desk before saying a quick hello to the audience at the back of the venue. I then crowdsurfed to the front and made my way back onto the stage to finish the song. Tomorrow�our last gig on this tour!

Wiesbaden was to be the last show on this amazing tour. We were all very sad to say goodbye to our good friends One Fine Day, and also sad to say goodbye to Germany for a few months (we�ll be back for the festivals this summer! Oh yes!). We left, however, on the most positive of terms! The audience was absolutely crazy and we were running all over the very big stage of this very, very big venue! The speakers at the sides of the stage were EXTREMELY high, but I still decided to climb them and dive off. I survived!

All in all a rather mind blowing tour.

See you all very soon!

Japan and Australia� here we come!!

William Lunn (Esquire)

x

Happy New Year!! Bring on 2009!!

Tue, 13 Jan 2009 12:00:00 GMT

We're preparing for a rocking year! We've added 2 sideshows in Australia, 3 shows in Japan, 3 Austrian dates, 2 Belguim, 1 Swiss and 1 Czech date to the bands already busy schedule and there's more to come!

They'll also be playing a not so secret London show in January. Though no extensive UK tour is planned in the immediate future after last October's tour we'll be pushing for festival slots in the summer. Going to be a fun year!

Adventure Belgium/Holland!

Sun, 09 Nov 2008 12:00:00 GMT

This was the second time we'd played Botanique in Brussels. The first time was a few years ago and it was a standout show of the tour. This year we played Pukkelpop and it was also very special for us, so today's show had a lot to live up to! Someone after the show asked me whether I was really actually having a great time onstage and asked if I meant it when I said that the audience was being absolutely brilliant � a bit of a stupid question to ask, and not one that implies a huge amount of trust in what I say when I'm onstage � but believe me, this audience was AMAZING. Considering the reaction from the crowd and the fact that I didn't have to sing a word for the intro of "I Want To Hear What You Have Got To Say" speaks for itself! Was I enjoying myself�What a silly question!!

Arriving in Amsterdam was rather exciting! Amsterdam is always a fun place to play! The show was rather LOUD, though only just slightly less loud than Brussels � but still VERY LOUD and crazy! I arrived in the dressing room after the show to see that the whole crew had adorned the walls with birthday decorations for my birthday (which was technically the next day, but hey, we're in Amsterdam!). I was given some fantastic presents, a birthday cake and a few lager shandys before retiring to my bunk for a good sleep!

William Lunn (Esquire)

x

FOR FULL DIARY PLEASE GO TO...
www.myspace.com/thesubways

Die Deutsch-Abenteuer (Part 1)

Sat, 08 Nov 2008 12:00:00 GMT

Saarbr�cken was to be the first of our German shows on this tour! We arrived at the venue and wondered whether this teeny little venue would hold all the craziness of the German people! We take to the stage and the heat from the crowd hits us. We burst into our first song, "Kalifornia" and all hell breaks loose. The people at the front are all bent over the barriers and there are people crowdsurfing in the small gap between the audiences heads and the REALLY low ceiling. Saarbr�cken was a real rock'n'roll gig. Sweat pouring everywhere and the sound was immense. My ears were about to burst!

The Frankfurt Batschkapp is a venue we have visited once before, and it's always a treat arriving at a venue you know and have memories of. Before the show, I decided to take a long walk with our manager into the centre of town to have a look around. We found a computer shop so he could buy another power lead for his laptop and I browsed and ogled the new Apple Macs and then bough some doughnuts. Tasty! The show kicked off and everybody went crazy. It was easily one of the hottest shows we've ever played. I nearly slipped over my own sweat on the stage floor. I had three patches: one from my left arm, one from my right arm and one puddle formed from the sweat coming from my head and dripping off my chin. My hair was EXTREMELY wet! Gross, but slightly amusing! And I thought this show was hot and sweaty, then we arrived in K�ln...

K�ln was easiest one of the biggest indoor shows we've played in Germany. 1,500 people in one room all ready to dance and go crazy! Onstage it was EVEN hotter and sweatier than Frankfurt! We looked out on the sea of people singing our lyrics, dancing , crowd-surfing (WHICH I LOVE TO SEE!!) and moshing - there was also the occasional circle pit going on. Only three shows in and Germany is kicking ASS!

See you in Bremen!! :-D

William Lunn (Esquire)

x

THE SUBWAYS LIVE & FREE ONLINE!!!

Sat, 08 Nov 2008 12:00:00 GMT

THE SUBWAYS LIVE STREAM TOMORROW!!!
(SUNDAY 8th NOVEMBER 2008)

CLICK BELOW!!!

New German January Tour!!

Wed, 05 Nov 2008 12:00:00 GMT

Check the live dates for the latest announcements

The Subways to play Manchester XFM Winter Wonderland

Mon, 03 Nov 2008 12:00:00 GMT

XFM has asked The Subways to join the fun at their flagship Winter Wonderland Xmas show in Manchester!

All money raised will go to the Oxfam charity.

Manchester Academy 1 Monday 8th December

Full Line up...

Scouting For Girls
The View
The Music
The Subways
The Automatic
Cage The Elephant
Kid British

Get your tickets here...

L'Aventure Fran�ais 2008 (Part 1 & 2)

Fri, 24 Oct 2008 12:00:00 GMT
Waking up the day after the Brixton show was probably one of the most labouring tasks I've ever been put through. By the time I'd shaken off the sleep and made myself a tea everybody had already left to go home for their day off. The train journey home was bearable and actually quite snappy. The missus kept me upright (what a lifesaver!) until I felt my cerebral capacities slowly come back to me for the journey home. Then sleeeeeeeeeep�.

The great thing about playing shows in France is that they feed you very well. And that's ESSENTIAL. So today in Lille before the show we all had a juicy filet steak with garlic potatoes and, if you were lucky, a side of artichoke. Yummy! The show was also a fun one. The venue was quite compact and there were quite a few people there to see us! Some heckles en Francais and some surprising requests for "Move To Newlyn"! My white Gibson 335 has all but packed up so we switched to a borrowed brown one and it sounds like LOVE at my fingertips. Fantastic audience tonight!!

A day off in Bordeuax� I took the first turn out of the hotel and decided to walk around and see what I could find. What I found was one of the sweetest little old towns � it looked more Italian than it did French, which sort of implied itself in the pizza I ended up eating after I found a nice little caf� to stop at. The show the next day was probably one of the best performances we've pulled out of the bag in the while. We were just FEELING it. It all happened and the sound was rolling through our minds and came out in sweaty bundles into the audience. Stage dives and dancing, and at one point the crowd split like the Red Sea. This is turning out to be a very interesting French tour!!

William Lunn (Esquire)

x

L'Aventure Fran�ais 2008 (Part 2)

I'm making a really good habit of falling off the drumkit. Once in Berlin (check YouTube for that spectacular example of Gravity Vs. Billy Lunn) and now once again in Toulouse! I leap from the kit during the intro of "Oh Yeah" (it already feels like the song is going warp fucking speed) and the lights shut off and I have no idea where the floor is. I make what I think is an informed judgement based on memory, which clearly isn't as fucking crystal as I'd like it to be, and land later than expected - my weight is already too far back on my feet so I stumble haphazardly backwards and straight into the monitors at the front of the stage. I can still feel my legs so my spine isn't severed, but my dignity is harshly bruised. The audience, wonderful as they have been so far on this French tour, lift me from my pit of pain and despair and I carry on with the song thrashing the fuck out of my guitar cursing my wits. The show ends up being a great one, and after this particular show we make the decision to come back to France next year.

Montpellier Rockstore is a BEAUTIFUL venue. And, as our wonderful French support band for this tour Quidam inform us, it has an important rock heritage. It's a shame then that the first thing that greets what we call the gift and blessing of audial capacities as we enter the venue are raped and ravaged by the sound of fucking REGGAE. What is it with France and reggae? Granted, the French still think hip-hop is innovative and experimental and is totally, like, the bomb. Still, we're making a killing at these shows so clearly the ROCK is still flowing healthily through the veins of the French! I fall over once again - but at least this time it looks like I'm just going for it purposefully as I'm already flinging myself about the stage because I can't hear a damn thing in my ears - our monitor engineer gave me the wrong in-ear pack and I'm hearing only Josh's snare drum at 3,000dB. After mincing about onstage to find the right pack (my Dad, Josh's drum tech, had my pack!) I totally neglect the idea of even talking between songs and just PLAY. It was one of the most enjoyable times I've had onstage in a weird, slightly annoyed, totally aggressive and fucked up way.

MARSEILLE tomorrow!!

William Lunn (Esquire)

x

Second Frankfurt show added!!

Tue, 14 Oct 2008 12:00:00 GMT
The Subways will be playing Frankfurt for the second time on November 22nd 08. The first one sold out so fast we felt we should add another show! x

Adventures Parts 3 to 6 - Billy Lunn Tour Report

Tue, 14 Oct 2008 12:00:00 GMT
Adventure 2008 (Part 3) �AVIN IT!!!

Norwich didn't much like my "Aha!", but then i guess every band going through Norwich gives the Partidgeism a shot! We played two completely new songs, "Always Tomorrow" and "This Is the Club For People Who Hate People". Man, these audiences are amazing!

Tonight in Oxford was particularly special. We're two shows in and already hitting our stride!! I was carried all the way to the bar and Oxford screamed the luuuurve!

Beautiful people, we salute you!

Adventure 2008 (Part 4)

After Oxford, we had a lot to live up to. It was one of those shows where everything was just RIGHT. The set flowed nicely and the audience were all what Mr. Partridge would call "mentalists"....

...So then we're back at Keele Uni. It's been three long years since we last took to this stage and a lot has happened since then! Most notably, we've released another album and toured the world. Least notably, I've grown SOME chest hair. Just a little, since then. A teeny weeny hiccup at the beginning of "Kalifornia" aside, the show was storming and the audience went ballistic. NUTTERS! I couldn't help climbing the speaker stacks either. I'd never even considered the idea until the promoter came up to me ten minutes before the show and mentioned that the security guys had move the barrier back from the stage another two foot to prevent me front stage-diving or leaping from the speakers. That automatically instilled the "fuck you" attitude in me and I vowed to give it a go, just to piss the cheeky little (big, really) gits off! But really, the least they could have done was ask. I JUST made it over. On the first jump my bum literally scraped the paint off the barriers. On the second I decided, if I didn't want to Bill Hicks my own fans, I'd better put a little more into it and cleared the bugger nicely. Looking up at Sam and Barry from Twin Atlantic on the balcony I gave a little knowing wink (we'd made a wager before the show after I'd been told about the two foot difference whether I'd make it over!) and breathed a sigh of relief.

Everytime we play Leeds, we know that the little Yorkshire tykes are going to be clambering their way onto the stage and dancing like their grandmas after two shots of absinthe. I appreciated the kisses, too! There was a hell of a lot of dancing going on. And that break in "Turnaround" looked amazing from where we were standing. I still can't believe that Charlotte didn't fall over one of those "lumps" we had dispersed around the stage. Maybe it was because her boyfriend was in the audience and she wanted to impress him so she was EXTRA careful. Everybody now... "AAWWWWWWW!". But seriously, it's a very Charlotte thing to fall over ANYTHING. I'm still very shocked! And those platforms either side of the stage at that venue - well they're just begging to be jumped off, aren't they!! I couldn't help but swing off the second from the lighting rig. Variety is the spice of life!!

Adventure 2008 (Part 5)

Here we, here we, here we fucking go!

Touring with a support band like Twin Atlantic is great for so many reasons, not just for their awesome Scottish accents but these guys really know how to rock and they really love doing it. And as we head into the boundaries of Scotland you can literally here its inhabitants gasp. They can taste us approaching. Glasgow...You. Were. AMAZING! Not that you didn't know that anyway. Loud as hell. Twin Atlantic rocked the masses and got them going before we took to the stage to the yells of "HERE WE, HERE WE, HERE WE FUCKING GO!" - that chant is our most favourite thing about playing in Scotland...apart from the deep fried Mars bars and king spare ribs.

Only one Scottish date on this tour, but Jesus Fucking Christ was it a scorcher!!

Adventure 2008 (Part 6) rockin

SO I wake up and the first thing I see of Birmingham is the dark walls of a tunnel. After touring for quite a few years I should really be used to this now: we always park our bus at the back of a venue, which goes deep underground. I pack my things up, have a quick shower and decide to go for a walk in town. Why are there kids lining up outside HMV at noon? Shouldn't they be in school?! I say that out loud and someone leans in and says...
"You Me At Six are playing there later..."
"So fans of You Me At Six don't have an education? Go figure..." I replied, thinking immediately of getting some food in my belly to take my mind off mocking the growing line of the mostly young, female and (probably) virginal You Me At Six fans. Another bland mess that has sparked the imagination of people who can't help not knowing any better. Once they get wind of Biffy and QOTSA, they'll "get the net", as Wayne Campbell once said. I get some food and head to soundcheck. ROOOOOOOOOOOOOOCK ensues! Tonight's crowd is literally baying for blood. If there's not a circle pit then there's a yelling-the-words-to-the-sky competition going on. Sometimes both at the same time. I decide to leap from the speakers that earlier in the evening I'd promised myself not to!!

Southampton was another adventure. Our bus broke down....outside the venue!!! Lucky, eh! So we had to lug all our equipment and clothes and whatnot onto a replacement bus that showed up a few hours later. No big deal. Just a bit of a git, really. The Dodge Brothers turned up and Mr. Kermode immediately announces that he forgives us for our appearance in Rocknrolla, which I slyly laugh off and ask how stuff has been. They've all been great, apparently! It is bloody wonderful to see The Dodge Brothers once again - and to hear them play, because they sure can rock. Mark's new song, "42 Days" is a winner. Look for it on the new album. Oh! And they did insist that I try some new hair product...

Adventures 2008 (Part 2)

Wed, 01 Oct 2008 12:00:00 GMT
A quick pizza and a train into London spelled the beginning for me on this adventure. We rehearsed all the newies planned for the tour and joked about Charlotte's fucking extraordinary ability to be able to sieve any memory of any songs we haven't played within the last three weeks. Quite amazing.

It's good to have the crew back all in one place (minus our favourite Norwegian, a devoted Travis crew member now...!) and recapping on old ways and also joking about the extravagance planned for our first ever Brixton show!

Tonight it's Norwich UEA. D'ya reckon Partridge will be there...?

William Lunn (Esquire)

x

TOUR IS ROLLING!!!

Wed, 01 Oct 2008 12:00:00 GMT
CHarlotte now 110% and The Subways are ready to rock! First show is Norwich UEA tonight!

Adventure 2008 (Part 1)

Fri, 26 Sep 2008 12:00:00 GMT
"Charlotte is ill!", I hear down the phone line. I must confess, I was a little drunk when I heard this news. Drunk or sober, I knew this spelled out B.A.D. since we were supposed to start touring the very next day... "The show in Germany has been cancelled and we'll probably have to move the Nottingham show to the end of November to give her just a few more days to recuperate..." - When we play, we like to play hard and there's really no point in us going onstage unless we're ready to ROCK.

"But I really wanted to play this German show", I said, "I was looking forward to going to Hamburg!".
"I know, dude..." mumbled our manager, "It's just one of those things..."
"FUCK IT!", I replied! "Book me a ticket, I'll go over there on my own with my acoustic and bash out a few numbers. At least then one of us is there and who knows, I could actually have a LAUGH..."
"Well I'd best call Steve (our sound engineer) to look after you... You know what you're like Billy. You'll end up in a ditch in Middlesbrough."

And so the journey began from my house in Essex to the runways of Heathrow Airport (approximately two and a half hours!) and Ice G (Mr. Steve Gurney - sound engineer/tour manager extraordinaire) and I were off to rock Hamburg armed with...my acoustic guitar...watch out, Hamburg! We arrived and made our way to the venue to commence soundcheck.
"So it's just you?" said the stage manager.
"Yes! Little old me. I'll still blow your socks off. Just without a distortion pedal. Don't worry, it'll all be fine...", I lied "I've done this a thousand times before..." I lied again. I even convinced myself!
Ice G and I zoomed off to the Italian restaurant where all our label reps were drunkenly convening before the big bang that was tonight's festival show. I assured them that even if I sucked we could all sip on German beer and numb the effect of disappointment and tiredness by at least 30%. Off we all went, and I kept my chin held high. Foals played a blinding show before I took to the stage, quivering and mildly content that in 9 songs it'll all be over with anyway. Did I expect that sort of reception? NO. Wow! Did I expect that sing-a-long? NO! And that loud? NEVER!! Was I happy with how it all went? OH YES! Well worth the trip and the hair-tearing nerves. I even stopped the set to give Charlotte a quick phone call so the audience could all wish her well in their Germanic unison. Her mobile went to voicemail...BOLLOCKS! I have her parents number, maybe she's round there...
"Hello?"
"Hello, Sharon (Charlotte's mum) it's Billy. Is Charlotte there at all?"
"Yeah she's just asleep at the moment, I think. I could go and check for you...?"
"That would be lovely, thanks Sharon!" I almost went into full blown conversation asking how her day was, but I was reminded by the 800 people gazing at me intently in the spotlight onstage exactly what it was I was there for. And for a moment I wondered whether Charlotte's mum would say that she's asleep and shouldn't really be woken! What to do then?!
"Hello...?" Came Charlotte's frail voice down the line...
"Hello Charlotte! How are you feeling today? Any better?"
"A little bit, thank you... But still very tired and ill and sickly..."
"Aw, well I do believe that Hamburg has a special message for you..."
"GET WELL SOOOOOON CHAAAAARLOTTE!" came the yell down the line!
"Aw that's very sweet of you all! Vielen Dank!"
"Well she loved the message Hamburg! Now let's get back to the music!"

And so the adventure began! More to come, rockers! See you on this tour!!

William Lunn (Esquire)

x

Charlotte ill: Band to reschedule Nottingham show at Rock City

Fri, 26 Sep 2008 12:00:00 GMT
New date NOVEMBER 25th 2008 (moved from SEPTEMBER 29th 2008)

The Subways have been force to reschedule their September 29th show at Nottingham Rock City due to illness. Charlotte Cooper, the band's bassist and singer, has been struck down with food poisoning and has been unable to eat for a week. Doctors have advised bed rest and under no circumstance is she to leave the house, let alone play a rock concert.

The band would like to express their frustration and assure fans that they will be playing Nottingham in November and rocking extra hard.

All original tickets valid, refunds from the point of purchase.

Apologies for any inconvenience caused.

Goomusic
On behalf of Billy, Charlotte & Josh
The Subways

The Subways Signed drum kit on ebay!! BOLLOCKS TO POVERTY!!

Wed, 24 Sep 2008 12:00:00 GMT
Official Press release...

Bands, including The Subways, drum up support for 'Bollocks to Poverty' charity Auction- launching today.

Today, charity ActionAid launches its 'Bollocks to Poverty' auction, with exclusive goodies like a drum kit from indie rock band The Subways and loads more money-cant-buy items from The Ting Tings, Editors and many more��..

Music lovers should get ready to bid for their favourite bands' bits as loads of goodies donated by today's coolest bands are set to be auctioned off on Ebay for charity.

The 'Bollocks to Poverty' auction will raise money for International Development charity ActionAid and will give fans a chance to get their hands on items such as a drum kit from The Subways and a harmonica signed by Duffy.

Bidding will start today, Monday 22 September at 12 noon and continue until 1 October.

ActionAid is running the 'Bollocks to Poverty' auction to raise vital funds for its work throughout Africa, Asia and the Americas. Rather than just handing out aid, the charity works with the world's poorest people to give them the power and resources to change their lives for the better, for good.

Just a small amount can make a huge difference, so the more money raised by the auction, the better!

� �10 can provide five families in Liberia with enough seeds and tools to rebuild their livelihoods.
� �60 can provide a child in Malawi with life saving antiretroviral treatments for HIV for two months.
� �133 can enable 20 teenagers set up a community radio station in their favela (slum) in Brazil.
� �400 can provide enough medicines and materials for one community health centre in Cambodia.
� �1,000 can provide education for five ex-child soldiers in Sierra Leone.

ActionAid works in Africa, Asia and the Americas to end global poverty and injustice.

ActionAid's 'Bollocks to Poverty' auction launches today. Follow the link below and start the bidding!

Fancy Supporting Us?

Wed, 10 Sep 2008 12:00:00 GMT
With competitions running throughout September there's plenty of oppotunity to get that killer track down and send it in.

Apologies to those in areas where no comp is running (We did try to set them up)

The full list of stations:-

Mon 29 Sept NOTTINGHAM ROCK CITY
Trent FM

Wed 1 Oct NORWICH UEA
99.9 Norwich

Thurs 2 Oct OXFORD ACADEMY
Fox FM

Sat 4 Oct KEELE UNIVERSITY
No Comp

Sun 5 Oct LEEDS MET/ REFECTORY
No Comp

Mon 6 Oct GLASGOW ABC/ACADEMY
XFM Glasgow

Wed 8 Oct BIRMINGHAM ACADEMY

brmb
Mercia
Beacon Radio
Wyvern FM

Thurs 9 Oct SOUTHAMPTON GUILDHALL
No Comp

Sat 11 Oct NEWCASTLE ACADEMY
Metro Radio

Sun 12 Oct MANCHESTER ACADEMY
XFM Manchester

Tues 14 Oct BRISTOL ACADEMY
No Comp

Wed 15 Oct LONDON BRIXTON
XFM London

The Subways at Reading

Mon, 01 Sep 2008 12:00:00 GMT
Go to Reading? Go to Leeds? Miss both? Want to see the Subways performance?

You can watch their set on the BBC website here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/readingandleeds/2008/artists/subways/

Or see Billy perform an acoustic set backstage for NME here: http://www.nme.com/festivals/video

Billy in live webchat!

Tue, 26 Aug 2008 12:00:00 GMT
He'll be all on his own so join in, keep him company and ask him lots of questions.

The Subways in Habbo

Tue, 26 Aug 2008 12:00:00 GMT
The Subways are doing a web chat live in Haboo tomorrow at 4pm (GMT) and all you need to do to be there is register on Habbo�s site, build you avatar and get going! Just visit the site here:

By joining you�ll also get access to an exclusive Subways live recording from the Hammersmith secret gig. It�s the only place you�ll get to see it.

See you in Habbo tomorrow!

I Won't Let You Down Out Today!!!

Mon, 25 Aug 2008 12:00:00 GMT
Download now from seven digital for 79p
HERE
Or click on banner to right for CDs & 7" records

The Subways Live At Abbey Road!!

Fri, 22 Aug 2008 12:00:00 GMT
The band will be on the show performing 3 or 4 tracks.

The first TX will be on More4 this weekend...
More4 Live from Abbey Road Saturday 23 August 12:15am - 1:20am. It will receive it's first airing on Channel 4 next week... Channel 4 4 Music:Live from Abbey Road Sunday 31 August 12:10am - 1:10am. Also, their 11-minute 4PLAY piece will be repeated this weekend on Channel 4 Friday night/Saturday morning after Transmission.... 1:15am � 1:25am 4MUSIC: 4PLAY: THE SUBWAYS

European Tour Announced!!

Sat, 16 Aug 2008 12:00:00 GMT
Sat 18-Oct Lille Grand Mix
Mon 20-Oct Bordeaux Bt59
Tues 21-Oct Toulouse le Phare Club
Thurs 23-Oct Montpellier Rockstore
Fri 24-Oct Marseille Cabaret Aleatoire
Sat 25-Oct Lyon Transbordeur Club
Tues 28-Oct Strasbourg la Laiterie
Wed 29-Oct Paris Elysee Montmartre
Fri 31-Oct Reims la Cartonnerie Club
Sat 01-Nov Brussels Botanique
Sun 02-Nov Amsterdam Melkweg
Tues 04-Nov Saarbr�cken Roxy
Wed 05-Nov Frankfurt Batschkapp
Thurs 06-Nov Cologne LMH
Sat 08-Nov Bremen Schlachthof
Sun 09-Nov Hamburg Markthalle
Tues 11-Nov Berlin Kesselhaus
Wed 12-Nov Leipzig Conne Island
Thurs 13-Nov Munich Backstage Werk
Sat 15-Nov Zurich Rohstofflager
Sun 16-Nov Vienna Flex
Tues 18-Nov Stuttgart Rohre
Wed 19-Nov Bochum Zeche
Thurs 20-Nov Munster Skaters Palace

Highfields performance now FRIDAY 15th August

Sat, 02 Aug 2008 12:00:00 GMT
The festival promoters have asked the band to move up the bill and onto the Friday night at the festival.

Billy Lunn US Tour Diary Summer 08

Fri, 01 Aug 2008 12:00:00 GMT
THE SUBWAYS American Tour Diary by BILLY LUNN

Friday 25th July 2008

Yesterday began with practically no sleep and a very early flight from London Heathrow to JFK airport in New York. Today started with at least eleven hours catch up sleep under our belts and a nice warm breakfast in our bellies! So onwards to Warner Music HQ, where eight interviews were scheduled and only four took place � still, it all stank of absolute fun and extreme enjoyment! We potted about stealing CD�s from desks and playing Rock Band on Wii � and finally realising that the only people who try to be good at this are absolute retards with more time to waste than Satan HIMSELF waiting forever more outside the gates of heaven. We�re off to do the real thing, and play to a room full of New Yorkers! After all the flying, lost hours, no sleep, no food and dealing with underpaid, impolite and frankly dementedly fascistic customs men (both sides of the Atlantic� are these people born, raised and trained by jackals?) we play to the sexiest bunch of people. We have a tour manager and guitar tech without VISAs and stranded in London right now. It�s all very punk rock at the moment with guitar tunings and production organisation. Regardless, our audiences are starting to shock us in their sex ratio � we�re really starting to build up quite a batch of sexy fans. I�m very proud! New York had spirit tonight.

Saturday 26th July 2008

My alarm was set for 4:30am. I managed to get to sleep for midnight after hot-tailing it out of the venue last night, even though Luke from The Kooks asked if I wanted to party with him. �Errrr, no! I�m afraid I have people to rock, Luke�� Still, I could have done with a nightcap. A quick bathe and a shave (do I even NEED to shave? It�s mostly blonde fluff�) and I was out the hotel room and in the lobby by 6am for our trip back to the airport to catch the flight to Boston. Or �Borrrstowwwwn�, as the locals speak it. Our plane was so teeny even a gnat�s fart would have caused turbulence in this thing. Joshua was shitting his pants but any fears of plummeting out of the sky were eradicated by the amusement of filming Charlotte�s half sleep/half awake head-bobbing. When we got there we zoomed to our Days Inn hotel and recognised the clerk at the desk from the last time we were here. Some things never change. Like how total groovejet Boston audiences are. YES! Our rent-a-guitar tech today was awesome � thanks Mike! - and so was Chad, our sound engineer for the night. Let�s celebrate not fucking up for a second night in a row with a few beers in a Boston college bar full of jocks! The place really got going at my request for Rick James�s �Super Freak� on the jukebox.

Sunday 27th July 2008

Waking up to Neil Young�s �Heart Of Gold� is such a sweet thing. That�s why I set that song as my alarm tone. BEEEAAAAUTIFUL! It�s a travel day today. Our plans were to fly back to New York to connect with a flight heading to Seattle, but they were slightly hampered by the notion of a summer storm swallowing the entirety of The Big Apple � no planes going in or out all day. Thank the universe, then, for the 32 track Biffy Clyro playlist I�d made on my iPod! It was so good my face actually began to melt. By the time �With Aplomb� came on we�d re-jigged our tickets to take us through Dallas and on to Seattle. Phew! As �Jaggy Snake� hit its climactic flourishes we�d boarded the plane. In Biffy we trust. But the majesty of Biffy (or even QOTSA) couldn�t stop the feeling that halfway through our flight to Dallas we realised that we�d easily miss the connecting flight we booked to Seattle� The times on our tickets didn�t seem to work out� We�d been booked for the wrong departure time� By the time we�d land in Dallas our connecting flight to Seattle would already have fucked off without us. SHIT! So after we landed, running ensued. I felt no sense of guilt barging past the old lady in the wheelchair (Americanism is contagious!) to leg it to our connecting flight. The bastard had gone. SHIIIIIT! Who the hell said travel days are days off???? But what�s this? There�s one last flight? Get us on it!! Even if we are at the back! Get us on that plane! GET US ON THAT PLANE!!!

Monday 28th July 2008

We got on the damn plane! It was a four-hour flight and we all managed at least two hours sleep during. By the time we arrive at our hotel in Seattle it was 1am (4am to us on East Coast time!) and we�d been travelling for at least eighteen hours. Sleeeeeeeeep�. After our first solid bit of sleep in a week we all woke to find that our bus driver who�d be escorting us around the West Coast for the next week, wasn�t going to make the pick up time at the hotel - but by this time we were used to things not really going to plan so we hailed a taxi and lugged all the equipment into the back and made our way to the venue. Some razor sharp legend at our record label secured a live acoustic performance for Charlotte and me at End Radio (great station, by the way! We played at their festival, Endfest, a few years ago and it ruled!) occurring during the small window of time we were given to perform our necessary soundcheck � we�re all on rented gear on this tour so soundchecks are essential for us to mess around and see if everything is working. NOT TODAY, apparently! Still, the thing rocked and we knocked out renditions of �Oh Yeah� and �Shake! Shake!� to a handful of very enthusiastic attendees. We rushed back to the venue to grab some grub before we took to the stage. First song in and I receive a delicious blast of electric current to my mouth pulsating right through my body making me convulse as I try to sing the opening lyrics of �Kalifornia�. THIS IS WHAT SOUNDCHECKS ARE FOR!! The rented amps I was using weren�t earthed properly so everytime I made contact with the microphone to sing it felt like I was going to shit my pants from the force of these electric shocks � very painful. Luckily our monitor engineer saw one of the convulsions and managed to find a cover for the microphone so I could finish the set comfortably and without any pant-shitting antics ensuing. It really wouldn�t have mattered if he hadn�t, though, because I was buzzing so hard from the amazing audience we had. Bouncing, moshing, and my eardrums seemed fit to burst with their screams it was purely fucking orgasmic. GO SEATTLE!!!

Tuesday 29th July 2008

Portland has always been awesome for several reasons, one of them being that it�s a tax-free state and the food is cheap! Yum! So the first thing we did was find the nearest restaurant around, which happened to be Lebanese, and filled our bellies to keep up our energy. Yum! With this show being the last before our tour manager/sound engineer and guitar rejoin us after VISA kerfuffle�s, we really felt compelled to kick out the jams. Our guitar tech had some issues with our strange tunings and so some of the songs were played in alternate keys and with strange notes here and there but that all added to the frenetic air of the show. Plus, tuning your guitar halfway through a riff with a spare hand looks awesome, and I never pass up an opportunity to look awesome! Let�s have a beer�to celebrate the end of the hardest four days of any recent tour we�ve done! Tomorrow is San Francisco!!

Wednesday 30th July 2008

YES!! So this morning we finally picked up our wayward tour manager/sound engineer, Steve-O and our guitar tech, Mr. Ken Wood (yes, that�s his REAL name) and we headed for the gay capital that is San Francisco! After a few rather fun interviews (one involving me stammering through a guitar magazine cross-examination and practically blagging it) we soundchecked. It was all rather pleasant having them back and, during the course of soundcheck, we realised I should completely ditch the Les Paul we�d rented as a backup guitar realising it looked and sounded way to Wolf(wank)mother and I really didn�t want to look like (too much of�) a dick. We also realised how much of a walk this soundcheck had been since our last four soundchecks where we�d literally been running about the place plugging shit in where it don�t necessarily need to be plugged � �What the fuck does THIS wire do????� etc. The show, then, was pretty awesome. After I had a quick two-hour catch up nap we took to the stage and the crowd were great! Regardless of the fact that on two occasions I called the people who weren�t clapping along Pricks, but by the last three numbers they�d all thrown down their beers and taken to dancing their sexy little tushies off! And for the first time ever I did a Jack Black � I dover off the stage to have no little git catch me. They PARTED!! I landed right on my arse, stunned, and couldn�t stand up for at least ten seconds because my legs went like jelly beneath me. Hiding my shame (and my pain) I climbed back on to the stage and told them that I�ll be jumping again and this time they�d better catch me, which they did. Thank fuck for that!!

Thursday 31st July 2008

Day off in Ventura, California. I had a bowl of chilli and a beef stew along with the greatest milkshake I�ve ever had in my entire life (and Oreo milkshake, nonetheless!) in a classic 50�s American diner. Sleep ensued, and the conservation of energy along with it! I wrote an email to my mum and watched Seven on my laptop. Not an eventful day, but a necessary one at that!

Friday 1st August 2008

Los Angeles, today! Our bus pulled up outside Ralph�s (which is essentially what we�d know as Tesco) and we all grabbed some grub before heading for the venue. Soundcheck was dandy, though Josh spent what felt like twenty minutes checking every tiny corner of his drum kit for the PERFECT onstage sound, and we all went for more grub! Fooooooooooooood! You must keep up your energy levels for this sort of thing. The show was introduced by KROQ�s Rodney Bingenheimer. He took to the stage and introduced us whilst Josh was still in the toilet �getting ready�, so we ended up actually appearing three minutes after he said ��And now here�s The Subways�!� I leapt off the balcony during Rock & Roll Queen and landed on exactly the same brusied coccyx I�d landed on during the San Francisco stage-dive! This is really going to take a while to heal� After the show we went to a bar three doors down from the venue. Of course, we�d have to wade through the mob of paparazzi. Not for us, apparently. The club next door was full of famous people � it�s a celebrity hang out, of course! Come on, people! We have them all in the same place at once! All the stupid media whores in the same vicinity as the parasitic paps! Take them out!! Next time, maybe.

Saturday 2nd August 2008

To keep ourselves from getting totally roasted by just sitting around in the sun, our favourite Warners rep, a Mr. Brant Weil, took us on a trip through Anaheim to the seafront where we ate at a classic 50�s American diner. I consumed half my burger and didn�t touch any more chips for fear of an aneurysm. My Oreo shake was EXCELLENT. Tonight was one of the best shows and that�s probably because it was one of those gigs where it�s really small-town, and it reminded me of the venue where we used to go and see shows when we were young(er) and where we played our first ever gig when we started out- The Square in Harlow. The place wasn�t exactly full but the energy and the spirit and the will was there and everybody really got into it. Smiles and dancing all round!

Sunday 3rd August 2008

It�s Josh�s birthday in three days. Shit! And I still have nothing yet to give him as a present. I�ll think if something. San Diego was an awesome crowd as usual. It was fantastic seeing familiar faces in the audience and finally getting to play all the new material we�ve been waiting so long to play for them. I remember that we kicked out �Girls & Boys� live for the first time after finishing writing it in San Diego on our 2006 tour with Taking Back Sunday so there are a lot of nice memories here for us! I climbed the rafters in the ceiling and felt less of a twinge in my coccyx from my previous two accidents in San Francisco and Los Angeles. The dancing and moshing in �Turnaround� was monumental and it�s starting to become a real live favourite for us watching all the crazy bodies go utterly nuts in the breakdown. With this being the last of the American dates we celebrated in classic style by cracking open the leftover beers on the bus and having a nice mini party with our support band, Black Market. Awesome guys and awesome conversation!

Monday 4th August 2008

Press day in Los Angeles! Greeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeat! But seriously, it was all great fun and we love any opportunity to talk about ourselves for long periods of time. Plus we get free food and drinks all day!

Jarocin Festival Photos

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 12:00:00 GMT
The Subways rock Poland!! pics here

T In The Park Live Link

Wed, 09 Jul 2008 12:00:00 GMT
Over the weekend you will be able to link to T in the Park updates at...

The Subways fantastic feature in FRONT mag

Wed, 09 Jul 2008 12:00:00 GMT

Presale tickets for Sept/Oct tour dates available from 9am tomorrow

Tue, 01 Jul 2008 12:00:00 GMT
Tickets go on general sale Friday July 4th but we wanted you to be able to get yours first.

Pre Order links...

29th Sept Nottingham Rock City

1st Oct Norwich UEA

2nd Oct Oxford Academy

4th Oct Keele University

5th Oct Leeds Stylus

6th Oct Glasgow ABC

8th Oct Birmingham Academy

9th Oct Southampton Guildhall

11th Oct Newcastle Academy

12th Oct Manchester Academy

14th Oct Bristol Academy

15th Oct London Brixton Academyy

Glastonbury Photos

Mon, 30 Jun 2008 12:00:00 GMT
The Subways rock Glasto!!

Album Instores & Signings!!

Tue, 24 Jun 2008 12:00:00 GMT
Sunday 29th June GLASGOW ARGYLE STREET HMV 4pm
Monday 30th June EDINBURGH PRINCES STREET HMV 5pm
Tuesday 1st June NEWCASTLE HMV 5.30pm

Win ticket to Live From Kerrang in Birmingham July 3rd!!

Sat, 21 Jun 2008 12:00:00 GMT
The band will be performing an intimate acoustic show for listeners in the Kerrang Radio studios at lunchtime.

Kerrang Radio will be giving tickets away all through daytime programming starting on Loz & Christian's show tonight!!

KERRANG RADIO WEBSITE

Download the DIGITAL single at itunes !!

Sun, 15 Jun 2008 12:00:00 GMT

Download ALRIGHT at the 7 digital for 50p !!

Sun, 15 Jun 2008 12:00:00 GMT

UK Instore Performances next week!!

Thu, 05 Jun 2008 12:00:00 GMT
Performances start at 6pm. We'll be signing copies of our new single and kicking out the Jams at Zavvi stores.

US tour Announced!

Thu, 05 Jun 2008 12:00:00 GMT
Fri 25 July NEW YORK Blender
Sat 26 July BOSTON Paradise Rock Club
Mon 28 July SEATTLE Chop Suey
Tues 29 July PORTLAND Doug Fir
Wed 30 July SAN FRANCISCO Bottom Of The Hill
Fri 1 Aug LOS ANGELES Troudadour
Sat 2 Aug ANAHEIM Chain Reaction
Sun 3 Aug SAN DIEGO Epicentre

Berlin itunes Festival EP (Excludes UK)

Tue, 03 Jun 2008 12:00:00 GMT
On May 4th 08 The Subways performed a show in Berlin as part of The itunes Festival. Josh had to pull out at the last minute due to severe illness (poor boy... though he's better now). Billy & Charlotte stepped up to the challenge of performing an unrehearsed acoustic set.

The show was magical. The audience blown away and the resulting EP is probably one of the best acoustic live recordings we have of the band.

New Gallery Pics Added

Sun, 01 Jun 2008 12:00:00 GMT
Martin Cohen On Tour & itunes Acoustic Live!

Make your own video!

Mon, 26 May 2008 12:00:00 GMT
There are two ways to take part:

1) If you�re a bit of a whizz on the computer and have some editing software on your computer (QuickTime, FinalCut etc) then you can download four different videos of the band playing and the track and make your own video from scratch.

2) If you�re not that advanced or have access to fancy software don�t worry you can still take part. Just make a background image and upload it to the site, you�ll be able to see it with the band playing in front almost immediatley!

Good luck! The winning video will be picked by the band and featured as an extra on the new album �All Or Nothing�. Take part now for the chance to show the world your talent�

GO TO VIDEO COMP

Vote for The Subways on MTV " TRL Germany

Fri, 23 May 2008 12:00:00 GMT
MTV "TRL - Rock" (Germany) VOTE THE SUBWAYS

MTV "TRL" (Germany) VOTE THE SUBWAYS

Pre-Order 'Alright' Now!

Thu, 22 May 2008 12:00:00 GMT
It's been a long while since The Subways released anything but 'Alright' is set for release on 16th June.

Pre-order it now from the official store and you can get 3 formats for �4 plus a free plectrum card!

PRE ORDER HERE

Billy Lunn blog

Mon, 12 May 2008 12:00:00 GMT
So we're on a plane to Japan and we know this is going to be exhasting. Two days of ten hour long sessions of interviews and a show for MTV Japan with The Music. It was. But goddamit, was it fun!!

I don't think I've ever been so amused at watching Josh actually sleep through four interviews. I felt a sense of empathy rather than annoyance considering that they were the last of what was essentially a 20 hour stint of talking about the same issues and interests to do with this band, consisting mostly of the lyrical and musical direction of the new album (agiven), the album title and its interpretations and Charlotte and me breaking up halfway through the recordings. No subject is taboo when one chooses to wear ones heart on one's sleeve.

Japanese food... Mmmmmmm!!! Watching The Music also made us feel like we weren't alone in this world. Another band who actually give a fuck about playing a LIVE SHOW! And if Robert Harvey hasn't got one of the greatest rock voices of our generation then who the hell has? And those guys can drink, too. It was also quite assuring hearing their mutual opinions on what we like to call "jingly jangly" bands - bands who fear for their lives about wanting to use dynamic, structure and maybe a distortion pedal in any of their songs to create impact! Thank the universe then for bands like The Music. Brains and balls. And just really really nice lads to boot.

So on the plane to Germany...here we come!

William Lunn (Esquire)

Win tickets to an exclusive gig now!

Tue, 06 May 2008 12:00:00 GMT
The Subways will be playing two exclusive gigs next week on the 14th and 15th May. The 14th will be an acoustic set and the 15th a live one.

The gigs will be taking place at a secret location in Hammersmith and there'll only be 250 people at each event.

To be in with a chance of winning a pair of tickets just send your answer to the following question to thesubways@warnermusic.com

Q: What date is the new album 'All Or Nothing' set for release?

The prize covers two tickets to the event but not travel expenses so you need to be able to book and pay for your own travel.

The gigs will start at 8pm and doors close at 11pm.

Good luck!

Alright video up for Hot New One on MySpace/MTV Chart

Tue, 06 May 2008 12:00:00 GMT
The Subways new vid 'Alright' is up for the Hot New One vote on the new MTV2/MySpace Chart

Please take 2 seconds to vote for it here:
http://www.myspace.com/mtvtwo

(The Hot New One voting is just below the Top 10 listings, just click on VOTE underneath their video box)

All Or Nothing

Sun, 20 Apr 2008 12:00:00 GMT
We found this image of stunt driver Spanky Spangler's car careering off a ramp on fire and knew immediately that this was the album artwork for us. It reminded us of ourselves, spinning and stamping onstage and leaping our kamikaze arses off balconies and 20ft speakers into the sweaty, crowdsurfing masses. It encompasses everything that this album is about: ALL OR NOTHING. Billy Lunn - The Subways

The Subways Moho Live show - Cancellation

Mon, 14 Apr 2008 12:00:00 GMT
The Subways Moho Live show - Cancellation

The band's management regret to announce that the show at Manchester Moho, May 23rd 2008, as part of 'The Aftershow', has had to be cancelled. The show was booked as a secret gig (unannounced) as part of a 6 band bill but since the booking, tickets advertising The Subways have become available at seetickets and as a result are being sold for profit on ebay. We feel that this is unfair to fans as the show was booked as a special guest appearance and subsequently the band were due to play a very short set. This was always intended to be a non-advertised special guest appearance; it was never intended to be a Subways headline show and tickets should not have been advertised on this basis . The band and management would like to apologize to tickets holders for any inconvenience this may cause.

Tickets can be refunded here at point of purchase.

The band will be announcing a future solo show in Manchester for after the festival season at a later date.

The Subways booked for itunes Festival in Berlin!

Fri, 11 Apr 2008 12:00:00 GMT

The Subways on BBC2 Sound!! Tomorrow! Sat 12th midday!

Fri, 11 Apr 2008 12:00:00 GMT
The band also appeared in a piece filmed at the Ritzy cinema aired on Sat just gone (5th), but is still up to view for another 6 days on the BBC iPlayer.
LINK HERE

Tiscali Showcase Announced!! London next week!! April 17th

Thu, 10 Apr 2008 12:00:00 GMT
Tiscali Showcase features the hottest music acts in a flagship monthly live show at the Soho Revue Bar, London.

The ever-popular Tiscali Showcase has been running since September 2004 and has played host to over 100 of the best new and legendary music acts. Each act is filmed performing three of their best tracks along with an exclusive interview available to watch online HERE

Monday morning Sound TV Show!

Sun, 06 Apr 2008 12:00:00 GMT
If you are an early riser get yourself down to Southbank Skate Park, Waterloo, SE1 8XX next to Royal Festival Hall. As you are looking towards the River Thames from the Hayward Slip Road, the Skate Park is on your right.

At around 11am the band will be recording Girls & Boys. Several run throughs.

If you can make it and can brave the cold then see u there!

Free entry

50 tickets released for London ULU show!

Sun, 06 Apr 2008 12:00:00 GMT
If you have had trouble getting yourself into ULU then check seetickets as we've just released 50 new tickets!

Paris show goes into diary

Wed, 02 Apr 2008 12:00:00 GMT
La Boule Noir, 22nd April!!

Girls & Boys Out Now!!!

Tue, 25 Mar 2008 12:00:00 GMT
If you haven't done it already, DO IT NOW!

You can now get Girls & Boys as a free download from http://www.thesubways.net/download

Tell all your friends...

Girls & Boys up for 'Hot New One' on MTV2

Tue, 25 Mar 2008 12:00:00 GMT
The Subways 'Girls & Boys' is up for the Hot New One vote on the new MTV2/MySpace Chart

Please take 2 seconds to vote for it here:
http://www.myspace.com/mtvtwo

(The Hot New One voting is just below the Top 10 listings, just click on VOTE underneath their YouTube video box)

New Festival Dates Announced!!!

Mon, 24 Mar 2008 12:00:00 GMT
T in the park, Oxegen, Hurricane, Southside, Summersonic slots now confirmed! See you in the summer!

May Tour Announced!!!

Mon, 24 Mar 2008 12:00:00 GMT
Sun 18-May Wrexham Central Station
Tues 20-May Preston 53 Degrees
Wed 21-May Coventry Kasbah
Sat 24-May Sheffield Foundry
Mon 26-May Peterborough Cresset
Tues 27-May Portsmouth Wedgwood Rooms
Fri 30-May Leicester University
Sun 8-Jun Cambridge Junction
Tues 10-Jun Reading University
Wed 11-Jun London Koko

Girls & Boys out Tuesday March 25th!!!

Wed, 12 Mar 2008 12:00:00 GMT
Zane Lowe will be playing the bands brand new track on his show Tuesday 25th March. Listen HERE. The track will then be available online from www.thesubways.net straight after the show.

Girls & Boys is the first track to be released from "All Or Nothing". The bands 2nd album, due this summer, was recorded with Butch Vig last year and is set to rock the world!

The explosive 'Girls & Boys' video will go up at the same time.

COPY AND PASTE ME TO SPREAD THE WORD!!!!

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Supports Confirmed!

Mon, 10 Mar 2008 12:00:00 GMT
Main Support for...

Tues 25 March Falmouth Princess Pavillion
Wed 26 March Bristol Thekla
Thur 27 March Cardiff The Point
Sat 29 March Nottingham Rescue Rooms
Sun 30 March Tamworth The Palace

Kentucky band Cage The Elephant.
During their first trip to the UK last year, they toured with Foals and the Wombats, and they have also supported Queens of the Stoneage. Their live show is absolutely crazy, and certainly worth arriving early for.

Check out their MySpace at www.myspace.com/cagetheelephant

Click here to get a free download - www.relentless-records.net/cagetheelephant

1st on...

Wed 26 March Bristol Thekla
Thur 27 March Cardiff The Point
Sat 29 March Nottingham Rescue Rooms
Sun 30 March Tamworth The Palace

Welwyn Garden rockers The Culprits...

Download Festival!

Thu, 06 Mar 2008 12:00:00 GMT
Fancy a fat slice of Rock then get yourself down to Donington Park June 13th for this years download festival. Also confirmed for the weekend... The Offspring, Lost Prophets, Incubus, HIM, Jimmy Eat World. Full line up HERE

The Subways recording "All Or Nothing" in LA Video - (Part 2)

Thu, 06 Mar 2008 12:00:00 GMT
The Subways are happy to give you part two of their six part in-the-studio diary whilst recording their new album "All Or Nothing".

Hear how our first single "Girls & Boys" sounded in the studio, and hear also Josh's trouser-less attempt to be a lead singer. Thank God he stays behind the drums!

Thanks to Middlefield Pictures!!

- Billy Lunn

GERMANY: K�ln, Berlin, M�nchen... and finally, Hamburg!

Tue, 04 Mar 2008 12:00:00 GMT
Germany! You utterly crazy bastards, you! I thought we were in for an easy ride these first few shows of our first tour for what feels like FOREVER, but obviously not so! But then how could we cop out like that when we call our new album "All Or Nothing"...? It HAS to be all or nothing, and so far it's pretty much been the "ALL" all the way.

It's fair to say that the video recording show at the Stoke Sugarmill and the Clash Magazine show at the Green Room (in our hometown of Welwyn Garden City) were our first tentative steps into playing with the assertive vigour we've been commonly associated with, and K�ln (Cologne to you uncultured philistines) was the show where we truly flexed our muscles. You kiddos sure as hell showed us what you're made of too. You scared this old hide of mine for a minute or two into our first number ("Kalifornia") when you greased up and 'got stuck in' in the mosh pit. MOSH PIT! It's been a good while since I've seen a proper one of those! And compliments to the 7,000 or so loudest bunch of screamers (that I've ever heard...!) at the Fritz Radio Berlin Arena show. I think the rest of Germany heard us. And if they say they didn't hear us then they're lying. They're just jealous because THEY WEREN'T THERE! And people of M�nchen! Dangling from the ceilings and lighting rigs is DANGEROUS. Naughty naughty naughty people of M�nchen! I LIKED IT. Very much! And thank you to the gentleman who handed me the beer halfway through my crowdsurf in "Turnaround" - though was it totally necessary to demand your beer back after the show? Surely that was a GIFT to the ART OF ROCK!!

And so here we are... Hamburg!

But it's not over by a long shot. We'll be back VERY soon. And to the rest of you, be warned! The Subways are on their way to you!!

William Lunn (Esquire)

x

London Koko show added!

Sun, 24 Feb 2008 12:00:00 GMT
The subs will be playing London Koko on June 11th. A new show at Hitchin Club 85 has also been added to the upcoming single tour.

Nassfest 08 confirmed

Fri, 22 Feb 2008 12:00:00 GMT
NASSFEST 08

Bath & West Showground

Box Office 0844 8472252

LINE UP so far...

Friday
Pendulum, Late of The Pier, Does It Offend You Yeah, We Smoke Fags, more tbc

Saturday
Less Than Jake, The Subways, more tbc

Clash/ Red Stripe bringing it back show!

Wed, 13 Feb 2008 12:00:00 GMT

EXTRA TOUR DATE FOR VIDEO SHOOT

Thu, 24 Jan 2008 12:00:00 GMT
We've added a show at one our fav venues Stoke Sugarmill to film a video for an upcoming single release. Going to be a good one. Feb 18th

INTIMATE UK TOUR ANNOUNCED! GET YOUR TICKETS QUICK!

Wed, 23 Jan 2008 12:00:00 GMT
We are delighted to announce we'll be back on tour this March! Taking in 14 intimate club dates to build up to the release of our new album "All Or Nothing". Come and check out the new tunes!

The Subways recording "All Or Nothing" in LA Video - (Part 1)

Tue, 22 Jan 2008 12:00:00 GMT
Middlefield Pictures present The Subways in-studio video documentary. This is part one of a six part doc of the band's own footage shot recording their second album. Edited by the boys at Middlefield pictures (much thanks for sorting through the hours of guitar solos!)

NEW GALLERY PICS!

Sun, 20 Jan 2008 12:00:00 GMT
Whilst in LA we hired a photographer friend of a friend (Bryan Sheffield) to take some documentary style fly on the wall photos of the band kicking up a fuss in the studio. The results look fantastic. We've saved a few for the album sleeve but most are now up on the site. Check em out!

Stu Nicholls (www.stunphoto.co.uk) has been following the band now for 4-5 years since their first trip into London to play The Buffalo Bar in 2003. We are currently discussing putting on an exhibition of his shots alongside the album launch. In the meantime check out his shiny photos from Reading 2007!

LIVE EPS HIT ITUNES!

Tue, 18 Dec 2007 12:00:00 GMT
Live & Acoustic in Magdeburg

Oh Yeah (Live)
Mary (Live)
No Goodbyes (Live)
With You (Live)
I Want To Hear What You have Got To Say (Live)
Rock & Roll Queen (Live)
At 1AM (Live)

The Live Videos (San Diego)

I Want To Hear What You Have Got To Say (Live Video)
Oh Yeah (Live Video)
With You (Live Video)
Somewhere (Live Video)
Rock & Roll Queen (Live Video)