Gein's Family Giftshop - Tour Blog 4
It's such a shame! We've had the best night of the tour so far and we know for a fact that at least seven billion of you weren't there. We've seen the figures. Four billion of you don't have the internet so we can let that slide, you weren't to know; but what the hell were the rest of you three bill up to?
Luckily (more than) one (but less than a) million of you turned up which meant that we got double treats on the way back home, two KFCs and a gender specific kinder egg, plus no rehearsing when we got back so we got to get some sleep!
If you forced our hand and absolutely made us dissect each gig... we couldn't and wouldn't - force our hands wherever you want, we ain't doing squat! But we could tell you about the lovely places...
Cardiff
Cardiff, Cardiff, Cardiff, the place of many. What we know about Cardiff could fill a third of an incredibly #viral blog, and trust us, it will, we've seen the figures.
Cardiff has at least two bars and a pretty flippin' cool-as-shit gig venue called Clwb Ifor Bach, which puts on great sketch acts so we've heard. One of the bars also sold a giant scotch egg or "a normal scotch egg" as they called it which we shared between three of us (we offered the vegetarian the egg section but they seemed averse after its meat sauna, which is fair).
The "normal scotch egg" was the highlight of the gig and will make future gigs nearly impossible to beat. We also snuck into BBC Radio Cymru to yell at Eleri Sion, who took it all incredibly graciously and may have even broadcast some of the calmer bits.
On the way out, Jim had a 'cats in an alley' kerfuffle with Rick Astley because he'd replaced our 'parking reserved' sign for one he made himself. Jim kept yelling "Never gonna give him the satisfaction of playing Together Forever on Spotify ever again" on the journey to Coventry.
Coventry
Which leads us nicely ('A-', creative writing) on to Coventry! The big C! Sudetenland of The North! Ancient capital! Lovely gig!
Coventry was tip top wonderfuck, and everyone involved was an egg of the goodest order. The venue was located on a university campus and if there's one thing students like more than sketches about butt holes... we haven't heard of it.
We were allowed one treat each in Coventry so we all chose to eat again, Ed got a scone, Kath got a cake, Jim got a bread and Kiri got home made vine tomato gnocchi in a 4 cheese reduction and a lightly toasted garlic ciabatta on the side, like a loser.
Coventry was the first place to get our rider correct; a big ladder that Ed can climb and swing from and pull Jim's tail like a monkey annoying a dog. Obviously that pre-show warm up took the show to another level and we all had a great time.
The M6 also got our rider correct; close all the lanes down apart from one for no reason to add an hour on to the journey. Bliss.
Thankfully we got enough XP from those two gigs to progress to the next level, Level 5: Birmingham and Maidenhead.
Coming up: Birmingham and Maidenhead
Ed's best friend used to live in Birmingham so he knows all the best chicken shops and also how to dress in order to minimise any groping that might happen (denim and/or scarfs). A previous gig in Birmingham was crowned by people on cocaine in the balcony, like a midweek bacchanalian festival on a modest budget, so we have high hopes for this one as it's on a Friday so their budget may have gone up. Either way, we will have a wonderful time performing our little genitals off and looking at their 188 million pound library. Jim says it cost so much to build they couldn't afford any books to put in it, so all the books are hollow.
Kath doesn't want to go to Maidenhead for obvious reasons. We promised her we have sorted a permit for her to keep her head but in all honesty we haven't got round to it yet so who knows what will happen. Fingers crossed Kath will keep her head as she keeps insisting she needs it to perform. We've never seen evidence of this but we suppose there's always a first, and Maidenhead could be that first.
The cars are really bogging us down on this tour, they're by far the biggest prop and we don't even use them in the show, so we're thinking that this next run we use the waterways of the country to move, undetected, from gig to gig. Will let you landlubbers know how that goes.
Edit: Turns out you have to buy a boat, all the ones in the water are owned by other people. Gutted.
We'll have another update from the group soon (as long as Kath doesn't lose her head). In the meantime, to find out more about them, and where they'll be visiting, go to www.geinsfamilygiftshop.co.uk