12-7-07

Chicago's Metro was a really wonderful place to end our everlasting journey. Thanks to everybody who came to shows worldwide in the last two years. We are exhausted and grateful. Next up for us will be some time off to write and record. Creative vibes are flowing and we can't wait to get busy on this next record, so we'll keep you up to speed!

12-7-07

Mr. Derrick Brown surprised us all with end of the road gifts in Chicago. See who got what. Not sure who scored bigger: Warkensteins' Facts of Life button set or Van Heules' Yo Mtv Raps cards.

12-6-07

When you try to go premeditating your grand finales you'll usually be let down i.e. New Year's, birthdays, etc. Columbus was our second to last night of tour but became the pre-ender blowout when we went out to the college bar and drank $1 Budweisers and Jager Red Bulls with locals and engaged in call and response chants O-H! I-O! and F-U Syracuse! On the walk back to the bus there were snowballs thrown in faces, tackles in the powder, and squealing icy slips to the ground.

12-4-07

This is getting just too cold for us. It was really special for us to play before Spoon tonight, to get done, sit on the side of the stage and enjoy these songs that only a few short years ago we listened to in our cars never knowing that we would begin a band.

11-30, 12-1-07

Webster Hall double header! We got to spend some quality time in the city this week walking through the park, holiday shopping, the whole deal. Maust even ice skated.

11-26-07

HEAR YE, HEAR YE!

Richard Swift hurt his wrist and cannot complete part two of the US tour. He is sad and we are sad. Wish him a speedy recovery as he is a busy man with a lotta love to spread. We will carry on with fellow Long Beachers We Barbarians stepping up for the East Coast, ALSO with the help of Nashville poet Derrick Brown reading his poems with us playing some instruments behind him.

11-17-07 - San Fran

11-16-07 - Portland

11-13-07

Final show in Dublin with Patrick Watson & Co. Another tear-filled parting of bands leading to heavy drink. French Lighting guy Sebastian (group pic, far left) has just discovered that he is getting his passport in time to come with us on his first journey to the New World, America! He is most excite` to be staying on Hollywood and Vine, promenade sur la plage in Santa Monica, and skydive des falaises de Malibu.

11-11-07

We walked around Lille for many hours looking for a decent cup of coffee. We found a Thelonious Monk Street, but we mostly got lost until we had to hop the fence of a high security physical rehabilitation center where people in wheel chairs being pushed around pointed and shouted at us. Later on we found coffee, but they were those little baby cups and we had to order about six each.

11-7-07

Jonnie's talking to the man in the mirror. He's asking him to change his ways.

11-5-07

Here we are in Vienna at the Flex, halfway through the Euro leg of Cold War Kids' "Politic Tour '07"* and the Danube flows right outside our dressing room into many other countries.

*Everyones kinda getting in to politics. Finally.

11-4-07

Bus Driver Tchoky has a pretty serious DVD collection that is really making this trip exciting. We watched "Battle of Algiers" in Vienna. It is a great balance between documentary style and fiction. Much of the content is eerily reminiscent of news coming from war in Iraq. Watch it.

10-31-07

In Copenhagen our show was in a villiage called Christiana, which is a military barracks turned commune. It's kind of like Tijuana but more hippies and more cold. A true melting pot of globe-trotting wackos, a real life Desolation Row. Also noteworthy that this freakiest of all places was unaffected by Halloween. So, stop by if you're in town.

10-30-07

In Berlin reading the recently released "Best American Essays of 2007." This edition is edited by David Foster Wallace whom we are unshy about our feelings for. These essays are a good read if you're feeling detached and uninformed. Read Elaine Scarry, Phillip Robertson, Daniel Orozco, Malcom Gladwell, Peter Singer. Strong opinions will well inside of you. Share 'em with us.

10-29-07

We are in Brussels and it is raining something awful. Our socks are wet inside of our shoes and we mostly only brought one pair. This morning, early, we wanted to be adventurous and decided to throw our middle finger at Mother Nature and take a walk anyway and we got lost and are soaked and have paid the price dearly. But all in all, Euro Tour is going swimmingly. Patrick Watson and group are really great people and musicians and we are charmed to have them with us. We did the Electric Proms show a couple nights ago, (which I can't find but you may be able to) including a wee string section on the new song "Dreams Old Men Dream." We're gonna have them play some tunes at Shepherds Bush as well, for you lucky Londoners.

10-25-07

Skin is thicker in Glasgow. Literally, your face is cringing from a different kind of cold that bites around your eyes and makes them crinkle inward, forming an expression of meanness. But the kids come out to the shows yelling and it is exciting to talk to these kids with so much energy and pride.

9-23-07 Due to the turbulent nature of recent scheduling, we pretty much forgot we were playing Leno! We pulled it together last minute and enlisted frequent and fabulous collaborators Elvis Perkins in Dearland and International Wordsmith Derrick C. Brown. Your eyes do not deceive you, this is the Honey herself Jessica Alba, and she is seriously a real sweetheart.

9-11-07 Sorry folks, but it's true. White Stripes have cancelled. We are sad too. We wanted to watch them more than you did. Big apologies for those that bought a ticket. Hopefully you can catch us on our tour with the fabulous Richard Swift in the US and Patrick Watson in Europe!

8-28-07 Cold War Kids are home again, tucked away in their beds after a week spent at Reading, Leeds and Rock en Seine. Playing before Devendra Banhart & co was a treat; fine musicians and scholars, good to fly with you gentleman. We have a too short two week break where we must choose to: a) pursue love interests b) reconnect with family and friends c) clean our rubbish apartments d) finish new songs for white stripes tour. Call Jonnie and let him know what you think we should do.

8-7-07 We've got some recapping to do on the last week of opening shows for Muse. An obvious highlight was playing Madison Square Garden. The whole night; rehearsing the set in the dressing room with Elvis Perkins in Dearland, the walk from the dressing room where pictures of John Lennon, Paul Simon, Prince, Jay Z, Dylan, the running around the empty center of the room and screaming and fake slap shotting like we're Mark Messier of the NY Rangers, and the sweet bottle of wine called "Flowers" drank at the evenings end. Glad we had some Dearland parents there to make proud.

Day 3 Lunched at Winston Churchill's favorite spot. Everywhere you look groups of five to ten men are taking breaks on the side of the road, leaning on buildings, smoking. Big women in small bathing suits. Three mischevious boys lobbing rocks at their sister wading in the water, whining at them to stop. We can't figure out why this place is so wealthy and clean with nobody doing anything. An old British man who sat next to us at the Yacht Bar told us that we were the only Americans he has seen here ever. We commend ourselves as cultured Ambassadors and swill another G & T. Overall, we recommend Madeira highly for it's European architectural flair mixed with South American vibes. And now we had back to London for Lattitude Festival.

Day 2 Convincing the motorcycle rental people that back home we are veteran riders and that a class "C" license legitimizes this was easier than we thought. For many hours we cruised the windy steep streets heading west on the south coast. I know now why motorcycles are mother's worst nightmares. We had that invincible feeling of taking blind turns pinned out past the highest peaks of Europe overlooking the ocean with no railing. Only damage at the end of the day was a broken headlight from Aveiro's hydrant crash.

Madeira - Portrait of a Portuguese Vacation

Day 1 We were picked up at the airport by Aveiro's non-english speaking aunts uncles and cousins. They were so proud of their shy tapping youngster turned world traveling rock drummer for returning to the homeland. We tried our high school Spanish, which worked about half the time, and ate the red meat and red wine this country is famous for.

MATT & MATT VS. PORTUGAL PIGLIANO AND THE COWARDS OF BELMONT SHORE by m.wignall

We left Dublin after 24 hours of literal travelling insanity. I met the Cold War Kids at their London hotel at 10 at night when this all started. Maust, Beeman and I went to a pub and had crappy food that we kept saying was suprisingly good, mostly on account of the price. We had to wake up at 4 am to fly to Edinburgh Scotland for T in the Park music festival. This was a special kind of drag as I had just come from 9 days of not getting enough sleep with Mando Diao in Sweden. We drove in BMW's with suit wearing drivers to Gatwick airport which seems as far as France especially at 4:30am. We got to the gig after a flight on Easyjet which we now refer to as cheesy jet, idiot jet and any other number of names that seemed more clever at the moment, if you've flown them you'd understand. Scotland was rainy, and the band lost their room to someone called Razorlight who had a larger entourage than us ( I being the only one in the CWK entourage). I've learned that these UK festivals largely consist of mud, and people living in it. The bands for the most part live in their buses only exiting onto a metal ramp where they are whisked onto stage. The Cold War Kids are not big enough for a bus as they are still a pretty ma and pa orginization, they have something like a bus, and while not living in squalor, they sure don't live like the people called Razorlight. So we spent the day in Scotland looking for places to lay down and get free food both of which were graciously available in the main hospitality tent. That evening, having already been at Gatwick and Edinburgh airports, we headed back to Edinburgh in our jalopy, which I have failed to yet mention, and borded our 2nd jet for the day to Dublin where we would basically repeat the aformentioned scenario. Our jalopy, driven by our rough and tumble brittish driver was aqcuired through the company Blah Blah Blah. They are the cheapest way to travel as a band in the UK. The wheels are vintage Mercedes plumbing truck or some such work vehical, and the trailer was a horse or donkey trailer with a tarp tied over the open top, that had a very suggestive female printed around 6 feet high on the back of it. The driver was cool and I spent most of the time in the jalopy sitting next to him in the front seat as I tend to get car sick any where else. I asked a lot of questions about the UK, as I had never been. The boys sat in the back on the wrap around leopard skin couch which was either based on, or the isnpiration for, a leopard print tattoo on the drivers forearm. I loved the whole thing as I like people with character and this whole scene was just dripping with it.

Outside of eating late at some variety restaraunt in Dublin where a lady that ran the place eyed us with hate and scorn as we danced to gangsta rap music being played uneccisarily loud, we had a largely uneventful time, I acquired some unnamed quota of good photos of the band and it was off to London in morning where we would begin to move our different ways. Matt Maust and I would stay in London with our friend, financial tycoon Nate Rose, and the rest of the band would head to Portugal to visit Matt Avero's relatives on an island where they eat coconuts and have no or very few cars. This is where things began to get exciting.

Getting onto Cheesy Jet is problematic if you have more than a fanny bag. We all had a lot of crap, especially me with all my photo gear, at check in we had to combine, rearrange and condense to save money and not have to check in said photo gear. The color photo of "dangerous materials" are the items that for whatever reason did not make it into the collective check in bags of Maust and myself. A lighter, a knife, and various containers containing a who's who of dangerous substances hidden within hair re-growth shampoo and conditioner bottles that are way to big to fit in the plastic bags. I speak for Maust and myself when I say sneaking this through Dublins bag screening was a thrill the likes we rarely see. We figured out over the course of many flights, that by buttoning or zipping up a jacket, it becomes a shirt in the eyes of the screeners. It can't be a heavy jacket, you'll get popped everytime for that, but a wind breaker, a blazer, buttoned, no problem, walk on through, unbuttoned, you have to strip down, red flags galore. We had an apple which was to be our diversion, and pockets riddled with our precious booty. I held the apple aloft and loudly asked, can I bring this through the beeping arches? Everyone is now focused on the apple, me and Maust walked quickly through, David Blaine and Chris Angel would have been proud, in relative terms we just made the statue of liberty dissapear. Sadly our brand of magical diversion was so flawlessly executed that only we could revel in its brightly burning glory. Every instinct I had was to turn around and say ha! We have just infiltrated your shoddy system, we know the secret, that it is all a show, all wound up in political correctness and self importance and continuing under estimations of our clever foes. The crowd at the screening area would have been in awe, we would have been the object of envy and secret flatteries. I looked down, swallowed my pride and clutched my precious survival lighter and knife. Matt had his herbal hair re growth shampoo, and we knew we were more than just men lost among the oceans of human beings traveling the world. Anarchy in the UK indeed!

At the airport that day we all hugged and said our good byes. I have surfed for most of my life though I try to keep it a secret, being an artist and having an alter ego called Matt Death in tow, it looks pretty bad to my public to be hanging out in flowered shorts getting a tan and engaging in happy sunny beach activities (ironically I have little to no public to worry about and any public I have is purely delusional). For this and other reasons I was and am insanely jealous of Matt A (Portugal Pigliano), Nathan, Johnny and Beeman. Portugal is fabled to have some of the best surfing in Europe and they were to be on some island with the same name as a crumby town in the central valley of California. I knew they were going to Portugal but they kept saying they were going to Madera I think, and I kept wondering why they were so excited to go to that crap hole not realizing it was the islands name. Having that all cleared up, Maust and I decided to stay in London as he need a break from traveling and I was on my way to Africa to photograph the installation of charitably funded water wells in remote villages. After 2 weeks of European work and travel, sitting around financial tycoon Nate Rose's Notting Hill flat was sounding pretty grand.

RIGHT-ON BRIGHTON JULY 10

Maust had this picture of him and Nate in front of the burned down pier in Brighton, and based on this feature I suggested we go out there and do some proper photography. Maust is great at bumming around whatever city he is in and usually is wandering aimlessly looking at stuff and doing whatever he does. We decided that Brighton would be a great day trip and we would feel like we were on vacation, and would live large, and would have a far better time than our brothers eating coconuts on the island in Portugal. On the train, we repeatedly discussed how Nick Cave lives in Brighton and in our little worlds this may as well have been the queens palace we were going to see. It is funny the people and things that strike us as royalty. Nick Caves part of town, and a burned out pier fouling up everyones view. I was in heaven. Me and Maust took beautiful photos, and mentioned a handful of times how we should have had the hole band there to photograph. It really is such an amazing area. I resolved to take the best portrait of Maust that I had ever taken in my life just to stick it to the our brothers eating coconuts on the Island in Portugal. (view picture at www.mattwignall.com). We came across a big dumb happy dog and a ferris wheel and it was all very sad in a happy and nostalgic kind of way. That kind of sums up Brighton in my thinking.

We met a guy with a handle bar mustache named Henry Rumble from the Rumble Strips, he was touted as one of the nicest people Maust had met in Europe and after he bought us a round of Guinness and poorly executed Irish Coffee I was in agreement. Over a pint he told us the story of two Welsh men, who with a GPS tracking system and months of gear, borded a pink peddle boat and peddled their way to America. When they arrived some months later, with no clothing in tact and full beards, they were arrested and deported. He said this kind of behavior is to be expected from the Welsh. I think I like the Welsh.

We got back to London and did more sitting around in financial tycoon Nate Rose's flat. We occupied ourselves for hours with his stupid internet connection and the 40 some odd wireless connection signals that were every last one password protected. Not very sharing the Brits. I was supposed to photograph this band the Ettes who I very much like. They have a fabulous girl drummer with big hair and dark eyes, a cute and friendly girl singer, and a strapping, ascot wearing bass playing young man who may or may not be involved with the singer. I photographed them once before and it was great and we hung out and talked about Strangers With Candy, a very funny show which is obscure enough to create an immediate bond between people in the know. We were to meet at the millennium bridge, which I find overstated, and the big communist looking museum. I was tired from 3 weeks of photos, me and Maust wanted to see a movie, and they were 45 minutes late so we split. I couldn't get a phone to work right anywhere in Europe so we couldn't call, and I was feeling more self important than usual in regard to the respect of my time. With a lot of travel behind me and what would become a African travel cliche of self realization and epiphany to come, it was a welcome break to my sometimes crazy life behind the camera. I left my cameras at financial tycoon Nate Rose's and Maust and I went to see Elvis Perkins and his goons. They put on a fine show and it was nice to see some faces from our side of the pond. The next day Maust carried my bag for me to the train station, listened to my bitch about petty problems and complaints about my failed music career, and saw me off to Heathrow Airport where my 2 weeks in Africa would begin. I never found out what happened to Portugal Pigliano and the Cowards of Belmont shore.

7-10-07 We had a few days off in London and we decided to get the hell out and take a vacation. (Isn't touring in a rock group a constant vacation, you say? The answer is no. The honeymoon is over.) So we found a cheap ticket to the Portuguese island of Matt Aveiro's origens - Madeira.(Check google maps.) Maust however, stayed behind in London. The next few days we'll see via images who had a better time.

7-7-07, 7-8-07 Tea in the Park and Oxygen both had some good bands playing. After our set we watched Bright Eyes and got to talking about love and life and music and they are positively pound for pound one of the nicest groups we have met. It's funny, you know, every band has a personality and some bands, like actors, are attractive because they are so allusive, or even outright jerks. In any case, being around these types ain't interesting for long. I think bands are timid about being friendly with one another because they want to be consistent with that personality. It's encouraging to discover people that set aside stage presence and all that tension and maintain a simple comraderie in the music. And yes, that sounds sappy. . . We watched Arcade Fire last and danced and had a great time. Tim Robbins and Susan Sarandon were the only ones on stage, wearing cowboy hats and taking pictures and we kind of got dumb chills.

7-1-07 Festival in Werchter was by far the finest in the land. Metallica headlining, so you know things around here are top notch. They've even got their own washer and dryer in flight cases. Maust offered James Hetfield three bucks to wash his socks and underwear. Hetfield just chuckled and looked confused. Seriously though, you should've seen what was going on with Metallica backstage…(They have the word metal in their name! Imagine if the Skatalites became the biggest band in the world!) There were about fifty people outside of a room labeled "Tuning & Attitude" where the guys were warming up with their chordless guitars. When the band walked outside the room, a hush fell upon us all. Lars yelled out "it's fucking cold!" and ate a strawberry with a fork. (It was a light 65 deg.) We weren't sure who was a part of the crew, but we were the only ones not wearing all black. (They have a crew member for everything, one who we're pretty sure had the sole job of not letting people take photos.) 50 yards from the "Tuning & Attitude" room, 70,000 people were screaming their brains out, tongues waggling out of their mouths, horns up, eyes rolled back. And they took their sweet time, talked to friends, laughed aloud, put on bandanas for photos and finally, walked on stage. Mental. 6-30 Of all our Euro visits, today was our first day off in Paris and honey, we did it all; walked to the louvre, (saw Ms. Lisa and the Rum Sodomy 'Medussa' paintings) salads under the Arch of Triumph, sensitive reading time at Shakespeare & Co., coffees on the Seine.

6-26 What do you know about Glastonbury? That it was began by druids on a farm spanning 10 miles? That 160 thousand people are there camping in mud that creeps halfway up your shins? We knew none of this. It goes without saying that people here are crazy. It's mob mentality. People can't really enjoy this. It's a tradition thing. They know that they are supposed to enjoy it, so they follow suit. There was one guy that was walking by us wearing a shark fin on his back doing a genuine breaststroke and the look in his black and sunken eyes convinced me that he had been out to sea in his mind too long. We tried to get away from the mud and get some sleep in a little tent on top of wooden picnic benches. But we found no solace. And no Winehouse, either. But we did discover Seasick Steve. He was playing before us at the Q party. Seasick Steve is a tough looking man (eagle and sailboat forearm tattoos, big ole white beard) from the U.S. South, aged about 55. He plays guitars with an average of 3 strings and his songs are pretty terrific stories. On his day off in South London, Maust become quite the gin snob after his super elite and private tour of the Beefeater distillery In case you want to walk by, it's the Vauxhall tube station.

6-24 Hello Germany! After our first week off of '07, we had a lovely day on the green fields of Bremen for the Hurricane Festival. Maust and I were taking pictures in front of The Good, The Bad, The Queen's dressing room and suddenly out walks Paul Simonon. Don't worry people, we played it cool and did not come off as weirdos or perverts. But we did feel silly. No need after all, perfectly nice fellows, the whole group. "I love being backstage" The whole summer festival experience of backstaging with the likes of the aforementioned group, Beastie Boys, Pearl Jam, Wu-tang Clan, to Brian Wilson to Bjork, etc. is bizarre for obvious reasons, but specifically because it places us, (physically) right next to them. Because think… I could never forgive my sixteen year old self if he ran into Bjork at Subway and didn't say SAY something. Even something dumb like "yeah, aren't the veggie patties great?" Letting the opportunity pass without having some kind of story would be (imagine explaining a freeze up like that to friends?!) at the very least a shame, at the most downright irresponsible. But now these musicians whom we have lionized from our youth, we can now introduce ourselves and have very normal and cool conversations with people… It's nuts! Clearly that's a good chunk of why people love being close to musicians; they like the feeling that they get from having regular relationships with people whom the rest of the world considers irregular. Of course we have to be aware of our expectations; people aren't always 'nice,' and excited about conversing with strangers. In the past, I have always been guarded, never wanting to risk ruining my idea of certain musicians by attempting an exchange and ending up feeling like they're a jerk. But now WE know what it feels like, to an extent, to have people want to express sincere compliments, and we also know what it feels like to be annoyed and exhausted from jet lag and to not even want to talk about our band. So the risk factor is different, if somebody is a jerk, we can sympathize. Anyway, the point is, keep checking by and we'll have some good summer festival yarns on our favorite rockers.