Antillectual and Static Radio – European tour 2011 part I

Since Antillectual is on the road all the time, we approached them if they could keep a ‘tour diary’ for us. They’re on the road now with Static Radio playing Europe. Today and tomorrow are the final shows already (they’re playing Wiesbaden today and Bergkamen tomorrow). But since it takes some time to put this kinda stuff together we’ve got a report of the first days ready for you right now. Let’s see what Glen, the new bassplayer, has to say about his first trip. The Glentillectual files, part I.

Hello, my name is Glen ten Haaf and from December on I will be hitting the stages with Antillectual. This is my story how I experience life with adventures I have to survive everyday.

This journal I will call Glentillectual.

What the F#ck Happened to my Life?

2 months ago I replied to the newsletter from Antillectual in which they were searching for a new bass player. Hey, why not? I can play bass and do vocals, as I have done that in the past. If I would become the new bass player they said I had to be available for 100 shows a year, I would meet a lot of new people and would get some new best friends in the form of band members. It was an intense mail conversation before I even got my first audition with them. They asked me how I was going to do this financially because you have to be flexible to go on tour every month. For the people that really, really want to know: I work in healthcare and I will have a zero hour contract so I’m flexible for my boss and I’m flexible for the band. That’s the question most people asked when I got the green sign and the press bulletin went out that I was the new guy for the job. A lot of it is new for me. Now antillectual has a history of ten years and 3 albums (I don’t have to learn every song), I’m gonna get a vocal coach end of October. I’m excited! It’s a thrill and it’s going to be a heavy experience hopefully for the following years. Oh yeah, doom scenario thinking: hopefully Riekus doesn’t break his arms between the door of the van, Willem doesn’t choke in his beard, and Thomas won’t kill me with a flight case in the van. So what am I doing now? Practicing, singing, trying to remember all the lyrics. And I will try to make this blog as continuous as possible.

So how’s life now? I’m in the van travelling trough the UK. And this is my story of the first few days.

Compact travelling Advise.

I never travelled light in my life before. I got a mail from Willem 2 days before the tour that I should NOT take too much stuff with me. That might be a good change for a guy who normally forgets everything, every day. And keep all that you carry in bags; don’t take any loose stuff with you. The mail of Willem ended with the clear intention that we would leave from Nijmegen to Sneek at 2.00 P.M. Friday 15:30 we were (finally) driving to Sneek. The van is so stuffed that we can’t carry anything more. The first time I drove the van everyone was looking with big eyes if it would go well. They knew because I had told them I got a driver license. After they took me in the band I also told them as a sort of extra or special that I also had some accidents in the past with driving cars (all accidents through intense stupidity but hey, nobody likes to hang on telephones with insurance companies). What is also strange for me is that I’m going on a tour for 14 days with 4 guys I barely know. But I know (and they know) we are going to get to know each other in a very short and intense time. Maybe a good thing is that a colleague told me “it will be 3 years before they figure out that you are crazy and they won’t fire you by then”.

Olaf olaz road proof

We survived our own Paris-Dakar from Sneek to Manchester. 15 hours of driving, nice weather and 5 sweaty men, and the worst jokes you can imagine to keep us awake. The venue was cool, nice people, and I photographed some street art near our venue. Because of our 15-hour drive we were a little broken. At 01.00 A.M we got to our sleeping place at Clare’s. I really thought I needed a shower, but something strange happened. I never, ever in my life saw an electric boiler. So I turned the knob and cold water was coming out continuously. Ok, let’s turn the knob again. Shit! Only cold water and it doesn’t stop. Pulled Willem and Thomas out of their sleeping bag. Koen got the Leatherman from the van. And still cold water streaming constantly. But Willem found the main water tap. I called Clare: sorry, I broke your shower! I really had no idea and no bad intentions. Koen on the other hand forgot his bag…

For our breakfast we drove to Adam from Leagues Apart. Had some food and up we went to Edinburgh.

Freedonia in Edinburgh

Wow, cool city! They got dungeons over here, tourists and our venue has its own cinema with horror movies. There are a lot of different entertaining things, like a pole dancing room with George Michael music. Edinburgh has a lot of tourists and in the town you can do guided pub-crawls and ghost tours. No time for a pub-crawl and because we have Mike from Static Radio we’re already having a ghost tour all day with those guys. I never was in Scotland before but what a nice underground feel it got: everyone listens to the music and everyone is in for a party. After the show we went sleeping at Chris, Rachel, Ross and Cillein’s place. I got a real thing for comedy (I know humor is very personal but there is a lot to laugh if you don’t take life too seriously). Ok, for me the series “the IT crowd” was totally new. But this was a really cool discovery for the day. And if you want a good address for vegetarian haggis, mail me and I got a real good address for you in Edinburgh. It’s almost 14 hours ago since I ate it and I’m still not hungry: potatoes + good coffee = a happy Glen.

The Universal language of “WA?” in Wiki Leeds.

Ok, I’m from Eindhoven and the rest of the guys live in Nijmegen. I speak a different dialect (better). I noticed that you can respond to every sentence with “WA?”, which means: what do you mean? I really don’t understand a lot of what everyone is talking about sometimes, so using “WA?” I noticed that everyone will repeat their sentence for me and start talking more politely to me. So this works. What else happened today? The road from Edinburgh to Leeds led us along the shore. The UK has got some beautiful parts for sight seeing. I like the colors in the landscape turning more brown and yellow. Yes, autumn in kicking in. And today I drank my first Ale ever. Can anyone give some advice what the difference is between ales, stout, draught, lager and cider?

My baby got sauce…

I like food. If I know how to continue this journal I’ll be writing a lot about food that I will eat everywhere. The grocery stores have a lot of “ sauce” over here. I bought a lot of sauce that I’m going to experiment with at home. We survived the night again in Manchester with Adam and Jamie. Jamie introduced me to reggae reggae sauce. Put a lot on Willem his bread and seeing Willem’s beard turning more red I knew that this is the good stuff. Maybe I will take some extra bottles with me for some of my good cooking friends. It was a 4 or 5 hour drive to Swansea. The venue was really cool, some sort of a house and they told me in the past it also was a restaurant.

There was a painting hanging in a backroom that freaked people out, so they said. I don’t know how, but it’s now in our van (we asked if we could take it of course) and if the story is true it’s made by a guy called Alfie. He made it when he was on drugs and when he awoke he had made this. If it’s true it’s cooler than ever, if it’s not true it’s still nice. I made a deal with Koen that we would have a temporary exhibition every year with the painting at our homes. I know for sure that if I’m ever going to live with a girlfriend in one house this thing goes out first. It has a hell visionary or something and speaking of Hell: thank you Jamie for the John Constantine comic this morning. It was great, and speaking about comics: this is a picture I took of the toilet in Leeds. Gives me some inspiration for at home (no, not the smell of the toilet but it looks great).

Jamie, the promoter, told us we would be sleeping in a house by the sea in Swansea this evening. Nice! I had a few drinks, so I said I’m going into the sea the next morning. Why not? It’s october, it’s raining, and there was a good three or four beaufort wind blowing. It was a great house but I slept really bad. I have to do better with picking a spot when I go to sleep. In the morning I woke up and I felt a soft wet body next to me and breathing softly into my ears… It was Naddy, the border collie.

So I went into the sea this morning, my heart stopped for a few seconds and for the rest the sea was great for the next 15 minutes. Went back into the house, took a shower, had breakfast and made a romantic walk with Koen on the beach. We stayed in Swansea all day because driving to Bridgend was only a small hour from Swansea.

To be continued… ?

Print this page