I’ve finally worked out how to be in “MySpace” and what an ordeal it was. The combined brain power of Mr Creighton & myself was not enough after a month of trying, till a friend cracked the code for me and there you have it. The stupid url has nothing to do with anything because it appears that someone has been registering King Curly tracks for some nefarious purpose of their own. There is even an eejit who calls himself King Curly on the thing. But here is the definitive article, and where I live on MySpace:

http://www.myspace.com/landoflove

It had become increasingly irritating being told by just about everybody that being on MySpace is the only thing standing between an artist and success. It’s hard to shake the feeling that the whole concept of MySpace is a measure of some deepening sociological crisis. I feel dirty being on it – like when I look at pornography – but I am adjusting and like most things find that there are positives. Mainly it’s pleasing to have many friends - some of whom are people I would otherwise not have a chance to be friendly with – like Paul Keating, Ennio Morricone and Akira Kurasawa. Of course it seems possible that I’m being duped but I don’t want to go there and I feel reluctant to try to broach a conversation with any of them either in case they rudely ignore me. Better just to carry on making friends (I seem quite popular and am The Belle of the Ball without having to do much at all).

Good news – we have been invited to play Woodford this year which we have never done before.

PS: Mr Creighton is so vain that he is insisting I let it be known that he thinks his brain might have been up for the MySpace challenge – but whenever he looked at the thing it made him feel angry, depressed and confused – in that order. He kept telling me that MySpace was only for paedophiles – turns out he was only partially correct.

I slept 8 hours at home last night only to be woken when my excited daughter jumped into my filthy bed out in the shed. Part one of the Doomsday Piano tour has been fun and very well received with only 2 crap gigs out of the 15. The last 3 shows in the safe seats of Sydney, Canberra and Katoomba were packed houses so we even made some money which is a nice change.

I want to make special mentions of talent we ran into on the way. ‘Betty Means Business’, the ukulele trio who supported us for a number of the shows were fine company and have won fans everywhere. A guy called Steve Ryan in Armidale played a solo support spot for us there and showed himself to be a truly brilliant songwriter and singer – I hope to play with him again now he has moved to Sydney. We had a support in Adelaide called ‘Unspoken Things’ who I liked a lot. They are like a high school band – heaps of energy and not taking it too seriously. Their tenacious little singer/drummer Travis very rudely said I looked like ‘Ed’ off that American sitcom but the bullet bounced straight off me. Well,… I suppose it did hurt abit. Ed – God. He was such a goose. Deb Collins and her partner running the Blue Poles venue in Byabarra were favourite people of ours – good people to balance against some of the evil characters we encountered elsewhere. Thank you.

Mr Creighton sometimes asks The Internet what people are saying about King Curly. From what I gather, there is a servant of the Internet called a Google which knows everything. For instance, Mr C told me he discovered a nest of King Curly afficionados in Japan. This is important stuff and might lead to King Curly’s first invitation O.S. To tour Japan, the US, Canada and Europe is what we would dearly like to do now. And so comes the necessity to get a record deal over there – as well as some level of general patronage. I have decided to put out the following:

“Open Invitation To Patrons of The Arts and Benefactors of Anything”

King Curly is issuing a general call to arms. Whilst an international record deal and tour financing are prime objectives there are many other pieces of the jigsaw that the serried ranks of the King’s operatives here and abroad can assay. Media coverage, support from venues or the simple couch ta kip on in Prague etc are invited. Contact us here : king curly (at) kingcurly.com .

A thing which prays on my mind when away on tour is the rat problem I have at home. I practice chicken husbandry in a modest way – and of course this is the source of the problem. My neighbor also has chickens and is equally determined in his efforts to bring the rat population to its knees. He told me one night about his coming face to face with what must have been the grand patriarch rat. THE RAT KING. He confronted it in his own chicken coop and could tell its pedigree by its massive size, its insolent demeanor and what he swore was a glittering golden beard. So it is good to be back on the job now I’m home. I must confess I’ve been using baits for some time as no other method seems to help and I have killed a lot of rats as has my neighbor who is a mad inventor of all kinds of rat traps – but when I turn the morning corpses over with my boot I’m always looking to see if it’s Golden Beard. BUT STILL HE PREVAILS.

Having just returned from our South Australian leg of the tour I should mention our encounter with an unusual and soon-to-be-banned shower head. We were provided in Adelaide with accommodation by a very kind relative of John’s in the Bel Air hills. It is a tremendously relaxing and beautiful place while the house itself has clearly been designed with the environment as a priority – recycled water systems, solar power etc. It was here that we came to know the “Lil’ Pixie 500“. A shower head which gave off such an economical jet of water that it was impossible not to hate it. It was more of a fine cold mist to stand in. I consider myself a lover of the environment but the “Lil’ Pixie” must go down in history as a bizarre false economy. If it does get dug up by some an archaeologist in years to come I’m sure they will have no idea what the stupid thing could have been for.

UK journal GIGWISE has a lengthy feature on “Doomsday Piano” where they note “best work to date” and “one of the more imaginative releases you’re likely to hear this year.”

TIME OFF remark on Steve’s unpleasant habit of scaring children and then laughing about it, but they also say that “humour and haunting darkness… wonderfully characterises Doomsday Piano” and predict a lucrative future for the album. That would be nice.

Brisbane’s COURIER MAIL sez of Doomsday Piano: “songs that sometimes sound as if they have beamed in from an alternative-pop dimension” . They also gave it a separate 4 star review, “achingly beautiful, moving pieces”.

The Australian sez “a strange and wonderful hybrid”, “deliciously warped pop sensibility” and “highly original”. Also 4 stars.

It would have been nice to assert in the banner, “ALBUM ENJOYED BY ALL” – but you just never know, do you? If you know of someone who didn’t enjoy “Doomsday Piano”, push them down the stairs. And if you didn’t enjoy it, I suppose you will have to push yourself down the stairs.