Two shows in and it’s the day of the first 65daysofstatic headline show, in Hoboken. Whenever we tell people in America that, they say, ‘Yeah! The home of Frank Sinatra!’ and in my head I reply ‘But surely it’s more popular for being mentioned in the title of an incredible Yo La Tengo song?’ but don’t say it out loud because I don’t want to be proved wrong. It’s a really good song.

Frank Sinatra is excellent in The Manchurian Candidate, especially when he does some martial arts. On the other hand, he is also indirectly responsible for Ocean’s 12. Not to be trusted then.

Simon has broken an already impressive 65 record by breaking his brand new, fresh-out-the-box, $1600 Ampeg Bass Head after one show. ONE SHOW. We are driving round various Guitar Centers right now looking for a replacement. In the last one, Rob and Paul found some synths and became an admirable approximation of Daft Punk, Joe talked to a girl about delay pedals and tried out some kinda geeky guitar/fx combo and made a sound like all the dinosaurs that ever existed coming back to life at the same time. Simon, meanwhile, failed to get a new bass head of any description as the one they had in the store was ‘already’ broken. But none of us saw the amp prior to Si trying it out. Our plan in the next guitar shop (or store as they’re known over here) is to walk in and say ‘Hi, can you direct us to your broken amps section’.

The Guitar Center was next to a Chuck E Cheese. What’s a Chuck E Cheese? Chuck E Cheese is a giant mouse from space. Thumbs up.

Tonight we are playing with God Fires Man who are some members of Gay For Johnny Depp who we just finished touring with, so we’re hoping that they’ll help us out of this tightest of spots. (Last night, incidentally, the glorious Simon Gallup of The Cure came to our rescue with his spare amp. When Joe explained this to the crowd, the amp got a much bigger cheer than any of our songs did).

Everyone in American arenas has to sit down. This is an awful thing and I am suprised that there hasn’t been a revolution. It is because the venues/promoters can make more money selling seated space than standing space, apparently. Real shame…

So far, our soundchecks have been taken up mostly with fixing things and we’re playing on different gear to the stuff we normally use so if anyone saw us at any of these shows and thought we were shocking, that’s the story we’re sticking to.

Yesterday in Philidelphia there was a giant, rusting ship that looked like that bit in Ghostbusters 2 where the Ghost Ship Titanic pulls into port. And also a great little independent music store somewhere in Chinatown that sold me a power supply for a midi interface and the guy who helped me had heard of 65daysofstatic. Which was exciting. Joe’s looking tired.

Me: ‘Joe, why are you looking so tired?’
Joe: ‘I don’t know. Why?’
Me: ‘Is it cos you’re drinking too much?’
Rob: ‘It’s cos you’re drinking too much’.
Joe: ‘Fucking right’.

Arty from God Fires Man just called. They have an amp.
We’re winning.
Onwards…
65.x