Tonight's gig: nasty venue, scary-looking people in the crowd, previous bands getting heckled...  And then we played and completely reversed the atmosphere; we felt like the Beatles afterwards, everyone wanted to complement us.  You never can tell!

It's a perfect way to start the new year because we've been saying that this is the beginning of a new era for Mount Fabric, we are going to take it to the next level, and tonight was a beautiful way to christen our brand new setlist.  So thankyou Stockport!

1. SeeThrough
2. Wrestling With A Wrecking Ball
3. Trapped Messenger
4. Epiphany
5. Treetops
6. Contraband
7. Sarah & The Multiverse
8. Straw Dogs
9. One Shot

You may have noticed a lack of blog entries recently. You may have made assumptions to why this is; Christmas, laziness, lack of time due to the unrelenting amount of fan mail we have to get through each day... Unfortunately the truth is much more sinister.

Since the start of this new decade, we have had Alex locked down in our rehearsal room, 24 hours a day, 5 days a week (it would be 7 if we didn't share the room with another band). We visit him from time to time to make music, but mostly he's chained to his desk, mixing away the final tracks for the EP. Fortunately he's quite happy with this arrangement, and as he doesn't eat, he is quite happy as long as the heaters are on full blast and he has enough Pepsi to keep him awake. Most of the tracks are pretty much done, and freedom is looking tantalisingly close.

Unfortunately, he's shot himself in the foot. We can't monitor him all of the time, and it seems he has written a fair few new songs while we weren't looking, all of which have the potential to be awesome. While no doubt he will get some time to feed his rats and visit his family, it won't be long until he's back on lockdown and working on the new stuff. The boy just doesn't learn.

In other news, Mount Fabric have accidentally all ended up playing black guitars. This was not planned, nor is it very cool, or interesting, or even worthy of being called 'news'.

Mixing mixing mixing.  No rehearsals this week so I'm mixing like a baker with OCD.  It's all about the EP, and this week I have mostly been working on Wrestling With A Wrecking Ball.  It's pretty difficult work, this is something we're going to make hundreds of CDs of so it's important that it sounds good.  Anyway, I just thought I'd say that it's going well, Wrecking Ball is shaping up sweetly!

Meanwhile, download our fan pack, especially Treetops!

We've played a couple of gigs in the last 2 days, one acoustic and one fully leaded.  The acoustic one was surprisingly good, we didn't have high hopes!  It was one of those in-the-corner-of-a-pub gigs where the band commands the same degree of attention as the wallpaper, and on this occasion the bar was filled with students (dressed as old ladies) on a pub crawl and barely anyone else.  It's difficult to know sometimes whether you'd rather be playing to 5 people who have no choice but to listen to you or 50 people who are barely aware you're even there.  Still, we went on and played, and on the whole far more people were listening that we expected and people were friendly and complimentary afterwards.  Once again, Sarah & The Multiverse was the clear favourite, still haven't quite got my head around that one...

Last night we played the Attic, a completely different affair.  The good thing about the Attic is that it's not a bar, so people come to watch bands, as opposed to the bands just happening to be playing in the same room.  It's a dark and dingy place but that's no bad thing, the main irritation was that the only light on stage was one that is sound activated, so we played in this constant low-level strobe effect and nothing more.  It was a trial, but not because we played badly, we actually played well and enjoyed ourselves.  It was a trial because Joel was using his new guitar and I was using an FX unit that has developed a mind of its own in the last week.  Essentially, this meant I was playing my first ever gig WITHOUT FX, which is a very strange thing for me to be doing!   Nevertheless, I think we just about pulled off a good performance.  (And I didn't break a string!!)

Acoustic @ The Garrett
1. Wrestling With A Wrecking Ball
2. Epiphany
3. Straw Dogs
4. Spend All Your Money
5. Sarah & The Multiverse

Electric @ The Attic
1. Wrestling With A Wrecking Ball
2. Epiphany
3. Way, Way Out On The Border
4. One Shot
5. Fountain Of Knowledge
6. Straw Dogs
7. Treetops
8. No Answers

Btw, if you haven't done so far, get on the mailing list and get some free live music from us!

Just got back from the gig, it went very well for a Thursday night.  It's always difficult mid-week because the crowd are never as lively, but there were still plenty of people watching and the sound was really good on stage tonight so we enjoyed ourselves.  Fountain Of Knowledge went well for the most part!  We're hoping for a last minute gig at Jabez on Sunday so maybe see you there.

Setlist:

1. Wrestling With A Wrecking Ball
2. One Shot
3. Fountain Of Knowledge
4. Way, Way Out On The Border
5. Treetops
6. Trapped Messenger