The new Ruts D.C. single 'Kill The Pain' is released today!

The new Ruts D.C. single 'Kill The Pain' comes out today on Westworld / Sosumi Records - it's certainly one of my favourite songs on 'Music Must Destroy' (incidentally Pete Sargeant has just published a splendid review of the album on Just Listen To This which you can read here - thanks Pete!) so I for one am well pleased that it's out in it's own right. And after what seems like an age of anticipation our tour with The Stranglers finally kicks off in Lincoln next Tuesday; it then winds it's way up and down England, Scotland and Wales (no Ireland sadly, but more about that in a minute) before finishing in Manchester on (gulp!) April 1st. It promises to be an absolute classic, and if you're coming along to a show then do please say hello. Blogging opportunities are likely to be few and far between but I will be attempting to update my Facebook page on a regular if not daily basis so if you're interested in following how it's all going that's the place to be.

And if you are interested in following how it's all going then you can find my Facebook page here. See you in Cyberspace!

As I say it's a great shame that we're not going to get over to Ireland this time - but we are playing with Stiff Little Fingers in Dublin on Friday 25th August before a very special show in Belfast the next night with SLF, The Stranglers and The Outcasts with Terri Hooley DJ-ing. Crikey! Did I really just type that? Yes, incredibly, I did. Hurrah! 

St. Elsewhere

I'm sure Windsor was quite a lively place on St. George's Day - Uxbridge certainly was, if you count gangs of large shaven-headed men cheering drunkenly as they wended their way from pub to pub as 'lively'. Still Balcony Shirts did a roaring trade in printing ENGLAND on white polo shirts for quite a few of the afore-mentioned shaven-headed men so perhaps I shouldn't complain - well, not too much anyway, and I'm sure their Queen (and indeed St. George) was very proud of them... when we got to Windsor we saw someone dressed as a dragon in the car park near the theatre (hmm...) and the souvenir shops had noticeably less Union Jack flags (isn't that the flag of The United Kingdom rather than England? Just a thought, as they say...) and t-shirts than they'd had earlier in the week so I'm sure they were happy.

The theatre was certainly a lively place during our show - a much larger audience saw us play what for me was the best show so far. I was back on the white Telecaster and spent the first few numbers wondering why my guitar sound wasn't quite as raucous as the previous evening - maybe that's why I went into the middle section of 'Soul Man' a verse earlier than I should have, causing much amusement for Squirrel standing next to me and Pete in the wings. Bah! Oh and Phil the soundman distinguished himself by playing The Ramones, The New York Dolls and The Clash over the P.A. after our soundcheck - I always knew he was a man of taste!

Two nearly-sold-out shows today... can't wait!