AFRICA AFRICA

My favourite name of any continent.

Apparently people make good money from directing people who read their blog to certain products and services.... we don't but we probably could. I just want to share!!!!! ---->



As we have said before, we played in Reading on Sunday, and part of the fun of the whole night was the pre gig meal that we had.

In the Global Cafe on London Street, there is a Woman called Tutu, who cooks fantastic Ethiopian cuisine. Her venture is called 'Tutu's Ethiopian Table' and this is her website.




In case you were unsure, Tutu is the lady between me and jonny. See! look how happy we all look. I look happy anyway.
So if, like me, you weren't sure of what Ethiopian food is like, it's hearty and tasty, and it's served on something that me and david thought were towels or serviettes but are actually some kind of bread/pancake that you can wrap around your food a bit, and eat. Tastes really good.

So if you live in or around Reading, go in and meet Tutu and EAT HER FOOD!

They also serve Tusker beer (which I think is african- Kenyan ?) which immediately became one of my favourite beers in the whole world.

.....IN OTHER NEWS.......

We are doing some more work with David.M.Allen, who recorded our songs Blood Get's Thin and Jennifer. He's been hanging out with us a lot, coming to listen to us practise, and generally being a very wise man. (note... this probably has something to do with our new album. but not saying too much)

We are also about to embark on a merchandise madness scheme where we get very very creative and hand make all of our merch, it WILL be the coolest merch you can get. Keep watching this space for more info.....

Wow, two posts in one day, i'm exhausted.

bye

The geese are getting fat

Hello everybody

It's very cold in my basement flat and there is a pathetic layer of snow/frost/sludge outside my window. How i wish it could be Christmas every day.

So as mentioned, our recent 'christmas' shows have been going down a real treat. To those who came to Reading, Tooting and last night's Kilburn gig at the Luminaire, thank you.

Last night's show was put on by the guys who run Song Kick, which if you are an ardent live music fan, might be an invaluable web of intrigue for you. It basically shows 'gigographies' of bands you love so you can view photos, vids, set lists etc that users upload. It really seems to cover all elements of live music. I now sound like i'm really plugging it, which i am, but only cos I think it's good.

OUR SECTION

Last night we played with Riz Mc who was very entertaining and a very nice man. And also Stairs to Korea, who showed what could be done with a midi guitar, very educational, a master of effects pedals. Coincidentally, we both played 'silent night' in out sets, they were 2 very contrasting versions though.




Our friend Pooneh who we met in New York around March has been visiting London, and continuing her admiralbe quest of capturing bands and music via the beautiful medium of Polaroid, and other quirky unusaul cameras. None of this digital nonsense. She came to our show at the Tram and Social in Tooting Bec, South of the River (a venue/pub which is well worth a visit) and took some stunning (i think) photos. Here is her website



I've interspersed some of Pooneh's photos through this blog, I haven't asksed her yet if she minds me putting them up but I don't think she will..........?

Well we don't have anymore shows before Christmas, so see you in 2010 - ah the first time i've written 2010. need to get used to it. not yet though. If we don't post again before christmas, have a good one. Love thy neighbour. x

Toot Toot

dear All,

Big massive thanks to everyone that came to see us in Reading we had a crazy old time! if anyone has any photos send them over or put links up to them etc etc.

Another big up to the tooting massive who put on a great night and in a great venue. Nice to discover such a gem south of the river. (Which is of course where i live and have been searching for some cool places to hang out)

sorry to our friend salv who got smacked in the head by Tom's guitar.....consider it a battle scar. That's rock and roll for you.

Jonny

ps:

RE toms previous post....

here is some more moustache evidence.



Its all true ...i'm so sorry

Eleven of O nine

WHAT HAS HAPPENED IN NOVEMBER?

PETE PETE AND I GREW MOUSTACHES AND LOOKED LIKE TWATS.
ALTHOUGH LITTLE PETE SEEMS TO OFTEN HAVE A MOUSTACHE, IT WAS MY VERY FIRST EVER, SO IT WAS SPECIAL TO ME.

I wasn't sorry to shave it off though as it became a little itchy.
David has a large red beard at the moment, but i don't think it's got anything to do with our taches, and Jonny isn't involved in the facial hair scence very much.

Also in november, and this month too, we have been doing the odd show to keep us oiled and have mainly been meeting up half in Reading, and half in London, to play music together which is of course what we do.... but we are increasingly increasing the probability of creating our second album which is tantalizingly imminent you can almost hear it in the distance... in fact i wrote a new song today which i've just mailed to the other folks.















































Tomorrow we play our home town of Reading - a special Christmas Shindig with super surprises hidden with in our set list. You really have to come. I'll buy you a mince pie. The next day we play in Tooting Bec. Never been there but it's a great sounding place. You really have to come. I'll buy you a soda and lime.

Posts of more relevance WILL follow. This is kind of padding, but that's fine.

I'm listening to Mazurkas. Polish waltzes i think.

More moustache photos are available on application.

later on isn't it.

Sorry, Yeah?

I regret not writing anything in the blog for quite a long time. I've just not really felt inclined. But I think the ice is melting now.... jonny just forwarded me a collection of songs we played in Amsterdam. (not this, this is a photograph of us playing a song)


Yes it was good fun, I remember it well now. Holland is quite alright, i reckon i could live there for about 6 months and have a real fun time. Thanks to the fellas who made this little film, it was good fun and they did a great job.

Here it is, so it is.


Amsterdam Acoustics : ''Pete and the Pirates'' on their walk through the city from Mokummercials on Vimeo.

What else can we talk about? The album is coming along.... there is an aspect of um... well we just want to be really careful about releasing something that's right. So basically it's going to take us a bit longer than we might have planned. We aren't capricious, but we are prone to changing our minds about stuff and having great epiphanies. I think at the moment there is a great sense of excitement amongst ourselves... or at least amongst myself. You might not know it to look at my face though, i just always look like that.

this is us at our first gig in NY

and this is David and Wesley Patrick Gonzalez having an arm wrestle. They are both amazingly weak.

As an after thought, here is an interview with TAP TAP (that's me by the way) where there is a song to listen to as well. I might even start a tap tap blog, i'm just not sure i have enought interesting things to say.... !

(click the photo)

Ok that's all then, goodbye again.

welcome back!

hey everybody,
we are all recovered now from our horrible illnesses which is good news.
i suppose it is time for a little update,

we went to NYC for a week to play at a festival called CMJ (more like a SXSW than a Glastonbury type festival)
it was crazy good fun, we ended up doing more shows than we originally planned which was good news, had some very very good food, as well as having good times drinking in bars and such like...
it all seems like a little while ago now so sorry these recollections are a bit vague.
how about a list of some highlights?>

Good things.
1. Playing at The Bell House with Let's Wrestle = a very nice place with chandeliers and photo booths.
2. Seeing JEFF The Brotherhood play = they rock ok
3. Food = Sushi, Pastrami, Hot Dogs, Pizza, Pasta, Chilli Dawg, Cuban Wrap, Pickles, Lil' Frankie's
4. Record shopping = Vaselines, Michael Hurley, Exceptor, Slumberland sampler, Shackleton, The Bats etc.
5. Getting fit = just walk everywhere- it is fun

Okay what next? you ask
well we have a sepcial show to tell you about:
On December the 13th the special Pete and the Pirates Xmas Party/Shindig/Concert is taking place, in good ol' Reading . which everyone should come to, because it is gonna be F-U-N. playing with us are our good friends the excellent Ex-Lovers, who you should definitely all listen too (google them?) as they are great, also a new band from Reading called Worship (featuring ex-members of the band Fox Cubs)who you should be sure to check out too. i believe there will be one more band playing too, but we are yet to decide on who it shall be...here is a flyer:

okay more from us soon
love david pirate

Flu

sorry for lack of blog at the moment some of us have contracted deadly swine flu, and the rest of us have bird flu.

I have mad cow disease.

We'll do full updates of the best stuff from our recent tour and how the album is going very shortly.

For the time being i'm off to see Tap Tap tonight in Brixton. So there!

jon

S Pain

So we took a break from our album making antics to do some shows around Europe. We just got back from 3 days in Spain. "Wow that sounds lovely!" i hear you cry.

Well yes and no. I think since Wednesday we have had on average 2/3 hours sleep a night and feel pretty zombie-ish at the moment. On top of that we had a 10 hour drive then a gig at 3.30am in Bilbao. Ouch.

So...complaining aside the gigs were actually pretty good and the Spanish fans are great.

And now follows some pictures from the merry trip...

Jonny Donette?



Pete and Tom looking weird



Cartagena in the south of Spain. Everyone looking happy i see.



Garish



The rain in spain falls mainly on the plain?




So there you have it.

We are now off to Holland, Brussels, Luxembourg...and NYC!


J o n n y P i r a t e x

Almost there, we're almost there

This week is the last week we will be spending in the studio.

all the recording is done, we are now mixing.

I can report that it's sounding sweet. We are all very happy. David has been away on holiday so missed the fun of last week but now he's back and we had a good day today adding the final touches to our new material.

Also today we recorded some brass and although peter is caught here looking sad with a violin, we didn't record any violin.

What more is there to tell.... we are going to Spain early October for a few shows, followed by holland, belgium and that kind of stuff where beer is nice and ther is lots of Nutella, then from Brusells to NYC where I don't really know what happens cos I never been but David says it's good and in the films it seems like a bit like London but with less idiots than London has.




Also end of September (ish) is the release of the new Tap Tap album which is also coming out on Stolen, the first run of which has special limited edtion 'wrong tracks' which don't correspond with the art work due to a phenomenal fuck up at the manufacturing stage. So get your special copy now before it becomes a rarity!!!

In The woods

Here's some video evidence to back up David's post...

this is Micachu at in the woods:

In The Woods

Yesterday we played a festival in a secret place somewhere in Kent called In The Woods. It is organised by the band Laurel Collective, i think this was the fourth time they have done it.
It had the best line-up out of any of the festivals this year: Connan Mockasin, Micachu and the Shapes, Screaming Tea Party, Anna Calvi and of course Laurel Collective themselves to name but a few. It was set in a kinda natural ampitheatre which was surrounded and covered by trees. bee-yew-tea-full.
We got there nice and early so we saw all the bands play and had a really very good time.
By accident we played pretty much all new songs, which was good and we finished with Lost In The Woods (clever huh?)
I played guitar with Micachu and the Shapes on one of their songs which was very fun.
At the end of all the music there was set to be a big Wickerman-esque bonfire, however we had to leave before the fire was set alight. i forgot to take my camera so i'm afraid this report is words only.
tomorrow we go back to The Classroom to continue recording the new record, so expect some in-studio reports over the next few days...

On a Break

Don't worry we're not on a break as a band, that's what couples do who get sick of each other but still have mutual friends so are scared to break up. Although we do get sick of each other as a band, this only tends to happen after prolonged exposure to each other's company especially in confined spaces.

We are on a break from recording which explains why I'm writing total crap to 'pad' the blog and and keep it fresh, innit. It's quite frustrating cos we'd like to get straight back in the studio to keep things moving, but it's good to get the time to reflect and listen to what we've done. And it's sounding good btw, obviuosly not gonna post up any previews yet cos don't want to give too much (anythying) away.

in the meantime, i thought i'd post up some mostly patp unrelated photographs i've taken of things in my days off which caught my eye or make me chuckle.





This sky made me feel worried when i walked out of my house. There were a group of seagulls screaming and I had to run away.


And here is a house opposite a friend of mine's which stopped shaving completely.

Wine tasting


bye

hummmmming

Humming video i made, i hope you're not epileptic

CLICKY CLICK HERE

Sorry couldn't post it to watch on here because the blog is very thin. Go to youtube to watch it and click HQ to see it bigger and better!


Jonny

Tom Seat

I just found this photo of Tom entitled 'Human Seat'













(Thanks jasperbeatnik on flickr)

jp

Big yet Tiny

We are 2 weeks into recording and the songs are sounding great.

We're eating beef and drinking beer which i think is having an effect on how some of the songs are going to sound.

I did a panorama, innit. click on it to make it all big.

yesterday we experimented with tying tissues to guitar strings and playing loud solos through toy amplifiers. Not going to give away too many secrets of our sounds though.

(One of Pete's tricks to getting good sounding takes is to look really fucking cool when recording).

Bobby thanks very much for lending us the guitar and we're really sorry for not giving it back to you xxx

Peter and David take a little break where they share a cigarette and agree that I'm a dick.

Boys on the Beach

What do Pete and the Pirates do on days off from their punshing recording schedule? This exclusive footage reveals all....

Yes, we are in Newqualy soaking up the sun after being locked in some dark rooms for 12 hours a day. Not that I'm complaining, we've been looking forward to recording for about 2 years. We were actually here to do a show but our over zealous tour manager got us here about 4 hours early so we had plenty of time to get all sandy.

New Album Studio Tour

Hi guys this is a video It made at the beginning of last week. Hope it fills in a few gaps. My camera has pretty much broken now I'm sorry to say but that's okay I'll use music for memories from now on.

Speak to you next week.

XPX

We've been having some fun.

We've been having fun in the studio, as you may have gathered.
Here are the edited highlights of the first few days.




More videos to come hopefully.

P xx

that was yesterday, this is today

jonny and peter having good times in the drum room

david making sure everything is sounding right, under the watchful eye of producer gareth parton



jonny doing a drum take

Muggy Morning

welcome to day two recording,
we are just settling in, cups o'coffee, cups o'tea, bacon n egg, tuna melt
first things first, we are listening to all our fine work yesterday.
yep very good.
more news on that later...

in other news if you want to hear my remix for micachu's song lips you can go to her myspace and listen there, it is the 1bpm remix: www.myspace.com/micayomusic

david

DAY 1 in the big fortress house

After spending about 3 hours trying to make a snare sound like a snare we are well on our way.... here are pete jonny and gareth in the fortress where we first recorded Little Death all those moons ago.

Non piratic posts

On Sunday I saw this:



It was fookin' good. Nisenenmondai are a Japanese 3 piece girl band from Tokyo and I've been wanting to see them for ages. They were playing well near my house so I went even though i hadn't been to bed the night before and was feeling tired and rough. They woke me up. It's not exactly easy listening. I bought a pink t shirt.

They were supported by an equally great band called Bo Ningen, also Japanese. Who in places reminded quite a lot of this band:



Who are on our label, and who are VERY good.


Then on Tuesday Jonny showed me this:

http://www.stsanders.com/old/index.php?v=4

which made me chuckle. (although i didn't understand what it was at first cos i'm a bit thick)

Other exciting news.... is that as Jonny pointed out were are about to go into the studio with our extremely itchy fingers to make a BRILLIANT SECOND ALBUM. People go on about second albums being difficult, living up to the first one etc. I don't think it's going to be a problem for us!!! (this is self-assured confidence, not arrogance)

roll on August....

bye

New Album Nerves

Hello...

On Monday we go into the studio for the first part of the recording of Album No.2. I am listening to the demos at the moment and it's quite exciting. After rehearsing for so long it's nice to have some time to reflect on the songs and try and take them in from an almost objective perspective. I am hopefully that people will like it!

We have nearly narrowed down the tracklist but nothing concrete yet. There'll be plenty of new songs that hopefully people won't have heard..and some they will, if you are a keen patp gig goer that is!

No release date as yet. First part of next year perhaps? Lets get it recorded first eh?

Byeeee

Jonathan Of The Pirate Clan

Pictures

Tommy has been encouraging more Blog action so here's a post from me about me.

Some thoughts on religion perhaps?

















Or an x-ray snake?


















Or something lovely?


















Or an x-ray cat?



















Let me know your thoughts...

more like this here on my fabulous website

Jonny

From the Vault

Here are some really really interesting photos that I plucked at random from our past....

D. Thorpe writes a set list

Jonny and Connan Mockasin, from when we were on tour together.... the long lost brothers

Our old van.... if you sat here you were a dick.

This is Pete and I driving to somewhere at some point in history but I think it must have been Christmas cos pete has santa hat on. ???

Jonny likes to experiment with masks.

Pete doing some recording of some demo in my room.