Peterborough has big plans for its Olympic Torch celebrations, and the performance of There With You promises to be nothing short of spectacular. In addition to The Lightyears, the concert will feature nearly 700 voices, along with 50 drummers to reflect the cultural diversity of the region. More details to come nearer the time!

Visit the Voyager School website to find out more.

Many of you will remember that we have a long-standing relationship with the city of Peterborough, having released charity football single Posh We Are with Peterborough FC and the Voyager School back in 2008. Read more here.

I think she’s in some kind of trance.

Phoebe was the sole witness to the three days George and I just spent in his studio up in Yorkshire working on a batch of tracks for The Lightyears’ new album. You can tell the music is speaking to her from the look on her tiny little face (unlike many Jack Russells, Phoebe is a die-hard fan of diminished chords).

Meanwhile, Tony has a handful of tracks he’s been working on and there’s a rumour John is vying to fill the rest of the album with slap-bass solos, which I’m obviously very excited about. So things are shaping up…!

This album will come with an unusual bonus – a novel, about the band, by the band (well, me). Based on a true-ish story, Mockstars chronicles how The Lightyears got together, and sheds light on the people and places behind the songs.

Watch this space for updates…

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

MOCKSTARS
by Christopher Russell

Chris and George are best friends, and they want to be rockstars.

Unfortunately, a childhood spent playing in the school orchestra and listening to Jimmy Nail has left them a little fluffy round the edges, and at the age of 23 they still live with their parents and travel to gigs in a Skoda. So how do two boys-next-door from the Home Counties go about taking on the cut-throat, image-obsessed world of rock and roll?

Easy. They’re just going to have to fake it.

‘Back in the nineties, when everybody else was at illegal raves chomping ecstasy pills, what were you boys doing?’
I look at George. He shrugs.
‘Jigsaws,’ I reply.
‘We’ve got a LOT of work to do…’

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

The first two videos are now online – click to view our acoustic covers of David Guetta’s Titanium and Rihanna’s We Found Love.

More videos to come, including a dusting-off of Lightyears favourite Girl on The Radio and three readings from my new LYs novel, Mockstars.

On the right you’ll see what it looked like from where we were standing. What a beautiful bunch. In fact, let’s face it – you okes in Cape Town are hogging all the decent genes.

Anyone who can write in and tell us where in the crowd George’s mum is standing gets a free CD*.

(*George’s mum, you can’t enter.)

info@thelightyears.com

The shoot was in two parts – 1) filming three short extracts from my upcoming Lightyears novel, Mockstars (and, in doing so, pioneering a genuinely groundbreaking new art form we like to call ‘Rock & Roll Jackanory’) and 2) filming five new live music videos.

We’re beavering away on the edits as I write, and you lot will be the first to know when there’s something to see. To keep you amused in the meantime… erm… click here to find out what my dreams look like.

Yeah? You like that? Yeah? Of course you do. Of course you do…

We’ll be heading back to CT to headline at the Cape Town Tens on Saturday 4 February. This has always been one of our favourite international gigs and has repeatedly proved to be pretty much the greatest party on earth (apart from those parties you had as kids where one of your chums would hire out the top floor of McDonalds in Reading. Man, were those parties ACE.)

Click here to read my previous South Africa tour blogs.

To our South African friends – we’ll see you all out there!

We will be headlining at a special fundraising show in aid of Cancer Research on Friday 15 July at The Memorial Hall in Shiplake, South Oxfordshire.

It’ll be an unplugged set crammed full of old Lightyears favourites (including a song or two we haven’t played in years!) and some of our newer material. Support comes from the thunderous DRUMCLUB and local band 5:31.

Doors 7pm; tickets £5 for adults and £2 for children.

Looking forward to seeing you there! Full details on the GIGS page.

This was our sixth year performing at the QBB and, as always, all the stops were pulled out for an evening of fine food, outlandish decor and wild merriment.

2011’s theme was Alice In Wonderland, which very much accounts for why Tony could be found running around Insadong at four o’clock in the morning brandishing an enormous polystyrene mushroom. Actually, having said that, there’s no excuse for behaviour of that sort. But at least now the people of Seoul know why it happened.

A Fortnight In The Mountains – A Musical Horror Story
by Chris Russell (published in State Magazine, November 2008)

Since the major record labels began tightening their belts, more and more bands have found themselves ‘going it alone’. Unsigned bands have re-branded themselves as ‘Independent Acts’ and can be seen attempting ambitious global touring that, once upon a time, would have been funded, organised and overseen by a team of trained industry professionals.

It was in this spirit, then, that my band embarked on its first ever international tour a couple of years ago with little more than a hunger for stardom and access to Google Maps. In place of a nightliner we had an ageing Vauxhall Omega, a car which we had bought off our guitarist’s dad and that didn’t so much say ‘rock and roll freewheelers’ as ‘Sunday afternoon at Furniture Village’. Into this vehicle we managed to squeeze an entire PA system, all our instruments and four grown men. This, believe me, was a miracle of spatial engineering.

After 14 hours driving down through France, we eventually arrived at our chalet at around 2.30am. We were met there by The Booking Agent, a man who would never look you directly in the eye, probably for a very good reason. It was as if he’d shot your grandmother in her sleep and didn’t want you to find out.

We enquired after the unmade beds which, apart from looking distinctly uncomfortable, were entirely devoid of sheets.

‘Didn’t you get the memo about bedding?’ The Agent replied.

Memo? Bedding?

And it was with that that we found ourselves, on our first night of our inaugural European tour, struggling to achieve slumber underneath makeshift quilts fashioned from napkins and flannels. Which very much set the tone for the coming week.

We were touring the clubs and bars of high-society ski resort Meribel, sometimes playing for up to four hours a day. This was our Hamburg. Our initiation into the daily grind of a touring band. Only instead of the Top Ten Club and the red-light district, we had ‘Cross-Dresser Night’ at Le Pub. After about a week, the hefty gigging schedule began to take its toll on our drummer and he developed a stomach bug of epic proportions. He was up all night, literally sluicing from both ends. I can say this with confidence because the meagre width of the bathroom walls, coupled with the bizarre acoustics of our poorly-constructed chalet, meant I heard the whole thing as if it was happening right next to my head. And, believe me, when somebody is projectile-vomiting next to your head for six straight hours, it’s really quite tricky to get any decent shut-eye.

The next morning he stumbled into the living room looking like the abandoned love-child of Quasimodo and Pete Doherty. Sadly, however, there was no opportunity for respite as we were scheduled to scale the mountains once more in search of Le Rond Point, the next venue on the tour. The weather up until this point had been clement, since April usually brings very little snowfall in the Alps. As a result we were woefully unprepared for what was about to hit. Namely, an enormous blizzard.

Driving at 3mph along winding mountain roads through a violent snowstorm in a heavily-loaded car with virtually zero visibility is, take it from me, pretty bloody scary. Part of me wondered whether this was the moment in which I was going to die. This was it. Had I achieved everything I desired in life? Had the band made its mark on popular culture? Would we be remembered as a modern-day Lynyrd Skynyrd, plucked from life in a cruel motoring accident at the height of our potential?

Needless to say, we didn’t meet our demise on the mountain-side that day. But we came pretty close. And so now, if any prospective tour manager asks us to bring our own bedding or drops the phrase ‘Cross-Dresser Night’ into conversation, we know to run a mile.

We sang as the sun went down over the stunning architecture of the city, Europe on one side, Asia on the other. I can definitely recommend this as an experience (although the singing part isn’t essential).

Here’s to many more future visits!