Countries
Information about our own international travels to see bands play gigs
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With Clox Pitcher – The Düsseldorf Rock’n’Roll Headquarters, Dusseldorf, 24 July 2025 The end of our own #RaceAcrossEurope odyssey took us to The Pitcher Bar in the back streets of Dusseldorf. More accurately, we were heading to ‘Pitcher – The Düsseldorf Rock’n’Roll Headquarters’. The exterior artistic work provides a clue as to what might be…
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Gregory Porter
Kurpark, Wiesbaden, 22 July 2025 In seeking a definition for ‘eclectic,’ I found the following – ‘deriving ideas, style, or taste from a broad and diverse range of sources.’ A few words which more than adequately describes the musical acts we had seen over the previous couple of weeks across Europe. From indoor arenas to inside…
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Ezra Collective
with Kokoroko The KKL, Lucerne, 21 July 2025 A few weeks prior to seeing Nick Cave in Naples, southern Italy, and Gregory Porter in Wiesbaden, middle Germany, we were looking for a stopover to break up the journey between both and decided upon Lucerne in Switzerland. No point travelling all that way and not to…
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Nick Cave
Pompeii, 19 July 2025 The Amphitheatre of Pompeii is one of the oldest surviving Roman amphitheatres. It is located in the ancient city of Pompeii, near Naples, and was buried by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD, that also buried the city of Pompeii and the neighbouring town of Herculaneum. It was also the stage setting for Nick Cave and…
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Nile Rodgers and Chic
With Son Mieux, Cattolica, 18 July There is something very distinctive about songs that Nile Rodgers has an input into. They always involve beats that force the body to move in time to the rhythm coming from whatever source is playing the music. Radios, stereos, headphones, or a sunny evening in Cattolica on the Adriatic…
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Queens Of The Stone Age
With The Kills and The Amazons Bassano Del Grappa, 16 July A number of lucky factors had brought us to Bassano Del Grappa to see Queens Of The Stone Age, namely the venue was enroute between Munich and Catollica, with a minor detour on our #RaceAcrossEurope The were a band we hadn’t seen live before…
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Patti Smith
Munich, 13 July Under the big tent in Munich, part of the Tollwood Summer Festival, the audience who came to witness Patti Smith were, mainly, of a certain age / maturity. People who had been following the godmother of musical protest for a generation or more, a lot more. On stage for the best bit…
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The Kills
Tvornica Kulture, Zagreb, 12 July With Ki Klop in support The straight-line distance between Glasgow and Zagreb is a little over 1,100 miles and, as part of our own #RaceAcrossEurope tour, we were in the city to see The Kills deliver an electrifying set that had the locals swaying, cheering and idolising two people who…
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Yamato The Drummers of Japan
Opera House, Graz, 10 July Pictures taken from Yamato The Drummers of Japan website. ‘Serendipity – the occurrence and development of events by chance in a happy or beneficial way.’ If there is one word to describe why we found ourselves in Graz to see Yamato, The Drummers of Japan, then serendipity would be as…
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Amyl And The Sniffers
With The Bigoter X-Tra Zurich, 8 July Next up on this year’s Interrail European Tour took us to Zurich to watch the bundle of energy that is Amy Taylor front her band Amyl And The Sniffers. As if they have recently materialised from the Australian Outback, they are on the lips of everyone with a…
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Nine Inch Nails
With Boys Noize Accor Arena, Paris, 7July A different city. A different country. A different headline act. The same expectation and excitement. The first gig on our personal #RaceAcrossEurope tour, saw us take in the magnificent Accor Arena in Paris to see Nine Inch Nails with support, and some added musical accompaniment when required by…
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Tom McRae
The latest gig on our A to Z Musical Tour was …… In this post we review TOM MCRAE, with support from LOWRI EVANS When we saw Tom McCrae earlier this year (Reviewed here) in La Laiterie Club, the audience were compacted into a relatively small, dark club space with the stage a few inches above…
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Black Pumas
The 17th gig on our A to Z musical adventure was …… Back in 2019 I attended a Black Pumas gig in Glasgow’s Audio, which has a capacity of around 150. Their debut album had been released earlier in the summer and Faye from Some Great Reward had suggested I might like the album. I…
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Gallus
The 15th gig on our A to Z musical adventure was …… To those in the musical ‘know’, Glasgow band Gallus has been building a well-deserved reputation as a live band for the past six or more years. Their mix of punk attitude, allied to fine musicianship, is built around songs blending insightful observations of…
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Takuya Kuroda
The 14th gig on our A to Z musical adventure was …… And it was to the Porgy & Bess Jazz and Music Club we headed to watch and listen to Takuya Kuroda and his band play two sets in Vienna. On a scale of 1 to 10, my knowledge of Jazz is, at best,…
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Róisín Murphy
The 13th gig on our A to Z musical adventure was …… If you’d asked me what my favourite music genres were, I’d have included post punk, shoegaze, goth, psychedelic, alternative indie and a subset of modern jazz. After last night’s Roisin Murphy gig in Prague, I think I’d better add dance/disco too now. If…
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IDLES
The 12th gig on our A to Z musical adventure was …… IDLES, Max-Schmeling-Halle, Berlin, Germany. After selling out a near 12000 capacity venue, there’s probably a degree of expectation by the audience that has been, so far, unmatched by the band to date. So it was with the IDLES last night, as they took…
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John J Presley
The 11th gig on our A to Z musical adventure was …… Having left Glasgow early on Monday morning, we arrived in Germany’s second city Hamburg, via Brussels, to kick off the first European leg of our A to Z Musical Tour. Musically, Hamburg was made famous when a group of unknown young lads from…
