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Hi guys,

The DC Machine is turning over at a furious pace at the moment. With the ever closer Album Launch Party (26th of sep, contact us if you want tickets!) Dc are playing the Soundbar on the 12 of September in the middle of Birmingham.

Its £5 on the door, if you want £4 from www.ticketsllers.co.uk

Support DC Fontana on the night are Marquis Drive - http://www.myspace.com/jadeband1

So please come and have some beers and enjoy some great music!

There was no need to consult the compendium of rock & roll controversy.

There were no drugs busts, no televisions propelled through any kind of glass l, no hordes of groupies hangin' out and no cliches of "rock & roll" total excess to tell the grand children in years to come.

But the "Contessa" jaunt was memorable for a host of reasons on all kinds of (spirit) levels and it was a success. Yes...a success!

The tour was designed as a two-week promotional hors d'oeuvre for the forthcoming debut dc record and a chance for us to escape the studio and head out on the continental highways for a breath of fresh air and to vibe-up again.

Since last summer we have been travelling backwards and forwards up and down the M6 to Liverpool where we have been hanging out and recording "Six Against Eight"at Echo & The Bunnymen's studios, Parr Street.

The "Contessa" tour was partly to promote the forthcoming release and also partly a chance to let our hair down after completing 90% of the album and give us chance to hang out.

But chasing Helios and his fiery chariot across Europe in a stifling tour bus minus air-conditioning left the 11-strong touring party exhausted, dehydrated and often soporific-terrific.

The exhaustion was palpably worsened when humping heavy gear often at the hottest part of the day (anyone who has tried to move a Hammond organ across a busy beach front and down lots of sandy steps with the Mediterranean sun blistering your back will know what I mean!).

But the exhaustion, sunstroke and dehydration was nothing compared to the good-time groove of the good-ship DC Fontana and we had a great time, making many new friends.

My original intention was to write an in-depth daily tour journal on the run but we had lo-fi wi-fi headaches and so this tour diary comes to you right at the end of the "comin' down" part of the trip (man).

Take it in. Spit it out.

DAY ONE - Saturday July 04, 2009 (Polesworth, UK)

The tour began with a "local" Midlands gig close to DC headquarters in the UK... we made the short journey to Polesworth in the north of Shakespeare's county (Warwickshire) on what was the village's busiest day of the year.

Carnival Day in Polesworth is like nothing anywhere else....vast amounts of alcohol is drunk to the point where all the pubs have to close by evening time as they literally run out of beer and almost everyone seems to be off their face, including the kids!

This meant we were guaranteed a large and very very lively turnout for the first show of the tour and the audience was a mixture of "smashed" villagers and genuine DC followers all of whom crowded into a small room to catch us playing two sets in very hot conditions.

It was great to see our original guitarist Lloyd (Barnett) in the audience and he seemed to really love the night.

The gig went VERY well and we played a lot of tunes from the new album including "Six Against Eight" (the title-track), "Winona Ryder", "Switchblade Love", "You Strip Me Bare", "Sleeping With X", "Poor Boy", "Benny" and more.

Ex-Dream Factory drummer Steve "Quilly" Quilton sat bleary-eyed at the front of the stage, directly in the full hazy view ofour singer Karla & constantly demanded to play her tambourine and maraccas...

For the most part this was taken in good spirit but he did overstep the mark and try and grab the mike at one point and to be honest it did become a bit of a pain.

In the end Karla relented a little and let him have a fiddle about with the tambourine but his constant interfering, while amusing the band, annoyed some of the tanked-up villagers and by the end of our last set we heard that he had been given quite a heavy beating outside in the car park, providing a literally bloody end to the first night of the tour.

Rock & roll.

DAY TWO - Sunday July 05, 2009 (Coventry, UK)

The second leg of the tour was also in the UK Midlands as we made our way down to Coventry to appear at the tiniest venue we have played for many a year...

The Craven Arms is a traditional back-street boozer but is run by a scooter-riding fan and we had a great night there in what we designed as a "dress rehearsal" for the contintental leg of the tour.

Somehow we managed to squeeze into the tiniest of spaces, blocking off the front door of the pub and we were less than six feet from the bar itself by the time we were ready.

It was another fine gig with the new original songs being well received by everyone and we also met up with Dee Dee Kett (she of the mucho-mod-scribblings aboard Facebook) who came along to check us out and seemed to thoroughly enjoy herself.

DAY THREE - Monday, July 06, 2009 (Tamworth, UK - Metz, France)

After a short sleep the dc touring party made a 9am rendezvous at my place in Tamworth and Ad, our regular tour driver (from Vans For Bands), arrived with the tour bus and large trailer which would take us down to Italy and back.

Our Hammond player Scott (Riley) and merchandise-selling girl Charlotte "Charlie" Rose did not join the trip at this stage as they had other commitments which would mean them meeting us in Italy a few days later.

But the rest of the band arrived almost promptly: Karla (vocalist), Neil (guitarist), Jamie (tenor sax), Tim (alto sax & flute), Steve (trumpet), Ben (drummer), Josh (the teenage trombone-playing one)....

After packing the bus and trailer expertly, we set off from dc HQ at 9.30am and trumpet-playing "Trigger" (aka Steve Trigg) immediately suggested a "let's start the tour as we mean to go on" kind of toast and opened the first bottle of tequila!

The normally silent and reserved Ben (our drummer from the original Hollywood....i.e. the one in south Birmingham and not the one in California) jumped at the chance of downing some of the Mexican spirit.

I made a mental note at the time: this tour is going to be messy.

We arrived at the Channel Tunnel bleary-eyed and babbling incoherently, enjoyed a brief kick-about with the dc football in the car park and then set off on the Tunnel sous La Manche towards la belle France.

The rest of the trip involved us watching a number of DVDs while drinking more tequila and beer including a new DC Fontana "movie" which I called "Grasp The Candle" that I had created on my PC at home.

This 25-minute film shows us at work and play in Liverpool during the early part of 2009 as we continued recording our forthcoming debut disc, "Six Against Eight" at Parr Street Studios on Merseyside.

This seemed to go down very well and matched the tequila-&-beer combo and after watching the DC moviewe were titilated by other visual delights including Derek & Clive, Morecambe & Wise, Family Guy etc...

Our first stop in Europe was at the north-eastern French city of Metz which is the capital of the Lorraine area. We had an overnight stay here which included drinking red wine and noticing how various lorry drivers were taking "ladies of the night" into the hotel for fun and paid-for frolics....we sat outside the hotel in the warm night-air having fun and toasting all manners of things with le vin rouge while being observed by a half-naked man from a nearby window.

DAY FOUR - Tuesday, July 07, 2009 (Metz, France - Luzern, Switzerland)

Heading east towards Strasbourg and then south to the border with Switzerland, we experienced rain showers and found that the wi-fi going was poor-to-impossible.

Having never been to Switzerland before it was really great to see the place and the scenery we passed by was just stunning all the way.

We arrived at our second destination, a campsite on the outskirts of Luzern, by early evening and we were shown to our dormitory huts (which we all felt was VERY "Great Escape" - I nicknamed our hut "Tom" after my eldest son!) before heading into town for drinks and food.

Luzern was a smashing place, really pleasant and some great sights to see...... it was as if we had kind of infiltrated some kind of postcard world... I felt like I was in some kind of Alpine AAP cartoon show without any Lederhosen....

After a short while we managed to find ourselves in a bar run by a very friendly Geordie fella from the UK who turned out to be a very genial host, plying us with yet more alcohol and peanuts as the bar's big screen was filled with the sights and sounds of the Wacko Jacko funeral over in the US of A.

By this time we were already "lubricated" and as the beer continued to flow some of our "comments" about the star-studded so-called King Of Pop's farewell (particularly when Mariah Carey appeared) were not so well received by other people in the bar.

Striving to avoid an international incident we continued to drink more heavily!

Our genial host had his laptop connected to the big screen and to our amusement (and the irritation of others in the room) the Jackson show was replaced by footage of DC Fontana that can be found on You Tube for a while.

After staggering out of the bar in a largely embarassing state of drunken laughter we had a walk (and then a run) across the city's famous Kapellbruecke wooden bridge, ate a giant sized pizza and then walked back to the camp site decidedly sloshed.

On the way back Neil & Josh decided to collect a large sized hardboard dolphin advertising sign for reasons only they will know but were stopped by a perturbed Swiss police officer who then frog-marched them away to an office to photocopy their passports and to deliver a severe telling off and to inform them "I will be making a report about you."

During the night in my wooden hut, Jamie was awoken by a mixture of creeping claustrophobia and disturbing noxious whiffery. I was mentally disturbed by his super-strong snoring and searched in vain for the entrance to any escape tunnel...

DAY FIVE - Wednesday July 08, 2009 (Luzern, Switzerland - Menaggio, Italy)

Word reached us from England that Donneye (our producer Donald Ross Skinner) was very pleased with a mix-in-progress of the song "Snake Charmer" from our new record which was underway by his brother Gavin in London.

In the meanwhilst we were also awaiting news from Moseley, Birmingham, where GCorp (formerly the Groove Corporation) were tackling the job of mixing "Switchblade Love" for the new album...

Travelling through Switzerland and part of the Alps we were treated to a feast of scenic beauty. There was an ambiance which filtered through the tinted glass windows and into our tour bus itself and we settled down,after several failed attempts at yodelling, to enjoying the view and applauding the brilliant driving feats of our regular driver Ad Of Oxford.

There was trouble ahead though.

Firstly, at one of our "urination stops" at a motorway service station I was totally pissed off to discover someone had stolen my camera... this was a tough blow for me as I was amassing loads of material for posterity and as my wife had bought it me as a gift I felt particularly upset about it.

It seemed all a bit mad...weren't the Swiss supposed to be friendly people in a country where petty crime was almost unheard of? As I surveyed the collection of people in the building it was a mish-mash of holiday-makers, officious service station staff and the occasional lorry driver.

I quickly figured that I had either mis-placed my camera or some non-Swiss opportunist had honed in on me as I was a very tired-looking person. Whoever had taken it and for whatever reason didn't quite matter...I was gutted.

The staff at the services didn't really want to know and I left that place with a heavy heart and feeling glum. It was hard to be cheered even though we were passing through some of the prettiest places to see.

As we reached the border between Switzerland and Italy, still in Alpine country, the frontier forces were less-than-friendly and noticing the "rock & roll" element to our vehicle, we were immediately brought to a halt and myself and Tim were taken off to a nearby police office to explain who we were and what we were doing.

The past day or so had been quite easy in a linguistic way as I speak both French and German (in admittedly limited quantities) but now in Italy I was unable to catch the drift of what animated conversation was taking place before our eyes between various police officers, jobsworths and a rather cool and laid-back cigarette-puffing customs official.

Thankfully, after a while the latter decided to address me in English and he walked me back to the bus and trailer and asked us, in a slow monotone, to open "her up" so he could check what we had on board.

He initially spoke in a very hushed and measured tone which kind of added a touch of menace to proceedings. He had a way of looking direct into your eyes, a look which was horribly penetrative and it seemed to dig in past the eyeball and start tickling the fear-nerve.

The way he spoke made me feel uncomfortable and even made me feel guilty despite the fact we had nothing on board to break into a sweat about (thank God).

He had an intimate knowledge of electric guitars and Hammond organs which was another surprise and he asked me to prove that we were indeed the owners of the gear contained in our bus trailer...he also wanted us to prove that we hadn't bought all this equipment a few miles behind us in Switzerland (because that's not part of the EU and therefore there were customs and legal implications).

After allowing us to speak and sweat (and it seemed much warmer over in Italy even though were a stone's throw from the land of the Swiss) he calmly said "I like you. I believe you. You can go."

And so we left behind the Swiss-Italian border and soon made it to our next stop which was in the truly magnificently and magical town of Menaggio which hugs the expansive Lake Como.

Here were we staying at the International Youth Hostel which is perched above this impressive body of water and a few hundred yards outside the hustle & bustle of this tourist-trap settlement.

Sadly it was siesta time which meant we couldn't check in and so we decided to head into town to have a beer or two.

That was lovely and the place was just majestic in its natural beauty....everywhere you turned your head to look was another beautiful sight and in a way this got to me as I had no longer got a camera to capture it all!

After yet more lubrication in town we returned to the youth hostel, checked in and went down for dinner and to drink what turned out to be vast quantities of local red wine while savouring the views across the lake.

In fact, we drank ALL of the youth hostel's red wine and the surprised barman was sent out to find moreas the festivities continued unabashed.

Even driver Ad joined in and he put away a tidy amount of the tasty red drink before retiring for the night! Steve and Karla consumed considerable amounts of wine as well.

This was a fantastic night and even I somehow managed to cheer up - the vibrations were all VERY VERY good to say the least and I think each and every one of us was sad to leave Menaggio after such a short stay (it's a place I will deffo return to).

DAY SIX - Thursday July 09, 2009 (Menaggio, Italy - Montevarchi, Italy)

The sadness of leaving Menaggio had a bitter twist to it when we realised a few people in the party had been targetted successfully by the local Italian mosquito contingent whomust have had a thoroughly fine feast at the expense of dc fontana.

Jamie was particularly hard hit and had a number of nasty-looking bites which left his legs badly blotched and red. Tim and Karla were also "victims" of the human-hungry mosquitoes whose penchant for English rock & roll blood was in high evidence.

Fortunately, my own insect repellent from Boots had saved my own skin...

After finally clearing the Alpine region we drove south to Milan and collected Scott & Charlie who joined the tour-bus after flying in from ole Blighty as we continued our merry way south into Tuscany, another beautiful area to delight in.

The journey south saw big changes in weather as we experienced prolonged rain showers followed by very warm temperatures indeed.

By the time we reached our destination, the town of Montevarchi in the province of Arezzo, we were in a MUCH hotter climate and we were all sweating and feeling dehyrdated.

Our next gig on the tour was to be held in a cellar bar called, curiously, "Mods Lounge" on the edge of a piazza in the town centre but when we were greeted by the bar owner David, he explained that it shuts during the summer and all events are held outdoors during the hot days.

He gave us all a very welcome cold drink in the cellar bar, had a good chat with us (he speaks brilliant English) and seemed a throughly decent fella.

We followed him across town to the Montevarchi swimming baths and were told we'd be playing outdoors on a lorry trailer in front of the swimming pool!

Ad, Charlie and myself all took advantage of the pool before the sound check and enjoyed a good swim in very hot temperatures before we decided to set up the stage ahead of our first Italian show of 2009.

After a lovey pre-show dinner of pasta we enjoyed the gig a lot and though the numbers of punters there was disappointing it was EXTREMELY well greeted and - again - material from the new album was received extremely well, particularly the frenetic psychedelic jazz of "Six Against Eight" which we had re-arranged especially for the tour with our brass section playing some of the very challenging and ultra-cool string parts that appear on the recorded version.

We sold a few dc t-shirts and badges (thanks to Barry & Denise at Pip! Pip! for the excellent merchandise) and all was good.

After the gig we were taken off into the darkness and the hills that surround Montevarchi where the famous Chianti wine grapes are grown and we spent the night at a quite stunning rustic farmhouse high up in the hills.

The place was just amazing and though we were all tired it was a cracking place to spend the night. They had a very friendly husky and beagle and an equally amiable cat at this place and - interestingly - inside each bedroom there were a collection of vintage organs and rotary cabinet speakers...

DAY SEVEN - Friday, July 10, 2009 (Montevarchi, Italy - Terracina, Italy)

If the journey from Menaggio to Montevarchi was a long and hot one then today's trip from the Chianti region to the beautiful coastal resort of Terracina facing out on to the Tyrrhenian Sea was even hotter and more uncomfortable.

We became a veritable boil-in-the-bag band as the tour bus steadily steamed down the Italian peninsula through some more delightful countryside.

Despite the discomfort of the heat, we headed south for the "Right Track On The Beach" mod weekender in fine spirit.

After getting a little lost in the town itself, the organisers sent out Guido on his scooter to find us and we followed him to the gig venue with our Vespa escort!

Arriving on the sea front in the middle of the afternoon with the sun at its scorching peak we then had the unthankable task of loading the gear down on to the beach itself - the Hammond, its Leslie, the Fender Rhodes and my 8x10 bass amp were all particularly problematic and the sun-worshippers looked on baffled as this hair-bear bunch of tired English people attempted this tricky task right in front of them.

Our hosts Leo & Peter were lovely guys, very friendly, helpful and cool people and we knew we were in for a good time.

After a few ice cold beers the band soundchecked and dashed back to the hotel for a quick shower before returning in time to be fed. The organisers provided us with plenty of food but unfortunately it was not vegetarian-friendly so I headed off into town with Jamie for an alternative meal and we got back in time to go on stage.

Having no time to try and sort out my unruly hair was of particular embarassment to yours truly....inevitably, as it is want to do, my hair decided it would fool around prior to going on stage and with it sticking out here and there at silly tangents it was quite frankly annoying to me and amusing to the rest of the band.

I refused to gaffer tape the hair down or use industrial strength glue and instead let it flow with the sea breeze as we took to the stage....

Guido introduced us on stage & we started the set with the 100mph amphetamine-doused instrumental soul of "The Contessa" and the roar after that tune and the following number, "Sleeping With X" was great to hear and set us up fora great night by the seaside!

All in all we played for just under two hours in front of a very smartly-dressed crowd of 60s nuts from all over Europe.....we saw cats from Spain to Scotland and from Italy (of course) to Sweden and all seemed to be smiling and enjoying our performance which also included newies like "You Strip Me Bare" (at the moment very difficult to play without the orchestra that we employed in the studio) and the 5/4 psychedelcised jazz of Scott's tune "Poor Boy."

Indeed, "Poor Boy" for some reason didn't seem to generate the same sort of loud sonic appreciation of clapping hands and whooping shouts as some of the other tunes....this seemed to be happening on a number of the gigs on the tour and "Winona Ryder" was another that occasionally had the same, more muted reaction.

Being someone who looks far too deeply into the whys and wherefors of such stuff it did play on my mind a little....why were these songs not getting the rip-roaringly great reactions they should be getting?

Certainly they are great songs and we play them well..... in the end I remembered the words of the great Scott Walker. We had been watching the "30 Century Man" documentary on the tour bus about Mr. Engel and he had commented that he feels part of the reason his amazing "Scott 4" album inexplicably died commercially was that he had been writing a lot of his songs in 6/8 and 3/4 and other time signatures than the obvious 4/4 that most pop songs are written in.

It got me thinking....were songs like "Winona" (which is basically a waltz-time exercise in other-worldly psychedelic soul) and "Poor Boy" (complete with mod-jazz groove in 5/4) a bit confusing for a crowd expecting four on the floor dancers?

My verdict was that we should do what we do and so we did of the rest of the tour...both "Poor Boy" & "Winona Ryder" (& indeed the title track of the album "Six Against Eight" which is another non 4/4 rhythm track) were played out on each night.

It seems to me you gotta do what you believe in, even if people don't "get it" straight away! It's currently a time for bravery within the dc camp...

Interestingly, one or two people did comment to me on how great "Winona" was in particular after the gigs and that they really enjoyed its slow, soulful vibe which in its live setting has a sort-of Stax brass feel rather than the more elegant orchestrated version that will appear on the record.

After the gig in Terracina Scottish DJ Mickey Collins said he particularly enjoyed Scott's song "Satisfied (Part 2)" which was great to know (he seemed to like the band a lot and we are hoping to get something on the go with him in Glasgow). The drinks were flowing in earnest and Karla certainly let her hair down late into the night.

The DJ part of the event was taking place above the area where we had played in a circular room and it was cracking fare on offer with an exquisite blend of sounds for the cool school covering most aspects of the mod/60s scene.

Rumour has it that Karla later decorated the beach before the sun came up with an assortment of tummy tinsel but I didn't witness that myself :)

Indeed I was starting to feel decidedly dodgy so I made a sharp exit back to the lovely hotel. Scott and Charlie got a lift back from Peter and were in a messy condition to the point where Scott climbed over a fence to get back into the hotel and injured his ankle quite badly while doing so.

Another ankle problem affected Neil whose joints seemed to swell alarmingly as if he had some kind of water retention problem due to the long hours of travel on the tour bus.

My theory was it must have been red wine retention but, joking aside, he did suffer with this for a few days.

DAY EIGHT - Saturday, July 11, 2009 (Terracina, Italy)

This was designated as our main "day off" and those who managed to make breakfast at the hotel should have been awarded a medal. I failed and spent several hours seeking the solace of the cold porcelain of my hotel room toilet.

I think it was a mixture of the soaring high temperatures, the long days of travel, the exhaustion of humping gear & playing live and perhaps maybe a teeny weeny bit to do with excessive alcohol intake.....

Eventually I wobbled downstairs to the terrace area outside our (magnificent) hotel and joined the rest of the DCs who seemed to be in far better shape than myself.

We spent most of the day relaxing on the terrace drinking, having fun and even taking a two-hour swim in the sea which was great fun. Neil and Josh chickened out from immersing themselves in the salty waters and Karla only made a brief appearance but the rest of us swam about in seas strong enough for good surfing.

Later that evening we switched hotels and Tim and I went for a quick shopping trip before the evening fun started at a bar in the town centre called The Old Square where DJs were playing out some fine music as an aperative for the night's fun back down on the beach.

The dcs together with Ad (sporting a brightly-coloured Hawaiian shirt) and Charlie all enjoyed several hours sitting outside the Old Square drinking, digging the sounds and having our photos taken.

Then we went for something to eat and ended up back at the beach for the night's entertainment.

I managed to also buy a replacement camera in Terracina which was another good moment for me :)

DAY NINE - Sunday July 12, 2009 (Terracina, Italy - Genoa, Italy)

It was sad to leave Terracina as we had such a great time there and met so many lovely, friendly people before and after our gig....we left with great memories and embarked on one of the longest journeys of the tour which would take us almost the length of Italy back up to the north of the country.

The journey was made on one of the hottest days of the tour so far and by this time everyone was really starting to wilt under the intensity of the heat.

Tim finally decided he could no longer continue being in the van while wearing a shirt and so went topless for the journey while Scott used his own personal fan to try and keep cool (in vain).

Indeed we even plugged in an electric fan to try and cool ourselves down - sadly this merely blew the electricity inside the van which was a bit of a blow of the wrong kind!

Eventually we made the beautiful port city of Genoa and then we looked on in a mixture of disbelief and genuine anxiety as our driver Ad had to drive the tour bus and trailer around some incredibly tight and steep hairpin bends going uphill as we seeked out the International Youth Hostel in Genoa where we were staying overnight.

By the time Ad expertly navigated his way up the mountain to the hostel everyone broke out into spontaneous applause - what a great driver (and with such a great beard)!

Views from the hostel itself on the city below were spectacular and after dinner and yet more wine we attempted sleep.

DAY TEN - Monday July 13, 2009 (Genoa, Italy - Lyon, France)

The day began with clouds in the sky which made for a merciful (yet temporary) relief from the heat as we set off heading north from Genoa past Turin and over the border back into France through the south-western part of the Alps.

The Alpine scenery was once again wonderful and though the heat returned with a vengeance we enjoyed the first part of the trip greatly as we headed north.

But it was not a short journey and as the day wore on we became more and more heat-affected. By the time we reached the venue in Lyon we were running slightly late and really feeling exhausted.

Nevertheless we immediately got our gear into the Toi Toi Le Zinc venue and set up to soundcheck which turned out to be a difficult process as local byelaws prohibit loud noises during the day!

Temperatures were now even higher than they were at Terracina and the sweat was literally pouring off us and inside our clothes and shoes as we completed the soundcheck!

Outside there were some great sounds being spun by the English Soulcialist DJ team while Denis (Troufleau), the organiser (and keyboard player with local Lyonnaise funk outfit Betty Pearl) cooked a barbecue.

Also playing on the night was another local Lyon-based band, Mr. Day who were a very tight quartet (Hammond, bass, drums & Mr Day himself on guitar & vocals) playing a brand of Weller-esque soul and funk grooves which was also heavily influenced by Curtis Mayfield.

After they finished their spot we tried to get on stage as fast as we could to rip into "The Contessa" which of course we did with aplomb! The reaction was deafening and we had a resounding response from the French crowd.

The 90-minute show was one hell of a sweaty affair and at various points I felt like I was melting into the stage itself...the sweat was pouring off my hands onto the bass which made playing quite complicted at times.

We encored with our re-sculpture of Jackie Lomax's "Little Yellow Pills" which was received brilliantly well. Ben produced one of his often hilarious set-climax drum sticks-throwing affairs complete with accompanying gurning and this left us all with big smiles on our visages as we left the stage, the floor of which was awash with sweat!

Sadly Jamie left a pair of Levis at the venue during the staggering, bleary-eyed aftermath...

DAY ELEVEN - Tuesday July 4, 2009 (Lyon, France - Six-Fours-Les-Plages, France)

Eleven days into the tour and we were travelling back south again and even further into the furnace!

The journey from Lyon to the French Riviera was another exhausting affair though driver Ad seemed to somehow find an extra burst of speed from somewhere as if we were driving down hill with the wind at our backs driving us forward!

Driving through Provence was just brilliant, and like others before me, I found that by sitting in the front passenger seat of the tour bus with the window wide open produced the most fantastic breeze and brought me pleasurable relief from sitting in the back of the bus which still resembled an oven.

We made the seaside town of Six-Fours-Les-Plages by 2.30pm in the afternoon and found the gig venue, La Vague, right on the seafront. However, there was nowhere to park and so we had to double park on the main road and load the gear directly on to the beach in front of several thousand astonished holidaymakers who were sun tanning themselves on the beach outside this quaint restaurant.

The gig was to be played on a reactangle-shaped trailer base parked on the sand facing the restaurant (with the Mediterranean Sea on our left and the seafront road on our right).

As we loaded the gear onto the beach we were met by Bool, the head honcho at La Vague who couldn't speak a word of English but was a charming, lovely fella and who I managed to converse with using my GCE French!

It wasn't long before Alain and the rest of the French band Penelope also turned up together with the sound engineering crew and so we all set the stage up as the sun continued to burn brightly throughout the afternoon.

At one point Ad shouted for help as two French policewomen started to write him a parking ticket. I dashed to his aid and explained to the duo that we would only be double parked for another few minutes.

I have to say to you I've never met two police officers like these before in my life - they were genuine beauties and looked more like models posing in police uniforms....they also had pleasant personalities and were most helpful to us and decided to tear up their ticket!

How I love the Gendarmerie! :)

As we were soundchecking we saw this young lad keep walking in front of the stage and he looked like he was putting sand into the rubbish bin...."odd" I thought. Later I found out he was standing in the sea and scooping out loads of poisonous jellyfish and then putting them into the bin so that he and his friends could feel safer swimming!

This was Bastille Day in France and there were thousands upon thousands of holidaymakers swarming across this popular Riviera resort close to Toulon and Marseille enjoying thier special public holiday festival.

Josh and I bumped into a Bastille Day parade in the town centre which had policemen, soldiers, civic dignitaries and a collection of odd-looking firemen who looked like they had been transported straight out of some old 1940s World War II movie.

Penelope played first and had plenty of their own local friends and followers to give them a resoundingly fab reaction. Musically they sounded in some parts 60s-garagey, some parts funky and at other parts quite post-punk, particularly when playing their assortment of synth keyboards (they used 5 keyboards on stage).

Bass player Alain, who also DJd at the party afterwards under his pseudonym of Numero 9, is one of those lovely people who you really enjoy meeting....he was like a large, ever-smiling Gallic garage band guy...somewhow he seemed to personify the year 1966 (not a bad thing in my book) and I found him to be a top fella!

And that had absolutely nothing to do with the fact he kindly gave me a copy of his vinyl compilation of French 60s organ grooves, "Quel Organ!" complete with naked French lady on the front jacket sleeve.

We somehow squeezed onto a tiny stage and felt genuinely worried that one of us would topple off the side or back of this unstable-looking trailer base and fall on to the beach below!

As we launched into "The Contessa" there were fireworks exploding across the skyline all around us and there was a gaggle of teenage girls who stood at the front of the stage and bounced up and down together like a female po-go troupe! Standing next to them and going for it was a young teenage mod boy (maybe aged 12 or 13?) dressed in a boating blazer who was having a great time.

It turned out later that he was the son of a radio presenter from Lille in the north of France and they had made the very long journey south to watch us play and to interview us for their show! Magnifique!

This young mod kid went ape when we did our ballsy cover of Brian Auger's "Black Cat" and that was a great thing to see! Holidaymakers were walking past all the time and most stopped for long periods on the seafront and danced together on the concrete while the young indie-girls leaped up and down on the sand and pebbles.

We finished our set just in time for the heavens to open which was a huge surprise and we had to make a mad dash to get the electrical equipment under cover... It was a great gig and one that will live long in the memory.

After the show Karla was interviewed by the radio station guy from Lille and we had compliments a-go-go from all manners of people.

DAY TWELVE - Wednesday July 15, 2009 (Six-Fours-Les-Plages, France - Nice, France - Beaune, France)

This was one of the longest days of the tour.

Firstly we had to drive east to the city of Nice in the morning to drop off our teenage trombone star Josh Large at the airport. Sadly he had to leave the tour early & fly back to Birmingham as he was due to appear in a very prestigious classical concert at the city's Symphony Hall.

Seventeen year old Josh not only plays trombone with the DCs but he is regarded as one of the country's top up and coming classical brass players and this was a concert he just couldn't afford to miss.

So we dropped him off at Nice airport hoping to God he had got his passport and paperwork sorted out and then we headed back towards Toulon before turning north through Provence and heading out of the heat of the south of France.

We drove all day and some of the night as we eventually reached Beaune, a very pretty town in the Burgundy area of France made famous by the Beaujolais wines.

This was another tough day in the tour bus even with one less person on board.

At Beaune we managed to persuade the head waiter at the "Buffalo Grill" restaurant to stay open for a bit longer so we could eat and drink (we did both gloriously well) and then we collapsed into our hotel utterly exhausted.

DAY THIRTEEN - Thursday July 16, 2009 (Beaune, France - Paris, France)

The drive from Burgundy to the Ille de la France was mercifully more bearable than previous days as the further north we drove the less intense the heat became.

We arrived in Paris much earlier than we had expected and headed straight to the venue for the evening's gig which on this occasion was, bizarrely, a genuine Chinese junk ship moored on the River Seine.

La Dame de Canton is about as unusual a gig venue as you can find but somewhow DC Fontana has a knack of seeking them out! :)

Loading the gear on board the ship was yet another tricky exercise and I was wary because on board we immediately noticed that it was moving quite a lot due to the swell on the river as various cruisers steamed up and down the Seine.

I am one of those people who can get sea-sick standing on a barge so I was dismayed thinking that I was going to spend the gig later that night puking up into a vomit bucket while trying to keep the groove flowing!

The sound engineer, like all those we encountered on "The Contessa" tour was really quite fantastic and very much "on it." This meant the soundcheck proceeded very smothly (in direct opposition to the choppy waters of the Seine which were throwing the junk about quite a lot).

I was grateful to get off the boat so this land lubber could sit down and clear my head!

There was nowhere to change before the gig so we turned our trailer into a makeshift dressing room before we went on stage to play two sets on board the boat.

During the first set there were not too many punters on board.....and as we had our break we experienced a quite stunning storm of ferocious intensity.

Considering it was the middle of July and that daytime temperatures even in Paris were still scorching, the scene after our first spot resembled November or December. Gale force winds and torrential Monsoon-like rain lashed the boat and the quayside and then the hail arrived...

I don't think I have ever quite seen hailstones as big as what we witnessed outside La Dame de Canton - they were the size of pebbles and were really hurting anyone they hit. In the night sky above us we were treated to the most spectacular electrical storm and it was all very dramatic, almost cataclysmic and armageddon-like!

People huddled together under the giant gazebos covering the quay next to the boat as she lurched up and down in the waters.

We made a dash for it as our second set was due to start and by the time we were back on board the place was heaving with people, some who were genuinely there to see us and others who wanted shelter from the storm.

This made for an electric atmosphere on the boat and the second set was blistering with a raucous atmosphere as our French audience went nuts. The roar that came during the opening bars of Scott's Manzarek-esque intro to "Remember Me" was just brilliant and the gig was a huge success.

Sadly for Tim the heat on board the boat was a bit too much and he very ill minutes after the gig ended and was in a bad way.

After the gig we stayed in a hotel near Montmartre, one of my favourite spots in Paris. Sadly on this trip we were not able to meet up with our Italian friends Kicca Andriollo & Oscar Marchioni (who both live & perform in the French capital) but we are looking forward to them appearing with us live at our forthcoming album launch show at London's Crossfire event (September 26).

After the Paris gig more wine was drunk in the hotel to celebrate the end of the continental leg of the tour....

DAY FOURTEEN - Friday July 17, 2009 (Paris, France - Tamworth, UK)

We left Paris in the morning and headed north to Calais and the Channel Tunnel to return back to England.

Once again the rain started to fall and though everyone had enjoyed a great trip it was clear that it would be nice to be back "home."

We arrived back at dc HQ by 10pm to disembark.

DAY FIFTEEN - Saturday July 18, 2009 (Batley, Yorkshire, UK)

On Saturday we travelled north to West Yorkshire to play at The Frontier Club in Batley.

Sadly we were without Steve for this gig though we did have trombone-playing Josh back with us for the gig.

MARK MORTIMER

This is me, and this is a handy way to test whether i'm doing this right. so far so good!

The band returned from Tour last night (17/06/2009) We arrived in Tamworth around about 9.30 after leaving Paris at 9.30am... amazing!

Tonight we are gigging at the Frontier Club in Batley (up north!) if your near there do come and say hello and see the band. Anway thats it for now, hopfully this doesn't look to horrible and i will update more on how the tour went!

Ciao,

Jamie

Please bare with us we are still busy building, pop back soon maybe!