Day 501

Monday November 18

Before Frank, we still have another whole day to aim at Madrid. This is going to take us to the iconic roundabout of Cibeles which dominates the head of Gran Via as you enter the main city. And I plan for us to visit the tower of Cibeles from which you can look out over everything. That tower is within Cybele Palace, the home of Madrid city council, and the building is every bit as spectacular as you would expect something like that to be. Actually, when I saw the Wedding Cake building in Rome, that very much reminded me of it, although Cybele Palace is much more striking. When I lived here, a friend once said that whenever they walked through and round Cibeles and looked up at this building in particular, they experienced a shudder of excitement that they lived in Madrid. It really is a special area, and today we’re going to go inside it and experience not just the tower and the views, but also the fantastically cavernous and luxurious study space of the main library room. This is going to be one of the centrepieces of the whole trip. Except it isn’t. We walk up to the main doors, into the actual building, meet the security guards and the airport like conveyor belt bag x-ray thing, and they say, sorry, we’re closed on Mondays. Oh OK. Well, at least we have the turtles of Atocha. The turtles of Atocha. Did you know about them? Yep. Atocha train station. In 2023, the BBC named this as one of the top five train stations in the world with its forest platform area containing a pool populated with real live turtles.

Except, you’ve guessed it. It doesn’t. Not anymore. I’m stunned and not a little heartbroken, as well as apologetic to Maja, to discover that the forest area is no longer there, the area itself closed off to the public, and all that’s left is a few sad, faded leaves in a frankly pointless attempt to hint at what it used to be. Rather than a tribute, this looks like a building site that they haven’t quite finished taking down. It really would have been better if they’d got rid of it altogether. I think this bears repeating. It was regarded as one of the most remarkable train stations in the world. And I’m sure, reasons, but they deliberately destroyed it. And then, to top it all, the mocking sign reading, ‘Did you know, there used to be turtles here?’ Yes I did. That’s why we’re here. There should also be a sign saying, ‘There used to be quite a nice station here. One of the top in the world don’t you know? And we just decided it wouldn’t be.’

So here’s our Madrid checklist of no-shows. 

The garden bridge of Plaza Espana. I didn’t mention this at the time, but yeah. A fantastic garden bridge that I was really excited to show Maja on the day we met Rick. No longer there. Not only that, the place had been reconstructed so much I couldn’t even get a real handle on exactly where had been. And I’m sure there are great plans but they’re still only in the middle of them, so all I was really able to show Maja of this area was a building site.

Templo de Debod. A staple to take any visiting friends to. Closed but for reservations.

J&Js cafe, bar and bookshop. A great hangout from my days here and what I really thought would be a starter for ten with our Now Hustles. Still not ready or open for business when we arrived, although my sources had hinted it would be. Oh well.

Teleferico. Oh, what a spectacular outing that is. Closed.

And of course earlier today, Cybele Palace.

Oh well. Once again, it has been 10 years and a pandemic since I was last here and of course things change. But we’ve also had a few pieces of bad luck with timings. 

From Cibeles, we walk a little further up, and there we reach El Puerto de Alcala, essentially the door to Madrid itself, and one of the many monumental roundabouts of the city. This puts us right at the corner entrance of Retiro, the central park of Madrid, so of course we’re going to go in, and no, it’s not closed. This was the scene of so many days out with groups of friends as we would meet with guitars and settle down for drinks, snacks and jams, always at a different part of the park. One of the more memorable days happened deep in the park as we hung out on the small lake area behind the crystal palace. We won’t be venturing out there today. But if we had, guess what? Yep. It’s closed.

Oh, this is just a great walk through the park, and it begins as we encounter the boating lake right inside the main entrance. We head to the left to go round that, meaning we stop half way up the length of the lake to sit and take in the Monumento A Alfonso XII. This is a sprawling colonnade with the actual monument to Alfonso XII standing proudly at its centre. It’s late November and the sun is beating down and we’re able to comfortably sit at the foot of the statue and take in everything. From here we can see over the lake and boats to a large vista of the park itself. We do this for a while, also enjoying the strains of a nearby horn player playing the melodies of pop ballads which perfectly sets the scene. And yes, we drop a coin or two in his hat because he really has been a great accompaniment to this moment.

When it’s time to leave, we set off on a wide ranging, meandering walk through so many different parts of the park, offering so many different settings. This includes sections of walking on tiny trails, almost ducking among the trees as you make your way through what feels like your own private, secluded woodland.

We leave through the opposite corner to where we entered having walked all the way through the park, although far from having explored all of it. This thing is bigger than London’s Hyde Park.

Not far off the corner we pass a beautiful looking Paella restaurant. This is something you really do have to try in Madrid, but not here. Nothing at all wrong with the restaurant, but there’s a big, dirty roadworks right outside it, complete with a pneumatic drill. No thanks. Got to feel for the management of that place as the horrible scene outside it repels us far away. But we’ve got paella in our heads now and want to find at least something of a replica of the place we’ve just turned down. I would never have suggested we walk all the way to where we do, but we just don’t come up with anything resembling what we’re looking for. It’s the classic, the place is full of this type of bar or restaurant. It’s all you can see. But the moment you want to try to find that thing, it’s just nowhere to be seen. Well, this is us now. Our walk takes us all the way to Plaza Mayor. Oh. Right. Well, it might be just a touch tourist trappy, but there are some totally classic looking paella restaurants on one of the beautiful tiny streets right off one of the corners of the plaza. We have to check that street out.

I never came to this particular restaurant when I lived here, regarding it as too tourist trappy. Maybe a little local snobbery there. But damn it’s good, and wow, the setting truly is spectacular. Yeah, maybe still a little tourist trappy, but hey guess what? We’re tourists. Yep. This really is one of those times when you know exactly what you want, right down to the picture, and you go out and find exactly that. And again, late November and we’re able to sit outside comfortably right on the cusp of Plaza Mayor taking in this classic Spanish street setting. This will definitely do.

Now it’s time to head back to the hostel, shake today off of us, and then out to Frank Turner. Who just happens to live just down the road from us in London, but no, we’ve come all the way to Madrid to see him. The thing is, he has two London shows on this tour. His 2999th show in 93 Feet East, a relatively tiny venue in Shoreditch. The reason for that being that this is the very first venue he played. As such, expect that to be mostly, if not totally, friends and family and maybe long time fans from the very beginning. I think we’d say they were also friends. Then the next night he’s playing to 10,000 at the Alexandra Palace. Of course. The triumphant London homecoming and the 3000th Frank Turner show. We covered this at the time, but it was all sold out when we first looked for tickets. So Madrid it was. We considered a return to Antwerp, the scene of one of our own European successes, but the pull of the chance to return to Madrid and the opportunity to show Maja around my old city was just too strong. We’ve done all that now. All that’s left is to see Frank. But first, this little detour.

The reason we’ve come to all this trouble is that Frank Turner has become one of Maja’s absolute favourite artists. This is a little bit strange because I tried to introduce him to her way back when we first started recording our debut album. Yeah that was a while ago and we’re still on it. But hey. Oasis took three attempts to record their debut album, The Las are apparently still working on their debut album 40 years after the record label lost patience and released what they had to the disgust of main man Lee Mavers, and Guns’n Roses’ Chinese Democracy took Axl Rose around 10 years to complete. So yeah, we’ve had our own issues but we’re not in terrible company there and we are at least making some progress with three songs actually out and available to hear – How You Rock’n’Roll, Rock’n’Roll Tree, and Insanity. While I’m at it, you can actually hear them all here:

How You Rock’n’Roll

Rock’n’Roll Tree

Insanity

Following these, we have eight more tracks to go, which will be put out as we complete them. Once that’s done they will be repackaged to make the debut album HEᒐ. Every one of those eight tracks is almost completely recorded, and we have learned a lot about mixing and mastering in those first three released tracks, not least what we’re actually looking for in our sound, so we expect to be going through that part of the process much quicker as we come to each one. As for the actual issue, or issues, that have held it all up, maybe we’ll take a look at those another day. We know what they are, I think we’re just not ready to talk about them just yet. But I think the fact that we have completed and released three tracks demonstrates that we are at least getting through it. And we really think I Like You (Better When You’re Naked) will be next. It kinda has to be to be fair. We would have recorded it as part of this batch already, but have recorded it so many times; Two or maybe three times way back when it was first written and before we had any thoughts of an album, then it was the first track we recorded for the album, thinking that made sense because we had recording experience of it. But then when we decided to pull that after it had been released because we realised we really hadn’t nailed the spirit of the song, when we got back to recording again, we kind of knew we were going to go through a whole mixing and mastering thing with the first track and what a good decision that was. We went for Rock’n’Roll Tree and it’s a miracle we still love it and get excited about playing it live. We listened to that song, and individual sections of it, far more times than anyone should ever have to listen to anything. But yeah, we got through that, then much more quickly, although still not quite studio veteran quickly, completed How You Rock’n’Roll then Insanity. Then Christmas and various other things intervened to make us put the next track on hold, which we fully intend to to I Like You (Better When You’re Naked.) Looking ahead, we can say that album two is completely written and already partly recorded. It even has a cover concept and title. And we have enough in the can for album three with more songs being written all the time that we hope and expect will also jostling for places. And by the time we get to album two, we’ll have all the experience of album one, so it will hopefully be a quicker process.

Right. Now I’ve taken the opportunity to tell you all that, what’s this got to do with Frank? Well, we first began recording the album in, let me check, April 2022. Damn, almost three years ago. What excited puppies we were about it then. Now it’s more like, can we please just get this thing done? One of the first things we learned about recording was that you should have a guide track. That is a track of a similar artist which you use for production level cues such as where various sound and EQ levels and such should be for the right kind of dynamics you’re going for. There are other technical things, but that’s basically it. My first suggestion for someone even vaguely in the ballpark we were aiming at was Frank Turner. He’s mostly acoustic, punky with big bass and drum sounds and, while I don’t think you would really describe him as pop, is still a very melodic, hooky songwriter. But I just couldn’t find the right track to match the dynamic we were going for, and Maja was pretty much unimpressed with just about everything I found of him. We ended up going for Supersonic by Oasis. But not long after moving to Camden, Maja just suddenly discovered Frank Turner totally independently, absolutely fell in love with him, and I was like, I tried to get you listening to him ages ago. Oh, did you? Fine. But this was the cue for Maja especially, but then at times by extension me, to listen to him all all the time. And when we finally got round to be ready to do our first actual mix for our first completed track, Rock’n’Roll Tree, the song we used as a comparison track was I Still Believe by, yes, Frank Turner.

So yeah. Here we are. HEᒐ Ho. We’re heading out to the punk rock show.

But really, we had no idea how much of a punk rock show it was actually going to be. And oh my. What a night of nights this is. This is the first big live show we’ve been to together and we discover we have the same in-built desire to get in right at the beginning and see every support act. The venue is just a short walk away from our hostel, just a quick hop past Triskels as it happens, and we’re in bang on 7.30, just as The Meffs are about to take to the stage.

This is where I should mention that I’m really excited to be hooking up with my old Madrid friend Sally who was the incredible singer in my Madrid blues band Soul Mission. We tried to meet on Thursday at the open mic but she wasn’t able to make it but she really wanted to come out to this. It feels a bit potentially weird though having not seen each other for a decade, the prospect of introducing her with a girlfriend she’s never met before, all in the middle of a loud rock show. How do you watch the show and catch up? You don’t really and I’m just totally in denial hoping the stars will just do me a favour and align. Magically, they do. We see The Meffs, they finish, then just as they do, Sally arrives. It’s an interesting set up of a venue. Here we are in a crowd of around eight or nine hundred in front of the stage. There’s no immediate side wall towards the back on the left. Instead, that’s a big open space going towards the bar over on the wall there. It’s through this space after The Meffs that Sally emerges having just arrived. Oh wow. Maja Sally, Sally, Maja. A quick catch up and we’re able to head over to the bar for a while for a chat until the next band begins – Skinny Lister. Repeat after Skinny Lister with a 45 minute break before Frank, and what could have been a nice but really awkward reunion works out absolutely perfectly. We lose her during Frank as you’ll see, and she has to leave before the end for the last train home, but we really do manage to properly hook up and get all introductions done. I really had been quite anxious about how this would go, and Sally acknowledges that had timings worked out differently, it really could have ended up being a bit weird.

Right. Let’s backtrack a bit. The Meffs. A full on guitar bass, drums and vocals two piece. Yep. Two piece. Quite brilliant and Lily Hopkins on guitar, bass and vocals is just an amazing performer, holding and filling the stage all on her own, while Lewis Copsey is in just the most perfect synch with her on drums and backing vocals. You really know he’s there. As for that bass and guitar thing, Lilly, I’m sure I’m going to get things wrong here, just saying as I see/imagine it. She has a pedal that makes her guitar play guitar and bass simultaneously, but somehow no matter what she does, it’s just one string at a time on the bass that pumps out, just like a real bassist playing. And it’s done through different amps, with dedicated guitar and bass amps behind her. The result is these two guys making all the noise and filling all the space a full band would and with all the exact same tightness. What a concept, really good songs and an overall great live show. They completely have the crowd, and Lilly talks about the importance of warming us up for a Frank show, at one point getting us all to crouch down and then jump up again. At this stage, we have absolutely no idea how right she is, or what an important job she and they do.

Skinny Lister are up next, and if Maja doesn’t quite steal the show, she at least in some way shares it. This folk punk band has been going since 2009 and rival Frank himself in their commitment to touring and hard work in general. And they keep the crowd going at the high energy levels set by The Meffs. Think The Pogues, but with a lighter lyrical touch and a lot less earnestness. It’s multi vocal affair with Dan Heptinstall on guitar and vocals and party leader Lorna Thomas joining him up front on lead vocals. She is also whiskey deliverer-in-chief, wading into the crowd with a huge flagon of whiskey. By this point, Maja has already placed herself front and central, and the flagon somehow homes in on just her and she delightfully takes the first drink before the passing round begins. Sorry, I’m a little queasy with sharing drinks with sweating, roaring, possibly already drunk strangers. I pass.

A little later in the show and Lorna is out cheerleading again. Right out in front, right in the middle of the action, this time looking for people to arm wrestle. Who could she choose? Of course. Maja’s right there again. But an arm wrestle needs a table, right? Where could that come from? Yep. My back does the honours as I offer myself on all fours to the two girls who pile in on top of me to do battle right in the middle of a melee of Madrid punk rockers. Through all this, Sally is right there, just loving seeing the two of us get totally stuck in.

When the triumphant Skinnies depart the stage, they leave a sweaty mess of a crowd behind. All jubilant and completely red hot warmed up and ready to welcome Frank himself and his backing band The Sleeping Souls. 

They don’t mess about, hitting the stage as though right in the middle of a storming set with No Thankyou For The Music. What strikes me and Maja pretty much at the same time and with absolutely stunning ferocity, is how stunningly ferocious a Frank Turner show is. He’s not mainstream or conventionally famous, but he incites a rabid loyalty from his fanbase on a par with at least certain levels of soccer fandom. Alright, maybe not right down to a hooligan element, but damn this is a boiling, thundering, slamming mosh of a crowd and it’s totally exhilarating to find yourself in the middle of it. But Frank’s aware of the dangers such enthusiasm can engender with that rule that there’s always one. After the first song, he breaks to talk to us, saying, among other things, Don’t be a dick. If someone goes down, he says, help them up. Look after each other out there. With that, they’re off again, and we’re left to our own devices with a now self inbuilt safety switch. And yes, people do go down, people do get, if not hurt, at least a bit buffeted from time to time. And elbows fly and people jump up and down and toes and feet get occasionally bashed. Because, make no mistake, this is a slam dancing moshpit of frenzy. It’s not quite up there with festival and forum Metallica and Korn pits I’ve been in, but it’s no toe tapping head nodding affair either. Which, to be fair, is more what we were expecting. Again, we had no idea a Frank Turner show would be like this. Our expectations were not even close. But now it’s upon us, we are a fully joyous, conscious part of it. And Maja even discovers crowd surfing, getting herself picked up to go sailing over the frothing masses, all the way to the front, over the barrier, round and back again. And off she goes again.

When the band takes a break and Frank comes out to play us a few acoustic only numbers, I feel an almost sense of relief. But oh, now I realise just how hot and sweaty, not to mention exhausting this all is. I honestly feel like I’m in the middle of a masterclass gym workout and can barely take it anymore. Thankyou for the musical break. This is where Frank attempts a little bit of Spanish to the massive appreciation of the crowd, and even uses a cheat sheet to sing a few verses of one of his songs in Spanish.

Tea break over and the band comes back to take this place to eleven once more. And we’re off again. Circles are called and we all walk around in them, slow, then faster and faster, then the heaviness of the song kicks in and the whole euphoric moshing pile on begins again. And now here comes Frank to join in himself on the amazing I Want To Dance. This contains a massive screamed rap about the power of dedication in music and the lack of it in some others, particularly from a place we know a little about – Shoreditch. At the risk of infringing some copyright, but I think this is legitimate and all OK in the spirit of things, I’m going to paste that verse in here.

Yeah, is anybody else sick of the music that’s churned out by lackluster scenesters from Shoreditch?

Yeah, it’s all sex, drugs and sins, like they’re extras from Skins!

But it’s OK, cause they don’t really mean it!

I want bands who had to work for their keep

Drove a thousand miles and played a show on no sleep

Sleeping on the floor at a stranger’s place

Hungry just to do it all again the next day!

This single verse has actually become something of a rallying call for us, and now it becomes a centrepiece of this show as Frank launches himself onto the top of the crowd and is crowdsurfed all over the place on his back as he screams out this verse to the ecstatic eruption of the crowd over which he rides.

Then he’s back up to the stage, a couple of encores, then we’re out. Lights on. Shell shock. All around faces of drained exhaustion, but that thing dripping off them could be sweat, or it could just be distilled elation. I know I look like that too, and Maja certainly does. And we are shocked, still a little bit unable to take in just how wild and frantic and totally immersive this experience was. Because yes. This wasn’t a show we watched. This was an experience we participated in. And Frank and his band with, as you know by now, nearly 3000 shows in, played this like it was the one show they had been building up to for months and the one show they knew they were going to play for some time, so let’s smash it and leave it all out there tonight because we don’t know when we’re going to do it again. But no. They played last night, the night before that, will be playing again tomorrow. And so on. But you get the feeling that every show Frank ever does feels simultaneously like the first and the last. Like the most important show he’s ever played and the most important he ever will. You certainly feel like that being part of the audience. Oh, he’s doing this for us. No-one else gets this kind of special full on let’s sprint it out till we all drop down effort and attitude. No. He’s been doing this nearly every night for 20 years, and will probably keep doing it for another 20. At least. It’s nothing short of an inspiration. A lesson to us all, and a personal one to our very selves. The Diaries. This is how you approach a show. Every single one. There was no yesterday, there is no tomorrow. There is only this, now. And this is the only one you will ever do so make the most of it. That is what you want the people in front of you to think. And you want to it feel like the truth. Frank, it felt like the truth.

Now for some perspective on that 3000 shows thing. First, he often does multiple shows in a day, not least his world record breaking thing in May last year when he played 15 shows in 15 cities in 24 hours. Still, if you were to play a show very day, it would take you eight years and three months to play 3000. As far as I can see, Frank’s first show was in January 2005. We’re in November 2024 right now, but for the simplicity of maths, let’s call that a straight and exact 20 years of live shows. This gives us the very tidy number of 150 shows a year. That’s almost a show every two days for twenty years. The exact(ish) calculation is a show every 2.4 days non stop for 20 years. But of course there are breaks for album recording, traveling, and just breaks. Cos a guy’s gotta break, right? So you just know there are massive chunks in there of a show everyday or every other day for days and weeks and months on end. That’s just pure relentless relentlessness. And once again, like the guy’s music or not, just pure inspiration.

Now we’re off to the merch stand where we get to meet and chat to Lilly and Lewis of The Meffs and a few members of Skinny Lister. Me and Maja both even manage to get autographed drum sticks from Skinnies’ drummer Tim. In the chat with Lilly and Lewis, they tell us they’re going to be in London in January. We say we’ll check that out and maybe see them in London – fast forward. We do.

We also chat quite a bit with a few members of the audience we’ve been slamming about with for the past few hours. Being in that cauldron really does bring out the brothers-in-arms vibe. Kind of like, I guess at times, people who get in fights against each other can come together afterwards in mutual respect and friendship.

In this whole congenial environment of congratulations and fan/musician meetings, Maja gets a whole bunch of autographs – on her stomach. OK. Frank and The Lost Souls haven’t made it out by the time we decide to call it and leave. Outside, there’s a bit of a crowd waiting for Frank and his mates to come out, but let’s face it, mainly Frank. Me and Maja look at each other and say, ‘Nah. Let’s be cool and leave them to it.’ So back into Malasana we disappear.

We’ve decided to head in the direction of CBGBs. There, we’re delighted to meet owner Nacho again. He’s delighted to see us return, but says sorry, he’s closing right now. Oh. OK. Fair enough but shame. However, Nacho is happy to chat to us for a little while as he closes, and he tells us he’s actually added our stuff to his playlist. Damn. Playlisted in CBGBs. Surely one of the ultimate compliments and a real nod to our punk credentials. But not only that, he says that he’s had people ask about us while we’ve been playing in there and requesting links so they can listen at home. Wow. A whole nother level. He now introduces us to a guy called David, one of his regulars, who is very pleased to be meeting the subjects of the playlist conversation. With CBGBs closed, there’s only one thing for it. We kidnap David and take him down the road to Triskels for our final pints of Madrid.

You might remember that Nacho asked if we’d be able to play tonight but we couldn’t because we had, well, tonight. But we played El Pez Gato yesterday, Now Hustled a show on Saturday, did the thing with the TV guys on the street on Friday and of course kicked it all off with our open mic thing at Triskels on Thursday. That means that, Frank Turner night apart, we’ve played live every night we’ve been in Madrid. That and playlisted in CBGBs.

Yes, we definitely feel we’re leaving a Diaries shaped footprint behind.