Recording Diary of VD in America by VD TOM

Wablow homies.

This recording diary is sure to be mad fun for all who read it. Or not.
I was meant to be starting this on day one of VD arriving in America but now it's the trinultimate (I made that up) day (18th November) and I've only just decided to start it, so it might be an incoherent mess. If it is, it doesn't matter cos no one actually reads these things.

So... where to begin? At the start I guess *Shakespeare alert*
Rodney and I arrived at Heathrow airport confused, and not knowing what the fuck we are meant to do. I make many phone calls, and we all wait around to meet the video director for our new single 'I wish I was a girl'. We pray its going to look better than the last one, and all is good because -

1. He isn't shooting the whole thing on a Mini DV camera!
2. It has a plot!
3. Our demand of fit laydeez has been responded to! Wahey! (more on these VERY fit laydeez later!)

We collect our tickets, make the obligatory 'Arab' jokes and board the plane after Rodney buys his 100 quid's worth of 'Friends' (obviously to comfort him) DVD's.

We all smile gleefully at each other as we look at the spacious seats/beds our record company booked us in First Class. As we get ushered past there, that smile turns to a grin as we survey the Business Class seats our record company have booked for their favourite band. After being shooed past this area like a pack of smelly dogs (or the smelly teenagers we are), that grin becomes the expression that would have been on the black slaves' faces upon entering the boats bound for the West many years before our time. As we cram into these very not-tested-to-be-safe-against-the-effects-of-deep-vein-thrombosis seats I get the feeling that I'm going to hate the next 8 hours in this thing. An
Orthodox Jew in front of me provides much amusement for all of the 5 minutes it takes for me to study his mad beard and definitely deranged sideburns. Wonder if he's a Jewish extremist. I get all excited about the TV in the back of the seat in front of me.

TV! The box which provides such wonders and insights into life and I can experience so many things through this delightful example of how important technology is to the Modern Teenager. Unfortunately British Airways (at least it isn't Ethiopian Air) haven't caught on to such sophisticated things, in fact the one film I want to watch wont work because the 'pilot has jammed the tape'. How reassuring! This cretin is flying my plane! Ah well. Order a Vodka and Coke, eat some dirty aeroplane food, watch some of Scooby do, realize its rubbish and go to sleep, listening to Killswitch Engage. Fill out unnecessarily complex form.

Finally get off this horrible thing, negotiate our way through the airport, stroll through customs without any checks on our guitars and get into the cars waiting for us.

Meet Dave again at the studio. He is Dave Chavarri from Ill Nino who is producing our album, people know this but are still surprised when I tell them. So here it is again. He brings his girlfriend Lauren with him and we go out to a restaurant and order 24oz steaks. So far so good.... Go to bed in our apartment and get prepared for the first day of recording.

We wander into the studio and meet the staff there. Nice place. Get set up and start jamming out 'The slut who loved me'. Get recording some drums, everything appears to be good. Thing is, unless you are actually recording, it is horribly boring to read about, so I wont write much about it.

Instead I'll write about how much I love England. My love for it at this current time might be enhanced due to the fact that I haven't been able to chill out back home for about 2 months. It's much easier not having a girlfriend during this, if I did it would suck big time! But still, the immigrants are better in England, the people are friendlier, the food isn't better however... nor are the prices for the food, but then is being obese and having 'food' as your biggest cultural distinction something to be proud of? The porn is expensive unless you go to a market stall, the CD shops are marginally better so I can finally buy an AFI CD for a less than ridiculous price. The clothes are good here, but I still dislike New York quite a lot. Its too hectic, too fast and too loud. I can be an old man with regard to that. Give me London any day. Ben agrees with me, Ken loves America and Rodney... well.

Rodney being the awkward singer type decided to get ill three days before he is meant to start his vocals. Not just mildly sick, but fucking diseased. He doesn't see a doctor and gets told he has to stay here for 3 more days while the rest of us go home. He watches Friends DVD's all day.
American TV sucks. Spanish TV on American TV however... Wow! These women are hot! Cant understand a word they're saying but still. they are as fit as anything England has to offer! Cant wait to tour in Spain! Dave and Laz (Ill Nino bassist) says we can tour with them in Spain. Wahey!

Not much of any interest happens... we aren't up to much other than hanging about, me being on the internet, Ken sleeping and Ben out partying, smoking crack and fucking ho's.(probably not).

In true bad essay writing style I'm going go off on something I just remembered - Tonight is actually the eve of the video shoot. Its ten past eleven and I'm in my room in the apartment typing this shit out. Getting up stupidly early for the video shoot...cant wait however. We went to visit the director, the stylist and producer etc and they've bought us lovely girls clothes, great outfits for the actual video and some HOT girls. My one is called Meredith, has some impressive measurements (32 bra, size 8, gorgeous sparkling blue eyes and black hair) and is actually a model. I call her 'my one' because the idea of the video is that we each have girls who are going to try and take our place in the video whatever we are doing. Rodney's one is very hot, Ben's is the hottest but is a paedophilic 5 foot tall. Ah well! Cant complain! I'm really looking forward to this shoot.. Its gonna be good I think.

It was Ken's Birthday the other day. He was 25. We went out to the steak place we visited on the first day, which was cool. As a special birthday treat, Rodney taught Josh (our manager's son, age 21 months) to say 'chinky' to the Desperate Jap (D.J.) Ken (even though Rodney is Chinese) much to the amusement of everyone. He now has an impressive vocabulary of 'fuck', 'gay', 'twat' and 'chinky'. We're such a bunch of intellectuals!

Ken slept all day and I went out with my parents cos they flew out for a few days. It wasn't a crazy celebration cos me, Ben and Rodney are too young to drink here. Too young for many things, couldn't even go to a titty bar! Went to bed early, playing on my new laptop (which I'm on now).
The songs sound amazing, the working has been tough but its all worthwhile. Still cannot wait to go home though, and play some more gigs. Seeing as I had been touring the UK for a month before this, its weird to be here doing fuck all. Or doing fuck all in general is weird now.

19th November - Video shoot.
Get to the meeting room at 7.30 am and meet the girls in person. Meredith (the girl playing the part of me) is there first. She appears to be friendly and chatty, and fit. Then Rodney's girl turns up. Very fit too. Bens girl, fit... you see the general pattern emerging. After changing into our video clothes I sit down, talk to Meredith who is really nice and just chat to everyone, while we start filming outside on the balcony of a very big building. The view is 'beautiful' I'm told by Meredith. It's a different kind of beautiful I guess, a concrete jungle beautiful if there is such a thing that can be talked about in a positive context!

After shooting some shots there we move out to our second location out in New York. We film us running, turning into the girls, running, and running. Its all going well, except for the fact it is FREEZING. Us and the girls were dying out there but its all good so I wont whinge about it...
Next place - Coney Island. Not really an island, but still has a fun fair that we play about in. I'm not gonna reveal too much about the video... so I wont write what happens. Suffice to say it is going to absolutely rock! I hope anyway, haha!

To tired to write much, sorry!

20th November - last day/travelling
Probably not the most exciting thing to write about... I'm on the plane right now, its horrible. No mad vibes here. My ears have popped (several times), and I can JUST about hear Glassjaw over the roar of the planes engine. No crazy Arabs on board which is reassuring. I've been reminded to recall a few instances that I forgot to write in cos I'm very forgetful (too much TV and computer games rotting my brain).

On the second or third day we had Dave being the usual slave driver and putting his foot up our arses (metaphorically speaking of course) and making us play better and work harder. Ken came in looking tired before he had to do his drum tracks and Dave was like 'wassup bitch? You tired? I'll make you some American coffee.' He did, and within ten minutes Ken was puking his guts up in the toilet, and Dave laughed. In fact we all did. It worked, Ken has rocked out his best drum tracks he's ever played, they sound awesome. We also all laughed when our manager noticed Ken had left his Visa he had been applying for on a table in the artists lounge and she hid it and he was franticly looking for it for a few days worrying about being deported. Another amusing incident was Ken puking up for the second time, this time on the video shoot, bringing his chicken back up. A proud moment for Ken was getting the very fit stylists number while her husband was standing right there getting pissed off. He also did it without the usual tactic of 'insult the rest of the band in front of the girls in attempt to look bigger' which was far more impressive for all. Anyway, if he comes back here he is in there for real, lucky fucker!

This plane ride is still unbearable. Four hours to go...the idiot in front of me has pushed his seat right back making it impossible to type, stupid tit. Ah well, this is the end of my recording diary I guess!

Thank you for reading this rubbish.

Love me.
(I wasn't being cute, I really think you should)