vs

 WED 25TH FEB- DUBLIN, THE HUB,TEMPLE BAR

the emerald isle..... ahhhh, first Wales, Big Stig was born there ya know, Cardiff 197-summat... so he drives-by carefully through Anglesey village 5:30 start... ginsters... ici lights... snow covered slag heaps... ferry port.. onion rings.... DUBLIN.....

driving through the outskirts of Dublin is a little like a more grandeur Kensington... big fucking houses all the way down to the river and then were into the armpit tourist trap that Temple Bar has become, Ged Stig only just manages a shit in the first Guinness pushers before were asked to leave.. summat about dress code...blah blah blarney....  1am in the afternoon with 5 hours of avoiding 5 euro  pints and abrakebabrah outlets calls for shift sleeping in the bus and random wanders around the river that divides the city into 2 equally poncy and euro shafted area`s.....

 luca-san , Dublin USAGI-The Hub

is every city slowly becoming a carbon copy of London's endless high street chains and kitch over priced soho-squ arsery?... who cares, long as the people are boss... and the folk running tonights gig in a dingy underground bar ( The Hub ) are fooking good people....  Usagi open the night still blurry eyed from travelling yet still make the gathering audience's jaw`s drop with their dis-jointed hardcore beats and  spooky spine dancing vocals of Usagi queen joni.... the appreciation from the crowd was fantastic all night.... whooping and dancing for friends and strangers alike, local ska-pop, 2-boy, 2-girl band Doller $hort give the people what they know and lead into STIG`s first show of the tour.... bombarded with applause and folk dancing the waltz Stig spread their Angry Madness around the building before handing over to the evenings local hero`s Pinion, heavy and tight melodic tunes til the next thing we know were walking half hour across the city with sleeping bags and liquor to stay at some aforementioned good folks flat.

DJ STIG- The Hub  (l-r) Notto, Nicole, Ged + Si Stig, matt)

The gig was set up by a collective called gigsmartireland, they are doing amazing things for the underground music scene in dublin, putting on shows, running studio`s, publishing news letters and magazines dedicated to the un-heard noise of the city.. really impressive people.... a collection of bands was put together last year and entered number 20 ( ithink) in the irish charts... its a good cd, compleatley random in styles and  boasting some wicked tunes inc. pinion and uprising hardcore Dubliners Mike Got Spiked... check above link for more info and cheers to all that came to see STIG and USAGI.....

THURS 26TH - GALWAY, Richardsons Bar, Eyre Square.

3 Hours drive west from Dublin amoungst other teeny towns is Galway, home si-Stig tells us to some fierce surfing waters and college hippie types.... we find posters in the venue for every footy match this week plus an all girl punk band from belfast also called USAGI- strange that.... were later assured it was a one off mistake... we arrive early, eat sandwiches in the downstairs pub and are later let loose in the venue upstairs with its working guinness pumps, pints of whiskey and simpsons on the t.v for about 3 hours before any barstaff or signs of life from the good folk of NEWNOISE.com collective....

ckilling time in a traditionally un-staffed bar... pints of bushmills..etc

A small crowd gather around infront of bits of p.a and lights weve cobbled together... interesting looking bunch of peolpe who have been putting on shows in Richardsons bar for a while now, a local band, maybe TRIGGER, a hardcore female led noise who`s cd im listening to while writing this...would have helped the turn out a bit  ( goodvocals.. shouty-screetchy and yet melodic-just how we liike `em..tunes are little bit mid-temp rock and the mention of god in the influences has chilled me to the bone, but fooking great voice)  Aye Trigger or any of the bands people tell us they play in locally would have been good, but the place is healthly full anyhow, and after the 21st round of the electric shock game weve been playing all day,STIG do a couple of laps of the bar in the name of carnival trumpet noise, fuelled by hidden pints of bushmills to the growing audience...

2 trumpets and early 60`s celtic footie club photo   

Richardsons Bar- Galway

we like little groups of people who build there own scenes and swap cd`s and generally buzz off finding new noise.

USAGI are still new noise.... its easy to forget this is still there first few gigs as a band in this mutation.. though all members have pretty much played together for years in various bands- 3 Ant Riot / U Will Die + Murder Mile... this is what makes them sound so ridiculasly tight yet dis-jointed.. stop / start - dance/crash 

Lullaby-call to get the fuck up and mooooove..!!!!!!! and Joni`s haunting voice once again reduces Ged Stig to tears & emotional hardcore....(wat tha fuk is emo?!?..)

There is a week in Galway every year the name of which escapes me were it is tradition for the whole town to get fucked up drunk for 7 nights... some say this is the nature of most of ireland, but only in these wee tucked away regions will ya find such suitable historic trraditions named and honered like a publiic holiday... low and behold the town is compleate bollix`d chaos outside... the van is packed in minutes with the help of 6 foot singing irish men, our own unit of liquer soaked rabble, were escorted across the square by our own gardien angel, (liam from Evangelists is doing a year stretch in Galway and putts us stinky folk up for the night) to chow down at  the most foooking rancid, department store sized fast food outlet that i swear down looked more like a set from living dead. Women fighting with bouncers, people throwing themselves at the doors in the vague hope the`ll rugby scrum past, down to the front and stuff another pototoe wedge into there best mates eye socket... if a food fight had kicked off i doubt we`d be here to tell the story.... imagine an  entire town, falling down-piss drunk and trying to order burger & chips at the same time... 

 Luca Usagi- richardsons (crap/shit)              Joni Usagi- pissed

All salute the family Deehan, Limady, Northern Ireland... (patsy far right)   a fan fair please....

 fRI 27TH - DERRY, GASSYARD CENTER

You know those big fooking tin cans that goes ups then downs depending on the amount of gas in `em at the time?.

right, one of them, with a wooden floor, 100 feet high... and a pocket sized p.a...

bollix,STIG couldn`t play.

that was the only shit bit, we spent the day taking our lives in our hands on the back roads of Ireland, entirely gob smacked by the sites we`d absorbed on the drive from Galway (Republic) all the way up north through the snow capped mountains of Donegal and into the strange city that is Derry and more to the point its slightly nervy territory of The Bog Side... we ten were cold, tired and we'd all witnessed our first bulls knob.

Gass Yard Center, Free Derry

to be continued.....

Usagi- big tin can, Free Derry.

Derry children of rock.... oh how they rock..

TO BE CONTINUED.......