We managed to all make it through airport security without having anything confiscated this time although I was subjected to a personal pat down which in another circumstance I might have paid money for. Either the guy was convinced I had something illegal concealed in my trousers or he was practising reiki on my pelvis, I don’t know?
This was to be another fly in, do the gig and fly out mission again. This can make life very confusing. One minute we’re at home doing the washing up and performing the other mundane tasks of everyday life, the next, we’re walking out to 60,000 people in Vienna at a Rolling Stones show. I feel like a rock’n’roll Hannah Montana.
Upon arriving at the Ernst Happel Stadium in Vienna, we went to find our dressing room. With such a vast network of passages, corridors and tunnels, this proved to be harder than we thought and a Spinal Tap “Hello Cleveland” type scenario unfolded. We were sent this way and that until we found ourselves in a corridor lined with such signs as “Warm-up Room” and “Band”. There was the smell of incense in the air and people with walkie-talkies wearing black we’re busying themselves with bowls of fruit. Hold on, this definitely wasn’t where we were supposed to be…we had stumbled into the Stones’ inner sanctum. It was like taking a wrong turn whilst on a sightseeing tour of Buckingham Palace and finding yourself in the Queens bedroom.
We were subsequently pointed in the right direction where we found a room containing a bag of mixed nuts and a box of Choco Leibniz. Yup, this was us! Strangely, the sign on the door read “Anti Doping”.
There have been a few tweets and posts recently stating that we are supporting the Rolling Stones but haven’t met any of them yet. Well this is no longer true as we had a pleasant chat with the great Charlie Watts as he left the stage after their soundcheck. He and Damon found some common ground in drums and cricket and no doubt if they had spent a little more time together Damon would have given him his recipie for scones.
Now that we’ve done a couple of shows with the Stones, our faces have become a little more familiar to the crew and we were made to feel truly welcome when it was time for our soundcheck. They are an incredibly warm and professional bunch and should they ever read any of my literary efforts here, I’d like to express our deep gratitude to them. Thanks Guys.
So, onto the show itself. As we got together for our traditional group hug before walking onstage, we were almost at a loss for words. What can you say really other than “Have a good one boys!”? On the other side of the backdrop were 60,000 people who for the next 30 minutes were going to be watching The Temperance Movement. Yes, we’re only borrowing them from The Rolling Stones for half an hour before we have to give them back again but hopefully some of them might come back for more at a later date. That’s the idea at least. The show was fucking amazing. We came off buzzing from the adrenaline. This experience is bonding us even tighter as a band. We’ll never forget it. Oh, and thanks to the guy near the front with the Temperance Movement T-shirt. We saw you!
Well, I’ll sign off for now as I have a feeling the next and final Rolling Stones special tour diary entries is going to be a big one…stay tuned for Dusseldorf!

– Nick

A year ago, the idea of supporting the Rolling Stones would have seemed utterly preposterous, yet here I am, on a Swissair flight back to London writing about exactly that. Here’s how it went down…

The universe smiled down on us, the planets aligned themselves and an unlikely series of events over the past couple of months resulted in an email from above stating “We’re on! We’re supporting the Rolling Stones!” My email response to this…? “Holy fuck!!!!!”
Here ensued a tornado of activity as the first show was seven days away. An operation was launched to extract Luke from his holiday overseas, all other engagements were cancelled and “Exile on Main St” was on constant rotation.
A week of excited anticipation went by before the time came to meet at Heathrow airport and disembark on a magical voyage we could tell our grandchildren about. We boarded the plane feeling like we’d all won a golden ticket to Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory.
Upon arriving at Zurich international airport. We eschewed the usual band tradition of being met by a man in a van and instead, took a train and a tram to our hotel. If there’s one thing The Temperance Movement collectively love, besides good food and rock’n’roll music, it’s a hotel spa. At this stage in our career, the chance of there being a spa in our hotel is just hopefully optimistic and usually highly unlikely but upon discovering one on the top floor of our Zurich hotel, Paul, Damon and myself were up there like a shot. It was like a sauna nirvana up there! A sauna disneyland! We showered, we sweated, we steamed, we bathed in Japanese Onsen pools and we lounged around in our dressing gowns like a trio of Hugh Hefners. Had we actually been the Rolling Stones, i’m sure we could have also summoned the Playboy Bunnies too…but one thing at a time!
I woke early the next morning like a small, overexcited child on Christmas day. I crept silently out of the room so as not to awake the Kraken – a soundly sleeping Mr Damon Wilson, and went downstairs for a coffee. Today was the day we would get to play at a Rolling Stones show!
Nothing of particular note happened until we arrived at the venue. It was then, when the gigantic stadium loomed ahead of us that the excitement really kicked in. When you enter the Rolling Stones’ world, it’s like visiting Blofeld’s volcano lair in James Bond’s “You Only Live Twice”. There are men in hard hats everywhere, some holding clip-boards, checking computer screens, shouting into walkie-talkies, abseiling down from high above the stage or speeding past in golf buggies, all under the ever present watch of the “Lips” insignia. As a Stones fan, finding yourself amongst this is the equivalent of a Star Wars obsessed kid visiting the actual Death Star! We were shown to our dressing room – bigger than most of the venues we played in our previous visit to Europe – and were greeted by a couple of very welcoming and helpful representatives of the Stones camp.
After the Stones’ soundcheck, we were given the green light to set up. A team of hard-hatted crew helped carry all our gear onstage and in a matter of minutes we were line checking, and in a matter of a few more minutes we were done. Doors had opened and an army of Stones’ fans were already excitedly charging towards the stage from the back of the stadium.
As i may have mentioned more than once before, we like food! Eating food is not purely a human function to be performed to stay alive but it is a multi-sensory pleasure to be experienced in the company of others, and what better place to do this than in Rolling Stones’ tour catering. The colours, smells and tastes were almost overwhelming. Tantalising salads, exquisite cuts of meat, delicate and mysterious deserts, intricately carved watermelons and even a chocolate fountain! I realise i’m being overly verbose for the purposes of making my tour diary interesting but fuck me it was good!
The time finally arrived for us to go to the stage. I wouldn’t say that i was nervous. Just very excited to be a part of something so big and steeped with so much history. It really was a huge honour bestowed upon us by Sir Mick et al and if he or any other of The Rolling Stones touring party happen to read this, i’d like to sincerely thank you all for giving us such an incredible experience and for making us feel so welcome in your travelling home. We had an absolute blast.
So here we are now. Travelling home and taking with us one hell of a memory. And the best thing is…there are 3 more shows to go!

– Nick

The time is 7.47am. I’m sitting at gate D26 at Amsterdam airport waiting to board my flight home. The tour is over and The Temperance Movement touring party has dispersed (temporarily) and scattered to various destinations via varying methods of transport.
There are always mixed feelings at the end of a tour. Excitement at getting home and seeing friends and loved ones and also tinges of sadness at the thought of leaving our strange little tour bubble.
Last night in Haarlem was the end of an era as we said farewell to merch salesman and stock control manager, Mr Tom Tunstall. He was way over qualified for the job anyway and will soon be putting his dashing good looks, sophisticated charm and infinite capacity for absorbing knowledge from books to better use. We’ll miss you Tom but if things don’t work out as a professor of English literature, you know where we are.
James Pepper (guitar/backline technician and assistant TO the tour manager) will particularly miss Tom Tunstall as the two have become inseparable friends during their time with us. He, however, will not be leaving us as he is serving a lifetime apprenticeship. We have legally adopted him and frankly, I doubt anyone else would want him. Only joking Pepper, you’ve done an incredible job and the thought of losing you to another band is too distressing to contemplate. You are an inspiration to us all and your unwavering positivity has been like a rock for us to cling to in our darker moments!
As this diary entry appears to be tuning into some kind of overblown acceptance speech, I should also take the opportunity to thank our tour managers, Iain “Mr G” Graham and Neil “Doddy” Dodd. Two tour managers who couldn’t be further apart in style and character but who, in a head to head battle of tour managerial and sound mixing abilities, are worthy opponents. We salute you!
So, last but by no means least, I’d like to thank all of you for taking time out of your lives and coming to the shows. Let’s face it, they’d be pretty sad affairs without you! We’ll be popping up at festivals over the coming months so hopefully we’ll be seeing some of you then. We wish you all a fantastic summer and until the next time,

Be lucky, be happy!

– Nick

I woke earlier with the sun pouring through the porthole in my cabin. Slightly confused, I got up and peered out of the small round window to discover that I was, in fact, not on a ship, but in a hotel in Portsmouth. Clearly, when designing this building, the architect made the obvious connection between Portsmouth and sea vessels and came up with the genius idea of adding a little porthole to each bedroom so the morning light could flood in and act as a natural alarm clock (curtains would have spoiled the effect from the interior). This gift from Ibis however doesn’t seemed to have had any kind of impact on Paul Sayer, my room mate for the night, as he is still flat on his back, wrapped in his duvet like an embalmed and mummified  Tutankhamun before they stuck him in his ornate casket.

So, before I mention last night’s gig at the Guildhall, let’s skip back a couple of days to the London show. There was always going to be an added pressure on the London show. It’s the biggest we’ve done to date, It’s a legendary venue and all our friends and family were going to be there along with agents, management, promoters, etc, Really, it should be no more important than any other show as we always strive to deliver whether in London or Inverness. If someone has paid money for a ticket and travelled see us then they deserve the best we can give but I must admit that there was slightly more nervous anticipation than usual in the dressing room before stage time. Phil and myself dealt with this by singing Bee-Gees songs in the men’s room.
I’ve been to many gigs at Shepherd’s Bush Empire before but to play there is something else. To walk onto the stage and look out at that amazing room full of beautiful souls who’ve come with the sole intention of listening to you play music is pretty mind blowing.
I’d like to take this opportunity to express our gratitude to everyone that was at Shepherd’s Bush for making the effort to travel to the show despite the tube strike. I know a lot of you had difficulties either getting there or returning home but the fact you were all there meant a lot to us. Thank you.
So, on to Oxford, and another chance to visit the awesome Lebanese & Moroccan restaurant down the road from the venue. I’ve been watching  Rob Brydon and Steve Coogan’s “Trip to Italy” on BBC iplayer on this tour.  If anyone has watched the programme, our tours are pretty similar to this. We drive from town to town searching out the best places to eat whilst relentlessly taking the piss out of each other by doing impersonations. You soon learn to develop a thick skin.
This brings me neatly to yesterday where we had a great pub lunch in Abingdon, a pretty little town near Oxford. Other than the shows themselves, these are my favourite times on tour when we find ourselves eating great food together and having a good old chat. Who knows where we’ll be in five or ten years time. We may all be travelling in separate buses and staying in separate hotels, unable to stand the sight of each other, or we may have given up and started careers in Telemarketing, but right now, I love the guys in this band like brothers. We may occasionally get on each other’s nerves or get a bit tired and emotional but we’re all there for each other and I wouldn’t want to be doing this with anyone else.
Last night’s show in Portsmouth was a belter. I really enjoyed it. As the Portsmouth Pyramids had been flooded, the gig was moved to the Guildhall, a beautiful big room that you all filled with your infectious energy. We’d spent the hour before going on stage in our dressing room singing and dancing around to a selection of great tunes from Lenny Kravitz (first album), ELO, Paul McCartney and Wings and Delaney and Bonnie. I may start compiling a playlist of our favourite pre-gig music.

Right, I’ve just received a call from the Captain of the good ship Ibis, instructing me that we’ve out-stayed our welcome and can we kindly leave now so I’ll wrap up this lengthy tome and leave you with a lovely picture from last night taken by our very own James Pepper Esq.
See you in Cardiff!

– Nick

It’s gone midnight and we’re hurtling down the M1, homeward bound. A couple of hours ago, we were playing to a packed venue in Leeds. Once again, the people of Leeds made an astonishing amount of noise, thus spurring us on to wring out that extra ounce of energy.
We’ve been on the road in the UK for only a week so far but it feels like a lot longer since we played the first show in Lincoln. I guess we’ve squeezed a lot in to that week. Seven shows covering the Midlands, North of England and Scotland. Gone is the Black Mamba. This time we’ve taken a more stealth approach to touring. We’ve been driving ourselves in a Ford Galaxy whilst another vehicle containing the gear, Pepper, Tunstall and Mr.G travels ahead of us. This allows us to stop at any and every coffee establishment on route to each gig. Coffee has become the new cocaine and no journey is complete without a google search for the nearest independent, artisan coffee twattery (as Iain Graham likes to call them) to get a hit. Personally speaking, I enjoy coffee, but it makes me pretty twitchy and anxious. As a result, Paul likes to encourage me to drink it as he finds this highly entertaining.
Anyway, back to the M1. As we get closer to London and the big Shepherds Bush show, we’ve been reflecting on how crazy the last year has been. We’re totally blown away by the numbers of you turning out to the shows. The Temperance Movement isn’t just the five of us, it’s all of you. Thank you,

Nick

It’s the time of year for listening to Tom Petty tunes. There’s a feeling of harmony best served with a slice of Boys of Summer. Gaps in the puffy clouds reveal a true blue sky echoing an argument with David Rawlings concerning Morrissey and then “One… two… One… wee-ooh!”
On a beautiful day the M6 to Glasgow is a pleasure. It’s especially enjoyable the day after a riotous live performance at Manchester Academy 2. So many good people. So much genuine love for the band. Thank you.
It’s a good time for The Temperance Movement. Even now as a light shower slaps the windscreen in the Borders, we know it’s only a playful slap on the bottom like you would in the bedroom. No need for safe words here. No, no. We’re all friends now and everyone knows the rules. Like the Bible says: Proverbs 12:3 ‘Playing to 1000 people a night is good thing. Enjoy it’.
Manchester: vast beacon of culture and enterprise. You did yourselves proud last night as five red faced lads were encourage further not to go back to their day jobs. We shall return very soon to see yous all again I’m sure. It was a buzz to meet those patient enough to catch my tardy aftershow appearance. Big love.

And all the while, Blue Monday was playing in my head on a loop! No joke. Is there something in the water or what?

Phil x