The lowstar lowdown 8 - monday 26th june

evenin' all! how's it all going? thanks again for tuning in to the ramblings of us at lowstar. we do appreciate it and we'd love to hear from you, even if it is to tell us to get to the point more quickly and stop arsing around. originally, we had intended these updates to be short and to the point, maybe a little bit of gentle humour, but mostly informative. a bit like a gary lineker link, with a glint in its eye and a knowing charm. they do seem to have become more like a ronnie corbett monologue though. if it helps to imagine the lowstar boys in a giant armchair in pringle jumpers, please feel free to do so. now where was i? oh yes, i was talking to the producer the other day and he told me a story that reminded me of something.... oh hang on... do you see what happened there? if i don't stop this soon we'll be having a song from elaine paige or barbara dickson....

so, what have the 'star been up to this week? answers on a postcard actually, cos i don't have a clue. after the highs of the studio, we've taken a bit of a break for a couple of weeks to recharge the batteries. quite literally actually, as magic used so much power with his rainbow of rock in the studio that they need a while to recover. once they're back up to speed we will get back to rehearsing, gigging and working out what to do with the tracks we recorded. a brief update on the individuals reveals that magic has been sunning himself in the dominican republic, while keith and ian have been working hard. rob has simply disappeared. rumours are that it's yogi and boo-boo's turn to have a world cup party and so park ranger rob is on 24-hour pickernick basket alert. not long to go now rob, hang in there. how typical it is that the singer gets to swan off to the sun, while the rest of the band get their own hot climate every morning on the victoria line. in fact the similarities are uncanny when you think about it. you get on a tube and you're surrounded by things that are a bit crabby from a late night before, you get to the beach and you're surrounded by things that are a bit crabby from them being crabs; on the beach you have to beware of stray sand in your pants, on the tube you have to beware of stray hands in your pants; and of course on the beach you have to be careful your towel doesn't drop when you're changing into your trunks and it's exactly the same on the tube... no? just me then.

so, what with there being no lowstar news we thought it would be a nice opportunity to introduce the world to the surely by now infamous imaginary alan, keith's imaginary friend. imaginary alan was raised in cromer, home of mary jane's fish and chips and just along the coast from ronaldo's ice cream shop in sheringham - and if anyone has been watching brazil in the world cup, it would appear that ronaldo has been licking the spoon rather a lot as he's been making his ice cream. he moved to hethersett and 'met' keith in a spanish lesson at school there - 'hola keith', 'hola imaginary alan'. they would hang out every night and kick a ball about, imaginary alan always went in goal and this led to keith having a very high opinion of his killer instinct in front of goal. the years went by and keith and imaginary alan became inseperable. but no one else had even met him. he was quiet you see, a bit shy. in the summer the two would kick a ball about in the winter it was off to keith's garage for pool. there was always a house of love tape and a glass of pop involved. halcyon days. after school, keith and imaginary alan lost touch for a while, but were reunited when they both located to london and would meet for lunch once a week in cavendish square, where they always seemed to get a bench to themselves while they chatted animatedly about what they'd been up to. time went on and imaginary alan got himself a girlfriend and left the country leaving keith behind although he did get to go over for a visit. keith had to return after a couple of days though cos he was relying on imaginary alan to order the food in the local language and it wasn't working out so well. the shopkeeper would ask what keith wanted and he would say 'i'm sorry i don't speak the language, alan will translate for me'. the shopkeeper of course couldn't see alan, it was very dificult. however, after a few days on a drip back home, keith made a full recovery. imaginary alan has now returned to england and is living up north somewhere. he has yet to let keith know where exactly. so there you go, this gives you an introduction to the adventures of imaginary alan and they may crop up from time to time in these updates. please let us know if you would like to hear more about imaginary alan and also if you can work out what sort of person invents an imaginary friend that leaves the country and then moves hundreds of miles away? cos we can't work it out. it sounds like a job for one of those psychologists on big brother, but we wouldn't want to let them loose on keith, who knows what would turn up.

so, briefly, the lowstar woestar... there was no practice this week, or recording so it's pretty difficult. but we'll give it a go. i figure it's keith's best chance this week, as he can't disgrace himself with fluffed notes and inappropriate noise. however, he has revealed this week exclusively to this update that he actually dreams feedback, so the suspicion is he does it on purpose at practices. he has also dreamt of being chased by giant punctuation marks though, so like we said, it's best not to encourage this very strange man. ian, on the other hand has remained largely quiet apart from the occasional witty email. the man is unnaturally cool and so will have to be excluded this week on the grounds that the chances are he'll walk the next practice woestar. magic is simply excluded for leaving the country without the rest of lowstar. i can assure you there wasn't even an offer of smuggling the other three in his suitcases, let alone an offer to fly them all out first class. it's not like they would've got under his feet while they were there, but they weren't even given the option. tut. no the woestar this week has to be uncle ranger rob the throb. and not just by a process of elimination either. rob has clearly been laying his life on the line for all our pickernick baskets this week and it's about time we showed him some gratitude. you da man, robert! thoughts for the next practice...

- hope the ikea trolley is ok
- your thoughts on how many mic/lead/stand combinations will actually work would be appreciated. my guess is not one combination, 3 mics total to work, 2 leads and all the stands to be drunkly swaying like a weeble.
- will ian start off another tv theme singalong with a catchy fill by mistake?
- will lowstar ever be able to light their practises using the LEDs from magic's pedals?
- will rob return to lowstar as we know him or will the pickernick basket wars have scarred him for life?
- when will anyone notice that keith is trying to remember old living colour riffs and tell him to stop?

more from us next week. write and tell us stuff or say stuff or ask stuff and that and then we can put it in next week. if not, there'll be more about imaginary alan. you've been warned. th-th-th-tha's all folks.
lowstar lowstopping.

blog list
recording november 2008
gig email - 20 nov 2007
gig email - 24 jul 2007
happy new year - tuesday 16 jan 2007
lowstar lowdown 17 - monday 16 oct 2006
lowstar lowdown 16 - monday 18 sep 2006
lowstar lowdown 15 - monday 11 sep 2006
lowstar lowdown 14 - monday 28 aug 2006
lowstar lowdown 13 - monday 14 aug 2006
lowstar lowdown 12 - monday 31 jul 2006
lowstar lowdown 11 - monday 24 jul 2006
lowstar lowdown 10 - monday 17 jul 2006
lowstar lowdown 9 - monday 10 jul 2006
lowstar lowdown 8 - monday 26 jun 2006
lowstar lowdown 7 - monday 19 jun 2006
lowstar lowdown 6 - monday 05 jun 2006
lowstar lowdown 5 - lowstardate 27th may.6
lowstar lowdown 4 - monday 22 may 2006
lowstar lowdown III - return of the blog (15 may 2006)
lowstar lowdown 2 - wednesday 10 may 2006
lowstar lowdown 1 - friday 28 april 2006