June 2012
1 post
Polaris Nomination
Of course everything is bittersweet these days but I thank Polaris for the nod in nominating us for their prize.
All forms of love and support is truly meaningful currently. So thank you fans and judges. I mean it: it means a lot.
x,
Alexei
May 2012
1 post
Thank You.
I cannot begin to give words or reason or clarity to this very personal and private situation which has been made public. Instead I can only express the immensity of my gratitude for the love and support and curiosity and collaboration and fortitude of spirit that you shared with us and helped us be committed to. My world is forever larger and grander and wholly changed because of the experiences...
March 2012
1 post
European Tour Cancellation
The band have had an urgent health issue come up, and will be unable to make the overseas trip in April. Alexei and Dan do not take having to cancel performances lightly, and if there were any way to make the trip, they would.
Thanks very much for your understanding during this difficult time.
February 2012
1 post
Oh man: I love how divided the attention to the Jersey Shore coverage has been. Part of me wants to let the true Handsome Furs fans know that we actually have no control of how MTV uses our material, part of me wanted to explain that we did Sirius radio the same day Jersey Shore did and coincidentally took that silly photo, and the other part of me wants to let everyone enjoy their guilty...
January 2012
1 post
December 2011
2 posts
Here’s Alexei’s Top “Ten” Great Things From 2011 In No Particular Order (from SubPop.com) Number one: Belgrade Punk band Repetitor’s debut album Sve Sto Vidim Je Prvi Put Number two: Making out on a docked Ukranian gun ship/venue in Budapest prior to stage time Number three: Crossing eight borders in sixteen hours touring through the Balkans with Bernays Propaganda Number four:...
Han Xia explains it all
Han Xia directed our brand new video for Serve the People! We love her. She wrote a little about her inspirations for the video and we wanted to share it with you. Thank you again to Han Xia and to all our friends in Beijing. We miss you!
The very first time I met Handsome Furs was when I was in my second year of film school. I could not speak English and was immersed in weird music and films,...
November 2011
1 post
Lucky as fuck.
There are certain days that make me relatively sure that I am one of the luckiest girls in the world. Some times there are even days where I receive confirmation of my fortunate existence via snail mail. With happy thanks to the postman who braved the windy and uglying winter weather of Montreal’s city streets, I must make two announcements.
1. Some of you will remember my earlier posts...
October 2011
5 posts
October 5 – Warsaw
“Can you write about this for your tumblr? You need to write about Warsaw.” A tender gentleman held my hand and expressed this wish after our show in Palaty Kultura. There is, of course, always a risk to being an open book: You risk exposing yourself in ways that are not always most flatteringly. But truth be told I’d rather all my flaws be exposed than be unknowable. I feel lucky in my line of...
October 11 – Copenhagen
“That’s not the way things are done here in Copenhagen.”
Frequently Danes compare themselves to Swedes, as we all tend to define ourselves by the differences from our nearest neighbours, and frequently Danes find themselves a little looser than Swedes. I cannot tell you how many times I have heard that Swedes are their stiffer brothers, more strict and more dominated by rules and more...
October 12 – Stockholm
In Stockholm we introduced the Swedish police to the English expression Shit or get off the pot. At first we were confused by their random harassment but, in time, we managed to turn the tables and confuse them, feeling redeemed and triumphant, with our witty anecdotes. Here’s what happened exactly: We played a ballsy set at the city’s schwankest Scandic Malmen hotel lobby venue where the finest...
September 30 – Zagreb
Home sweet home. As Dan and I cross the border into Croatia we realize we have more recently been in this heavenly nation than in our actual home city of Montreal. The signage feels more familiar than Quebecois francaise and we are eager for the comfort foods of cevapi and kaymak and the choicest onions and soft smoky bread as if we were experiencing the cravings of returning home. When you have...
Noisey
September 2011
17 posts
September 21 – Cologne
Finally success!!!!
One of our most memorable shows occurred in the charming city of Cologne. It was not memorable because we played particularly well or because the venue was particularly unforgettable or because the staff were necessarily noteworthy. And it was certainly not made memorable by being well-attended. In fact, it drew only seven people if my memory isn’t embellishing those numbers....
Echo Songwriting Prize
Please vote for us! One week left! http://www.echoprize.ca/
September 20 – Paris
There is a common saying among the poorest people who perform in the Carnivals of Brazil: “Only the rich like modesty; the poor prefer luxury.” It is said, of course, with pride because their costumes are the most glamourous and eye-catching of all.
As a kid my own nickname was Flash n Trash because I delighted in red shoes and big gold baubles and purple make up and slicked back shiny hair and...
September 18 – Munster
If you have been in a band long enough, you have likely met this breed of soundman: He is German and efficiently so. He is long-haired and yellow-toothed. He has likely never worn an item of coloured clothing since the day he was able to dress himself. He chainsmokes. He talks very little. The only band he likes from Canada is No Means No. He thinks the younger generation (presumably including...
September 17 – Tilburg
Tilburg is most likely the show where we caught the bug. I could very surely point fingers at the culprits. But it wasn’t their fault exactly and they were the kindest of gentlemen so they will remain unnamed. In fact I wholly sympathize now, rather belatedly, with just how bad they were feeling. Each member of the supporting band ran through a litany of complaints, the grievances that were taking...
September 16 - Brighton
SOLD OUT SHOW!
Okay so perhaps it doesn’t mean so much if the club is the size of an oil baroness’s walk-in closet but, heck, it meant a lot to us to sell out Brighton’s The Hope. And it meant even more that the folks who crammed into the room were adamant fans. Mikhail Bus from Poland and the intrepid Spidey and Don were in attendance as well as Beth’s sister and two Sri Lankan brothers who...
September 14 - Manchester
“If rain is what makes England great then Manchester’s yet greater.” – Paul Hedon
Or something like that. And it’s true: Manchester weather does not let up. On television, we watched the weatherman turn out a veritable thesaurus for “drizzly” as he described the current temperatures and upcoming damp, thunderous, cloudy, light precipitations, heavy rains, and certain showers. It is sure to be...
September 13 - London
PJ Harvey’s latest album LET ENGLAND SHAKE certainly predicted these recent riots of London and it was also one of my favourite releases of this year. With it, she gave early voice to what she felt was rather foreseeable for her country’s unsatisfied citizens. In every interview I’ve read following the fires (which coincidentally sent our own records up in flames during the destruction of the PIAS...
September 10th – Seattle
By the last day of the third North American segment of this non-stop world tour, I have started reading Zizek’s Living In The End Times, roughly a guide to dealing with the various stages of grief applied to our upcoming economic Armageddon. These are things I think about and discuss constantly with anyone willing to chatter about falling empires and overthrowing tyrants, about ecological crises...
September 9th – Victoria, British Columbia
Right before we take stage, the hotel concierge from next door runs into the green room of Club Nine One Nine and squarely spins me from my backstage pacing and grabs my shoulders, out of breath from her jaunt over and divulges these words with a wink, “Your Dad just called from Brugge to wish you a good show!” She’s ready to flurry off back to her desk and dreary work when she notices my confused...
September 7th – Boise
What bands listen to on tour is a good indication of whether I’ll like them or not.
Talk Demonic is listening to 90s hip hop while they barrel down the road and Ben from Suuns was so engrossed by Willow Smith’s “Whip my hair” video that it looked like he was learning something. The man will certainly need extensions to bust them moves but he looks willing. And our own personal confession is that...
September 5th – day off
Sometimes you face death. Sometimes Death is wearing a skeleton mask and a leather jacket and careening through the night outside America’s Biggest Little City atop a tricked out motorcycle going so fast it might as well be spewing flames from the exhaust pipe and leaving a trail of fire in its wake. Sometimes Death rattles your car windows. With black-gloved fists. Sometimes Death threatens your...
September 4th – Sacramento
Life as it is rarely suits us. You keep wanting to substitute what you would like to believe for reality and either view it through rose-tinted spectacles or give it horns and a tail, depending on your personal inclinations. In Sacramento I might have had my blinders on during the day until my lofty convictions actually came true in the evening. But certainly I Love Teriyaki was not worth the...
September 2nd, , 3rd – LA, San Francisco
I’m pretty sure I manage to offend both the San Francisco and LA audiences by saying that I’m an East Coast girl but that I’m warming up to the West Coast. My intentions are good but I always flub everything from stage. What I meant was this: I will argue with New York about bagels and win. (St Viateur bagels make New York’s rendition seem like dense bread. Go fuck yourselves. It’s true. No...
September 1st – San Diego, California
In the southern parts of these southern states, I am prone to declaring, “Ahh… my people…” every time I hear a proud Papi declaring his love for his newest bambino Jesus or every time I see a full-lipped senorita stuffing herself back into her mesh and sequin blouse in an open bathroom stall, brazen and beautiful, or every time I witness an entire family engrossed in heated debate under the hot...
August 31st – Tucson, Arizona
As we continue along El Camino Del Diablo, I read about the six miserable stages of dying of Hyperthermia. Dying of heat. It starts with Heat Stress. You know this stage from swollen fingers and minor rashes and sunburn. We’ve all had these headaches. Next is Heat Fatigue. Your crotch is wet. The thin parts of your skin begin to burn. Your eyelids and cheeks, your neck and the part of your hair...
August 29th, 30th – Sante Fe
The green out here is grey. The sage and acacia and saguaros covered with a film of dust hundreds upon hundreds of years old, baking under the desert sun. And perhaps it is because I have begun reading Luis Alberto Urrea’s Devil’s Highway that I am seeing the earth more scorched. My eye starts squinting for bones amongst the cactus patches. Mauve and yellow cliffs might offer the only shade in the...
August 2011
25 posts
August 26th, 27th – ¡¡¡¡¡TEXAS!!!!!
Everything is big in Texas, but it came as a huge surprise that we were big in Texas. With its “go big or go home attitude,” our eyes had been stuffed full of mega-churches and BBQ outfitters, giant shiny oil-money skyscrapers and clean wide highways. The flags, of course, were numerous and giant, giving every car dealership and truck stop an air of grandeur and terror – depending on what “neck of...
August 24th – St Louis
The first gift Dan ever gave to me was William T. Vollmann’s enormous novel “The Royal Family.” It is a seedy account of a prostitution ring in California but it is also tremendously romantic and dirty and tender. It will always be one of my favourtie books and it was the best pick up line a girl like me could ever receive. At a coffee shop in St. Louis, Dan passed a table with a young beautiful...
August 22nd – New Port Kentucky/Cincinnati Ohio
Having rested well after a night off in Florence, Kentucky, during which our only exerted energy was put forth in our shocked and giggle-ridden reactions to the stupefying stunts and spectacles featured in the outlandishly gross and absurd action/suspense/thriller Final Destination 5 in 3D with 3D glasses!!!, we are pleasantly ready to drop our jaws at the sights of Cincinnati. Before we leave our...
August 19th – Philadelphia City of Sisterly Love
Only in Philadelphia can I get naked with two black lesbians in the sanctuary of a church and not feel like I’m sinning…. much. Stasia and Cat are the dang glorious members of THEE Satisfaction (and the “living proof that there are black people in Seattle” by the by) and prior to our shared show we are all in the upstairs of the First Unitarian Church trying to figure out what to wear since it’s...
August 18th – New York
Blood. He’d had the same dream in the cities he’d visited – with their underground networks of pipes like cobwebs - running thick with blood. And from the cracks and curvatures of the pipes, from the l-bends and u-bends, blood spurts like water. A fountain of brackish rain sprays the air; a bright-red assault on the senses. And there he saw the wells and rivers all turned red, rancid with the...
August 17th - Boston
Parking lot. Processed cheese. Parking lot. Bad coffee. Parking lot. In Boston, we endure the ripple effects of culture shock from having flown from Kosovo to an airport hotel near a medical ward in Sommerville Massachuesetts. It is a bit bleak out in these heavily paved boonies despite the shiny signage and catchy restaurant mottos and chipper concierges. I feel immediately like I’m being...
EURO Cont.
Pt. 6. “There, where life is for living. There, where food and drink are for feasting…” prompts a familiar Turkish verse about the fertile hedonism of Bitola. The city of Bitola, though nearly invisible between its green hilly arms of the Baba Mountain and the Pelajonia granaries, surprises us with its own pedestrian “Broadway” street crowded with shoppers and daytime drinkers. I like a place with...
EUROPA AUGSUT 4th – 15th, 2011
In which the band gaily journeys from the bottom of the Hapsburg Empire to the top of the Ottoman Empire, through the green peaks made famous by the Sound of Music, the pine forests and pebbled beaches of the Italian coastline, the golden cliffs and army barracks of the Dalmatian shores, seven border crossings of once-Yugoslavia, the fertile plains of Pelagonija, the unplumbable abyss of the...
August 1 + 2, 2011
There’s truly never enough time for Toronto. The last three days of our North American tour were divvied by two sold out dates in the Legendary Horseshoe Tavern, accommodation in both the schwank boutique Gladstone and the dank Hotel Grange, dining experiences with immediate and extended family, visits with old friends, close friends and new friends, in equal measure our time spent between the...
July 27, 2011
Dearly beloved, we have gathered here today to get through this thing called Life – Prince.
Minneapolis doesn’t have it easy. The Somalis have their tribal infighting, warring gangs with old grievances. And Hard Times Café continues to document the hard times of the city’s transient communities. And the shelves of Extreme Noise are stocked with the hidden gems of crust punk records of disaffected...
July 30, 2011
Fireworks.
There is a scene in an episode of Sex and The City where Samantha is griping to her lesbian lover that they spend too much time talking and soaking in bathtubs. She gushes, “I want fireworks.” In a rapidfire retort, the senorita begins opening the kitchen cupboards and pulling out ceramic dishware. “You want fireworks?” she threatens. “I’ll give you fireworks,” she pledges and begins...
July 29, 2011
The night before had also been restless, but not unpleasantly so. Prolonged sleeplessness always produces a little delirium. Not all the brain cells remain awake. Some realities disappear and those that remain alive develop without check. We knew we had something to say to the world but in our state between sleep and wakefulness we were still pretty unsure of ourselves. So I say it with gratitude,...
