A rant today, if you’ll allow me. Earlier this morning I posted, on the 21st Century fuckfest that is Twitter, a link to this article at The Daily Mash. As per usual, it was both very funny and incisive, addressing the recent change in legislation with regard to illegal downloading. I can’t say I’m a huge fan of either Mandleson or Geffen, and the propsed legislation is dubious both in origin and content. The part of the article that I enjoyed the most was the satirization of the common adolescent justifications for illegal downloading (or, as I prefer to call it, “theft”). My post gave rise to a deluge of replies on the subject, some heated exchanges, and basically ended up with me wanting to smash through the 140 character barrier and say what I think here.

This is a tired subject, and I don’t want to rehash the whole thing. Obviously you can’t un-invent the internet (nor would I want to, it’s one of humanity’s highest achievements), and obviously illegal downloading happens, and is here to stay. To be philosophical about it, the industry structure that has successfully rewarded musicians and others (engineers, producers, PRs, agents and so on) for their labour since the 1960s is in the process of dissolving. I’m confident that the wonders of capitalism will, within a few years, throw up a new system. But that hasn’t happened conclusively as of yet. The basic fact of economics is that we reimburse people for enjoying the fruits of their labour. A situation where people labour and are not reimbursed is untenable and unjust.

So my thoughts for the day are these. Firstly, while I am confident that we will realign, it’d be naive not to notice the danger that a generation of people are coming up who do not understand why they should pay for music at all. It seems churlish to restate, but let’s put it this way: recording isn’t free, instruments aren’t free, session players, producers, engineers, artists aren’t free. My time isn’t free either – I work hard and I expect to get paid for it. Maybe we are heading for a world in which all recorded music is free, but if so, be prepared for gig and T-shirt prices to rise.

Secondly, the idea that by stealing music from the internet you’re somehow crusading for justice against the big bad record labels is absolute fucking bullshit and needs to be stamped out. Britney Spears and David Geffen aren’t going to downsize their condo’s because you didn’t pay for a Fugazi album. The people hit first and foremost are the low-level workers in the industry and smaller or independent artists. Telling yourself otherwise is, in my opinion, more often than not a lame attempt to salve a guilty conscience.

This brings me onto point three: most people don’t know very much about the mechanics of the music industry, but feel qualified to theorize about its economics at length. I actually find this pretty insulting. I don’t spend my time wandering into hospitals / shops / schools / banks telling staff how much they should be being paid, or how much they should charge for any good or service, because I don’t know enough about it. Having worked in the music industry for a few years, I do a fair bit about it, and I think illegal downloading is a bad thing. As a point of proof, find me any indie record store or independent artist who thinks that file-sharing is a boon for them and their career. QED.

Point four is just a reply to one point someone made to me earlier. They said that by “stealing” my album they’d come to buy gig tickets and T-shirts which they would not otherwise have done. First up, lose the quote marks, it’s stealing, plain and simple (basically shoplifting for cowards). Secondly, that’s like saying it’s OK for me to steal a car because I’m going to put petrol in it. Duh.

Finally, if you’re going to be a thief and enjoy the products of the labour of strangers without paying for it, don’t fucking tell me about it! I know people are going to nick my music, at the end of the day. But fuck, don’t email me about it!

End rant. Sorry to go on and on about this. But like I say, I wanted to get it off my chest. Carry on.

A morning in Winchester listening to Loudon Wainwright is nothing to be sniffed at. These last few precious days before the tour madness kicks off in earnest are something to be handled carefully, spent well with friends and family. Come next week I’m off until Christmas, basically.

But the schedule never stops. A few things today. First of all, the new album is currently Album Of The Week on the Zane Lowe show on BBC Radio One. Which is very nice. If you tune in (7-9pm) this week, you’ll be able to hear tracks from the album before it officially comes out on September 7th.

Speaking of which.. This is the moment in the cycle where I encourage you all to get involved in pre-ordering the album. This is a wonderful idea for you, obviously, because you get the album on the day of release (and often some promotional stuff as well, see below). It’s also, in honesty, good for me too, because it’s important in this industry to try and maximize first-week sales. So it’s a win-win situation, basically.

So. If you’re in the UK, you can pre-order from Recordstore and get a signed album, if you’re quick. If they’re out, you can get signed albums from Xtra Mile as well. Or you could head to my favourite independent record shop, Banquet Records. There are plenty of others too.

In the USA and Europe, you can order from Epitaph themselves, which is probably your best bet. Americans could also have a look here for a free shirt with the album.

There are, of course, plenty of other places to look. But yeah, happy shopping, it’s been such a long build up for this album, I actually can’t wait until this one is properly in the public domain. Not long now.

Happy Monday morning everyone! To celebrate having survived another weekend (which involved both a whole heap of fun at Beautiful Days and a full game of tennis – tennis! – on Saturday), here’s a blog post with some treats.

As the title suggests, it’s a mere 2 weeks until Poetry Of The Deed is upon us. This is, of course, excellent news. One thing you can do now, if you so wish, is to pre-order the album. There’s a bunch of places you can do this (Amazon, HMV, Epitaph and so on). For those in the UK, my personal recommendation would be the good people at Banquet Records. Not only is the pre-order on for cheap, they’ve even renamed their website for me to promote it..! So head to www.franquetrecords.com and show them some love.

Secondly, I spent some time cutting together a “making of” video for The Road. The process of making the video was pretty gruelling, but going through the footage to make this was infintely more so. Basically, watching it all back sober was upsetting, ha. Check it out.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J4wBC7acCWo]

In an unprecedented break with recent tradition, the UK has decided to have something of a summer, for a few days at least. It’s actually quite weird, but in a good way. I shall be topping up my tan in the parks of London, while getting ready for uber-touring. I should probably be working out or something, HA!

Two tidbits for you today. Firstly, the good folks at Punknews.org continue with their frankly rabid coverage of my every move (I think they fancy me) by posting the second half of an interview I did with them in NYC, which you can read here. I must stop swearing in interviews. Or I guess just stop doing interviews when I’m drunk. One or the other. Anyways, enjoy.

Secondly, you’ll be pleased to hear that we’ve posted another song off the new album on my myspace. “Try This At Home” can be found in all it’s recorded glory right here.

OK, so a day late, but then maybe I was just lying in a darkened room being comprehensively underwhelmed by the fact that I wasn’t on Wogan after all. Maybe I’m not that much of a dick though, haha, you decide. The MacMillan Cancer Benefit show in Shoreditch yesterday was a lot of fun, and raised a heap of cash for a good cause. Result.

I don’t speak German (though I want to try and learn, ha!), but here’s a couple of things for my friends over in that part of the world. First up, I’m hoping everyone knows about the free show I’m playing at the Ramones Museum in Berlin on September 4th. It’s kind of an album launch show, and it’ll be fun. I’m also going to be back, with my band, in December. Dates on the gigs page.

Second up, my good friend Gunner, proprietor of Gunner Records (see what he did there?) is, as of today, releasing The First Three Years on CD and Vinyl in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. You can find order info at the link above. If you live in the UK and want to get hold of the vinyl, he’ll ship here too. Huzzah!

Finally, you can all go here and vote me up in the German college radio charts, if you’re into that sort of thing, and feeling helpful. Danke schon!

At the risk of devaluing my own hype-ometer, after yesterday’s post about how everything was pretty mental, I crept wearily into bed and slept soundly, only to be woken up by a text message from Ben (Million Dead). The text said “CNN? Christ, which crossroads did you sell your soul at, and where is it?” I replied with a bleary-eyed “What?” This was the start of a conversation that ended with me discovering that I had something of a feature on CNN last night. You can see it here. I’m slightly flabbergasted by it, to be honest. But hell, there’s me on CNN. Nice!

Anyways, back to the mega-update. Today we’re talking about releases. First of all, to reiterate for those who keep asking, Poetry Of The Deed will be out on 7th September (UK) and 8th September (USA). The single (The Road) will be available for download through iTunes, 7Digital and the like, on 31st August.

That’s all old news though; what’s new, for starters, is that I’m lucky enough to be releasing a split 7″ with Richmond Virginia’s very own Tim Barry. I’m very pleased about this, Tim is a fucking legend, one of my favourite songwriters, and an all-round gentleman of the highest order. The release is on coloured vinyl, is very limited and all that kind of thing. It’s coming out through Suburban Home / Epitaph. You can find out everything you want to know about it here. My song is an acoustic version of new song “Try This At Home”.

Next up, I contributed some vocal’s to a friend of mine’s project, Amongst The Pigeons. His album, “Music To Brush Your Teeth To”, has just been released, featuring my track and contributions by many others, including Beans On Toast. Well worth a look.

Right, I’ve just realized that I need to do another update tomorrow, specifically for people in Germany. So, watch this space for that one, especially, uh, if you live in Germany. For now though, here’s a link to me performing a new song for a podcast in Hoboken, NJ, earlier this year, courtesy of Issue Oriented / Ronen. Who knows, by time I post tomorrow maybe I’ll have been on fucking Wogan or something.

So I went away on holiday for a little while, which was fucking great actually, and then come home to find out that everything has gone batshit insane. Still trying to figure out if that’s because things built up during a week of having my phone switched off, or if it’s because things are, well, insane right now. Probably a bit of both. Anyways, there’s much to say, so I’ve broken things up into two parts. Right now I’m going to talk about news to do with shows. We’ll do news about releases, um, probably tomorrow.

First up, this Thursday (13th) I’ll be playing at 93 Feet East in London as part of the Macmillan Brick Lane Takeover. It’s for a great cause, in a great part of the world, and there are some awesome other bands (not least The Xcerts and Dave House). So there’s no good reason not to come along then, eh?

Secondly, for those on the other side of the world, there’s going to be a free instore show in Los Angeles on 15th September at Amoeba Records. Which, I think you’ll agree, is seven shades of awesome.

Continuing on the thread of American shows, I’m very, very pleased to announce that I’m going to be joining the second Revival Tour in November. Last year I did a few shows, and they were mind-bendingly great. I’m pleased to say I’m going to be playing a whole chunk more this year, from Las Vegas through to Florida. The dates can be found on my myspace. Good fucking times.

Here it is, at last. Enjoy.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gfGLzDQ7e-k]

I’ve just returned from a 3 day press trip to Germany, Berlin and Cologne to be precise. How strange life is. Having spent such a long time building things up the hard way in the UK, it seems, bizarrely, that there’s almost something of a hype going on in Deutschland. 20 interviews in 2 days got a little tiring, but it was a good experience. I’m back there for the night in September (the 4th) for a free show at the Ramones Museum in Berlin. Cool.

Tomorrow is, potentially, radio D-Day in the UK. With the promotion for the last record, we came on so very far, moving from occasional plays on specialist shows to day-time playlist. A major part of how we achieved this was thanks to people power – i.e. contributions from people like you, yes you, right there, in the shirt. I remain hugely grateful for that contribution. And now it looks like we might need your help again.

Tomorrow, Jo Whiley on BBC Radio 1 will be giving “The Road” its first day-time play on her show, which runs from 10am-1pm. So, tune in and have a listen, but more importantly, let her know you loved it. This can be done through the medium of text message, or by emailing the show. Then, on XFM, the single will be played on the drive time show from 3pm-7pm – same deal really, Dave Berry is on 83936 or dave@xfm.co.uk. Finally, the single can be voted for on the BBC 6Music Rebel Playlist at the moment, right here. If it gets enough votes it hits the daytime playlist there too.

Every little helps the cause with this kind of thing, so thanks in advance for your help.

So in the whole life-vs-offspring-blog battle I’m only actually about a week behind the times, which is better than it feels like, if you see what I mean. The final enthralling chapter of me and John’s adventures in Yanksville can be found over at the NME site now. Have fun reading, it’s been fun writing.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbiFg0jpn-M]