a blog of many things good.

first, in a deck clearing way, people asked us to do this so we did:

EUROPEAN DISCO

a complete 21 song collection of b-sides and remixes and otherwise unavailable stuffs, with loads of arts by lewes and relevant lyrics and linernotes. if you buy it, we'll have money to make more shirts, thus keeping the product cycle going and inadvertently aiding the death of humanity by encouraging investment and emotional attachments to material possessions. but, you still should buy it cos there's some good songs, like.

anywayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

hello. good news then (for you)

might as well just show you the press release:

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johnny foreigner and alcopop are proud to present "certain songs are cursed", a four song frisbee-ep, available 18th April. these songs are the first fruits from 2 months of writing and recording in our home town for our third proper album. It's going pretty great thanks, we think we're nearly done.

One of the most cool and weirdly fulfilling things about being in a band is hearing stories from strangers about how your music has soundtracked various important moments in their lives; how your sounds are forever intimately tied into someone else's most awesome memories; their perfect summers, legendary roadtrips, first kisses with future lovers. We're flattered by both chance and choice. It's these happy stories of synchronicity that are sure to warm our hearts long after we lose whatever skillsets we have and the bayliffs kick the door in. Certain songs tho, are forever cursed. Think of your own; perhaps by chance it spoilt an otherwise perfect moment 10 years ago and still repeatedly pops up to remind you. Maybe you selected it yourself, to frame an event that never transpired. Maybe it just pure shits on your ears, and every radio play, or advert sync, or mentions by random girls about how the way he sings is like, so sexy tho, feels like god laughing as he punches you in the face. Whatever, calm down. you'd never select it again but it's out there, public property for ever, and permanently fused to that kiss that didn't, or that night you shouldn't have, or that awful time you...

of course, such hippy talk is entirely personal and subjective, which is why we can say with 100% confidence, that none of these four songs are in anyway cursed, hex'd, star-crossed or otherwise bedeviled, and any displeasure you encounter whilst listening is entirely your own problem. good luck!

for this release, us and alcopop have chosen to eschew standard packaging in favour of a more practical, if less catalogable design we firmly believe will revolutionise the upcoming summer, where, as everyone knows, there's never a frisbee around when you need one. our artwork, as always, is drawn by lewes herriot.

certain songs are cursed:

1. what drummers get
2. twin sisterzz

3. johnny foreigner vs you (cursed version)

4. certain songs

we would also like it to be known that, despite having no luck so far, our campaign to get wil wheaton to write and perform a minute long monologue will continue until we at least get a ghost written "no" in reply. The sampled voice on "certain songs" was sent anonymously to us, if it's you, then thank you.

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frisbee-ep. frisbeep: we'll have a superltd amount to sell on tour, so best pre-order your frisbeep from alcopop right here. frisbeep. + other rad deals from our label involving other rad bands. rad/rad/frisbeep. anyway, thats enough talky, listen up these:

What Drummers Get by johnny foreigner Johnny Foreigner Vs You (Cursed Version) by johnny foreigner

we hope you like them and go buy our frisbeep and are all like, shit i cannot wait for this album. back soon, with news of actual european discos. that we're playing. gigs. at.

frisbeep.

and you'll miss it.

okaysies, i'll try and keep this brief.

Blink 182 are playing the NIA in birmingham on July 1st. There's no supports confirmed. You can totally see where this is going can't you. aim high or stop playing with that rifle.

three reasons.

1) its fucking blink! they pretty much invented what we do. well, okay, the pixies invented it but we're too young to call them our own and that generation never got the guitars to sound loud enough. It's weird, our band seems to tread a fine line between indie world and rock world. there's this big gulf between the two that belies the fact its both people with guitars playing songs to more or less the same demographic, and nothing shows this up more than when interviewers think i'm joking when i tell people that blink song structures, sense of dynamics, chord sequences, harmonies, guitar sounds, drum fills, are totally aspirational.

2) its fucking birmingham! a wise taxi driver once told me, you can't be a hero in yr own town. it totally doesn't bother us that we're more likely to be "recognised" in tokyo or toronto than birmingham, but, just for once, it would be nice to pull off something spectacular in our own back yard.

3) its the NIA! where i work irl, counting boxes of merch on and off trucks, selling overpriced tshirts and explaining the concept of "skinny fit" to tragically obese teenage girls. It's a pretty rad job if you ignore all that stuff and the long hours, complete disregard for health and safety procedures, and card machines that don't fucking work ever. Just so y'all know, this preplan is mostly kellys idea, not just a way to boost my ego over my friends at work so i can roll up backstage stoned at 1 in the afternoon and be say - hey, you load all these boxes off and count everything and sort it into sheet order and count it again then get the additions off another truck and count them and then merge them into the first lot and count them again and agree the figures and divide them amongst the stands and recount them and make a display and arrange the stand and sort out the fucking card machine, i'm going to go stand on that big stage and play guitar really loud.

but that'd be pretty sweet also.

SO GUYS, HOW THE FUCK DO WE ACHIEVE THIS? Blink are like, in another world to us. it's not like we know someone who knows them, there's like a full 7 degrees of separation and all of them degrees are full of other peoples motive to put some OBVIOUSLY LESS APPROPRIATE support band on the bill instead.

suggestions please? are you related? do you share a house with their agent? do you know a guy who knows a guy?

our (clueless) gut feeling is, if we can get their attention, we'd be in a better position than trying to worm our way thru agents and the necessary industry bullshit. Those guys were/are a properly working band, they put in countless hours diy punking themselves around before they broke, and as such it'd be nice to believe they had respect for bands who do the same thing; more at least, than for bands who use major label money to appear from nowhere into the mainstream, and would traditionally be shoehorned onto a major tour like this.

so do we just try a frantic twitter campaign? sky writing? DO THEY GOT FORMSPRING YET?it's not like we're asking for a ride home after; a 7.30 opening slot to a half full arena will be legendary to us.

so yeh. please write any ideas in the box below and we'll get back in a few days and form an actual plan.

chances are this will never happen, fucking lost alone will play, and you can come up to me on the merch stand and give me a commiseration high five.

but for now, let us discuss the intangible possibilities of what ifs and maybes.

okay goodnight

xlex

talk to me.

hellos

sorry for being quiet, we're dead busy. our album is sounding truly fucking immense and thats pretty much all we care about. thanks for everyone who sent in photos for artworks, its shaping up well good. mostly everything is useable and some HI PATTY are fucking stunning. we still have a bit of time to play with (we're between 2 weeks to a month late in life) so if anyone else wants to get involved then mail us for the briefs. we'll be using some for the first single art too, eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep

only, it won't be a single, it'll be an ep, called, certain songs are cursed. there's something else kinda awesome about it too but its all super secret for a couple more weeks. YOU WILL SEE.

anyways, favourtime again. We need some speech samples. I don't know how popular this is going to be because noone likes the sound of their own voice, but, what would be all kinds of good, would be if you guys sent us these samples. are you in? if not, s'probably best to wait for the next bus..

certain songs are cursed. they hang out uninvited in your head. it's nothing to do with concious, thinking you. there's who you want/try to be and then there's who you really are, and these are the songs that make the wedge that splits the two and shows you the difference. they'll remind, with pin sharp accuracy, of the smell of ex lovers, the laughter of old friends, of lost atmospheres and environments and scenery and pointless detail, and everytime you hear them by chance (and it's always by chance) it's akin to a needle, scratching at a part of your soul that scientists have yet to document. There's nothing you can do but relax; get old and build a tolerance, and in a few years time, when you're sitting in a bar or a club or around a friends kitchen, and some playlist expurges those hideously overfamiliar opening daggers, you'll be able to quell those emotions within the briefest of facial tics and noone around you need ever know that, out of all the postal service and notwist and owls you listened to that summer, double bright eyes albums, hole bside compliations, repeated plays of goodbye sky harbor, you had yr worst ever heartbreak to fucking run by fucking snow patrol.

have you been luckier? unluckier? have a song you believe to be cursed for a less embarrassingly emo reason? TALK ABOUT IT INTO THE MICROPHONE PLZ.

what would be ideal, would be between 20seconds to a minute of YOU just talking. if you can do it into yr computer or phone and send us the file or a link to the file, that'd be ideal. we can rip stuff off video files too, quality doesn't matter so much, but you gots to do it in as quiet a place as possible.

there's no real need to mention the song itself; it's probably best to be as un-namedroppy as possible. just like, talk normal. remember, this is a sample on a music record, not The Tumblr.

rad. YOU'RE GOING TO BE ON OUR ALBUM! you still gotta go buy it tho!

please send files or links to johnnyforeigner@hotmail.co.uk, include yr name for the credits, and mark it BEHOLD MY SPEECH TO YOU so we can easily find it amongst the offers for shitty shoreditch shows and cheap sporting goods mails.

THANK YOUUUUUUUUUUUU

ha, stoners

y'know that compilation we just released? s'alright yeh? 2 things:

1) there when you need it was the working title for our alcopop ep. i thought i was being clever reusing the name but now i'm worried that in 100s of years, when internet historians are digging up our career, they'll see references to the working title and assume that this compilation is that ep. obviously this will keep me awake at night far more than it will you. A way better title appeared in my head too late, if i told you, you'd all be like, wow alexei you're so cool, but i think we should use it for something else so i daren't mention it in relation to this in case these interneteologists fall into a similar trap and give up on us.

2) we, um, forgot a song from our roundup. ooops! it's a cover of the most beautiful widow that we did for artrocker in summer. have it for free: (thanks dave from soundcloud for upgrading us!)

the most beautiful widow by johnny foreigner