Use It Or Lose It / Flogging A Dead Goat

     So I just got an email from my friend Alexander in Germany that there is a boot of the Cursed Two LP going around, and before I get a bunch of questions or emails about it, I just wanted to say...GOOD!

     I was hoping to reissue this myself but it got over-complicated. Chris at Goodfellow was and still is a dear old friend of mine, and his label is defunct. The complication was never with him but the people that backed GFR financially and so, "own" it. I've been trying to get an answer out of the businessmen who own my sentiments for over 3 years now, just your basic "blink once if you won't sue me for putting out my own records years after you let them go out of print", and they've been blowing me off or telling me to come talk math while simultaneously trying to sell it to labels which are friends of mine, which then gets back to me. So it's been your basic classic Sit On The Catalog / Highest Bidder routine, a favorite move of middle management and heartless manipulators since the dawn of the phonograph. One thing I've always loved in hardcore is that it doesn't work like that. Our culture and our ideas are more important than commodities, and will always find a way to break through the bullshit. I'm very glad to see that it's still the case in 2012. They made 800 of the Cursed II LP (and I had to twist their arm to even do vinyl in 2005. How are CDs doing for you now?) which were gone in two weeks and then never repressed, so even the original print was under-run and it turned into a way-overpriced Ebay record. So, if it looks and sounds good, and it's cheap and accessible, this Cursed II boot sure as hell has my blessing. And yes, DWI is doing a great-looking redux of Cursed One this year. Check in with them for news on that. Now we just need a III and it's complete! 

     So thanks to Alex for the heads up, thank you Anonymous Euro for your efforts, and to the Heartless Manipulators (if you see this) - you can save the indignant email that you know you were never otherwise going to send, and go back to blowing it off. Our world isn't waiting for anyone's permission.

--- EPILOGUE ---

     Hey, there's not often anything to post officially about Cursed so while I'm at it, let me bring everything up to speed, because I still get asked a lot. Cursed is done as of one fucked up day in Germany but realistically, the many fucked up days that led up to it. Some of us still play in our bands, and some don't, but there's not going to be any more Cursed activity beyond represses of records, and definitely no reunion shows (someone's gotta not do it). Some very old friendships were casualties of our band and we're already years out of touch with each other. It was a wild ride and I don't think any of us would take it back for anything, despite the wreckage. A lot is made of bands like ours after the fact, especially in the internet age. Realistically, it was never grandiose, never larger than life. It was actually a lot smaller most of the time. We played our asses off at 30 confused people with their hands in their pockets in every town in the world for years, and loved it that way. We wouldn't have had this for a life if certain bands hadn't impacted us like they did, so it's great to see and hear that Cursed inspired a lot of younger and newer bands. But don't idolize. Anybody. Ever. I'll tell you for a fact that your band is better than ours simply because it's alive, it exists and you do it.

Take Care. 

CC

From Beyond the Grave

The last Cursed 7", recorded live in the UK for radio in the midst of the final tour, is now out on High Anxiety. If you're a store/distro or individual internationally, you can order it straight from No Idea by going HERE. There are 100 black, 250 purple and 650 gray/salmon colored. (NOTE: some of these colors are sold out as of 01.11.10) And hopefully 2010 is gonna bring reissues of one or more of the LPs. Thanks all. We're all still keeping busy playing in all our other bands. Quest For Fire is moving onto their 2nd LP, on Teepee. Burning Love and Mature Situations are both cranking out shows and records (about to record an LP for Deranged), and Crux of Aux is also keeping it ital. So there's that. Thanks.

Old Words and New Old Shirts

Hey, I just found this old Wavelength interview: HERE ..but mainly wanted to put the word out that Shirtkiller now has shirts of the below, and ton(ne)s of other great shit. Give 'em some love HERE. Did I say "love"? I meant "raaargh, go eat a bag of shit" or something like that.  

Postcards From The Edge

Pat from Poland's Daymares, a solid dude and a solid band, just sent over these pictures from the 2005 Warsaw show - the hottest, sweatiest room on the coldest night I can remember. Taken by Aneta Kot, see the whole set HERE. Pat also did an interview in Austria this last time that we'll have up soon. Meantim, Check out Daymares. And god dammit, check out Mönster from Berlin. I wish we'd all had more time together, boys. And thanks for the pix, Pat.

Posthumous Accolades and New Old Shirts

(....and dime-sized nipples. Willem, I think it's a tie.) 

So, Cursed.

We (were) Number One! We (were) Number One!

This week we won some official music industry reward for Cursed III as loud/metal album of the year. Thank you, Hamilton and RIP Frankie Venom (Teenage Head)! It should have been Mickey De Sadist. There, I said it. 

We (were) Number Two! We (were) Number Two!

...on Exclaim's Aggressive Tendencies' Top 10 LPs of 2008. Thank you Canada! 

As you may have noticed, we are dead. But thank you all, and to Sean Palmerston for accepting the award in our absence. Also, I found some old shirt designs I didn't want to see go to waste. One of them is an LFD one intended for the '04 reunion show (the DVD of which apparently is very near completion for a spring '09 release on Deranged) and the other, a Cursed design, was used on an older European tour but the print job was botched. So you can now get either of the below designs, awesome and not botched, from our brahs at Shirtkiller:

Also, Deathwish currently has these designs: 

...& give the Doomriders - Disfear split some love while you're there. Oh yeah - and we'll know in the next week or two what the plan is for the ltd picture disc version of III and a possible gatefold 180gram reissue of II. Woot! See? Death ain't shit. 

Fucking Nostalgic At 3AM

Some big news on the case today ... it still fucking sucks, and contrary to the rumored last shows people have been asking about, there is no such thing and anyone that tells you that any Cursed anything is ever happening anywhere, is full of shit. I just came home from seeing Young Widows here at Dees, some very near and dear friends that we spent a lot of time with on the road and shared all the best and worst of it with. Their new record Old Wounds is their best yet, and they fucking devastated tonight, and reminded me of all the good things and people that got me through some shit times in life - which in turn reminded me of the shitty things and shit people that drag down those good things.  Which outweighs the other? I can't say. As Integrity once put it, "a trial of humanity, going on inside of me - and the verdict will be the death of me". I miss you, old friends. 

Case Closed.

Okay, so it's a few months later, and nothing new is gonna come of this. No more resolution and no further plans. Thanks to everybody that helped us out. If you wanna keep up on what we're all up to, there's still Crux of Aux, Quest For Fire, Burning Love and High Anxiety going on. I was hoping to make photo albums of the tour, theres about 1200 pictures to go through, and when I do I'll put links up here.  GFR will still be reissuing II on vinyl and I'll be doing the BBC sessions 7" in the near future on High Anxiety. 

Good night and good luck. 

Gil from Mi Amore sent me this bunch of pictures, from Olivier's cottage in northern Quebec during an early East Coast Canadian tour that feels like a lifetime away. Thanks dude. And here's the link to The Void video by Karol Orzechowski (everyoneisdoomed.org). I'm still working on uploading the last tour diary and all the photos from it. Anyone out there with videos or anything like this you want to share, now's the time. Burning Love is still going to record, Mike's band Quest For Fire is about to tour and keeps getting better and better, check out the link on the left. The other guys still have Crux and Dan is doing some well-deserved Takin' It 'Eassse.  He won a blanket in a raffle and went North to get it. I'm thinking of what best to do next, if anything, besides camping. Where best to spend my energies. Every time something has ever tanked like this, I've dove into the next thing. It's a good and impressive trick, and the die-hard impulse is always there, but it's also possible that everything we ever needed to do or say, we did. I think I cut the brake cable so long ago that I wouldn't know. 

The Void from karol orzechowski on Vimeo

A Brief Recapitulation Of The Dramatic Events

It's a week later. We're all back in Ontario intact now. Thanks for everyone's help and concern. Sorry to have been away from computers while everyone was stressing about it but my mind was blown and I think that goes for all of us. I'm just starting to get back to everyone one at a time. 

It's like a sudden death that you can't wrap your head around, it hits you from a different angle every few hours, just as your mind is wandering from it you're aware again that it's still that day, that week, it's still happening. Anger, grief, frustration, suspicion, paranoia, futility, in that exact order. And repeat. It's been like that since that morning. 

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...

Mulheim Germany, the last, very fucking last morning of tour. And finally a good real squat show, where the promoter (Jan) and everybody from the place was nothing but great to us. Sleeping in a room on the 2nd floor of a locked building, on a compound that nobody lives on, Tomas is outside in the van, the 4 of us and Sam are set up in the band room. There are a lot of little details that keep going through my mind, like the cheesy votive candle I lit in the room. I am the last one to sleep, I'm washing some socks and underwear in the bathroom sink, having had no clean (or even dirty but dry) clothes for a good week, hoping they can dry by morning, which is only a few hours off. I take a bath in a gnarly bathtub, it is late and no one there to care, and it seems like a good enough way to wait for the ringing in my ears to subside enough to sleep. I wring out the wet clothes, go back in the room and hang them up on a bunk bed by the light of the candle that is still burning, blow it out. No trace of a bad vibe. Remember thinking how nice it is that no one is snoring. Fall asleep. Next thing is voices shouting, morning light, and the whole thing. Sam's bag missing, him asking if we're pranking him. Christian's bag also missing. Found outside the window, tossed and pissed in with selective items missing. Sam's bag, having contained all the tour's money, in cash, and several passports, not found. The formality of German cops, joking to Jan and the squat kids (there again getting breakfast ready) - "What do you want me to do, take DNA samples?" . I get it, it doesn't matter. It's a formality, it's already over my the time we know it has happened. Car ride. Brooding. Tension. Cursing. Questions racing through my head, such as who the fuck would go to all that trouble and then hang out tossing a bag right outside the building when they may have just woken us up? If they had to break a lock or force the door it would have made enough noise that one of us upstairs or Tomas (in the van just feet away) would have heard it. With no signs of tampering to the lock or door, how could anyone without a key have been in there? Was it before or after I went to bed? Et cetera. The list goes on but none of it is tangible, nothing you can point at except that it has happened and that everything is suddenly over. We get to Arnhem, to Reflections. Johan and Suzanne are being amazing about it, pragmatic even in the moment's chaos. We had decided on the spot that that was it. The fact that we still had to play that night was secondary. There are a lot more details, I'll save it for round two. End result is, someone did it, and got away with it. And the hole it left us in happened to be the last straw. If it had been a few years and a few hundred shows ago it might work otherwise, but for our reasons, we are taking the hint and deciding to trust the reaper on this one. If there's any news or plans that come up, we'll make them formal. But for now, we all need some time and space. 

There's been overwhelming support from all of you. It's encouraging, it's genuine, it's incredible, and at the same time equally maddening that all their sincerity and good wishes are compensation for the one motherfucker that killed it. It's hard to let that part go. Sorry to anyone that wrote in the past 10 days and didn't hear back. In the wake of it all, I wasn't anywhere near a computer and am just now getting to it all, trying to get to everyone one by one. 

Important - If you are involved with any donations or benefit shows, anywhere, please contact us directly about it so that we can direct any money raised in the right directions firsthand - no middlemen and no grey area. The possibility that anyone might take further advantage of the situation and doing bogus benefits, would blow my mind even further. For the record again, the cursed myspace page isn't related to us. If you or someone you know does it, please just put something up there saying that or better yet, quoting this. There are paypal donations via the Burning Love and Goodfellow sites. And thanks to everyone here in Toronto that got last week's benefit show together in lightning speed. Same for Willem & Co. and anyone else in Amsterdam doing the same. If you're anyone else taking the initiative, as a lot of people out there have, it's very much appreciated. Please get in touch so we can make it official. 

As for Cursed. This spring's shows were awesome. We got to play the shit out of Southern Ontario, all the places we cut our teeth on. All the basements, record stores, halls and clubs in our own stomping grounds, and all the awesome and energetic kids and bands in our own backyard. Don't let up. 

It was a high note to go out on.  Of course it would have been ideal to know it was coming. Or would it?  

There's a lot more to be said, it's still getting resolved, so stay tuned. I have a huge ton of photographs from the whole tour I'm gonna try and upload them somewhere online and make links here. Also, our friend Karol made a video to The Void that is fucking awesome and I'm gonna upload it here in the next few days. So keep posted. And hey - I know its inevitable but please try to discourage the internet rumor mill. I don't care to hear theories, they won't be anything that hasn't already been doing circles in my head, but I hear it's getting a little out of hand. Unless you were in that room, this here is the best information you're gonna get, and (like us) the most anyone can do is speculate. It's a big fat fucking question mark. But again, thanks everybody. 

When Your Number's Up

Yeah, you heard. Apparently, it gets even worse. That's all I know or even want to know for now. We got robbed at the very end of tour in a totally unreal, extremely sketchy series of events that still makes no sense at all, only leads to paranoia, anger and a total loss of faith. Passports, money, all the costs of the tour. Either way, whoever did it, it was a bullet in the head, the end of the line. A sudden and totally fucked up way for it to end, which I know will be fitting when I look back on it. All we could do was play the show, badly, and go our ways with whatever money we could muster. I hitched a ride back to Prague with Tomas. Since I can't do a fucking thing about it, I'm going to hang out with my girl, and friends, stare at some Czech mountains and try not to think about it. Needless to say, all outstanding plans are off. All this shit aside, thanks to everyone that helped out and travelled from all over for the shows on this tour, all the kids and bands we played and stayed with. Minus a few fucked up shows, it was probably the best tour we ever had. Thanks everyone for your good wishes. I'll elaborate when I'm home next week, for now - yes it's true, and yes it's over.

Cursedendom

Wow. So its been a week. Mike almost didnt make it after a passport discrepancy, but it wouldn't be a Cursed tour if something didn't get hopelessly fucked up right off the bat. Few days later we were all in one place, at Sam's in Amsterdam. You'll never believe how the boys spent those few days (hint: equal parts Cheeching and Chonging). Then we were joined by Tomas. We played Tillburg (Holland) first night and it was the first crack we had at the rented backline, kept having to stop but it was still good. Night of driving and straight to a 5am (aka 9am) ferry. The BBC was amazing and the people were great, we did the session in John Peel's own Studio 4. There's one to make your balls tingle. We made it to Brighton, a few hours late, met the Aussie kids that came over, and were joined by the Wraith for the whole of the UK. Short version: It's been some memorable late nights with them since then. There's so much to say already about this week's shows, too much to write standing up in a Birmingham club, there's a lot of photos and I'll try & put up a whole album somewhere and link it when there's time and a place to do it, which is tight with no days off. But it was great to see old faces and new ones in Scotland, Wales and all over England. It's a boner having to part ways with the Wraith (and Johnny's brightly coloured, erection-incompatible shorts) after London tomorrow, but somebody has to rape and/or pillage Europe, no?

*required van listening: Fun Things EP
*required van watching: Murder Party / Lost
*required van reading: Lovecraft

Get In The Plane

Thanks to everyone in Windsor, London and Kitchener involved in all the shows last weekend, it was an awesome wrap-up to the ONT/PQ shows. Here's the finalized info on all Europe/UK/Scandinavia shows that start in a few days. So stoked on these shows with the Wraith, Disfear and Rotten Sound, and seeing Samsterdam, Tomosh and everybody Over There. Don't know when/where we'll be able to update this on tour, but here's the itinerary, see you out there:

24-4 Tilburg/Netherlands @ 013
25-4 Brighton/UK @ The Engine Room + Wraith
26-4 Newport/UK @ Le Pub + Wraith
27-4 Durham (City)/UK @ Sherburn Village Hall + Wraith
28-4 Glasgow/UK (@ The Barfly + Wraith
29-4 Leeds/UK @ Brudenell Social Club + Wraith
30-4 Birmingham/UK @ The Factory Club + Wraith
01-5 London/UK @ The Underworld + Wraith
02-5 Caen/France @ Bar L’Excuse
03-5 Lyon/France @ Warm Audio
04-5 Milan/Italy @ The Garage
05-5 Vienna/Austria @ Arena
06-5 Prague/Czech Republic @ 007
07-5 Nurnberg/Germany @ K4/Zentralcafe
08-5 Dornbirn/Austria @ Schlachthaus
09-5 Karlsruhe/Germany @ Jubez
10-5 Meerhout/Belgium @ Groezrock
11-5 Groningen/Netherlands @ Vera
12-5 Hamburg/Germany @ Hafenklang
13-5 Gothenburg/Sweden @ Sticky Fingers
14-5 Oslo/Norway @ Garage
15-5 Stockholm/Sweden @ Debaser + Disfear + Rotten Sound
16-5 Malmö/Sweden @ Debaser + Disfear + Rotten Sound
17-5 Berlin/Germany @ Cassiopeia
18-5 Mülheim/Germany @ AZ
19-5 Amsterdam @ Bitterzoet

Making Puke a Treat Again

Whoa Guy. Europe is coming up fast. Last weekend was another bl'ast, filled with vomit, late nights and shit getting broken. This weekend is the last stand before we head off. Thanks a ton to Scallen, Dave Shaw and everyone associated with End Hits, same for Dan and everyone at the Blackdot in Montreal. Our late show got busted mid-Bionic and shut down, but we'll totally do it again first chance we have in the summer, and hit Sherbrooke, Sudbury and Kingston in the process. And thanks to Titan, Eating Glass (Spencer, you're not THAT bald...yet), and Living Darkness. Check out their show with Disfear coming up in T.O., and I'll have their 7" on hand in Europe, and hopefully the new Cheap Tragedies EP too.

So, just like old times, we started playing shows after a straight year off, and within the first few days we farted and eighteen tours came out. We're trying like the dickens to get our P2 visas for US shows when we get back, we've got some plans up our wizard sleeves about that. And as soon as the Japanese step up to it, we'll be working out the details of that tour (and with that, Australia and NZ). We're also on the verge of being able to announce a really fucking cool Canadian tour in the fall. In the next few weeks hopefully the details will get hammered out and we can make it official.

Everyone that wrote here about coming up from exotic US cities this weekend (Matt/Jeff/BJ and Dave Buston & Co), you'll have spots held at the door. The house show Sunday is small and space ltd, so get there early as you can.

*and yes, we have butt-tons of III LPs. 

R.I.P. David Kelly

As of this week, our world is down one extremely creative and unique soul. Dave Kelly (David Nanasanakwut-Pizhew) one third of Winnipeg's noise-rock kings, the legendary Kittens, and more recently of the Distants and Echohawk, passed away this Monday at his home in Los Angeles. Our hearts go out to Pony, Jahmeel, and all Dave's past and present bandmates, his friends and of course his family.   

Goodnight Bazooka. 

Okay, Who Hit The AWESOME Button?

 

Wow. All these shows have been so much fucking fun, every single one of them has been chaotic and great, seriously. Thanks to Sonic Boom for everything last weekend. And everyone in Hamilton. That show with Taken was audio & video-recorded so we're gonna put something DVD-like together with that and all the live footage from the last 7 years that we can muster.  By the way, III was Now Magazine's Record of the Week, and there's also some reviews up on Stereokiller, Lambgoat, PRP and others. Apparently the record really whoops a cheetahs ass (Wesley Willis, I miss you). 

This weekend's the second last of these blowouts. We head out tomorrow for Ottawa (there's been a late show added at End Hits), and Montreal (late show also added at BlackDot and the "special guaests" are indeed BIONIC (Mtl) and Monotonix (from Tel Aviv) - doors 12AM), and then Peterborough on Sunday. And what the shit - it looks like we'll finally have the proper Cursed III vinyl with us! 

Also, and this is kind of premature, but just 'cause people are asking - no it's not a sick April Fools joke. Yes, we are trying to set up tour in Japan and Australia, with the help of the good folks at Howling Bull and Resist Records, respectively. And if we can swing it, maybe New Zealand too. Hopefully it's gonna happen. As soon as I get more official word about it all, I'll post it here. 

 

P.S. "It's called 'Witchcraft', Shortbus."

Do We Owe THEM A Living?

Okay now this is getting awesome. So someone (as you can read below) grabbed a release show-only version of the LP (point of a show-only version of a record, if you don't know, is to create a memento of a specific night, meaningful after the fact to the buyer and seller alike) and stuck it directly on Ebay. A lot of people alerted me to this, I got a bunch of sand in my vagina about it, as you can read below, and in a day it went from $108 to the $800s, to the thousands, as many true Kids figured it out and did what they do best - fuck with shit, until it shot up into totally ludicrous sums and wrecked the auction. And again when another one popped up the next day. Did I mention I fucking love you resourceful saboteurs? 

Oh yeah hey, there's a show tonight! Oh yeah, the MUSIC! On the home field. Hamilton, with Taken, To The Lions, Hoosier Poet and Vatican Chainsaw Massacre. At the Casbah. We're recording it. Check for what tickets are left if you're local, may be all gone by today. But back on this weekend warrior train, and tour's only a few weeks off. Sunday is the Sonic Boom show (picture above is the screened one for sale at that show). 5pm, Bathurst & Bloor. All Ages, Free. 

Well that took all of a few days. It's fucking stupid, not because we didn't expect it to happen, it's a free country (and a freemarket), but because there were people there that actually wanted to own it (for $15) that couldn't get it, because some douche bought it just to do this with it. Sorry to single you out, but this is, well - pretty cunty. What the fuck is this, Flip This House? For Christ's sake, please don't pay some jackass $180+ for this. It's just a fucking record, with a picture I made stuck on the front, not a four leaf fucking clover. There's all kinds of limited, bizarro vinyl coming (pic disc, 180 gram gatefold) if that's your thing. Dumb dumb dumb. Wake me up in 2 or 3 more generations. 

EPILOGUE - Hah. Well today it was up over $180, and that was indeed getting fucking ridiculous. But right now it's at $830, which means either that German hardcore kids have got to it, or that someone's starting just flooding it with ridiculous bids. Good fucking work, if this was you. 

Working For the Weekend

 

Man. So the shows are underway and tearing us up. We seriously had no idea they were all gonna be this awesome, fuck. Thanks so much to everybody that's been coming out and making long drives to these. The Toronto show was so fun. Living Darkness tore it up (I'll have their 7" at all these Cursed shows), 50WattHead absolutely ruled (we're gonna get them back here and do some more hoser-sludge-oriented shows together in the summer), and Career Suicide needless to say, was off the fucking hook. Thanks to Lee's Palace, Donny, Adam T (for the disgusting projections), Pesci for DJing and everybody who helped. The whole night totally 

exceeded our expectations. And thanks to Spencer and Eating Glass, Titan and Our Father for the rulin' house show last night. Sorry to everybody that's asking but the ltd. release show edition of the LP is totally gone. We tried to limit them to one per person to cut down on dicks immediately putting them on Ebay, but as they say, you can't stand in the way of Progress. Also, I gotta say, I was assembling/gluing/numbering them while trying to watch our merch and lost track and started numbering them all 69/85 after a point. The regular press is on the way for anybody that preordered it (thanks for your patience) and the picture disc still to come close after that. All the 1st pressing info for the NA and Euro versions of III on vinyl are in the post below. And for vinyl nerds that have been asking, go to Dead Format (link at left) for all Cursed, Swarm and LFD vinyl pressing info. 

This weekend - Hamilton show with Taken, To The Lions and Vatican Chainsaw Massacre. There's still a few tickets left, try Dr.Disc. We're gonna be audio and video taping this so get your best moonwalks ready and wear that nice sweater that your aunt got you. And on Sunday, for anyone under 19 that missed the Lee's show, we're playing at Sonic Boom records (Bathurst & Bloor, Toronto) at 5pm. The show is free but there will be a benefit for the Friends For Life bike rally for people in Toronto living with AIDS (www.bikerally.org). So donate money and you get a ltd. silkscreened poster of the show. 

Good news for Dirty American Infidels: Yes, we are. Soon. Good news for everywhere else - yes, we are too. We came home from the first weekend and farted and 8 tours came out. So we have to sort out which we're gonna do and when and then we'll announce everything far & wide that we'll be doing for the rest of 2008. 

Vinyl/Solution

Tomorrow:

Okay. Bad news - Vinyl (N.American) got held up after okaying test presses due to some graphics/printing details, so we didn't have them this past weekend and won't have the regular ones (same with distributors) till sometime next week. Good news - the vinyl itself was done so we got some sent and will have 85 limited, hand numbered ones in different jackets that we'll have at the Toronto LP release show (hence the term) on Saturday, and the Burlington house show on Sunday. All in all, the 1'st NA pressing is 700 black, 300 grey/white marble and 85 release show edition. And the 1'st European press is 500 black, 250 clear/black, and 250 clear. 

"Volume Machismo" Year Seven

It's real!

Nothing against the leaked version (what was going around was unmastered) but the actual LP is done and sounds pretty boss. OK'd the test press the other day, SAMO did a bang-up job of the vinyl. Thanks Paul, Adam and everyone there, and Ali - as always. The official release is tomorrow (March 11) for indies and the 25th for the big bastards. As for the dates listed below, second (late) shows have been added to Ottawa and Montreal. And even more new shirts are coming in time for this weekend and this whole run of spring/summer shows. Also, hey - a bunch of people seem to be driving from different parts of the States and other provinces. If this is you and you're coming a long way, leave a comment with your names and I'll make sure there are tickets held for you at the door where there's still room. Some shows are sold out but move fast on the 2nd shows (MTL/OTTAWA) because these are primarily small venues and house shows.

Heads Up...

...Here's the final Europe/Scandinavia/UK list:

(UK dates sponsored by Rock Sound)

24-4 Tilburg/Netherlands @ 013

25-4 Brighton/UK @ The Engine Room

26-4 Newport/UK @ Le Pub

27-4 Durham (City)/UK @ Neville's Cross WMC

28-4 Glasgow/UK @ Barfly

29-4 Leeds/UK @ Brudenell Social Club

30-4 Birmingham/UK @ The Factory Club

01-5 London/UK @ The Underworld

02-5 Caen/France @ L'Excuse

03-5 Lyon/France @ Warm Audio

04-5 Milan/Italy @ The Garage

05-5 Vienna/Austria @ Arena

06-5 Prague/Czech Republic @ 007

07-5 Nurnberg/Germany @ K4/Zentralcafe

08-5 Dornbirn/Austria @ Schlachthaus

09-5 Karlsruhe/Germany @ Jubez

10-5 Meerhout/Belgium @ Groezrock Festival

11-5 Groningen/Netherlands @ Vera

12-5 Hamburg/Germany @ Hafenklang

13-5 Gothenburg/Sweden @ Sticky Fingers

14-5 Oslo/Norway @ Garage

15-5 Stockholm/Sweden @ Debaser Slussen

16-5 Malmo/Sweden @ Debaser

17-5 Berlin/Germany @ Cassiopeia

18-5 Mulheim/Germany @ AZ

19-5 Amsterdam/Netherlands @ Bitterzoet

...and the final Canadian ones (note Sarnia/NF venue change & added late shows):

03.14 Sarnia @ RCN Hall (1420 Lougar) w/Nailsplitter, CA13, Weakness, Our Father

03.15 Niagara Falls @ 4555 Queen St w/Our Father, SAW (AA)

03.16 Etobicoke @ Brickyard BBQ w/Vilipend, Titan, Strawman Fallacy ($8/AA)

03.22 Toronto @ Lee's w/Career Suicide,50WattHead, Living Darkness (19+/$8)

03.23 Burlington @Pomona House w/Our Father, SAW, Eating Glass, Titan

03.28 Hamilton @ Casbah w/Taken (Reunion Show), VCM, HP, To The Lions

03.30 Toronto @ Sonic Boom (In-Store. Free w/NP Food Donation) 5PM

04.04 Ottawa @End Hits Records w/Riot Service. $10 8PM (407 Dalhousie)

04.04 Ottawa @End Hits Records - LATE SHOW w/Vatican Chainsaw Massacre
04.05 Montreal @ The BlackDot w/Black Ships, Barnburner, Kraken. $8

04.05 Montreal @ The BlackDot - LATE SHOW w/Bionic +1

04.06 Peterborough @ Underdog w/LivingDarkness, Eating Glass, Titan (9pm)

04.11 Windsor @ Coach & Horses w/Endless Blockade, XBrainiaX (19+)

04.12 London @ Wippet Lounge w/EndlessBlockade,Nailsplitter,Black Ships,Midwives

04.13 Kitchener @ Cory's House w/Endless Blockade, Black Ships, Father's Day, VCM

New shirts. Relapse has one up there now (it's a 16th Century woodcut - who the fuck is Machine Head?), Reflections has a new exclusive one too, and our friend Brody will be making our new ones for these shows and be selling them (as well as all High Anxiety band shirts) afterwards. Link coming soon. Sean Pearson is making a video for the III intro, pretty cool so far. I'll post it here when it's done.

Exclaim Magazine has a Cursed story up right now. With the exception of the part about Donny (he's independent, not inexperienced), it's pretty thorough. So thanks Keith and The Grza. There's also a Decibel Piece by Shane from Playing Enemy, and there's Big Cheese, ChartAttack, Give Me Back, Rock Sound and a bunch of zine interviews coming out, and we're going to be doing a BBC Radio One Session on April 25, before the Brighton show. Do It To It.

Hands Of Doom

Hey. So here's the update. Basically Christian's hands were pretty totaled from years of thrash and hard labour (yeah, I know, there's a "U", it's Canadian. Weird, huh?). He had to have double surgery and then total rehabilitation for them, and this was the only time in the last bunch of years that we've been off the road long enough to do it. One hell of a painful uphill fight but he's back on his feet like Cool Hand Luke. We're getting ready to resuscitate this bitch by March when the record comes out officially and we tour. We've had no P2 Visas for US shows for a while now, that's why we haven't

 been playing that charming little country, but we'll have it sorted out by summer. And we'll announce the specifics of the Ontario release shows here once we decide on the details. 

All three of our other projects (Crux, Quest For Fire and Burning Love,  are all recording for different things in the next 2 weeks. There's a second pressing of the Cursed I gatefold reissue on Trash Art (see link below). Also, the III vinyl is going to be both gatefold and picture disc. All the III lyrics have been put up (see link on the left). There's some newer interviews going around now too, to answer life's greater questions and the mysteries of the universe. 

We'll throw them up here too. 

Stay Classy.

P.S. New Rotten Sound. New Naomi Klein.

...I can't decide which is sexier.

P.P.S. Oh yeah, Here's Donny's home video of the III studio sessions, featuring a dead bat and the longest string bend ever, so you can taste and hopefully smell the magic (there's a PT.II yet to come with a one-man watermelon fight):