Firstly, huge apologies for the lack of blogs recently, this is the first in a series of entries called The Catch-Up Blogs!

What do you do when an opportunity presents itself to spend a weekend with a Scottish folk legend & his amazing family in a sleepy town north-west of Sydney?

You go. And you come prepared for anything, because anything can happen when Dougie MacLean & his wife Jenny are in charge.

The town of Colo hosted Dougie and his family as a stunning end to his Australian tour, which also served as a part holiday. Sunas was asked to perform in the series of concerts over the weekend, which was just an excuse for a big catch-up, really.

As we drove into the retreat, an extremely tanned man came over to greet us. Dougie, in his own personal style of greeting everyone, was, well, brown. There's no other word to describe the colour of his skin, he was a deep brown hue. Baked is the word I would use!

'What do you think of my tan, eh?!' was the first sentence out of Dougie's mouth. Dougie's daughter Julie told me that he just loves the sun (not surprising seeing as it rains in Dunkeld 300 days out of the year) and spent literally about four hours per day of the entire tour soaking up the rays. I just laughed. Bridge & I were now the whitest people there -not really a great Australian representation!



The first order of business was a dip in the lovely freshwater creek, which was incredibly refreshing. Again, Bridge, Paul & I slathered on the sunscreen, ever-protective of our pasty skin, while Dougie just ran straight in.

The walk back to the retreat was followed by an absolutely incredible foody chat between Paul & piper Ross Ainslie, who have found a kinship when it comes to anything gourmet. After that it was on. Silences would be punctuated by Ross & Paul discussing in mouth-wateringly delicious detail the dinner menu they would be preparing for us. There were no problems from anyone else!

The next day we were in concert prep. Floors were vacuumed, chairs were placed out, sound gear was meticulously set up. Then Jenny informed us that the ABC were coming to film the concerts. None of us are particularly keen on being filmed, particularly by the ABC! We get uncomfortable, then we man up, get onstage & then... nothing else matters. The music takes over & everything feels right.

Concerts with Dougie mean you are kept on your toes. There was another local band performing with us called Frozen, so rehearsals began in earnest. Dougie songs, tunes with Frozen, and Mannie being asked to accompany Ross on an epic set of tunes, he on bouzouki and Ross on the Highland bagpipes. I could literally see the 'freakout' cogs turning in Mannie's head, but the rest of us knew Mannie would do a great job & were really proud of him. It didn't stop him requesting six or seven rehearsals with Ross though, to which he good-naturedly obliged!



The ABC crew arrived and we met a lovely chap called Martin and his assistant Monica who were busy interviewing Dougie & Ross and filming our rehearsals. Martin started chatting to Mannie, and before Mannie knew it, Martin had set up the camera and began interviewing him as well! I had a bit of a giggle that I'd gotten away with being interviewed before I heard Mannie say to Martin, 'if you need any more info you should speak to Sarah, she knows everything about our tours & trips', to which Martin's gaze (& camera) were directed straight at me. Time for my 'freakout' cogs to turn! The entire time I was being interviewed I was thinking (along with my other bandies, no doubt), 'Speak slowly & don't swear!’ (which, after BBC Cornwall, is the new band motto).

Meanwhile the concerts went off with a bang. Like all good things, it was all over so quickly! Highlights were Dougie yelling at the crowd to ‘Make weather noises (cue audience making terrible whooshing sounds), Dougie’s son Jamie playing the VB beer carton as percussion, Mannie & Ross playing crazy piping tunes and the enormous session of everyone performing the finale of a mash-up of ‘Singing Land’ and ‘Waltzing Matilda’. They were both pretty epic shows, and we finally got to fulfil a long ambition of playing Ready for the Storm with the man himself. Magic.




And then one of the best moments was everyone chilling out on the couch under the carpet of stars with a cider and listening to silence. What a great, great weekend!

We are still here! Now that we have a bit of time, we're preparing for the next album (and enjoying a tiny bit of downtime between the festival seasons!). There's also some huge news afoot which we should hopefully be able to reveal very soon.

Thanks for all the emails! We will reply to them all, it's just sometimes it takes a little time, especially when Masterchef is on).

Sarah, Paul, Mannie & Bridget

After Paul’s nice shiny blog about snow and fun, here’s the real truth. For those of you who think being in a band is a glamorous, exciting and easy job, I have news for you:

It’s not.

Well, not quite, anyway. The performing part is about 20% of the package you see in front of you. The rest is a massive flurry of action behind the scenes: networking, rehearsing, travelling to and from gigs, setting up and packing down from gigs, recording, correspondence via email & phone, promotion, festivals, planning and organising.

To a musician, the performance side is simply the best part of being in a band. To a manager, that sweet moment after booking a nice gig is the best part. When you do both like I do, these two elements combined are moments of pure and utter elation.

In mid-February I received a call from former Súnas member and good friend Brendan who asked if we would be interested in playing a nice gig on Sat 13th March for the upcoming St Patrick’s Day celebrations. I said of course, where’s the gig?

He replied, ‘Russia.’ As you do (my hands started to shake here)! I have to say big thanks to Brendan for thinking of us for this gig, because if it wasn’t for him I wouldn’t be writing this blog for starters. From there, it was three weeks of the most incredible amount of stress that I have ever experienced in my life (and this was even before we had boarded the plane!), but I would do it all over again in a heartbeat. Here’s how our amazing gig came about:

We were asked to submit an email to an entertainment agency, and the email was to list who we are, our sound, hi-res pics, pricing and video. Bear in mind, all we knew was that the gig was in Russia (no idea where), it was for one night and if we were successful we’d be flown there & back with all expenses paid. Well we in Súnas don’t do anything by halves. Paul & I worked for NINE HOURS to get this email together – the majority of it was a crash course in learning how to cut the footage taken from our concert at Perthshire Amber last October. Once the email was satisfactory to our critical eyes we finally sent it off in the wee hours of 17th Feb (something along the lines of 2am) and then played the waiting game.

It was five long days before we heard anything. Because I was listed as the primary contact, poor Mannie, Bridge & Paul were on tenterhooks in daily contact with me on the off chance that I had heard something. My most used expression during that period was, ‘As soon as I hear anything I’ll let you know’.

On Sunday 21st I was contacted by a man named Alan who said that it ‘looked as though’ his clients liked us and would ‘probably’ go ahead with us.
That wasn’t a yes in my book! I updated the others, but we still waited. More phone calls flowed between Alan & I regarding visa types and contracts etc, but I couldn’t do anything because we still hadn’t received the all clear! I’m sure he was thoroughly irritated by my constant calls, but I wasn’t going to get my band’s hopes up on the word ‘probably’ (having said that however, Paul gathered everyone’s passports at Sunas HQ, just in case). Regardless of everything, I had a great feeling about this possible trip from the word go. And I bloody held onto it over the next week, let me tell you! Don’t tell me we can’t do it, tell me that it’s a problem and that we can get around it. Never take no for an answer.

After another week of tense waiting, we were given the Official Yes late on Friday 26th Feb. I received one more phone call from Alan telling me all about the gig: It was a private gig for an oil & gas company in a town called Yuhzno-Sakhalinsk in very far eastern Russia. So far eastern that it wasn’t even on the mainland, it is on Sakhalin Island located above Japan. We would be gone for five days in total, including our performance. Alan finished our call with: ‘You need to organise the visas pronto’. I had heard from a few people that Russian visas were a logistical nightmare, so I got straight onto the Russian Embassy website and brushed up on my knowledge. We had to get the visas sent to the embassy in Canberra by Wednesday 6pm at the absolute latest for them to be processed and returned before we flew out. However (of course), it wasn’t as easy as that. Firstly, which visa do we apply for? Business or tourist? My first inclination was tourist, since we were only performing one gig – but because we were performing a gig I then looked at the possibility of the much more complicated business visa. Oh help.

Cue my introduction on Monday 1st March to our absolute angel Svetlana, the company contact who spoke beautiful English tinged with a Russian accent – she sounded like someone straight out of a Bond movie. Svetlana told me we only needed to apply for a tourist visa, and could I email our scanned passports ASAP to book flights please?

Bugger. Our scanner had packed it in. So instead I called Mannie & that night we went straight to his work and scanned the passports (thanks Theo!) while he filled in & signed his visa form & gave me a lovely visa photo that made him look like an illegal immigrant. I then drove across town to Bridget’s place where she filled in her form & gave me a visa pic that was absolutely stunning – she’s so photogenic, not even a visa pic would look bad! Paul & I added our absolutely awful pics – he looks like he hasn’t slept for a year & I look like I’ve swallowed a lemon. I was organising our applications the next morning and feeling quite overwhelmed with the documents we needed when I stopped and looked at our visa photos laid side by side. It made me cack myself laughing!

So I sent out an All Points Bulletin to my bandies:



HAVE YOU SEEN THESE MUSICIANS

• known to be of the Celtic music equivalent

• Slightly hairy, but not smelly

• Will do anything for a pint

• Considered cuddly and extremely dangerous

• Have a penchant for banjos

• Also known by rather naff nicknames

SUBJECTS ARE KNOWN TO SPONTANEOUSLY BREAK INTO SONG OR TUNES. ENSURE YOU KEEP YOUR DISTANCE. IF YOU SEE ANY OF THESE HEATHENS, PLEASE CALL 1800-PATCHOULI.

Aren’t we a pretty bunch. After everything was organised I was speaking to Mannie's wife Annette and filling her in with all the details. The first thing she said was, 'Thank God you didn't send those awful passport photos with the visa applications!' Oops, sorry Annette :)

Lesson: When stressed, find something to laugh about. It lifted my spirits tremendously! There were times through it all when everyone around me was doubtful that it would go ahead, but I chose not to listen. If worst came to worst, it would still have been lovely just to have been asked.

I was then in almost hourly contact with Svetlana. There was so much paperwork we needed for the visa applications, such as booked flights, hotel reservations, hotel vouchers, official invitation to Russia from Svetlana’s company, official invite and details from the Russian travel agent, official ministerial stamped papers allowing us in the country …

Tuesday passed, Wednesday arrived. Svetlana had sent through everything except the Russian travel agent invitations & the official stamped ministerial invitation. We had until 6pm to get the applications in the post before I would panic and have to fly to Canberra in person to get everything done. I spoke very nervously to Svetlana that morning, and she said that it would come through, she would get it organised.

I arrived home from work at 3pm and Svetlana had emailed letting me know that we would receive the documents by 4:30pm that afternoon. I had two flute lessons to teach from 4-5pm, and as soon as my second student had left just after 5pm I raced to the computer, my heart in my mouth.

No email.

Paul already had that defeated look on his face. OhGodohGodohGod, please don’t let this be happening. So started my frantic international dialling to Svetlana, over 20 times which normally put me straight through every time, but Murphy’s Law, this time I was unlucky. I emailed her, knowing she was probably as stressed as I was, but hoping to receive something soon!

5:05pm. Nothing.

5:10pm. Nothing. I will an email to magically appear in my inbox.

5:15pm. Still nothing. I felt like a group of rubber bands stretched to breaking point.

At 5:20pm I sat back in my chair. I couldn’t believe it. For the first time in the past two insane weeks I actually doubted that we would be going Russia. I looked at Paul and tried desperately not to show on my face that the infamous Súnas optimist was firmly and completely pessimistic at that very moment.

5:25pm. An email from Svetlana marked urgent and containing two words (‘It’s done!’) and multiple attachments arrives in the inbox. I stare at it in complete shock and then scream at Paul, ‘IT’S HERE!!!’

5:30pm. Each application is printed and assembled in military precision. I am focused, I am in the zone. I am actually beyond obsessed, I am completely BAT-SHIT MENTAL.

5:35pm. We’re in the car, gunning it to the closest Express Post Box (literally only two minutes away, but we weren’t taking any chances). Paul is driving as though he’s in a rally and we’re in the lead.

5:40pm. I stand at the post box and post the now-very-thick application.

And then I burst into tears. I just could not believe it. It was gone, we could focus on being excited!

Everything went well until Friday morning. We had flown down to Hobart for the Fleadh Ceol and had just finished having a morning coffee (good sign) when my mobile rang. A lady with a thick Russian accent named Natasha (I kid you not!) was calling because there was a problem with Paul’s visa application.

I was gobsmacked, felt the familiar tightening in my stomach and prepared for the worst, only to be told that we had simply filled in the wrong form. If we filled in a specific one and faxed it to her straight away she would process Paul’s visa as long as we sent the original that day. So we called on the magnificent Alistair, publican of the New Sydney Hotel & host of the Fleadh Ceol, commandeered his computer & printer then set about filling the damn form in. It was a lot more detailed than mine, Bridget’s & Mannie’s! Luckily, there was an Australia Post next door to the pub & the form was faxed off before midday with no problems. I emailed Svetlana the details of what had happened, and we spent the remainder of the day getting ready for our gigs at the Fleadh.

Fate was surely smiling on us that day, because at 4pm Svetlana sent me a text telling me that she had spoken to the embassy in Canberra and that our visas had already been completed and sent in the mail!

There was just one other thing to say to my bandies: WE’RE GOING TO RUSSIA, BITCHES!

Needless to say, I was utterly elated

Sometimes we get a gig that is just so odd, so outlandish that we have to accept it. But there’s been nothing like this before.

We were invited to Russia, for a single show.

I won’t go into the details of how we got this gig, as Sarah has a whole separate blog coming on the hair-ripping agony that was putting this together. I’m just going to write about the trip.

It started at 3am on the Thursday, getting to the airport to catch the first flight to Sydney. Because of the extreme late notice of the gig (we had under two weeks, from the first call to leaving), we’d missed all the direct flights, so we had to catch a flight from Brisbane to Sydney, then on to Seoul where we’d stay the night, then catch the plane on to Sakhalin Island in the morning. And so began the first adventure. We only had an hour and a half window between landing domestically, claiming all our bags and transferring to the International Terminal, and checking in. The minimum time allowed is three and a half hours. But we managed it, huffing and puffing a guitar, bouzouki, mandolin, flute case, fiddle, bodhran case, four bags and a cd briefcase between us.

More adventures in Seoul. The check-in chap in Brisbane had marked it so we would reclaim our bags in Seoul for the night stopover (which we were glad of as the thought of the instruments sitting somewhere was somewhat hairy). So, we landed, cleared customs, immigration, and picked up our bags… only to discover that no one had heard of our hotel. After literally walking miles around Seoul airport (possibly the most boring in the world, except for the food) we eventually found out that the hotel was actually inside the ‘sterile’ area of the airport (where we’d got off the plane) and there was no way back inside! After much more walking from disinterested Korean help desk to disinterested Korean help desk, we eventually had someone from the airline graciously check us in on the next flight (8 hours early and after many managerial phone calls), and give us the boarding passes that would allow us back in. After all that, we had a pretty decent night’s sleep after a ripping supper of Korean food.



I think we all expected the leg to Russia to be on an old DC10 or the like, but in fact is was a wonderfully new 777. We were still flying Asian Airlines at this point. Air Russia would come later…

So, my first view of Sakhalin Island. It wasn’t snowing, but it was cloudy and it looked fecking cold. Conifer forests made way to very uniform streets and square, almost stereotypical Russian buildings. There was a lot of grey. The airport was very scary, with just a couple of smoke-stained rooms, the immigration booth and a lot of very hard-looking guards, most of them blonde women who could probably kill me with a single judo chop. We met a very happy-looking Svetlana there, our wonderful Woman in Russia, and were quickly bundled into waiting 4WDs to the hotel.



It was cold, and there was a lot of snow.

About 6 foot of it.



It was everywhere, and under the snow was about 8 inches of solid pack ice. As we were driving, I was shocked at the state of the road, only to realise we were on ice, and the pot holes were just where it had broken up. It was an eye-opening drive. The Russians are almost as bad on the road as Brisbane drivers, and they’re utterly unfazed by snow and ice (as I guess they would be). The scenery alternated between beautiful winter stands of silver birch trees and extremely run-down buildings, most with smoke coming from the chimneys meaning people lived there. The actual city of Yhuzno-Sakhalinsk switched between looking like a regular city (except for the walls of piled snow to either side of the roads) to echoing one’s worst stereotypical idea of Russia. Square apartment blocks in serious disrepair, beautiful orthodox churches, shops that are nothing more than porched doorways, their wares unidentifiable by the gaudy signs, and the people, hatted, huddled in thick coats, just shapes against the cold. And it really was cold. Walking from the warm car to the hotel, it was like a slap in the face that left behind a million ice splinters, although Svetlana told is they were having a mild patch at the moment!



The Hotel Belka (Hotel Squirrel!) was warm and lovely –a big double room each and a super spa shower. The whole place was made from real logs, and looked a bit out of place, but it was great. The view from the window was brilliant:



We spent the rest of the day exploring (i.e. arsing around in the snow), and meeting the Riverdancers that were also part of the show. We then had dinner with Svetlana. Food in Russia is pretty average, with warm cold drinks and somewhat interesting taste combinations and some truly classic spellings (Porc stake in beer and hony anyone? Or how about following that with sheese and crackers?), but the company was fantastic, there were a lot of laughs, and we left to find it snowing outside.



I love snow at night. I love the hush of it, and there, well, it was magic.

We spent the Saturday exploring with Zara, Aioffe, Cathal and Sean, and it was great fun trying to find the Bank of Moscow in a blizzard. It was truly Baltic (-10 to -18) and at times, the wind would somehow stab through my thick woollen coat, my trusty Paddy Pallin Polartec pullover, my Merino layer and long-sleeved T-shirt…



Later that afternoon, while the girls had a nap, Mannie and I decided to go exploring, despite the still-falling snow. A quick aside here: Sakhalin is on the same time zone as Brisbane, even though the seasons are utterly reversed, so there was no jetlag to speak of, only the exhaustion of sitting in a plane for half a day, and after the adventures in Seoul, we were all quite buggered, but I said to Mannie, ‘screw this, we’re in Russia, let’s explore!’. So we did. I’ve got a pretty good sense of direction, so we wandered off to have a look at the church we’d stumbled upon the other day. We also found out a secret. Russians have these little things they wrap around their shoes, a bit like cowboy spurs, but on the underneath, to stop them slipping. Nothing screams ‘TOURIST’ as much as seeing someone slipping and sliding along the pavement. Poor Mannie nearly broke his arse trying to walk and film at the same time. We managed to find a beautiful park that we *think* is dedicated to Uri Gagarin (there was a big statue of him looking terribly cosmonauty). It was just magic.



The snow came down quite heavily, and it was just wonderful walking along the barely-cleared path, seeing all these little cut through tracks people had made through the trees or across what would be greens come summer. Huge ravens gurgled at us from branches. In the distance, the mountains hunched, visible through the breaks in the clouds, scored with ski runs that were lit at night. I’m not a skier, but I imagine that would be brilliant fun. There was a Ferris wheel deeper in the park, but it was quite a chilling sight as it did nothing more than remind me of the famous one in Pripyat, the town next to Chernobyl –my overactive imagination and the fault of playing a certain computer game set there before we left! It’s a pretty obvious thing to say, but everything was so… Russian. It’s quite like being inside every bad cliché you’ve ever seen, heard or read about a country. Thank you James Bond. It’s very beautiful, though incredibly hard. You can see it on the faces of the stunningly made-up women in fur coats or the flat haired, rough-featured men. It really is just like you’d imagine it. We took a different route back to the hotel, through the residential area that was almost eerie. Squat, grey apartments that looked very well lived-in, streets clear but snowing over, cars filthy with brown slush, salt and mud, icicles like dragons’ teeth hanging from broken gutters, windows taped up with fluttering plastic bags…



We got back with just enough time to shower and get changed. The gig itself was only one block away, so we walked, which was a bloody stupid thing to do with instruments and not a set of grippy spur shoes between us.



The gig itself turned out great. I say turned out, because there were more adventures to be had before hand. We warmed up (physically, not musically), then sat and watched the dancers run through their stuff. Excuse the language, but holy shit. I’ve seen a lot of dancers, but these guys were the absolute shiz. They were fully jet-lagged, having been flown in from Dublin just for the night, but even so…Mannie has some stunning video. We were waiting for our soundman to turn up, as there was no gear except for a dj’s console.

And of course, in complete realisation of my worst musician nightmares, our soundman turned out to be the dj, Ilya.

Who spoke not a word of English!

And of course had no idea how to set a band. So we did it ourselves, using whatever gear we could find, but having to forgo foldbacks as we just couldn’t get them working. Ilya and I developed a great communication style based around laughter. I would continually get these huge static shocks off the deck, yelp, swear, and he would laugh. Súnas. Breaking down barriers wherever we go.

But the gig was great. The sound was workable, but kept us on our toes. We played some tunesets for the dancers and they managed to get folk up and dancing, and all our worries about having the right material (remember, we don’t do stuff like Danny Boy) were completely unfounded. The Russians loved it, the Irish company was happy and it was a great night all round. We received a few offers for next year (and even a few ideas for a small tour), so hopefully this is the start of something.



And so, after just a couple of hours, it was over, so we did you one would do when in Russia.

We hit the vodka.

In Russia, vodka comes in the kind of glasses we serve lattes in, so it wasn’t long before there was some very spectacular dancing by certain members of the band that shall remain anonymous, and much merriment. We got back to the hotel sometime around 3am, and spent a good deal of time once again arsing around in the snow. As before, it was fecking freezing, but the vodka acted like a special pair of cosy thermal underpants, so we were immune!



The flight out was at 6am, and how I got up and packed was a damn miracle and mystery all in one, but we made it to the airport, said our goodbyes, managed somehow to get tickets and check in luggage at the single desk surrounded by hundreds of people, Alsatians, goats, smoking guards etc… The Air Russia plane was a classic 1970s 737, full of vinyl, faded curtains, ashtrays in the seat arms, rattles, shakes and odd timewarp hostesses. Standing on the runway, in the early morning with a snow front looming across the mountains and being dreadfully hung-over is not my ideal start to the day, and it was the only time I felt truly, uncomfortably cold. The wind whipped down from the snow fields, gathered pace over the flat expanse of the runways (only just snowploughed) and skated over the pack ice to bite our bones. We must have looked quite pathetic (and me quite green) to the laughing Russians waiting to board. The takeoff was pretty horrendous, as the plane skidded and shuddered across the iced runaway, and I’m not sure what alarmed me most, that, or the lack of a barfbag in front of me. I’d drawn the short straw and was sitting away from the others (small airlines generally only have rows of 3 seats). The lady next to me was quite friendly, but dressed in a fur coat that looked to have only been cured a week ago. Needless to say it was a very uncomfortable flight. As a result I’ve pretty much sworn off alcohol for a while now. Rock and roll!

Seoul was easy, just boring, as we had to wait six hours for the flight back to Sydney. Seoul airport is a huge crescent about a mile long, but unlike say, Singapore, it just has the same six shops repeated every 50 yards or so. BUT… it has awesome food. We noshed on traditional Korean dishes like Bibimbam and some of the best sweet and sour pork I’ve had (I was feeling a bit better by this point!). The Starbucks there managed a decent coffee, but I nearly made the barista cry trying to explain what 55 degrees for the milk meant. So much for my efforts at miming me burning my lips and frothing milk. I think she thought I wanted 55 shots of espresso. Actually…

The flight was fine, except for me deciding to sit through the dreadful 2012. If the cutlery hadn’t been plastic I might well have stuck it in my eye. Rewatching Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid more than made up for it. I love that film. Another good few hours at Sydney awaited, and it was there I discovered the mysteriously-shaped hole in my guitar case. To me, it looks like a Russian bullet hole, and although that’s not at all likely, that’s what it’ll be from now on. I’m pretty pissed as it’s an expensive case, but the guitar inside was ok so that’s the main thing.




A reminder of the oddest Súnas adventure so far!

We've just come back from a whistle stop trip to play a gig in Russia. It was the most amazing, surreal gig we've ever done, and needless to say there are a few blogs on the way.

Until then, there are some photos available Here. I'll upload the full lot to Flickr and link them here as soon as I catch my breath!


Listening to: "Diamond Wheel" by Kate Fagan

I have to start by saying that this blog would not have been possible without the help of Henry, one of the cooks at the New Sydney Hotel who just gave me the wonderful latte he’d just made for himself (I think I must’ve had a desperately needy expression). It pretty much sums up what it’s all about down here. Within moments of arriving, we were using the owner Al’s computer to hurriedly finish off some of the Russian documents for next week, had pints in our hands and were all ready smiling.

I’m sitting here doing something I really love to do when we’re on the road; I’m sitting in an empty pub in the early morning. Everything is clean, tidy and arranged, and the old lady (the New Sydney Hotel was founded in 1835) is just resting, getting some much-needed sleep before it all starts again and midday, as it has for the past years. In my mind I can still the the ghosts of the hundreds of people that were here last night, singing, dancing, playing instruments. I love this pub. It’s my favourite one in Australia, and about the closest thing I’ve found to a ‘proper’ pub. There’s no Keno, no poker machines, not even a jukebox. It sells locally produced beers and ciders (they even have a Kentish Ale that I’ve fallen in love with) along with drinks we don’t get in Brisbane, like Magners pear cider and even genuine Strong Suffolk Ale, the walls are covered with flotsam that is just fascinating, and the food is fantastic too, so hats off to Henry, and the New Sydney.

As most of you might know, we have a very special relationship with Tasmania, and to say that we’d been looking forward to these gigs at Fleadh Ceol is like saying that I like the occasional coffee. It’s an oft-used phrase, but for us it’s perfect.

It’s like coming home.

In a way, Súnas wouldn’t be the band it is now without the Tasmanian adventures. It was the first small tour down here that really woke us up to the fact that people may actually come out to listen to us (that sounds a bit self-deprecating, and I guess it is, but really, we’d never taken ourselves all that seriously). Tasmania made us re-think that. There’s also the whole Helen factor, and although each of us have different meanings and thoughts there, it’s still very much a part of it. This is our first trip down here since she passed away, and even though it’s only been a couple of months, It’s still very much on our minds, and the people down here that knew her too. Sarah told me she had an odd moment on stage last night where she looked up and really expected to see her out there somewhere. I think she is, there’s just too much joy and happiness for her not to be.

Last night’s gig was brilliant; hot, hard, fiery, fast, unpredictable. But to be honest we had more fun watching everyone else perform. Tonight will be a little different, more relaxed I think now that we’ve got over the initial performance bump with Jamie (who’s standing in for Bridget for this weekend). But then maybe not. We never seem to be able to control these things!

We have been out of radio contact for a while, apologies to everyone. I haven’t really had the motivation to write anything since our beloved Helen passed away. She was a monumental figure in our lives, and will be missed always. Thank you everyone for your wonderful wishes of strength and support –I can’t begin to describe how they held us together at the end. We have all had good and bad moments since then, as I’m sure you can understand.

Since then, we in Súnas decided after an enormous 18 months of festivals and touring to have a quiet six months to renew energies and begin rehearsals for the next album. Judging from our busy gig guide our carefully made plans quite obviously went to pot, didn’t they? The plans are still there, they’ve just been postponed until after an utterly mental March.

This coming Thursday (4th March) we visit our wonderful friends in Tasmania for the Fleadh Ceol at the New Sydney Hotel in Hobart. We’re performing alongside Martin Spurway-Smith and Zac Johnston as well as our good friends the To’rags, Daideo and the Blue Mosquitoes and Mick Flanagan. The last time we gigged at the Fleadh it was 2008 and we had a cracking time, so I mean it when I say it will brilliant to see everyone again!





The following Thursday takes us to Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk in Russia for a private St Pat’s gig with the Irish Riverdance crew as support. As you do. We are utterly blown away at an opportunity such as this (and are trying to act cool, but failing spectacularly). I hear Russia is lovely this time of year – in Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk, on Sakhalin Island, the temperature ranges from -5 to -30 degrees. Can you hear Mannie sobbing from here?

Then, 1 day after we return, comes the madness that is St Patrick’s Day. On Wed 17th we’re performing at Harrigan’s Drift Inn at Jacob’s Well from 12-3:30 and then at the Down Under Bar on Edward St in the city from 7-9. Come and say hello!

And THEN we cap March off with a flying visit to Colo in north-west NSW to perform at Dougie MacLean’s Colo Celtic Festival from 19th – 21st. You can check the details out here. It’ll be great fun to get up with Dougie again and play some songs. Hopefully he’ll bring some of his divine 12-year single malt Caledonia whisky with him!


Currently Listening to: 'Eclipse' by Imogen Heap.

The final two Perthshire Amber Tour blogs are up!

Sorry for the delay!

All the Britain Tour Blogs can be found HERE

We said goodbye to an old friend today.

Helen was there when we first started working out what we wanted Súnas to be, all those years ago on Mannie's verandah, and though she moved down to Tasmania, she never left the band. For a few years now she'd been bravely battling cancer, and last Wednesday, surrounded by family and friends, she let go.

There's almost too much to single out just a few things about Helen that made her special; her incredible (naughty) humour, compassion, crap suggestions for cover songs (sorry Helen, but 'Ob-la-di' will never make it to a set list), but most of all, it was that she was fearless. She did things that the rest of us only talked about. From selling everything and buying a B&B in Tasmania, to travelling across the world in her last months to see a festival she'd been dreaming about for 5 years. She followed her dreams, not matter where they led and her boundless optimism was a lesson to us all.

We miss you Helen. You never did anything simply, never took the easy path, but you always wanted to carry everyone along with you for the fun.

We miss you.

So it looks like we've not updated this news page for a long time, but the blogs from the past couple of months are over at the Tour Blog page. Just thought I'd clear that up for those of you that have been sending polite emails asking!

There are two more tour blogs yet to go up. They're sitting on my laptop waiting to be tidied up and uploaded, something that sounds incredibly simple and quick, and indeed is, it's just since we got back we quite literally haven't stopped. We actually got our first gig call not 2 hours after landing in Brisbane!

We've mentioned this to those of you that have come to the last few gigs, but we're scaling back a bit next year. We've decided only to go to a few festivals and focus mainly on the new album (plans for which are proceeding quite nicely!) and getting a whole load of new material. Because we seem to have spent most of the last 18 months on planes, we've really only brought out a couple of new tunes and songs, and we're beginning to get a little stir-crazy. We've got a whole lot of stuff just waiting to go, but like most things, it's a matter of finding (or making) the time to get together and learn it. Saying that though, in true Súnas style we have a couple of very interesting surprises in store for next year...

Anyway, have Happy Holidays one and all, and hopefully we'll see you in January!

(Oh, just to clear up so as not to be accused of big noting or the like, Bridget, Sarah and Paul will be at Woodford this year, but not as Súnas. After a few massive Woodford Festivals for us, we're on our 'gap year'. Bridget is involved in the Fiddle Club, and Paul and Sarah will be sessioning and generally bumming their way onto anyone who'll have them's stage). But who knows...

5:25pm, Somewhere near Aratula, Qld
So right now, we’re bombing it to Cunninghams Gap on our way to Severnlea which is down on the granite belt near Stanthorpe. Actually, bombing it is rather an optimistic term to use as we’re in Mannie’s van. Chugging it would be more appropriate. A good-paced chug. Despite the rush (it’s a good three hour run from Brisbane), the idiot drivers and utterly disgusting Brisbane traffic towards Ipswich, it’s actually a very cool and chilled out place to be. The iPod is on a random shuffle of a genre it loosely calls ‘Americana’ (Ry Cooder at the moment, though we’ve just had some Matthew Ryan, King Curly and a touch of Sinead -not all Americana, I know, but the Genius list isn’t without its own quirks). The Great Dividing Range is laid out before us, just a magenta silhouette against a burnt tobacco sunset. The sun is going down smoking.



The downs between Ipswich and Cunninghams Gap are usually brown, sunburned to within an inch of dust, but not this evening. There’s been so much rain that we’re literally passing incredible, though temporary, lakes dotted with waterbirds and happy cattle. My fingers are tingling, which they always do on the day of a gig, but I’ve got no idea quite what to expect. We’re playing tonight at the superbly named Whiskey Gully Winery, a ticketed event where we get to play our favourite material in front of people who actually want to be there, as opposed to those that just happen to be. It’s a nice change. I’m a terrible one for trying to predict things. I guess it comes from being a writer; my head never really shuts down. But tonight I’m not. Tonight I shall be a guitary leaf on the wind of the band. And after the roadhouse food we just scarfed, it’s going to be a blustery night….


The Whiskey Gully Homestead

1:29am, Diamondvale (The Big House)
The gig was in an old homestead, all high ceilings, antique furniture and verandahs. We were set up in a little corner of the main room, close to the huge fireplace big enough to roast Mannie in, backed by a wall polkaed with beautiful guitars. I’m resisting the temptation to describe them, but let’s just say there were some gems there. So, two small, cosy sets to a wonderfully attentive, well fed and wined audience that sang in all the right spots, laughed at Sarah’s naff jokes and got on the take-the-piss-out-of-Mannie bandwagon nicely. There was some great support from Terry and Bob, and a handful of numbers from John the owner that mixed up the night wonderfully. It was a lot of fun. We were all very relaxed and firing quite nicely. The kind of gig we love. Outside, loading the instruments it was -2c, and Mannie was almost sobbing, despite being wrapped up in his polar Scott of the Antarctic coat, genuine Sherpa ascent boots, World War Two bomber pilot sheepskin mittens and a rather fetching pair of arseless llama-pelt chaps.


John with Sarah and Bridge (and lots of tasty guitars)

Then it was back to Diamondvale, Dave & Trish’s incredible house for more drams and a wee sleep (with Mannie being acoustically isolated in the guest house of course). Wickedly comfortable beds with nice electric blankets.


Diamondvale.

2:12pm Somewhere north of Aratula
Back on the road again. After nomming a huge traditional musician breakfast of sausages, eggs, bacon toast and Coke, we’re once again on the chug. We have a few hours to get back to Brisbane to load the van before we head off down the coast for tonight’s gig at Harrigans. The iPod is still playing silly buggers, as we’re alternating between Neil Young, Dougie MacLean, the Police, Mark Knopfler, Pavarotti and Roxette. Funny, as I have no memory of ever putting Roxette on my iPod…

The Snowy Mountains of Music Festival. Just sounds exciting doesn’t it? And we certainly were excited to be involved in Dave De Santi’s new vision, the first ever festival to be held in the Snowy Mountains, on the opening weekend of ski season.

So once again we found ourselves at the airport, although at a new and strange time... no 5am flight! Woohoo! We flew in to Canberra (at night!) and were greeted by Sarah’s fantastic Grandad, and were instantly welcomed with some chicken soup (A Dorothy special made just for Mannie) and apple pie. What a welcome! Unfortunately it was a very quick stopover, as we had to be back at the airport the next day to await our bus to the snow.

We were surprisingly organised and arrived with plenty of time to spare (no comments please) so of course the bus was two hours late. After many coffees, and a great catch up with our good mate Enda Kenny (the people you find wandering around Canberra airport), we squashed onto the double-decker bus and were on our way. There was a brief lunch stop –and might I say the best impromptu deli picnic with Lindsay Martin and Enda, red wine, prosciutto, vintage Cheddar and all – then off we went. You could feel it getting colder as we got closer, and although we were separated on the bus, we were all nervously watching the time, as we were due on stage at 5pm and still seemed to be a long way off. We phoned ahead to say we were running a little late, to which Dave said ‘no problem’ and said we could just go on when we got there.  A big thanks to Bruce Mathiske who took our place on stage and performed superbly as usual! We ran on stage at the Smiggins Hotel (to Sair and my horror with no make-up and wearing jeans!) but had a blast and a great start to the festival.
 
Rockstars that we are, we had a quick dinner and found our accommodation, ready to snuggle in to our warm beds for an early night (of course after Mannie dragged his mattress into a snore-proof chamber). We woke up early the next morning, a little disappointed to find that there was still no snow, and headed off to Perisher in search of breakfast, coffee and our first gig at the festival opening.  We were greeted by Dave himself, arms full with a very welcome sight... a tray of butterscotch schnapps :) Yum! From this point on, we were hooked! The opening concert was great, very laid back and a glimpse at some of the entertainment still to come.  We ducked off for a quick grocery shop and then straight off to our next gig at Basil's Bar. We had a schnapps-sponsored gig and had a great time! Sair and I were surprised to catch up with an old friend, Liam Dorney, who we had both met during our pre-folk years at the Brisbane Regional Youth Orchestra (apparently we were there at the same time and had no idea!). Liam was now playing with the uber-cool Gold Coast band, A French Butler Called Smith, who we caught up with numerous times through the rest of the festival.

That night (still with no snow –but a definite drop in the temperature) we ventured up to watch our good friends Humbug, who were sounding as good as ever. We had a great singalong and very brief catch up before heading back to our Smiggins Chalet for a gourmet delight ala Paul. I love travelling with someone who can cook! We give him a sweet potato and some chicken and he whipped up beautiful curry (accompanied of course by the requisite $13 bottle of butterscotch schnapps). Thanks Paul!

Ok... now for the good stuff... SNOW!
 
Mannie came running in to our room pointing at the window (at arse-O'clock I might add). What an amazing sight! It had just started snowing lightly. I sat, glued to the window for about an hour (having never seen it snow before) and then decided we couldn’t possibly sit inside while this was happening outside. We got ready as quickly as possible, and then the others proceeded to watch me run around and take photos with a giant smile on my face. Sairey was just as excited and was willing to pose in a million photos with me (the boys having grown up in snowy weather were slightly less impressed with being asked to wait for photos every 3 steps). The rest of the festival was a bit of a blur. We had some more great gigs, more snow photos, more schnapps, catch ups and pics with the amazing Davidson Brothers, more schnapps, battling snow-covered roads with our fearless transporter Barney, watched a beautiful concert with Enda and Lindsay... and of course more photos and schnapps.

 

I will take a moment to describe one of the funniest parts of a festival in the snow. Our beloved Mannie. He alternated between grumbling, shivering and complaining (quite a sight with his beanie pulled down low and his giant army coat – thanks Bernie)... and then pretending to ski (highly entertaining and surprisingly he didn’t fall once!) and making snow angels. And of course the boys had an ongoing snow-ball fight every moment we were outside.

 

This was a truly amazing festival and one I will never forget! Despite the bus having some dramas on the trip back, we were still buzzing when we made it back to Sarah’s Grandparents' place for a couple of hours sleep and then you guessed it... back at the airport at 4.30am.

What is there to say about Wintermoon?
 
Could it be the lush tropical rainforest location and the deliciously relaxed surrounding areas?
 
Or maybe the gorgeous green eco-vibe that permeates every building, tent, stage and communal gathering area, from candles in the restrooms at night to Jenny Drake’s untamed chickens casually wandering the grounds to the organic freshly picked bananas in the Chai House every morning.
 
Or the talented, humble and inspiring musicians we met along the way and were so fortunate to share the stage with; people who, fuelled by cider, beer or nothing at all would happily natter about anything and everything while relaxing between gigs in the communal area behind the Lunar Stage. The entire weekend was peppered with conversations, jamming, rehearsals, and writing. Wintermoon is the first festival I have performed at where I have come away more relaxed than when I got there.
 
And what of the incredible people who organise this amazing festival and go out of their way to make you feel at home? So many were offered use of Jenny’s shower & use of her car to travel into Calen to buy supplies; sharing tables during meal times with beautiful people along the likes of Chris Cann, Ira from the Perch Creek Family JugBand & Campbell the gentle Swaggie; the amazing sound crew smiling through intense pressure to deliver the best sound for their tent with only ten minutes notice, while happy volunteers greeted me with a smile everywhere we met and then paid us the biggest compliment by dancing at our shows – this festival wouldn’t happen without all of you.
 
But mostly, to the festival attendees who allow us the opportunity to perform and share our passions with you. There are no words except thank you for your support!
 
Highlights for me, other than the ones described above and in no particular order were pulling Paul’s former bandmate and stunning singer Nadia Sunde up on stage to sing Dreams with us, catching every Barleyshakes gig (they ROCK), meeting Richard Kaal, the awesome guys from Swoon & Wishing Well, Bridge & I sharing songwriting tips with Enda Kenny, meeting S. Sean Tretheway and reading his wonderful book ‘The Roadless Traveller’, and relaxing in general – what a luxury!
 
The last Wintermoon concert featured JigZag, and in true folkie style, they pulled every available player (Bridge & I, Lindsay Martin, Erin from Barleyshakes, Richard Kaal, Sarah from Wishing Well, Campbell the Swaggie, Dave Flower, Jay Bishoff and Sally from Dev’lish Mary to name a few!) up to play some solos on a few songs. I shared a mic with Lindsay Martin, and it was brilliant! After we all performed on Stronger the Tree and One Love, the crowd decided we weren’t getting off that easy and demanded one last song for the finale. And what a song! We did crowd favourite ’30 Seconds of Happiness’, which featured scat singing, Aretha Franklin, fiddle solos and the best crowd participation I have ever witnessed.
 
What a remarkable ending to a wonderful weekend!
 

Listening to ‘Kindred’ by Swoon

It's official!

Wintermoon is one of those festivals that we’ve heard so much about but never actually been able to get to. It’s a smallish festival about an hour or so into the mountains near Mackay in Queensland, and despite the name, it’s pretty warm...

We had a nightflight up to Mackay, which meant one of those wonderful take-offs over Brisbane, then a quite mysterious bus ride out into the tropics courtesy of the magnificent Jim (who waited very patiently at the airport as we were quite delayed). We also got to meet the very cool and suave Ira from the Perch Creek Family JugBand


Have you ever seen Brisbane from a 737 at night? (sorry Mr Kelly)

So now I’m sitting here, on an old couch backstage, on the verandah of the chai house listening to the wonderful sounds of Dev’lish Mary. The acoustics are just incredible. If we were to ever record a live album I'd want the mics placed right here. Every nuance, strum, breath, I can hear it all.


The Chai House. Inside it's like an old, wonderful barn

Alas I have a bit of a whiskey head on me at the moment, the result of a rather late and most excellent evening of tunes, laugher, candlelight and half a bottle of Glen Morangie. Our performances are over, except for tonight’s finale where we’ll get up with everyone for one last hooley. It has been just a lovely experience. I wrote last time about my perceived differences in festivals, and rather than go over old ground, I’ll just say that Wintermoon has to be one of the nicest I’ve been to. Maybe it’s the tropical environment, but everything here runs at a lightly slower clock. We’ve actually had a lot of time to sit, talk and play with people (and work on some material for our new album and some special stuff for the joint gig with Jigzag in a couple of weeks). It’s a very recharging experience, and after the hectic start to the year, it’s almost been like a beautiful little time-out. 


The wash basin, complete with one of Jenny's Chickens (and yes we couldn't resist playing the tune!)

Except for the shows. They’re a mass of dancing, heaving bodies (often led by the ever-enthusiastic Alan Kelly from the great Barleyshakes). Saturday night’s show on the main stage was really grand, as what I thought was a low rumble through one of the mics actually turned out to be rain on the tarpaulins, not that that stopped anyone, in fact, it was almost as if a lot of folks had been waiting for just that moment to step out and dance dark in the rain.

One aspect of this festival that I really loved was that they fed us. Not because I'm a guts, but more because for three times a day, most of the musos and performers were brought together around the chai house. This was conducive to some very interesting conversations and no small number of impromptu jams over the truly wonderful food. It's something only a smaller festival could do (can you imagine the logistics behind say, Woodford, feeding 1500+ performers?), but it really made a difference to us.


The Amazing S. Sëan Tretheway holding court with his magic

Some other highlights:

Sarah being slightly tipsy and shining the torch into the sky and yelling, ‘Look at the size of that spider web!’ only for us to point out it was a powerline.

Having a wonderfully ambient pee in a spooky, candle-lit toilet then turning it into a drunken Phantom of the Opera reenactment (probably the sort of thing you had to be there for).

Chatting to Campbell the Swaggy (who actually lives here!). What an incredibly interesting and erudite man. He was nearly always asleep upright in a chair by the open fire in the Chai House, empty tea mug in his hand when I crept in for my very early morning coffee.


Sarah and Campbell

Having our dear friend Nadia Sunde singing with us on ‘Dreams’, then leading the early morning crowd on a few choruses.



Having the amazing Nahm paint a mural of our album art over alongside the other artists that have passed through.

Chatting to all the wonderful people who queued to buy a cd, then waited in the sun while we ran around looking for a signing pen.

Meeting too many new friends to mention here. Festivals have turned into these wonderful reunions for us now, and it's wonderful to be part of the family.

The final evening here was something very special, and I think I'll let Sarah write about that (I'm adding this little extra bit back home in Brisbane -I'm not psychic!). But here's a small taster of the final concert


Sarah and Bridget join in the brilliant finale

So, next stop, the Irish Club, then it’s the Jigzag gig (details on the Sunas Gigs page). The next festival is a bit of a contrast to this one. It’s in the snow...

Maybe I’ll finally get a chance to wear my velvet jacket!

Listening to: 'Insides' by Jon Hopkins