Fancy Resorts, Adelaide Nappin' & Jamming With Jeff Martin: Lepers & Crooks On The Road

gold coast

Every time we go to the Gold Coast we have pre-drinks down the road at our mate Harry’s place, this has become problematic as the last few times we’ve been introduced to a new drinking game called Hockey. Beginner's luck didn’t seem to exist in this circumstance and we were all wondering how the set would go, somehow managed to pull it together and the crowd is always so loose at the Goldy so happy days! Although at 3 in the morning we decided to go back to Harry's for a rematch, we were planning on leaving back to Sydney in a few hours, Garreth who was taking the first leg in the van called us at 7am very concerned we hadn’t yet made it back to the hotel, seems like we have a bit of a competitive streak! This is Damo on the walk back to the hotel.

adelaide 

We’ve toured all across Australia; we’ve tallied close to 300 shows since we started touring and until recently we did it all in a van — including a road trip across the Nullabor Plain to Western Australia. We got the pleasure of experiencing our first flight together as a band when we took to the air to make our show in Adelaide this tour, feeling rusty after our all-nighter in Adelaide, Sam takes the time to rest up before boarding our flight back to Sydney, it’s the simple things on the road and we certainly made the most of our in-flight experiences.

noosa

In our times of travel we have had our fair share of couches, grotty hostels, back seat snoozes and in one case even sleeping on the stage of a venue we played in Bendigo but when we found ourselves booking accommodation on the day we got into the Sunny Coast we lucked out – none of the regular budget hostels were available so we decided to lash out and book ourselves into the local resort. We treated ourselves to a game of tennis, sweated up the sauna, had a dip in the pool and Garreth couldn’t resist a workout in the gym. We didn’t do the full rock star and trash the hotel room, maybe because we never made it back after the show! Couch lyf 4eva.

yours & owl

Touring can sometimes feel relentless, constantly on the move and never really settling down in one place or time, but when we get the chance to chill with new friends in new places that can be the best experience of being in a travelling band. This tour we had the opportunity to head down to Yours & Owls Festival and check out some of our favourite bands (old and new), goes without saying it was an absolute cracker weekend and the best way to celebrate Alex’s 25th birthday.

australian music week

We met Jeff Martin back when he was living in Fremantle WA, we were playing a show at Mojo’s just across the road from his old studio The Palace, he came along and jumped on stage - we jammed out some classic Led Zeppelin and Hendrix tunes and thus a musical bond was formed. We went on to have him produce our EP The Heathen Circus up at his new studio, The Riverhouse, in a secluded location just outside Byron Bay. When we found out we were both on the bill for the Australian Music Week we decided to tee up a recording session at 301’s Pop Up Studio and lay down an acoustic version of the first song we recorded together – Ten Year Ramble.

Head here to check out the rest of Lepers & Crooks' tour dates.