Earlier this autumn, the Bay Area pop group Chime School flew over the ocean for a tour of the United Kingdom and France and they documented it all for chickfactor and you can read it here.
Buy their latest album, The Boy Who Ran the Paisley Hotel, here.
Andy is also in Seablite, who we interviewed in CF19, 2022.
Copies still in print and for sale.
Bandleader Andy Pastalaniec writes: From the moment “Chime School” transformed from a bedroom-pop solo project to a debut LP on Slumberland Records with a fully formed backing band, it’s been a goal of mine to take the project across the pond to the land where so much of its “formative jangle” originated.
The opportunity arrives on New Year’s Day, 2024, when we’re invited to play the Paris Popfest in September. My sophomore album, “The Boy Who Ran The Paisley Hotel” is slated for release in August on Slumberland. Paris Popfest is exactly the anchor we need to build a tour around.
I’ve always done pretty good booking DIY tours, but I have no idea how to book a tour in the UK. Luckily, I don’t have to, as I’ve convinced Reuben Miles-Tyghe, of UK tour agency Outsider Artists, to add us to his roster. OA have been leading a sort of reverse “British Invasion” of California indie groups to the UK and Europe, booking tours for many of the contemporary indie cognoscenti: Cindy, The Umbrellas, The Reds, Pinks & Purples, Kelley Stoltz, and others. I am a bit nervous that we are not as big as those groups (our second album hasn’t even been announced yet) so this whole thing could flop in a most-embarrassing fashion. But I resolve to do what I can to make it a success.
So, over the next 9 months I’ll spend many hours making videos, posters, flyers and other promo materials for the upcoming album, and what has become an 11-show France/UK tour, beginning September 27 in Paris, and concluding October 7 in the legendary indie pop city of Bristol!
Travel Day: September 25-26 – San Francisco to London to Paris
Andy: We have about 20 hours of travel ahead of us, flying first to London, then lugging our bags and instruments from Heathrow on the tube to St Pancras station where we’ll take the Eurostar to Paris.
Josh: Our travel day starts off with an important victory: we’re able to convince the people at Virgin Atlantic to let us carry on our guitars, so they can be stored in the cabin for our flight instead of having to be checked (and maybe lost). So this puts us at ease for the journey right away.
Andy: Pro-tip, if you’re touring overseas, avoid connecting flights and take your instruments straight to the gate. Play dumb, and be very very polite.