Fuck the Creditors!

Friends!

Sick of "clever" radio stations playing "Taxman" and "Money" all day? We of The Blood Arm feel your pain. That is why we are giving you a delicious taste of our album-in-progress, a rough mix of our take on the global recession and financial meltdown: "The Creditors." Stream it here (http://www.myspace.com/thebloodarm) until the end of the week, in (dis)honor of Tax Day 2009!


Then come see us play with Sweaters at Bordello in Downtown Los Angeles on Thursday, April 30!

And then come see us in Europe at one or all of the following dates:

May 12 Innsbruck, Austria – Weekender
May 13 Munich, Germany – Atomic Cafe
May 14 Koln, Germany – Luxor (w/ Art Brut)
May 15 Hamburg, Germany – Molotow
May 16 Berlin, Germany – Kesselhaus (Jagermeister Rock:Liga Finale)

We love you!

xoxoxo The Blood Arm

Every Day is the Greatest Day Ever

Every day is the Greatest Day Ever for the Blood Arm on this Second Helping Desired, Required 2007 European Tour.

We went to Dortmund, Deutchland the other day and did a show, drank the German beer, German-kissed the German people, said to ourselves, it can't get any better than this, hopped on our big blue bus and waved goodbye with tears of longing in our eyes. Thanks for the memories, we whispered, then prayed in our bunks for some mishap in the cosmic time continuum that would allow us to relive that day over and over for the rest of our lives.


Instead, our big blue bus took us to St. Tropez on the French Riviera. We were given golden all-access tickets which not only entitled us to drinks on the beach, but jet skiing and golf-carting as well. We went jet-skiing. We worked on our tans. We made love with each other in the sand, and, almost miraculously, the coarse granules didn't get everywhere. The show took place fifty feet from the beach. We kissed the ground and crossed ourselves, convinced we had died and gone to heaven. Heaven is in St. Tropez, we said, please let this be our eternity.





Then we woke up on a stage in front of 25,000 dancing people next to Lake Aix-Les-Bains at the Musilac Festival. We schmoozed with Frank Black, oogled a topless Johnny Borrell, stood in awe of Muse (perhaps one of the best live bands we have ever seen, and definitely Zachary's favorite group), and were serenaded by Mumm-Ra on the way to the bus.






Okay, this is getting sort of ridiculous, we said. Then this morning we woke up in Paris...

I love you a little more every day,

Ben Lee Handler

Les Ardentes Festival, Weinheim Party

The Les Ardentes Festival in Liege, Belgium was all kinds of awesome. We're pretty sure we're best friends with Good Shoes, Clinic, Ladytron, and a Belgian band called Ghinzu now, but we can't remember entirely how it came to be. Something involving a swing set, a teacup, thirty Mars Bars, and a fuckload of booze. It was a good day.






Then we went to Weinheim in Germany, where Nathaniel stood on a table and sang and Milla Jovovich beat Dyan at arm wrestling.



Today we traded in the van for a big blue bus.

I love you madly,

Ben Lee Handler

We saw the Brementown Musicians and...

Oh, travel days. After approximately 15,000,000 hours in the bus, one can laugh at just about anything.




Not photographed: About 100 ausfahrts, Bum Bum ice cream bars, the billboard with the sexy lady eating a sausage...

I love you,

Ben Lee Handler

A One Act in German with Terrible Spelling

Jodie Foster: Baldwin! Ich will dine freunen zine! Willst du liebe mir?

Alec Baldwin: Nein! Ich liebe meine arbeit, und mein arebit nur!

Jodie Foster: Scheiße! Du bist mein liebe, du bist mein kampf!

German Efficiency

Our German friends at thebloodarm.de had a party in our honor, only they didn't invite us. It's probably for the best; the last time we hung out with those guys someone tied us to a tree, stripped us nude, threw our lederhosen in the icebox and tickled us with a bratwurst until we cried. Granted, we usually do that sort of thing for fun anyway, but I'm told it can affect our work visas if ever we're caught. We're entertainers, not chew toys goddamnit.

Anyway, you can check out some photos of how are German counterparts throw down HIER.

Dyan and I are going to SXSW on Tuesday, and the others are joining us on Friday. Expect frequent updates in the coming weeks!

I love you,

Ben Lee Handler

Jarvis Cocker. Also, Europe.

So first things first... We're in Europe. So far we've partied, performed, and partied some more in Paris, performed, partied, and partied some more in Zurich, then Munich, then Dresden, and now Berlin. If you're keeping track, that's a lot of partying, and our livers doth protest! (Do we listen to our livers? Never! Are the whites of our eyes growing yellower and yellower? Always!)

Here's a brief, city-by-city rundown of the events that have transpired on our European tour thus far, minus those involving hospital vists and violent neck lice infections.

Paris:

After performing at the fabulous Les InRocks festival with the Automatic, Emmanuel, owner and visionary behind our European label, Because, (who sometimes performs under the name Serge Gainsbourg--you may have heard of him) had some very special Parisian surprises for us.


For one, we got to party with our European labelmate, Jarvis Cocker.


For two, we got to party with our European labelmate, Jarvis Cocker.


Additionally, Emmanuel enabled us to party with our European labelmate, Jarvis Cocker.


We also DJ-ed under close supervision of Emmanuel's right-hand woman and superstar club DJ Marie,


performed at the Virgin Megastore directly underneath the Louvre,


found a giant poster with the album cover on it,


and partied with the fabulous Pipettes.


And how can I forget... We acquired a tour bus for the European leg of the tour. Her name is Charlotte.


Then Charlotte took us to Zurich:


We performed at the Hafenkneipe, which apparently means awesome drunken time in German. Our new best friends Ollie, Roger, and Richie ensured we had a good time and drank well. Also, they taught me how to bartend.


(I call that one the Cock Vomit.)

This is the point where my camera ran out of space and my computer ran out of batteries. Please trust that the following day, we did go wine tasting on a grouping of boats in Lake Zurich, that we did actually drink a fuckload of tasty wines, and that Nathaniel and Dyan were actually arrested on charges of wine terrorism, only to be released after Dyan destroyed the evidence.

Things we've done in Germany, with marginal photo documentation:


-Drank too many liters of beer.

-Ate too many Bratwurst. (Including yours truly, who for ten years has fancied himself a vegetarian. This prompted too many hours of puking shortly thereafter.)

-Been kicked out of famous Hof Braus in Munich.

-Watched the film DIG! approximately 300 times on the bus.

Now we're in Berlin with a recharged computer and a camera with ample space, so please check in often for more frequent updates.

I love you,

Ben Lee Handler