Yesterday morning I stayed in the hotel, working, a) because I’m incredibly conscientious, and b) I have an impending deadline. Deadlines help me with my conscientiousness, I find, but I didn’t enjoy staying in the hotel while people had fun; I suppose you could call me a conscientious objector. Boom-tish. Alyssa, Paul and Jerry went looking for gadgets, and found a middle aged couple who engaged them in conversation. “You have a Japanese girlfriend?” the man asked Paul. “No,” said Paul. “You take my wife,” the man suggested, generously. “Nah, you’re alright, actually,” replied Paul.

Once again we were taken in an air-conditioned bus to the festival. Although it’s not that hot here in terms of degrees celsius, the humidity is incredible. The journey from air-conditioned hotel to air-conditioned bus is short, but tropical, and requires everyone to be equipped with plenty of cold water and towels. Kind of like the opposite of childbirth, I guess. We arrived on site for the customary two hours of working to ensure that everything was going to work OK, and then took the stage to a hall which quickly filled up. We played a vigorously thrusting show, assisted by Tim Burgess of the Charlatans who stood in the wings nodding his head furiously and shouting “Go on, mate! Go on!” at Dave in between the songs. The heat was exacerbated by a huge lighting rig, but everyone got through the show without lapsing into unconsciousness, which is always a good sign that things have gone well, isn’t it. I did my best to snap photos of the audience, but nearly all of them were black (the photos, not the audience) and this was the only one that came out. Pathetic, really as a memento, but it’ll do:

Afterwards I met up with chum Ian Masters, formerly of the Pale Saints who now lives in Osaka and babysits internet servers for a living and makes music when the babysitting is over. He gave me a present of two pairs of Japanese socks, neither of which I’m wearing at the moment but plan to at some point. Some of our tour party went off to watch the Flaming Lips and came back in tears; the rest of us, crippled by backstage boredom, chose to play a series of Playstation games that involve the player energetically participating in the on-screen action via a TV-mounted camera. The most amusing by far was one requiring you to clean suds off a series of panes of glass, to the soundtrack of “When I’m Cleaning Windows” by George Formby.

Today’s the last day! I suppose I should go outside and experience some of Japan rather than sit here blogging. Especially as most of you are fast asleep. Yes, that’s what I’ll do.