Day 4 Saturday June 16

Woke up to messages from the last Air BnB. Could I please check everyone’s bags once more before they get the police involved. Checked. Then I had to write a police report. 

Beautiful day so the first thing we do is work out how far it was to walk to our gig. We're playing at a studio called artYARD. 10 minutes. Great. Then we kept walking into Osaka. Neon wall not so fabulous (well it still looks great) as at night but we would come back after the gig. Or so we thought. Record shops, guitar shops, clothes shops. Toy shops too. Just drifted around. Rod makes a purchase at Time Bomb records. 5, 6,7,8s t-shirts for his girls. One of my favourite record shops in the world! Look for King Kong records around the corner but it's gone. Spent time in another guitar shop Julian Wu had recommended. Chirpy found a drum store.

Got lost once more. . Turns out I was leading them to a place I remembered from Tokyo. Oh dear. Time ran away.

Went back and picked up our stuff for soundcheck. Again a little late. Again messages. We really need to get to the gigs on time. We’re only 5 minutes late so it wasn’t that bad. 

The gig looks like a studio. Like a TV studio. No lights. Well just like normal lights. Set up. Go through 3 songs then off to get something to eat. 

Come back for the gig. The band goes into a little bar downstairs while I go upstairs to let them know we’re here. The bands are so good I can’t get away. Poz and Yol and Erin turn up with a couple of other friends and Yol takes over merchandise again. The vinyl is gone long before we start. Two guys do papers scissors rock to decide who get's the last "Baby It's You" single. Could of brought a lot more.

The bands on before us are all brilliant. The Original Mixed Up Kids. The Wimpy's and the Zip. All top notch bands. The Wimpy's are a power pop punk band. Get the album. It's great. The Zip are one of Osaka's top Mod bands. If not the tops! The DJs have our first record on display and play it quite a few times during the night. They can't believe Little Murders are in Osaka. Neither can we sometimes.

We come on at 8.45pm and it’s another great night. It's strange to have so many people in front of us wearing Little Murders t-shirts.  Our first crowd surfing since 1981. We're old enough now to worry they might fall and hurt themselves. Everyone is going nuts and someone knocks out the leads on Rod’s effect pedals. Rod is not happy but soon gets it together and we're off again. During the Kids Are Alright encore I leave the stage (well cross the floor actually since there isn't a stage)  and sing amongst the crowd which is great. Poz joins in to. The band sound fantastic. The floor is wet with beer. Everyone is sweating in the heat. Brilliant.

Merch is sold. Photographs are taken. The lead singer of the Zip asks for the set list. It is completely doused in beer. Modern art indeed. 

Then we are invited to the After Party. First we want to drop off our guitars. A few of the crowd follow us but we explain that we’re just dropping off guitars. Some of us want to see Osaka at night but will pop into the party first.We go to the After Party. It’s at a restaurant around the corner from the gig. When we arrive the whole crowded restaurant claps and cheers. We have to climb over seats and tables to get to a spot and as each person goes down they are applauded. We have a great time and forget all about Osaka at night. This is too much fun. Our hosts are fabulous and I spend a lot of time talking about Australian power pop bands. They are particularly interested in the Riptides and the Innocents and are happy to hear about the times we played with both bands. The food is delicious and the beer goes down well. 

What a brilliant night. At the end we all go outside and pose with a large banner which says Target Maark ...the name of the event. A regular one I think. The night is unforgettable, not only because the gig was so much fun but meeting the people who came to our gig and eating and drinking with them was so much fun.

Tomorrow back to Tokyo.