No Escape

somehow, No Escape managed to survive as a band from mid 1997 till early 2005. taking in 4 EPs, 3 tours, countless support slots at major venues, a few bad hair cuts and that one album that we always promised but never actually got round to recording along the way... we were the best band in ayrshire to never play Parkers

people keep asking if No Escape still have songs online that they can download - i set up a purevolume page before this whole myspace thing kicked off, but sadly just like our mp3.com account and NEsite.co.uk beforehand it seems to have dissappeared through out time. it feels right that i should put up some songs on here for download since we're closing on 2007 which would have been our tenth year had we continued.

the band was a big part of my life, and it really was just 3 best friends playing in a band together. we managed to go nearly 8 years without any arguments... the closest thing that came to an argument was one time in the middle of edinburgh we were in the wrong lane and my head got in the way between alans line-of-vision and the wing mirror of the van.

as much fun as playing in the band was im sort of glad that it ended when it did, i dont think i would be doing The Ansion if i was still playing in No Escape and we most definitly wouldn't have No Escape playing Ansion style songs.

honestly, we did try to record an album. but every time we went into the studio we took ages and always ended up coming away with an EP instead. the last EP we recorded was called "The Lesser Known History Of The Commonly Used 3 Degree Tilt And Other Misanthropic Physical Responsibilities Of The 20th Century" which was kind of an in-band joke for 'SONGS ABOUT FARTING' (the '3 degree tilt' being the angle that most people will lean at when they let one go). it was by far the best recording we had ever done - the quality of it was amazing by our standards. everything about it was on form; i was experimenting with different guitar stuff, alans technical abilities really shone through and serges production skills were pushed to the max.

as always, a tour was needed to promote and sell the new EP. we always classed our tours as more of a holiday. it was all about having fun, seeing friends who moved to different cities, playing music and buying terrible alcohol that nobody would drink. yet again we hit the road with Misled Youth, for what would be the longest, hardest and best tour we had done. me and alan actually ended up playing bass for M Y at 90% of the shows and kev from M Y came up and played guitar on 'Enola Gay' with us once or twice. i miss going on tour, plus its great to learn from mistakes you made the night before - you always improve when your on the road, second last night of the tour is always the best show (the last night you are gagging to go home so you may slip up and make mistakes)

we never got a proper send off, we never knowingly played a "last ever show". the last show was a single show in edinburgh with Misled Youth about 3 or 4 months before we disbanded. for that night we had written a brand new song it was taking the band in a slightly different direction than the rest of the songs in the set, but it still felt right to be playing it, and that night it closed the set. it feels strange now to know that the last song we ever played as a band was a brand new untitled song that no one had heard before. i sometimes imagine what the reaction would have been if we had said that night that we arent going to play anymore and then break into "chef" or something

i wish i could say that we all got in this terrible big fight and decided that the band was through, or that we started playing stupid music that nobody liked and everyone stopped coming to shows. but to tell the truth the break up was pretty much shrouded with mystery for everyone. i was playing in 1950DA with alan when he decided he was going to leave 1950. eventually everybody just stopped talking to each other, No Escape hadn't practiced since before the edinburgh show and by now it was january/february. i think we all eventually seperately came to the conclusion that No Escape was no more, it was never really a group effort to properly end the band and tell everyone - it was more of a case of saying to who ever asked us, and not giving a reason for the ending. we should probably have made a more publicly available disbandment notice but i guess we all thought that one of the other two would do it.

so on a 'technicality' No Escape never officially broke up we just havent practiced in a few years, but i wouldnt hold your breath for any kind of reunion in the forseeable future.

i think this says it all. to quote REFUSED and peters fore-arm; RATHER BE FORGOTTEN, THAN REMEMBERED FOR GIVING IN

cheers, Jon