In September, the fall of the year I visited the hometown of Nothing But Thieves, Conor suddenly announced on Twitter that he was going to release songs he wrote during the pandemic since he had a lot of time to reflect on himself.
Hello everyone,
I have some news I’d like to share with you.
I’ve made a solo EP under the name Man-Made Sunshine.
During the pandemic I had time and space to reflect, as many of us did, and discovered that my head was filled with trapped emotions and
I ate a potato pie served on the plane for breakfast.
During my stay here, I needed to print out tickets for a concert of girl in red and the Van Gogh Museum I was planning to go on this trip.
So I asked the lady, the owner of the Airbnb house, where I could get them printed.
Then, she was kind enough to let me use her printer.
She asked me: “Do you have any friends or someone living here?”
I couldn't tell her that I was here just for my favorite band, so I just answered “No.”
As I was sending my stuff to the printer, she saw my back, the Broken Machine Tour jacket I was wearing, and said:
“Oh, Nothing But Thieves. They are from here, Southend-on-Sea.”
!
“My son goes to their school.”
!!!!!!
“Yeahhh… I love them! That's why I visited here…!!!”
Well, it seemed like you suddenly became fluent when speaking about things you are obsessed with.
“Do they have a concert here today?“
I told her that I just wanted to walk around their hometown, and then she laughed.
I left the house.
Of course, I knew where to visit first.
Conor's apartment
I knew he didn't live here anymore, so I hope no one thinks I’m creepy.
He moved out about a year ago.
I might have liked it if he still lived here, but I was relieved that he had already left because I didn’t mean to bother his private life.
And of course, I wouldn't post a picture like this if he still lived here.
Then walking for a bit, soon I found the landscape.
This is the view Conor loved.
The station I arrived at last night, Leigh-on-Sea.
The fact that he used this station whenever he left this town got me butterflies in my stomach.
I think his apartment is the tallest building in Leigh-on-Sea. I was able to see it from everywhere.
It must have the best view in this town.
I don't know which floor he lived on, but probably near the top floor.
Then I headed to the site of the castle he visited before.
I checked it on the map but wasn't sure what the road to the castle looked like.
I see, so it's like this…
There was no one here.
Literally no one here.
I felt like I was left alone in the world.
Hadleigh Castle
Yeah, it's a complete ruin… yet beautiful.
After returning, I headed for Southend Central, the central town of Southend-on-Sea, by train.
Southend Central
There was a university nearby and many students were walking around.
I wished I could have spent my college life in such a place.
There were many people with colorful hair.
In Japan, people with colorful hair are usually wearing a lot of makeup and unique outfits.
But here, people casually dyed their hair with blue, red, or green.
I liked how dying hair colorful was just a part of an expression of themselves.
HMV, that they used to hold album release events or something.
I thought it would be nice if they had autographs or something, but they didn't have anything like that.
Southend Central has the longest pier in the world.
I was going to go there, but it was typical British weather.
So gloomy that I couldn't even tell the border between the sky and the sea.
I asked myself: “Am I going to pay £5.8 to stare at an empty space?”
Decided to go back to Leigh-on-Sea
It started raining.
I had been listening to the songs of their first EP, Graveyard Whistling, to soak this scenery in those songs.
Because, you know, music has a great memory.
It remembers the moment you listen to it, it makes you recall it vividly, and it even remembers the smell of it.
I always get swallowed by the atmosphere of the Michigan State University campus, where I studied abroad for 4 months, every time I listen to the 4th album of Marianas Trench.
I was surprised when I had them for the first time here. I never thought I would be impressed by scones in the first place.
The clotted cream was also very nice. I ate all of it even though there was a lot for one scone.
I was happy to see the jam label, it was made here in Essex.
Near the lagoon
Well, I wasn't sure if it was a lagoon or a beach though.
There were many abandoned boats. They were badly decayed.
I wondered if I could walk forward by any chance, but I didn’t try because I didn't want to spend the rest of the trip in muddy boots.
Graveyard of Shipwrecks
I saw a picture of this town on the Internet with the title “Graveyard of Shipwrecks” and then I was instantly reminded of their song, Graveyard Whistling.
“'Cos if you don't believe It can't hurt you And when you let it leave It can't hurt you”
I have been considering getting this tattooed, but is it too sad?
I love their music so much that one day I suddenly realized that getting a tattoo of the lyrics might be the most realistic and closest way to be together with their music.
Ever since then, I've been thinking about which lyrics and which font to use.
It's been more than 3 years now. I'm such an indecisive person I will be thinking about it until I die.
This place is where the Thames River, which has come through London, turns into the sea.
I wondered if these boats were anchored, or abandoned.
Or some kind of monument? Do they move?
I went down to the sea and up the hill many times.
Last Orders
There is a song called Last Orders, in their first EP, Graveyard Whistling.
There are some places in the lyrics.
“We left The Cliff Wandered down the Broadway to The Elms For another”
This place is called Cliff Parade.
And they walked the Broadway.
The Broadway was a shopping street.
Oh wow, this song is exactly the one they wrote when they lived here.
The Elms was the name of a pub.
I only noticed that after I came back to Japan, so I didn’t go there… I regret that so much.
I wonder if they were often hanging out there?
Maybe I need to go back someday…
They actually shot a music video at a pub.
I was relieved that it was not The Elms.
There were so many benches, as if to say, “Just sit down on me and enjoy the view”
It stopped raining and the sun was shining through a break in the clouds.
This is the town where Nothing But Thieves was born.
A bit depressing, yet beautiful.
I thought it was perfect for their music.
It was such a lovely town.
I wanted to walk around forever.
I hoped the songs of Nothing But Thieves would memorize this scenery.
The total number of steps I took that day was over 30,000, but when I came back to Japan, it was split up and down to about 20,000 due to the time difference. I cried.
Returned home around 6:30pm.
A cat welcomed me.
This was the second time I used Airbnb, but I thought it was pretty exciting. I felt like I could taste a bit of the local daily life.
I wished I could have lived in a house like this.
I came to the kitchen with sandwiches I bought at a supermarket, but it seemed like the owners were out of the house.
It's a private house so I can't post too many pictures, but
Look at this.
They are recording their children's height. It's so cute.
There was also Leigh-on-Sea related artwork everywhere.
It was nice to see how much they loved this town.
When I leaned out the window of my room, I was slightly able to see Conor's apartment.
Early summer nights in England come so slowly.
I thought my story ended here, until he announced his new project.
While everyone all over the world was in quarantine, Conor Mason, the singer of Nothing But Thieves, was posting videos of himself singing from his apartment.
He called it “Sun Sessions”
The love he sometimes talked about for his hometown Southend-on-Sea, the view outside the window, the building next to his apartment, that sometimes appeared in his videos…
I was deadly bored, stuck in my own room in Japan, enough to spin Google maps with those clues, and finally identified where exactly he lived.
Now I have to go there.
Well, I’m joking.
I just always wanted to walk around the town that raised their music, since the love of the band for their hometown was well known.
On 2nd May, 2022.
I was in an empty airport.
We have national holidays in May.
I thought I might be able to travel abroad this year, so I renewed my expired passport last December.
That was the right decision. I didn't think I could do that soon though.
The restriction for covid 19 was getting gradually eased.
Yet still, the situation of traveling abroad was complicated, since the Japanese government had a lot of stupid policies.
To enter Japan, you needed to take a PCR test and get a negative certificate within 72 hours before your departure.
The Japanese government was very strict and required you to write down the results on an original formatted form for Japan. Even though you had to take the test abroad, in a strange country.
After arriving at the airport in Japan, you also needed to go through quarantine.
No matter how hard you worked to get a negative PCR certificate, if you test positive there, you had to live in quarantine in a hotel near the airport for a week.
Okay, so now, with all those difficulties, why did I want to go abroad so badly?
I don’t know.
For me, traveling abroad was almost the same as an overdose of anti-depressants.
I swallowed all the pills I had gathered over the past few years.
I was able to stay at the second closest Airbnb house to Conor's apartment. (I couldn’t use the first one because I didn't meet their check-in time requirements)
That distance was about 400 meters.
I hope he won’t recognize such a crazy fan.
It was the house of a family.
My room was an attic.
Now, I can finally catch my breath.
I made it.
For the first time in 4 years, I finally got out of my country...!
