New Model Army

FIRE DESTROYS NMA STUDIO

UPDATE: 20 January 2012 As many of you will now know, on Christmas Eve our studio/rehearsal room was destroyed by a fire which began in the furniture outlet next door. We have lost our entire studio set-up - desk, microphones, recording gear etc - and many irreplaceable instruments including Michael's Tama and vintage Gretsch kits and Robert's priceless old Slingerland. Gone is Michael's entire snare drum collection, eight guitars including a Les Paul, the Phew that Dean plays live and a vintage Epiphone acoustic, a 1960s C3 Hammond organ and a huge number of our favourite instruments, large and small. On the plus side most of our touring equipment was still cased and stacked up and, with varying degrees of smoke and water damage, we have managed to salvage much of this.

As expected, our Insurance claim will take quite a long time to settle but we are already rebuilding and hope to be back in our room by mid-February. While we have certainly lost a lot (including time and work on our new album), the Justin and Dean tour will go ahead as planned and we hope to be back up and running at full speed by late Spring.

We would like to thank everyone who has written to us with messages of support and offers to loan gear from all over the World. We have honestly been amazed and humbled by this response. Our gratitude and respect goes out to all of you. And lastly, but certainly not least, we'd like to thank the firefighters who contained the fire and saved the Mill (and even some of our equipment) in difficult and dangerous conditions.

STOP PRESS!!! CHARITY AUCTION OF JUSTIN'S FIRE DAMAGED GUITAR IN AID OF THE FIRE FIGHTERS...