Mike Skinner Is No Longer Walking Through France

Mike Skinner of The Streets has cut short his walk to southern France… because he forgot he was playing a gig.

Skinner launched the trek, for which he was filming the video for a new track called "The Escapist," last week. He originally intended to walk from England to southern France with friends who work with him on his Beat Stevie television show that airs on the U.K.'s Channel 4. They were filming the video and documenting the trek on the Beat Stevie website.

Things originally seemed to be going well. Despite bad weather, Skinner was still walking, wearing — as the rules for the trek stated — "nothing but the shirt on my back" and using "nothing but the money in my pocket."

Then, in a May 20 MySpace blog post, Skinner wrote that the rules for the walk had been "bent slightly." One of his friends accompanying him on the journey offered him some fresh clothes since the shirt he was wearing was looking a little worn. He also enjoyed a meal in a French restaurant.

"I couldn't refuse," wrote Skinner. "The descriptions on the menu were so funny and as Ted read them to me out the car window I salivated profusely."

Judging from the posts on the Beat Stevie website, it looks like Skinner opted to dine on goat.

Later, Skinner suddenly remembered that he had a gig in a different country the next day, which meant he'd either have to stop walking or cancel the show. He chose the former.

"I also hadn't realized that I had a gig to do in Austria tomorrow," Skinner wrote in the same MySpace blog post. "I made the flight to Vienna and I have to make the decision whether to go back for some more walking or home to my bed and back to Stevie's house to edit the video. I think we got some amazing shots though."

Skinner left for Graz, Austria to play the Electronic Beats Festival, which also features Robyn, Roisin Murphy and Roni Size.

"Austria is not very sunny but the sausage tastes good in the home town of Arnold Schwarzenegger," Skinner wrote in a follow-up MySpace blog entry.

"We are stood on stage ready to play but no one is out there. Apparently they haven't let them in yet. This is how it feels on the rare occasion one is granted a soundcheck at a festival. Empyy hot dog vans. Clean toilets. Songs echoing through the air with no answer to the heartfelt emotion. Fuck it. I'm back to the dressing room. I have written a sexy song this morning. Nothing too sordid but tense with the sense of sex unsaid..."

Skinner will have to make a quick decision about whether he wants to return to France to finish filming his trek or face more empty hot dog vans. He might want to note that his MySpace page lists a gig at the Newcastle Open Air Festival on May 26 and a bunch of European festival dates in June, July and August. That said, there's a big gap between shows in June, so maybe he could sneak in some walking time then.