Spring Break 2007, Dudes!!
For the next two weeks Hope For Agoldensummer is touring out to Austin, TX and back. We are opening for our side project: Dark Meat & Vomit Lasers Family Band. The trip from Athens to Austin will be a long one because Dark Meat is a huge band. There are up to 23 people in Dark Meat, but only 14 on this trip… all in one van…with my parents’ cargo-bubble on top… and hauling a trailer. Coordinating piss-stops is challenging. As you know, women who live and work closely together often menstruate at the same time. Unfortunately this cannot be said of other bodily fluids.
So, on this particular tour, Hope For Agoldensummer is comprised of me and my sister. We did not drag Deb along as Hope is only playing half of the shows. We rehearsed a few times with Jason Robiera (drums) and Kris Deason (guitar). They are both on tour as part of Dark Meat and we sweet-talked them into backing us up for our sets. Also I am certain of a few trumpet/piccolo cameos from the Dark Meat horn section.
Monday, March 12, 2007 :: SLUGGO’S CAFÉ in Pensacola, FL
Today we left our ol Athens-town and headed south to Pensacola, FL. Before we even left our practice space the van already smelled like a boy’s armpit and we ran over our brand new soccer ball. It exploded like a shotgun. I spent the trip listening to old mini-discs of Hope rehearsals, field recordings and live shows. And I spent hours thinking about song-order for our upcoming album. We arrived in Pensacola after dark and went straight to Emily’s parents’ house. Their neighborhood is straight out of A Wrinkle In Time. All the houses look so much alike that we had to go around the block before Emily could figure out which one belonged to her folks, only because of a red pick-up in the driveway.
Emily’s mom made enough food for 20 people. Mostly vegan and even vegan blondies and choco cookies.
We arrived at Sluggo’s around 9pm. 3 electronic bands from Baltimore each performed short sets. I caught part of the last one but spent most of the time rehearsing with Kris in the parking lot. Oh, Nick Canada and I wasted about an hour talking on our CB radio to this lonely guy holed up in his house somewhere near Sluggos. He kept saying he was single and did I want to come over and did I want his cell phone number. And when he thought things were going to get steamy he asked my to switch to a less public channel 24. Nick took over and feigned a fading signal.
Without a soundcheck, Page and I took to the stage around 1am. The sound guy is sweet, but he is working with subpar equipment in a damp, concrete square. We played 4 songs as a duo, amidst much feedback and a patient crowd. Kris and Jason played 3 songs with us. I thought we sounded chaotic. We all forgot our places on Candy Dots, with Jim McHugh accompanying on harmonica. Whiskey River sounded okay, but I chose my extra long saw which is not the one I’d been rehearsing with, so I hit some strange notes. In general we played alright, but I expect a much stronger set once we’ve spent a little time on the road. Seems like that is what always happens.
After playing we quickly got our gear off stage and changed into Dark Meat issue clothing and war paint.
And then what transpired was REALLY, REALLY, I mean, TRULY AWFUL. Dark Meat has two drummers that play facing each other with kick drums ushed head-to-head. One bass player. A full horn section. 3 guitarists and 3 back-up singers. The rhythm section had purchased 3 boxes of natty light and most of the band was loaded. Every single song was flawed by missed hits, jarring out-of-synch drums, shit falling off stage. At one point I looked over and watched while Ben laid his bass guitar on the front of the stage and petted it like a cat. Instead of redeeming ourselves by ending early or throwing dollar bills, Jim decided to close the show with possibly our least admirable song “There’s A Retard On Acid and He’s Holding A Hammer To Your Brain.” It is a drone lasting anywhere from 10 to 25 minutes. I sat on the edge of the stage for the first 5 minutes of the show and then shuffled backstage to take out my earplugs and put on some pants.
Tuesday, March 13th, 2007 THE GREEN PROJECT (New Orleans, LA)
Well. I am in the van with my laptop plugged into a DC to AC power converter that our resident electrician, Forrest, rigged up. There all all kinds of wires coming out from and strewn across the dashboard. It whirs. Nick Canada is at the helm. I just ate 6 sweet tarts.
Half slept at a big DIY house, the rest of us on comfy beds at Emily’s parents’ house. Ate their oatmeal and blueberries this morning. We got everybody from the other house and hit Whattaburger for hashbrown burgers. Yep, 4 strips of hashbrown between a bun with the works, no meat. Lots of coffee. And on to the beach. Sand is so white it took me an hour for my eyes to acclimate. I saved the lives of several deep-red jellyfish while running up and down the beach with Page Swimming in icy, blue ocean water. Now everyone stinks worse than before. My pink hotpants are drying on the back of the trailer as we head toward New Orleans. We are late, the speed limit is low, and this stretch of highway is notorious for a liberally-ticketing patrol. For some reason we are blasting Fleetwood Mac. And now Dinosaur Jr. I am halfway thru my column of sweet-tarts. I eat these knowing that I have at least 4 surface cavities and no money to have them filled. It smells real weird in here and this is only day 2. I think Forrest put his dirty clothes in the food cooler…
2:59am and we are all crashing at Margaret’s townhouse in New Orleans. Real swank. Lots of floorspace and spare mattresses. She and 4 Dark Meats just chugged a can each of natty light and are doing normal rocknroll things like lounging around in boxer shorts, smoking and a drinkin, getting high, eating ramen noodles and old mealy apples and generally trying not to let this humid night even end. I am sitting in the doorway to the back yard attempting to hijack someone else’s internerd signal. No luck so this is being typed offline.
Tonight’s show was at a place called Green Project. It is a huge 2 story warehouse. The lower level is a recycling facility and those folks allow all these punk hippies to operate a DIY gardeners resource center / art gallery out of the top floor. They have all sorts of green thumb projects and flats full of budding vegetation. Lots of photography on the walls. And community projects like a field-recording exchange and listening center. 4 bands played. Hope was not on the bill tonight, just Dark Meat.
If you haven’t been to NOLA since Katrina hit, you should go and witness the devastation that still exists. Not for shock vaklue but more as a sociological study of how this town has adapted in the absence of swift governmental organized assistance. There are still X’s on most of the houses. In each quadrant of the X there is a notation: 1)Who inspected the house. 2) The date. 3) How many people were dead in the house, if any. 4) And one other that I can’t remember. Page and I explored a dilapidated lot next to the Green Project. It is full of old parade floats. I would love to hitch them all up behind our tour van and make a grand entrance and exit everywhere we go. Some of them have giant sculpted animals. Or stages with clouds. There are 3 old boats on wheels that are dolled up bedazzeled pirate ships, All of these relics are floating in a sea of garbage, used tires, empty propane tanks, old coolers, green plastic corrugated panels. Lots of good stuff in there to make music and float our own parade.
The first band was The Heart Attacks from Atlanta. I had never heard of them but Page says they were mentioned in Rolling Stone recently. I watched bits of their set but kept having to walk away out of sheer amazement at how polished their act appeared. Everything seemed choreographed and rehearsed down to the swinging of the mic stand and the little dancing jigs and vocal nuances. It is always weird to see a band perform like that when there is not an arena full of people in front of them. Also performing was Recovery Period and Brain Worms. Both were loud and good and even got a few folks dancing. Dark Meat went on last. We got all cute with glitter and face paint and played what would have been a near perfect set if not for the deluge of technical difficulties: PA sound kept fading in and out; Jim broke strings on 3 guitars; Ben’s bass shorted out; Ben’s tuner stopped working; the tubes in Jim’s amp were screwy. I think that is all. We had a lot of fun. People danced. Soccer in the parking lot. We took a giant band picture within the parade float chaos and split when a cop car slowly weaved its way ‘round the bend.
Wednesday, March 14th 2007 307 CLUB (LaFayette, LA)
Where have all you people been spelunking for so long. Man. Hope opened the show tonight in Lafayette and there were people who came to see us even though we’ve never been here before. Knew our songs. Called out “Religion” and “Laying Down The Gun” and “Midwest” and thankfully did not request “Malt Liquor” because I am taking a temporary/mental/personal break from that song. Anyhow, dang! That was real nice to see people who had heard of us even though we’d never heard of them. One guy even had on our signature HFags t-shirt. Neat-o.
So, right now the band on stage, Dire Wood, just covered a Flaming Lips song REALLY well. I am all sounded out and resting my ears here in the van, in the dark... but I can hear that Dire Wood is good. Plus, Aaron told me so and I believe him.
An employee of this fine establishment just caught Curtis pissing behind the dumpster.
So, I don’t think the entire crowd of Hope fans were bowled over by the overwhelming noise that is the Dark Meat, but some did stick around. I had fun dancing. I think it was on the 3rd or 4th song that Tim started wanking out and the stage became a giant display of cock-rock. That made me laugh at us and I caught Nick laughing, too. And then it was downhill from there. Major rhythm screw-ups and angst and tension. Close to the end of the show Kris broke his high E string in the middle of a song and I turned around to see him standing there with the unplugged broken-stringed guitar still strapped on, and another guitar stacked on top of it looking like Jimmy Page or one of those dudes that plays a two necked ax. Hmm. What else.
Oh, We spent all day roaming New Orleans and I lost $5 at Harrahs while Nick broke even at tournament texas hold ‘em and I saw the most amazing clarinetist performing on the street and he reinvigorated my interest in learning to conjure woody whiny wonderful sounds from that instrument. We ate Po Boys and Beignets and Chickory Coffee and lots of sin, sin, sin. I had no idea there were so many sex shops and strip clubs. There is one called Barely Legal where all the girls apparently are legal but look young enough to be your middle school daughter. And now we are all piling into the van to drive to Houston to pick up the 3rd Dark Meat singer, Heather, at the airport. And then we continue driving into the dawn breaking above Austin, Texas as we are performing at frickin 12 noon. I guess we’ll all sleep after the show. Find a dry spot in a grassy park. Sleep.
Thursday, March 15th 2007 :: Flamingo Cantina (Austin, TX)
Well, we drove thru the night from Lafayette to the Houston airport, picked Heather up at 7am and got to Austin, TX about 2 hours before showtime at noon. I am in a hotel lobby and Kris is passed out asleep on the counter next to me. Lots of people came to our show today. This show is Team Clairmont's showcase at SXSW. We were the opening act and all these people were lined up around the block, not to see us, but for the boxes of free shoes that Saucony was giving away. Each showcase has a ton of sponsers. The whole point of this fest is schmooze and schwag and schtick. Tomorrow we play Chunket Magazine's showcase with David Cross, Patton Oswalt and Andrew WK among other noteworthy guests. I want to find a grassy knoll and sleep, but everything is concrete covered in trash and flyers, cups, etc. You can't walk a block without comeone handing you a CD, flyer, promo gift, bottle of taurine filled crapjuice, etc. I think a lot of people are here just for the free stuff.
So, since both Team Clarmont and Chunklet basically hustled us onto their showcases, we don't get a damn dime from SXSW. We don't get wristbands, but we damn sure walked out of that club with a new pair of shoes on. I think bands get paid something like $50 for performing. But it costs $35 to apply to be considered for a showcase. So, um, we made $15. Thats a dollar each. I think I should busk tomorrow.
This place is overwhelming. It helps to cement what I already knew which is that the market of musicians is just like most any other market: oversaturated. Furthermore, these events don't necessarily accomplish the job of getting unsigned bands exposed. So far, every band I've seen here is already on a label. I think, like Nick says, most of the bands here are literally just entertainment for the execs here to schmooze and finish deals already on the table. If you are reading this and got signed because you performed in a showcase, please tell me so as to boost my faith in this system. I guess the main thing that is hindering me from letting go and just enjoying the experience of being surrounded by music is that seeing all these bands in one place, and combining that with the # of bands that didn't get accepted (like Hope For Agoldensummer), you realize just how many people are vying for a successful, long-lived musical career. Only so many people can be CEOs, and only so many people can be Bono. I think what most people here want, myself included, is to quit working for someone else and to generate revenue from their art. I know many people who are perfectly happy playing music as an aside to a completely arbitrary, unrelated career. But how much revenue do we want? What is enough? What is success? I am all too aware of the constant struggle to make ends meet and leave time for art. Especially since two members of Hope quit the band and cited lack of income as partial reason for their departure. Yep, I get it.
What keeps me coming back? I cannot leave music for long. Everytime I try, I always fail. I mean, even just trying to hold off booking shows while the making of this album is completed was impossible. I am a compulsive show booger, I mean, booker. Oh man, I am sleepy. I have had 4 bottles of vitamin water, and coffee, and a mediocre veggie burger, cheetos, and a pickle.
Have I ever written about this ideal of mine? In this overpopulated world I realize that we cannot all be entrepreneurs. People need teams, partners, employees. That is fine. What I don't understand is why we must work 5 days a week, or the majority of the year, for someone else? Who decided this was normal? People should work no more than 3 days a week for someone else unless they have some sort of financial goal they are trying to achieve, or are bound to work this much by circumstances beyond their control (babies, sick family, addicted to Home Shopping Network, have pre-existing condition and must work 40 hrs to qualify for group health insurance). So, I quit the pottery studio back in March before I went to Peru. Or, I guess I didn't formally quit. I just went to Peru and did not resume work at the pottery studio upon my return stateside. Now I am doing purchasing for an A/V company 3 days a week. I make $12 and hour. After taxes I make about $250 per week. My rent is $200, but this will be changing soon so I may have to ask for a raise because I have made a firm decision taht at this time in my life I have many more important things to do with sunlight than hide from it behind a computer screen in a concerted airplane hanger next to the giant chicken factory which smells like old, gnarlly death. What I mean is that I have decided to spend the majority of my waking hours working for myself and not for someone else. All of this is to lead up to my ideal which is this: what if businesses paid their workers double, but everyone works half as much. This means the owners and chairmen and CEOs and boss hogs take a huge paycut. The employees make just the same amount of money, but more people are employed (you'll need twice the workers if everyone is working half as much). I know this sounds threateningly close to some kind of blessed communism, but that is only because I am a communist at heart, sometimes a socialist, rarely an anarchist, but definitely longing to be both feral/nomadic and be a farmer amidst farmers who are also artists and teachers, whose homes creep outward from a heartmending epicenter surrounded by fruit trees and old hardwoods.
The Dark Meat show went well, by the way, until the last song when a group of pixies simultaneously maltuned all the stringed instruments and we bellowed thru with Jim singing with the pitch of his guitar, and Heather and Page matching the pitch of Kris' guitar, and the horns looking over at me laughing, and all these people wondering who'd beat them to the free shoes and monogrammed afro-picks. Tomorrow we are going to challenge The Polyphonice Spree to a full band thumb wrestle.
Friday, March 16th 2007 :: Red 7 (Austin, TX)
Today was some good fun. We slept at a DIY house behind a restaurant. Some camped in the yard, some upstairs on dirty floors. They are on a greywater bucket system for flushing the toilet but at 3am I was so frustrated, and had dumped all the bucket water into both the bowl and the tank and been unsuccessful at flushing…mmm…so I uh… I just turned on the water and let the tank fill up like a normal stateswoman. What could I doo doo? As a guest, which is ruder: To leave their toilet unflushed? Or to undermine their prevailing ethical system and use city water to flush? I don’t know. It was extremely late and I made an executive decision without consulting the porcelain congress because I couldn’t because they were not in session, being asleep and all.
Also, I meant to add that this DIY house was situated next to one of those businesses that helps people find rental housing and roommates. In a great display of irony, upon arriving at work, the manager of said business was the person who awakened those of us camping outside and asked us to kindly find somewhere else to camp… but did not offer his services in said pursuit.
So, we packed it up and headed downtown. We parked at the same lot as yesterday because this nice Greek man let us come and go if we tipped him an extra $5. We arrived to a completely unorganized Chunklet Magazine showcase sponsored by Dewars Scotch Whiskey. Yuk… but my Dad loves that stuff so I got him a T-shirt and did a shot in his honor. Which made me drunk, but that was not until after we played.
Anyhow, after gently arguing our case with the sound people, they relented and let us tear down the backline drum kit. We have to go thru this everytime we play somewhere with a backline. They don’t understand why we have to use our on gear and have to have 2 drummer facing each other rather than one drummer facing the audience. The first band that played was really good and had awesome weird instruments like harmonium. The percussionist had this weird wooden framed instrument with keys like a toy piano that when played struck rectangles of metal like a glockenspiel tines, and then in tuen reverberated these cylinders of metal like windchimes. Very cool. We played and threw out mardi gras beads and had a good ol’ time. The horn section played Albert Ayler's "Bells" while the rest of us unloaded. We spent the rest of the day wandering around watching music, drinking free scotch, waiting on our wristbands to arrive (we accepted an official SXSW show for tomorrow which means we get wristbands), hanging out in the parking lot drinking Ouzo from Al’s family which the smuggled thru customs in a big evian bottle. That stuff is harsh. Someone accidentally traded our last wristband for chocolate mushrooms, not realizing we still needed it for Aaron. Drama ensued and I knew it would so I had my mini-disc ready and caught it all for posterity’s sake. The evening went pretty much the same way as the afternoon. Endless roaming, standing in line, watching Mohawks and short shorts. Saw Robyn Hitchcock with Peter Buck accompanying him. It was like a palate cleanser for my ears. The quietest act I’d seen in days. Good.
Kris and I went to see Polyphonic Spree at 12:30am. It was really beautiful and made me want to write more music. And record. I had never seen them or heard their music before, but they have a good rep so I drank 2 cups of coffee and stuck it out. Very inspiring. Gorgeous harp playing. Synchronized 6 person choir with killer dance moves. Everything was gorgeously orchestrated. The lyrics were uplifting. I think it was the 3rd song where I started crying. I was thinking of my friend Paul Blanks. He shot himself over a year ago. I still miss him. After he passed I worked a lot of late nights, staying until 3 am sometimes to turn up the kilns. I talked out loud to him. Thought I saw him in the periphery many times. His brother stayed on at the studio and is still there. He has become quite a prolific painter in the last year. Really intricate work with paint and clay.
Tonight we sleep on a carpeted floor.
Saturday, March 17th 2007 :: Opal Divine’s (Austin, TX)
“Fuck By Fuck You”. I saw that phrase used in numerous magazines to describe South by SouthWest, the giant, unwelcoming monster in whose employment Dark Meat just spent 3 days. And after playing a show each day, I must admit that the going got rough. Last night we were treated amazingly badly by some of the people working the show at Opal Divines. We ended up with this show because Les Claypool saw our show the day before at Red 7. He had this showcase and one of his bands cancelled. He liked us and invited us to fill the slot.
After spending all Saturday lounging around our hostess’ house, talking with the neighbors, and pushing the neighborhood kids around on their fake ATVs, I loaded up with everybody and we headed back to downtown Austin for this last show. We’d cancelled our Denton show so we could stay this extra day in Austin. When we arrived at the back of the venue we found that it was in fact a parking lot that had a tent recently erected over it. We were barely out of the car before some dude walks up and says, “Are you really a 15 piece band?” And we said, “Yeah.” And he sighed heavily and walked away. The stage managers and sound people had not yet arrived so we went to Magnolias to eat gingerbread pancakes and fish tacos. When we got back we walked into the MoFro lions den. MoFro was the band slated to go on after us and they were FURIOUS that a 15 piece band had been invited to fill the empty slot before their set. But they were not pissed at Les Claypool for inviting us, they were in fact pissed AT US for existing at all. They kept coming up to us and bitching and doubting that we would be able to set-up and breakdown within 10 minutes, so they shortened our actual performance set to 25 minutes thinking we’d need all the other time (we’d originally been given an hour) to set-up and breakdown. They told us we owed them $40 for the soundguy (the club was only paying us $100 to perform), and at one point the manager walked up to us and said “You can see why we are a bit perturbed, can’t you?” And Charlie said , “No..” And the guy gestures to our giant pile of gear under a silver tarp and says “Well you are asking us to make the switch from a 4 piece band, to a 15 piece band and then back down to a 5 piece band.” Huh? We did not invite ourselves, and we certainly would not have taken the show if we’d known our mere presence would offend the other bands. Sheesh. Anyhow, because we are now aces at the quick draw, we were set-up and performing in 13 minutes. We played 5 songs, people dug it, and we had the stage cleared in 5 minutes. MoFro took almost 45 MINUTES to set up after we cleared the stage. I give them and their manager and all other jerks at SXSW the big middle finger.
I must say that I had a great time seeing the Polyphonic Spree on Friday night. I had tons of fun people watching. I saw a nice set by Robin Hitchcock. But mainly there was a lot of waiting in long lines and roaming the streets in search of a slice of pizza less than $3.50. I saw lots of Athens and Atlanta folks there: Trances Arc, The Whigs, Cinemechanica, Summer Hymns, Chris Hassiotis.
We drove to Denton last night and arrived at 4am. Slept at Nate and Aprils place and are now in the van on our way to Lawrence, Kansas From here on out all our shows will be Dark Meat, Drakkar Sauna, and either Hope or a local band opening. We go Lawrence to Bloomington, IN,, to Nashvilles, to Murfreesborro and then home sweet shower and bed and back to my desk job and finishing the HFags album.
Saturday, March 17th 2007 :: Opal Divine’s (Austin, TX)
“Fuck By Fuck You”. I saw that phrase used in numerous magazines to describe South by SouthWest, the giant, unwelcoming monster in whose employment Dark Meat just spent 3 days. And after playing a show each day, I must admit that the going got rough. Last night we were treated amazingly badly by some of the people working the show at Opal Divines. We ended up with this show because Les Claypool saw our show the day before at Red 7. He had this showcase and one of his bands cancelled. He liked us and invited us to fill the slot.
After spending all Saturday lounging around our hostess’ house, talking with the neighbors, and pushing the neighborhood kids around on their fake ATVs, I loaded up with everybody and we headed back to downtown Austin for this last show. We’d cancelled our Denton show so we could stay this extra day in Austin. When we arrived at the back of the venue we found that it was in fact a parking lot that had a tent recently erected over it. We were barely out of the car before some dude walks up and says, “Are you really a 15 piece band?” And we said, “Yeah.” And he sighed heavily and walked away. The stage managers and sound people had not yet arrived so we went to Magnolias to eat gingerbread pancakes and fish tacos. When we got back we walked into the MoFro lions den. MoFro was the band slated to go on after us and they were FURIOUS that a 15 piece band had been invited to fill the empty slot before their set. But they were not pissed at Les Claypool for inviting us, they were in fact pissed AT US for existing at all. They kept coming up to us and bitching and doubting that we would be able to set-up and breakdown within 10 minutes, so they shortened our actual performance set to 25 minutes thinking we’d need all the other time (we’d originally been given an hour) to set-up and breakdown. They told us we owed them $40 for the soundguy (the club was only paying us $100 to perform), and at one point the manager walked up to us and said “You can see why we are a bit perturbed, can’t you?” And Charlie said , “No..” And the guy gestures to our giant pile of gear under a silver tarp and says “Well you are asking us to make the switch from a 4 piece band, to a 15 piece band and then back down to a 5 piece band.” Huh? We did not invite ourselves, and we certainly would not have taken the show if we’d known our mere presence would offend the other bands. Sheesh. Anyhow, because we are now aces at the quick draw, we were set-up and performing in 13 minutes. We played 5 songs, people dug it, and we had the stage cleared in 5 minutes. MoFro took almost 45 MINUTES to set up after we cleared the stage. I give them and their manager and all other jerks at SXSW the big middle finger.
I must say that I had a great time seeing the Polyphonic Spree on Friday night. I had tons of fun people watching. I saw a nice set by Robin Hitchcock. But mainly there was a lot of waiting in long lines and roaming the streets in search of a slice of pizza less than $3.50. I saw lots of Athens and Atlanta folks there: Trances Arc, The Whigs, Cinemechanica, Summer Hymns, Chris Hassiotis.
We drove to Denton last night and arrived at 4am. Slept at Nate and Aprils place and are now in the van on our way to Lawrence, Kansas. From here on out all our shows will be Dark Meat, Drakkar Sauna, and either Hope or a local band opening. We go Lawrence to Bloomington, IN,, to Nashville, to Murfreesboro and then home sweet shower and bed and back to my desk job and finishing the HFags album.
Sunday, March 18th 2007 :: Jackpot (Lawrence, KS)
Ah. Nice. We pulled into Lawrence, KS in time to eat a homemade pasta dinner and Haam’s beer at Jeff & Mary’s. It was amazing. Home cooked food. We were late. We fed our faces, jumped in the van and followed the Drakkar Sauna duo to the venue. A nice sized club, not too big, enough room to dance and also have an intimate, attentive show. Dang, I have a helluva cough and a huge zit right below my jaw.
Okay, so we set up Dark Meat and then put HFags in front. We played to a real sweet crowd and definitely Jason and Kris accompanied us with more ease than the other Hope shows thus far. Folks bought lotsa merch and then we ran to the bathroom to change into our Dark Meat go-go outfits. The rhythm section was fraught with peril. At one point I saw Ben grab Tim by the gold braid of his highschool marching band jacket and slovenly scream “Staythehellouttamyway!”. After the show was over Tim came down with a sudden case of the chills and puked his brains out later in Jeff’s backyard.
But, before the vomit came the Drakkar Sauna. If you have never seen them you ABSOLUTELY MUST attend any and every show that the have anywhere near you. Their set-up is simple and brilliant. The have one really nice mic for guitars and voices, like an old timey bluegrass band singin into a can. And then they have an ir organ permanently duct-taped to a bar stool miced by two sm57s. To the side of that is a kickdrum and a tambourine that gets strapped to Jeff’s foot. Jeff simultaneously sings, plays guitar or organ and kick drum and tambourine. And Wallace sings and plays guitar. Their songs are brilliant. They sing about medical calamities, characters living on the fringe of society, family, sex, God. Oh how we love them. And they let Dark Meat and Hope keep the entire $ from the door. That sure is hospitable.
And then we packed it up and went home to Jeff’s to pitch tents and sleep in various corners of his yard and house.
Monday March 19th 2007 :: The Hospital (Bloomington, IN)
Okay, so up early and a 12 hour drive from Lawrence to Bloomington. We arrive perilously late as the show should end at 11pm and there are now three bands playing and we didn’t arrive until 8:30pm. I really like The Hospital. It is a big open room with balcony and a shared living space/sewing room/art gallery.
We unpacked quickly while the audience egan arriving. A really good turnout for a Monday night. Damn. Am I coming down with something? I can’t stop coughing and there is a clear excess of phlegm in my throat. Ew. Hope played first and there was a lass that had driven from Ohio to see us. Dark Meat next and I think the echo factor, while suited for a quiet band like Hope, did not necessarily enhance the bang of the Meat. But we played decent and folks liked us. And he stage was a good size. Drakkar Sauna headlined and they covered two Louvin Bros’ songs. Page and I sang harmonies from out in the crowd. The crowd ate ‘em up.
Do you think that the reason I have a cough is because I ate a block of chocolate that Vanessa dumpster-dived and brought to the show? Hmmm. I didn’t have a cough before I ate it. And no one else who ate it seems to have a cough. It could be because I slept on the stage after we got back from an AWESOME round of karaoke where Page and I belted out Bonnie Tyler’s “Total Eclipse of The Heart” but changed the words to “I totally shit when I fart.” Just a touch of class for the good people of Bloomington.
Oh, and then all hell broke loose because one member of Dark Meat who has a girlfriend that normally tours with us but stayed home to earn money so said member could go on this tour… well, he made out with another member of Dark Meat and said girlfriend found out about it and wouldn’t stop calling and freaking out and we all went to sleep except Page who stayed up until 5am talking to said girlfriend on ye ol cellphone.
And now we are all awake and the drama ain’t stopped and I am worried about said girlfriend and we are driving past a nuclear power plant somewhere between hither n’ yonder. Somebody better get their dukes up cuz I have a feeling our arrival in Athens will herald a pretty awesome fist fight. Also, said girlfriend turned her rage into an extreme painting party wherein she has apparently covered everything belonging to said Dark Meat member in paint, including his vintage bass guitars and his vintage van, which is kinda a shame because that was my all time favorite van: high lonesome desert sunset scene painted on the outside and orange shag carpet on the inside. Well, I guess all his shit will sit out on the curb covered in paint for the next 3 days until we get home. An artistic testament to repercussion and ramification. I hope someone takes pictures.
Daytime Show :: Tuesday, March 20th 2007 :: Grimey’s Record Shop (Nashville, TN)
Well, I’m sick. I woke up coughing and realized where and when and who: Tiny Timmy Timble. We sing into the same mic on some Dark Meat songs and he has been ill for the last 4 days. I guess I caught his croup. We arrived in Nashville an ENTIRE HOUR early. Woah. Page and I sat out on the stoop of Grimey’s reord shop working on 4 part harmonies with Jeff and Wallace. We are going to sing Louvin Brothers songs with them during their set tonight in Murfreesboro. Grimeys is tiny and they moved a big CD display case out of the way to make room for Dark Meat. There were about 25 people in the store watching us. We got off to a rough start but the energy escalated and by the 4th song we were doing fine. The crowd was real sweet and Grimeys made an excellent recording for us that we’ll probably be able to use in the future. Now on our way to Murfreesboro.
Nighttime Show :: Tuesday, March 20th 2007 :: The Boro (Murfreesboro, TN)
By this time I realized I was definitely coming down with something and I had to make a choice. Either starve it and consume only fluids, or feed it a huge block of protein. I chose the latter and got a giant plate of steak fajitas at a Mexican Restaurant called “La Siesta”. Mediocre. I sat with Drakkar Sauna gents. Wallace ordred the same thing as Jeff. Apparently he always does that because he thinks it is funny and he says sometimes Jeff chooses good food. Jeff ust shook his head. Wallace told us about his escapades as a recently hired & trained city bus driver in Lawrence, KS. He said that he is not allowed to kick people off his bus, and that there is a federal law that no one can be turned away from a bus if they don’t have enough money to ride. Looks like the world is my oyster again. Wouldn’t it be amazing if that rule applied to Greyhound buses as well. Hmm. On second thought, I’d rather fly. Greyhound bus rides are unnecessarily long and dreary. Stuffy, too. And sometimes smelly. The bus rides in Peru are also like that but factor in Montezuma’s Revenge, highway bandits, terrible teen flicks,. Oh, and if you use the restroom for anything other than pissing the driver gets on the loudspeaker and announces it. Public humiliation for natural bodily functions.
Okay, so after the food I plugged my laptop into the venue to use their electricity and wifi. I was in search of a good hotel deal. We have been camping and squatting for this entire tour and everyone is worn out, so we decided to get 3 hotel rooms. I found some that offered an ASCAP discount of 20% which is cool, but it turns out you have to book way ahead of time thru a reservation service, which ain’t so cool because it is difficult to predict where one will land on a tour. I know it seems like it would be easy since you go into it knowing where you’ll be each night. But almost everyday there is some unpredictable occurrence that throws the whole boat topsy-turvy.
Okay, so Drakkar Sauna opens. Page and I sit in on the last two songs: Louvin Brothers’ versions of “The Family Who Prays” & “The River of Jordan”. Then I go to take a nap in the van and start having crazy chills and fever and can’t stop coughing up mucus. At some point Page comes to tell me it is time for Dark Meat to play and she sees that I am really ill. We decide I should sit this one out. Since I wasn’t inside, I can only report from my van window vantage point. It sounded and looked like a great rock show. The club invited us back. But then tried to stiff us on money. There was $150 missing form the door money envelope and no one on the bar staff would fess up. So, we split with as much $ as we could and left the promoter to sort out the rest.
After driving up and down a hotel strip for almost an hour, with Forrest running in and either being scrutinized, turned away, or quoted an enormous rate, it was decided that I should be the one to represent us to a hotel manager. I was the only one dead sober and devoid of face paint, plus I am female and that opens doors, like it or not. We stopped at the Red Roof Inn and I told the guy we needed 3 rooms, got him to give us 10% off, smiled real cute and went the heck to bed with an ibuprofen and a huge swallow of gas station generic robotussin.
Now we are back in the van, nourished on Waffle House and vitamins, on the way to Knoxville for our final show out of town. I think we are driving home tonight after the show. Yea!