So close and yet so far away
Man, it is weird to be in Pennsylvania. Weird because I was on the west coast a week ago, and weird because I'm five hours from DC with two weeks left of tour. Very disorienting.
We're having a blast on the road. This trip has been head and shoulders over last summer's tour, and some of the best shows were in the past few days. We're already talking about doing a 10-day jaunt out to Minneapolis and back in January; the upper midwest seems to like us. Fuck Japan, we're big in Detroit!
Chicago: Laziness got the best of us, and we spent no time checking out the city, which none of us has spent any significant time in. We ended up lounging around Zack's place in Milwaukee till late afternoon, and driving into Chicago just in time for the show. Good turnout with a vibe very comparable to the Madison gig but in a (packed) living room. We had planned to stop by the Waldheim Cemetary the next morning to say whassup to Emma and all the other good folks buried there, but we slept late and lost the directions our hosts had given us the night before, so we just hit the road for Cincinnati.
Cincy: Stayed with and played with Envenomed, whom we had shared a bill with in Kentucky last year. We played in a room in a massive warehouse that's being illegally rented to tenants, including the girlfriend of one of the Envenomed dudes. There wasn't a huge turnout, but everyone had a good time, and most people came back to the house where we were staying to party.
Detroit: We'd been looking forward to this show. Kids went off for us there last year, and the venue was the same as last year, a big anarchist house/performance space/etc. called the Trumbullplex. Envenomed was playing too, so we all drove up together. Local bands Reaper and Shitfucker filled out the bill. Lots of kids showed up and rocked out for every band. Unfortunately our singer, Justin, who's a big dude, did a "combat roll" early in our set and landed wrong and probably cracked a rib. So he's in some pain. Other than that, good times.
Pittsburg: Here we are. We played the Roboto Project with our friends F.L.A.K., who play a similar style of music. It was an early show that moved pretty quickly. We missed the first couple bands, and then all of a sudden we were on and then done, and then it was 9pm, and now it's 1:30 in the morning. Kind of a strange day, what with the rather abrupt return to the East. I took a much needed shower and washed a pile of my reeking clothes.
And now: the Canada problem. Just as we had sorted out how we could most easily get ourselves across the border (Justin, who may have legal issues, walking across with a friend as a day tourist and the rest of us ditching all of our merch at a friend's place in upstate NY and driving across with just our equipment, looking positively angelic and non-terroristic). We were actually starting to feel optimistic. And then Forrest lost his wallet, which contains his only piece of photo ID. So we're in limbo, big time. We're supposed to play our first show up there on the 4th. I have no idea how things are going go, but I daresay our prospects are quite a bit darker than they were only a day ago.
I don't want to end on such a negative note. But I'm going to.
We're having a blast on the road. This trip has been head and shoulders over last summer's tour, and some of the best shows were in the past few days. We're already talking about doing a 10-day jaunt out to Minneapolis and back in January; the upper midwest seems to like us. Fuck Japan, we're big in Detroit!
Chicago: Laziness got the best of us, and we spent no time checking out the city, which none of us has spent any significant time in. We ended up lounging around Zack's place in Milwaukee till late afternoon, and driving into Chicago just in time for the show. Good turnout with a vibe very comparable to the Madison gig but in a (packed) living room. We had planned to stop by the Waldheim Cemetary the next morning to say whassup to Emma and all the other good folks buried there, but we slept late and lost the directions our hosts had given us the night before, so we just hit the road for Cincinnati.
Cincy: Stayed with and played with Envenomed, whom we had shared a bill with in Kentucky last year. We played in a room in a massive warehouse that's being illegally rented to tenants, including the girlfriend of one of the Envenomed dudes. There wasn't a huge turnout, but everyone had a good time, and most people came back to the house where we were staying to party.
Detroit: We'd been looking forward to this show. Kids went off for us there last year, and the venue was the same as last year, a big anarchist house/performance space/etc. called the Trumbullplex. Envenomed was playing too, so we all drove up together. Local bands Reaper and Shitfucker filled out the bill. Lots of kids showed up and rocked out for every band. Unfortunately our singer, Justin, who's a big dude, did a "combat roll" early in our set and landed wrong and probably cracked a rib. So he's in some pain. Other than that, good times.
Pittsburg: Here we are. We played the Roboto Project with our friends F.L.A.K., who play a similar style of music. It was an early show that moved pretty quickly. We missed the first couple bands, and then all of a sudden we were on and then done, and then it was 9pm, and now it's 1:30 in the morning. Kind of a strange day, what with the rather abrupt return to the East. I took a much needed shower and washed a pile of my reeking clothes.
And now: the Canada problem. Just as we had sorted out how we could most easily get ourselves across the border (Justin, who may have legal issues, walking across with a friend as a day tourist and the rest of us ditching all of our merch at a friend's place in upstate NY and driving across with just our equipment, looking positively angelic and non-terroristic). We were actually starting to feel optimistic. And then Forrest lost his wallet, which contains his only piece of photo ID. So we're in limbo, big time. We're supposed to play our first show up there on the 4th. I have no idea how things are going go, but I daresay our prospects are quite a bit darker than they were only a day ago.
I don't want to end on such a negative note. But I'm going to.
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