Show Journal 2004-09-22
Day 6 – On to Bakersfield. I realized on the way that despite being in Southern California we didn’t see the ocean of the Hollywood sign. Weird. Another nice sunny day which bordered on hot. We can’t stop singing the song “throw the jew down the well” from Da Ali G Show. It’s offensive and wrong but it’s so damn catchy. I was also reminded on the drive how much I enjoy listening to the Alkaline Trio and how much I am now sick of Jawbreaker thanks to Justin. We stopped at a 2 story truck stop and ate a pretty sketchy buffet. The club tonight was called Murder City. Ironically there was a murder there a week ago. We got there way early and headed over to a music store so Dave could get his broken bass amp looked at. Jim went over and bought a smoothie at a place that doubled as a music venue. We came to find out that we bought the smoothie from the singer of Korn’s mother. Too funny. We headed back to club and proceeded to wait another 2 hours for the doors to open so we could load. This was one of the first shows here so attendance was pretty poor. 30 people does not fill up a 1000 person venue. We tried to rock but it proved difficult to the spare crowd. Thirty3 mixed it up and brought people on stage during their set. Kind of cool. Apparently it was Mike’s birthday … again. Afterwards we headed out with Thirty3 for a house to stay at. It was a little sketchy so the decision was made to stay at a truck stop. Everyone seemed to be in a bad mood and the van ride was silent. Deep inside I was still elated to not be working and out with my friends. We finally hit up a truck stop but sadly it was next to a cattle ranch and reeked of manure. We drove on to a less smelly location and slept in the van.
Show Journal 2004-09-21
Day 5 – Woke up quick at about noon, felt that I had to be in Compton soon. Today Chris cooked us the best breakfast I’ve had in ages. Mike, who is traveling with Thirty3 is also Zebrahead’s tour manager. Being that he’s friends with those guys he also lives with Greg who is the guitar player for ZH. The reason for pointing that out is because their house is littered with ZH memorabilia. There were tour posters from Japan, limited albums and all kinds of other cool stuff. It made me realize how many bands and how few actually make it. After food we watched some reruns of Da Ali G Show and realized just how god damn funny that show really is. Tre Tre and Jim hung out while Dave dragged Justin and myself to see a tank. Really. After that we headed over to the LBC to see our friend Robert and his merchandising business. His warehouse of shirts and stickers is like a historical archive of punk and rock history. Very cool stuff. After that was had pizza and admired what is perhaps the greatest collection of DVD’s and CD’s I’ve ever seen. All hail Robert. Tonight Thirty3 got to play a show at the Chain Reaction in Anaheim. We couldn’t get on the bill and played at the Cat Club on Sunset Blvd. in Hollywood. You’d think a club on the strip would have a crowd right? Wrong. The first band has a few people in attendance. They were a hard rock band from Israel so a few people seemed curious to watch. The second band was a local LA band. In the most pure Hollywood moment I’ve ever seen I went up and introduced myself to their drummer. I said “Hey, I’m Eric from 800 Octane, the bartender says you guys do well and I’m looking forward to seeing your set.” No shit the guy shakes my hand, pats me on the arm with his other hand and walks past me. What a cock. They did play the best cover I’ve ever seen of AC/DC’s song ‘TNT’ and deserve props. Unfortunately the rest of their set was a lackluster rendition of something along the lines of Hoobastank. We played last and it was dismal. Here are the people in attendance: Robert (who’s house we were staying at), Brent (a friend of the band), one of Brent’s friends, the bartender/sound guy and two of the people from the second band. All the crowd left, the band from Israel left and the friends of band number two left as well. I tried to convince Jim to play our song Hollywood but the humor was lost on deaf ears. It was pretty bad but a bad show is better than no show on tour. Thanks to Robert and Megan for their hospitality.
Show Journal 2004-09-20
Day 4 – We got up early and left for Fresno. Thirty3 left early to pick up some cd’s, so we took our sweet time on the road. The drive was uninteresting at best but thankfully it was warm and sunny. We actually arrived early and wound up at an internet café where Dave and I checked e-mail and played mundane video games. Jim purchased a wireless card for his laptop and we have dubbed him “the wifi hunter”. At some point Thirty3 informed us that our host from the night before didn’t like our band because we “played punk rock”. The more I think about that statement the more it annoys me. It just seems so shallow to like one kind of music (hardcore) and not another (punk) when they are so similar and share so many of the same origins and influences. This is more annoying when Thirty3 isn’t a typical hardcore band and we aren’t a typical punk band. Of course, the more I think about it I guess there was a period where I refused to listen to heavy metal just because it was heavy metal. A few years ago became zen with it again. Maybe everyone really into music goes through that phase. I’m rambling. The show tonight was interesting. There ended up being 5 bands playing in an standalone garage behind the house. Kinda cool atmosphere for a show. Plus it was across from a place called The Peach Pit which send Justin and Mike into nerd paradise. About 2 bands into the show a neighbor (named Bud) strolls over and lays into Dave about the volume. We knew it was going to be a rough night since the first two bands were relatively quiet and there were still 3 to go and two of which we knew would be very loud. The third band took forever to setup and play. Bless them for being young but I don’t think they realized we had driven 4 hours and were on tour where as they cam from down the street. But then again can you really get mad at a band of teenage girls? After the long set from band #3 we came dangerously close to playing an acoustic set but later decided us and Tre Tre should share gear and rip through 4 songs each. It took all of 20 minutes and we were done before Bud could hobble his old ass over again to bitch. Since we got done early we headed to Mike’s house in LA. Jon provided us with walkie talkies for van to van communication for our commute across “the grapevine”. Along the way a ghetto bird flew by and ran his spot light on Thirty3’s van for about 10 seconds. Weird.
Show Journal 2004-09-19
Day 3 – Sunday morning we hung out briefly with Kaylin and talked guitars with her dad. Next was a stop to Jake’s for breakfast. It took almost an hour to get our food but man it was good. We took the back road from Bend to Shasta, which was a nice detour from the normal I-5 commute. Somewhere along the way Jim repaired the headlight and Justin coined the hit song “llama said knock you out”. It has been a long time since we played Redding and it was nice to see there were at least a handful of people who remembered us. The show was small but fun. During the show we found out it was Mike’s birthday so happy birthday Mike. After the show we stayed at a friend of Thirty3’s. Her roommate (who was unaware we were coming) nearly passed out as two bands walked in with sleeping bags and pillows. I couldn’t imagine sitting at home watching TV by myself and being invaded by 10 smelly people who had come to crash.
Show Journal 2004-09-18
Day 2 – Pretty dismal start to the tour as we ended up leaving Portland late and arrived to the show in Bend 10 minutes after Thirty3 finished. This was not good because we were supposed to be playing second. Oops. Somehow during the set I knocked the living hell out of my hand and thought I had broken it. It instantly swelled up and it hurt to even strum the guitar. Rock and roll. The show went well. If we hadn’t been so rushed I would say it was one of the most fun shows we’d hand in Bend in sometime. Thanks to Kaylin and PJ for hooking that up. No thanks to the vandals who insisted on spray painting the venue during the show. Afterwards we went to Sharis to hang out. This was the first time in almost 3 years we didn’t have to drive home from Bend after the show so we were stoked on that. After food and gossip we followed Kaylin to her Dad’s house. I’m amazed we could follow her since her headlight points 90 degrees left and illuminates the side of the road. We were also warned “don’t hang your genitalia on the couch.” This wasn’t really going to be an issue but we found it odd that someone actually made a rule about it. To create a rule probably means it happened more than once. Needless to say I slept with my sleeping bag zipped up as not to touch the couch fabric.
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We’re heading out today for tour in a few hours. Thanks again for everyone’s support and we’ll see you on the road!
Show Journal 2004-09-17
Day 1 – Cool show tonight. The Silence sounded cool and had the best selection of t-shirts I’ve seen in many years. The Physical Challenge totally kicked my ass with their rock and roll/hardcore sound. Our set was short but fun. Thirty3 was very loud and very energetic. Their greatness was further magnified by their mustaches. Can’t wait to hit the road with these guys. Thanks again for everyone’s support on our tour kick off show.
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Our tour dates with Thirty3 are fast approaching. Can’t wait to see some of our old friends again and hopefully meet some new faces along the way. This will probably be our only trip south of Oregon for the rest of this year so if you are in California, Nevada, Arizona or Utah do try to get out and see us!
Show Journal 2004-09-10
When I think of MusicfestNW I think of a cozy, loud, smoky, beer drenched night of rock and roll. My vision of rock does not include the spacious interior and sparsely populated confines of the Paris Theater. It’s a good place for an all ages show but the jury is still out on it’s status as a rock bar. So yeah, this was our MusicfestNW showcase. Not the most ideal time slot but we were still glad to be a part of it. Quite a few people wandered in and watched which is really all that you can hope for at such an event. Anyway, thanks to the Willamette Week people for letting us be part of it and Michelle for the cookies.
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Over 21+ and going to MusicfestNW? Come check us out at the Paris @ 9:00 sharp! Also, check out Eric’s words of wisdom/sarcasm in the latest Willamette Week.
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