:: Music As Social Agitation Records::

:: Sunday, January 30, 2005 ::

I think this is only the second tour entry I have typed that is happening on schedule, right after the shows. We have been in Montana now for two days and have had two of our best shows in Helena and in Missoula. We were on the greyhound for 24 straight hours to get here from St Paul, though the trip was not so bad and the overnight bus not to full. for the first time I took the very back, three seat by the bathroom and we were on a private line carrier, so the bus was a lot nicer. that allowed me to sleep most of the night away, which helped out. after a few layovers and transfers we arrived in Butte, MT around 4:45. the schedule said we got in at 5:45 and it turns out that we had a 45 minute layover at some casino literally two blocks away from the main greyhound station in Butte. It would have been nice to have figured this out earlier, since Tyson (Old Shoes) and Jen (Annie J & The Radiant Murmur), who set these Montana shows up, were going out of their way to come to Butthole Montana to pick us up, and we were gonna be running behind as is. Me & Tony decided just to walk to the Greyhound Station and wait out the hour there. there was not much we could do to get a hold of Tyson and Jen to get them there sooner. I decided to play some guitar and ruminate on Tony (and some dude behind us on the bus) assertion that Butte was an awesome city. I guess it reminded tony of west texas. I didn’t see the lure at all. I decided to try and re-figure out the Racetrack cover I have done in the past and in the process, came up with a nice progression. I can sing “the way things are here� to the progression, but it is in a different key and pretty different, so I think this is going to be a 1985 song, perhaps incorporating the lyrical theme of the racetrack song. anyways, after an hour, and a bit of watching that shitty movie “Open Waters� (or whatever that new ocean/shark movie was), Tyson and Jen showed up. it was really good to see them, and Emma (Jens road weary car) looked as dismal as ever. It took us a few minutes to find the interstate we needed to take north to Helena, and in those few minutes a pretty fast/witty/sharp/biting/sarcastic tone was set for the trip (I think we overwhelmed our hosts a bit this time). once we got to Helena, it took a few minutes to find The Pattern House. when we pulled up, a few minutes late, we could hear someone playing and it appeared that the show was started without us. The Pattern House is a two-story café/coffeeshop nicely furnished and decorated, with all its glossy wood exposed frames and milk white walls. there was a lot of kids, mostly high school, who showed up for the show which was amazingly awesome. the music was upstairs, in this giant room that ran the length of the building and this guy Matt was playing to pass the time before we arrived. he played a lot of good covers and possible a couple originals and his voice reminded me of Travis Morrison, in good ways. we met Reagan, who had set the show up and whose band (Rusty Guns) was playing. Tyson had known Reagan and Ryan (lead guitarist) for a few years. We set up the merch stuff alongside the crafty display that OS/AJatRM have and after Matt played Old Shoes took the stage. It was a great, loud distorted set for Tyson and the kids appreciated his native banter and charm. the room sounded awesome and it was one of my favorite OS sets all-time. after Tyson, Jen did her Annie J thing and it her voice filled the room nicely. She has the kind of voice that you want reading you stories as you go to bed. good shit. It was my turn to go first (me and tony have been alternating) so I set up and was a bit nervous for such a large, young crowd. I quickly destroyed any inkling they might have towards me with some comment about my age, which I thought came out offensively and rude. I was looking forward to having a good set and most of the songs felt alright (I liked the way the PA handled my voice) and people seemed receptive enough. I ended with A Framing, which I had only played twice on tour, and afterwards tony set up his goodnesses. he had a little difficulty tuning for the first song, the instrumental rock out, but his banter was good and people were patient. his guitar sounded pretty dope in the room and it was a good real live tigers set. he wound up cajole-ing one of the rusty guns (ryan) up to play drums on the last two songs, the final song being the instrumental which tony rocked the fuck out of the way he does. I was feeling pretty dumb and self-conscious, like I had bungled up another of our bigger shows, but rusty guns came to the rescue with their alt-country tinged pop songs. twas good shit and all their friends, who had waited patiently in the hot room through all of us, seemed to enjoy it. afterwards, tony sold a couple cd’s and I half-sold a couple and it was decided that we would go get some food before heading back to Missoula. we were trying to get back before the japanther show ended at area 5, so we could pass out some hand bills, but that was looking less and less likely. after driving around for about a half hour trying to find our state highway and kind of looking for food, we were on the road again, highway 12 our route. 12 is a mountainous, two lane highway and I was pretty much rudely freaking out the whole time and eventually just put my head down and tried to sleep (the dark, foggy road reminded me too much of that canyon where me and jonny spilled our shit). anyways, we got back to Missoula and stopped at a diner. I decided just to continue sleeping in the car cause I was pretty tired and I am not sure how long those kids were in the diner caffeine-ing up. we went back to the dorm that tyson and Jen live in and made a game plan for the the morning. me and tony took tysons room, tyson and jen took jens room….

I woke up early so I could try to get some work done on the computer (the last couple times I had had internet access I used it to try and fill in some show dates for us and was neglecting my responsibilities for work and such). I wanted to try and get a little more filled in on the stuarts closure, though the mess about it on the CP board was a little outrageous. I was finally able to cut my inbox in half, and answered like 80 emails, which is a good thing. tony woke up soon after and at noon we called to wake tyson and jen. after some planning and meeting, tony took off for downtown, I took off for a computer lab in the library and tyson and jen hung out. we were to meet back up at 5pm, in case our radio interview came through, and then we were to meet nathan (aka Purrbot) at the burrito joint at 6pm. turns out the radio thing was a go, and we all reconvened in good time. headed to the station, to the local show. it was good to be back at KGBA or KBGA or whatever the hell the call letters are. I believe Nicki was the DJ's name and she was nice enough to let us hang out for an hour and play some cd tracks and i even did a live performance of olive to close our interview out. she was a little sick/hungover from the night before (the talk of the town this day was the japanther show the night before at area 5). we left the station a little late and traveled down to "taco del sol" or whatever it was called. tyson and jen swore by this place and said it mopped up all over banditos in bham (oddly enough, the two of them had still not gone to casa). it was really good and releatively cheap. the place was packed the whole time we were there. nathan was there and had already gotten his goods. we had a nice meal and it was good to meet nathan and such. afterwards, we headed to area 5 and began to set things up and get ready for the show. nathan and tyson had done a great job promoting the show, so we were optimistic that it would go well, despite there being 3 other all-ages shows that night. well, at 8:30 pm we started and there were only a handful of people there. but i took a turn as the doorperson and during tysons set, people started to fill the place. eventually there was like 35 people or so and it was a great crowd in a great venue with great music and great friends. tyson and jen both did amazingly well and they charmed the audience in the end with a duet sing-along to "total eclipse of the heart." tony went next and he had one of his best sets as well. his music does well in the bigger, hard-sounding rooms, echoing nicely. i was a little nervous when i went on next, not because of the crowd, but because i had just seen three of my friends play possibly the best sets i had seen them ever have.... okay. so tyson always bugs me to play whatcom falls, which thankfully i "can't" do with the whole four-string 1985 set-up, but i realized that i had never played the song at all for him and that i should so i started my set off with the song, using tysons guitar, having not even played it in over a year and a half at least. ironically, i was able to remember the lyrics better than i usually do (usually i forget the fuck out them even though this was the first song i ever wrote). good times. in the set, i also decided to try the racetrack-esque cover of "way things are here" which felt really good to play. i really like the progression and have decided to use it (a wholey different meoldy and progression than racetracks version) couple with a somewhat like-sounding vocal melody and some of the track lyrics to make the song about the inaugeration. "whats it worth, these half-filled streets, where we push our way(s), our own beliefs, while they lead that downfall, on the districts(/DC) green mall." hopefully the track wont get mad. it sounds a lot different.... anyways, the set was fun and better than the night before, but still not feeling wholly there the way sets should after 20 days of touring and 8 years of show playing... i dunno, good times. sold a couple cds. gave a couple away... oh wait, yeha, and purrbot played after me and nathans music was shit. such good pop tunes. he accompanied his awesome vocal melodies in turn with a keyboard, a gutar and a backpack guitar. he was a nice dude to boot, which is always a bonus. i need to get this cat to come to bellingham. after the show, we kind of had to bust out of there early cause tyson had nightwatch duty at one of the dorms. i was really tired so i decided to go with tyson and jenn and jenns friend rather than rock it out with tony and nathan and crew. we headed back tot he dorms and milled around a bit by the front desk tyson was anchored, too. i had been pretty exhausted since during nathans set (i wish i could put him on my nightstand like a wind-up and have him sing me to sleep everynight) so i said my goodbyes to tyson and jen and jens friend and peter (whom it was good to see and i was glad he came to our show after his bands -my pal ghosty- set at one of the other all-ages shows). so i went to bed at tysons dorm room and woke to the presley phone call int he morning. him and nathan came by to pick me and all our shit up and then we headed to the greyhound station. the guys had stayed up all-night hanging out with friends and scheming their upcoming tour (don't ask me what one of the names they came up with was)... nathan dropped us off we said our goodbyes and then waited for our relatively short ride to pasco to come...

:: brs 8:35 AM [+] ::
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Comments:

I'm honored!

Jackson

# posted by  Anonymous : 9:16 AM

 

this has to be the longest most detailed thing ever...
see you tonight.
.joshua.

# posted by  Anonymous : 5:33 PM

 

good call, joshua. i wouldn't expect anyone to read all this boring bullshit. i am just trying to document it so that i will be able to remember it way down the life-line.

# posted by  brs : 3:49 PM

 

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