End of USA Tour, Possibly our van, Keep on Keepin on.

In front of my future residence

  

How's it going, on this blustery old fall day?  Days are getting shorter, subsequently the nights are getting shorter, and our van is still a fucking piece of shit.

Just wanted to do a quick little blog recapping the last couple days of our previously mentioned small excursion into the USA.

It's like they knew we were coming and erected a statue of Mike's boner.

Where we last left off, we were in Frostburg, Maryland. Never heard of it? That's ok. Neither has anbody have we, or anyone else we talked to basically outside of Frostburg. That night we ended up finding the cheapest drinks we would all tour, or actually in my entire existence. Ready for this?..........10 cent beers. I fuck with you not. Despite how pathetically broke I am, I went for it and tipped a whopping 25%....Totaling at 2 and a half cents. Yes, please shower me with compliments of how considerate I am....

Anyways that wasn't at the venue we were playing at, the venue we played at was called "Dante's", and it was a pretty cool places. In a week that had a couple strange venue's on it, it was nice to play on a real big stage. But we kind of just roll with whatever situation we're given, stage, floor, dark corner, rollin with the punches is what we do best.

New band member

On stage in Frostburg, one of the local patrons who could rip the saxophone came on stage with us to add some horns to a couple of our songs, he was a great lover musician, and it was cool to add something new to proverbial fold.

Everyone was feeling mighty sick at that point, sleeping in our van and being freezing cold turns out did not bode well for our health. So the next morning we got the hell outta there, to perhaps one day return, who knows. I should mention that all the people we met there were real nice to us. 

"Hi I'm Max, the stupidest piece of shit alive"

Anyways, the next day we played in Arlington, which is kind of sort of part of Washington D.C. unofficially (as one resident explained to us).  So we mustered up the energy to check out all of the touristy Washington stuff.

We thought this was the white house for like half an hour

Seeing the white house was actually spectacularly boring but the Lincoln memorial was cool. The show that night, we played at a place called the Cowboy Cafe (we knew we'd fit in instantly given our love affair with romantic comedies starring Hugh Grant  cowboy movies. The show there was fun and people seemed to dig it and buy cd's and t shirts all that important jazz that keeps us on the road. Bands are really just T shirt companies, we make more from t shirts than anything else, it's really the only that keeps us going, so ya know, if you're at a show in the next little bit and the shirt you're wearing sucks, check one of ours out?? 

See; dark corner, as mentioned above

After the show we got invited to a party with some local folk so we figured we'd go there and try and find a floor to crash on. Unfortunately at one point some drunken asshole came in, said he hated Canadians and we got kicked out of the house. What a bunch of fuckfaces if I do say so myself. There are generally speaking subtle differences with American and Canadians, but I just don't see any Canadians doing something like this (except Scott, he's a dick) but maybe I'm just painting us all with a very broad stroke of kindness. Not sure anyone I've ever met would kick someone out of a place for being "American", as if right? I'm sure this was just one asshole and obviously most American's wouldn't do this, but it still left a salty cholorine-"y" taste in our mouths.

The place we played in Lock Haven

Not to make this too much of a sob story or anything, but on the way home from Arlington, shit really started to suck. Somewhere about 60 miles outside of Buffalo our van completely and utterly fucked off on us. It stopped accelerating and instead started to hiss very loudly. This is just such a bummer because we obviously need that van. We ended up having to tow it back from Buffalo to the border, than from the border get picked up by another tow company and back to our place in Toronto. If you get anything from this blog....get CAA. Haha. Our total trip would have cost us over 800 dollars, if we didn't have CAA. Fortunately we do, so it was free. Wish the same could be said for our transmission replacement.

So yeah that was our second foray into the United States. I think we're doing a decent job on starting to build a bit of a following there and it's definitely been extremely cool to us, however this one just ended on a bit of a bummer note. But we'll bounce back, keep soldiering on. If there's one thing we always do, it's soldier on.....It's what good waffles do.

Good Waffles

 

 Some Random Observations  

• Some guy came up to me in Arlington and was like "you know what we call Canada right, America's hat! Get it, like cuz it's on top of America right!"  You know what we call America? Canada's dick.  He thought it was pretty funny, he was a pretty good guy actually.
• Cannot believe how much prices vary in the states. The average pint cost like 2 and half bucks. That would be terrific on my wallet and just terrible on my liver/reputation/livestock....k I don't have any livestock, but good god, under the circumstances in which I did, and there was cheap pints, they would most likely be neglected.
• Cannot wait to hit the road again. Gotta say it's depressing a little bit to be back home. I feel like in some fashion we're really only "us" when we are on the road.
•  We have TONS of new songs! Can't wait for everyone to hear them. They sound awesome. In some ways we're starting over and it's pretty different stuff. Not to suck our own schlong, but I'm not sure it really sounds like anything that's out there right now. Maybe that's just wishful thinking though. You can decided in the upcoming year as it's all released. 

Thanks for reading. I'll be sure to report any other news or musings in the future. Hope this didn't bore the shit out of you.

Jesse

Read my blog and tell your friends to too, if you feel like it.

Susan Sarandon is a huge fan, she asked us to sign her tits

 

Ahh being on tour. When your body feels like garbage but you're too drunk to notice.  Just joking, we're alive and well. How are you all doing? Well I should hope. Though this has only been a short little jaunt, it's been an eventful one! Feels great to be back ripping it up on the road.

We started out in Boston, which has in our brief experience there been a cool city to us and this time was definitely no different. The venue we were playing, like our last time here, was right on the Harvard campus, and was having a party for it's law students when we got there. I think it goes without saying that we fit right in, and had the students approaching us asking for law advice and our study notes for the bar exam. Which we of course all completed in our free time. I think it also goes without saying that they had some free catering there and we snuck our way in, downing quesadilla after quesadilla. The next half hour so, isn't blog worthy necessarily as it was cumulatively spent in the bathroom. 

I, uh, should mention that these photos are photos from my camera phone taken of my actual real camera, sorry folks!

Jokes aside, the crowd in Boston was awesome and started dancing as soon as we started playing, and for once I'm pretty sure it wasn't a coincidence. After we finished playing, a very nice lady gave me a Wilco sticker, not sure if it was random or she was aware of my deep love affair with the band, nontheless it's now on the inside of our van. I'm rambling but whatever.

That night we had the luxury of sleeping in our van. In the summer it wasn't that bad, I mean it was really sweaty and stuffy and crazy hot, but I'd take that over what we had to do that night. It was so so cold, Massachusetts was already covered in snow and it was well below freezing. It was really one of those moments where you're questioning the decisions that lead you up to that moment. The things I've done for music, fuck me. 

Crowd in Boston getting down!

We decided then regardless of budget there was really no way we could sleep in the van again, and headed to our second ever show in New York City. Instead of playing in Bushwick under a subway line, this time our venue was right in the heart of Greenwich Village, so we were pretty stoked about that. Being just the richest brokest band in the history of all time, we had to get the nicest sketchiest and least scary scariest motel ever in nearby New Jersey, and by this time it was for some reason, an orgy of snow and sleet.  Our van isn't really in good enough condition to drive in regular weather let alone this so it was no time at all until we had already smashed into another car. Luckily they were pretty "chill mother fuckers" about it, because there's just no way we could afford the insurance if that premium went up. And everyone was still alive and everything too, which was an added bonus.  Anyway we paid the 20$ toll for the Holland tunnel and continued onto Manhattan lucky that our van wasn't smashed up to bad and no one got hurt. 

Hey, our motel didn't have towels, clean sheets, or peace of mind, but it did have free porno, something I'm sure the Waldorf would never offer.

The show in New York was pretty great, we played two sets at this bar called Wicked Willy's that was hoisting a Halloween party costume party. We didn't have costumes, but that didn't stop me from pretending. After, the venue had professional beer pong tables where we proceeded to challenge the locals.

After the snow storm

The next day the weather finally fucked off and we walked around Manhattan trying not to break the bank. After that proved impossible we decided to leave the city. We had a day off, and it was too cold to sleep in the van still so we got a cheap cheap hotel somewhere en route to our show in Lock Haven, Pennsylvania.

We had another day off and proceeded to spent 11 hours in the same bar, never once venturing outside.  We were in this town called Hazleton, and we were just bored as hell looking up places to go. It was on trusty old "Yelp" that we found the Battered Mug. The oldest bar in all of Hazleton. This place was literally an exact replica of Moe's Tavern, handful of locals sitting quietly in a drunken stew. In a matter of hours ( well actually in a matter of like 6-8 hours) were pretty much no different. This place had a shuffleboard, and we just sat there drinking $1.50 pints for, yea 11 or so hours. Another one of those moments where you kind of question what the hell brought you here. I should have probably been in class back in Toronto, but the Battered Mug for whatever reason felt a little more like home.  At a bit after midnight Mom (Colin) came and picked the three of us, and our buddy and roadie Eric Limoges, up and we passed out at the hotel, from what I remember. I should also mention, Max would not shut the living fuck up about how good he thought he was at shuffleboard. We're still waiting actually. Man I hate that guy.

Toto we aint in Mount Britchets anymore

We were pretty close the next day to our next venue, in Lock Haven. It was a coffee shop and we played to the fewest people we ever have in the history of our band. Just Eric Limoges and the two people working who were both extremely nice and one of them let us crash at there place that night, a very kind gesture indeed.

This brings us up to yesterday. We played in Conhoshocken, a ritzy neighbourhood in Philadelphia. The people at the venue were super cool, as the show was supposed to be an acoustic show, and they let us play a regular set...because we don't know how to play an acoustic show. The venue was called Guppy's and it was run by a fellow Canadian who even served Poutine. How awesome. The bar was also hosting a cancer benefit that night and it turned out to be pretty packed.  I think we made some fans and friends and we actually headed to a local strip club after where Colin's mom was dancing  where we had a couple beers and left. We usually don't "do" strip clubs, but this seemed like a fitting occasion. Turned out one of the dancers was actually from Nova Scotia too. Sweet huh?

Me looking handsome, but hey what else is new

Anyways I'm just sitting here in "Charlie's Motel" in Forstburg, Maryland where were playing. Not sure what to expect, no one we'd talked to thus far in the past week has even heard of this town, but I hate these guys and wish they were dead as long as we're in it together I'm sure it will turn out great. Tomorrow we play in Arlington which is apparently a super awesome place so we're stoked for that too.

Till next time

Jesse