tour entry 3: san francisco, northern california

So after our arrival into L.A., we spent the evening drinking whiskey from flasks and bottles going clockwise around our little pool party which we were supposed to have played. The residents of the home were the band Blanket, a band made up of two dudes named Scott. Yes, very similar names. Our members are Bill, Will, and Willis, so we bonded.

I jumped in the pool and caught a chill, then slept under the stars and the fragrant breeze out in Chris Colthart's garden. Woke with the sun, forced Chris out of bed, drank coffee, called a car rental company called "Rent A Wreck." They came and picked us up, only an hour late, and took us to a non-descript, somewhat bleak neighborhood right off the freeway called "North Hollywood." The streets were mostly empty and there wasn't a tree in sight. Lots of parking lots. Our driver was somewhat of a maniac, pulling through lanes, yelling into his cell phone, asking me questions all the while. I looked back and saw Will gritting his teeth as we screeched around a curve.

The "rent a wreck" office felt bleak and depressing. The air was thick and stale and slightly sweet, like a carpet slightly damp with cleanser that hadn't properly dried. The "rent a wreck" sign was chipped and faded, appropriately so, and perhaps even intentionally. We picked a blue mini-van, hurried through the paperwork, and were shown out to the vehicle. The doors wouldn't open, the windows wouldn't roll up, the seats were ripped, and the engine made a loud repetitive "thwack" sound when in reverse. Perfect. We christened the vehicle "The Blue Turd."

After being assured and re-assured the vehicle was in tip-top shape, we headed north on I-5 towards San Francisco, stopping to check the engine's vitals and filling the air with tires. We pulled across the Bay Bridge around 9pm, and as I called ahead for directions to Adobe Books, I could hear Mark already playing in the background. And one of the my favorite songs too! I wove through traffic, pushing our beloved Blue Turd as hard as she would go. We made it to Adobe Books in time for a song and half of Mark's... and such sweetness we did hear. He now has an upright bass player, quite sympathetic. We played our set... very innaresting. We had recorded John Kolar playing drums before we left, and we burned this onto a DVD. Using my toy projector and an audio feed, we projected John playing onto the wall and it came off pretty well... looked like John had been astrally projected into the room with us. We played amongst Adobe's stacks of books and felt warm and happy and people were actually dancing while we played! Never in Austin, never in clubs... we had to hit a bookstore in San Fran to finally get people moving. We played an unrehearsed encore consisting of "It Glows (memory" and "Zombies." I do believe I was screaming louder than I'd ever screamed. To honor the scholarly feel of the venue, I screamed "Zombum," a sort of Latin take on the song. To honor the place, I suppose. It felt right.

I roamed the shelves and bought Willis a copy of "Terminator: the Novel." It was pparently based on James Cameron's screenplay. For myself, bought Djuna Barnes, Balzac, Gide, and The Psalms, all in beautiful Penguin classics editions.

Afterwards, we feasted on pastries pulled from a dumpster down the street and drank another bottle of whiskey. We ended up at a dive bar nearby, where we commandeered the piano and sung like the drunk folk we were. The bartender didn't like us much, and kept yelling at us to "shut up." Metallica was playing on the jukebox and honestly, I didn't think Metallica deserved any special treatment, so we kept singing until we basically got kicked out of the bar. The back to Mark's house where we smoked spliff up on his roof, feeling the fog in our lungs, and taking in the hills bulging up all round the city. Everything felt back on track, finally.

Willis slept up there and passed out on the floor in Mark's room. He dragged me by the leg and I slept on his couch. We woke to another amazing day and walked a short ways for a fine Salvadorian breakfast, thick tortillas, queso fresco, rice and beans, the works. Cheap price.

Then walked back with Mark to his place, talking all the while of music and growth and change and travel, honoring the creative instincts, moving on, life and death, the passing of youth, and also digging all the crazy murals all over his neighborhood, the Mission. We stopped at a cheap tourist shop and Will bought a belt decorated with drawings of marijuana leaves. It looks pretty good.

Stopped back into Mark's, listened to his new album (a work-in-progress) and I got the chills 3 different times. Good job, Mark. Man oh man.

Then dropped Mark at work and we headed North on the 101, stopping briefly on the Marin County side of the Golden Gate Bridge. Took some photos, got our hair blown around, and headed further north, on into Humboldt County. At some point, our "check engine" light came, definitely an ominous sign.

Arrived into Arcata, and drove still further north to Trinidad, where Willis' friend Mike had retreated to the forest. We set up and played music on his porch, sat by the fire, drank more whiskey, and smoked spliff til morning. Mike is quite the gardener, if you understand my meaning.

Next day, we hiked several miles up Redwood Creek and found a pristine spot, untouched, nobody around. We swam and soaked the sun, surrounded by ancient redwoods and pine and spruce and we stopped all along the path, picked fresh blueberries and blackberries and other berries I don't even know.

Campfire, warm dinner, guitar playing, more spliff.... perfect.

Now we are headed futher North, to play KEXP in Seattle tomorrow morning. Hope our engine makes it.


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Willis McClung's thoughts:
It has been about 5 years since I last saw my friend Mike Black in his town of Arcata California. To see him again, this time further north just outside of trinidad, CA, Brought my great joy. We hand picked our dinner from his garden with broccli, Kale, and carrots fresh from the dirt to bring on a trek thru the Redwood National Forest. With Sunshine the dog by our side we arrived creekside at a campsite where we swam and reflected on all things beautiful. We said our goodbyes and Peace was restored to my soul.

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Will Patterson's thoughts:

Humboldt County is the most rediculous place I have ever been. Guarenteed fun. Were leaving the town we stayed at and are journeying north to Seattle. Our rented wrecked minivan is on the verge of breaking. Hopefully if we break down, there will atleast be fields of blackberries. This is the most interesting and exciting tour I could imagine. There is a lot of improvising.

tour entry 2: lost at sea

Tucson....

So we went down to Bentley's, but the coffee shop had already shut down. Undeterred, played an impromptu show in the parking lot of this bar called "Dirtbag's." The bouncer stepped outside, wearing very baggy shorts and two large diamond stud earrings. He listened to us for awhile and asked us to come inside and play a show... we of course agreed. This would be the best show ever, of all time, anywhere.

But then word came down from up on high... the manager said not only could we not play a show at "Dirtbag's," but we weren't even allowed on the property. Which included the parking lot. "We can't have guys like you associating with Dirtbags." I'm not sure the bouncer knew how that came out. He didn't seem too incredibly self-aware or to have much sense of humor.

Oh well. We videotaped our performance and it will be a youtube sensation, I can just feel it.

We drove to a hostel nearby that was kind enough to let us sleep on their back porch for ten dollars a head... we drank beers and sang songs and saw the whole west coast spread out before us... our minds spread to the pacific and then northward. Perhaps the world would be our oyster.

But perhaps this oyster would be from Long John Silver's. In other words, a rancid oyster, a smelly stale, over-fried clump of batter, with maybe a few curly hairs from the "chef" thrown in for good measure. In other words, maybe the world would be our oyster, but our oyster's expiration date had long since passed. Maybe the world would be a pretzel shaped oyster.

None of us could sleep too well that night. Seems flies had overtaken the back porch of the Roadrunner hostel, and had taken a liking to our faces. We all woke with the sun and limped our vehicle (now nicknamed "Uncle Buck," in reference to the fine John Candy film and the slumping station wagon featured in the film) to Pep Boys. For four hours, we writhed in the waiting room. Willis played a great Blind Willie McTell song surrounded by shiny hub cups (are they called rims?).

The mechanic replaced the hoses that had sprayed like madness the previous evening. Our rear axle had lost its protective rubber "boot," and could no longer remain lubricated or protected from the elements. In his broken English, our mechanic Saul told us to fix it very soon. He then squirted the thick thick oily goop all over it and wished us well.

On our way out of Tucson, we stopped at a donut shop. God, I hate donuts. Took one bite and off into the trash. They had these things called "photo cakes" wherein they took some pre-selected photo and somehow engraved into a cake's icing, to make for some extra special birthday treat. Some of the cakes were just strange to me, though... like the screaming shirtless pro wrestler, veins popping from his neck and popping off his biceps. He was either trying to be intimidating or maybe he was just screaming in agony. He was wearing these very very small shiny red shorts that were in no way intimidating. And I just sat and marveled at these cakes and wondered what child would want an aggro-steroidy-glistening wrestler screaming back at them from their birthday cake.

We took to the highway and things seemed fine, for a bit. Willis bought a translucent plastic hat with retractable sunglasses built-in.

But a horrifying noise came crackling from beneath our rear axle... we had run out of luck, if we ever had any to begin with. I called AAA and we were picked up from Quartzsite, Arizona, an hour or so later... our driver Stan told us all about his tours of Iraq and killing people and war in general, his wife who divorced him and screwed him out of all his funds while he was away fighting the war. We kind of bonded with the guy. Will called him "the biggest hard-ass I ever met."

He dropped us in California, our vehicle still not working but we could only get towed 100 miles as per my AAA account, so we called Maverick and he saved our asses, as usual. He let us piggy-back on his roadside assistance account and that got us all the way to L.A. That was the bumpiest ride I have ever taken. Ever. It was like those exercise belt machines you find in gyms that you kind of strap yourself into and then the thing shakes violently. I was never quite sure about those things... were they supposed to shake the fat off your body? Is it possibly to exercise without actually using any muscles? Well, this teeth-chattering tow truck ride didn't much feel like exercise either, maybe just an exercise in withholding screams of terror. The driver played screeching glam metal the whole way, through a crackling speaker right behind our heads. Still, we all three managed to pass out on the drive. I awoke and felt the tremble of our tow truck descending into L.A.'s glowing valley. Willis and Will remained asleep; their heads shook violently back and forth, sometimes bumping into one another.

Pulled into town and headed straight to Echo Park... missed our pool party, but arrived in time for some killer karaoke by the pool... Willis sang some steely dan and I sang a song by Travis Tritt. Will watched and laughed.

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here are some thoughts by Will Patterson:
The idea of powering a tour on vegetable oil seemed to me to be very funny. Although we have not broken into grease traps (yet), we have still managed to run in to some extremely strange and funny situations. In New Mexican city Truth or Consequences, aka "T or C" on highway signs, we hooked up with a dude who truly blew my mind. I have seen many of his type before: dressed in Camo shorts, a large brimmed hat, sunglasses, and impressive dreads, but he was much different and productive than any other new-age hippie I have ever met. In a renovated RV lot, he and his wife had a plethora of wondrous inventions and projects, all which sustained his life's needs. He showed us this crazy LED plant growing system which emitted red and blue light but only used a fraction of the power of normal grow systems. It seemed very simple to me yet, I would never be able to invent such a thing. In addition, he showcased all of his gardens, solar power systems, and innovative housing technique which used recycled trash. He actually had a 30 foot tall volcano he made using the same material. It required twenty gallons of vinegar, ten pounds of baking soda, and one gallon of red ink # 5.

When we left T or C, me and Willis embarked on a new series of exquisite corpse drawings. We drew imaginary bands...it turned out quite nice. By the way Willis really sucks.

QUICK TOUR POST, PART 1

Photo courtesy of Mikey Sklar

Well, tour so far has been very very innaresting. Incidents thus far: running over a dead deer, surviving a fly infestation, police search and lengthy interrogation by state trooper (" you guys are crazy! this vehicle is going to explode! "), back axle making very disconcerting noises (likely as a result of the dead deer we hit), hot springs, bathing in crystal pure waters (using our trusted Dr. Bronner's), trespassing and swimming in fast-flowing creeks on a farm, long mountain drives, a death threat from a drunk man, our engine exploding into a hissing cloud, buying butter at a Circle K and being literally bombarded by drunk people in the parking lot, 15 gallons of bio-diesel, 80 gallons of waste vegetable oil, the confused looks of fellow drivers who see us filtering oil in a parking lot using a filtering sock into a plastic barrel, tour of a former RV park now a completely off-the-grid compound inhabited by an inventor (Mikey Sklar and his cool lady) who recently sold his latest invention to NASA, a tour of a biodiesel facility... to filter their oil, they had constructed a copper pyramid and were piping in Tibetan monk chants through speakers to create spiritual intention for their filtering process. And we are about to play, uninvited, unannounced, at a coffee shop called "Bentleys."

Mikey Sklar's blog entry about our visit can be found here. He also included a nice photo!

Mikey is the aforementioned inventor who just sold a patent to NASA.

"Deep-Fry Into the Sun" Tour

On Wednesday, we will be leaving for a West coast tour we have dubbed the "Deep-Fry into the Sun" tour.

Our vehicle is a 1984 Mercedes station wagon that has been converted to run on waste vegetable oil. We have a pump that filters oil from grease traps, and plan on filling up the whole way using waste oil from restaurants. This will be a first for us, and for any other band I've ever known.

This is very exciting. Free fuel (!!!!!), provided the restaurants allow us to pump. If they don't, we could always go "ninja-style" and liberate the oil. This neatly circumvents the insane problem of "touring cost" that most bands are facing right now.

Environmentally speaking, this is a revolution waiting to happen. We're removing ourselves from the grid of ridiculously overpriced gas stations that pollute our world and have distorted/dictated American foreign policy for quite some time.

We're also not burning million-year-old carbon (petroleum) to fuel our car. This closes the "carbon loop," so to speak, since the carbon we're releasing would have been consumed from the air (by the plants that created the oil) within the past few years.

It's really kind of like Dr. Brown in "Back to the Future." Remember how he fueled his car on Marty McFly's trash... he poured beer and a banana peel into the tank, remember that? Well, looks like the future's here, folks.

I will be blogging extensively along our travels. This tour is an experiment, a bit of research into a new and hopefully better way of doing things. So stay tuned for updates from the road.