Are you disconnecting me? Are you?

First off, the British lady that lives inside of our Garmin GPS unit is going insane. She keeps telling us to take nonexistant exits and get on highways in the wrong direction. Crikey!

I'm in the "game room" of a home in Orlando that houses 4 video game loving college students. I'm about two feet away from the drum set from "Rock Band" and all I can think about is the notorious drum fill from In The Air Tonight by Phil Collins. The 2 people that live here that invited us over from the show are both going to school for computer animation, and last night they showed me some of the stuff they do for school and for hire. This includes a video by a talking CGI copy machine for a sales DVD that explains its features and eats memory cards. It was every bit as good as Veggietales.

Today we have one of the shortest drives of the tour so we're going to hit up the beath in Jacksonville, FL before our show. We might do the Anheuser Busch brewery tour too, it depends on when we get out there.

We were THIS close to catching Lisa Loeb last night around the corner. We worked it out so that we could get in free, but it turns out she played the early show and we just plain missed her set. Bummer.

Here's a video somebody posted of one of the first shows on this tour:

In Atlanta at the clean house of Harvey Danger superfan Christin with an awesome dog and awesome cat. Ate some awesome pasta and awesome Heath bar ice cream. About to have awesome slumber on awesome couch. Awesome.

Tonight we played Wiffle Ball outside of the venue, watched ridiculous videos that Heavy Heavy Low Low made on their computers, played a decent set, watched HHLL play the most punk rock set i've seen them do, listened to You'd Prefer an Astronaut by Hum on the PA between bands, watched HORSE with their intense new backdrops of "Paradise and Hell" by Bosch, loaded out, drove to Harvey Danger superfan Chrstin's place, see above.

Nathan from HORSE met a potentially homeless guy outside of the venue that he's completely convinced is himself from the future. I think his mind exploded.

This evening's set:

Search Party
Heat/Humidity
We Vibrate, We Do
New Bones
Keep it Simple
Home Is Where the Box Wine Is
In Every Direction
If You Didn't Want to Know
Progress

...or else you're leaving with a fat lip

In Athens at Bryant from Cinemechanica's place. We played last night at the Go Bar, which is a tiny brick room outside of downtown that Michael Stipe has some form of ownership in. It's the only show we have this month that isn't with HORSE the band and Heavy Heavy Low Low. The only thing that's kind of a bummer about the HTB/HHLL tour is how the local opening bands for each tour have been (with one exception) bad hardcore bands, so it was definitely a relief when we found out that last night's opener was called Duet for Theremin and Lap Steel. And that's exactly what the band was: two dudes playing ambient soundscapey stuff and plugging the theremin and lap steel into their computers to run live effects on them through software. WAYYYY better than drop A- chug metal.

While Duet for Theremin and Lap Steel was playing, Jeff from We Versus the Shark leaned over to me and said "you're totally going to blog the shit out of this, aren't you?" And here I am today.

There are no red states or blue states

Gas stations are a crucial part of our daily routine. Aside from the necessary fuel, bathrooms, and snacks, they also are a source of entertainment. I've been getting a kick out of the things people write and etch onto the bathroom walls, mirrors, hand driers, and any other hard surface they can scribble on.
We've been knee deep in the Bible Belt for the past few days and our rest stops have peppered the rural South so it is no surprise that this is what we would find:




This did not sit too well with me.



It's hard to read, but "WHITE POWER KKK" has been etched into the Xcelerator hand washer.
By the time we pulled out of the parking lot it looked like this





Here are a few souveniers we chose to pass on during our pit stops:








"Drinking doesn't cause hangover waking up does" and
"Jesus is the key to eternal life" hats on the same rack.
I think it's funny.





I found this gem on the wall in the Men's room at The Door in Dallas.



Here are a few pictures from our night on Bourbon Street with HORSE the Band

Thumbs up/Thumbs down

Today marks the end of the first week of tour. We've been losing a battle with having internet access, so we have to play catch up.

Bartlett, Tennessee

Thumbs up: To the Taco Johns we stopped in on the way where two guys came up to us and said "good show the other day." We didn't realize we were back in Atkins, AR where we had played a few days prior. Minutes after they left, the dude who booked the show came in and was pretty surprised that we were there. To the band Nights Like These who put us up at their apartment where they were having a birthday party with a keg and a great dog. To the kid who said "you guys are in So Many Dynamos? Once I took acid and listened to your band for 10 hours straight."

Thumbs down: To the Bible-beating moms who took offense to the lyrics of us, HORSE the Band and Heavy Heavy Low Low and tried to get the show shut down. To the Bartlett police department for being too aggressive and randomly checking ID's of kids hanging out outside the venue for warrants. To the kid at the party that stole HHLL merch guy Erol's Wendys. To my stomach for rejecting the keg beer and vomiting on the grass outside of our van.

Metairie, Louisiana

Thumbs up: To Sonic for offering tater tots instead of fries and having real strawberries in their strawberry limeade. To the High Ground for being an overall rad DIY venue and also for moving their show area to downstairs to avoid loading up the hellish staircase that leads to the upstairs. To the kid from the opening band that nerded out with me about early 2000's Vagrant Records emo bands like The Get Up Kids and The Anniversary. To the French Quarter of New Orleans and to bar that existed inside of a gift shop, where we had a drink and looked through offensive t-shirts. To the invention of the "hand grenade" girly drink that I'm not man enough for.

Thumbs down: To my right eye for being irritated all day. To Chris from Heavy Heavy Low Low for asking me if I had pink eye. To the High Ground's lack of toilet paper and generally disgusting bathroom. To HORSE the band for staying in a four star hotel while we stayed in a Motel 6 because we forgot to ask around for a place to stay after the show. To Erik from HORSE for saying "Motel 6? It's that a ONE star hotel?..." To the National Guard for trolling the streets of New Orleans and informing us, gun in hand, about their 2 AM curfew.

Anniston, Alabama

Thumbs up: To the best Pizza Hut buffet that has ever and will ever exist. To Maps and Atlases for making the You and Me and the Mountain EP. To the kids who drove from Birmingham, Alabama to see us. To Model City Records for putting little pieces of irregularly shaped foam on the walls sporadically in an adorable effort to make the room acoustically more sound (it's the thought that counts). To HORSE for making us watch Xavier: Renegade Angel. To Griffin for letting Danny from HHLL borrow his guitar and forgetting to put it in drop D first. To the first set we've played on this tour that felt like a party.

Thumbs down: To the thousands of bugs that died by way of our van's grill driving through the swampy paths that lead out of New Orleans. To Heavy Heavy Low Low's trailer for blowing an axle. To HORSE the band for eating at a nice seafood restaurant while we held ourselves over with Doritos before we could eat at Taco Bell after the show. To somebody being drunk and urinating in the middle of HORSE's mosh pit (subsequent semi-ironic thumbs up to the kids who said "fuck it" and ninja-danced in the urine to the breakdown in "Cutsman" anyway). To the girl who was vomiting in a bag in the greenroom when we were leaving.

We're in Athens right now playing our only show this month that isn't with our two heavy handed friends. Tonight we're at the Go Bar with free-jazz obsessed pop band Mouser and some touring bands that nobody has told us who they are. Thumbs up to Luke Shark for letting us into his home at 5:15 in the morning.

Now with footnotes!

I'm backstage at the Marquee in Tulsa, OK while HORSE the band plays their set. This means that I'm about 8 feet away from the metal-est Nintendo band (or Nintendo-est metal band) in the universe. They're playing, i'm backstage writing on our blog and drinking Coors with 3.2% alcohol in it. How lame is that?*

The 4 hour drive from Dallas today was about as painless as it gets. Before the tour we downloaded the "200 best songs of the 1960's" according to Pitchfork Media.** We listened to 1-50. Realizations:

-The Who rule
-"Tomorrow Never Knows" by The Beatles is the best recording of all time.
-Records sounded better 40 years ago.
-"I Want You Back" by The Jackson Five is also the best recording of all time.***
-James fucking Brown.
-I want to listen to "Pet Sounds" really badly

Griffin's old childhood friend Chuck lodged us last evening (is that proper terminology?) and made us homemade pizza. The crust didn't involve sugar, which is fascinating. Apparently it's more "Italian" that way. We hung out and listened to "Judy Blue Eyes" by Crosby Stills and Nash more times than I can count. So good.

Tonight in Tulsa, I could totally tell which kids were here to see us. This is actually a common phenomenon on this tour. Kid with the Devil Wears Prada shirt and headband? Here for HORSE and Heavy Heavy Low Low. Guy with gigantic Dan Deacon glasses and a jew-fro, here for us.

Chad Matheny (aka. Emperor X [aka. complete genius]) caught me on Gmail chat today and sent me a link to a pulsar recording of the big bang. I don't even know what that means, but after HORSE plays "Cutsman" and this crazy mess chills out, i will. Oh yes, I will.

*very

**out of fear of appearing "lame", i feel obligated to mention that I downloaded this folder after randomly finding it in somebody's Soulseek folder. Saying that I didn't compile the tracks myself or search it out myself seems necessary to me for some reason, I guess as to not appear like a Pitchfork fetishist. However, I do respect the individual that did assemble these tracks, and the Pitchfork writers to compiled the list. They all made our day better.

***calling this a realization of the day is unfair. This is something that has been fact for quite some time.



ALSO:




One of the first times we played with HORSE the band, inbetween songs, their frontman Nathan said "are there any Native Americans here? You guys have some pretty sweet pottery."

We've fashioned moon boots now.

I woke up this morning with a bad case of what we call "rock neck": neck pain caused by non-ideal sleeping situations and physial stress from strapping on a guitar daily. I can roll my shoulders and the sound of my sore muscles rubbing against each other is loud enough to create an echo if I were to be in a large, cavernous room or an actual cavern. It's offical, we're on tour.

Two mornings ago we drove to Atkins, AR to play at this warehouse-ish venue called the Godbey. When we arrived I asked where the bathroom was and the promoter pointed to this door at the top of an out-of-place looking staircase. I hiked up the stairs and the door, expecting to walk into a bathroom. Instead I entered a really nice apartment with a kitchen and a bathroom. Played a show, made some spaghetti and drove all night to the house of our pals Toto (from The Octopus Project) and Brandi.

On the drive to Atkins, we were listening to the new Target Market album, which I finished recording in our basement mere hours before we left for tour. TM used to be an angular-ish spazz-ish dance-ish band not unlike us until they got obsessed with Pavement a few years ago. We were driving and listening to this record while we passed a sign that said "New Pavement". Maybe you had to be there, but we got a hearty chuckle out of it.

Arrived at Toto/Brandi's at 9:45 AM after our GPS got us lost and angry (please reference sentences 5-7 of the third paragraph of this). Slept, made some grilled cheese and tomato soup and fruit bowls, drove to San Antonio. Accidentally drove to the promoter's house instead of the venue, then hastily figured it out. Played show, drove back to Austin and Toto/Brandi's, drank Lone Star. Lone Star is Texan for "Budweiser".

San Antonio was significant for us for a few reasons. It was our first of 30 or so shows with our buddies HORSE the band and Heavy Heavy Low Low. The other thing that makes San Antonio somewhat important is that, last time we went out with these bands, our show in San Antonio was the first one where we felt like we had done well with the crowd.

Last night's show in San Antonio was one of the rare-ish shows on this tour where we had a significant part of the draw. We made a lot of friends last time and we got to experience that sheer excitement of watching people you've never seen before sing along to our songs. Today is Dallas, where our show on this same bill last year was one of the coldest responses we received. I feel like, if we can win them over this time, we'll be on top of the opening-band world.

It's hard to be the weirdo indie rock band on the hardcore tour, but I think we've got our heads on straight about it this time. Last time, our sets were as much (if not more) about heckling as playing music. For fear of sounding like a hippie, we put out some bad vibes and got worse ones back. I can already tell this one is going to be different. Things are gonna change, I can feel it.

Oh, and we got added to two shows with this band. Booyah acheived.