Seattle, Olympia, CD RELEASE!, Roanoke, Pittsburgh: Northern Tour '08 Part I

Lynn, Tom, Lily, & Noah in their Seattle yard.


Me with one of their chickens. Never held a chicken before this. They are kind of heavy, and very soft.















Crocodile Cafe, Rip.









Mighty-O (vegan) donut! Nice presentation, eh? Nana's best dinnerware.











The University Theater, where I screened the doc.




















Bill's Off Broadway, a restaurant my dad co-started in the 80's.










A place I lived for a few years in the 90's in Capitol Hill. My apartment was in the tower section. That's why I wanted to live there, for the tower. Very run down inside, very cheap.



















Um - it's very hard in Blogger to line up the picture labels with the pictures.


So I'm not going to try - but on this post, please find awesome pics from my cute nephew & Rob reading, cute nephew drumming, etc...Rob's brother and sister...

us playing on KAOS radio & at the Mix in Seattle...

our CD release with pics of Cantwell Gomez & Jordan & eberhardt.

Also, band-wise, find the Olympia act Captain Sickness & His Fabulous Maladies. In Roanoke - the awesome Illbotz rap/comedy duo, and Wading Girl, a Steve-Earlesque bite of Virginia & beyond.

I also took a pic of the Frick Fine Arts Center, where I screened the doc in Pittsburgh.

Also find me with my mom & Nana, more chickens (this time at the homestead of Rob's mom, brother, & sister), goats in Rainier, WA, complete with snow...

and what happens when I buy a pack of vegan cupcakes.

Spring Cleaning

What a boring freakin title. But this post relates to both. Today Rob and I participated in our neighborhood's (Cleveland-Holloway) cleanup. We found cool and gross things. I did end up throwing this little (Cinderella?) away.

This trashy picture here is part of Ellerby Creek. Not the best part. It's hard to tell from the picture, but countless bottles, plastic bags, and trash coat the surface. We're hoping to clean this up soon too.














As you might imagine, most of the trash we picked up today wasn't exactly healthy trash. We're talking Twinkie boxes, Wild Rose, Chips, Coke, candy bars. Kinda made me want to give up my junk food eating ways. I mean, there must be a connection between the litterer's diet and the litterer.

So I was very disturbed when I stumbled upon members of the vegetable family...mr. carrot, mr. celery, and baby cauliflower.














I can only be consoled by the nearness of Spring. Each year when the untrimmed bush in our front yard transforms from dead brown twig to this, it continues to amaze me. How do they all come back like that?












Then there are these flower bulb thingys that Rob planted last year. They came back too! So we must be ok, I mean, as people.

Pay Me to Eat Your Vegan Cake ... & Greensboro

One might think, from reading this blog, that Rob and I have a slight addiction to vegan baked and/or frozen goods. Nothing can be more removed from the truth. As most of you know, tours aren't exactly get-rich-quick schemes. And we've got bills to play, plants to water, etc. How to make ends meet and still get the show on the road?

Endorsements for vegan baked and/or frozen goods, of course! So we're not actually eating the items like the pineapple-basil sorbet you see Rob holding there in the waffle cone. But he is getting top $$$ from the Pineapple-Basil Sorbet Co., let me tell you. I think he even shined his sunglasses before this shot.

The last night of a tour is sort of important, I think. We were fortunate enough to have an awesome, awesome last night in the company of Wilmington's Ponchos from Peru and Greensboro's Invisible.

We've played with Ponchos a few times now, and each time I see them they just keep on getting better. I'm trying to get them to record an album so that we can all have some Ponchos in our homes and computers, but they are procrastinating so when you get a chance gently encourage tracking and recording behavior.

I had heard of Invisible through a friend who attended their show at BCHQ, and reported that they were amazing. Then I saw one of their contraptions in a production held at Manbites Dog Theater (presented by Little Green Pig theatrical concern), Europe Central...the Selectric Piano.

In any case, I love it when bands do some things not the same. Some different things. Like making therimins and funny sounds...but doing so in a way that is interesting and more honest than hokey, if you know what I mean. Invisible are that unique combination of band that is this: nice people, inventive music, great performance, fun songs.

We left Greensboro and headed home to Durham. It was so good to be back home. Huge thanks to Resist Not and Evelyn for taking care of Syba. We heard that she slept on their bed and everything. Big thanks to Keelee and Catherine for taking care of moody little Greco too.

Summary: The best part about touring, apart from vegan cake endorsements, is hanging out and hearing other musicians. This can be the worst part too - but fortunately, that was not the case on this tour.

Atlanta, Athens, Winston-Salem: Gaining Weight Fast

And here we have a random dog that I named Chile. Little Chile sat with me as I awaited the screening at the 11:11 teahouse. Chile was instant love. Chile did not care about my harsh words or evil doings. Chile just wanted to be near. The screening went well.

The next night BB had a show with Pete D (of Gringo Star) who played an awesome acoustic set. He was so kind ... instead of accepting money for his 7" he asked folks to donate to the touring band (us). Since he tours for a living he understands. Hurrah to kind musicians!! The more we tour, the more I realize things we could do differently or better for bands coming through too.

Batata Doce played after our set. They were, from what one of their fans said, tropicalia style. This music comes out of revolution. At the end the drummer played on glass jars filled with different levels of water. Sounded way better than my wood block.


The next night we were supposed to leave and go see Kim's band play in Athens, but Justin was kind enough to get us a last minute show at the Earl with Dylan Kight & the Nightbirds as well as the Preakness.


Here are my drums on the stage. We played out front and it went pretty well. Pictured here is Dylan Kight and the Nightbirds, and the Preakness, below.





Before the show we went to Athens to leaflet (rob) and check out the Grit, an established veg restaurant of deserved awesomeness. In addition to real food, we had two different kinds of fake food, namely, vegan cake - the Grasshopper (my favorite) which tasted sort of like the mint chocolate chip ice cream, but way better, and then the other cake, which had a name I'm forgetting (see, Jamie, Rob looks happy again). These were especially good after the show at the Earl, on our way to a house party that Patrick's new project was playing. Unfortunately we missed his band, Hawks, but got to visit with him and accidentally walk into a frat party.


The next day, we headed to Harmony, which has vegan chinese food. It was no Teapot (Seattle) but pretty damned good.





We found the Werehouse and screened my documentary there. I was kind of nervous because I haven't been doing this as long as the band. But load in sure is a lot easier. Go Triad and Relish were kind enough to write articles about it. There are links to these here.

I think that the Werehouse is my new favorite place. There was obviously a lot of work, love, and thought put into this place. They even roast their own coffee.


Here Rob is interviewing a member of the collective, Eric, for his soon to be streamed podcast, BB radio.


We will be playing in Greensboro tonight with Invisible and Ponchos from Peru. More on these amazing bands tomorrow....

Atlanta the Snowman

Here is our last bit of cake in Asheville. Today we're in Atlanta. It's snowing. Yesterday was spring-like and we walked all over up to the Virginia Heights neighborhood we accidentally found. We had some tea and coffee at the friendly Aurora coffeehouse, and took care of some tour business there. We left and walked back down to Trader Joe's where we were the number of customer that warranted a bell-ringing and prize. Rob went reluctantly to pick the velcro fish off of the wall to discover the prize that awaited us. Would it be vegan? You could cut the tension in the air with a dull knife. Somehow Rob's return to the register became slow motion...everything stopped. “Tru...ffle...browwwwwwn...ie miiiiiiix!” he managed. The cashier went to fetch the mix, the same mix which I'd seen earlier and thought, “I can make that from scratch, beotch! Who needs a mix?” But it was ours. Every vegan crumb.

Also picked up some pizza, burritos, chipotle hummous, tapanade, and bread product. We were hungry. Earlier in the day we had eaten at the newly established Calabash downtown. Nice, nice folks with delicious vegan food buffet-style. Three dishes for $6 – we had the mac & cheese, which had a nice bread crumb crust, and thick, creamy sauce on the large macaroni noodles, and the steamed vegetables, as well as the esco...somethingarather fish. It was like nothing I'd ever had and quite 2^nd tripable. We'll be back. For anyone in the Atlanta area, they are having a party in March to celebrate life and the hard work of the owner, the wife of the man who told us about it. Open to the public.

We also found this awesome coffeeshop in Cabbagetown that serves some vegan food and has a dog park attached to it (see picture). We so need this in Durham. Anyone?
Today was the search. Where will Rob leaflet? Where is the Kinko's so I can make handbills for the screening? Where to park? Where is Little 5 Points? Where is the Cosmos Vegan Shoppe, most importantly? We didn't find the Kinko's but stumbled upon the very street that Cosmos was on and took it. All of this searching made us hungry. Lucky us, we stumbled upon the Soul Vegetarian Restaurant by accident. I'd been wanting to try it. It was all decked out with Eternal Soy Kream and their exclusive kalebone seitan. And it was all vegan goodness. I had the gyros, and Rob had the basket that included a tempura mix of cauliflower, onion rings, kalebone, and mushrooms. The sauce for the salad preceding the meal had to be the best thing since Vlacho Nacho. After lunch I had the vanilla pistacio cream and Rob had some berry flavored concoction.

We continued down the road and found the wonderful Cosmos Vegan Shop. They have handmade handbags, wallets, shoes, and most importantly, Stonewall's Jerquee. We got a handful of those, and Rob bought a new Vegan shirt that they commissioned. Pictures to follow. You can buy yours here.

The nice folks at Cosmos were as much about this screening happening today, if not more, than anything else. Not only did they hook me up with Second Opinion radio, blog about the screening, and post the flyers, they printed out flyers for Rob and I to hand out around town when we inquired about a Kinko's. When we found out that there was no projector at the venue, they printed us directions to the nearest Office Max. Then, when we bought the projector and realized it didn't have the appropriate S-cable, I'll be damned if they didn't buy one and bring it down to the screening. Crap. These kind of folks make me feel like I can sure sing songs about liking people too. All this and a cool store to boot. Check them out when you're passing through Atlanta, vegan or no. They also have an assortment of snacks, like my favorite rice milk bars, candles, and journals.

Right now we're at the 11:11 teahouse awaiting the hour of the screening to arrive. It's a peaceful little place, with tea steeping sounds, soft music, green pastel-ish walls with vintage clothes hung on them, and low lights. It's more peaceful than I could ever be, and I envy the little teahouse that. I can't imagine hurting its little teacup ears with our songs tomorrow when we play, but we'll try not to shatter the teapots. From the look of the PA , however, it appears that there is more to this place than yerba matte.

We will be performing with Batata Doce and Pete D. We are looking forward to seeing the show and playing too, course.

Hello Spindale: Don't go for the cheap rooms

It is day 2.5 and we're having a great time. We played and interviewed on WNCW yesterday at Isothermal Community College in Spindale, NC. What a kind group of folks...I recommend this station highly. The studio was huge, and they have a bunch of bands come through there all the time. Dennis, the sound engineer who recorded the session, played some Old Ceremony they recorded recently and the recording was amazing. We also interviewed for another show that Les (see picture) runs featuring indie bands. They will be sending us our recording from the live show in the mail and we'll post something from our new song Unification of + and -. I think this show will be running at midnight on Saturday.

We decided to sleep in Spindale because we'll be in Asheville a few days already, and wanted to experience the town. We filmed a little bit for the video we're making for "Got married on myspace" and found an awesome Thai restaurant complete with Veg options listed on the menu. We got the Phad Thai and Ginger/Garlic tofu vegetable marinade thingymadishybop.

On a quest for a cheap hotel to stay in, we stopped at a couple of $20/night options. I took a look in one of the rooms, and it seemed that it would work well in a movie setting where someone ODs. So we paid a few bucks more for something with less stains and HBO.

Today we arrived in Asheville, one of the shangra-la stops for vegans. Starting this tour properly, we stopped at Rosetta's after Rob leafleted at UNCA and had some smoked tofu wraps and chocolate peanut butter cake.

Delicious does not describe this food appropriately. Awesome environment...I've been here working on press stuff for about five hours and not one odd glance. Except from Rob, who is quite ready to leave and meet up to have a beer with some new vegan folks he met while leafleting, who were kind enough to offer up their home for us to stay.

I'll be screening my documentary tomorrow at the French Broad Coop.

It's cold here but it feels nice and mountainy, as to be expected from a location in the mountains.

We'll be heading to Atlanta around Monday to screen and play. A huge thanks to Atlanta's Second Opinion Radio for interviewing me on Wednesday about the doc.

Thanks to everyone for checking in and reading our updates....means a lot to us.

Hello Charlotte! Stop #1.

It was the night of the lunar eclipse. I could have sworn you're not supposed to look at those things straight in the eye. Accordingly, my eyes blurred a little bit when staring up to see moon partially covered in pink disc. Is this what Nick Drake was talking about? It was hard to see through our speckled windshield while we waited for the longest train ever to pass.

Better seen it was at Snug Harbor, where we kicked off our little SE tour eclipse-style. I couldn't get that song out of my head, “All I can say, total eclipse of the heart....turn around bright eyes...turn around bright eyes!” Just like when Rob and I play rummy and I get the Queen of Hearts and can't stop humming Juice Newton. It totally gives my game away and I really should stop it.

On hand at this most friendly club (thanks to Beth of Red Collar for recommending), besides an extremely friendly and attentive sound engineer (Daylon = sound love), were a troupe of improv performers and a bearded man that was extremely fond of the moon. He stood outside almost howling at it with a few other Snug regulars. When an airplane flew in “front” of the eclipse, you would have thought his spaceship was arriving.

Luckily Rob was able to capture a recording of moon man and a short interview and song from the kind band we shared the night with, Seth Boulton and the Dream Machine, as well as some tips for bands from Daylon. This will be our first podcast as part of the BB Radio series we're launching from the road. Stay tuned, we'll be uploading this soon & it will be available at our friends Subdivision 67 site. Pictures will soon follow.

We asked for a floor and received a couch. What more could we ask for? A breakfast recommendation, of course. We ate at the vegan-friendly, and friendly-friendly, Zada Janes (http://www.zadajanes.com). When we walked in and a man said “Hey!” I tried to recall if I met this man at the show last night. Was this the guy who said he'd put me in his pocket, take me out so I'd play drums, then return me to his pocket? No. I was hoping it was because that sounds like a great gig. But we did not know this man, he was just very welcoming. Stay tuned, Rob got a clip of him for BB radio. I had the roasted potatoes and vegan sausage patties. Rob had the Indian tofu scramble & toast. The food was delicious and the coffee strong & medium style like we like.

We're on our way to Spindale now to leaflet then play on WNCW.

Tour regrets: We packed way too many things. Since we're not camping, due to our low tolerance for cold/bears, we should have brought less blanketage.