Friday, May 29, 2009

Photos from day 5






More soon, we gotta hit the road!

San Diego

Hello dearest readers,

Thus far we have managed to maintain energy and enthusiasm. We are in San Diego and having tons of awesome fun and eating some seriously sweet food. Today we drive North on Highway 1 which runs right along the ocean. We plan on camping somewhere between here and San Fran. On the way we are picking up our new records that we haven't even heard yet and hanging out on the beach!

Our shows have been good so far and the landscape has been incredibly beautiful. Driving over the mountains in southern California was bitchin. We pretty much felt like the Flintstones. I have been filming a lot of what's been going on and I think that we might try to load some videos on here before the tour's end.

Anyway, we're about to hit the road. Stay tuned for more sweet news and pics.

love,
marcus

Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Photos from day 1 & 2





tour blog-first weekend

Hi, we are going to try to have a running travel blog of our tour, so people can know what kind of shenanigans the gang is getting into. So every few days hopefully we'll have something up.

We left carbondale at around 7 p.m. on friday night with full stomachs and roared into the humid, purple dusk. We promptly fell asleep, or at least most of us did. Past the Missouri Ozarks, into dusty Oklahoma in the night and through the scrub plains of Texas with it's cattle standing in the morning sun, we finally made it to New Mexico. After 26 hours of not sleeping or eating, we stopped in a small town on route 66 that looked pretty much the same as it did back in the 50s except decrepit and neglected. Bread and turkey, pepperjack cheese, carrots for lunch in a city park. After streching and playing on the playground equipment we hit the road.

We drove into some intense storms that didn't last very long, you could see them coming a long ways off, huge mountains of dark clouds. The weather the whole drive was pleasant, surprisingly cool sometimes. Later that afternoon we stopped in Alberquerke to see the "old town". It was tourist central and we were bored with that so we left. There is a shady park there that the old men sit in and look at the pretty girls as they walk by.

Finally at around 8p.m. we stopped in Gallup, New Mexico for much needed rest. We decided to splurge and got a hotel room. We made a synchronized swimming routine in the pool, sat in the hot tub, and sat in the bath tub with the shower running. We were all pretty much pooped and fell asleep early. Next morning we hit up the continental breakfast, piled in the van and crossed into arizona. The hills slowly became less green and less round. The soil became sandier and rocks became redder. We passed through the Navajo reservation, with broken jalopy cars, weather beaten sheds, clothes on the line. Most had tires on their roofs, and we didn't know why.

Went to Petrified Forest National Park and got ripped off buying overpriced soda. The park was amazing!! Huge vistas and expansive views of purple, red sunset rocks and shadowy mountains in the distance. Enormous piles of clouds ambled by with bright blue sky background. Jasper Forest is an ancient stand of trees that were buried in volcanic ash eons ago and eventually when the hills eroded enough they fell into this valley that was chock full of huge petrified trees. At least it was before the railroad was built nearby in 1882. Pretty soon tons of the trees were being hauled off by settlers and being sold or blown up with dynomite to try to extract crystals from inside.

Ate lunch in the stands at a baseball diamond in Winslow, Arizona to keep out of the rain. More turkey sandwichs, chips and salsa, hummus. Accidently went to Flagstaff because of wrong address in the GPS but turned out great because Flagstaff is a pretty cool town. Surronded by mountains and pine trees, with a nice atmosphere. We walked around, went to thrift store or two. Marcus bought some sweet shades. A bluegrass group was playing in the town square. We went to a brewery and bought some pints. Driving through the mountains on the way to Phoenix was AMAZING!!! The rain stopped and the sun came with late afternoon sideglow on the mountains. We saw a rainbow. The air smelled and felt like honey. Huge views of meadows and valleys. Huge cactus and palm trees!!! We rolled into phoenix feeling great. Ate some burgers and veggies which were awesome and are staying in a house with a pool. Sitting around under palm trees and taking it easy. We are playing our first show tonight in Tuscan, and the next day in San Diego. I think all of us are itching to play. Hope all is well where you are.

That's it for now,
Nighty Night

Thursday, May 21, 2009

HOLY SHIT! We're going on tour!

SOOOOOOOOOOOO much news!

Hope everyone on the west coast is ready! We're going to swim and hike and eat DQ and drink homemade mead and HAVE SO MUCH FUN playing music for you!

Here's what's new in our world:
1. We're getting some sweet shirts made! Bunch of colors.

2. The test press of belle, our upcomming 7" release on Let's Pretend Records, is almost ready and we'll have a limited number of them to sell to folks on tour before the "official" release in June.

3. We hand painted/printed a bunch of sweet CD cases and will be selling super cheap CDRs of the belle 7" for those of you who fear analog sound.

4. We've been writing awesome new material at a feverish pace.

5. We've all developed diabetes from excessive DQ sunday and blizzard consumption. Seriously, half of David's diet is DQ soft serve. HE NEEDS HELP!

Oberanout,
-nn