thursday june 19th...

Q-tip was right. things are going to be ok. We spent the last two days wearing out our welcome at JMM's house of fantasic wonderfulness. He's even got a pool now, it was chill. alright, so we we're pullin into town tuesday way too late because of some car stuff an caught the tail end of a party thrown "for us" cuz we seemed like a good excuse. Mike and Kim quickly fed us with that concerned look southerners get when they tell you to eat something. there were regular burgers and murderburgers for meatatarians, chips, watermelon, beer and i ferget what else. all was delicious but the icing on the cake was, of course, Poli Sci Clone. Check his myspace, he rules. He writes, records and plays all of it himself and it shows. it's urgent, straightforward, almost confusingly sloppy rock'n'roll. this man walks it like he talks it: plain, heartfelt and weird as all heck. And Buddy was there! the fantastic director behind one of my fav Willies videos, where we are dolls in Mike's daughter Hannah's dollhouse, menaced by a new toy, which may or may not be Mike's dad John's dentures, i can't remember. but i look cute in it. i remember that. so there was a sad and serious band that opened the show at murphy's. it was like...fuck, i don't know, they kinda sucked but i guess they got some potential. who cares? Poli Sci Clone played again an it was awesome again. I like Lakesided Love the best (of the songs on myspace), so i sang along to the badass sing-along chorus it's got. He's hard to explain, cuz the man is weird. You know talking to him that he's got nothin but love in his heart and it's creepy. He plays sitting down, with a casio keyboard on his stand, a guitar in his hand and a karaoke machine at his back. cheap casio beats and basslines get blottoed by hacked-out, forced solos, he'll hit a chord or two on the keyboard and it's back at the guitar, the whole time pouring his heart into the microphone. I love it and him alot. after that was Thee Amazing Audacity Band who killed it, like always. They've been playin around with things a little, i think, and it's fun to listen fer differences each night. At this one, Cameron snapped a string and had to improvise harmony basslines on the fly. Hey Cameron! Awesome Show! Great Job! Then we had to beg the guy not to take the microphone home so we could play ten minutes. i think we played very well, and so did Buddy. We even won the mic guy over. he said we could play as long as we wanted. we loaded out and headed back to mike's attic, which is one of the neatest places i've ever been. i can't read ten pages in a book there without noticing the title of another one and haveng to pick that one up instead. me and caleb we're up til the wee hours just reading and listening to sean snore (that's right you heard it here first folks, he snores). i read trance induced revelations, the gospelvis, a history of judaism in america, early days of the children who would become Lux Interior and Ivy Rorschach, a Kid Anarchy comic and a book about the white problem in america by the editors at ebony magazine. we woke up today and farted around enough to make Mike think maybe we weren't leaving so we skidaddled outta there and drove to this super 8 next to a cracker barrel. i'm sitting in the van while everyone else showers and relaxes so you can make the rest up yourself.

officially frakked.

We're currently driving back to get audacity, who's van broke down again after a day of waiting to give midas a grand for not doing anything to our van. last night's shows were awkward. the second one wasn't as bad as the first cuz there were actually people there who weren't performing. we played after an improv comedy show that we heard was both terrible and ok. after audacity and us, Harlem played and sounded better than at the trailer space record market. i like them so much. they got a song about bein sad and wanting to go to bed. it's got me all jealous. so now we're sitting here on the side of the freeway an it sounds pretty bad. i guess there was a loud bang, and then the van didn't work anymore. did i mention sean paid a grand to fix a problem that didn't get fixed? ah, what a tour! Sean and yer boy Dan here watched the new battlestar galactica and it was amazing. i seriously didn't even care that we're totally frakked! If you are not watching that show...i don't even know mang, you need to watch that. so now we're sitting on the side of the freeway and praying to god that audacity's gonna get bailed outta this mess. word on the street is that matt's dad is in dallas, which is a mere 40 miles away. keep yer fingers crossed and send us money. anyway, harlem is good. i don't really get why people call them garage rock. they got songs with the chooga chooga guitars to make you caveman dance, but i think everyone's sleeping on the fact that they write real good and sound new. lyrics are pitch perfect an they don't resort to the usual hooks and bullshit gimmicky garage stuff. at least to me, and i'm a professional. they chop songs up very well. things change up, even abruptly, but maintain a lovely balance and keep hammering away. which is probobly why the garage tag. whatever, i wanted to dance ALOT, but im wack like that... so now we're sitting on the side of the freeway and i'm running out of things to write about. i could bitch alot, would you like that? how about details of our bitchings at eachother, yeah? q tip just did the usual stay-positive-thing he's so good at, and it worked. so audacity says they gotta check out their piece of crap van to make sure they are frakked before they rent a car. we would rather they just rent one. no one can make up their mind and neither can i. whomp whomp. i really hope we get to JMM's house on time tomorrow. You may know him as John Michael McCarthy or the Pop Cop. ally an i met him a while back and found out that he is real cool and weird. He makes movies that you would like and should therefore buy. Like: Superstarlet AD, a fun filled romp through a post apocalyptic memphis like land, where women have taken over as almost godlike, and men have devolved to horny neanderthals. so some things stayed the same i guess. anyway, all the girls have separated in to clans based on hair color and it gets cooler from there. It's black and white, shot on film (illegally), sexy and weird. is this enough, yet?


we called him outta the blue and i think he felt obligated to be super hospitable. as i was starving at the time, i accepted a lunch date. everybody says we'll make it, but i have my doubts...sorry q-tip.

DAY DOS - Broke Down & Busted (I Am A Kitten)

Dan already started writing this blog but quit in the middle of it because he needs everything he writes to be perfect. So he's handing it off to your friend Sean because he knows he is a capable, handsome leader with excellent hygiene and really nice shins. But little does he know that having a pair of highly touchable shins does not translate into good blog writing. I am having a very difficult time figuring out what to write. I'm not feeling this right now. I feel like I should just come back to it later, but I have to write this right now. I HAVE TO. Because all of our loved ones are wondering what's happening with us and we need to let them know we're all safe and sound! So you realize how important all of this is. And on top of all that responsibility, I have to make it entertaining to read! So far, I don't think it's going too well. Let me read what I've written and I'll let you know what to expect ... OK, no worries guys! I'm a genius. I have no doubts that you will enjoy the rest of this post because I wrote it and obviously anything I write is going to be pure gold.
...
OK, I just tried to build myself up there to hopefully squeeze some creativity but nothing came out. I failed. I'm a loser. I apologize to our readers, but I don't think I can do this right now. Gimmie a couple hours and I'll try again. I sorry.

DAY UNO - Grad Night w/ The Fam

Hey yo, what up b?! (hello all, salutations!) Welcome to the first installment of the new travel buddy!! Since i've already written it, and have now decided to write a better intro, i can say with confidence that this one is not really funny or interesting. But if you think yer so smart, write something funny yourself (in our comments please. i can't be bothered to read other people's things). So!! Tour!! These drives take forever! so long that i've been toying with the idea of correcting grammar, capitalization and the like but...no. I can if i want to though, Mom, promise.
We're currently parked at a competitively priced gas station about 60 miles outside of phoenix, but since that's just as boring to talk about as it is to experience, let's revisit what Sean is insisting was the actual first show of the tour, titled Grad Night W/ The Fam. Incidentally "The Family" is a fantastic band, but that's neither here nor there. Uuummm, Roundabout 4 oclock, Lee and yer boy Dan here, were just a printin the afternoon away, pleased as punch at the latest batch of Burger swag. We made shirts and record totes and laid dat kustom stuff on leelee's hoodie. It was all cool all chillin with Justin Creep, Jacquie an Margot (IE!) n just printing n gabbing whatnot, you know. But yeah, that's what we did an then it was time to go. Sorry this is taking so long to type, Lee is freestyling right now and it's frakkin me up. So we got to the mansion and the cops had beat us there and kids were drinkin in the street but it's those hill's up in fullerton so you know....
...anyway, Matt's house was about 3 miles up this driveway, but it was totally worth it. Mom was beaming with pride and it was all graduationny and warm. We got introduced to enough of the family to make me ferget their names. sorry. They were extrremely kind. Hey! Have you heard that Millennium album? (whistle)! it's a good'n. Back to the show. Everyone was very nice to us so we blushed and got shy, I'm sure. We played in the living room and it got pretty wild, considering the living room. I hope we didn't mess anything up. We played a real quick set, sharing equipment with audacity, who did the same. It was alot of fun, everyone was singing along to everything. To me, that's fun, to me. We're currently following a cop and it's scary just cuz, ok? we ain't from around these parts...after the show it was late and this beautiful house was filled up with all these kids so Matt's Mom kicked everyone out as politely as i've ever seen anyone do. I was amazed it even worked! She just walked around apologizing and the seas parted. After that it was time to fold the laundry I'd left on the bed to make sure it would be put away before i went to sleep. Then, after flossing carefully and brushing my teeth in considered horizontal, vertical, and circular scrubbing patterns, i moved Elenore to the other side of the bed and crawled in. She mewed at me and moved to the down comforter on the floor, which is too warm for me to sleep under these days. Bored yet? I am.
Tonite we play in Tuscon with our friends the swing ding amigos, polka madre and of course, audacity. I can't wait...

wookena woorioa

so...funny time! ha ha ha!! we are on our way home from a lovely weekend spent with our friends up north there in the bay area. little tony (Antonio Marco Santos) just spoke from the back seat, reminding me that he came with. sean is reading this as i type and it's making me nervous, and want to write better (funnier). he says it should. also along for the ride home are Alana and Kathy, whom you all know from the pinks/fevers etc.
we left friday afternoon after lagging like always, so we missed the last gasp christmas party, which we heard was cool. oops. we came real close to forgetting tony and sat in traffic for two hours before getting out of LA. next stop in n out then i woke up to us being kinda lost in san francisco. there was a road closed or something so i'm all like "yo marty, chill these fools out an tell'em where they be." an he's all "ok turn right." we got there a little before the show started and found out how little Buzzer are, raising our hopes that little tony (Antonio Marco Santos) could weasel his underage lil self in there. and it worked! the front door guy passed the buck to the inside door girl, who was kinda like "well, ya got this far". we had a drink with some familiar faces and spotted a bunch more coming in.san francisco rules like that, son! up first were Buzzer, which is andy from the cuts and time flies (who are both awesome as you undoubtedly know already, being the savvy gent you are) with two little children on drums and bass. they play well (it was their first show) and are ridiculously good looking. the drummer stared out at the crowd never blinking, and when he'd get to you you had to look somewhere else, it was too much. someone kept yelling "punk band!" at them. then the lights came on and i found fifty cents on the ground, kaching! then when we set up there were burned copies of metallica and somethin else i don't remember. they stayed where they were. when we played it was cool! we laughed and sang and danced along with everybody. hooray! then i bought a drink and the bartender made a good one. hooray! devon williams was up next and i don't think he had a good time but i enjoyed it. outside i started to tease him about not playing the party in oakland the next day but he wasn't havin it so i stopped right quick. they got some hit's though, boy! buy what you can find! we're listening to the violinny one right now, it's lovely. sean totally just criticized me for writing too much! he's like "my, we did alot of stuff that day."! then i got all defensive an he's all "i'm not critisizing you or anything, here let me save it in case anything bad happens." but he saw me suspiciously eyeing his fingers so he couldn't erase it, ha! then we went to sleep.

Alright Danny boy! You had your fun, it's time to scooch on over and let Sean the College Graduate take over. I'm like the headliner of this blog; my name would be at the top of the marquee on this one. That's a lot of responsibility, you know? I have to finish this, but I have to do it better than Dan. I hope I'm not building this up too much, I hope I'm not crushed under the weight of this tremendous responsibility bestowed upon me! Let's find out...
I awoke on the cold, hardwood floor of Laurel's house. My back hurt, my bones ached and I painfully maneuvered myself to an upright position to see our little friend Tony's sleepy eyes staring back at me. He looked well rested. That's probably because he slept in a bed. With sheets. And a pillow. I hope you enjoyed it Tony. You obviously deserved it when you drove us up there and played a show...oh wait, no you didn't. You just slept the whole ride. Good on you Tony. Good. On. You.
Well, we woke up, milled about the house, brushed our teeth and made ourselves presentable for the outside world. We hoofed it to Lois the Pie Queen for breakfast (because we love them). They are our "special friends." They gave us a card that said so. Our waitress either really liked us or was playing us for fools because she kept giving us "the look". There was much blushing at the table and then she touched my arm! Lee was jealous. Our breakfast was so very delicious, I got french toast with fresh strawberries. Lee was jealous.
We walked to Tina's house after we had our fill of Lois the Pie Queen. We were going to leave her a note instead of showing up unannounced, but then we heard Elvis Costello blasting from her house so we went up and gave the door a knock. She answered but said she had to go to work so we gave her the card anyway and then went back to Laurel's house to use the bathroom. Good times. We drove to Ameoba in Berkeley to maybe find some Christmas presents, but I just ended up getting some stuff for myself (sorry family!). I got The Vipers, which looked cool and we think they were on the Children of Nuggets compilations, Don and the Good Times, which looked gummy and Guided by Voices' Bee Thousand album. I recently got into Rob Pollard and all of his stuff...it's so good! Lee got an awesome Status Quo box set of their Pye years. $12 for 3 CDs, can't beat it! We went to Tina's shop "Down at Lu Lu's" after that and hung around for a bit. Dan bought a Traditional Fools 7". He also bought a Cyndi Lauper trading card pack and we were joined by a homeless person on our way to the Smokehouse hamburger joint and Dan showed him his cards to which he started singing "Bums just wanna have fun fun!" It was really, really fun in a bummy kind of way. We ate at the Smokehouse (yum) and then headed back to Laurel's house where we spent the next 4 hours watching Mystery Science Theatre 3000 DVDs with Benny the Roommate (who was awesome). We watched Time Chasers, Legend of Boggy Creek 2 and a part of Merlin's Shop of Mystical Wonders (Merlin is creepy, yo!). Benny and I were the only ones awake by the fourth hour. So nuts to everybody else. At 9pm we went to the show at Carlos' house. It was the total opposite of a really depressing shitty time! So much fun! Lots of friends showed up! That night we were playing with NoBunny (who we love very much) and The Rantouls (who we love even more! (sorry NoBunny))! We've been looking forward to it for a very long time, and for good reason! It was happiness personified! Lots of kids packed into a tiny room blasting forth with good music! NoBunny played first and ruled! Rantouls followed him with a healthy dose of awesomeness and we played last! We played our new songs and kids were singing along (not to the new songs, dummy!) and dancing and having a good time. We were scrunched in this little corner with a giant "D" and a picture of Twilley and Seymour taped to it. I'm glad they were there for the show. I'm also glad Brian Hermasillo, Alana and Kathy were able to drive up that day to come to the party and have a good time! So we hung out for a little bit after the show, met Brian Glaze who was funny (and on drugs) and then there was the puddle at the party. But this was no ordinary puddle, no. This was an evil puddle. It would just sit there and wait for drunk people to fall in. Many did, I saved Dan's life as he was about to take a step backwards into it. Alana stepped in it. Someone peed in the puddle, but don't tell her because that's gross. We went home around 2:30 and I fell asleep on the couch. Tony slept in the bed again. Nice.

notes from the road...day fortytwo

tucsoooooooon! alexxxxxxxx! hungieeeee! almost home and almost to in-n-outttttt!!!
before heading out of town, we ate at cheap and yummy mexican resuraunt. they had a salsa bar with grilled onions and chile peppers. lee and i were sure we were in heaven. dan and i ate chirizo burritos and lee ordered a lousy burrito that he did not finish. also, we drove by an old church lee wanted to check out. i told him it was only a year or two old and my dad helped build it, which made him mad in a comical way. pushing buttons is fun sometimes. the drive from nm to tuscon wasnt too bad. on the way, i remember trying to make out objects in the clouds cuz the day was so pretty, but not much more than that. boring. sorry.
we arrived in an extremely windy tuscon around one in the afternoon. guess what our first stop was? a record store! yay!! sean bought a resonars record and lee and dan both bought dollar tapes. mc5 and christian death fer a buck! double yay!! of course pizza was next. the place we ate at offers a discount if its a fullmoon that night. it wasnt. spring has unsheathed all them pretty womens from their winter coats. this means lots of poking to my side from lee and lots of drool from us all. if anyone says they weren't don't listen to 'em, they are lying.
after foods, sean started downloading the new lost episode. it was gonna be a half hour or so, so dan and i walked the tucson strip fer a bit. it was too windy even with my new haircut. imma shave it all when i get home and show the wind whats up. Dan noticed a few USA/WPA writings in the sidewalks which he says were made when theodore roosevelt instituted the "the new deal." im looking it up now. "...state and national reform legislation introduced in the Progressive era." so there is more out there than records with music on 'em huh? history!
We came back, watched a good episode of lost, then headed over to the club. it was closed and everyone was hungie again. we proceeded to wander the area looking fer somethin to eat and could only find a subway. bah. after a sammich and some suprisingly delicious chocolate chip/m&m cookies, we walked back to the club. still closed! we met some other band and a bum who ended up being terribly angry at the world for not giving him a hambuger. the club eventually opened and we loaded in. i called my mum and let her know i would prolly not be able to come that night for we would be playing so late and nobody wanted to drive six hours afterwards. sorry mom : (
the okmoniks and sharkpants peeps showed up and we greeted whilst pulp fiction was on the tube. that movie was so entertaining to watch without sound. me likey.
we played a pretty swell last show. people cheered at the sound of a 1910 song and wanted us to play indian giver. we didnt. umm afterwards i jumped in the van, changed and called the prettiest little thing on the tellie. from what i hear there was a lot of hatred directed towards the band that played last. a white girl and and guy from florida who "rapped" about "feelings" and "drugs" or something. everyone looked like they had been socked in the face when i asked 'em about the band. but seriously, watch pulp fiction without sound and the subtitles on. i was laughing a bunch.

so that pretty much ends our tour of love. we woke up this morning, showered, played super smash bros., and said goodbye to the okmoniks who let us sleep over. its been amazing, kooky, and amazingly kooky. thanks to everyone who helped us out with houses to sleep at, shows booked, underwear thrown on stage (i wish), drinks purchased, laughs, giggles, directions, and fun times. we appreciate everything and love you all. see you at disneyland!
xoxoxoxoxoxo thee makeout party!!!!

notes from the road...day fortyone

all the way from the back o' the van - alex!
i'm confused and dan's last post isnt helping. he tried, but lee has pounded my tiny brain into oblivion with blog mixups. so we drove from denvy to new mexico-y. i remember it being pretty dang long. lee says, "it was beautiful too." he is right. the mountains in denver, when covered with some snow, are quite a site to be seen. unlike those others sites which should be heard...i dont like that previous sentence i wrote. bah. umm. anyways! the new mexico sky was amazing at night, its like one of those light-brites or whatever. tons of stars that make little ole me feel even smaller. like one of those tiny ants or whatever. if i were on stage telling this stuff, im pretty sure i would have tomatoes in my hair.
well, as soon as we were a mile or so away, we became lost. im not sure why it happens so much, but it does. we stopped at a gas station and i jumped outta the seat to get directions and/or an address. while waiting for the man moppiing to come my way (i was told not to go on the wet floor that night) a trailer-park-trash-scaring -me-weirdo asked me, "are you in the movies??" "hey! are you in the movies!?" so i replied, "nope." he then asked if i was a skateboarder or something. To many, i suppose, i look a lot like the guys from dogtown. ironically, i cannot skate for jack. so i gots the address, we mapquested some more and eventually found our way after many u-turns and finger pointing the correct way. So we located "the Farm" which was a great yet completely trashy house owned by a bunch of kids. they had foosball table and dan was extra excited. We loaded in, played, and ten or so kids started dancing and havin a merry time. Oh yeah, for some reason, tons of nm kids love batman and seans batman shirt.
im not sure i like jack lee's solo record too much. its kinda boring. but, prolly better than anything i've ever done, so whatcha gonna do? allll right. so before we loaded out, and before i could put a dry shirt on, dan wanted to get his foosball skills in everyones face. turns out, the two kids that were hanging around the table are insanely good and made dan and myself look like...well, look like a bunch of shitty foosball players. SUPPOSEDLY, dan won a game later on, but its hard to imagine, those guys were kickin' ass. I felt like being home and not in some gross, smokey nm house, so i played one more game of foosball (against dan, which i lost) then jumped in the van for a stinky sleep. i need more showers on tour everyone. Dan says after we went to bed and the ladies left home, the talk turned to perversion. im not gonna go into detail cuz you all know what happens when a bunch of 18 year old boys talk about girls. and that was about it i believe. see you tomorrow, pals.