Show Journal 2000-08-27
Day 10 – This morning we listened to ‘Get In The Van’ by Henry Rollins again for inspiration. It’s starting to get really hot and I miss the 80 degree Oregon summers. The show tonight was weird. We got stuck playing after several bands, one of which was a Christian hardcore band. During the other bands we met a girl named Emily who actually lives in Portland and had seen us play the week before we left. A lot of people left before we played but seemed to wander back in towards the end of the set. Strange. The sound tonight really sucked ass. Constant loud feedback the whole show. I pity the people who didn’t have ear plugs. The guy who put on the show was pretty cool to hang out with before the show but ended up fucking us on the money when we were done. He claims to have “already paid someone in your band” and kept asking “are you sure you didn’t get any money.” Yeah whatever. Hello, we’re 3000 miles from home. I don’t know if he was serious or not and we were so pissed we just didn’t really care. We did sell one CD that night so we at least got $10. Despite the whole money issue I still want to thank him for setting up the show tonight. We pressed on past Nashville during the night and slept in another truck stop.
Show Journal 2000-08-26
Day 9 – Back to Boone again. I’m surprised we made it there because Justin later confessed his hands kept slipping off the steering wheel when he was driving because he was so sleepy. Boone was weird. It’s been two years since we’ve played there and 4 years since we lived there. Needless to say no one really knows us anymore. We are just another out of town band playing there. That’s ok because it’s starting to feel like just another town on tour. It was really strange being there without Bryan. It was odd introducing Jim and Justin to everyone. I wonder if it was weird for them? Today was my birthday and we went out to eat at my favorite restaurant called Makoto’s. I really don’t feel 27. Anyway, we met a guy at the record store who asked us if we were 800 Octane. We said yes, and he told us we were the first show he ever saw. Pretty cool feeling. The show was ok. The place is kinda crappy compared to the Fireside and 7th Street complete with bad sound, terrible lighting and a bathroom located behind the drums. Playing with and hanging out with the Karloffs and Agent Ink made it all worthwhile despite the blank stares from the crowd. I wish we had more time to hang out, but I’ll take a few hours with my friends any day. Thanks to Heather and Jake for making the pilgrimage to see us. Thanks to Rob for the quick visit as well. Also I guess I should thank Matt for the place to stay. It was good seeing him again after all this time.
Show Journal 2000-08-25
Day 8 – Our show tonight got cancelled but I really didn’t care. We got laundry done, got an oil change for the van, ate real food and watched Top Secret with Dave’s mom. We finally got some clear skies today but it wasn’t very warm. At one point I got to take a nap outside by the pool. It was a good day.
Show Journal 2000-08-24
Day 7 – I used a trucker shower this morning. It was nice but I just couldn’t bring myself to take off my shoes. Justin was the smart one for purchasing some Baywatch brand flip flops. Since we had the day off and time to kill we went to Cedar Point in Sandusky, Ohio. As I write this Cedar Point currently has the worlds tallest and fastest roller coaster. It’s called the Millennium Force and it rages. It has a 310 ft drop and goes 90mph. Amen. It was such a good day. I totally forgot we were on tour, it was just us hanging out with friends and having a blast. After riding every roller coaster in the park we ended up stopping at the world’s slowest Steak and Shake. Still tasty as ever though. Just so you know, the road construction in Pennsylvania sucks because it lasts for 200 miles. On the drive we bastardized the Bob Marley song ‘we jammin’ into ‘pa jamas.’ I won’t elaborate right now but it was very funny at the time. We stayed at Dave’s mom’s house tonight in real beds.
Show Journal 2000-08-23
Day 6 – Back to my old hometown … Chicago. We got to play at the Fireside Bowl which was cool since I had actually seen a show there before. The bad news was we were second of eight bands. Yes, eight bands. That part kinda sucked. Thankfully quite a few people were around to watch our abbreviated set. The quote of the night was when Dave announced “you can come closer to the stage … I may be fat but I’m not going to eat you.” Not very classy but it actually worked. A few kids sheepishly walked up to the front and seemed to be relieved that the large bearded man was in fact not hungry. Justin continued his quest to jump off every stage clearing the 3 foot drop and the huge monitors at the club. After our set we packed up and drove downtown the eat pizza at Gino’s East. Mmmm. Justin and Jim stopped at Hooters to get shirts and stickers. Apparently some pictures were taken. After taking the scenic route through “the asshole of Chicago” (and also by way of lower Wacker Drive) we drove onto Ohio. One of the highlights tonight was misplacing the tap light and searching for it by pressing on everything. The van passed 100,000 miles tonight. I can actually remember when it passed 20,000. Another truck stop night. Jim shared with us his desire to attend a trucker only strip show where you put dollars in their beards. Jim also taught us the noise Justin would make if a trucker came and violated him in the night.
Show Journal 2000-08-22
Day 5 – Another day, and thankfully another shower. We went out for some breakfast and record shopping with Chuck this morning. It’s still overcast and we haven’t seen a sunny day yet. The drive today was short and mostly pretty boring. We got to Wisconsin Rapids early and drove around for an hour looking for the show. We were doing a u-turn in the mall and see a kid with spiky hair and a Misfits patch on his jacket. Turns out it was the guy putting on the show. The show was odd to say the least but it was still kind of fun. Here’s the situation, Wisconsin Rapids is a really small town. We played in the basement of a bar. It was hot, it smelled and there were no flyers. In fact the guy putting on the show had never even seen the club before. The place was not wired for a show. The power kept going out on the opening band who had pretty small amps. We roll in with 3 huge amps and blew the power in the first song. Eventually we figured out the power situation and got things rolling. I think there was probably around 25 people there tops, but they all stuck around and seemed to enjoy themselves. I see a lot of bands and I have to say the Shut-Ups are the best bands I’ve seen this year. Kind of like Zeke … super fast and very raw. We were all totally impressed with them and couldn’t believe they were playing this tiny show. They were so damn good. After the show we drove 3 hours to Oshkosh to stay with their drummer. Their bass player insisted on riding with us since we had Nintendo in the van and I think he played it the entire drive. Thanks again to Justin for the place to crash.
Show Journal 2000-08-21
Day 4 – I woke up early and took my first shower in 4 days. Dave woke up with a small piece of cat excrement stuck to his arm. Our van has been stinking pretty bad and we finally identified the source of the smell. It wasn’t Dave’s arm, it was actually Jims sleeping bag. It now resides in the back of the van as far away from us as possible. During the drive we stopped in a small park in Minnesota today to kill some time. We were playing on the playground rides and were suddenly approached by a small girl who thought Justin was weird. Pretty perceptive for such a young girl. So we kept playing on the swings and carousel thing with this little girl following us around from ride to ride asking us dumb questions. Finally we got over to a set of those little spring loaded animals that you sit on and rock back and forth. Anyway Dave, Jim and this 7 year old girl are all sitting on the springy animals and Justin decides to get freaky with one. He’s standing in front of the horse shaped one and starts rocking it back and forth in front of his crotch to simulate … well you can guess what. Anyway it suddenly dawns on us that he’s doing this in front a 7 year old. Dave and Jim just about fall over laughing and Justin quickly realizes what he’s doing and tries to play it off like he was doing something normal. I hope the girl’s mom wasn’t watching. That poor girl is going to be scarred forever. On to Minneapolis. We were all amped to play with Wesley Willis tonight but it turns out he cancelled. Total bummer. Despite his absence the show as he would put it, it “rocked a cheetah’s ass.” We played awesome, even more energetic than last night. Everyone seemed to dig it. Plate O’ Shrimp were cool guys and fun to watch. I’ve said it before, but 7th Street is such a cool place to play. Cool thing this year was that the club had made some massive 4 foot posters for the show which we quickly removed and acquired for ourselves. Huge thanks you to Chuck for hanging out, hooking up the place to stay and just being Chuck. No thanks to my stomach for being upset until dawn.
Show Journal 2000-08-20
Day 3 – Today started off nicely with a visit to the world’s largest Holstein cow in North Dakota. Justin got a warning ticket for speeding somewhere in North Dakota … 41 in a 25. Pretty good for an amateur. We ate at the Space Alien cafe in Bismarck. The food was good but Justin hanging the video camera over the stall door during my bathroom visit was not. I wish we had a show in Bismarck but it just wasn’t in the cards for us. The show tonight in Aberdeen rocked. I can’t remember us all being so energetic during a show before. Ferd Mert rocked even busting out some AC/DC at one point. Tonight we stayed with Kim and her 3 cats. She told us we were the most boring band that has ever stayed with her.
Show Review
Next up was 800 Octane from Portland, Oregon. The only thing I had heard of these guys before the show was an mp3 from their webpage, which by the way was good. Now I’m not sure what anyone else thought of their set, but I thought it kicked a whole lotta ass. These guys played with so much energy, it was amazing. I don’t know that I’ve ever seen a band play in Aberdeen that moved around on stage as much as these guys did. Not only do they play with energy, their music is good too. On a scale of 1 to 10, I give this show a 9.99.” (Aberdeen Punk Page)
Show Journal 2000-08-19
Day 2 – Today started off in typical 800 Octane fashion … we took turns bathing in the sink of an interstate rest area and spent the morning making crude jokes about one another and their mothers. During the morning discussion Justin taught us many new terms including the rare and elusive Eiffel Tower maneuver. Ask him for a description some time. Kinda crummy drive because it was so overcast all day. Eventually we realized it was the forest fires that were burning away most of the state. At one point Justin started “driving” the van and we joked that his blind spot is the whole road. We stopped to eat at a good sandwich shop in Missoula where we actually ate on our first tour. Today’s show was a benefit for a skate park. Weak sound, half awake crowd but we were stoked to be playing. Afterwards we hung out with Switch Two 47 and learned they are popular in their hometown of Buffalo. Thanks to Gary for setting up the show. After the show we pressed in towards North Dakota. At one gas station we were parked in front of a wall right in front of the store. Jim sat down right in front of the car to have a drink and smoke. Dave quickly realized the van’s headlights were right about at Jim’s eye level, so he tapped me on the shoulder, yelled to get Jim’s attention and then proceeded to blind him at point blank range with the high beams. We both laughed hysterically for about 10 minutes. After that high point the rest of the drive that night sucked ass. We were on a small 2 lane road literally in the middle of Montana surrounded by lighting storms. Since it was about 1:00 in the morning and in the middle of nowhere we started driving totally fast. So we’re happily cruising along at about 90mph making great time and we pass a deer which was standing about 2 feet from the side of the road. Close call. We slowed way the heck down and started to realize there were deer all over the place. Big ones, little ones, horned ones, even a defecating one and every last one of them wanted to be as close to the road as possible or in the road. I never thought we were going to die so often as tonight. A fully grown deer hitting the van would be seriously bad news. I stopped counting them at 100 and the deer fest went on for 3 hours. We saw dozens smashed and dead in the road. What a scary drive. There was also raccoons and rabbits in the road and even a black cat. Tonight was another night spent in a truck stop.
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