Beginning of Fall Tour: En route to New Orleans
It’s been awhile seems like. Can’t remember when we did
those east coast dates but I guess I could look it up. We haven’t been exactly
idle eric though have we now? We played some shows I didn’t write about because
they didn’t feel like tour shows. A nice show in Chicago at the Bucktown Arts
Festival where we drove up and back the same day, (5.5 hours each way) which is
the first time we’ve done that. Economy has probably never been more pressing
than these days. That’s not a bad thing, in many ways it’s the result of having
maybe the best year we’ve ever had. Regardless, I don’t want to get ahead of
myself, as the compromises and costs of being in a band after the bloom has
come off is what’s on my mind this trip. We played some swell local shows,
including one on Fountain Square in front of several thousand (i.e. around
2,000) people and got to chat with the charming Kelley Deal. (formerly of the
Kelley Deal 6000) After that Chuck and Lisa spent a good hunk of September
touring England in support of a compilation of our first 4 records that
Damnably Records put out called "Buckeye." It’s weird to have a record out and
feel so disconnected from it.
Other than Lisa doing the artwork we didn’t really have a damn thing to
do with it. Anyway, the tour went pretty well I guess. They said everyone was
ridiculously nice. One night the former sound guy for Gary Numan did their
sound. Most of their stories revolved around the shitty food and shit-filled
toilets. I won’t share those here though as I’m still getting yelled at by the
squeamish about how poop-centric the summer tour posts were. Harumph, I say;
the human body is beautiful and I won’t be held in thrall by all you
shame-filled puritans.
I have to admit I’ve been looking forward to these Afghan
Whigs shows for months. We all love John Curley. He’s produced pretty much all
our records. I love the Whigs. Most of the shows are sold out and we’re going
to get to play some venues that are legendary. It’s just really exciting. There’s
always a balance to things though and touring in the fall is complicated for
me. I’m the only one in the band with kids at home and I’m a single dad. I love
my kids more than anything and I’m not complaining, I have a great life, but
I’m a school teacher too and I have to keep the mortgage paid until/if music
pays the bills. I’m also not saying I have it harder than the rest of the band.
They may have more flexibility but also they’re practically starving by not
being able to work. My schedule for the Whigs tour goes like this: Work
Thursday, fly down to New Orleans, (the band is driving the van down) play the
shows, fly out of Raleigh Monday morning early and work. Wednesday, drive up to
Detroit after teaching, play show, drive back that night. Work, play
Cincinnati. Work, fly to Chicago. Play those shows and then fly out of
Minneapolis early Monday morning and hope to make it back in time to work that
day. Again, none of this is by way of complaining. On the contrary, I feel
ridiculously lucky that I get to do this tour.
So this blog is going to lag behind the tour more than
usual. We averaged four hours sleep this first weekend and spare time is spent
sleeping.
