My week in Baltimore (lengthy post).

Last I left off on my adventures, I had run off in a stranger’s car to the Steam Punk World’s Fair, only to quickly kidnap myself again down to Baltimore with another new friend.  My wanderlust was apparently quite unsatisfied with a one week tour, so short and traveling to many lovely places I too rarely visit, so I was adamant about not returning to NYC any sooner than necessary.  So, in some sort of bizarre relay race, I was passed off and shuttled further South.

I really couldn’t have found a better person to meet in such a state.  I’ve joked for years that my ideal companion would be a well-spoken and festively adorned vagabond accordion player who lives in a van.  You’d be surprised how often this flies right back in my face.  Well, unless you know me well, in which case you’re laughing already.  Needless to say, I have every intention to work on a project with this fellow sometime in the future, ideally on the road whenever my schedule allows for that.  It’s rare I meet someone whose lifestyle and interests are so similar to mine and who is open to future collaboration.  That said, the problem and the beauty of meeting someone akin to oneself is that we both immediately split town in opposite directions.  I lose track of more new friends this way…

In the meantime, we had a really fun time getting to know each other.  Sometimes roadtrips are the only way to get quality one-on-one time, especially in my case, and I always seem to make deeper connections in vehicles than standing still.  As soon as we headed out, I felt like I’d gone the right direction.  It was a treat to decompress from the SPWF with someone who has such a similar outlook on the scene, but who also knows a lot more about its history than I do.  The most brilliant assessment he made was that steampunk conventions are where nerds pay crusty punks to entertain them, which works out beautifully because they all generally like each other.  It was also reassuring to hear more about how radical politics are not just complimentary to, but in some ways inherent in the steampunk movement.

His brother rode with us most of the way to Baltimore.  I’d warned them I might sleep quite a bit of the way, as I was still exhausted from the night before and nearly no sleep, but I got so involved in conversations with them that I barely even closed my eyes.  His brother and I quickly became aware of our shared knowledge of musical theatre and sang through much of Sondheim’s Assassins.  The conversation in the van remained similarly nerdy, highbrow, and artistic for the whole trip.  After we dropped off his brother, it was a gradually sleepier chat, but still a good one.

The next day my new friend introduced me to two very awesome new Baltimore experiences – the most decrepit and lovely waterfall I’ve ever seen…

and Red Emma’s Bookstore Coffeehouse.  I only saw the waterfall that one time, and I’m not sure I could find it again on my own, but that coffeehouse became like a second home to me this time around.  As we walked to the cafe, we shared our delight in the other being fairly unfamiliar with our creative work, something I’d never expected to find so appealing until recently.  Five minutes later, I realized there used to be a copy of one of his comics in the bathroom at the DIY show space where I sublet in 2009.  He admitted he’d crashed my band’s show years before as a surprise opening act, so I guess we’re still even.  He also knew half the people in the cafe, something which is usually my schtick.  Like a charm, though, every time I went in after he left town, I knew someone there.  We ended our time hanging out, at this point clocking in at nearly a solid 24 hours, with a jam session in a lovely little park nearby.  There was no way I was letting an accordion player get away without swapping a few tunes.  I imagined we were in a square somewhere in Europe playing, the apartment buildings and churches around us were so old and charming.

Another friend met up with us in the park, watched the end of the jam session, and the baton was passed once more.  He and I checked out Ted’s Musicians Shop at the insistence of my marching band friend from Honk Fest.  Spot on recommendation; the place was full of gorgeous old instruments, some of which are so old or exotic I’d never even seen them in person.  The store had closed about twenty minutes earlier, but the guy let us come in and have a look around.  He and I had a very nerdy conversation about vintage saxes, of which they had several.  When I told him proudly that I’d found a metal clarinet, he deflated my enthusiasm slightly by showing me the pile he had laying around.  Even so, he assured me he could find a case for mine if I came back again when they were open.  Of course, I was back there several more times than expected.

The rest of the evening might have been the tipping point in my growing affection for Baltimore.  I had first heard about the city when I was in high school and a handsome artist passing through Chicago with an art carousel, who caught my eye on senior ditch day, would tell me stories about his home city.  He told me many nice things, I’ve just only recently been able to believe the ones about Baltimore firsthand.  In college, everyone I knew from Baltimore seemed odd and wonderful, and likewise obsessed with being from the home of Poe and Waters.  Around the same time, a branch of Chicago’s own independent silly toy and knickknack emporium Uncle Fun opened up at the Visionary Art Museum.  Later, when I lived above Goodbye Blue Monday, I adopted the members of Baltimore’s Wham City for a night.  They were doing a live action musical version of Jurassic Park down the street and derailed me en route to another circus show with their giant white school bus full of cardboard props.  Finally, within the past year, I’ve managed to randomly visit this city with increasing regularity.

My exposure to Wham City a couple years ago had given me an inkling that Baltimore had a lot to offer in the way of independent and ambitious DIY performance.  My visit to my friend from Honk last fall reaffirmed this when we went to Ottobar to see local burlesque including Trixie and Monkey.  Then, this past week, within a single hour, I got a look behind the scenes at both the Fluid Movement space (home of the water ballet and roller skating spectacles) and the revamped old theatre housing the Baltimore Rock Opera Society’s ambitious new double feature.  I had to admit that Baltimore was doing a fine job of wooing me.

What a big day!  No wonder I spent most of the following daylight hours laying around on a futon in my friend’s living room in a daze, catching up on phone and computer whatnot.  Fortunately, I was right next to Charmington’s, a cafe which my Honk friend’s girlfriend part-owns, so it was easy for him to scoop me up there and steal me away to the other end of town where they live in a gingerbread house.  We got to watch bellydancers rehearse in the living room, drink gin and tonics, and eat poutine.  Even I’m a little jealous reading this… and I was there.  No wonder I like Baltimore so much.  We finished up the night with some Balkan jamming and then quieter geeking out to footage of ourselves playing in Emperor Norton’s at the SPWF.

When we’d parted ways on Monday, the vagabond accordion player and I both imagined we would be travelling even further in opposite directions by the next day.  Well, two days later we were both basically still in Baltimore.  We got one more good hang out and visit to Red Emma’s before going our separate ways.  He drove straight South to North Carolina just as I was heading to the cheap NYC bus.  I sat across from two very sweet traveler girls and was so sure we knew a lot of the same people around the country that I didn’t even feel the need to pry further into our overlapping circles.  They said they’d ridden out from the West with a band called the Homeless People, who sounded like folks I would know, yet I’d never heard of them.  Strange moment of foreshadowing there, as will be made clear later.  I did a lot of productive writing on that ride, but by the time I reached NYC I felt an utter fool for leaving Baltimore so soon.  I came up with all sorts of reasons for myself to have been anywhere but NYC at that moment.  I spent Thursday doing necessary, although arguably postponeable, errands and chores – doctor’s office, laundry, moving my bags to a new place.  I woke up the next morning and got myself right back on a bus to Baltimore.

There are a variety of reasons I turned right back around, but the clincher was getting to play with Barrage Band Orchestra, even though I’d never been to a rehearsal.  I’m a real sucker for sitting in with renegade brass bands.  The only bus I was able to find space on, due to an apparently epic weekend of activities in humble Baltimore, left me off at a far away mall outside of the city.  Inevitably, my Honk Fest friend got lost on the way there, and I marveled for a while at the strange culture of the suburbs.  Somehow, I managed to find free outdoor music while I waited.  We swung by his house and loaded our arms with instruments, then made it just in time for their show.  It was a modest fundraiser in a backyard and we got rained inside, but it was a ton of fun.

The highlight of the show was, of course, the gratuitous jamming afterwards.  A few of us went over to their band’s accordion player’s apartment to have a drink and didn’t leave for an hour or two.  My brass cohort in Seattle called and, as he does sometimes, played Klezmer tunes on his trumpet for me over the phone.  I already had my instrument out, so I joined in.  I was borrowing my friend’s alto sax for the gig, in order to bring my newly acquired metal clarinet from NYC instead, and this was my first time really playing it.  Their accordion player grabbed his instrument, followed by their clarinet player, my friend on a borrowed cornet, and soon their euphonium player heard all the commotion and came over.  There was much banging on pots and pans, as it was a kitchen, but the highlight was the squeaky mouthpiece-only version of Mescecina.  My heart glowed over the fact that the jam session had been started via telephone from the West Coast.  Someone else’s phone rang and that person was then set on the table as a hostage audience member.  We all eventually made our way back to the dwindling party and played until we were asked to stop.  Their nine year old neighbor was accompanying us on tambourine, and playing it with more subtlety than most adults could even attempt.  I tried to teach her how to play in 7/8, which was equally amusing and educational for both of us.  Finally, our ragtag band, fueled by liquid courage, found our way to another party and played a short set in their backyard.  It’s been far too long since I was set loose on a relatively unfamiliar brass band and as a result inspired such spontaneity.  My friend and I returned home somewhat late and continued sharing music on our computers as though it was still my “last night in town” a few days ago.

The next day I helped out a bit with chores around the gingerbread house.  He and his girlfriend have taken to calling me their “house elf” and even said I was entitled to pick the color of the guest room since I’m in it the most often.  Eventually, we readied ourselves for the evening and swung by the wine store and Ted’s for last minute supplies.  I had picked up that metal clarinet case before I’d caught my bus out of town the last time, and now I got to prove to the guy that I really had gotten a bargain on a fully functioning instrument.  My friend got a new pad for his flugel horn for fifty cents.

We were playing at a cute little festival called “Folk You” in a warehouse space near downtown.  All the proceeds went to the Baltimore Free School, and I’m glad to be in a place in my life where I can afford to spend a weekend playing benefit shows.  This show was extra special for me because I was going to be playing bass drum with the band.  None of their usual drummers could make the show, so it seemed the logical thing to do.  I’ve definitely had some experience with hand percussion, washboards, and even bass drums, but this is the first time I’ve ever been the only drummer for an entire set.  It felt awesome.  I’d really wanted a cymbal for the top of the drum, but the tambourine worked nicely by itself for quieter parts.  I also opted for a wooden spoon in my right hand instead of the usual switch-style stick.  I rocked out pretty hard with my bootleg tupan, and the band seemed pretty pleased with my work and asked me to come back and be their drummer.  That’s a big compliment for a horn player indeed!

After we played, we were all still pretty amped up, so I talked everyone into marching over to Death Fest and playing Balkan brass band music for the metal fans and traveler kids in the parking lot.  This seemed like a good idea, even despite the long walk there with our instruments and two bass drums (double bass!), but when we got there everyone outside the festival seemed more intent on having fist fights than listening to an anachronistic band.  So, we wandered a couple blocks down and played in a park.  We managed to play our horns while walking and carrying our cases and two extra drums.  I have a huge bruise in a line across my left thigh from the drum banging into it.  We marched past Red Emma’s just as we were playing Bella Ciao and did a very quiet version along their storefront, totally confusing the people at the book lecture inside.  A little ways down the street, someone way up in an apartment applauded out their open window, so we stopped and launched a full version of Rue de Paname.  By the end, we had people leaning out windows in all directions applauding, it was lovely.

We made it back to Folk You just as the band Homeless People was finishing.  Small world that it is, they were the group that the traveler girls on my bus to NYC had caught a ride with from the West Coast.  I had really wanted to see them, with their promises of raucous Balkan-influenced street music, but had to settle for a CD and plans to meet up with them in NYC and/or Boston as they made their way along their tour.  I had been surprised on the bus that I hadn’t heard of a band made up of so many traveler kids, but of course I knew more than half the band after all.  One remembered me from busking in New Orleans a couple Mardi Gras ago and another used to work pedicab with me in Portland, Oregon.  It was good to reunite with more traveling buskers.  We’d started partying early, so it was an early night for my friend and I, and we retired to the gingerbread house early and swapped more music.

The next day I made it to the Sowebohemian Arts and Music Festival, a sweet little street fair in a somewhat “dodgy” part of Baltimore.  It was really nice actually.  The band Neutron Bomb, which had opened for us in Baltimore when we played there, was playing.  It was good to get to see their whole set, since inevitably that almost never happens at shared shows.  Somehow my bag was taken back to where I was staying and I was lent a bicycle and wound up outside of Death Fest again.  I then stopped in at Red Emma’s, where a member of Barrage Band was working and a girl I knew through mutual friends in Indiana six years ago was sitting at the counter, and grabbed a bite to eat.  I headed to my next destination, and when I stopped to ask directions out front of a little bookstore, was fed again at their barbecue.  Again, win for Baltimore and its friendliness.  As I was biking down a busy street from there, I ran into a traveler kid I knew, sitting outside a bohemian cafe with his dog just as the girl from New Orleans had been in Burlington.  It was then that I got a phone number for the kids in Homeless People, a detail I had overlooked the night before.

My final destination for the night was the aforementioned rock opera.  It was as ridiculous, technically messy, and wonderful as I had imagined.  It was actually quite well done for an original and independent production.  It’s not their fault that wireless mics are such a pain to deal with, and that was really the only glaring problem.  Sure, all new works have their glitches, but the overall ambition of their production made up for anything lacking.  It was a double feature, so the whole event clocked in at nearly four hours.  The first show was somewhat historical, while the second was an outlandish outer space tale.  That one was my favourite for sure.  I went back with my friends who had worked on the show and ate lots of vegan ice cream before falling asleep in their guest room.

The next day I woke slowly and got ready to leave that evening for NYC again.  Deja vu, I went to a park with an accordion player and taught him Amara Terra Mia and Oche Chornia.  A mutual friend of me and both accordion players found this hilarious.  We found a group of his friends to entertain in the park, which was pretty fun.  Next, it was off to a barbecue at an old Victorian mansion with a hula hooper.  My friends convinced me it was worth sticking around town for the afternoon, and indeed it was.  It’s incredible the quality of life that can be attained so much more easily by creative types in Baltimore than in most other cities I’ve visited.

I fled NYC this weekend for peace of mind but also because no big plans had been proposed to me, which was strange and refreshing.  Of course, as soon as I left, I got invited to two shows and offered work at an underground party.  Apparently half a dozen of my friends were all within blocks of each other all over North Carolina over the weekend.  I also missed Seattle Folklife, which is one of my favourite festivals in North America, especially for busking.  Ah well, there’s always something I’m missing somewhere.  Also, for all my downplaying of NYC and everything about it, I was welcomed back to the big city by fresh cotton candy, a dark and stormy, and water pistol battles on a rooftop in Union Square.

Travel slideshow until the next post…

Since I only seem to be getting writing done in moving vehicles, here’s some photos from the last long while, including ones from tour:

Sweet “home” Chicago.

Rooftop (bedroom) in Philly.

The alley side of the cathedral, NYC.

Post-work sunset in Brooklyn.

Practice room – perk at work.

Inferno tour roadside sighting, your guess is as good as mine.

Kensington Market is magical.

In Canada, they still have phone booths!

Montreal feels more European than anywhere else I’ve been in North America.

Awesome Quebecois bicycle lanes.

Montreal has its share of gorgeous old churches too.

Our show marquee in Boston.

Steam Punk World’s Fair (‘ew Jersey)

Sometimes I make very specific plans with very vague details. This was certainly the case with my idea to play Webster Hall with World/Inferno Saturday night, then turn around and play with Emperor Norton’s Stationary Marching Band twelve hours later in another state. Somehow, in that small span of time, I managed to get a ride to and from the afterparty, get a few hours sleep, throw on an appropriate outfit, and head back out on the road with my sax.

I owe a lot of this to my own ambitiously social nature, as well as to a relative stranger’s openness and sense of adventure. In fact, I’d say I owe most things in my adult life to these factors. After the show, I got talking to a kid who I’d seen at a lot of our East coast shows. He bears a striking resemblance to a dear musician friend of mine in London, so I kept noticing him. It had been long enough, so I finally talked to him at this show (and no, he’s not related to my friend in England). It turned out that he was driving back to New Jersey the next day, so I asked if he’d like to be whisked away on an absurd adventure the next morning and he agreed almost before I could lay all the cards on the table. If he’d be my chauffeur, I’d get him VIP status at a ridiculous festival, it seemed fair. I have a friend in England who filled a significant part of his summer this way.

Early the next morning, I repacked my tour bags as well as my bleary eyes could manage, stuck them somewhere out of the way (the bags, not my eyes), and stumbled out of my friend’s place at some ridiculous hour like 9am. I only brought the clothes on my back, my frontier punk boots/hat/goggles, my netbook, and several extra pairs of goggles. The trip was good, as I remembered snacks and was delighted with this guy’s mp3 player. It was full of friends’ bands I adore, and even had electro swing (including Movits!); clearly I had chosen a good person for a roadtrip. We made it there just in time for me to put a pair of goggles on his bowler hat, get him into a vest, and hurry into the convention. It was set in a nondescript hotel, which made the hoards of people in costumes all the funnier. I joke that steampunk conventions are just Renaissance faires for people who don’t like camping, but there certainly is something more dignified about geeks in the woods versus geeks in a chain hotel with taupe walls. I couldn’t contain my nervous glee about the absurdity of it all and kept chirping “Nerds!” as we wandered through the hotel to find the mainstage. I’m one to talk… We found our way easily, hearing the band in the distance. I unpacked at the door and my trusty sidekick for the day scooped up my stuff and found a spot in the audience. I arrived just in time to get a solo on one of the first songs of the set. It’s a large marching band, so members showing up mid-song is almost expected.

I couldn’t have imagined how good it felt to play with ENSMB again. Since the last time I played a show with them, I went through that identity crisis about tone and technique and fixed some frustrating leaks on my sax, so this time around I was coming at the instrument from a whole new direction. I doubt anyone but myself noticed the difference, but for me it was huge. It was especially clear when I took solos on the Balkan style tunes; I could really feel an openness in my tone that I’d been craving for a while. I also noticed I natually played a whole lot louder than before. Wow, listen to me… and I’m calling the folks in costumes geeks. Well, besides my own epiphanies, it was a joy to play with this group, as always. Marching band is, of course, a whole different animal from rock band. Not only is the material quite different, but I go from being the only brass instrument to being the most common element in the group. One thing I especially enjoy about ENSMB is the dynamic between myself and the two main sax players. The bandleader’s tenor winds up flanked by two silver altos, there’s choreography sometimes, it’s neat. It’s very clearly a sax-led band.

Another plus of making it out to this gig was getting to see the new live CD. All of those shows I played with them in Boston over the fall and winter paid off, and I finally got my name on a CD. Somehow, that seals the deal for me that I’m in the band, no matter what they always tell me. Our merch was set up at a booth, same as any other vendor, which is an interesting way to brand a band at a festival. I definitely found myself checking out the wares of bands I’d never even seen, and thus feeling more compelled to seek them out. We played one more set later in the day to an overflowing crowd. I’ve never been so proud to play in this band, we sounded so good on Sunday. Amazing what playing multiple sets a day for an entire weekend will do to the tightness of an ensemble. There was also a funkiness to our stage set that I really liked. The audience reception was very warm, although nowhere as frantic and intense as what I’ve become used to with Inferno. I had worried that I wouldn’t enjoy a smaller-scale band as much after all this touring, but it was equally wonderful in different ways.

The time between sets was spent wandering around the fair with my handsome new friend, mainly checking out overpriced baubles while getting short history lessons from the vendors. The festival did a good job of booking a variety of interesting entertainment including acts, lectures, and screenings. I wasn’t there the whole weekend, but I didn’t see as many workshops or DIY craft events as they could’ve supported. There was also a surprisingly modest amount of circus/fire/sideshow from what I could tell, but then maybe I’ve just traveled in certain circles long enough that I expect an oversaturation of it wherever I go. At least there were no dancing bears. My cohort for the day and I sat out in the courtyard on the soft grass and listened to Kopal’s set. It turns out I know two people in that band, but somehow didn’t realize it despite seeing them before. I watched several other good acts that were dripping with gimmicks but nevertheless lovely and sincere.

What really impressed me that day was the Labour Rally, which I unfortunately had to miss most of to play our afternoon set. I barely believed my eyes when I saw the posters, and was even more impressed when I caught the beginning of it. Not only were they paying tribute to the labour struggles that were such a part of the eras that steampunk imitates, but they were legitimately calling out the organizers of the event for booking the fair at a non-union hotel. Impressive. I haven’t been to many conventions, but I imagine most of them don’t get terribly political, especially in a real-world sense. Radical cries came from the back of the crowd, while fancy men stood at the sides in disapproval. I imagined an oncoming skirmish, but never got to see it play out. A variety of political speakers were scheduled for the rally, lending a welcome seriousness to a generally whimsical event. Apparently most of the historical talks that weekend were quite intelligent and informative.

The convention itself was fun. I heard a variety of critiques on how the weekend could have been better, but I was there in such a daze that I was able to ignore most of the flaws. I was very proud of myself that, despite the massive amount of shiny things for sale, I refrained from spending the cash I was carrying around from our tour payout the night before. I did treat myself to an awesome resin necklace full of little cogs and a mouse skull extracted from an owl pellet found in a barn. It’s shaped like a heart, cute and creepy. Someone in my friend’s old band, Ego Likeness, made it. Somehow, I avoided trying on any clothing the whole day.

It’s impressive to see how the steampunk movement is taking off in a seemingly healthy way. The SPWF was clearly centered around independent vendors, but a large part of the emphasis was on noncommercial aspects. In reality, the focus of the event was everyone socializing in their outfits, as most cons seem to be. That said, I was also impressed that nearly everyone there showed up in a well thought out costume. Not to sound all Burning Man about it, but the idea of “no spectators” was unknowingly upheld. It was also wonderful to see the variety of ways that the participants interpreted steampunk. Part of my agenda with the frontierpunk genre that I invented is to show that steampunk doesn’t have to be limited to upper class Victorian England. I was glad to see that other people feel this way too, as I saw Native, military, East Asian, manual labourer, and Roma influences in people’s outfits and historical personae. In general, there was more “Wild West” than I was expecting, although a healthier dose of Pacific Northwest would always be welcome in costuming too.

The story of my next post (coming soon) began shortly after I arrived at the Steam Punk World’s Fair. An old friend from Honk festivals had traveled from Baltimore to play with us and after our set insisted that I had to meet a certain friend of his. A little later, he found me wandering the halls and said I should come out front and see his friend busking. Indeed, it was a good idea. Anyone who knows me at all could tell this was something I had to see – a crusty steampunk with an accordion singing the chimney sweep song from Mary Poppins. I caved and bought one of the guides to the apocalypse he was hawking in between lyrics. Our mutual friend was impressd that within minutes of meeting, I knew his travel itinerary and had worked myself into it. I was already set on not going back to NYC, it was just a matter of what adventure I could find in the meanwhile. We travellers can sense our own kind, so it didn’t take long to see how things could play out. “So, what about this friend you said I needed to meet?” Well, apparently I was about to go on a roadtrip with him.

To distract you from my distraction…

I got absolutely no writing done after I got back to NYC.  I ran some necessary errands and had at least one good adventure as a result, but nothing compares to the forced solace of a long bus ride.  Seldom am I so quiet and productive, even commuter trains offer too much distraction.  So, I got myself a ticket late last night and am headed back to Baltimore.  I’ll be able to play more music and see more free theatre there this weekend anyway.  The East coast is stunning in its smallness.  For about twenty bucks, more or less depending on your timing, you can go from NYC to a half dozen reasonable and interesting cities.  At these prices, who can afford to sit still!

Since I slacked on getting my post up about the Steam Punk World’s Fair, here’s a pretty high quality video taken from the crowd at the Boston show:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycd18wJFawQ&feature=related

It’s our traditional first song of the show, as some of you already know.  If you don’t think the horn parts are tricky enough, there are plenty videos of that out there as well…

Webster Hall Show – Everything Comes Full Circle

Webster Hall Show post… readysetgo!  (I was once again sitting at a cafe in Baltimore trying to catch up on writing, although I finished this post on the wifi-enabled bus back to NYC; how I wound up there and finally split town three days after the Steampunk World’s Fair is another story for another cafe in some other city.)

So, I called it “full circle” that I played with Inferno at Webster Hall, and indeed it was.  The only time I’d ever seen them from the audience was the Peter Lorre show there a couple years ago, when I was talking with the band about subbing.  I remember sitting in the VIP section that night, which was right outside our greenroom, so I had a stunning moment of deja vu.  At the Lorre show, the friend I had talked in as my nonexistent plus one on the guest list noticed that Lou Reed and Lori Anderson were watching the show over our shoulders.  I remember them being absolutely mesmerized by the circle pit, something I’m sure never happens at their shows.  We offered them our seats, which they refused as though we thought they were too old to need to stand.  Not old, we explained, just awesome and famous.  My appreciation for them grew at their insistence that we got there first, so we deserved the stage-side balcony seats.

Flash forward past months of assorted touring, running into Peter Hess in various cities, and one more moment of being in the right place at the right time, and there I was onstage last weekend.  Well, eventually onstage after the usual hours of waiting, during which we all apparently survived the rapture.  Our call time was just before that was supposed to happen, which was a sweet gesture if it was intentional.  We had a photo call at 7pm, so better that we were all inside for whatever hype-induced chaos might ensue at 6pm.  I spent the hours before then relaxing at the venue, meeting various behind the scenes folks like our booking agent, not getting any writing done, and venturing outside to visit a street fair and a friend’s cafe.

We got ready for the photo shoot during the first opening band, which turned out to include a kid from the Rude Mechanical Orchestra.  We got all fancy and gussied up while listening to them from the greenroom.  I did put our viola player’s hair up into a rockabilly swoop and later made our pianist look a bit more brooding via eyeliner.  We spent most of HR’s set taking publicity photos for Europe in an empty bar adjacent to the balcony.  Needless to say, it was not the most laid back prep time I’ve ever had for a show.  Regardless, I felt plenty ready when it was time to go on.  We lined up on the tiny staircase, the seven of us barely fitting backstage, even vertically.  Epic old ballrooms and theatres certainly have their quirks.

I had built it up in my head to the point where I was almost nervous, but the show was really wonderful.  The sound guys were very competent and helpful and the crowd understandably enthusiastic for our biggest NYC show in a hot minute.  The viola player had smartly put her pedal board at the back of the stage, but the frontman’s acoustic guitar was not spared the carnage of reckless stage divers, suffering a hole in the body by the end of the show.  I had a fine time occasionally playing the sax with my left hand while gently shoving kids offstage to crowdsurf with my right.  Maybe it was the vibe of the room or the climax of the giant last show of tour, but I felt like I could’ve played every song we knew that night.  Alas, the show had a curfew in order to make room for the circus party afterwards (which employs friends of mine, of course), so we had to stop at a certain time.  We didn’t, clearly, but there was only so far we could stretch it.

After the show, it took me ages to make it up to the greenroom.  I wasn’t in a hurry to crowd in with everyone and try to pack up my sax anyway, so I sat on the edge of the stage and chatted to folks.  I was drawn over by friends, but also chatted with road Infernites and fans I’d never met.  I even got asked to sign someone’s knuckles; that was a first!  I had the foresight to throw some rose patches in my microphone bag, so there was some handing out of trinkets as well.  Eventually, I went up the narrow wooden stairs behind the stage and decompressed for a moment, grabbed a drink to celebrate it being over, and met some friends out on the aforementioned VIP balcony.  What happened after this, besides the mellow afterparty at the bar where our guitarist works, will have to wait until tomorrow.

Awesome Boston Show

(A little late, but it’s been a crazy weekend.  Here’s how the show on Friday went…)

It was interesting to end the tour with two of our biggest shows since Hallowmas.  In some ways, the Boston show felt as highly anticipated as our swankier Webster Hall show the next day.  Don’t get me wrong, Paradise Rock Club was very well-equipped and fun to play, but was certainly smaller and less glamourous – factors which are pluses in their own right, of course.  A large number of loyal fans turned out for the show, especially since it was so much closer to NYC than most of our other recent shows.  The cheaper ticket price and smaller venue also made the venue seem a lot more full than the next night.  HR from Bad Brains opened for us both nights, but the bands opening before him those two nights were as different from him as they were from each other.

We arrived plenty early for set up.  I spent most of my downtime before the show either out back with the Swaggering Growlers and their entourage or next door at the Goodwill.  I was tired of the band and crew teasing me that I dressed like the lost and found box at a squat, so I was going to get a fancy dress specifically for that show.  I found a real beauty for ten bucks, plus a pinstripe blazer for seven.  I went back to the club, grabbed the Growlers, and took them back to go vest shopping.  I also went on an errand to find a snack and some sort of mixer for their tailgating greenroom (touring van) out back.  I grabbed a couple of traveler kids that had come out for the show and we found an Asian grocery store a brisk walk away, where I got a can of what I declared to be exotic martini mix.  Otherwise, I passed the hours greeting familiar faces.  Sadly, most of my Boston friends were down in New Jersey for the Steampunk World’s Fair.  Ah well, I’d be seeing them in two days most likely.

I was a bit disappointed I hadn’t gotten a chance to write about the Boston show the next day; I remember glowing from how well it went.  In hindsight, there were things that could’ve gone differently or better, like with any show.  The biggest problem that night was the vortex that seemed to exist over our viola player’s pedal board.  For some reason, everyone was intent on stagediving from right in front of us, which meant landing on her delicate gear.  We spent most of the show perched over the board, with one leg apiece up on the monitors.  I imagined we were gigantic birds protecting our nest while squaking at the punk raccoons wreaking havoc on our ecosystem.  Normally I enjoy the kids stagediving, but the common level of courtesy was simply lost that night.  The guys flanking the stage had their hands full keeping everything upright.  Fortunately, our more astute fans began to fill in the space in front of us, protecting our space a bit more from the chaos.  I won’t deny that I indulged my fondness for pushing kids out onto the crowd more than usual as a result.

The sound there was really excellent, except for that one point where all the chaos caused my microphone cable to come unplugged.  I fixed that immediately, since it wasn’t hard to notice.  As the only potentially acoustic instrument in the band besides the drumkit, I of course continued to make noise, but am far from audible when the rest of the band is going full tilt.  Otherwise, the entire vibe of the show was excellent.  It sounded, looked, and felt good.  The crowd definitely was ecstatic, which is a reward even bigger than a ticket price sometimes.

After the show, we had to run off immediately to a weird hotel somewhere far away.  There was a bit of time to mill about and decompress in the greenroom, but no epic afterparties or drinks with our local friends.  I imagine no one was about to complain considering we had a big home show to rest up for the next evening.  It’s so easy to forget when you’re not on tour how much of a job it can feel like when you are, all the responsibilities like not rendering yourself useless for the next day.  I think I fell asleep as soon as I got in the van, I was so worn out.

Show 4: Higher Ground, Vermont

The trip back from Canada went pretty smoothly. I’d even say border patrol was friendly and charming. We arrived in Burlington plenty early to check in, relax, head down the road to load in, do a laid back soundcheck, and leisurely pick away at the modest feast they laid out for us. I even had time to do a thorough warmup in my very own room. To say I was impressed with Higher Ground as a space would be an understatement. Apparently, it used to be a movie multiplex, but it seems like it was built to be the venue it is now. The opening bands’ rooms open out onto a balcony from which they can watch the stage. Some of our band snuck through their green rooms to see them play. Out another room was a balcony looking out on an even bigger stage/dancefloor/bar, a room I saw no sign of from anywhere else in the building. These spaces in general are far more beautiful than the exterior would have you believe, very spacious and woodsy. The show photos lining the walls attest to what a fantastic venue it is. A lot of really talented folks have passed through there.

Overall, it was a really fun evening, and in many ways different from the rest of tour so far. The venue was pretty large and legit, plus the hotel across the street made it all feel so much more high end. I was having unparalleled wardrobe issues, and the same lady who graciously lent me her car for the Philly adventure was just as generous with the black tank top she’d been wearing last night before her pretty dress. I tell you, these fans would give us the clothes off their backs – literally. A ton of Infernites came out of the woodwork, so there was a lot of participation and crowd surfing, which I’d missed at our last show. The opening bands were very entertaining and it was good to see Swaggering Growlers again. They have accordion, fiddle, and banjo. How could I not like it? Their lead singer, class act that he is, had a free cd with a shot of whisky waiting for me on the table as soon as I stepped off stage.

The strangest developement of the night was unmasking this guy I’d seen out in the crowd all evening. When I’m onstage, there’s inevitably someone out in the audience that catches my eye. Maybe they’re the funniest crowdsurfer, maybe they’re dressed circus or steampunk, maybe they’re just cute. For some reason, my eyes kept drifting to this one fellow in particular. I couldn’t explain it. I didn’t recognize him, yet he seemed to know all the songs and be super into everything. I promised myself I’d talk to him afterwards, as clearly there was some reason he caught my attention. Well, I ate those words. After I’d packed up, I was talking to the Swaggering Growlers guys and their cute hobo entourage, when I looked beyond them and saw the aforementioned guy – and he was my ex. Yep. It’s been six years and I’ve never let go of the resentment I’ve carried all this time. I’ve run into his sad eyes at Burning Man, BikeBike in Pittsburg, maybe New Orleans, Bike Kill in Brooklyn, folk punk shows all over, pedicabbing in Chicago, everywhere. Well, apparently he’s been a fan of this band since before I joined it, since before we even dated. I won’t go into details, but I still wouldn’t have given him the time of day if it weren’t for the promise I made to myself onstage… that, and the apology goggles. It’s true, completely unprompted, he brought me a pair of goggles he’d found in his parents’ attic that day. I’m such a sucker for symbolism. When he heard we’d be playing in his hometown, he figured out that I’d joined the band. When our frontman did his schtick about someone in the back of the room who didn’t want to come to the show because their ex would be there, mine apparently said out loud “Yeah, mine’s IN the band, and I know she doesn’t want to see me.” It was brave of him to show up regardless, to try again to apologize, but completely on my turf. Well, I finally accepted his apologies, we had a big talk out in the parking lot, and it probably did us both a lot of good. He said a lot of things I needed to hear and many I’m sure he needed to say. The most poignant part was when he pointed out that the life I’m living right now is exactly where I said I wanted to be six years ago. The weirdest part of it all: he admitted he’d been reading my blog. Hi.

It was good to have a proper hotel afterparty. I snuck a bunch of kids in with my key card so they could find the Growlers, and eventually I joined in the festivities and deliciously potent hard cider. There was also oatmeal chocolate stout and Southern Comfort. Fortunately, I’m still trying to minimize my drinking. Members of my band were in and out of the room, but the opening band held down the party quite well. I spent some time hanging out with a sweet rural banjo kid who knows my copilot from my recent Philly trip. Shrinking world. Speaking of which, while I missed the apparently epic bicycle museum downtown, I did get to visit Radio Bean, a venue I’ve heard of from various hobo sorts of touring bands. Sure enough, sitting outside with her dog was a lady I know from New Orleans. It was strange to realize the difference between this venue, where bands I used to tour in play, and the venue my present band had played in the night before.

The drive through Vermont has been really pretty, providing a soothing backdrop to my office on the road. Our driver is making us all very happy with his musical choices, especially me. We listened to 20s/30s pop music for a while, then the entire movie soundtrack to Cabaret. Joyous. Hopefully my quiet singing along didn’t bother anyone. I hardly ever get to geek out like this. Oh man, he just put on Annie, and the viola player is equally excited. This could get absurd very quickly…

Canada: Sax and Violins

We’ve just gotten back into the states after three awesome days in Canada.  Most of the band is enjoying the super deluxe pool and hot tub at our otherwise modest hotel, but alas no pools for me for a while.  Ah well, at least I can catch up on some of the writing I neglected during our scenic drive through the Quebec countryside on the way to the Vermont border.  Time to reflect on the second leg of the tour as the third begins.

Toronto…

We made it up to Canada just in time for load in and soundcheck.  We were playing at Lee’s Palace, a venue I’ve been curious about since I performed in the Toronto Fringe Fest back in 2007, where the headquarters were down the street.  It’s a really interesting venue which, from what I understand, is an old two-story movie palace.  The upper floor is even more interesting architecturally than the lower floor where we played.  I remembered the neighborhood really well and went to the bar nearby to see if the same bartender still worked there (he didn’t) and to the falafel place across the street for a nostalgic takeout dinner.  The viola player and I wandered with our sandwiches down to Kensington Market, which I insisted was a must see since she’d never been to Toronto before.  It took us a matter of minutes to run into someone I know.  We scooped up my vocalist friend from Balkan Camp and went over to Moonbean for coffee and desserts.  I made a bit of a spectacle of myself about the Nanaimo Bars available there.  I’ve known this lady for years, but only ever seen her at camp or at Golden Fest, so it was a treat to hang out in the real world – if you can call Kensington Market the real world.  She’s about to go on tour singing in the band with Shantel and Bucovina Club; I’m so proud of her.  Little did I know that I’ve likely been dancing to her voice at clubs for years.  The ladies humoured me on my search for an old friend who hadn’t responded to my mass email.  I remembered where he lived and he wasn’t there, but his roommate led us down an alley to a warehouse space where we found him hard at work in his claymation studio.  Success.

The show in Toronto was a joy.  The venue was perfectly suited for our crowd, with a high stage and railings equally sized forming a box around the mosh pit.  The only thing it was missing was a full crowd, but supposedly Toronto audiences are notoriously tame.  From a performance point of view, the show felt fantastic.  Never with any band have I ever felt the audience to be so right there with the “horn” section as they were that night.  Every time we played an exposed line together, I could feel them watching our every move, hear their appreciation as soon as we finished.  Another highlight, I could dance again!  It didn’t dawn on me until I was onstage for the first song and the adrenaline kicked in that I could move with relatively little pain for the first time in many days.  As soon as I started dancing about, all the days of limping around began to disappear.  I was so thrilled with my regained freedom, I was surely overcompensating for my careful movement the past two shows.  I also knew there would be no show the next day, so I’d have some time to recover before I did it all over again.

After the show, two very sweet boys from an online publication interviewed the lead singer and bass player, as well as myself.  I was a little flustered and flattered that this happened again.  No complaints, though, getting interviewed is a lot of fun.  Fortunately, I had my own plans for the night, so I was able to stick around longer than the rest of the band and have a leisurely talk.  My animator friend patiently waited for me upstairs, where – again! – there was some sort of an ’80s goth night going on after our show.  I’m finding this pattern hilarious.

Several of my Toronto friends came out to the show.  There was my singer friend, plus the animator friend and his roommate, but also the guy who had lent me the rickshaw I raced in the Cycle Messenger World Championships.  He owns a lovely French bistro in Toronto and is one of the cornerstones of Kensington Market.  He’d been away for two weeks and came to my show despite just getting off the plane.  Apparently, inviting everyone to my show had a way of reuniting friends who live on the same block.  Who knew?  My animator friend’s roommate had left his bike behind for me, so I had transportation back to their house.  It was my first bike ride in over a week, I was ecstatic.  It was a clunky cargo frame with a smaller front wheel, so I was able to ride carrying very little on my back.  Even so, I realized that it will likely be a while before this gash on my bottom heals up and I can properly ride again, an unfortunate outcome that hasn’t entirely sunken in yet.  We had a short ride back to the neighborhood, where we closed two small bars in a row and finished with a bottle of wine in the park.  So many good conversations with friends I’d missed more than I could have imagined.  I’d been avoiding drinking since the hospital, besides sips here and there, but the Unibroue on tap and Bison Grass vodka was too much to resist.  Fortunately, the antibiotics don’t forbid drinking and I’ve stopped taking the Vicodin since it made me ill.

Waking up in Kensington Market was awesome.  It really is one of my favourite neighborhoods in the world, so special in its unity as a creative community.  My friend had just gotten his first aid certification, so the daily repacking and rebandaging ritual went a lot smoother than usual.  More painful, no doubt, but it was good to have someone else check out the wound.  Butt injury quote of the week: “You literally tore yourself a new ass hole.”  A mutual friend who’d missed the show came by and we all went for brunch, then she and I went for a wander around the cute vintage shops that define the neighborhood these days.  We also found another old friend at the bike shop he’s opened since I left.  Such a little village, this neighborhood.  I treasured every minute there until my vanmates came to pick me up and check out the neighborhood (too) briefly.

Montreal…

This was our only day off this tour, although it is a fairly short one anyway.  We were all invited over to our guitarist’s parents’ house for dinner, and a touring band couldn’t have asked for a better evening.  They live in a gorgeous old house with a piano, there was good wine and food, and we got to relax and chat all evening.  Their cat, which supposedly is standoffish and moody to everyone else, was possibly my favourite animal ever, and let me pick it up and cradle it as it stared intelligently into my eyes.  There was also a baby, which is another rare sighting when you’re on the road.  Many hours later, most of the band prepared to head to our tour manager’s friend’s space to sleep, but I had other plans.

At the start of the tour, I emailed all my friends from Toronto who I’d met at the Fringe Festival in 2007 and the Cycle Messenger World Championships in 2009.  It turned out that one of my Burning Man type circus friends who I hadn’t seen in nearly four years had just moved to Montreal!  I was really eager to see him and got dropped off at the Metro just in time for the very last subway to his neighborhood.  It was a very good idea indeed.  As if seeing him again after so long wasn’t enough, he was housesitting a giant and eccentric apartment and had a glass of red wine and dark chocolate ready for me when we got back.  Not only that, but he read me stories as I fell asleep and woke me up to start the day with breakfast in bed.

I awoke that morning a few times.  I think it was the very first time when I’d been dreaming about how the Queen of England – who I suppose was the new princess – turned out to be this tribal belly dance festival-going sort of lady, and we had met on the circuit and become close friends.  I was marveling at how my life had taken me to the point where the Queen and I got dressed up for absurd parties together and did each others’ circus makeup.  She was a pretty incredible lady in my dream.  Half asleep, I painted a picture of all this for my friend.  I was forced to admit that I was pretty into the royal wedding.  Yes, it’s embarassing, but I have almost no media vices otherwise.  Maybe I’ve spent too much in England, but the glamour of the monarchy holds a trainwreck sort of fascination for me.  I blame Canada and the Burning Man vibe of the appartment for the dream, though.

I am definitely falling into funny patterns with these tours.  So far, I’ve impulse bought bargain clarinets on both of them.  I’ve also spent the one day off on both tours lounging around with a clown.  I had intended to see some of Montreal, which I haven’t been to since I was a teenager.  I later realized that this was half of my lifetime ago, which freaked me out considerably.  However, as days off seem to go for most people, laying around and looking at the internet and sharing music with my friend seemed to be a better way to pass the time.  The venue was very close to my friend’s house, so it was a very easy day indeed.  True to form, my additions to the guest list were a clown and an accordion player.  I found her after I checked out a junk shop, went for vegan takeout (fake bacon made out of coconut!), and walked around a bit.  Apparently, May is the month of anarchy in Montreal, and there was a theatre festival going on right there.  My marching band accordion friend and I went up to say hi to folks before that show started, then I grabbed a cup of alright coffee at the cafe across the street and headed for the venue.

The opening band had an upright bass and an accordion, plus the girl sang some of the songs in French.  I spent a little too much time watching the sunset and missed a fair amount of their set, alas.  Our show was fun for sure.  It was a small but enthusiastic crowd.  Some kids had come across the border just for that night.  In general it was a nice change to have a crew with accents and all the posters in French.  I’m trying to finish up this post from the balcony at our show tonight while listening to the opening band, so it’s hard to remember too many details about the actual music that night.  Afterwards, the larger van set out sooner than we did, so I got a good long chance to hang out with my local friends and have a couple drinks.  The owner of the venue came and hung out with the ones of us who were left until the bitter end.  I even got a good chance to practice my French.  Eventually, those of us that were left of the band made our way back to the DIY wonder that is Death Church and sat up for hours chatting around the kitchen table before curling up on our respective couches and floors.  This morning I woke up and toured the place, checking out the stage and gigantic mural in the former sanctuary.  I stocked up on Canadian dark chocolate KitKats and we headed back across the border around noon.

Inferno Spring Tour, the First Two US Dates!

Let’s rewind to last Saturday, the first day of tour. It was 6am in the overnight wing of the hospital and the nurses woke me up with a fresh bag of mysterious clear liquid to funnel into the startlingly cute pink and teal apparatus that had been implanted into my arm when I was still downstairs in the ER. Before I could fully shake myself awake, the surgeon was there and I was being told I was good to go on tour. It was the news I’d been hoping for all night, but I was so delirious I could barely appreciate it immediately. Despite the early discharge, it took hours of waiting to get the tubes removed, get my discharge papers and prescriptions, and get out of the hospital. I hadn’t been allowed food or water for about twelve hours, so that was the highlight of the morning, besides my much needed freedom and improving health. I got out just in time to get to the tour van, but I still had to fill prescriptions, finish packing my bags, and shower off all the hospital grunge. Fortunately, I’d made a backup plan the night before, and a few Infernites who were following us on the first part of our tour came and picked me up around noon on their way out of town. I’m sure I had a far different drive to Maine than the rest of the band, travelling with super fans. I definitely laughed a lot though, which I needed more than anything after the night I’d just had. And they had healthy snacks.

I woke up just as we reached Portland. Alas, I slept through the very pretty last half of the drive. I’d only been to Portland once, years ago when I stayed there with The Underscore Orkestra before we played further up the state. It looked cute, and quite unlike many other cities I’ve seen in the US. Then again, I saw very little of it this visit too. I was pretty cowed by my time in the hospital, so the trip and show were a little surreal to me. That said, the acute pain and inability to drink is giving me an unparalleled ability to focus on stage. Hopefully, I’ll take some of this discipline with me once the pain subsides. If you haven’t noticed already, I’m pretty easily distracted. I consider it a valuable survival skill, but I am finding the ability to focus a welcome addition to my repertoire.

The show was fun and the sound at the Port City Music Hall was really excellent. It was also some of the better food I’ve had at a venue, all very fresh and interesting. There was even a guy selling hard cider he makes from local apples, just on the way to the restrooms downstairs. He gave me a glass for being in the band, and although I’m trying not to drink while I heal, I did have a few sips as I passed it around. Delicious and bitter. The Swaggering Growlers opened for us, and had I been of more sound mind and body, I would’ve been out there dancing to it. They’ll be opening for us again later on this tour, so I’ll have another chance. Several of our more dedicated fans came up from NYC, plus a number of local Northeast Infernites. The show was good, and I was fully aware of how much I missed performing with the band. I couldn’t dance about as much as I usually would, but I’ve learned over the years how to favour one leg on stage pretty well. The venue had put a barricade a few feet away from the stage, between the crowd and ourselves. Well, that lasted long. The crowd would surge forward and push the heavy metal barricades up against the stage. The bouncers would put them back, and the game would continue. For myself, the crowd highlight of the night was our driver getting up high above the crowd and balancing himself by putting his hand on the head of the bouncer centerstage who was trying to hold back the flood of excited kids trying to dance their way forward.

The kids I met after the show were super grateful we came so far North. I was too. The coolest surprise was meeting this lady named Sandra who used to play tuba in the band many years ago. I remembered reading about her in the zine at Hallowmas, but had forgotten she lived in Maine. She was really sweet and it turned out we have a dear mutual friend, although we spent time with her in different decades of the NYC underground scene. It was funny, because that same friend had been texting me all day about how much I was missed out in Seattle at Honk West, so she had definitely been on my mind. And the world gets just a little smaller, and the phone lines pull the corners closer together…

After the set, once I repacked my wound and bandaged it awkwardly in the bathroom mirror backstage, I finally took a Vicodin. I was refraining until after I played the set, not sure how these horse tranquilizer sized pills were going to affect me. Well, I got that answer on the two hour drive to our hotel near Boston. I’ve never felt that kind of an awful drug state. I’m pretty amazed people take these things recreationally. When I was awake I felt panicked and when I dozed off I had terrible nightmares that lingered into waking. None of this was fun on a dark drive through the countryside. I felt no pain, though… well, until the next morning when they wore off and I got ill several times before we left the hotel. According to my vanmates, I looked heartbreakingly pathetic all afternoon. Thankfully, it wore off by the evening, and I couldn’t have been more grateful. I vowed not to take any more than half of one, and even then to think long and hard before I did so. The doctors gave me an awful lot of them, so I’m not sure if that means I have a high pain threshold for not needing much medication or if all that talk about being in a punk band made them assume I enjoy pills more than the average person.

Ithaca…

I slept a lot on the drive the next day, although it did have its pretty moments when I was awake. I attempted to finish up the previous blog post on my smart phone, but found it more frustrating than I could have imagined and lost patience and thus consciousness pretty quickly. I sleep well in moving vehicles; it’s almost uncontrollable unless I have something like driving or blogging to keep me occupied.

We arrived in Ithaca pretty early for our set, but somehow we missed soundcheck. The venue was far away from the Commons in town and didn’t look like much from the outside, but the interior was fantastic. It was called the Haunt and had a general Halloween theme going in the decor, but was also a barbecue joint and music venue. One side had sliding glass doors that opened up onto a deck which hung out over the river and had a view of the train tracks. Everyone working there seemed to have the right attitude towards running a music venue and treated us really well… even if they were out of vegan ribs. This was the day when I started to be really psyched about eating again, although I was still keeping it on the lighter side. We got to order dinner off the menu at the venue, and again it was good food. We had our own greenroom again, which was another room around back of the building, homey and not too small. It’s too early to make a blanket statement, but so far the new booking agency seems to be taking good care of us.

It was kind of refreshing to play a venue in the middle of nowhere, so there were no distractions to pull me away. I recognized the guy from Ithaca Underground from when I was there on that Underscore tour. He was one of the show’s promoters and had a little table set up with the other bands’ merch. I really liked the opening bands, which were very different from each other. The first was just one guy with a standup drum set, a bunch of pre-recorded tracks he made, and his voice. It was really compelling, though. He was a really sweet and interesting kid, clearly really smart too. The second act was a ska band. I thought their horn arrangements were pretty interesting, but was a little put off by the fact that they didn’t dress up at all for the show and none of them talked to us. Although, if they’d had a sax player, I would’ve sought him out regardless. We still had some super fans at this show, but not quite as many as the night before.

The intimate venue was perfect for the crowd. The show was actually pretty spectacular. We sounded really tight and played an exceptional set. Towards the end, our bass player and our frontman went out into the crowd, and I saw him crowd surf for quite a while. That hasn’t happened since I joined the band. I was planning on trying to do that myself this tour, but being butt hurt put an end (har har) to that plan. We all felt pretty good about the set, plus were treated pretty well and had a relaxing time. Honestly, it might be one of my favourite shows I’ve played with the band, in terms of how it sounded from the stage at least.

The next morning, the Giggle Van got itself up early and, since there was no gym in the hotel, went down to the Commons to explore. I’d been psyched to have people to get up and do yoga or go jogging with on this tour – and I do, but it’s just not in the cards for my body this time. We went down there to look for the ridiculous chai house I’d been to the last time, where they fed us waffles for playing klezmer music. We never made it there. The band teased me that we’d found a Leslie store and had to go in, but I insisted it was a hippy store and the accuracy of this statement was far outdated. Well, I guess they were right, because apparently they sell random woodwind instruments in psychedelia shops. Ever since the Mucca Pazza tour, I’ve wanted a metal clarinet, but I never really thought I’d find one so randomly. It was clearly meant to be. Within fifteen minutes, I’d fallen for it, found an alto sax reed to test it with (as well as could be expected), sent the store clerk on a quest to work the price down considerably via telephone, and bought it with my credit card. That’s two for two on buying clarinets during Inferno tours. I had to wait until we got to Canada to test it with the clarinet reed I keep in my sax case.

Friday the 13th: unlucky butt MRSA

Yep, that’s right. At least that’s what the ER thought it might have been. Possibly the punkest ailment I could’ve gotten, not to mention that I got it from biking and almost missed going on tour because of it. Literally bad-ass and a pain in mine. All of this has transpired in the unwritten week since my last post. I worried it would keep me from touring with the band, but here I am in spite of it, hopefully healing up as we head North, and catching up on writing in between naps. Needless to say, I have a newfound respect for the temple that is my body as well as the general delicacy of life itself. Last weekend, though, infection hadn’t set into the abrasion I’d gotten at the film shoot, and I went about business as usual. Here’s some of how the week leading up to tour went.

The main activity of Saturday was Inferno practice. Our viola player wound up being able to make it afterall, since the last date of her other tour was cancelled. Afterwards, I went to a theatre show at a new space a short bike ride away. I got there early and the madame of the house insisted I play something on my sax. Clearly, I obliged. I went to my default sample song, which is Jovano Jovanke. She happened to have just learned the words, so we agreed on a key and worked out a little arrangement. Eventually a musical saw, an accordion, and a drum made it into the mix. We busted out Ochi Chornia and the Russian kid tending bar joined in singing. I taught everyone the alternate “You are my sunshine” lyrics (from Austin musicians) for the last repeat. All of this transpired in the audience, keep in mind. I haven’t had enough jamming or Balkan music in my life lately, so it was a real pleasure. The show itself was very good, featuring a Canadian clown, a character comedian, and Zero Boy – who I’ve heard about from so many friends and was glad to finally see perform. It was a small but attentive crowd, which made for an intimate and compelling show. It was a relief to know that these sorts of simple pleasures can still be found in a city so big and oversaturated with lavish performances.

Sunday I had originally toyed with the idea of heading up to Boston for the day to the Steam Punk International City that was being held in Waltham. Emperor Norton’s Stationary Marching Band was of course playing, plus I was sure to see many other friends there. The event itself sounded wonderful – an experimental Vicorian sci-fi city in an historic town, where a variety of entertainment, lectures, and nerdy activities were offered for two consecutive afternoons. Eventually, though, I decided the trip was going to be a little too absurd and expensive, especially when there was so much else going on right there in NYC that day. As a consolation prize, I got some much needed sleep that day and then took myself to the massive gothic cathedral down the street to see a concert on their newly refurbished organ. Close enough to steampunk… and free. It was incredible. The young French organist is apparently reknowned for his improvisation skills, and the acoustics in there are unlike anything I’ve seen in the US. Afterwards, I hurried down to the Lower East Side to try and talk my way into a couple shows where friends’ bands were playing. When I was at the Bowery Ballroom the other day, I almost fell over when I saw the poster for Movits! They had shared stages at Paradise Gardens and Glastonbury with the circus honky tonk band with which I used to tour. I’d made friends with their sax player and partied with them a bit when I was in England last summer, so I was super psyched for them to be touring the US so extensively now. They share the same booking agent as Inferno, so I managed to get in touch with them that way. Sure enough, just in time, they found a spot on their guest list. Down the street, Viva La Vox was playing at a much different venue.  I had never met them before, but have definitely been hearing their name for a while, and then Everymen gave me their CD back in Miami.  I had seen the poster for this at our rehearsal space, and that was the only way I knew about their show, just like the other one I was seeing that night – proof that this old fashioned kind of advertising still works. I spent the evening bouncing between the two shows. I hung out with the guys from Viva La Vox for a while before the shows started. I’ve walked straight into the Bowery before (with my bicycle, even!) during a friend’s soundcheck, but come showtime they really didn’t want anyone going where they oughtn’t. So, I hung out at the charming psychobilly-esque party down the street, complete with junkyard looking merch installations and fully tattooed bodies everywhere. When I told the Viva guys I play in World Inferno, they were so happy I came to their show, they put me on the guest list. I went over to the Bowery to get my hand stamped, came back and saw their opening act, then went back over to see Movits! I had friends meeting me at both shows, and eventually we all wound up back at the swamp folk punk show. It was very different from the polished Swedish rap electro-swing we’d just been seeing. After Viva La Vox played their set, I went back over to the Bowery to find those guys, got to check out their green room and hotel, and then learned how Swedish rappers party – dancing to ’80s music and the soundtrack from Grease in a fog machine, apparently. I think I was the only one at the afterparty who didn’t speak Swedish, but the bass player and I had a fabulous time talking about playing Balkan music.  Needless to say, I did not get as much sleep as I needed that night, but at least I wasn’t getting it on a bus back from Boston.

I’d planned to do my punk janitor work four days in a row, but only made it through two. When I got done on Tuesday, I walked over to Barbes to visit the owners, the bartender, and the guys in Slavic Soul Party. Usually I’d stay for the show, but I had to run off for a Bari Sax Army mission. In case you don’t know, it’s a free jazz attack band consisting of only bari and bass saxes. Our fearless leader lent me his vintage Conn baritone sax and a handful of us assembled on the LES, where we were invited to storm the end of a film premier. One of the guys from Movits! and an Infernite came out to see us, so we had a bass player and a lawyer as “hostages.” We paraded along, amusing bars and pedestrians and upsetting naysayers of fun along the way. One angry neighbor attempted to dump a bucket of water on us from their window, very clever defense tactic! Within the same block, I had an egg thrown at me and was applauded by a room full of people. That might have been the most emblematic moment of my musical career.

Now for the part about the ER… I had begun to worry the night before, but by 6am on Wednesday, I knew something definitely wasn’t right with the injury on my bottom. I went to the ER down the street, and sure enough it was an abscess and needed to be drained immediately. Macho as I am sometimes, I assumed I’d go right to work afterwards. Nope. Besides picking up my prescriptions, all I managed that day was a sectional with the viola player at a friend’s house nearby. I would get the packing out on Friday after rehearsal, it all seemed pretty simple, although the pain factor was pretty high at work on the day in between. I had my next day planned out to the minute, but my body had other ideas. I got up, started packing for tour, and stopped by the hospital on my way to the subway to meet anyone I could who might be working later when I came back. I made contact with enough of the staff to feel alright about my timing later on. Then I rushed over to Brooklyn for Inferno rehearsal, and then right back to the upper upper west side. I dropped my sax off, got quickly ready for work later, and hurried over to the hospital. The staff remembered me and I got seen pretty quickly. Alas, it turned into more than just a follow-up appointment. The infected wound on my butt had actually gotten worse and they were worried. It soon became clear that I wouldn’t make it to work that night, even though it was an underground party that lasted until 4am. To add insult to injury, as I laid there on the hospital bed, I got a text from a friend asking me to work last minute at another underground party until 2am for even more money. Well, I’d be working no parties and probably wind up owing money by the end of the night. I fought hard for the chance to be allowed out of the hospital in time for tour. After an hour of cutting and prodding, a cat scan (which looked a lot like a stargate), a lot of waiting and chitchatting with the friendly staff, forms and needles, it was suddenly well past midnight. My friend brought me food and kombucha, but I wasn’t allowed to eat or have fluids until they decided in the morning if I needed surgery. At about 6am, after a few hours sleep in an actual room with cozy footies and a window, the awesome surgeon lady came in to check on me. Small world that it is, her assistant is a friend of mine from the Balkan scene. Needless to say, he stepped out of the room for the butt viewing. Long story short, she said it looked better enough, and here I am – sitting on one butt cheek in some club in some other city, catching up on writing, waiting for our show.