Wednesday sept 20 frankfurt mousonturm SOLD OUT
Great venue near the zoo, and yet another glorious chamber of commerce day here in Deutschland. I hide out in the production office and nurse my pneumonia upstairs. There is so much smoking going on I feel like puking. Jamie liddell and snacks show up to do some drinking and recording in the back lounge. It seems that there was likely more drinking than recording. The show is packed, sold out in fact, and the crowd loves it. There are definitely people diddling each other in the crowd, and a crazy fuck actually pulls out his schwanze during shake yr dix and windwills the back of the head of his boost. Crazy krauts. Afterwards there is a wee party in the parking lot, I crawl into my bed to try and finish this dull Michael Jordan book, which still fails to say that he went to play baseball as a suspension for gambling. Just say it for crying out loud.
Thursday sept 21 munich backstage
It seems everything is gonna get my goat today. The trailer, the venue, the pneumonia, the Indian food, the passport photos, the speaker phone, the skype, the Japanese visa info which I am processing but not going, the getting the sack info third hand, and god forbid it is poor richies 2 year anniversary and we are being difficult. Nothing at the venue works, though the promoter tries his best to make us happy. Maybe partying will help.
Friday sept 22 milano club rainbow
So we get in a bit later than due to swiss mountains and Italian border guards. Oh well. We make it and are greeted by carlo, who looks after blonde redhead and immediately are taken for some espressos. Real nice. Back to the venue for the load and the shower(handicapped styley) and of course no internet. I get the passport info taken care of thanks to teo from the record label. The day is glorious, we spend the afternoon on the side of the street before heading off to dinner for some steak and pasta. A family affair, which is vaguely reminiscent why families are crazy. Back to the venue, the show is hopping, a great rambunctious crowd, a bunch of friends of sams join the party on the bus aftershow and we try to roll our rock to rome for an early get in. the key word there is try.
Saturday sept 23 roma circolo degli artisti SOLD OUT
So it takes forever(and a day) to get to rome, and we promptly get lost and it looks like the trailer is broken again.yay! the driver has decided to quit smoking which turns into a real treat for all of us.( as fionna says, ‘why do they always crack’) we finally get parked, the boss blows off all her press, the girls head off to sight see, and I hunker down in the production office to solve some problems thus negating any form of turismo in italy.
Pietro and his colleague romina take care of business for us and ensure us of a great disco load out. The show is very punk rock, loads of shit does not seem to work, but the energy is there. The crowd loves it, we eat an amazing dinner with more types of fish than a godddamn aquarium, the load out is very disco, there are more foxy signoras outside than an amateur beauty contest, and I soon realize that is don enzo/s 50th bday and what would/ve been my 11th anniversary. Time flies. I call the bronsons and there is still no kid, but they are close. We are now officially on the road to god knows where, sans the boss.
Sunday sept 24 sur la route
We stop in nice and eat moules frites and pate de canard with the crew. Of course, it being a day off the weather is shit.n hey now and mark the lampie jump in the med Afterwards we have an ipod party on the bus and everyone gets heroically drunk. Not a drop wasted, me thinks.
Monday sept 25 sur la route
We awake in bilbao with no sign of the double driver. Everything is closed. I tuck into my lionel shriver book to read the horror of parenthood. Not hungover, but dumb and stricken with what feels like walking pneumonia. Keeping it green, me thinks. We bounce our way through spain, finally stopping for showers and tapas in Salamanca.
I get to watch the bus, everyone else sight sees. It looks amazing this big plaza.
Tuesday sept 26 lisbon paradise garage SOLD OUT
So peaches has been in Portugal for 24 hours and has a case of separation anxiety from the band. They are all summonsed to the hotel and whisked off to lunch for octopus and what not. Our day room has evaporated along with the hospitality and everything else. At least we are getting hijacked wifi in the street. Because the dressing room is located next to an open sewer, smells real good. I go back to the bus, to watch the alternator being fixed on the side of the road and deal with more Japanese shit. Later , mark, the driver , and I go for bacalao and steaks around the corner and watch man u beat benefica. Thank god we do not have English plates. Later the crowd goes bananas for the show, we hang out in the sewer for 10 minutes and drive to Madrid.
Wednesday sept 27 madrid arena
So I have been here before. A real gross backstage and the strange subterranean parking under the plaza oriente. The day is spent juggling, sweating, rearranging, trying to find internet, wet nursing, contemplating air Iberia flights, eating crappy fried food that is quite expensive for new york standards, and then doing a show. Afterwards we pack and drive to Barcelona.
Thursday sept 28 barcelona apolo
So the rapture are at razzmatazz tonight which does not bode well for ticket sales. We get stuck in an intersection right near the club and have to get bailed out by the police. This driver had best start smoking as the chinks in the armor are turning into chasms. We finally get out of it(gps should be a guide, not a bible!) and move into the club. The local rep gets the boss into the dayroom asap, and the rest of the girls are off sight seeing for the day. We actually get internet and decent showers today, so everyone takes advantage of the situation. I even manage to get my rags cleaned. Later fionna, jd and I go for bocadillos and rose(and carajillos, mmmm) at the bar downstairs of the apolo. Show time and the corwd is well up for it, some homely lesbians who apparently were fist fucking each other at a le tigre show took their tops off in the front row. Not nice, to be sure. I nearly pass out from all the coughing, and send people off to the party for the hour before departure. Hey now even manages to nearly score some bimbozo in the street. He is like the new bounty. The similarities between this and the swans tour of 97 are looming larger. Whose arse are we gonna kick in London?
Friday sept 29 marseille marsatac w/ rapture and mogwai
So we miss brekkie after a detour through Barcelona and get everyone situated and loaded in. we get the boss to the day room on the old port and I do my best to avoid looking at the all female backstage staff. Good lord! After hours of trying the internet and confirming my gig with the shins for next month, I take the advice of one of les milfes francaises and take the walk around the harbor. What an amazing city. I also thought that I would die a horrible death in a Marseille hotel room. Must/ve been all the genet in college. Then again, perhaps it is never too late. That ferry next to the bus en route to tangiers is also looking enticing. But noooo. We eat the fish and the duck salad and drink the wine and eat the veal and watch the mogwai and check the email and watch the rapture and drink the wine and change it over and play the show and catch the stage divers and load the gear and drink the wine and get in the bus for the 12 hour drive.
saturday sept 30 off poitiers
busitis, I finish lionel shriver and segue into joyce carol oates, rape: a love story. Real happy reading here. We make it to the hotel in poitiers. Everyone is hating the hotel. I take a shower, feed the ducks and head out with mark and droadie for a quik burger. All the boys head out to do laundry. I retire with some red wine to watch a tim burton docko, then another docko directed by wim wenders about skip james. Droadie and I drink a bottle of vin rouge and watch jsbx, nick cave, and Cassandra Wilson do their versions of skip james songs. Pretty cool in that, I know loads of people who must/ve been involved. The droadie split to party with the girls downstairs and I sleep the sleep of drunken angels. Or ones with pneumonia , at least.
Sunday oct 1 poitiers le confort moderne
An old squat on the outside of town, the kind of place that only exists in Europe. Restaurant, record shop, gallery, good people. Today I can taste lake Michigan, but I still have nearly 3 weeks to go. The internet is internot, though we are able to tell that vince young made his first nfl start for Tennessee. How long for leinhardt? The day progresses as per usual-meaning interview, line check, soundcheck,lunch, dinner, internot. Same shit, different color. I skype the usa looking for inspiration in a set of head phones. Like I said.
The club is perfectly laid out. It is a blue print for the perfect rock club in a way. The crowd, though, has to qualify as the quietest crowd of the tour. For a moment I think that we are in japan. Finally the boss comments on it at the first song of the encore, and they make an effort. When the girls are walking off after the encore, they really give it up, but until then, crikey, you/d have thought that we were at a wake between songs. I nearly fall asleep at one point. After show, the girls make a dance party in the club with the staff, sounds like a bit of fun. I retire to my bunk to the book and lots of dreams about rats in new york city apartments.
