Saturday, April 25th
The Rickshaw Stop
San Francisco
155 Fell St @ Van Ness
$10

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Hope to see you there!

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I believe we’ll look back on this tour in two parts: before NC, and after. Those of you that know us well will surely hear why.

The show itself was great. Strange venue/crowd compared to all the other shows, but very friendly. We haven’t gotten one ‘boo’ or ’show us your tits’ the whole tour, which I consider to be a big endorsement, considering everything (especially the fact that I’m quite well-endowed).

After the show, a little bit of hell breaks loose. Hopefully, no lasting damage is done.

Atlanta, GA:

We got offstage about 45 minutes ago. The Variety Playhouse is an old theatre, complete with seats and box office. So, as you might imagine, the opening band (Halou) plays to a bunch of people sitting in the seats about 50-75 feet from the stage. Weird.

The performance itself was great. Especially considering the chaos last night. I have my own little inside joke about ‘It Will All Make Sense In The Morning’. If I’m too loud during soundcheck, I’m too quite during the show, and vice-versa. By show 10 or 12 you don’t really give a shit, actually. I love that part. The deadening of nerves. And the numbing of fingers.

So, I’m here, backstage at the Variety Playhouse in the ATL with a bellyfull of Mediterranean food (wtf with all the mediterannean in these parts?). Tomorrow could be interesting considering the noises the van has been making. Next show is Austin, TX, which is about 1000 miles away from here. Hopefully, the van, and feelings, make it that far.

RYAN

This morning, Rebecca and I woke up and headed out into the town to see what the surroundings were like. Ended up at some sort of upscale mall and was (finally) able to pick up some new shoes. My last pair were unfortunate companions in the snow and were so wide that I would fatfoot my guitar pedals leading to all sorts of mayhem.

Very hospitable people here and the city itself is quite likable, actually. Looking forward to the show in a few hours…

RYAN

Tonight is the earliest show of the tour, I think, in order to facilitate Bob doing his late night BLOWOFF club. His hometown crowd is insane, too.

So, we get here, check in at the hotel and scramble to the club. The help here is just on it. Food waiting for us. Quick load-in. Soundcheck is totally efficient. Just waiting for the other shoe to drop, you know.

When we hit the stage, I’m totally surprised by how many people are standing in front of me at 7:30pm. Impressive, actually. And many of these people know EVERY word. Even the new jams. WTF.

Tonight was my favorite of the shows so far in some ways. I guess, despite everything, I had modest expectations since the set time was so early. We played really well, Rebecca was in perfect voice, and people just seemed to love every note (it could be, too, that the spring weather and Chardonnay were creating a bit of magic). Tonight, Professional really stood out to me.

Tomorrow, we wake up and drive down to Charlotte, NC (6+ hours). We’ve got the day off, so hopefully a nice dinner will be arranged to go with the wine shipment to meet us at the hotel there. Then, Monday evening, we play Charlotte and hit the home stretch as we make our way back west through the lower part of the country. Tornadoes, move aside, please.

RYAN

Apart from that, there’s this tour going on. We played in the center of Philly’s Chinatown at the Trocadero in all its faded glory. Just like friends (or enemies, I guess) every venue can be appreciated or despised for its unique character and I immediately liked the Trocadero for it’s spacious backstage area and attentive staff that made our late arrival a non-issue. Turns out we got some bad directions and got stuck in rush hour traffic. Damn.

So the show was an early one and the crowd was a bit timid about coming up to the front of the stage. This always makes things a little awkward, but we had a great time nonetheless and the performance was great, I thought.

Rebecca’s sister lives in Philly so we connected with her and I got to see my wife light up with that connection. They’re very cute when they’re together - just like they must have been years ago when Rebecca visited New Jersey.

I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it before but we’ve cut Hollywood Ending from the set to make things a bit more taut. I love the song, but the last few shows without it maintain the right energy throughout now. It’s sort of a mixed blessing to be judged as a ‘rock band’ now by people that haven’t heard us before. We never fully escape our past, though, which is a good thing.

There was a small get together after the show that was nice - and the Burmese cuisine was quite delicious in spite of my loading up on mediocre Chinese a couple hours earlier.

Another great night, overall. Looking forward to Bob’s hometown show in DC tomorrow night…

RYAN

Definitely best show of this run so far for me (and, I think, all of us). Everything I hoped it would be. The energy was just so insane onstage. ’Professional’ and ’Clipped’ were just full-on and fun as hell to play.

Things were so tight and there were obviously many Halou friendlies in the crowd yelling for old songs, etc. Funny, but awesome. ’Oceanwide’, wtf? Classic.

Rebecca totally nailed it tonight, too. Her family was here watching her onstage for the first time so it meant a lot to her that things went right. And they did.

I’ll probably write more tomorrow. Right now, Bob is finishing his set and it’s nearing that time when we load out and look toward the next city.

Wish you were here.

RYAN

It’s at this point that I’m able to look back on the drive through Wyoming and the slide through Ohio with a little detachment. But not much. This alone puts me in a good mood and Boston is a great place to be at the moment, however briefly we might be here.

So the show begins and there are very few people in the club. It’s really something we expected more of, actually, since we are not headlining this tour and our start times are fairly early. Also, sound check was very brief so none of us are totally acclimated to our setups tonight and there are a couple hiccups. For example, when I hit the first guitar note on Honeythief it blows my ears off. Usually, I keep the guitar volume in my monitor quite low. Really, we’re into the third or fourth song before things normalize and people start filling the room. As usual, I notice some people getting into it and others quite obviously fidgeting while waiting for Bob to play after us. Understandable.

Watching Bob tonight, it’s obvious that the crowd is giving him some love. He seems to be enjoying himself quite a bit tonight and the band is tight as hell. Out by the merch setup, Rebecca is hanging out and absorbing the comments people always throw her way. ’You guys really remind me of a band called Lush’ I hear one Bostonite say.

Not my favorite show of the tour so far, but still another night’s worth of experience and a beautiful town to cruise through. Tomorrow is NYC, so I expect things to get pretty crazy in the next 24 hours…

RYAN