Hauling Ass Across America

Internet access is sparse. Sleep is deficient. Hygiene – don’t even think about it.

After a sold out blowout at the El Rey in Los Angeles, our first national tour is officially over, and now we’re driving straight across the country to Cleveland, OH to pick up another mini-tour with We Are the Fury and Rookie of the Year.

For the LA show, Under The Influence of Giants were back on the bill and the show was completely sold out. The El Rey was the largest and nicest venue on the tour with a capacity of about 800, a fresh remodeling job, and a top of the line sound system. It was a little disconcerting, actually. During this tour we got really comfortable rocking out those smaller clubs, and it was a little surreal to step out on that huge stage. The show was great though, and afterwards we said our goodbyes to Young Love, Play Radio Play, and UTIOG. We’d only been together for a month, but we saw those degenerates everyday. We’ll miss them terribly.

After the El Rey show, we played a second show at The Echo for our friend Heather Peggs’s birthday. We started late at 1:15, but we turned it into a wasted dance and make out party by last call. It ruled. After an unsuccessful attempt at taking the van and trailer through a drive through – horrible idea - we returned to our hotel at 4:30, thoroughly burned out but satisfied.

The label folk took us out to a nice lunch, gave us some energy drinks, and sent us on our way the next day. Getting out of LA was tough with all the Memorial Day traffic, but we made it to the Grand Canyon and got a hotel. The next day we did some responsible tourism, and then had a 24 hour straight drive to Kansas City. It sucked.

A quick recap of the latter half of the tour:

ATL / Florida –

We had a smashing good time in ATL, and met some of the finest people of our entire road experience. We’re still in regular contact with them via the internet. Florida however, was largely a bust. Without Play Radio Play or Young Love, we played for about 10 people at the 550 capacity Beta Bar in Tallahassee. The sound guy was great and gave us an epic light show, and we had a really nice time with the few audience members. Our Jacksonville show was cancelled due to wildfires and other factors, unfortunately we didn’t find out until we’d already driven there. We left Florida more broke than ever.

Texas –

Home turf for Young Love and PRP, the Dallas, Austin, and Houston shows were very satisfying - packed houses and great afterpartying. In Dallas we shared a venue with the Deftones, and everyone got to check out the show from backstage and meet everyone. Dallas seems like a nice place to live, and it was nice to explore a bit. In Houston we stayed at our very hospitable friends’ gorgeous mansion and had a relaxing day at the pool. In Austin we played a huge show at The Parish on 6th Street, then partied at the Beauty Bar with the Trail of Dead guys and Cedric from Mars Volta. Late night we tried to throw a 4am hotel pool party with the ladies and band members of Austin. This was naturally a bad idea. Though we kept it pretty quiet, it led to the ejection of every band member from the hotel by the police and an irate shirtless hotel owner.

AZ –

Another brutal 22 hour all night drive from Houston to Phoenix. Largely our own fault, for dawdling in luxury at our Houston mansion. The highlight of the drive was our stop at the border patrol checkpoint in Sierra Blanca, TX, about an hour from El Paso. My brother is a border patrol agent who was working there at the time, and we were greeted with federally demure fanfare. Thank god no one set off the drug dogs with some residue from nights past – second hand, of course. It was an exciting day to stop there, as they had just intercepted 1.2 million dollars of weed coming across the border. It was sitting there in a huge pile of black duffel bags on the sidewalk, protected by the national guard. We took pictures in front of it as if it were the Eiffel Tower. The AZ show was fun too, and we met a troupe of lesbian bondage and fetish dancers. Wicked.

Vegas –

With all the Young Love party boys egging us on every night, we knew this was going to be bad news. Exploring the city during the day was nice. We had a 10 dollar steak dinner and I lost 50 bucks in blackjack. The show was an 21 + outdoor party at the Beauty Bar. Good drinks, fun people, real Vegas residents and not tourists. Where else can you rock out with Cirque du Soleil acrobats? The night ended at 6 am. Larkin had to sleep in the car because we were too passed out to open the hotel door. I left my camera at the black jack table at 5:30am, only to wake up, panic, and recover it four hours later from the same casino staff at 9:30. Feeling lucky, I lost another 40 bucks. We also met the band The Higher, who we’ll see again in NYC. On this night, Young Love showed up with an arsenal of cheap airsoft guns that would terrorize the rest of the tour, especially poor Eric.

California –

All the Cali shows ruled. In San Diego we played with two great locals – War Stories and The White Apple Tree – and the show was a great big dance party with lots of enthusiastic screamers. Loved it. Later we hung out on the beach with our high school friend Dave, then drove to Santa Barbara to crash with our friend Kevin.

San Francisco was a packed show at Bottom of the Hill, where we encountered many of our upwardly mobile professional friends in the most eastern of the west coast cities. Britt Daniel from Spoon showed up to see Young Love, and yet again we partied late into the evening with some fine ladies and gentlemen. However – I had never seen so many forward homeless dudes and prostitutes in one neighborhood in my entire life. We drove through the night to LA, and couldn’t check into our hotel until 2pm, only two hours before load in. I hadn’t slept, and took a little power nap. We had a double header that day.

The rest you know. More updates soon, and check out the photo blog for our pics. And we’re getting a wireless card for the van. Booyah.

Updated celebrity encounters: James Valentine from Maroon 5, Cedric from Mars Volta and At the Drive In, Jason and Conrad from Trail of Dead, Britt Daniel from Spoon

Matt