Friday, March 18, 2011

SXSW

We're here! I can't write for a long time - the band is playing in a few hours downtown at Stage on 6th. Mario, the 23 year old manager from Seattle, flew in on Tuesday night and has been hitting all the clubs drumming us up some work. The band only had a house party lined up before getting here, and now have 5 shows. We played Opal Divine on Wednesday, and Agave on Thursday. Today and tomorrow the play Stage on 6th at 1pm and 4pm respectively. Please come by and check them out if you're in the madness!

Wednesday, March 16, 2011

Sunday Shenanigans

Trying to shop for a tire and navigate San Diego traffic were the cause of our getting to the Sunday LA show with little time but for the band to set up and start playing. After the stresses of traffic and repairs, we followed some friendly locals to a bar called the Cha-Cha (which is actually run by the same owner of Cha-Chas in Seattle). I was holding the keys and thus no beers while there, and also stood holding them while surveying our situation at 2 am on the streetwalk. Going to our previously arranged location was out of the question - the friend had long since gone to bed in time for work Monday. Besides, many in our party were too preoccupied with taco truck, new acquaintances, and their own confusion to be easily corralled in a quiet house. We were contemplating where to park for the night to sleep in the van, when Devon's former roommate Brittney offered up her apartment. Some of our more intrepid new buddies came along for the adventure, and we clamored into the van for a 30 minute ride through the deadened Sunday evening streets.

We parked on a quiet side street just a ways down from Brittney's place, and immediately set to to break up a fight that broke out in the van. Geoff was nursing a broken heart, and didn't feel the need to associate with anyone. Woken from his deep animal slumber in the back seat by a too festive Ryan, and we were prying the hands of one off the other in the lawn two minutes later. Leaving Geoff as he wanted to bed down alone in the van, we headed to our night's accommodations.

Brittney lives in a funky apartment complex, where two buildings with two levels of apartments share a central courtyard with a dinky pool and some benches. The apartments on each level are connected by a balcony walkway, where our friends' clumsy footsteps and loud carousing probably woke more than a few neighbors. We entered a two room space where living room had been converted to second bedroom, and two cats cavorted about our feet. It was very nice of Brittney to host us, though I wondered how exactly we were all going to fit in here.

Brittney seemed unperturbed by her newly thrust upon late-night hostess responsibilities, and broke out pictures of a much younger Devon sporting rocker bangs and the same style leather jacket. (I don't think he had then the red leather snakeskin pointy half boots he wears now though - at least I didn't catch a glimpse in the photo). Devon as generously broke out a bottle of booze and they proceeded to pass about the bottles and banter with equal gusto.

After a time, Noble and I asked for a place to sleep and crawled into our sleeping bags in the other room. Devon started telling a raucous version of tour immediately upon monopolizing the new audience, and we listened as he talked about the farting, the flirting, and the partying. Like the veteran rocker he is, the stories took on an epic quality, and a rather enlightened view of the storyteller himself. Noble and I, both silent before in the darkness, now burst out laughing at our band hero in the next room. Most warming to my heart though was how he praised the better balance struck this tour with the addition of a certain merch girl Shanana.

At some point after (wherein shirtless dance shenanigans were commenced in the rinky-dink weight room) the rest of the bunch joined Noble and I in the sleeping endeavor. Six of us bedded down in the rooms, with Brittney and boyfriend leaving to sleep at his place nearby. It seemed only moments before that Brittney stumbled out the front door, and her unexpected roommate fumbled in. He spent some time contemplating the situation in the dark - strangers in his bed, on his floor, making it hard even for him to enter. We later found that Brittney had not gotten a hold of him before, and she'd stopped trying to convey the message somewhere between rolling rock and Sailor Jerry.

The roommate went into Brittney's room to ask her about the present situation, and found yet two further strangers bedded in Brittney's bed. He walked back out and stood in the kitchen silently texting and waiting for someone, anyone, to tell him what was going on. Which is where we all found him staring at us when Noble's alarm went off at 7:30. We hastily sprung from the floors and couches and beds to grab our things and exit. I hate to think of the bad day we started for you, roomie! I hope you and Brittney work things out....

With little sleep, and such an abrupt awakening, I stood upon the balcony as our two new buddies walked out and leaned against the railing, one shakily lighting a cigarette. They turned to one another and immediately shared a laugh at their situation. Moments later, Devon stepped jauntily along the bleached sidewalk in his snakeskins, clutching a 1/4 bottle of rum and a sleeping bag with the arm that wasn't thrown over the shoulders of his new friend. We beelined the van for Discount Tire, and replaced the front two for our 7 hour drive to Tempe and the final show before SXSW.

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

Vantastic

We blew a tire on a stretch of I-5, simultaneously ripping through my contemplation of cherry orchards and vacations, the rubber to the rim (bending irreparably), and our best intentions to speed along to San Diego without delay. Geoff expertly guided the van out of traffic as semis zipped by. Immediately after coming to a halt we all piled out and headed for spare tire, the iron, a jack. Within moments it was discovered that the jack did not fit the bolts and I whipped out my AAA card so someone could dial them for roadside assistance. Meanwhile, the smartphones got to work locating us more accurately than between the orchard on one side of the highway and ranch land on the other. Others of those little brains came up with a list of tire places, their phone numbers and locations.

Pretty soon we were seated in the tall grass beside the van (I think I failed to mention before but it's a Dodge Ram 1500 with a small trailer attached) waiting for AAA, some of us gladly grabbing a celebratory beer that no one was grumpy or impatient, that we were in the sun, and that Geoff had steered our wounded chariot so expertly out of danger. Aura and I spent some time celebrating how much better breaking down now was with friends- so much more calm, assured and easygoing.

While the mood was the best we’d ever experienced over a busted tire, it’s not a minor problem to have faced. The cost of a new tire is $120 without installation or rim, and we have little spare time to wait to change it. When we arrived at the first shop that supposedly had our size, we found they’d misspoken. Checking the time, and realizing that we would just barely make it to the show to set up, we decided to risk it on the spare.

Another issue that came up that day was line-up. A miscommunication and we got bumped from third to fourth. The day before, we’d almost lost our direct support (band just before the headliner), and Ryan had to exchange a number of phone calls to preserve the set time. He works really hard to set up these tours, with months’ worth of emails and conference calling beforehand. He also takes a lot of the negotiating pressure, and without an agent or booker like other bands, that is a tall order.

Touring with other bands though ends up being a good thing. The people in the other vehicles (usually 16 passenger vans, or SUVs pulling a trailer) know what the situation is. Olin and the Moon had to replace brakes for $500 in Eugene, and Or, the Whale’s van actually caught on fire 3 hours into a previous tour. When we arrived that night to the venue, haggard from 10 hours on the road, members from both bands commiserated with the day and offered to share drums and bass to facilitate set-up. They also stayed to the very end of the show and the H&H’s last song.

We immediately broke down after the show and headed to bed. Geoff and Devon went with his older sister, and the rest of us to Aura’s parents house nestled in the hills 30 minutes from the venue.

The place that Aura grew up in is a Victorian-style kooky place designed and built by her dad (a Jewish man from New Jersey) over the span of 10 years. From floor to ceiling on every wall, the place displays the handiwork of her dad with mini model/figurine building, pottery, woodcarving, and painting. He also collects a number of things including crystals, bugs, small vertebrate skeletons, travel trinkets and craft ware, and movie and music paraphernalia. It’s a veritable museum of oddities, and one can spend hours poking about the corners of the space. The next morning, Aura’s mom made us the perfect cup of green tea, and her dad told us the history of his house and collections.

Try as we could to get a replacement tire for our spare, San Diego on Sunday was closed for such business. We loaded up once more and raced to the Sattelite in LA on our spare.

Sunday, March 13, 2011

Homecoming

Aura’s mother’s family lives in Japan just 10 miles up the coast from where the tsunami hit. After news of its impact, and before Aura could get hold of her kin, she quietly pursued news of their well-being via email, facebook and phone. Just as we were pulling into Santa Cruz, she leaned over and told me they were safe. Ten miles from them, the wave had completely washed away houses, buildings, roads, yet their homes were still standing. Even her uncle, whose front door opens onto sandy beach, still has a home (albeit needing repair) to go back to.

The town of Santa Cruz was quiet when we pulled off a side street to park. As Noble, Aura and I walked toward downtown, we noticed the beaches were closed. Later we learned that the tsunami had caused large swells that morning that turned over boats and cracked a few docks. Photographers perched atop a cliff overlooking the water and a helicopter circled with expectations that another wave would hit about 4 pm. It was a bright and sunny day, but the tsunami threat cast a slightly surreal feeling over the afternoon.

Aura, Noble, and Ryan all went to UC Santa Cruz for undergrad. As we walked past downtown store fronts, Noble pointed out where the DJ company he worked for used to be, ducked his head into a music shop where he’d bought one of his favorite guitars, and showed me the clubs where they used to dance. Aura almost visibly grew a few inches toward the CA sun. “When I drove up the first time from San Diego with my dad and opened the car door on the campus nestled in redwoods, my face immediately swelled from the pollen-filled air,” Aura noted. Now she and the rest of us can’t get enough of that fecundity into our lungs.

The feeling of homecoming followed the band into the night’s show. Exes came to watch the set and mingled with old roomies and former fellow music or theater majors. Ryan introduced me to his freshman year roommate, Aura friends from her Latin music ensemble. We had a guy come wearing a t-shirt from the band Ryan and Noble played in together ten years ago. The band was called It’s a Whale, and they used to hold hippie jam sessions at packed house parties before the police would break them up.

Especially fitting for such a night of remembrance was Noble’s tune “Victor Song.” It was written by a much younger Noble about 10 years ago, and had been marinating in his brain until the band started playing it a couple of months ago. Named for his father Victor, and addressing both his mom and dad, the song celebrates a family connection that lasts even as we venture out to make a solo go of adulthood. Though Noble notes that he didn’t follow any specific African musical tradition, the cadence gives it that feel. He keeps it simple – Noble playing acoustic guitar and Ryan trading guitar for snare and cymbal, Aura leaving aside her keyboard for a thumb piano.

Noble belted out the lyrics that night to a crowd of old friends in a town where 10 years ago he just might have dreamed them up. I couldn't help but see the song that night as his own little offering up of sentimentality for the homecoming, and for the family and friend connections (both near and far) that continue to make this trip possible.

Saturday, March 12, 2011

Happily Funemployed

Upon leaving Sacramento, we headed for the Bay Area, where Ryan and then band the Toy Soldiers used to pedal up big hills and play dance music to a crowd of eager listeners.  With a promise to meet them in San Francisco at Hotel Utah in time for the night’s show, I politely bowed out of a day in the recording studio and got dropped off in Oakland to spend time with college friends newly settled there.  (The show, by the way, fueled as it was by a full day of recording, was the best thus far in terms of vocal harmony.  They sounded really tight, and rode the wave of energy from recording right through to a sweaty encore.)

The Oakland crew is an intrepid and industrious one, with many of its members new to the circle or in a state of transition. I stayed with a house of four including John, Kasie, Nick and Ben.  Together with friends Lauren and Zak, John is establishing Doc’s on the Bay, a food truck to supply consciously assembled meals to customers and income and business experience to friends. Kasie is coaching lacrosse to high schoolers, gearing up for a gallery opening featuring her prints, and contemplating the principles of biodynamic farming.  Nick, settling now for the first time in over a year from the traveling life, works as an after-school tutor in math and spends his creative energies on singing and playing mandolin, writing songs, and performing with friends. Newest roommate Ben is spending his first week and a half cycling about his surroundings, doing yoga and working on building relationships within the friend group.

When I arrived at 12 in the afternoon, Kacie was home and John and Nick filtered in and out over the next few hours.  Not one of them works a traditional nine-to-five, and consciously so.  This is a group of friends that all value work/life balance, and recognize the merits of an economic perspective that provides for rent, food, and fun, but also for ample time to think, educate oneself, and foster skills in a variety of other venues.  I couldn’t help but make the parallel between such an existence and the ones that the band members choose for themselves back in Seattle.  Their jobs and living situations make space for music – for the flexibility of going on tour, the means to conserve money by living simply and communally, and the hours for practice. 

Such an existence breeds an industriousness and fortitude that I really admire, and that I believe characterizes many people in my age group.  I guess every generation says theirs is part of a new era or change in thinking, but I believe the twenty-somethings I know are making it cool again to diversify interests and practice self-reliance.  In an economic landscape that is harsh to workers of any kind, values flexibility to keep up with the technological leap-frog propelling the market, and faces political and ecological conundrums of epic magnitude, one HAS to be patient and willing to change.

One of the reasons I decided to go on this trip was as a way to mark my transition from full-time employed administrator to partly employed mental rejuvination seeker.  I’ll be starting medical school in the fall, and am committing myself to a place and a trade that from all accounts can be pretty consuming.  While I know this choice gives me little space for creatively configuring the coming professional years, I wanted to take some time to embrace the less regimented lifestyle of the freelance adventurer, to give myself the distance and unbounded days to think about how I’ve been living and how that might need to change.  It will also most importantly release me from some of the mental blockages that make such change difficult to implement.  I must then thank Oakland for a beautiful sunset run, lots of good coffee, 2am readings, and friendly pillow purges.  You’ve added to my ruminations on life post- 9 to 5 quite nicely. 

Wednesday, March 9, 2011

Goodbye Pac NW Gray - Hello Sunny SoCal


Sacramento!  Sun!  California! 

We made it into town a full three hours before the performance, and I took the opportunity to don running shoes and explore the neighborhood.  Oh my God!  To my sun-deprived skin, this place is a dream!  I saw orange-laden trees in many a yard, a geranium four feet tall, a full hedge of bird of paradise, and even some cherry tomatoes.  We are solidly in the world of spring down here.

The Sacramento show is the first on the tour with Or, the Whale.  They played a great set even though they were jetlagged and tired from three weeks’ tour in Scotland, Wales, and England (their first European!), which they returned from 2 days ago.  Lead female vocalist Lindsay related that every time she closes her eyes, even for a second, she starts to drift off.  Despite the sleep deprivation the tour gave them a lot of energy and excitement, which could be felt in the fullness of their songs.  They have a Fleetwood Mac type feeling, with two female vocalists, and a lead guitar/vocals guy named Alex.  Half the band has been playing together for over 6 years, when Lindsay and Alex found each other via craigslist, and half the band is a new admixture after three original members left last year.

After the show, we got to catch up with the Olin boys a bit more in a stupid bar called the Streets of London.  Funny bass man Kyle entertained me for a good while with stories about the road, and pictures of his girlfriend and cats Olive and Oscar back in LA.   He started playing with Olin about 4 and half years ago (about half a year after they started the band), when he met them drinking beer on a friend’s porch and lied about being able to play bass.  Being the only one of the band members who did not grow up together in Sun Valley, ID, he got an audition spot, picked up a bass from his tattoo parlor (the first he ever held) and skateboarded over to the practice space.  With some knowledge of guitar, and a lot of hours practicing the notes of songs on his own, he claimed his space with the boys.

Olin and the Moon have been getting some air play in TV shows, and recently shot a scene of them playing Not In Love for One Tree Hill.  They all flew out to North Carolina for the shoot, and Kyle related how upon arrival he was ushered to his own trailor.  “My…own… TRAILER! You gotta be fucking kidding me!”  They kindly inquired what he would like to eat, and assured they could procure anything, he settled on a BLT and a coffee…

Travis came over soon after and sat down with us, sporting his new denim vest, on the back of which he plans to sew The Destitutes’ Milo.  He’s the electric guitar man, supporting vocals, and big brother to front man Dave.  He sport a Harley Davidson T-shirt and mullet-y Mohawk, and only needs a Harley motorcycle to complete the picture.  Despite his intimidating figure, Travis is a sweet guy who manages a pizza shop in LA.  Having grown up in the bar scene, he’s a hustler at pool and darts, and thinks nothing of drinking a pitcher to himself.  When they go back to ID, his dad and all the neighbors show up to support the band’s efforts.  They once packed a tiny bar (where high school friend’s mom waitresses) with 400 people, some crowded up on stage to hear them play. 

Brother band Brown Shoe hosted us last night.  They have their 19-year-old brother sleeping in what once was the dining room.  He lives there free of rent with four other brothers, and cleans up to earn his keep.  What a beautiful set of siblings they are!  The 19 year old sweetie escorted us over to a coffee shop this morning and reminisced being 12 year old when Ryan and then-band It’s a Whale stopped off on tour to drink beer.  Seven years later and I’m sure he’s got his own stories now of drinking beer and crashing on couches with the dream of making it big.

Gold Rush Video!

Check it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MYDBGCFkwC8

Ashland Reprieve

A new rule was instituted yesterday morning after breakfast at the Wandering Goat in Eugene.  No farting in the van when we’re loading up!  Devon wanted the rule to be no farting at all in the van, and Ryan was too busy laughing at his van clearing capacities to defend himself, but once Noble pointed out that Devon had already broken that rule himself, it was revised.  Aura turned her phone on to get directions and immediately picked up coverage on the butt stink network.  How apt.

We rolled on through OR toward Ryan’s big sis Kristi’s house in Ashland.  Like all of Ryan’s family, she’s super supportive of her brother’s musical endeavors.  Sisters Sarah and Emily (along with Emily’s husband Austin) came to the show in Portland, and came next morning for an informal screening of the new music video (which sister Sarah helped film).  Sister Kristi came up for the show in Eugene, excited to see the Horde & the Harem live for the first time.  Now we were heading to her place where she lives with daughter Flora for a little family night and some rest from performing.

Aura took the wheel for the day’s drive, and while the boys watched movies and read in the back, we talked a bit about life back in Seattle.  Aura moved up there about 2 years ago to be close to her brother and his kids when their mother passed away.  In addition to her family responsibilities, Aura teaches piano classes to students from 4 to 40, and works part-time in a coffee shop.  She knows Ryan and Noble from their days back in Santa Cruz where Ryan and she took all their Opera classes together. 

About a year ago, Aura started dating boyfriend Dave.  She met him at a coffee shop she worked at across the street from Dave’s apartment building.  Days before she was about to quit, she told Dave that she would be leaving, and was excited that her then crush insisted they hang out away from work.  Now they’re swapping pictures of potential houses together, and she’s getting him to pick up the trumpet he’d neglected since high school…

Ashland is a cute little bubble of progressiveness in the more rural/republication Southern OR at large.  The van pulled right up to a friendly community yoga studio, where some of us did deep squats to expel the cafa of winter and tour living.  We were just grabbing sandwiches after when Noble came up with a flyer for open mic.  Why not?  We toted some instruments over to the Black Swan (an affiliate theater for the OR Shakespeare Company) and put names on the list.

The room was a packed one, surprising for a Monday.  The night featured some slam poets and hip hop artists, and the audience was an eclectic one.  I sat next to Holly, a woman in her 60s, who’d moved to town about 12 years ago after coming up for the festival performances for many years before that.  She told me about the green shows (informal outdoor shows before each festival performance), about the 12 different plays each season, and about the one outdoor Elizabethan and 2 indoor theaters whose capacities range from 150 to 1200.  She was pleased with the new management of the company, and noted a couple times how well they were doing at diversifying the offerings.  She’d never heard any slam poetry before, and was excited to see what it was all about.

Despite it’s being billed as an open mic, MC Claudia had a lot of the first 1.5 hours slotted for scheduled performers.  Some were awesome – Cornflower did two beat box jams with his loop pedal which were pretty inspired (and only a mite hippie spiritual), and another young guy did a great accapella performance of “No Contact,” a really funny and prettily rendered response to break-up.  The feature performer, though, fell right over the line of inspired to trite with his slam poems about fatherhood, religion, sexual feeling, etc, etc, etc.  Perhaps if he’d honored the spirit of open mic and shut up after a more reasonable 25 minutes.  Forty-five minutes and an epic mess-up later, he was still rambling on and rumpling papers.  Give up the stage! 

A quick check of the clock, and thoughts of visiting with Ryan’s niece Flora at a decent hour, had us sneaking out after feature fail.  We spent the rest of the night playing LIFE and eating grilled cheese at the kitchen table at Kristi’s house.  Flora was quite the little hostess, ushering the cats about and out of the way and showing us to towels and showers.  Thanks, Kristi and Flora, for a much needed respite!

Monday, March 7, 2011

And before I forget... Come see us!!!

TOUR DATES:

3.4 @ Sunset Tavern (Seattle)
3.5 @ The Woods (Portland)
3.6 @ Sam Bond's Garage (Eugene)
3.8 @ Luigi's Slice and Funhouse (Sacramento)
3.9 @ Hotel Utah (San Francisco)
3.10 @ Audie's Olympic (Fresno)
3.11 @ Crepe Place (Santa Cruz)
3.12 @ The Soda Bar (San Diego)
3.13 @ The Satellite (Los Angeles)
3.14 @ The Sail Inn (Tempe)
3.15-20 @ ...TBA.... (Austin)

For specific show times, see www.thehordeandtheharem.com

And if you buy me a beer, I'll post your picture here :)

If you can't beat em, join em (in the kitchen for a dance party)

We made it to Sam Bond's Garage in Eugene, OR just in time to check out the last 30 minutes of the open stage bluegrass jam (strings only) and eat yummy pizza, sandwiches and vegan cookies.  I set up the merch booth right next to Olin's group, who that night actually had their own merch girl, Dezi, who also happened to house us and some Olin boys that evening.  She's a cute junior at the U of O studying biological anthropology and business, and dreaming of promoting bands after graduation.  Given that she's hosted four bands in the last month in her house in Eugene, I'd say she's well on her way.

Zak, a 40ish man reading the paper when we came in, struck up a conversation with me about being on the road.  He'd worked for the BLM and the National Forest Service, and talked about traveling from February to October.  Each subsequent year on the job, his sleeping set-up became more sophisticated.  By the end he had a cool trailer with bunk and propane stove, which he pulled behind his truck and right into the campsite each night.  Now he's staying in Eugene as a consultant for waterways and invasive species management.  He says that Eugene is the kind of spot that bands look at as a fuel stop on the way to Portland or San Fran (depending on their directionality).  I wonder though what the local music scene is with the vibrant college community, and if maybe Zak was just a little wistful for his days on the road.  That sparkle in his eyes talking of forest restoration in the Pac NW, and following the snow line up, down, and all over the Cascades tells me my assumption is a solid one.

Sam Bond's is a pretty awesome hang-out.  There's a huge stylized tin longhorn chained up over the stage, and a mini barnyard door at the back to load and unload the equipment.  All the benches and tables are of rough-hewn logs and the beers (all local OR micro-brew) are served in mason jars.  Holla Eugene.  The sound was a little cooky last night, especially when Olin took the stage.  That definitely didn't deter their number one fan, a drunken graying gentleman who got a crew to move tables and dance for the last few songs of the set.

I thought after such a chill night at Sam Bond's that the evening would progress likewise, but Ryan got a fire in his eye, and Devon wanted to make a good night of his first with the band, and Geoff really likes Burlesque, and Noble is always down when he's got on his mohawk knit winter hat.  We ended up at 2 am outside of John Henry's after a very loud, obnoxious burlesque show where Iron Maiden featured prominently (some of the worst Burlesque I've ever seen, actually).  The scene at the house was likewise rowdy.  Dezi is a very accommodating hostess (thanks Dezi!).  She was happy to keep her sharp grey boots and red-hot lipstick on for dance parties in her kitchen.  She's also happy to supply the band with a sailor's hat, a jar of corn whiskey, and some colanders when the shirts come off.  Ryan, Noble, and Geoff just love to take those shirts off and rub all up on one another, and anyone else consensual enough to join in.  Devon is more happy to supply DJ capacities if Noble will relinquish the ipod for a moment.  And Thor is happy to also step it with his old band mates til 4, even as though his straight-edge ways means that his fuel is far different than the rest of the crowds...

We all crashed on the floor of Dezi's loft.  The last night's conversation turned to lady friends and music - as all conversations these days tend.  After Devon confessed how hard it was to break up with the three girls he'd been seeing for the one he really likes, Ryan turned to me to whisper from the folds of his sleeping back.  That's why we love Devon so much - he's such a lover.  He loves em all and when he loves your songs, he plays them so, so well...

Yeah, there's that, and there's also Devon's sage advice.  Don't use names!  Then you won't mix them up!  Each girl gets a unique nickname, especially the one's you care about.  But given names.  Only to be uttered to the favorites...

Aura was freshest of us all this morning as we stretched out the kinks from floor sleeping.  She was smart enough to hear the homecoming from bars last night and stick the earplugs in.  I might just have to get a pair of my own, though thus far the excitement is enough to keep me up...  If you can't beat em, join em.

Sunday, March 6, 2011

The Tally!

$32 sold at the Sunset

$25 sold at the Woods

1 Beer bought for yours truly

11 dollars bills spent in support of Portland's finest dancers.... 

Put a Bird on it and Call it Art

We set out to Portland from Seattle at 4pm yesterday, after my forgetting a few really important items, stopping to buy a skateboard for Ryan from a yard sale, and taking I-5 for three exits north before banging a slow and steady U-turn through cobbled streets to merge back onto I-5 heading SOUTH.  Seattle gave us a glorious send-off - both the Sunset Tavern show in Ballard the night before, and the sunset the following day as we made our way out of the city.  Sun-kissed all the way baby.

Last's night adventure was at the Woods venue in SE Portland.  The place was once a funeral home, and much of the decor has been eerily preserved - the tall transistor radio in the back lounge, the peddle keyboard in the bathroom, even the lift where we stashed the instruments before the show (once used for dead bodies and coffins).  I crawled in to stash an amp and the door started swinging shut on me, the last sliver of light slowly shrinking...  Baby Thor, former bass player for the Horde, and talented member at large for Olin and the Moon, rescued me just in time.  Thanks Thor!  I don't want my promising merch career to end so prematurely.

I couldn't help thinking about the new Portlandia series as we made comfortable in our music home for the evening.  Oh man.  Portland is so tongue in cheek and very much conscious of its hipster image.  Birdcages were everywhere in the venue last night, replete with origami birds and dollar bills (tip jar = bird cage here).  The bartender assures me they were birded up far before the show's release and that just makes me all the more pleased with their presence.  That and the fact that as much as Portlanders try to criticize the show, they can't help but identify just the teensiest bit.

O Horizon, Portland-based band, kicked things off.  As Monica, the front woman says, they've got a lot of strings in their group.  There's the stand-up bassist she's known since middle school, the tall percussionist (orange shaker, tambourine, tenor guitar?) lady she harmonizes so well with, Dan the guitar man from Wisconsin via Nashville and LA, and Monica herself.  She's got a nasal twangy voice, an ethereal sound that's getting pretty rounded out with the harmonies of the other three voices.  Check them out here: http://ohorizon.org/.   Their first EP is being recorded now, and I'd wager they'll get some serious attention in the next couple months.

The Horde was on second, and they sounded pretty great in the space.  Ryan's family and friends showed up and the crowd was definitely primed for dancing.  I got to try out my flip video skills and will post some video for you all soon.  David, Aura's boyfriend, got to play horns with the band - what a way to usher in his 30th year.  The Mama/Papa song written by Noble and performed for the SECOND time ever last night was especially memorable.  That and Children 2, written for Ryan's little guys back in Seattle's preschool.  They just all looked SO COOL up there too, like real rock stars or something.  The stage presence is pretty damn amazing, must say.

Olin and the Moon finished it all off.  It was the first time I really got to pay attention to their set.  The lead vocalist Dave sounds reminiscent of Bright Eyes, and the rest of his 5 male members back him up with a southern country rock style.  The Free Bird reference was more aptly applied to this set than most.  Their extreme excitement of escaping WA's rule for no beer on stage really made them quite gregarious.

And I got my first free beer of the trip!  Tyler from Anchorage Alaska struck up a conversation while they were playing and brought me back a PBR tallboy soon after.  Oh Tyler.  If only I were from Portland, and 7 years younger, and not in love with a cutie back in Seattle...

Mike, Ryan's buddy from college, was our host last evening.  He showed us some of Portland's finest establishments after the show, including one delightful steakhouse with the choicest meats, before ushering us all to bed under his roof.  His cat John MEOWkovich woke me up this morning, and Mike plied me further from his couch with offerings of his very own spuds and winter-marinated sweet kale grown on his 1/4 acre urban farm (plus eggs, toast, and oatmeal - whoa!).  Thanks, Mike!  Your 90s hits, your yummy food, your warm and welcoming smile, and your game of hoops and skateboarding expeditions were much appreciated today...

Now onto Eugene!

Friday, March 4, 2011

This is It!

This is it!  Tonight's the night.  My first gig as Merch Girl starts in about 2.5 hours.  The Horde and the Harem commence their West Coast tour this evening, with a kick-off event at the Sunset Tavern in Ballard, Seattle's most NW neighborhood (beat that, Fremont!).  Come on out, you Seattle homies!  You'll get to see the Gold Rush music video premiered, you'll get to hear the new tunes the Horde has been crafting, you'll get to see me (Merch Girl) "womaning" the merch table with all the aplomb and grace of a seasoned groupie.  

I'm sure you all are wondering how I landed such an amazing gig - how I got to go with one of Seattle's awesome bands down the West (best) coast, to cut across to Austin, TX for a two week music tour.   There's time enough for telling all the history behind my good fortune.  Right now, I've got to pack and fuel up for the journey.  Stay tuned.