These blogs were written on the road during Locust tours (Japan, Europe, US) and updated as events took place. They were originally posted on myspace, but i removed them and placed them here. Unfortunately communication/correspondence from comments did not survive the move.
The Locust Japan 03 / 08
Leaving the North American continent at noon on our eleven hour flight from LAX to Tokyo, Japan we chased a perpetual sun. That is to say, as our humble planet rotated, our movement in the sky counteracted the effects of the night and day song and dance crowning the sun as the victor. However, this counteracting effect was counteracted itself by the non-glorification of this wondrous non-normalness by means of window shutters remaining closed. There was the occasional split second glimpse of sunlight allowed by the few of those lucky enough to possess that power sitting at window seats, and who were curious enough to check on this cosmic reality. Apparently the hive-mind on the plane held their collective circadian rhythm higher on the priority-totem poll than the appreciation of this constant sunlight oddity. In any case we did not experience true night for fifty hours.
On a side note, American Airlines fucked up our "vegan" requested meals for the millionth time despite our three calls made ahead of time in anticipation of said fuck up.
Sixteen hours in the future smokers are to smoke inside a smoke box as opposed to outside.
Arriving in Japan, we reached this very futuristic landscape with wonderment, glee, and exhaustion. And indeed we are now quite literally sixteens hours in the future, compared to Pacific Standard Time.
Our first two shows were at a venue called O-Nest in Shibuya, Tokyo. Melt-Banana played the first one and shredded as usual! The surrounding area I have settled on describing as a Philip K. Dick-esk amalgamation combining Las Vegas, Tijuana, and New York City.
Recalling what I read in a book written by Alan Watts: Tao the Water Course Way, I am reminded of the jealousy I used to have for humans growing up speaking languages which do not use a non-intuitive system of consonants and vowels, but instead use ideograms and calligraphy, such as Japanese. Apparently F.M.R.I. scans showed that people who speak in Japanese or Mandarin use the right side of the brain when communicating, which is commonly known to be the "artistic" side of the mind. In direct Juxtaposition, when Latin derived languages such as English and Spanish are spoken, F.M.R.I. scans showed heavy activity in the left side of the brain, which is known to be the "logical" side. At this point in my life i do not have much room for jealousy of such things any more, life is simply too short. Plus the cultural differences may have been the catalyst that lead to the different systems of language, not the result.
Shibuya at night
During some down time I went in search of a nearby temple but found a couple of shrines instead. At one of these shrines an older woman sat at a sort of reception area and attempted to direct me to the temple i was in search of. For fifteen minutes I happily listened to this woman oozing kindness all over me. The experience, ill sort of embarrassingly report, filled the back of my neck with goose-bumps. It was unclear if she knew that I only know a handful of words in japanese, but she pressed on seemingly getting something out of the interaction as well. This was not the first goose-bump eliciting experience I have had thus far on this trip. On a bus ride from the airport into Shibuya the male driver would every so often make a kind, soft spoken announcement in Japanese over the semi over bassy P.A. system. These announcements only happened about seven times but I quickly became addicted to his soothing work-voice inflections. Later Joey said the guy sitting in front of him was looking at gay porn the whole ride. I wonder if he rode that bus for the sole purpose of listening to this man’s professional bus driver announcement voice while being turned on whole time.
We took a short domestic flight to our third show which was in Sapporo, on an island north of mainland Japan. Its kinda’ funny to me to think that there is a beer called Sapporo as well. I can’t help but think: what if there was a beer in America called "Chicago".
That day my volume pedal and Gabe’s kick pedal broke. Our set got cut short and by the next show in Kyoto we replaced and fixed the problems. Volume pedals cost twice as much as they do in the states, i quickly discovered.
Near Counter Action (the venue we played in Sapporo) were six or seven narrow shopping structures one after the other.
Street performers played in these shopping halls after hours and music-goers seemed to be ready for the event bringing materials to sit on.
Kyoto seems to have as many shrines and temples as the universe does galaxies! This morning I ventured out and went to the Heian Shrine which has an enormous garden covering thirty sqaure meters. Later on, since we had a day off, we all went on a family field trip, lead by Katoman, to the Sanjunsangen-do Temple which contains 1000 similar statues within, in addition to a giant Buddha and several other deities mostly borrowed from Hinduism. According to a display, all one thousand of these life sized statues burned down in the first year of their completion. They were subsequently rebuilt from scratch again by only three artists. Now thats some patience! We also visited the Kiyomizu Temple which had an elaborate ceremony today consisting of droney traditional horn tones and one of those long dragons requiring several people to move it about, granting it the gift of life. It is very interesting to me that Buddhism appears to have become more of a "religion" than a philosophy in contemporary Japan. This was first brought to my attention when taking an Eastern Philosophy class many moons ago. It seems that some of the original teachings by Mr. Buddha might be lost in tradition. After all it was around 2000 years ago when he walked around as a two legged creature on this planet. This is all particularly interesting since the book im reading right now is The God Delusion written by the cogent advocate of Atheism, Richard Dawkins.
Sanjunsangen-do Temple. Photo taken from this website: www.taleofgenji.org
The show we played in Kyoto was, for lack of a better term at this moment, awesome. It reminded me why i like live shows! Melt Banana played this show as well and were somehow even better then they were at the show in Tokyo. The second band that played the show were amazing, incorporating weird samples, split second changes with a creepy tinge of strange holding it all together called Dr C N, i think. Their name is written in Japanese, so i hope i got it right.
The show in ....Osaka.... was super rad as well. A band called Vampillia played which consisted of ten band members including an orchestra qualified violinist, a super attractive petite male cross dresser playing guitar and doing operatic vocals, a madman dreadlocked front man, and a man in a suit underneath a traditional Japanese robe using a huge knife on a cutting board as if it were a violin sometimes in time with the music but not intended to nor making any audible sound. I guess there is an ex member of Bordems in the band. Another rad, band i think named the Sun, played and reminded me of inventive bands on Gravity Records in the early 90’s.
Monika myself and Tetsunori (left to right).
On a side note, American Airlines fucked up our "vegan" requested meals for the millionth time despite our three calls made ahead of time in anticipation of said fuck up.
Sixteen hours in the future smokers are to smoke inside a smoke box as opposed to outside.
Arriving in Japan, we reached this very futuristic landscape with wonderment, glee, and exhaustion. And indeed we are now quite literally sixteens hours in the future, compared to Pacific Standard Time.
Our first two shows were at a venue called O-Nest in Shibuya, Tokyo. Melt-Banana played the first one and shredded as usual! The surrounding area I have settled on describing as a Philip K. Dick-esk amalgamation combining Las Vegas, Tijuana, and New York City.
Recalling what I read in a book written by Alan Watts: Tao the Water Course Way, I am reminded of the jealousy I used to have for humans growing up speaking languages which do not use a non-intuitive system of consonants and vowels, but instead use ideograms and calligraphy, such as Japanese. Apparently F.M.R.I. scans showed that people who speak in Japanese or Mandarin use the right side of the brain when communicating, which is commonly known to be the "artistic" side of the mind. In direct Juxtaposition, when Latin derived languages such as English and Spanish are spoken, F.M.R.I. scans showed heavy activity in the left side of the brain, which is known to be the "logical" side. At this point in my life i do not have much room for jealousy of such things any more, life is simply too short. Plus the cultural differences may have been the catalyst that lead to the different systems of language, not the result.
Shibuya at night
During some down time I went in search of a nearby temple but found a couple of shrines instead. At one of these shrines an older woman sat at a sort of reception area and attempted to direct me to the temple i was in search of. For fifteen minutes I happily listened to this woman oozing kindness all over me. The experience, ill sort of embarrassingly report, filled the back of my neck with goose-bumps. It was unclear if she knew that I only know a handful of words in japanese, but she pressed on seemingly getting something out of the interaction as well. This was not the first goose-bump eliciting experience I have had thus far on this trip. On a bus ride from the airport into Shibuya the male driver would every so often make a kind, soft spoken announcement in Japanese over the semi over bassy P.A. system. These announcements only happened about seven times but I quickly became addicted to his soothing work-voice inflections. Later Joey said the guy sitting in front of him was looking at gay porn the whole ride. I wonder if he rode that bus for the sole purpose of listening to this man’s professional bus driver announcement voice while being turned on whole time.
We took a short domestic flight to our third show which was in Sapporo, on an island north of mainland Japan. Its kinda’ funny to me to think that there is a beer called Sapporo as well. I can’t help but think: what if there was a beer in America called "Chicago".
That day my volume pedal and Gabe’s kick pedal broke. Our set got cut short and by the next show in Kyoto we replaced and fixed the problems. Volume pedals cost twice as much as they do in the states, i quickly discovered.
Near Counter Action (the venue we played in Sapporo) were six or seven narrow shopping structures one after the other.
Street performers played in these shopping halls after hours and music-goers seemed to be ready for the event bringing materials to sit on.
Kyoto seems to have as many shrines and temples as the universe does galaxies! This morning I ventured out and went to the Heian Shrine which has an enormous garden covering thirty sqaure meters. Later on, since we had a day off, we all went on a family field trip, lead by Katoman, to the Sanjunsangen-do Temple which contains 1000 similar statues within, in addition to a giant Buddha and several other deities mostly borrowed from Hinduism. According to a display, all one thousand of these life sized statues burned down in the first year of their completion. They were subsequently rebuilt from scratch again by only three artists. Now thats some patience! We also visited the Kiyomizu Temple which had an elaborate ceremony today consisting of droney traditional horn tones and one of those long dragons requiring several people to move it about, granting it the gift of life. It is very interesting to me that Buddhism appears to have become more of a "religion" than a philosophy in contemporary Japan. This was first brought to my attention when taking an Eastern Philosophy class many moons ago. It seems that some of the original teachings by Mr. Buddha might be lost in tradition. After all it was around 2000 years ago when he walked around as a two legged creature on this planet. This is all particularly interesting since the book im reading right now is The God Delusion written by the cogent advocate of Atheism, Richard Dawkins.
Sanjunsangen-do Temple. Photo taken from this website: www.taleofgenji.org
The show we played in Kyoto was, for lack of a better term at this moment, awesome. It reminded me why i like live shows! Melt Banana played this show as well and were somehow even better then they were at the show in Tokyo. The second band that played the show were amazing, incorporating weird samples, split second changes with a creepy tinge of strange holding it all together called Dr C N, i think. Their name is written in Japanese, so i hope i got it right.
The show in ....Osaka.... was super rad as well. A band called Vampillia played which consisted of ten band members including an orchestra qualified violinist, a super attractive petite male cross dresser playing guitar and doing operatic vocals, a madman dreadlocked front man, and a man in a suit underneath a traditional Japanese robe using a huge knife on a cutting board as if it were a violin sometimes in time with the music but not intended to nor making any audible sound. I guess there is an ex member of Bordems in the band. Another rad, band i think named the Sun, played and reminded me of inventive bands on Gravity Records in the early 90’s.
Vampillia in ....Osaka..... Photo by Robin Laananen.
After the show we went out to eat with some friends. I have a picture that i dont think i can post here on myspace. Its of a man who introduced himself as the Japanese Jimmy Page, right before his pubic hair was consensually set aflame at the dinner table. Many other shenanigans ensued including, but not limited to: a bottle in his anus, drinking tabasco sauce, and wasabi on the tip of his penis. Even though so many pictures were taken from several cameras, he was all to ready to redo some of his poses for those who did not get a good shot the first time around. For instance, he lit his pubic hair on fire three times for the sake of the shot! The waitresses at this restaurant tried their best to ignore this behavior and continued to serve us drinks, unbelievably. One of the great quotes from that night was from our new naked friend as he confidently professes, "I am Jimmy page," dropping the "Japanese" out of his title. He had surpassed world wide status at that point. Soon we were all using the lyric "Have a nice day" from the Bon Jovi song as a toasting term instead of "campai" which is "cheers" in Japanese. Another great little rendition evolved, thanks to Gabe I believe, using the Japanese word for excuse me (sumasan) and singing it to the tune of Have a Nice Day in a James Hetfield of Metallica vocal style like this: "suma-fucking-san!"
Confirming that Japanese Jimmy Page’s butt is in fact two separate cheeks using a pizza cutter.
This is Katoman, our fearless leader here in Japan. He has been our friend for years and set up all three of our Japanese tours, this being the third. He runs a label called Dotlinecircle. Photo by Robin Laananen.
In Tokyo we played with this band called Nisennenmondai. They are an all girl band and they are fucking awesome! Photo by Robin Laananen.
As Americans we stand out like sore thumbs. Photo by Robin Laananen.
Funny food. Photo by Robin Laananen.
Holy shit! Photo by Robin Laananen.
Kiyomizu Temple in Kyoto. Photo by Robin Laananen.
Sanjunsangen-do Temple also in Kyoto.
Beer and wine from vending machines in Kyoto.
Heian Shrine in Kyoto.
Osaka wall of ads
Ridiculous crab on wall. Perhaps its a recycled hamburger?
The show after ..Osaka.. was ....Nagoya...., which is the smallest city on this tour resulting in the smallest venue. As in ....America.... and European countries; the bigger the city the bigger the sub culture and hence the bigger the show. We played with a rad band called Nice View, whom weve played with on other Japanese tours several years ago. The drummer in that band (Talow) is so fun to be around and is one of the most inspiring weirdoes ive ever met. Similar to the two other times ive been in ....Japan...., him and i spent all night working on music together. This time we went to a rehearsal / recoding studio and like the two other times we had to mainly communicate through music itself as he doest speak much English and I speak next to no Japanese. Facial expressions explaining either a positive, negative, or neutral feeling towards a musical idea and hand gestures signifying tempos and repetitions were enough to fuel a night of jamming! Our musical project is called Kichigai Cuso, which directly translates as "crazy shit." The meaning of the phrase doesn’t actually translate so well in ....Japan.... so its more like "shit craziness." Unfortunately when I coined the name in 1999 I knew only a few words in Japanese, "crazy" and "shit," being two of them. I will however never deny the power which resides within the term "crazy." In fact one might say I hold the word in the highest regard as it is the first word I actively attempt to learn in any language. With it I have been able to seeming express excitement, empathy, gratitude, and pain with this single, mysteriously flexible word in a handful of languages using voice inflection to help contextualize.
This is Talow in one of his "Drum-Bot’s" which he uses for his one man band Talow the Tornado...
..
Today I saw one of the beginning sketches of Gabe and Joey’s furniture ideas! Holy shit, I cannot wait!
The last show was in ....Tokyo.... at a rad venue named Super Deluxe which sort of seemed like an art gallery. A cool band called Shobu, which our friend Monika is in, played. Most of us met her on this tour and she works as a translator. On our first night in ....Japan...., over drinks at a cool little bar that Katoman djs at sometimes called Beat Bar, she gave me a crash course on ordering food and drinks which ended up helping a lot! Thanks Monika. 2UP also played that show and were rad to see! Our good friend Tetsunori plays guitar in this two piece which has songs about such topics as mops, and asking where one can buy sweat pants! So fucking rad! Tetsunori and I have actually been working on a band through the internet called Thank You Forgetting Ideas. Its really, really weird stuff which I cannot even begin to describe yet as its unfinished.
2up is going to tour the east coast (....USA....) in early April 2008, catch em’ if you can!
Monika myself and Tetsunori (left to right).
Europe 2007
Day one, two , three. (8-16-07)
Finland
The phrase delariously disastrous comes to mind. This is after over 48 hours of no sleep, landing and playing immediately. Note that "delariously" is a combination of the words delirious, hilarious, and seriously. pondering its origin sparked a 15 minute internal etymological debate as to whether it was an accepted english word that existed previous to this usage. A later non hypnagogic state of mind revealed indeed this word has just been born, placenta still flopping on the floor.
On the 16 hour ferry ride from Helsinki, Finland to Sweden the live entertainment (dancers followed by a live band) filled the night club room with american cultural references spanning 60 years including disco, various stages of hollywood, and a monotone version of "im so excited". Overall though Finland seems to still be heavy in its metal years.
Stockholm (Sweden) should be great tomorrow.
Mike Hissong on the ferry to Sweden
leaving Berlin. recap. (8-26-07)
Sweden
Sweden was great as usual. Mike Hissong (our live sound engineer) and I squeezed out enough time to go to a music museum in Stockholm which has a theramin and a hammer dulcimer among dozens of other instruments they allow the public to fondle and play. They also have a whole room devoted to ABBA, the most successful swedish band ever perhaps!? We sorta wandered in and didnt find the place to pay until we were leaving. Although it wasnt our intention to play the "we are just clueless americans" card, i guess we sorta' did, because we walked out the door. whoops. Could I be that annoying american tourist that I have built up in my mind whom Im embarrassed of and despise?
Me playing a hammer dulcimer in a music museum located in Stockholm
In Malmo, Sweden we played a fest where Mayhem and Testament played and I got to bro down a bit with Alex Skolnik who joined Testament again after quitting and spending most of his time playing crazy jazz. I kinda always liked that story... he became bored with metal and had to resort to jazz. This guy was one of my main guitar idols as a pimply junior high and high school student and apparently he still writes for Guitar World sometimes but i was surprised that he hasnt spent much time exploring micro tonality. I slipped him a Locust CD and he caught our set. Their set was pretty flawless but the singer (Billy Chuck) plays air guitar on his mic stand in just about every song! I cannot help but feel embarrassed for him, I mean come on man you dont have to pretend, you are in the band for crying out loud! I feel that I have some sort of cultural energy invested in Testament. For one, their lyrics had an impact on me as they dealt with more existential and even environmental concepts at a time when their speed metal comrades of the day wrote heavily about death and killing, not that these are topics which cant be discussed through existentialist eyes as well. It was a time when Crossed Out and Drop Dead were splitting my interest in music between metal and the throng of outcasts comprising what is called 'hardcore'. euh. enough about that.
Norway
Olso, Norway was great. Its the biggest and only city we ever play in Norway. Our friends including Single Unit took us to the oldest Viking ships on the planet. The museum was a bit on the outskirts of the city but luckily we had a rare day off there. Nothing like the history of slave owning, rapist, traveling robbers to add some culture to a tour. They were after all the first europeans to the Americas, and although from the year 900 i swear these ships still had a nice old wood scent. You could almost smell the pillaging. Actually some of these facts are debatable, since the anthropologist and excavators seemed to have more questions than answers on their multi language plaques. For one thing they claimed that the ships were built by eye, but the precision reeks of mathematical glory.
Papa Bear A.K.A. Crazy J getting in touch with his Nordic heritage. He is the one who drives Eurobeast. He also runs Coalition Records with Marcel Palyama and plays guitar in Das Oath. His house in the Hauge, Holland is our usual home base.
Denmark
Free health care! But, Denmark did sort of loose its cool little long going social experiment in Copenhagen named Christiania where drugs were legal, and no police were aloud. This is in contrast to what Mike Hissong thinks and suggests that it still is easy to get drugs there. Another cultural staple lost due to some of the more conservative political parties new found power in the country was a long going squat also in Copenhagen. Despite the current political atmosphere the government aided venue 1000 Fryd in Alborg, where we played, still thrives complete with a cafe/bar, small movie theatre, band apartment and a protective glow from the locals. The promoter, Peter, left us with an open bar after he left at 3 in the morning. We had a couple more and called it a night.
Germany
One can always count on the severely paved subculture roads of Germany. The shows have been great thus far and the band we are doing these German dates with, Aux Raus, are a great two piece with live guitar and prerecorded Nord Lead synth parts with old 808 sounding drum beats in the back. I realize these ingredients dont sound impressive but a lot of these electro parts march into your subconscious and tickle your brutal electro buttons, so synchronistically familiar and pleasing. They are actually really popular in Holland and recently won a national award. I actually have made plans to stay and record some tracks with them in Amsterdam as im staying an extra week in Holland after the tour. My other plan was to go to the nearest country with free health care and do a human overhaul on my body. I guess ill just have to make due with self medicating in Amsterdam. It turns out Luuk's main thing seems to be making documentary films not Aux Raus. The small company that backs him also made one of my favorite documentaries ever which includes interviews with Rupert Sheldrake (my absolute favorite biologist), and Oliver Sacks among other greats. I just about lost my rice cakes when i figured this information out. This site that luuk does has some of the films Bastian and Luuk have made. Tropisms
Aux Raus doing it (Luuk on the left Bastian on the right)
For some reason people at the Glocksee in Hannover, Germany were not into our 'righteous show CD V2' which includes Hall and Oats, the Sanford and Son theme song, and Kokomo by the Beach Boys. I suppose they are used to DJ's standard crowd pleasing boring favs including typical crust punk jams. But we are there to provide entertainment! I suppose the CD is more for our entertainment though.
A couple of days ago a joke evolved into the form of Joey speaking in a parrot voice saying in a tardy rabbit from Alice in Wonderland sort of way "gotta get back in time, gotta get back in time" referring to the Huey Lewis and the news theme song for the classic Mikey J. Fox movie Back in Time.
leaving Leipzig, Germany (8-27-07)
The last time we played the venue Conne Island in Leipzig we had electrical problems and this time no different. The club's electricity reads at 104 volts instead of 110 as its supposed to. Our converters were not an issue, but our energy sucking Line 6 pedals started to behave like stubborn, mentally assaulted, schizophrenic children: Didnt work with plugged in power, didnt work with batteries rushed from a near by gas station, did work with batteries, didnt work at all, worked again without changing variables, etc. this went on for over an hour.
This venue is government granted and has been around for 16 years; when the wall came down people were very excited to start such a place in the former eastern Germany. Its run by a collective of about 50 volunteers with very few people actually on a pay roll at all. According to Ian, the promoter, decisions can sometimes take a long time to get approved by the collective at their weekly monday meetings. The reason being, they talk and explain and change things until there is unanimous agreement among these 50 people. Had there been a person or small group of people who didnt want the locust to play it might very well not have happened, although hours of rationalizing can actually change time and space, including peoples opinions.
After the show both Aux Raus and locust stayed at a band apartment complex near the venue. Aux Raus caught a ride in the back of our van where we usually store equipment which is closed off from the cab of the van and very dark. I lent them my flashlight and we communicated during the ride by singing ridiculous songs in unison. They were singing shitty dutch pop songs and we were responding with the newly composed acapella bro anthem by Gabe "you gotta help a Dawg out". Some light drinking ensued and i fell asleep with my contact lenses in.
in route to Stuttgart, Germany (8-28-07)
After the show last night in Marburg most of us went to a dingy little bar called Delirium which was really close to a 900 year old church. Aux Raus's driver/merch guy named Oscar spent his time there flirting (as usual). Joey at one point began banging a table in a cave man like fashion and Gabe offered to help bar back a bit by tossing used shot glasses out the window into a canyon. Luuk and I talked about the Netherlands television and how there are not that many channels so his documentary films have been viewed by quite a lot of people. He met Bastian (the singer of Aux Raus) at film school as was impressed with Bastian's film about his 17 year old friend who was going through dementia and who wore a Nirvana jacket that read something to the effect of 'I want to die'. Luuk got Bastian a job and soon after they started the band.
after the show in Stuttgart...
So the show went very well and we decided it would be a good idea to invite everyone who attended into the downstairs back stage area for a dance party DJed by Gabe and his fresh remixes of such greats as the Benny Hill theme song with double bass added. It took a little while before we got it filled but the disco balls and sound sensitive lights helped set the mood. Only slight dancing occurred and the club owners soon became unstoked as we were giving away free beer to people. We announced that these 40 or so people that took us up on our offer were our close personal friends but in the end we had to move the 'party' to the upstairs bar and commenced with the normal post show pleasantries. The whole idea came about as we were putting our uniforms on (half dressed) and dancing to g-mans double bass remixes before we played our set, mimicking the sped up chase scenes in Benny Hill.
Nuremberg (8-30-07)
The show was fun even though the stage at K4 isnt big enough to hold our equipment and us on stage. My poor amp was next to the stage on top of a few cases to bring it to the proper hight level, I promised my amp this wouldnt happen again.
In order to celebrate our last night with Aux Raus after the show we all went to an upscale karaoke bar and I attempted to sing 'Beat It' by Michael Jackson with Oscar. Complete with masturbation hand gestures for the chorus, they turned our mics down super low and the magic level went down for the second half of the song, plus we didnt really know the lyrics. Our next stop was a small dance club / bar in the red light district. We proceeded to liven up the dance floor with overly homo erotic style dancing which included Gabe and I tapping our Dutch buddies genitalia. I also incorporated some not so consensual intimate pelvic dancing with complete strangers. Even Jp got drunk last night.
Finland
The phrase delariously disastrous comes to mind. This is after over 48 hours of no sleep, landing and playing immediately. Note that "delariously" is a combination of the words delirious, hilarious, and seriously. pondering its origin sparked a 15 minute internal etymological debate as to whether it was an accepted english word that existed previous to this usage. A later non hypnagogic state of mind revealed indeed this word has just been born, placenta still flopping on the floor.
On the 16 hour ferry ride from Helsinki, Finland to Sweden the live entertainment (dancers followed by a live band) filled the night club room with american cultural references spanning 60 years including disco, various stages of hollywood, and a monotone version of "im so excited". Overall though Finland seems to still be heavy in its metal years.
Stockholm (Sweden) should be great tomorrow.
Mike Hissong on the ferry to Sweden
leaving Berlin. recap. (8-26-07)
Sweden
Sweden was great as usual. Mike Hissong (our live sound engineer) and I squeezed out enough time to go to a music museum in Stockholm which has a theramin and a hammer dulcimer among dozens of other instruments they allow the public to fondle and play. They also have a whole room devoted to ABBA, the most successful swedish band ever perhaps!? We sorta wandered in and didnt find the place to pay until we were leaving. Although it wasnt our intention to play the "we are just clueless americans" card, i guess we sorta' did, because we walked out the door. whoops. Could I be that annoying american tourist that I have built up in my mind whom Im embarrassed of and despise?
Me playing a hammer dulcimer in a music museum located in Stockholm
In Malmo, Sweden we played a fest where Mayhem and Testament played and I got to bro down a bit with Alex Skolnik who joined Testament again after quitting and spending most of his time playing crazy jazz. I kinda always liked that story... he became bored with metal and had to resort to jazz. This guy was one of my main guitar idols as a pimply junior high and high school student and apparently he still writes for Guitar World sometimes but i was surprised that he hasnt spent much time exploring micro tonality. I slipped him a Locust CD and he caught our set. Their set was pretty flawless but the singer (Billy Chuck) plays air guitar on his mic stand in just about every song! I cannot help but feel embarrassed for him, I mean come on man you dont have to pretend, you are in the band for crying out loud! I feel that I have some sort of cultural energy invested in Testament. For one, their lyrics had an impact on me as they dealt with more existential and even environmental concepts at a time when their speed metal comrades of the day wrote heavily about death and killing, not that these are topics which cant be discussed through existentialist eyes as well. It was a time when Crossed Out and Drop Dead were splitting my interest in music between metal and the throng of outcasts comprising what is called 'hardcore'. euh. enough about that.
Norway
Olso, Norway was great. Its the biggest and only city we ever play in Norway. Our friends including Single Unit took us to the oldest Viking ships on the planet. The museum was a bit on the outskirts of the city but luckily we had a rare day off there. Nothing like the history of slave owning, rapist, traveling robbers to add some culture to a tour. They were after all the first europeans to the Americas, and although from the year 900 i swear these ships still had a nice old wood scent. You could almost smell the pillaging. Actually some of these facts are debatable, since the anthropologist and excavators seemed to have more questions than answers on their multi language plaques. For one thing they claimed that the ships were built by eye, but the precision reeks of mathematical glory.
Papa Bear A.K.A. Crazy J getting in touch with his Nordic heritage. He is the one who drives Eurobeast. He also runs Coalition Records with Marcel Palyama and plays guitar in Das Oath. His house in the Hauge, Holland is our usual home base.
Denmark
Free health care! But, Denmark did sort of loose its cool little long going social experiment in Copenhagen named Christiania where drugs were legal, and no police were aloud. This is in contrast to what Mike Hissong thinks and suggests that it still is easy to get drugs there. Another cultural staple lost due to some of the more conservative political parties new found power in the country was a long going squat also in Copenhagen. Despite the current political atmosphere the government aided venue 1000 Fryd in Alborg, where we played, still thrives complete with a cafe/bar, small movie theatre, band apartment and a protective glow from the locals. The promoter, Peter, left us with an open bar after he left at 3 in the morning. We had a couple more and called it a night.
Germany
One can always count on the severely paved subculture roads of Germany. The shows have been great thus far and the band we are doing these German dates with, Aux Raus, are a great two piece with live guitar and prerecorded Nord Lead synth parts with old 808 sounding drum beats in the back. I realize these ingredients dont sound impressive but a lot of these electro parts march into your subconscious and tickle your brutal electro buttons, so synchronistically familiar and pleasing. They are actually really popular in Holland and recently won a national award. I actually have made plans to stay and record some tracks with them in Amsterdam as im staying an extra week in Holland after the tour. My other plan was to go to the nearest country with free health care and do a human overhaul on my body. I guess ill just have to make due with self medicating in Amsterdam. It turns out Luuk's main thing seems to be making documentary films not Aux Raus. The small company that backs him also made one of my favorite documentaries ever which includes interviews with Rupert Sheldrake (my absolute favorite biologist), and Oliver Sacks among other greats. I just about lost my rice cakes when i figured this information out. This site that luuk does has some of the films Bastian and Luuk have made. Tropisms
Aux Raus doing it (Luuk on the left Bastian on the right)
For some reason people at the Glocksee in Hannover, Germany were not into our 'righteous show CD V2' which includes Hall and Oats, the Sanford and Son theme song, and Kokomo by the Beach Boys. I suppose they are used to DJ's standard crowd pleasing boring favs including typical crust punk jams. But we are there to provide entertainment! I suppose the CD is more for our entertainment though.
A couple of days ago a joke evolved into the form of Joey speaking in a parrot voice saying in a tardy rabbit from Alice in Wonderland sort of way "gotta get back in time, gotta get back in time" referring to the Huey Lewis and the news theme song for the classic Mikey J. Fox movie Back in Time.
leaving Leipzig, Germany (8-27-07)
The last time we played the venue Conne Island in Leipzig we had electrical problems and this time no different. The club's electricity reads at 104 volts instead of 110 as its supposed to. Our converters were not an issue, but our energy sucking Line 6 pedals started to behave like stubborn, mentally assaulted, schizophrenic children: Didnt work with plugged in power, didnt work with batteries rushed from a near by gas station, did work with batteries, didnt work at all, worked again without changing variables, etc. this went on for over an hour.
This venue is government granted and has been around for 16 years; when the wall came down people were very excited to start such a place in the former eastern Germany. Its run by a collective of about 50 volunteers with very few people actually on a pay roll at all. According to Ian, the promoter, decisions can sometimes take a long time to get approved by the collective at their weekly monday meetings. The reason being, they talk and explain and change things until there is unanimous agreement among these 50 people. Had there been a person or small group of people who didnt want the locust to play it might very well not have happened, although hours of rationalizing can actually change time and space, including peoples opinions.
After the show both Aux Raus and locust stayed at a band apartment complex near the venue. Aux Raus caught a ride in the back of our van where we usually store equipment which is closed off from the cab of the van and very dark. I lent them my flashlight and we communicated during the ride by singing ridiculous songs in unison. They were singing shitty dutch pop songs and we were responding with the newly composed acapella bro anthem by Gabe "you gotta help a Dawg out". Some light drinking ensued and i fell asleep with my contact lenses in.
in route to Stuttgart, Germany (8-28-07)
After the show last night in Marburg most of us went to a dingy little bar called Delirium which was really close to a 900 year old church. Aux Raus's driver/merch guy named Oscar spent his time there flirting (as usual). Joey at one point began banging a table in a cave man like fashion and Gabe offered to help bar back a bit by tossing used shot glasses out the window into a canyon. Luuk and I talked about the Netherlands television and how there are not that many channels so his documentary films have been viewed by quite a lot of people. He met Bastian (the singer of Aux Raus) at film school as was impressed with Bastian's film about his 17 year old friend who was going through dementia and who wore a Nirvana jacket that read something to the effect of 'I want to die'. Luuk got Bastian a job and soon after they started the band.
after the show in Stuttgart...
So the show went very well and we decided it would be a good idea to invite everyone who attended into the downstairs back stage area for a dance party DJed by Gabe and his fresh remixes of such greats as the Benny Hill theme song with double bass added. It took a little while before we got it filled but the disco balls and sound sensitive lights helped set the mood. Only slight dancing occurred and the club owners soon became unstoked as we were giving away free beer to people. We announced that these 40 or so people that took us up on our offer were our close personal friends but in the end we had to move the 'party' to the upstairs bar and commenced with the normal post show pleasantries. The whole idea came about as we were putting our uniforms on (half dressed) and dancing to g-mans double bass remixes before we played our set, mimicking the sped up chase scenes in Benny Hill.
Nuremberg (8-30-07)
The show was fun even though the stage at K4 isnt big enough to hold our equipment and us on stage. My poor amp was next to the stage on top of a few cases to bring it to the proper hight level, I promised my amp this wouldnt happen again.
In order to celebrate our last night with Aux Raus after the show we all went to an upscale karaoke bar and I attempted to sing 'Beat It' by Michael Jackson with Oscar. Complete with masturbation hand gestures for the chorus, they turned our mics down super low and the magic level went down for the second half of the song, plus we didnt really know the lyrics. Our next stop was a small dance club / bar in the red light district. We proceeded to liven up the dance floor with overly homo erotic style dancing which included Gabe and I tapping our Dutch buddies genitalia. I also incorporated some not so consensual intimate pelvic dancing with complete strangers. Even Jp got drunk last night.
Italy
Milan, Italy (9-2-07)
What a heart breaking experience... we played right next to a go cart fun center type place last night in a Pinarrella di Cervia but in our free time we got lost trying to check in early to a hotel instead. Plus when we found it turns out that we were booked at a different hotel. After the show the venue turned into a disco, but instead of dance music the DJ played hardcore favs like Converge and the people danced. It was what i imagine you might see in some of these kids private bedrooms but instead it was on the dance floor. Interesting to witness.
Today we played last on the Myspace stage in Milan at a Hardcore/punk fest called Idroscalo Rock. NOFX headlined the other stage, and holy shit i wished i missed more of their set, but as we packed up our merch it was unavoidable. And i thought we were dorks...
So the next day was a day off in Milan, which was a Monday. We went to a large castle called 'Castello Sforzesco' which contained a museum with the 2nd best collection of ancient artifacts from Egypt within (closed Mondays). Then we went to a small church / museum where Da Vinci's Last Supper painting is, also closed on Mondays. We did manage to enter the second largest gothic cathedral in the world, The Duomo. I guess it took from the 15 hundreds to the 1900's to built this monstrosity. Gabe and Robin were wearing tank tops, so they were not allowed in. I guess Jesus will go casual t-shirt style but naps on the tanks. Its really creepy being inside the thing and thinking of how many people were killed in the name of this religion. Warms the heart. Sometimes i think it would be a good idea to convert all churches in the world into all age concert venues, leaving the religious aspects out. They could be tax free youth centers the way many countries allow for. The only problem is that the acoustics of churches usually suck. Huge echo chambers, perhaps good to record drums in. I suppose that was the whole point to keep the priests voices other worldly and forever resonating, would be horrible for a loud band and would just turn out to be a white wash. Maybe its not such a good idea after all.
Me at the Duomo
Inside the Duomo
Our tour manager, Robin, outside Castello Sforzesco. A.K.A. Tour Mommy
Switerland, Geneva (9-4-07)
Last time we crossed into Switzerland at a smaller border crossing we got fucked with by 20 something year old guards and had to pull out all of our merch and count it all in their presence. Bastard peers from an even more horrible parallel dimension. No problems at the border this time around. This show was with Vaz (US) and they fixed JP's bass as it broke towards the end of our set. The fluxless soldering job Mike and Joey did in Italy didn't hold and we found out that Vaz's soldering job didn't hold either the next night. Eventually he had to get a new pickup installed.
Austria, Vianna (9-5-07)
Even though i've been here a couple of times before its hard to shake my initial impression of this city which came from the movie Amadeus . Quoting Salieri"... and then i was in Vienna, city of musicians..." I watched that movie over and over and over when i was in my teens. Unfortunately we had no time to find Mozart's house. I really wanted to be able to say "I took a shit at Mozart's house", but alas my plans have once again been foiled by my eternal enemy and close personal friend, Time. Apparently he had a shit fetish. He liked to have people shit on him and he liked to return the favor as well. Mozart that is not Time, although i wouldnt put it past Time to pull some shit like that.
The venue, Fluc, is located below a ground level subway station, and the stage has a tapered stairway sort of design, with three tiers. Gabe was on the first tier while Joseph, Justin, and myself played on the one above him. It was difficult to hear some of the drum cues I depend on as the drum set was below me, but it was a strangely harmonious, triangularly symmetrical stage positioning otherwise.
Before we played Gabe played drums with Otto. Otto Von Schirach was on the first part of this tour from Aug 16th Stockholm thru Alborg, Switzerland. This cosmic freak has been mingling with our microbial infestations inside Euro beast (our rental van) since Italy on this stretch thus far. He is a one man freak show; uses his computer to seduce the crowd with his perverted remixes of Im too sexy and children's cartoon show themes such as the Snorks. He definitely has his screws twisted in pretty hard (in a good freak sauce type of way). We are vaguely connected with him through Patton as we both have releases on Ipecac, but we hadn't met before this tour. Gabe and Otto's set included evil gabberish remixes of the theme for Saved By the Bell and the 70's version of the Three's Company theme. Amazing! There was a guy whirlwinding his hair to Gabe's double bass addition to Charles in Charge! Not sure if all or any of these shows made it to Austria.
Trangularus Reversum
Gabe and Otto in the zone
These two Photos were taken by Robin Laananen (Tour Mommy).
Hungary, Budapest (9-6-07)
The architecture in this city is ridiculously pleasing. They have kept buildings up that were erected long before the United States was a wet dream. The attendees of the show included some rowdy characters, for instance a drunkish human dressed as a chicken that was dancing and rubbing Otto during his set. There was a back patio where some rappers were badly free styling to a few people. They seemed like they might be friends with Speak the hungarian rapper who can cheer up any sad human.
Austria, Linz (9-7-07)
We played a place called Kapu, which is pretty small with perhaps the smallest stage we've played on this tour. The room was packed which can create a close cosmic connection between band and audience in a sardine sort of way. Bands stay upstairs above the venue in a room full of beds where zillions of bands have stayed including Nirvana. On this night Mike Hissong decided he would shave his Tom Selleck style mustache, much to the disapproval of Joey and Gabe. This action marks the end of "summer of Selleck', and also triggered an unhappy, awakened Papa Bear as Mike's electric razor was just about the loudest one i've ever heard plus it was about 4 in the morning.
Joey taking a picture of Mike's mirrored reflection as he shaves his famous Selleck stache' in the kitchen while Gabe eats and looks on.
Austria, Hohemens (9-8-07)
Hohemens is located high in the mountains with clouds quaintly skimming the tops. We played a skate board company's fest called the Transmitter Festival, which was also a release party for their new video which froze on a frame of someone grinding when they tried to play it on a dvd projector.
I talked to an artist named Elzo who had his stuff on display. This freak runs a label called Plintub and makes rad zine art and poster art, including past posters for shows we've played. His english isn't that great so he communicated through sounds, Onomatopoeia from planet Zandar, because my french doesn't really exist (he's from Brussels, Belgium- where French, Dutch and German are the three main languages spoken there). We are going to try to have him do a new shirt design for us as he suggested he would like to so.
There were a lot of rowdy skaters some of which were jumping off walls and onto tables. I'm not sure if they were unsuccessfully trying to emulate kick flips or if they were purposely landing on their hips, nearly breaking these wooden picnic tables, and their bones. Last night some of the other guys in the Locust saw a drunk riot of sorts on CNN, which was two blocks away from my house in Pacific Beach, San Diego; the bro' area. It seems to me that some of these drunken archetypal party monster characters are universal and spread out across the world.
Hohemen's cloudmountians
Saarbrucken, Germany (9-9-07)
Show was great, the people at the venue we played called Garage were super cool, and some band members drank a good portion of a bottle of Jagermeister they gave us. I was on the internet again when we got to our sleeping accommodations. I heard of Gabe peeing and puking out of a window. I had a heart to heart with Mike Hissong which ended with him saying "thats great, i'm going to go puke". And he did.
Earlier this day i thought JP was being passive aggressive towards me when he refused my help with his amplifier and proceeded to lift it himself. Later when i ask him, it turned out he had other things going on and wasn't purposely directing anything towards me. It seems like most of the social problems i've ever had with humans can be traced back to miscommunication / misunderstandings, so i try to never let that happen anymore. Letting things fester is usually a bad idea. I've noticed that a lot of people seem to deal with their problems with specific humans by complaining to other people about it. Sometimes numerous amounts of people hear of the issue at hand but still the person they actually have the problem with is not contacted. I find this behavior confusing and counter productive.
Haarlem, Netherlands (the Fatherland 9-10-07)
We played a place called Patronaat, which has a very unique architectural design, which makes it interesting when walking through back halls. The set went well and many friends came out including Marcel (drummer for Das Oath), a very charming, suave character.
On our way to play. photo by Robin Laananen
Brussels, Belgium (9-11-07)
Having a head cold i slept as much as i could where ever i may have been at the time. This included during the show in the back stage area. The club, Recyclart, includes a gallery where 5 artists, including Elzo's art, are up but unfortunately the gallery was closed that day. Recyclart is a not for profit club which receives money from the government and they never make money off shows, but its on purpose! The promoter seems to almost speak of the situation in the past tense though, hinting that although its been like this for years this great arrangement with the government could end at anytime. Its actually located at a subway station, tracks running above the stage. The electrical current generated in the tracks is so strong that there was a pretty loud electrical hum in the monitor speakers on the stage. Since essentially we humans are electrical machines (synapses and brain activity are measured by electrical signals) it is interesting that live musicians at concert halls manipulate electrical current with instruments, amplify these sounds through speakers to in-turn vibrate the air creating 'music' for fellow humans to enjoy, hopefully generating some more electrical activity in the concert goers' collective mind(s). It's particularly interesting to have such a concert hall in a location where strong electric fields are already present. I wonder if this enhances the concert unknowingly. It's a cultural Mecca of electrical activity! Perhaps a blip that an alien might find though some sort of electric sense organ or machine. Perhaps the venue functions as a sort of unconscious religious temple paying homage to the great electromagnetic force-god and nobody is quite aware of it!
Paris, France (9-12-07)
So i loaded myself full of western medicine to deal with my cold, and while in the pharmacy i spoke in spanish to try to pass myself off as a spaniard. The head pharmacist was super helpful and happy to show off his spanish skills but towards the end of the interaction his demeanor changed as i referred to contact lens solution as 'eye juice', but in spanish. It seems this translated slang didn't translate so well and gave me away as some sort of impostor. Perhaps i was an American passing himself off as a spaniard! Whatever though, the public in France doesn't seem to despise americans, but don't expect english accommodations to come so readily. Learn a little french if you visit France!
On this night Otto had another partner in crime besides Gabe, a freak named DJ Urine who used circuit bent toys and laid down some vocals. This was our last show with Otto on this tour, so we said our sappy goodbyes in a haze.
DJ Urine putting New Erections through his innovative way of mixing a record on 4 record players at the same time (some must be playing backwards)
UK, Bristol (9-13-07)
We decided to take a Euro tunnel to the Uk instead of a ferry as it was cheaper. You drive into a train and it rushes you under the English Channel. The show was moved to a smaller venue called The Louisiana, which had a decibel meter hardwired to the front of house mixing board, and would automatically shut off the PA if the sound levels reached above a certain decibel level. During sound check the meter was on the verge of shutting off with just Gabe playing drums, which were not microphoned. The show was packed, sweaty, and quieter than normal. After the show our van battery was dead and we discovered we had no jumper cables. So we pushed it down a hill popped it into 2nd, and off to sleeping quarters we headed.
Me getting pumped by Morphic Resonance, Sheldrake's grand master theory right before the set. photo by Robin Laananen
UK, Leeds (9-15-07)
Finally got to do laundry! Got to say hello to a friend named James from the states whos in a tape noise band called Skaters.
UK, Brighton (9-16-07)
There are a couple of fellows, both named Paul who have had their own locust-esk uniforms designed and they have infiltrated a few shows including this one!
Robin taking a picture of JP with Da' Pauls
UK, London (9-17-07)
Get Hustle was playing at another venue and although we tried to twist the promoter of their show's arm we were unsuccessful in combining the shows. Jody who usually does our shows in London does a great fake american accent by the way. We played the underworld which is in Camden and the show was done in time to head over and catch most of Get Hustle's set. As it turned midnight i became the last in the band to enter his thirties.
The next morning, in order to commemorate this date marking the 30th rotation of earth around our humble sun with me on board Robin bought me the recent issue of the Astronomy based BBC magazine Sky at Night, as well as the newest copy of Beyond Magazine, which covers topics such as evidence for alien life. Beyond has an article about the San Diego based Heaven's Gate 'cult' that tried to cosmicly leave their human shells by means of collective suicide in order to catch a ride on a craft of some sort following the Hale-Bopp Comet. In the article the magazine asked an 'anti-cult activist' named Rick Ross the difference between a cult and a religion and he goes on to describe a cult as defined by a 'leader" which is "the focus of worship and power'. Also, according to Ross, a cult is to discourage "critical analysis in favor of dependance on a group'. This appears to me to be a slick criticism of Christianity. In any case the article goes on to put the Heavens Gate Cult in a sort of negative freak-o type of light. Although the article doesnt mention it, apperently there was an image taken of Hale-Bopp followed by strange bright lights the last time it whizzed by us. Were those strange orbs the Heavens Gate members' souls? i'll consider the possibility at least. That reminds me, last night i had a very intense realistic dream in which i and many other people witnessed an alien craft in the sky which ended up being 5 different bright oval shaped spots that collectively formed the points of a star shape. i was able to take several quick pictures with my camera. The rest of the dream included watching news casters reports of the event as well as being emotionally overwhelmed at the magnitude of what i had witnessed, yet maintaining a rational thought process.
A small article in Sky at Night brought up an interesting phenomena that the laws of physics allow for: a black hole can contain such a large amount of mass that it can trap photons (light) in orbit around it. So try to imagine a dark circle with a thin bright ring of light around it! craziness! If you could physically be there you could see the back of your own head!
Antonio Banderas in an ad for police sunglasses. "what an asshole"-Gabe Serbian
After checking in back a Burgerking employee tells JP that they cannot microwave a Bean Burger and suggests that it must be fried in the vat with all of the meat. An intrigued customer listens in on the virdict. UK Truck stops can be a little rough for vegetarians and vegans.
Crazy Jay pulling a 'Super Dick Maneuver' on the M-1 in route to Liverpool.
Definitions
Dick Maneuver- v. while driving on a freeway, when one drives in the exiting lane with the intention of re-entering the slow lane at the last second in order to minimize time spent in traffic.
Super Dick Maneuver- v. while driving on a freeway, when one drives on the shoulder in order to minimize time spent in traffic, while disregarding others.
UK, Liverpool (9-18-07)
Our first time playing Liverpool, so we pointed out Beatles historical landmarks to each other including such greats as 'Ringo puked on that corner', and 'George wrote that graffiti'. A great local band called a.P.A.t.T. played which is a sort of cross between Secret Chiefs Three, Gogo Bordello, and Mr Bungle, with a sort of semi electric gypsy vibe at times. Before our last song tonight the other locusts actually sung me a demented falsetto version of happy birthday while Robin brought up small wheat-free, vegan, cakes with candles in them. How silly.
Ireland, Dublin (9-19-07)
Out of the six European tours The locust has done this is the first time we have come to Ireland! Although the UK is between mainland Europe and Ireland, they use the Euro as currency not the pound as Ireland has successfully seceded.
We took the fastest ferry across the Irish Sea, ironically named the Jonathan Swift. Although it was fast the ride was pretty rocky; there were times when you looked out the window from the main room you would see all sky followed by all sea, and in the gift shop you could shop off the floor due to suicidal packaged goods that couldn't take life on the shelf any more.
We played a placed called Whelans with about 200 people in attendance. Yesterday's flyer for the show had a person being chased by their own cut off hands, but todays had a man with feet for hands about to catch a girl who also had feet for hands. What a strange dimension that would be, but one that a foot fetish enthusiast such as myself might not mind! The promoter, Paul, was a sweetheart and hung out till 4 in the morning with Gabe, Joey, and Mike at the bar. During our less than 24 hour stint in Dublin it rained in 15 minute spurts a handful of times, which is normal apparently. But according to the locals it has rained more than ever this year, which is something i have heard from several people in several main land European cities as well. Perhaps its Gaia's (earth as a living organism) defense against the slightly irritating, pesky, skin-living human fleas. More likely its the effect of increased CO2 levels, or perhaps both!
Everyone resting on the ferry to Ireland
Northern Ireland, Belfast (9-20-07)
So Northern Ireland is part of the UK and uses pounds of course, although for some reason people don't want to accept Irish pounds in England. As I understand it the reason why Ireland is split in two is the result of the civil war in the 1920's, although there has been a long history of bombing / revolt since then in terms of the IRA wanting the mostly Protestant Northern Ireland to become part of Ireland once again. Of course the IRA is known by most western media as a 'terrorist' organization, but they have recently agreed to a cease fire. Perhaps after a few generations go by Northern Ireland's status might change due to the situation that Mike Hissong describes; 'Irish Catholics reproduce quicker than Protestants'.
We got to the venue a little early and had time for our usual parameters of exploration: within 10 blocks of the venue and in one hour. Along the path of discovery we came across an antiquated architecturally stunning town hall building which has been converted into a mall, complete with a religious book store. ah, progress. Mike and i found the current city hall building which was completely overly ornate and we read about the different historical buildings of the city within, including an old clock tower which had the top part taken down temporarily to, among other small tasks, improve the gargoyles!
The show was extremely tight as we have been playing these songs for 6 weeks in a row now. One more show to go; i cant believe it has reached that point. What is interesting is that usually at this point in the tour my overall perspective of time is that its been a million years since the first shows and it feels as though time has been flying by. I love this manipulation of time!
traveling from Ireland to the Hague, Holland (9-21-07)-(9-22-07)
i began to experience an intense sharp cramp in my back over the course of these days, which turned out to be kidney stones; the universe's way of saying 'happy 30 rotations around the sun.' The pain abruptly became excruciating unbearable right before we boarded the 10 hour ship ride from the UK to Holland. as we pulled up to the check-in window Jp asked if there was a doctor on the ship and mentioned that one of our passengers was sick. Not only do they not have a doctor for the ship but they were not going to allow us/me to board as its too big a risk on their behalf, and they most likely wouldnt refund our fare which was pretty pricey. They had us park to the side and enter the office where i waited for what seemed to be the captain of the ship to come talk to me personally. Having to lie in order to convince this man that i was ok was one of the scariest things ive done in a while. Scary because i wasnt sure what was wrong with me and what i really wanted was to talk to a doctor to evaluate me, not convince someone that i was ok. After an unsure shaky approval by this man we walked back to the van. What followed on that ship, The Spirit of Rotterdam, was the most intense pain i have ever experienced in my life! I moaned and groaned in a restless agonizing personal hell for hours, while my band mates and friends observed helplessly. Seriously nothing has ever compared to that physical pain in my kidneys ever in my life. As soon as we got to Holland i went to the hospital, where the tell tale sign of kidney stones appeared; blood in my urine. Now im on pain killers and muscle relaxers to help let it pass through my urethra! the medicine was only 23 Euro for 10 days worth of 3 medications, about 28 bucks US. Luckily theres a cap on the price of medicine in Holland, plus the doctor gave me the go ahead on my own personal legal addition to the list of medications. Today i will be resting in a centralized, clean, discounted hotel room, trying to catch a rock out of my dick. Anyway my cold is finally gone.
this is like my dream i had a couple weeks ago, when i literally took a backwards flip into my subconscious. i was at a hospital, unconscious and drugged while people were operating on me. It was as if i were at the cellular level but still somewhat aware of the outside world of humans. i sensed internal blood squirt out of an organ, but the doctors were aware of it. Now that i think about it , the active side of my body in my dream was distinctly on the same side where my kidneys hurt (the left). When i woke up i felt as though i had a conversation with my body and it was somehow trying to warn me, so i wrote my dream down on a note pad. i wrote it off as just a dream that must symbolize something else. maybe aliens were altering me in a semi parallel dimension! ?
Well i decided to walk around as there was a city wide art festival going on here in the Hague called THX. Along a wide bike road was an instillation that consisted of huge speakers on either side of the road, spaced about 15 meters apart all they way down the street. And there were bright sets of flood lights at each speaker that would synch with super low rumbles and Doppler Effect-esk digital mimicry using strange echoey synth sounds. The sounds would built to an apex of super thundering, soothing, low rumbles. Later i read this was supposed to be by virtual airplanes landing bringing virtual artist from around the world. The explanation doesnt measure up to the diabolically, cosmic, imaginative interpretation of the unknown that people conjure up on their own. I wish San diego would do stuff like this. damn, the medication im on is strong!
Self portrait in the hospital
Crazy J with Gabe and Joey in front of one of three physically responsive light panels made by United Visual Artists, who made a recent Battles video
Tilburg, Holland (9-23-07)
The last show of this tour was a fest called ZXZW, jokingly named after the Austin Festival SXSW which is known as an industry style fest consisting of multiple venues though out the city hosting label 'shows cases' all at the same time. Holland's version does not have an industry feel at all. Some of the bands that played included Get Hustle, John Wiese, Negative Land, and Physic TV who i was able to catch and still be back in time to play myself. Genesis P-Orridge is creepy as ever as a woman, performing with breasts semi exposed. Most of their songs were actually kinda popy. That in itself is freaky! Although im still pretty medicated i was able to play as accurately as ever!
(9-24-07)
So now the tour is over and we are dealing with all of the end tour things like returning the rented equipment, van, etc. I had my visit with the urologist this morning and have set an appointment for an electro magnetic pulse type of therapy called a lithotripsy in a couple of days, which will be cancelled if i piss a stone before then. The procedure involves pin pointing the stone and forcing it to crumble via the electro magnetic force! Since i have no health insurance i will have to pay this on a credit card most likely. the total for all my hospital bills will be around 3000 US, so back into the hole for me. I assume that the same treatment in the states would cost more. Im kind of excited about the usage of the electro magnetic force. Humans have come this far in understanding nature, the point of displaying mastery over the electro magnetic force! Can you imagine it used for warfare in the form of sending dense thunder/lightning clouds over 'the enemy'. Sounds like something humans would do.
(9-26-07)
After a shot of a morphine like substance i proceeded with my plan of discussing my dream with the doctor who was manning the electo-magnetic canon. This was advice given to me from Maria Cochina, my loving girlfriend. The doctor actually listened very attentively to the details. I assured him i was not some crazy who thinks he is psychic and whatever other stigma i could think of off hand. The details of: a hospital, a procedure, and specifically the left side of my torso being in trouble were acurate. The part about an organ beginning to bleed and squirt during the procedure is what worried me and in a half nervous laugh after explaining my dream and reaching my point with the doctor, i asked him to 'please be careful' as i felt my dream was a warning. He made it appear that he took my premonition dream seriously. Although i have had very few first hand experiences that i can point to as being extra-ordinary, i believe that even what is know as 'supernatural phenoma', might simply be aspects of science we dont understand yet. i consider this dream an example of this. The problem is that one cannot reproduce these conditions in a labritory, therefore its nearly impossible to ethically test something like premonition of extreme physical pain/ailment. But i think many others have had such an experience. Now i shall await peeing ashes of an obliterated pearl my body so carefully created. im a human oyster!
the electro magnetic weapon
(9-29-07)
Recording with Aux Raus in Amsterdam has been great thus far. Creative juices are flowing from my medicated mind! Im really hoping that i can do some stuff on a song that Maria Daniela Y Su Sonido Lasser might be on. She too is on their mexican label!
Last night Get Hustle played and shreded! Marcel (Das Oath) got myself and Oscar whom im staying with into a big hip hop dance party at a place called the Milky Way. It was nice to be far out of my normal subcultural expeditions. The Djs were exceptional and i became fascinated with the collective worship of the 20 to 40 Hertz range (subs). I began to feel like somewhat of a savage taking pleasure in thick bass sounds rumbling my innards!
Luuk in their little studio. Today there was an 'art walk' inside the building where artists open their doors to strangers to come check out their work. We left the door closed as we were recording.
The view from Oscars window in Amsterdam, where im crashing right now. Im so jealous. He lives like 3 blocks away form the center of town. I want to live in Holland so bad!
The rest of my time in Holland involved more recording, a follow up at the hospital, and the manditory eerie walk through the red light district. Its hard for me not to think of individual prostitutes lives and life styles when cruzing down those streets. It must be insane for these people, and their loved ones. Once, a lot earlier in my life someone i was dating became an 'erotic masseuse' and i was fine with it. I was very idealistic about the situation and felt very in control of my emotions. Im not sure how i would handle the same situation today. although ill never be a 'john' i must admit i am intrigued by the profession and think its going to continue to exist whether it legal or not so it might as well be legal to protect those involved. as George Carlin puts it "selling is legal. fucking is legal. why isnt selling fucking legal?... giving someone an orgasm is hardly the worst thing in the world" The problem of course is that although mandatory std checks can screen for most stds, genital warts can be transmitted without symptoms and despite the use of a condom. perhaps its rare though. yikes nonetheless!
On the day before i left, Aux Raus and i went to a museum in Haarlem called Teylers Museum. It has over 1200 historically significant scientific instruments on display, including some electricity devices used by magicians to woe crowds and aristocratic gatherings in the late 1800's. The museum is the oldest in Holland and has mostly been keep unchanged since the late 1700's. The inclusion of Realist and Romantic period paintings in a mostly science museum i find fascinating, inspiring, and pleasantly pleasing. the correlation drawn between the fields (art and science) is a necessary element for human kind's advancement!
The Oval Room in Teylers Museum
Some random photos
People ride bikes in Holland
Old Erection Faces. In Belgium there are laws regarding the 'faces' of buildings of a certain age and older. Sometimes you can rebuilt the whole building but you must keep the facade up as it was. Similar laws exist in Holland and other european countries.
In Norway on our way back from a ski museum euro-beast counldn't handle the down shifting and horrible fumes spewed through the vent.
Within 6 hours of the last photo a tagger named 'fume' tagged euro-beast. Apparently Fume is an active member of the APV crew. Perhaps it stands for Arbitrarily Psychic Vandals.
In Milan, Itally there is a bull with a cup for a groin and if you spin in this cup, where his balls would be, you are said to have good luck.
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