parted ways with sam and the rest of iron and wine crew in nashville last nite, played at a beautiful venue home of the grand old oprey the ryman, a fabulous room with faded wooden pews and stained glass, quite an honor to play these shows with sam for a time, his voice was a refreshing breath every nite and some of the most even keel folks we've ever toured with, hotel in little rock, watching nightrider and a-team,

the new furr video is near completion, making me happy and strangely wistfull, that yellowed ochre sheen of home super eight videos watched in the living room without sound on a projector, the warped screen a crystal blue like still water, my father manipulating the black syrup colored reels in the dark and snow,

today, joe walsh, talking heads, legend of zelda, pulled over by a southern cop in west tennessee, remembering a praying mantis bit a chunk from my hand while working at a saw mill outside of eugene the incident a turning point for me succeeded in slowing my mind in a pointalist sense, like waking or seeing for the first time, explaining the meaning of lady on the water to daniel in Birmingham, a favorite derelict town with empty streets and stark brickwork. 

earley

   at this point starting to feel the road like a spindly witch's tit poking at the innards of my head, too tired to catch up anymore or care or otherwise, the east coast is fabulous but with all the shades of grey will suck your brain dry, Conan the other day felt absurd and funny, like climbing a limbless tree in a downpour, that man is huge, I felt like the dirt dwelling mullatto that i am in his massive shadow, heading south finally, and back into the sparse sprawling lands of truckstop diner and dusty hollow reedthin days on the road for hours.

     baltimore surprisingly good to us this trip, a dark city with steaming gutters and brick stretching endlessly upward, hopefully we'll be in another dream sequence by evening, somewhere in virginia walking thru the future and the branches clunking about our heads, missing oregon terribly, and the desert, be there soon.

     hotels like beehives here in the east, clunky elevators drinking whiskey and wine in the lobby, revealing the underside of ourselves to strangers and loose women, wearing no hats, missing my boots and making up games of chance in my head like counting stairs.  listening to aphrodites child, sixties extravaganza and winter.

earley

     tonite in Iowa city midwestern repose, a gaggle of crowded kids and hard rock nite.  playing James Gang cover with Jicks for encore, janet wearing her doggy ears and furry pants trembling under the fan hair swinging like a child playing hopscotch.

     halloween kids dressed as sluts pirates clockwork orange fish dangermouse robot for obama wolves and various star wars wardrobe, in Fargo we saw our friend Buffy and her shaved cats, ridiculous creatures with flat faces and clawless, tonite the fake cobweb stretched across the stage made for a decidedly metal mis en scene, Deathclok or spinal tap, white carcinogenic fluff stuck in my hair

     daytrotter session this afternoon went sly, and crooked recording with Jicks and some of furr live using old crusty instruments and piano forte, grim handling of a villanous group of songs undecidedly about death love and God.  a wacky new york interviewer quoted by me as saying something like 'what the hell's with that god and suicide song?'  what the hell is with that damn song?  quintessential american interviewers are dismayed by lyrical obesity and metaphors like birds exploding from a spruce in sunshine.  classic narrative like us a ship of fools in a white Sprinter now with our sound engineer, Moses, the leader of the children of israel, a mexican like ourselves, indian with headress and tattoos, knives and telling nose.  very thankfull indeed to god and the press and our parents dead or alive, and to those who seem intent on loving us even when we refuse to play sci-fi kid.

     Midlake.  again, like passing lights in the night, the skipping yellow lines trundling past as the world whips by.  Black Sabbath. another new day traveling and ozzy like a silvery pouch of Capri sun, or sunny d, drunk on guitar and death, shit.

e.earley