So we're all sitting at home in Berkeley for a day, and I hopped on the ol' myspace to keep you posted of our goings on.
SAN DIEGO:
We had the pleasure of playing LeStats, where the tea is scalding and the couches are comfortable, with
Eben Brooks, which made us all wonder if we had stepped into a Christopher Guest movie. Tyler had been bragging about to fall asleep drunk, but he really impressed us all when he passed out bent over a kitchen counter next to a Sparks. We also enjoyed the local cuisine of Juanita's, in our finely tuned opinions the best burrito anywhere in the world.
LOS ANGELES:
Ah, LA. When I'm in Berkeley and someone asks where I'm from I say "LA" because it beats explaining that I live an hour outside of the city in a tract house known only for Kevin Cooper's murder and the town next door that was discussed in "The OC." So our stay in LA required lots of driving back and forth from the lovely suburbs; this gave me the chance to display what Jason has called "freestyle driving," which is a nice way of saying I drive like Stevie Wonder after a few drinks.
We did get a chance to do some serious exploring in our love away from music, tacos. Using this excellent
taco blog as our guide, we traversed East LA and sampled some of the finest tacos ever known. Due to a fear of germs and death and plague, I avoided taco trucks and stands. Word from the rest of the band, however, is that the generator-powered cart on the corner of Indiana and 5th takes the prize. Maybe one day I'll man up and get back to that cart.
Oh yeah, we played some shows in LA, too. Our Knitting Factory show was all sorts of awesome. Openers Aanchors Aaweigh proved that drunker is better as they avoided tuned instruments and relied instead on endless badassery that included a cover of "You Make Me Feel like a Natural Woman." We had the pleasure of meeting Mike Watt, who was playing next door, and
The Blood Arm. They even brought along
Art Brut singer Eddie Argos. Art Brut? At our show? Twas a victorious evening indeed. The victory was limited by the fact that we had to load in all our gear from a parking garage into an elevator, up two stories, THEN into the venue. But, dude, whatever, Art Brut.
Our musical/culinary adventures continued the following day as we played a brief acoustic set for Indie 103.1 that will air on January 20th. While we were practicing outside we even made a dollar from a passerby, which is exactly one more dollar than we made on our last trip to Seattle. We played at The CIA, possibly the scariest fucking venue ever. It's decorated like a circus freak show, and you really have to check it out to understand. I made Jason escort me to the bathroom because I was afraid of a clown or a coke dealer leaping out of the walls at me. Our homie Austin and his band Dino Dance kept it real by setting us up with the show and put on a fine set themselves.
We finished up our LA eating adventures with Langers, home of the best pastrami sandwich in the country. We had a 400 year old adorable waitress and were offered fake IDS about 7 times between the car and the restaurant. But it's OK because the parking lot was situated between a mural of Selena and another of Edward James Olmos. I love LA.
We enjoyed hollering at high schoolers with our new favorite toy, my megaphone while we waited for Alex to finish up some JPL rocket science work leftover from his summer internship. Then it was up to Oxnard for a quick show at the Exerimental Cafe, and an intense drive back up North.
So here I am, back on my couch, showered, about to eat Cheeseboard, rooting for Obama, doing laundry, and catching up on "The Wire." Looking forward to getting started up again tomorrow in Chico.
To all the girls I've loved before,
Chris / Tempo No Tempo