If you know anyone in a band who says touring is fun, well they just haven't been doing it for very long. Touring is not fun. Sure, it has it's fun and memorable moments, but touring is the hardest "job" I've ever had. If you want to put a major rift between you and your best friends, go on tour together. If you want have trust issues with your loved ones at home, do a tour with your band. If you want to struggle every day and not know if you'll have enough money to eat that day or have enough gas to get you to the next city, then just hit the road with a band.

I've worked every back-breaking and spirit-shaking job you can imagine. I started working when i was 13, filing in my Mom's pharmacy. From there i've worked in restaurants, bars, construction sites, and even the 9-5 bullshit... and none of those jobs breaks your spirit like touring does. The long hours driving in a van with no rear windows, heat or air conditioning, the complete lack of sleep, the stresses of money issues and breaking down in the freezing cold mountains or blistering hot desert, the physical exertion of playing our hearts out every single night, the mental exhaustion of wearing your heart on your sleeve every single time you take the stage as you sing about the most personal things in your life.... the highs, the lows, the funny, the mundane. Singing original material on stage is like writing in a personal journal and getting up in front of large crowds with a microphone and reading your deepest darkest secrets to a room full of strangers. I could go on and on, but my point is that nothing is more physically and mentally exhausting than touring regularly every month.

A lot of people asked me why there was not a tour tales from our last tour, and the answer to that question is that it just wasn't fun. It was all work and no play. Powering through cities, playing every night, sometimes twice a night, contemplating our future every step of the way. It was a hard tour.

Prior to leaving for this month long tour of the 12 western US states, I was not looking forward to another tour. I wasn't very excited about the prospect of sitting in a van with no air conditioning on long drives through Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and Nevada, but more than that, i wasn't excited about being on the road trough those states, and 8 others, with my best friends. Questioning your relationship with your three closest and oldest friends really messes with your head. But this is the lifestyle we all chose, and it wasn't a choice we made as adults or even in our late teens. You can spend a day in an elementary school and know who the kids are who will turn out to be doctors and lawyers. You can tell which kids will become athletes, politicians, social rejects, social butterflies with mid income service jobs, and you can really tell which kids are going to follow their artistic dreams at any cost.

Chris, Pete, Matt, and myself, all made a decision early on that we were going to take what we could in terms of education from school, thriving on knowledge, but never intending on pursuing a career in a studious field. We knew what we were getting into a long time ago... our parents gave us all the same lectures about putting our heads in the books to obtain a steady career in the work force with a reliable income. But we didn't listen, we did our own thing, staying true to our hearts. The entertainment industry is different from most others in that there is no guideline. For example, you want to be a lawyer, you go to college, then on to law school, pass a test, and practice law.... same goes for being a doctor. Sure it's hard work, everything in life is "hard work", but it's very cut and dry... black and white... you take the steps, you achieve your goals. Simple. Not in music. No matter how hard you work, there's nothing that guarantees your financial security. You have to be content in knowing that you followed your dreams at any price and are doing what you love to do the most. The moment that ideal starts to fade, you've got serious problems. And that's precisely where we were when hit the road this tour.

So on July 3rd the four of us piled our sleeping bags and gear into the trailer, and closed the van door. The fact that there are no windows in our van brings in the darkness with the thud of the closing sliding door, trapping the heat inside... it's hell in a van. Our band has known each other our entire lives and we've said everything there is to say to each other, know everything there is to know. So after the first 20 minutes on the road, it's silent... just the wind and the roaring little 6 cylinder engine working harder than it should to tow a trailer loaded heavier than it should be. You're on edge every second and you feel like quitting the band because someone reclined their chair back a little too far for your liking.

Our first few shows on this month long tour were in northern California. Agoura Hills, just an hour north of LA, was our first stop. A lot of our So Cal friends and fans made it out to this show to say their farewells to us. It was a good way to kick off the tour because we had our friends there to ensure that we had a good time. We got back into the van with smiles on our faces and drove through the night into northern Cali. We arrived in Santa Cruz at 7:00 in the morning because we had a 10:00am show in the Santa Cruz 4th of July parade. We played for 3 hours that day, entertaining the early morning drunk patriotic locals. We had another show that same night in San Francisco so we couldn't stick around to celebrate the 4th. The only fireworks we saw this 4th was through the front windshield of the car in the far distance over the water. We unloaded the trailer for a third time in less than 24 hours for our 3rd show in less than 24 hours. The show in San Fran was a good one. San Fran is slowly but surely becoming better and better for us. It's a tough tour stop for us but we're dedicated to starting something cool up there. That next morning we headed back down to Santa Cruz to play an all ages show in a bowling alley. This tour has had more random show venues than any other. So far we had played a couple of bars and music venues, but we'd also played a parade and a bowling alley, and we had more odd stops to come along the way. After the Santa Cruz show we got into the van, exhausted from barely getting any sleep over the past 39 hours where we played 4 shows, and drove through the night into Portland Oregon.

I like Oregon. One great thing about touring is being able to see this amazing country. The scenery is stunning. Oregon is so green and lush with trees. Our gig there was at a Pizza joint called Rock N' Roll Pizza. The owners there love our band and gave us a great opportunity to play on the same night as a battle of the bands. We were set to play AFTER all the competing bands and BEFORE they announced the winner. The theory was that all the fans of the competing bands would still be around awaiting the judges decision and the room would be full for us. The plan worked to perfection and we had a good crowd to play for. After we explained to the audience that we were not a part of the competition and we were just there to entertain, everyone seemed to loosen up and just enjoy the show. It was a really great gig. The bands in the battle were a Hip-Hop Rap group, a Metal band, and a Screemo/Emo act. The hip hop group was straight gangsta'. That's not a stereotype either, these guys were Crips and proud of it... blue bandanas, sagging oversized jeans, the whole 9 yards... and there fans were even more "gangsta'". The Metal band was true to form... long haired head bangers who's fans were GIANT white males with shaved bald tattooed heads. The Screamo/Emo band was also exactly what you would expect from a band in that genre. Dyed black hair, cut unevenly and covering one eye, tight black pants, quiet and reluctant to smile or show any emotion (which is wonder to me why they call it "Emo" when the only emotion they show is the screaming and yelling going on by the lead singers on stage). Needless to say, this was not the best mix of people to be in the same room together. You could hear the racial slurs flying if you were close enough to the Crips to hear what they were saying about the Metal Heads. And if you stood near the Metal Heads long enough, you would over hear some of the most disgusting a derogatory terms that civilized society deems shockingly insulting for this century. The Emo camp just kept to themselves for the most part. But even with all that said, everyone from Emo to Metal Head to Gangster... EVERYONE in the room enjoyed our band and our performance, and we were complimented by fans from all of the other bands.

However, this night was FAR from over. They still had a winner to announce and there was an erie feeling in the room that this was a recipe for disaster. The crowd was worked up, drunk, and yelling for their favorite bands... which really had nothing to do with the music but more to do with what scene you were a part of. Two acts would move on to the next round and the judging was based primarily on the audience's cheers for their favorite band. The truth is that the Metal band had the loudest voters, the Emo band was the most musically talented, and the Hip-Hop group, well, they were the most scary. The judges, obviously influenced by intimidation and blue bandanas in back pockets, voted the Hip-Hop group on to the next round as well as the Emo kids. The Metal band got robbed. The contest was based on the audiences approval and the Metal band had the loudest fans BY FAR. Within seconds the first fight erupted inside the club. The venue was under-staffed and barely got control of the situation. They tried to empty out the club as fast as possible which essentially just moved the fight outside. It was mostly shouting and screaming back and forth at first but then a fan of the Crips, A PREGNANT GIRL, started swinging with one of the fans of the Metal band, and this giant Metal Head wasn't pulling any punches either... they were going at it! From there it became an all out riot... Gangsters vs Metal Heads, and an Emo kids somewhere in the mix getting a pounding from both. The pregnant girl who started it all got in her car and pulled into the battle field, or, the parking lot. She didn't need to pull in, she could have just left, but she didn't. She screeched her tires, put her hand on her horn, and drove straight into the center of the parking lot. Seven tattooed Metal Heads surrounded her car and started beating on it... kicking it, hitting it, spitting on it. Then the pregnant girl did something that scared me to my core.... she put her foot down on the accelerator and just drove... straight through the crowd with reckless abandonment. Both Gangsters and Metal Heads jumped out of her path of destruction, but some were not so lucky. She struck the security guard from the venue, flipping all 400 pounds of him into the air and on to the floor. A passing cop car happened to see it and tried to stop her, but she sped off. Later that night as we got onto the freeway we saw her car pulled over by 4 or 5 police officers. It was a crazy night.

We were hoping for a little less excitement in the state of Washington where we played 2 shows in Tacoma and Seattle. Tacoma was a new stop for us and we played a venue called Hell's Kitchen. So now we had played a bowling alley, a pizza join, and a kitchen.... and we still had a strip club on the itinerary! It was an all ages show and it went amazingly well. We sold more CDs and merch at this show than any show on tour ever. We'll be back to Tacoma and Hell's Kitchen again soon. Seattle was next and Studio Seven was playing host to us that night. It's a giant warehouse in an industrial area of the city with great sound. They fed us and paid us before we got on stage and we got to play with some other touring bands passing through Washington as well. Over all, Washington was a productive stop.

Driving out of Washington and on our way to Montana, the scenery is breathtaking. The mountains, trees, rivers, and sky are absolutely incredible to look at. We drove through the night and into the morning. Some time in the early morning while it was still dark we pulled off near a camping stop in the alpine forrest. Pete got out t throw away some trash. I watched him struggle with the trash can lid and I couldn't figure out what was happening. Each time he pushed his trash in, it would pop half way out. So he put some muscle into it and forced it all the way down. It stayed down for a few second and then, like an explosion, it was thrown back in his face and a creature jumped out of the trash can, brushed by Pete, and made a run for the forrest. It was just a raccoon but it sent Pete screaming and running back to the van in fear. If you're laughing right now, I want to see how you would react in the pitch black night in the middle of a forrest when a wild animal jumps out of a trash can at you..... ok, I guess it is kinda' funny.

We got to Missoula Montana early in the morning. We have some friends out there so we called them up and told them that we had arrived. They were wake-boarding up at "the lake". They asked if we wanted to join them and we agreed. We ended up not making it to the lake because we passed an overpass that was about 35 or 40 feet above the Blackfoot River, when Pete and I decided that we wanted to jump off of it and then relax at the little river cove right beneath the overpass. So we put on some shorts, walked discretely to the edge of the over pass, climbed over the barrier, counted to three, and jumped. We hit the cool water hard and swam over to the river bank fighting the slow current. The rest of the group met up with us and we spent the day laying in the sun and swimming in the river. It was perfect.... the sun, the cool and clean snow run-off water, the mountains surrounding us with pine trees filling every square inch of mountain... it was just amazing. We got to catch up on a little bit of sleep while we were there and after that we got ready for our show. The local bands in Montana are thrilled to have touring bands coming through their little towns because it keeps the music scene interesting and alive in a small town where there really aren't very many local bands or much of a music scene. The camaraderie between the musicians is awesome, so we drank and hung out all night. Besides enjoying performing in Montana, the state also has some of my favorite scenery in the world... only second to the California coast from San Francisco to Oregon.

From Montana we had a long two day drive into Colorado through Idaho, Wyoming, and Utah. We typically play a show in Utah to break up that drive, but this time we had to cancel our Utah tour stop in favor of getting to Colorado a day early for a show with our friends in the band "itis". And the venues just kept getting more and more interesting... This show was at a bikini contest hosted by the local rock radio station. It was BY FAR our best show in Colorado. We played for a big crowd who really enjoyed our band... not to mention playing for hot bikini contestants who really enjoy our band isn't so bad either....

Itis is an amazing band but they are even more amazing people. They are so accommodating to us and we've all become really close friends since we first started playing together over a year and a half ago. You'll see a lot of Itis and Warner Drive doing events together in the future.

So far the weather had been kind to us. The heat was bearable up to this point, but we had the hot-as-hell stretch of the tour staring us dead in the face. We were on our way to Texas now and I was dreading the humidity in Houston, our first of three shows in the state of Texas. What we didn't know was that it had been raining so hard and for so long in Oklahoma, Kansas, Texas, and Arkansas that the states were flooded! It was a scary drive.... sheets of rain pounding the car. I've never seen rain like that in my life. It was absolutely frightening! But one good thing about the rain........ no sun! It was still humid and sticky, but it wasn't insanely hot. And I'll take rain over a 117 degree day in the sun ANY time!!!!! The state of Texas is a new tour stop for us so we're starting from scratch there, but we're starting to make some fans in the cities that we visit. Austin is a music town filled with open minded people wanting to hear good music, and San Antonio was surprisingly fun. We walked "The River Walk" which is just beautiful, ate Mexican food on the river banks, then played a killer show at a place called "Jiggers". It was awesome! It was our best show in all of Texas. We can't wait to get back to Texas again on our next tour.

After Texas we were facing another 18 hour drive into Albuquerque, New Mexico. By this point I couldn't bare to be in the van for another moment... at least not right away. We hadn't had a break from driving or playing a show in so long, and the thought of being in that van for another 18 hours without any breaks in between was too much for me to bare. So as we were packing up the trailer after our show in San Antonio, the guys and I had a conversation that went something like this:

Jonny: "Fellas'... I'm not going with you. I'll meet you in Albuquerque."
Guys: "What the f*ck are you talking about man? Get in the f*ckin' van, we have a long drive ahead of us."
Jonny: "No... sorry guys, I can't ride in that van another second right now. It's driving me stir-crazy"
Guys: "Well what do you plan on doing then?"
Jonny: "I'll get a hotel, stay the night, and fly out in the afternoon."
Guys: "What if you don't make it to New Mexico in time for the show?"
Jonny: "Don't worry, I'll make it. I just can't be in that van for the next 18 hours."

Long story short, I got out the laptop, booked a flight for $110 on JetExpress (which I had never heard of, but who cares, it was cheap), went into my bag and took out one pair of underwear, one clean t-shirt, a toothbrush and my cell phone charger, and said goodbye to the guys. From there I got into a taxi on rout to the closest hotel. This was the best decision I had made all tour. I got to sleep in my own bed, had a bathroom all to myself, slept like a baby late into the afternoon the next day in an air conditioned room, had a quiet lunch on The River Walk that day, then went to the airport for my flight. The only draw back was that when i got to the terminal where I waited to board my plane, I noticed that the plane was TINY!!!! I have a fear of flying as it is, but the sight of this small plane scared the crap out of me. I tried to change my flight to a bigger, more well-known, commercial airline, but it was too late. If I wanted to get to New Mexico in time for our show that night, I had to get on this flight. So i reluctantly boarded the plane, kissed the doorway of the small flyer on the way in for luck, shook the pilot's hand, buckled up, ordered three Bloody Marys, and sat through the short two hour flight with white knuckles. Aside from some turbulence, I got to Albuquerque safe and sound... but I couldn't say the same for the guys....

Apparently, somewhere in the dessert on rout to New Mexico the van started to show signs of trouble. It was slipping in and out of gear for the entire ride in. As they pulled in to Albuquerque the van stalled out altogether. The gig wasn't very far from where the van stalled so we were confident that we could get to our show. A friend of ours named "The Civ" from a band called "The Ground Beneath" picked me up from the airport, and me and the band met up at his place to shower up and change for the show. I guess all the van needed was a rest after a long haul because it started up just fine and got us to our gig. We've made some good friends in New Mexico and the show went really really well. We even had a surprise appearance from our friends Austin and Jaena from back home. We all got an early night because we had to get the van to a transmission specialist in the morning before hitting the road for Arizona and our show there that very next night.

So after a transmission fluid fill-up, a quick look over the engine, and a topping-off of our gas, we hit the highway bound for Arizona. We were on pins and needles the whole way because we were sure that the van would break down at any second. But as we gingerly drove on the freeway at 40 miles per hour with big-rigs honking at us as the passed by at almost double our speed, our van, little "white lightning", said: "I think I can, I think I can, I think I can" the whole way up into Flagstaff Arizona and on into Phoenix. A seven hour drive took almost 12 hours, but who cares, we made it safe and sound!

Arizona can be hit or miss... there are two venues that we seem to frequent and those 2 places get better and better for us. This last show in AZ at The Martini Ranch was great! We played first, which usually sucks for a touring band, but we were opening for some local home-town heros and they had a good turn out, so we got to play for a lot of their fans. Everything went smoothly until we got our gear of stage and outside behind the venue getting ready to reload the trailer and head home.... can you say "monsoon"?

I've never witnessed a monsoon in nature. I watch a lot of Discovery Channel and National Geographic so I've seen lots of "Planet Earth" and "Killer Weather" documentaries, but I had never been right smack-dab in the middle of one. The wind, the rain, the sand, the dust, and the lightning, in over 100 degree weather, are intense! It's everywhere and all at once. Our gear got thrashed! It's all STILL brown from the wind and rain beating the sticky dust and sand against it from that one night in Arizona. And just then, as quickly as the monsoon hit us, it was gone. We packed the trailer and hopped back in the van, headed back home to California.

There's nothing quite like that final few hours on the van ride home. All of the concerns and stress we dealt with as the tour kicked off are now gone. We've made it through, safe and sound, and still a band. Nobody quits, nobody turns on their band mates, and nobody got hurt.

So allow me to refer back to my opening of this Tour Tales... Touring IS fun! If you want to create an unbreakable bond between you and your best friends, go on tour together. If you want learn the meaning of love and missing your loved ones at home, do a tour with your band. If you want to struggle every day, pay your dues, and not know if you'll have enough money to eat that day or have enough gas to get you to the next city because you've put your blood sweat and tears into something that you believe in, then just hit the road with a band.

Yes, I said it.... regular touring is mentally and physically exhausting, and the most spirit-breaking job out there... but it's also the most rewarding. And as you drive in to California, heading West on the 10 Freeway, and you see that first highway sign that says 200 miles to Los Angeles, you forget about the lows and you concentrate on the highs. Spirits are lifted, friendships have been solidified, and fans have been rocked. You're reminded in an instant why you do what you do, why you love it so much, why you sacrifice so much for it, and why you love it.

Our band Warner Drive and the guys in it are my entire life. We're a band of brothers intent on the same goals. We perform the music from our hearts, stay true to ourselves without getting caught up in image and scenes, and play the music that we love to play for the people who love to be a part of it. We've met some amazing people along the way, have the most loyal fans in the world, and have touched the hearts of so many.

Warner Drive is here to stay because it's in our hearts... and the more we grow and the more people who tell us that Warner Drive is in their hearts as well, the more driven we are. It's good to have you all along for the ride. Now hold on tight, it's gonna be a wild one!

-Jonny
Warner Drive