November '05
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Old Shit
11/28/05
Oh my god.... Auckland. I'm not even gonna talk about the other shows. This crowd of 13,000 put to shame all other shows the Foos have ever played. Even the biggies like Leeds and Reading (70,000)... even Rock in Rio a few years ago (250,000). This NZ crowd was so loud it blew my mind. At one point, right in the middle of Monkey Wrench, a squeal made it through the noise of of the song and the crowd... Sean and I both turned our heads towards the source of what we thought was feedback. It was a teenage girl on someone's shoulders. Screaming so loud that we heard it 60 meters away amongst all the other audio chaos.... and Sean even had earplugs in and he heard it.
Off to Brisbane after that... I got completely harassed by Aussie customs agents. Detained for about an hour. They really wanted to find drugs on us crew guys. They completely took out every item of every bag that I had and searched them ridiculously. They even felt the seams of every article of clothing I have. Sometimes profiling just doesn't work... ya fuckin' stormtroopers.
Day off nothing special... walk around town a little.
Brisbane show the next day was OK... good crowd. Dave, on this night and every few shows is kind and acknowledges me as "the best guitar tech in the world"... "give bb a hand". Well... I am good at some things... usually having to do with the big picture. I'm very intuitive about the show and what Dave is gonna do and what he's gonna want ... and the rest of the guys for that matter. I have a solid working knowledge of just about everything going on out here in tour land. However, I am not the best guitar tech in the world... that title goes to Sean. He is so knowledgeable about all guitars and all deep technical aspects of maintenance, modification, and repair. Sean is king with that shit. Me, being a musician myself and mediocre performer... gives me an understanding of some things that non-musician techs just will never get. So, thanks Dave for the pat on the back but Sean can tech the shit out of me... I'm probably talking myself right out of a job. I'm good at being a roadie... I'm not sure if that's something to be proud of.
Flew to Adelaide early. Once again... just like the early on promo tour... we're playing gigs and finishing load out at like two am... getting to sleep at three'ish for a few hours sleep. Waking up at 4:30 or 5am to catch first flights to wherever. Hanging out at venues all day with no where comfortable to be... it makes long days excruciatingly longer.
Adelaide show was in a small theatre with an enthusiastic crowd. This gig was not on the map for us. Disappointed fans started a petition for the Foos to come play as if it was some kind of democracy. But the 6000 signatures got someone's attention. A gig was booked on a day off and the rest is history. I initially doubted the logic... 6000 annoyed fans because the band wasn't gonna play... now 4000 really pissed off fans because they couldn't get tickets to the small 2000 seat show. The show was great though... the guy that started the petition was recognized and given a resounding round of applause. I can only guess why it wasn't in a bigger venue... Maybe the bigger place was booked... but it's more likely that there are no 5 or 6 thousand seat venues. I was told that the arena in Adelaide was 13000 seats. It's better to sell out a 2000 seat venue then half sell a 13000 seat venue. But to be honest... I have no idea why we played at the Thebarton theatre. It's sure was a great show though. The set list was great as well. Pulling out old stuff they haven't played in a while. My fav Foo song... MIA came out in the middle of the set. Hell, at sound check they played Headwired. The top of the show was All my Life into No Way Back.... goooood start. In the dressing room, Dave found graffiti they scribbled from 1998. One of the first Gus heads ever drawn.
Another early flight brings me to fighting my eyelids as I write this here in the Sydney enorma-dome.
I'm over it.
11/24/05
Thanksgiving in Wellington, NZ. The Foos flew the chef from Olive's in Las Vegas and his wife to NZ to cook Thanksgiving dinner for us... it was yummy. Although traditional thanksgiving food has never been my favorite. The stuffing was exceptionally good tonight as was the cheesecake. Everyone was pretty jetlagged but in good spirits. The trip over on Qantas was nice... I slept for almost 10 hours. They've got these motorized pod seats that go almost completely flat. Internationally I'd say it's my favorite airlines but domestically I hate it. Crappy luggage policies.
I forgot I took a bunch of pictures at the MTV Europe Music Awards in Portugal... The Gorilla's thing was pretty awesome. The rest of it was crap. Although I got to stare at that nutty redhead chick from Wedding Crashers for awhile... hot.
I'm feeling like I'm coming down with some kind of bug so I'm gonna sleep now... I hope I don't get some kind of plague.
Wellington show tomorrow... I'll try and motivate to take some pics and keep y'all posted.
11/19/05
On New Years Eve... BB and his FOB will be playing at the McDonald theatre in Eugene with old friends "Floater". I better see you there Toasted. In honor of this rock infused event, we will be reviving some old metal from our "Chum" past and putting alot of the country and bluegrass on the back burner. My old band "Chum" used to open up for Floater all the time but haven't seen our floater pals in years so it'll be good to hang out with those guys. Check out their website at http://www.floatermusic.com.
Here's a few songs you haven't heard and that we'll be throwing out on New Years Eve.
Anthill Mouthbox Lie Dentaphobia
These are all mp3's... there's more old rock on the Music Page that I just posted... check it out.
SNL went pretty good... at least our side of it... The Foos performance was great but the comedy was lackluster to say the least. It's a damn shame cuz I really love Jason Lee...All the way back to his early days with Blind Skateboards. His new show... "My name is Earl"... is fantastic. You all should give it a view.
Heading Down Under on Tuesday for a few weeks... looking forward to seeing friends and being in summertime. Then it's off to the UK for a few shows. Not back home till a few days before Christmas.
I'll try and be more on my posting game this leg for Y'all...
11/2/05
I was so looking forward to our Latino MTV Awards Cancun trip... five days in a resort hotel... three of those days off. I had bought a ticket for my friend come stay with me there seeing as I had a few days to hang out. It was gonna be great. We had to fly with a bunch of gear. Guitars... amp heads... tuners and tools... cables... wireless units... y'know, a bunch of crap. Way more stuff than any airlines wants to deal with. In the old days, before 9/11, all you had to do was tip a skycap a hundred bucks or so and they'd just slide it through... not anymore though, although we still try. They let it all through except for one piece... a very important piece. $800 bucks in excess baggage with excess weight. But what about the one piece? Well lucky thing our security guy, Bailey, forgot his passport and had to stay behind. We left the piece behind with him and he overnight shipped it to LA to connect up with the band charter plane.... problem solved.... or so we thought. We landed in Miami late... yes... we missed our connection. In the meantime, my guest had already landed in Cancun and was on her way to the hotel. There were no more flights to Cancun till the next morning... CRAP. The airlines put us up in the crappiest Holiday Inn... in some Miami ghetto. Rooms smelled like old wet mildewed socks and both elevators were broke. I woke up the next morning before our scheduled departure time... before the rest of the crew... to go to the airport and try and stand by on an earlier flight seeing as my guest was alone in Cancun waiting for me. The counter lady was a fucking cunt and wouldn't let me do it due to all the extra baggage under my name. I was furious. I left the counter trying to stay calm and went in to the terminal to have breakfast and wait for the rest of the crew. Everyone showed up a couple hours later and we boarded the plane... but not without a scare that they overbooked and there was a chance of a couple of us getting bumped. Upon landing in Mexico we were all pulled into a customs office and detained for about a hour... we never found out why. Now here's the cock punch... within two hours of arriving at our kickass hotel... we were informed that the Foos had cancelled due to the Hurricane and we were to fly out the next morning at 6am which meant a 4am hotel departure. Oh well... I resigned my self to the belief that this was some kind of karmic retribution for bad shit I had done in the past. I spent 12 hours in the fucking awesome hotel swimming in the giant pool, dining in their mediocre restaurants, and relaxing on the beach. The local wildlife was cool... while we were swimming some tourist lady shouted at us to get out of the pool as a huge snake had got in the pool and was swimming around... then later on as I hunted for an ice machine down a cabana hallway... a giant fruit bat flew down the hallway right at me and a maid who just happened to be standing there. As the huge bat got close, the maid shrieked and ducked. The bat did a 180 on a dime and flew out of the building the other way. There were also flamingos there and monkeys too.
At first... I think MTV was kinda pissed that we cancelled... they were still trying their hearts out to have the show. But they ended up cancelling the event. It's a good thing too... Cancun got fucked up. Also our early flight was the last regular flight before people started evacuating and the airport turned into a big mess. Fucking hurricanes.
Five more shows finished up this leg of the tour. San Diego, a Johnny Cash benefit, Portland, Seattle, and Oakland.
San Diego... two sold out shows. Roger Taylor from queen played drums on a song... good shows.
Johnny Cash tribute... at first I was kinda bummed that this got chucked in the mix at the last second... taking away from us a day off in Portland. But once I was what it really was... I was stoked. The Foos were to play a song with Kris Kristofferson. A great song writer and a country legend of sorts. Meeting the old bastard was pretty special to me. But the big highlight for me was meeting my favorite new country guy... Brad Paisley. Guitar Players... seriously... check this dude out. He puts all the other guitar weenies to shame. This dude shreds. The Johnny Cash song he did was Folsom Prison Blues, and he completely tore it up. It was Amazing.
Portland... I hate to say it about my own home town... but the worst crowd on the whole tour. No energy. I hate the way that they sell that venue too. They hardly let anyone out on floor... some stupid fire law. So it just looks even if you sell out. I was stressed out as well about all the guests that all of us Portland guys had. And lots of acquaintances of course calling at the last second to get in the show. Too many people on our bus and too many people in guitar world during the show.
Seattle... Same guest list stress for me... but got to hang out with an old friend I hadn't seen in a long time. Roy Winston... one of the most badass drummers on the planet. Used to be in this band I hung out with called Morphius... a speed metal band named after the Greek god of sleep and yes, they spelled it wrong... all so appropriate for them. They always did a bunch of stuff with the Accused. There's a Morphius / Accused flipside single out there somewhere that's awesome. My pal Libby also drove down from Canada to hang... good to see her as well.
Oakland... last show on the tour and a great last show at that. The "end of tour" pranks were abound. During the part of the Weezer set where they bring up a kid from the audience to play Undone (the sweater song)... we snuck Grohl up there with his hoodie pulled over his head. At the end of the song he smashed the acoustic guitar to bits.
movie 1 movie 2 movie 3 movie 4 movie 5
Then during the Weezer last song... the Foos bought 6 male strippers dressed as security to go up and take off their clothes. I think that Weezer was amused for a second then just kind of uncomfortable as the pretty boys got down to their G-strings... ew.
The Foos part of the show was kickass as well... the best of the tour I would say...
All in all it was a good tour... alot better than I was expecting.
I tried to get more of these pass pictures... but I was just to lazy... I promise I get more of these on the next leg... they're the best.
Right now I'm in Portugal for a different MTV awards show... why couldn't this be the one cancelled by a hurricane? It's not that bad though... good hotel... lots of sleep... and we just had dinner at my favorite kind of restaurant... Brazilian BBQ. After some appetizers... you flip over a red coaster in front of you to a green side and these dudes with giant swords of different kinds of rotisserie meats just start coming over and slicing bits off onto your plate until you've had enough meat to sufficiently clog your arteries... then you just turn your coaster back over to red and they stop bringing it. So delicious.
Yeti doesn't like red meat though... to bad for him.
Home in two days... I need to decompress.
I leave you with this final photo
