SoundRabbit

Why would I update the “Road” journal tonight from our hometown of Boulder, you ask? Because I absolutely cannot let a week go by without reporting on this past Saturday’s show – Ogallalapalooza.

We headed up to Ogallala, Nebraska on Saturday (05/03) to play at an Elks Lodge. I’ve never spent any time in the Ogallalalopolis, nor in an Elks Lodge – so I had no idea what to expect. When we arrived at the lodge, we found that they’d sold 100 tickets for the show (at $10 a pop… a steep ticket in a tiny town), and the crowd was quite eager to hear us in person. Evidently our album had been circulating in the months prior, to the point that there were people singing along to “Hazel” as if we were playing here in Boulder. Crazy.

Let’s just say that Ogallalaliliputians know how to have a good time. From the very first song we played at 9pm to the last song at midnight, we had people up and dancing… people of all ages and demographics. At one point I looked up and saw a couple in full authentic Mexican garb (sombrero, colorful shirt, dungarees, boots) country swing dancing to “Turn My Egg”… and let’s just say that when we broke into “Don,” “View From Way Up Here,” and “Park,” we had to improvise on the spot to extend the songs to double their typical length, as the floor space in front of us was packed with more and more couples with each verse. They loved our dip into the alt-country genre on those tunes. Surprisingly, we were able to rock Marula Binge for almost 10 minutes… not a song that we would have guessed would go over well… but they loved it. It may have been the best song of the night, in terms of the folks having a good time dancing and “whooping” it up (literally).

It’s funny how when we reflect back on the tour to the Northeast, some of the best nights we had were in small towns – be it Des Moines or Portland – and now this town of 5,000 in Nebraska. These were some of the friendliest, most out-to-have-fun people we’ve ever had the pleasure of performing for. They’ve asked us to come back this summer to play a beach party at the local lake, and we’ll likely take them up on it. It’s guaranteed to be a great time. Here are some pics courtesy of Bob Alberts, an Ogallala photographer who shot the event:

The end-of-the-night DieHards; midnight and still goin’ strong!

Thanks to all of the people in Ogallala who gave us such a great time. We had an interesting show on Thursday night in Denver (live recording of it will be up online shortly, show described in the post below), so this was a nice pick-me/us-up to keep us jazzed!

FYI, loyal readers, we’re heading into the studio this week to record our second album. We want to have a really strong follow-up to This Room Becomes A Crowd, and we’d love to have it out by the end of the year. We’ll post initial recordings and ideas here on the Backstage over the coming weeks and months (see “Music > Backstage Sessions and/or Scratch Tracks”)… we’re excited to get you a full new album of material. We’ll be back on the Road in June to the mid-Atlantic and southern East Coast, and recording in the time between. More later…

We’re back in Colorado, enjoying springtime in the Rockies. When we arrived on Monday night, it was warm enough outside that we had a BBQ on my deck that evening, watching the sun set over the mountains. Tuesday and Wednesday were in the 80’s. Thursday – the night of our gig – the high was 37 and we had so much snow blowing sideways that I couldn’t see 100 feet out my backyard. Indeed, we’re in a couple of days of slush and cold weather before returning to the 70’s this weekend. Crazy. We had a fun show in Denver tonight, though a quiet one. There were maybe a half-dozen loyal RabbitReps in the room… and we opened with “Park” and “View From Way Up Here”… and the owner of the place came up to the stage in the middle of “View” to tell us that we were “way too loud.” That’s a first. We’re not exactly the loudest band on the planet, and those two songs are among the quietest in our repertoire… so it was weird. Despite that interruption, we barreled through a full 90-minute set and concluded with a LOUD version of a Talking Heads tune… figured we’d go out with a bang (and not plan on booking the place again). Here’s the setlist:

Park
View From Way Up Here (with aforementioned interruption)
Story Of…
Heat
Don
Eoghan, Late Saturday
Marula Binge
Around The Bend
Nightlite Jesus
Hazel
List (EMINY)
IIOKYN
ZED
Turn My Egg
Obey –>
Life During Wartime (Talking Heads)

Thanks to all who made it out, including a bunch of RabbitReps and world-traveling Sticker Presenters. One of the Reps taped the show, so if the recording comes out decently, we’ll be posting it here on the Backstage… (thanks, Ed!)… today (Friday) a day off before climbing back in the van to drive 3.5 hrs to Ogallala, Nebraska on Saturday. Jason and I are playing golf in the morning, then meeting Anton and Beers in the evening to load in and rock the Ogallalans for an evening. More Road Journaling then… hasta for now.

Well, we’re making our way home to Colorado this morning. Looks like clear skies and perfect driving weather, so we should make good time (about 10-11 hours). We had a nice hearty breakfast at the Living History Farms in Clive, Iowa (a place where they re-enact the 19th century farms of Iowa)… and we’re now on I-80 westbound, all the way to Colorado. Had a great show in Des Moines last night… incredibly nice people who own Java Joe’s, and the room turned out to be HUGE. We were picturing a small-ish coffee place, but this turned out to be a large venue with two separate rooms/stages.

 

Here’s how the setlist turned out:

Don
Hazel
Heat
View From Way Up Here
Park
ZED
Eoghan, Late Saturday
List
Obey –>
Life During Wartime (Talking Heads)
IIOKYN
Nightlite Jesus
Turn My Egg

About midway through the set, Jason and Beers spotted someone walking through the room… and recognized him as the drummer from American Princes, one of the two bands that opened for us on Monday back in Boston, MA. Sure enough, it was them… playing in the room next door to ours. Talk about a small world. We just happened to play in Des Moines the same night, and in the same building. Crazy. Not much else to report at the moment… passing lots of farms, cornfields, and cow pastures… lovely country out here. We’re all looking forward to sleeping in our own beds tonight for sure. Catch y’all from Colorado, unless something journal-worthy happens to occur in the next 10 hours…

Hello from a van of non-sleepers. We’re about 2 hours from Des Moines, having driven through the night from Syracuse, NY… and it looks like we’re going to make it in time to grab a quick shower and then load in at Java Joe’s. Woo-hoo. We’ve been thinking about this leg of the tour for the past month, wondering if it would work out… and thanks to some Dunkin’ Donuts, a bunch of coffee, and a strategic rotation between the four of us, it’s working out just fine. Had a lot of fun playing in Syracuse last night… it was basically a private show for some friends and some people who found us online (on Jambase.com), and the staff of the place. The weather was awful, so there was zero built-in crowd whatsoever. We still had fun, the promoter who booked the show said that he loved the music and wants to work with us on our next time through in the fall, and we made some new friends with the dozen or so people who were in attendance. Here’s how the setlist panned out:

Don
Park
Story Of
List
Around The Bend
ZED
Marula Binge
IIOKYN
Nightlite Jesus
Eoghan, Late Saturday
Heat
{set break}
Hazel
View From Way Up Here
Relief
Emil
Obey –>
Life During Wartime (Talking Heads)

We packed up and pulled out of town at about 1:30am, and I drove until 8am with Jason staying up as co-pilot. Anton took over from there, then Beers, then Jay… and now Anton’s driving us the last 2 hours in to Des Moines. We’ll play tonight in the main downtown area of the city, then sleep VERY well and head on back home to Colorado in the morning. Next show is Thursday in downtown Denver… then Saturday up in Ogallala, Nebraska… so we’re not out of the van for too long… and still loving it. More later… thanks for your emails!

Just pulled up and parked in front of the Bull & Bear, our gig for the night. It’s a rainy, cool night here… raining cats and dogs, but it’s somewhat refreshing for us. We haven’t seen rain since we passed through this part of the country Eastbound last week. Might hurt the walk-in crowd a bit tonight, but we’ll have fun regardless of how full the room may be. Going to grab some dinner here and load in… catch you after the show. I think I’m driving the late night (2am-7am) shift, so we may not have an update until I’m back in the backseat of the van.

Howdy from the van. We’re cruising westbound on I-90, headed for Syracuse, NY. Just drove by Anton’s dad’s place, and we’re fairly close to the New York border.

We’ll play at the Bull & Bear pub tonight in downtown Syracuse, and we hope to be pulling out of town by 2am so we can make good time to Des Moines.

This morning I woke up and watched candlepin bowling for an hour or so. It rules. I’ve talked for a while about opening a candlepin bowling alley in Colorado, as a side thing. I think it would be pretty popular. Totally different approach to bowling:

I’ve spent this morning and the last hour or so adding photos to the Road Journal here, so scroll down and go back through the older posts to see them now with photos added. I should have the last of the pics up there over the next 30-40 minutes. It’s been an awesome tour, met a ton of great people, played some great rooms, and enjoying the changing scenery. It’s amazing to just be able to “take in” life on these trips… observing people doing their usual routine in the concrete jungle of New York City or by the ocean in Portland, Maine or in the plains of Nebraska. It’s a really small world (and an even smaller country), and jumping into their lives for a couple of hours, giving them something new to hear… before heading on to the next new group of people in a different place. The road thing isn’t for everyone, but man – I, for one, LOVE it (this is Russ, by the way). We’re here in the 9th day of driving in this big red van and I’m not remotely sick of it. I’ll write the rest of those thoughts in my blog and keep this thing band-focused.  🙂   We’ll give another update from Syracuse when we get there… the scenery right now is gorgeous and I’d like to stop staring at the computer screen for a bit. We’re just passing through the Berkshires and rolling woods of western MA/eastern NY… beautiful colors and a nice 70-degree breeze blowing through the open windows of the van.

Had a great show in Portland, just about to hit the rack for the night here in Massachusetts. We’ve got a long day ahead of us in Syracuse, ending in Des Moines 48 hour from now, so we’re getting a good night’s sleep tonight.The owners of North Star Music Cafe where we played tonight are unreal… we’re already booking our return trip for October ’08, to play this stage again. We even had people dancing the tango to our music, which was a first. Here are those same people in action on YouTube… a Portland tango group with some showdates outside the state on occasion. Now we’re back at the Inn in Massachusetts, catching one last night of good zzz’s before a long weekend of driving and gigging across the midwest. Looks like the weather is going to be crap for our drive, too… severe t-storms in upstate New York and the midwest as we make our way across. Fun times. Hopefully we’ll be able to make it to Des Moines in time for our gig at Java Joe’s on Sunday night. Time to snooze here… more later today!

Howdy from Maine. I’m sitting here at the North Star Music Cafe, listening to our support for the night – Jon Call (his myspace here)…

Jon Call – Portland, ME
We’ll be going on in a half hour or so, and there’s already a good sized crowd. Good times. We’ve been really surprised at how many people have been in the rooms up here, so far from Colorado.

This is our last night in New England before making our way back to the West. Given that fact, we went to a place down on the harborside and enjoyed a fresh seafood linner (“lunch/dinner”). We all had big bowls of New England Clam Chowder (mine was thick enough that I could stand a spoon in it), and I had a fresh lobster roll. Took a stroll around Portland, enjoying the smell of seafood in the air. Seriously, the second we pulled into town, we could smell lobster, crab, fish, salt air, etc… awesome.

Hello from Maine! We decided to come up early and find a restaurant overlooking the ocean… and have a big lobster dinner for our last night in New England. It’s almost 3:30pm and we’re just a few miles outside of Portland, I think. The weather has been absolutely postcard perfect this entire week. We’re all blown away by the experience and joy of this week. I have about 4,000 photos on my camera that I need to get transferred to the laptop so we can share them with you here on the Journal. I’m going to go back through and update previous posts with relevant photos from those days… so I hope it’s not too confusing for y’all. Last night in Newton was awesome… thanks to all who made it out, and to the new Backstage Members who’ve joined the website this week, from Rochester to Des Moines to Boston. Hopefully we’ll have a few more members join us tonight after the show in Portland. Okay… I’m going to keep working on these photos and get this thing updated with some color! Hasta for the minute…

Russ here… Anton took over the Road Journal duties the last couple of days. It’s been crazy running around from gig to gig and doing promotions in between. Played tonight at The Attic / Union Street in Newton, MA. It was our last night with Fred on the tour, helping us with sound, merch, navigating, etc. We were all grateful to have his help with everything. We dropped him home a little bit ago, and all the guys have gone to bed. I’ll be hitting the rack here in a minute, after this update. Got out and played a round of golf this morning with Jason, managed to shoot a decent round on a course filled with trees (we’re not used to that on the Front Range in Colorado), then headed to Borders for a quick in-store promo set. After that, headed to the Attic and played for a supportive crowd… great room… a bit upscale, lots of after-work folks in there dressed up, etc…. really good dinner beforehand… and I’ll need to re-check on the setlist before posting. Fred’s got it with him, so I’ll need to make a phone call in the morning. I also can’t seem to find my digital camera, which has all of our photos from the last few days (yes, including the World’s Largest Truckstop and a college student in a tiny, tiny coat)… so I’ll have to dig through our bags and get those pics posted later today (Fri). We’ve decided to stay here at the Inn in Massachusetts for an extra night, rather than staying in Portland… so we’ll be driving a couple of hours back down here after the show tonight (Fri). It’s such an amazing place here at the Inn… we’re all happy to be able to relax and sleep here for one more night. Okay, bed time… here are some pics from today… hasta for now.

Breakfast at the Inn