August Re-cap

Well, we seem to be getting further and further behind in this blog as time goes on. Please comment if you read this thing, so we know it's worth it. :)

Here's a recap of August's shows...

August 2 - Cosmic Railroad Family Gathering, Janesville, WI

Pretty cool small festival in Southern Wisc. During our late afternoon set, the sun set in our faces, blinding and burning us, as we plowed through the tunes. Highlight included "Oye Como Va" with Sean from Cosmic Railroad on percussion, and an impromptu drum jam. Girard, Mackenzie, and Tiff were on hand, and we had fun hanging out after the set. Left Mattias behind, but Tiff returned him in one piece the next day.


August 8 - Bell's Brewery, Kalamazoo, MI

Outdoor show with Michigan locals, Bump. I think we had more fun chatting it up with the Bump guys before/after the show than actually playing the show. We learned about Yorg's philosophy on "Deep V's" and his guilty pleasure of Revenge of the Nerds II. Again, left Mattias behind, but Bump returned him to the hotel the next morning, basically in one piece.


August 9 - Founders, Grand Rapids, MI

Shared the night with Four Finger Five, and heard one of the coolest drum solos in awhile from the FFF drummer. Highlight of the night was finding a $50 bill on the floor!!




August 21 & 22 - Fatfest, Wabasha, MN

After a relaxing weekend off, we headed up to Fatfest in Minnesota for a fun couple of days. Our Thursday night set got a late start due to rain, but we busied ourselves goofing off backstage with Jason Hann and Michael Travis from EOTO/SCI. The set eventually went off without any further rain interruption and the crowd was raging pirate-style!

On Friday night, Jordan and I kicked it with the Everyone Orchestra for some interesting impromptu jams, with a big cast of musicians including Futureman on the drum kit.



August 23 - NV Ultra Lounge, Normal, IL

Our Bloomington/Normal crew was out in full force, including Kayla and her cookies of course. Their enthusiasm helped us get through the frustration of a number of technical difficulties, including a completely inadequate house sound system, and my bass amp completely blowing up mid-show. We tried our bass/drum jam for the first time at this show, and it went pretty well.


August 27 - Mojo's, Columbia, MO

Tested out two new cover tunes at this show: "Subterannean Homesick Blues" (Bob Dylan) and "Love the One You're With" (Steven Stills), both with the usual FGC makeover. Didn't screw 'em up too bad. :)


August 28 - Cicero's, St. Louis, MO

The Hatrick opened up the show, and was one of the most enjoyable support acts we've had in a long time. After the show, went back to enjoy some cushy comfort at the swanky Wyndham suites.


August 29 - 31 - Strip Mines Festival, Murphysboro, IL

Arrived to the festival late in the afternoon on Friday. Things seemed to be off to a great start. People were filing in and everything was running smooth with production. We hit the stage for our headlining slot and it was awesome! Debuted "Subterranean" for our hometown crowd and closed out the night with a rockin' "American Girl" encore. We ended up lending some of our equipment to Garaj Mahal for their latenight set after ours, making it a very late night for us as well. Had a great time backstage eating Tiff's homemade salsa and hummus.

Sunday night pre-set ended up being kind of a stress for me. I was walking on a dark path back from the bathroom, and my ear plug got knocked out of my ear while brushing a bug off my face. (By "brushing", I actually mean waving my hands frantically and freaking out since I hate bugs!). This isn't an ordinary ear plug, but a custom-made musician's ear plug that is very costly to replace. It was pitch black outside, there was grass and brush all around, and the plug is tiny and clear in color. Not to mention, I was on a hill, meaning the ear plug could have potentially rolled a considerable distance after being knocked out of my ear. A sizeable search party gathered, with tons of nice people lending their flashlights and eyes. After over an hour of searching, a guy named Todd who had showed up for 5 minutes finally found the plug! I couldn't believe it! Thanks to all those who helped!!

Our Sunday set was a latenight one, starting at 1:30am. We were all exhausted, and the crowd prior to our set seemed pretty beat as well after partying for 3 days. I was a little worried our set would be a bust, but as soon as we hit the stage, the crowd became energized and we ripped through the set, leaving our fatigue in the dust. We did a triple encore, and closed out the festival in style.


That's it for August. Stay tuned for September, hopefully in a more timely manner!

July Catch-Up

I can't seem to get my bandmates to write in this blog, so it's all on me. Here's a recap of last month's shows. August schedule is fairly light, so I'll be making a concerted effort to post show-ly updates!


July 4 - Summerfest, Milwaukee, WI

We hadn't played at this festival since 2004, and were honored to be bumped up from the teeny no-name stage to the monstrous Miller Light stage. Unfortunately the sound blew, but we had a good time regardless. Zach broke the confines of parole and joined us all the way from Florida, so that was an awesome bonus. Caught some Phil Lesh after our set and then hit the road to make some headway toward Des Moines.




July 5 - 80/35 Festival & People's, Des Moines, IA

80/35 was a cool little festival in downtown Des Moines. We were tired from a long drive, but had to step it up when asked to play a last-minute post-party at People's down the street from the fest. So we ripped out two shows in one day and had a great time with the Des Moines crew.


July 11 - Vaudeville Mews, Des Moines, IA

Back in Des Moines less than a week later. Probably our best Mews show to date. We broke out Tom Petty's "American Girl" for the first time, even though it wasn't fully ready, but the crowd was great and we wanted to give 'em something to remember. We amazingly didn't fuck it up too bad. :)


July 12 - Camp Euforia, Lone Tree, IA

We got up waaaay too early for our 1:30pm slot at Camp Euforia, arriving to find out they were running about 2 hours behind due to some rain. Great. I made it through the morning by guzzling some Miller water. (Seriously, canned water?!) Check out some youtube footage from the fest.



July 17 - Majestic Theater, Madison, WI

Night #1 with Fat Maw Rooney. Our manager, Mike, came up for the show and that was fun. We ripped out "Young Lust" which we hadn't played in awhile, and, so we were told, "melted some faces." We also "miracled" some good fans with free 10KLF tickets. Fat Maw Rooney raged it, while my bandmates got somewhat trashed.



July 18 - Miramar Theater, Milwaukee, WI

After a nice and greasy breakfast with Mad-fans Matt and Dave, we made the short trek over to Milwaukee for night #2 with Fat Maw Rooney. Another great Wisconsin crowd. Split right after our set to get started on the drive to Ohio.


July 19 - Tabfest, Mendon, OH

Got a late start due to Adam setting his alarm for the completely wrong hour (nice one), but made it to the fest basically on time. A little bit of rain, but nothing major. We hung out for several hours, checking out Charlie Hunter and some Fareed Haque. Once again, bandmates proceeded to get retarded and I drove them back to the hotel. Thanks to Scott for the YouTube vids from this show.


July 23-26 - 10,000 Lakes Festival, Detroit Lakes, MN

Played a mean set on the Barn Stage on Day 1. Revisited "The Humpty Dance", and added the 3rd verse, which I only mildly screwed up. Crowd was awesome! Spent the rest of the weekend hanging out and checking out some other music.


I also played with the Everyone Orchestra, which this year included some notable peeps like Jason Hann and Michael Kang (from String Cheese) and the world-renowned guitarist Steve Kimock. After the set, Steve inflated my ego by telling me he loved my tone and playing, and that he "fell in love with me 100 times" during the set. He then handed me a small green rock crystal and said, "Put this on your windowsill, and when you're doing the fuckin' dishes, you can say, 'Oh, that's pretty!' instead of 'Oh, this sucks!'"



That's it for July! Stay tuned for August, at some point....