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Thursday, April 28
Coast Starlight to Portland, OR from Santa Barbara, CA
I canât believe weâre almost home. This has been an AWESOME thirty days. We had our first meal in the dining car at 6:30am this morning to celebrate the last train ride of the tour. As we sat watching the snow covered mountains of Southern Oregon go by, we were talking about how amazing it is that we actually made it to all of our shows, that we found places to stay every night, and that the only thing we lost that we know of was Joeâs pillow. Portland, weâll be home in several hours!---
After a 27 hour train ride that originated early Saturday morning in San Antonio, the Sunset Limited dropped us in LA at 8:30am on Easter Sunday. Tim Young, John Schuller and Doug Showalter met us with cars at the train station, and drove us back to The Youngsâ house in Silverlake, where we met up with Keithâs partner Jodi. Eryn and Tim Young prepared an amazing Easter brunch, consisting of fruit salad, several quiches, and delicate cupcakes with fresh strawberry frosting. We gorged ourselves, took showers, naps, and then gorged ourselves again on two different kinds of tasty homemade lasagna. Youngs: Thank you so much. We hope to repay your generosity ten times over someday.
After spending so much time this month in cities where weâve never played, it was nice to feel back âat homeâ in LA. Our show that night with The Youngs was right off the beach in Venice in the basement of The Townhouse, a club that used to be a speakeasy during the prohibition. Very good vibes. The LA Times did a preview of the show and an interview with Joe here.
The next day we took an Amtrak bus to Bakersfield, waving goodbye to a teary-eyed Chris Hudson, who would fly from LAX back to Portland. In Bakersfield, we loaded our stuff into the only hotel we stayed at on the entire tour. The college we played at, CSU Bakersfield, was able to put us up in a place that was literally one block from the train station. Very good move!
Our show and workshop at CSUB was organized by trumpeter Kris Tiner, who plays in the LA / Seattle-based group Empty Cage Quartet. Kris is a professor of music at the university. He invited us to come to Bakersfield to perform for and talk with his classes. We played a long set that was broken up by answering questions between each song. Afterwards, we did a go around with the music majors who stayed for the workshop to find out what topics people were most interested in discussing. We ended up talking about composition, tour booking and improvisation. At the end of the workshop, we played a 19 person extended version of Broken Windmills, and led exercises involving whole group free improvisation. I think we all came away from the workshop wanting to do more clinics at colleges.
It should not go without mention that Jiâs aunt and uncle drove 4 1/2 hours from Las Vegas to see Ji play at this show. Amazing. It was the first time they had every seen him play. Jiâs aunt said she couldnât miss the opportunity after her twin sister, son and cousins all saw the band play in Boston and New York.
Tuesday involved another Amtrak bus trip, this time to Santa Barbara. We were hosted by friends of friends of friends in Goleta, Thomas and Erika. Their house was perched next to the cliffs overlooking the ocean, and was filled with toys, colors, and many comfortable places to sleep, which we made good use of. After naps and a hearty meal of spaghetti and salad prepared by Thomas, we headed to the Mercury Lounge. The Mercury is amazing. All of the decor is era-specific to the late fifties/early sixties. It feels like The Rat Pack could walk in the door at any moment, order something cool in a high ball glass, and head to the back patio to tell jokes and snuff out cigarettes in one of the many fabulous vintage ashtrays. They only play records over their stereo system- no ipods. Dawn, the owner, is a big supporter of the arts, and always treats us well. This was our third time playing at the Mercury Lounge, but our first time using a P.A. system. It made a huge difference for the better, thanks to Brian the sound man, who was sweet and professional in the relaxed surfer way that is so prominent in this part of the West Coast. Dan Reynolds and Brad Gillan brought lots of people out, and it was great to see some familiar faces. It was a fantastic last show on the rails. Huge thank-yous to Steve, Rally, Dan, Ethan, Ferg and Jodiâs aunt and uncle for helping us with rides.
On Wednesday, at the Santa Barbara station, we passed the time until our train arrived by taking tons of photos and videos of some of our best dance moves. Then we got on the Coast Starlight, a train that runs from San Diego all the way to Vancouver BC. It is definitely the nicest train weâve been on this entire month. There is more leg room than other trains weâve been on, and it has a dining car, an observation car, a movie theater and a wine tasting room (unfortunately those last two are only for people who have sleeping cars). The real treat, though, is the first floor video game arcade, directly below our second floor seats. Blue Cranes now holds the number one slot for âPhoto Hunt,â but our race car driving is terrible.
At midnight, Kevin DeMarco and Al Miller met us on the platform in Davis, CA. Kevin plays guitar in Elders, with whom we have toured extensively on the West Coast. Al works in passenger rail advocacy in California. We met Al at a basement show we played last time we were in Davis, and he ended up being instrumental in connecting us with Amtrak and the National Association of Railroad Passengers in D.C., who ended up helping to promote our tour. We expected to be able to get out for a few minutes to say hello, but the train ended up stopping for less than one minute. Just enough time for hugs, a few words, and an unexpected hand-off of pistachio ice cream (thank you, Kevin) before âAll Aboard!â
Slideshow:
We are now somewhere in the Willamette Valley, four hours away from Portland. As the trees and hills become more and more familiar, I know that our trip is coming to an end. I cannot express how thankful we are to the many, many people who helped to make this tour a reality, from the 100+ people who supported our Kickstarter fundraising campaign to friends and performers who helped us connect with venues, to all of the people who gave us rides, food and shelter along the tour route, to everyone who came out to the shows. I want to give a special thank you to our publicist, Matt Merewitz. Without his countless hours of work, relationships with musicians and journalists around the country, as well as floor space to crash on, this tour would not have been what it turned out to be--a huge step forward for our band. I also want to give a giant thank you to Casey Rae Wickum Olsen, who traveled with us from Portland all the way to New Orleans taking photos, videos, selling merch, and connecting us with housing; and to Chris Hudson and Jodi Graul who did the same in Boston, Austin, and the West Coast. This was our first time traveling with people helping us, and it made a huge difference in what we were able to accomplish. THANK YOU to everyone, from the depths of our hearts. We do not take you for granted.
We will be performing one final show on this tour-- our Portland Homecoming Show--TONIGHT, April 30th at The Woods. We will be double billing with Wayne Horvitz's Pigpen, which is doing a reunion tour this month. It's going to be a very special show. For those of you who don't know, Wayne is a composer and keyboardist from Seattle. He wrote a beautiful song called "Love, Love, Love" that we cover on our album Observatories. Pigpen began in 1992 as a collaboration between Wayne and the phenomenal alto saxophonist Briggan Krauss. During the period they were together from 1992-1996, they performed all over the U.S. and Europe, and released five albums. I'm looking forward to hearing them back together for this reunion show. Doors will be at 8pm, show at 9pm. Tickets are $10 in advance through The Woods website, and $12 at the door.
Thank you!!!!!!
Reed (+Rebecca, Ji, Joe and Keith)
WWeek 2015