Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Show Day in Oakland, CA

Uh…no more Irish Car Bombs.

My head hurts.

Doing a show at the Oracle Arena (the old Oakland Coliseum) sucks bad enough, but doing it with a hangover just makes it suck worse…

Monday, September 29, 2008

Day Off in San Francisco, CA

Had lunch with Angela Jackson today, down in the Embarcadero area. Angela and I dated back in the mid-90's, but remain friends. Why she still puts up with my shit, I can't say. Anyway, she took me to some place she goes to regularly. We had fish tacos that kicked ass!

Met up with the Day-Off Dinner Gang in the hotel lobby at 5pm. We skipped the hotel bar and went straight down the street to Foley's Irish Bar. It was a night of Budweisers and Irish Car Bombs. Have you ever had one of those? I had 3 or 4 and will probably regret it tomorrow, as I never did get around to ordering anything to eat.

Back to the room by 10 or so…

Friday, September 26, 2008

Day Off in Anaheim, CA

The perfect day off. Got plenty of sleep on the bus overnight and woke up 5 minutes before we pulled off the highway to go to the hotel. I was in my room by 8:30 – yay!

Walked about ¾ mile down the street to do my laundry, then grabbed a Quizno's sammich on the way back to my room.

Surfed the web, watched a few TV shows I had downloaded to my computer, then went to the nearby shopping area to scope out restaurants for our day-off dinner. Did a little windowshopping there, too.

I also stuck my head in Best Buy for about 15 minutes, but there wasn't anything in there I couldn't live without.

Met production manager John down in the lobby bar around 5pm. Stage manager Matt and rigger Lyle show up a few minutes later and off we went. I had found a place earlier called the Broiler Market that had a killer menu. And their food turned out to be terrific! Everyone enjoyed it.

Back to the hotel bar, and I made it to my room around 10pm…

Wednesday, September 24, 2008

Day Off in San Jose, CA

Made it to the hotel today around 1pm. We're staying at the Fairmont, a very nice hotel in downtown San Jose. As the bus pulled up, the only thing I could see was the McCormick & Schmick's restaurant right next door. They had a big ol' patio and it was a beautiful day, so I immediately knew where I was having dinner.

Spent the afternoon in my room, then rolled down to the lobby bar for a beer before dinner. Wound up going to eat with John Lafferty (production manager), Lyle Harris (rigger) and Richard Carter (awesome merch dude).

The food was terrific, and we were done and back in the hotel by 8:30. So of course Lyle and I spent the next few hours in the bar…

Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Show Day in Salt Lake City, UT

I watched about 15 minutes of the show tonight. It was pretty cool. Those dancer kids are all great athletes.

Don't think I've mentioned this yet – my bus driver Reb lives in Kinston, NC, about 80 miles from where I live in Raleigh. He's a funny, funny fucker, too!

Monday, September 22, 2008

Day Off in Salt Lake City, UT

Nice long bus ride overnight from Portland to Salt Lake City – 774 miles. Got to the Monaco Hotel in downtown SLC just before 2:30pm. While I was in the shower, I got a call on my room phone, which turned out to be from my old buddy Garrett Rentz. He was staying in my hotel! He's Foreigner's LD and they just got to town, too. Day off for him, so we wound up going to dinner together and hanging out all night.

We went to dinner at the Market St. Grill, an awesome seafood restaurant about 3 blocks from the hotel. (Thanks for the heads-up on that one, Foy!)

In addition to Foreigner and their crew staying here, Lindsey Buckingham and his crew were also here. So there was a roadie convention in the bar all night.

Per the comments on my Portland entry below, here's that picture sleeve from the Dan Baird record (thanks to Terry Anderson!)…

Sunday, September 21, 2008

Show Day in Portland, OR

Today's show is at the Rose Garden Arena in Portland. Not much to report. I had to walk down the hall about a million times today, and this photo kept catching my eye:Gee, I wonder why?

I decided to call the photo "Introducing My Vagina" or maybe "Welcome To My Crotch"...

Long bus ride to our day off in Salt Lake City tomorrow – around 765 miles. I should sleep real well tonight...

Tuesday, September 16, 2008

Travel Day to Tacoma, WA

Flew to Tacoma, Washington today to start my new gig. Doing 9 weeks on the "So You Think You Can Dance" tour, and then maybe following that with 5 weeks of R. Kelly.

Took a cab from the SeaTac Airport to my hotel across the parking lot from our venue, the Tacoma Dome. It's a 300-foot walk between the two, so we don't even have to mess with shuttle vans for the next few days.

Load-in is tomorrow, followed by a couple of days of rehearsal, then a show here on Saturday night.

No haps here tonight. Had dinner and a couple of beers in the hotel bar, then off to bed…

Monday, September 15, 2008

Packing For Tacoma, WA

Lots of Ale House dinners later, I'm getting ready to go back to work. Last week I ate there 5 out of 6 nights in a row, choosing to spend the odd night out at Mitch's Tavern instead. I think I just wasn't in the mood to cook last week. Gotta work on that.

Anyway, today was my last day in town until late November. I'm heading out on the "So You Think You Can Dance" tour...

Thursday, September 4, 2008

Heading Home

Done with Rage until next year. Flew home this afternoon.

Went to the Ale House for dinner (surprise!). And that was about as much excitement as I could stand for one day…

Wednesday, September 3, 2008

Show Day in Minneapolis, MN

Tonight was the last Rage Against The Machine show of the year. Lots or rowdy kids inside:


And LOTS of cops outside. They were circling the entire arena (the Target Center), which takes up a pretty good-sized block in downtown Minneapolis.


After the show, Zack (the singer) came back out onstage and told the kids not to start trouble when they left the building because that's exactly what the cops were waiting for. In spite of Zack's chat with them, 102 people were arrested on a variety of charges.

We had our end-of-tour party around the corner in some bar, but it was a bit of a let down. It wasn't really the celebration of all the good times we've had on this tour together that I thought it would be. Too many idiots and strangers showed up, and we couldn't figure out who the hell invited all these people. Most of the crew left just as soon as we could and headed back to the hotel.

Oh, yeah, almost forgot this. Check out the message spelled out in the lights above the stage. It was like that for the 30-minute changeover before Rage came on tonight.

And check out a report on the preceedings HERE.

(Thanks for the heads-up on that one, Angela!)

Tuesday, September 2, 2008

Strange Day in St. Paul, MN

OK, it wasn't an official Rage show that was supposed to happen today. Their buddies, the band Anti-Flag, were playing a show on the Capital grounds in St. Paul, some eight blocks from the Xcel Energy Center, where the Republican National Convention is being held this week.

What Rage was gonna do, was just show up and play a 30-minute set with minimal gear, and hopefully minimal hassles. The local rock radio station made an announcement at 5:30 that Rage would be onstage in 60 minutes. When the band pulled up in a couple of vans around 6:20, suddenly a wall of Minnesota State Troopers surrounded them and prevented them from going onstage. In the midst of negotiations between the band, their management, their security detail and the Captain of the State Troopers, the entire crowd started chanting "let them play, let them play." That and a few other chants went on for quite some time.

The Mexican Hat Dance with the troopers went on for nearly 30 minutes, during which time the authorities killed all of the electricity for the stage and audio gear.

The police refused to let the band play because they weren't listed on the event permit. Also, the permit expired at 7pm, which it was by that time.

No permit + no power = no gig.

Someone handed the band a battery-powered megaphone, so all four guys (along with their manager and a security detail) waded out into the crowd to speak to them. A couple of the bandmembers gave quick speeches, and then they sang 2-3 songs over the megaphone. The crowd sang along with every word. Tom Morello even faked his guitar solos during the tunes.

Soon enough, they were whisked off to their vehicles to depart. The mob headed for the RNC a few blocks away and evidently there were "issues." If you were following the news today, you probably heard about it.

Photos from today:
Brad Madix, Pete Lewis, Andy Veasey
Spragoo, Brad Madix, Seth Kendall


Sooner Routhier:


The crowd:


Other shots:






Rage crew guys with cops: