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So we left home for three days. We even bought a new trailer for our little jaunt down to Texas. Well somewhere along the way that turned into a trip through Colorado, two trips to Vegas, a stop in LA, another dash through Colorado, a drive across country to Jersey, a stop in Louisville and two trips to NYC. Ends up being 5 damned busy weeks. Please don’t think we’re complaining. But it’s been quite nice being in our own beds for a couple of days. The taping of the CBS morning show was really fun. I was afraid when I saw call times of 4:45 am that things may be a little iffy but it turned out cool. Everyone there was very accommodating and easy to work with. We thank yall for the hospitality. With all the aforementioned running around it’s gonna feel real good to get back to doing some right and proper rock and roll shows this week. Asheville to start then Wilmington and two nights in Charleston. Hope we will see some of yall there.
Ps…….rumor has it there could be a special surprise for the weekend! I’m excited

So the Colorado shows ended up great. Denver was a lot of fun. The Soiled Dove is one of those rooms that sounds fantastic and people are quiet and really listening. Crowd had grown a lot since our last 3 piece stop too which is nice. We left after the show and headed back to our new favorite hotel, the Rodeway Inn in Boulder. Conveniently located within walking distance of a pizza place for Siggi, the Egg and I for Devin, a noodle place for me and a fancy cheese shoppe for Blade. Boulder was great to. The KBCO taping went well. We did ‘Even If It Breaks Your Heart’ and ‘The Wreckage’. Really a great station playing a killer mix of all kinds of music. Special thanks to them for letting us be a part of the whole weekend. All the AAA radio programmers were in town and we saw so many familiar faces. Folks from Charelston, from Virginia, out west, hell all over. It was fun. Plus our hometown Lightning 100 folks were in the fullest effect which was great to see. Got to see some cool shows too. Mindy Smith and her band were great on Wednesday and so was Paolo Nutini. I liked Serena Ryder and Ingrid Michaelson on Friday too. We skinned out after our show as we are en route to LA for a show on Monday at the Mint. Stopped in Las Vegas last night with intentions of raising all sorts of hell especially since the Official World Wide Star Trek Convention is one block from where we’re staying! Awesome I know. However my night consisted of In and Out Burger and passing out on the couch about 9:30. Damn it. Good news Devin saw a Klingon. Hell I’m more of a Star Wars guy anyway. So we’re up and at ‘em here in a bit and rolling into LA tonight. I see Jerry’s deli in my future……

That’s right, folks, our new ride has a name. We listened to your ideas, came up with our own, but bam, there it was written right on the side. THOR!! He’s done 10,000 miles in 3 weeks. He’s seen the Atlantic Ocean. Spent time at the beach. He’s climbed the Rocky Mountains. Three times and back at this point. He’ll see the Pacific tomorrow. He’s fed us in his kitchen. Today he bathed me and Siggi. Not together. He is Thor. We love him. We thought about naming it the SS Jenna Jamison because you know she’s coming and she’s always got a bunch of dudes in her, but that just seemed inappropriate. But funny. Anyhow, please welcome Thor to the family.

These trio shows have been GREAT! Omaha was fun. I like that club a lot. Then the three nights in Colorado were stellar. The two shows with Todd Rundgren went way better than we could’ve expected. The crowds were incredibly receptive in both Boulder and Aspen. Headlined in Denver at the Soiled Dove. Instantly moved into my top 10 clubs list. Our old pal Jordan Rivas is the house sound guy there now and it was wonderful to see him. Glad he’s found his ‘thang’ out there. Keep up the good work young man, we love you. Skinned out afterwards and headed up the 20 hour drive to Moscow, Idaho. Absolutely beautiful drive. I must admit I was expecting just potatoes and shit, but northern Idaho is gorgeous. Nice people here. We’re playing this cool little small town music series here in a couple of hours so I’ll let you know how that goes. Then sleep and off to Seattle for some Saturday rock and then 40 hours home for a Nashville show on Wednesday. ROCK AND ROLL!!
See ya’ll soon.

Will Hoge

ps….I saw a moose today
pss…we’re accepting license plates/ideas for the empty spot on the front of Thor. Send them to us, or bring ‘em to a show and we’ll travel the highways of the US and A and send you a photo. All we ask……be fucking funny.

That’s what the great God’s of the weather are doing right now. Laughing there asses off at us. A mere 4 weeks ago we sat in Florida in our own stocked apartments and mocked the lame asses who were gonna have to struggle through the cold weather months whilst we did our west coast tour and enjoyed the sunshine! We seemed to have forgotten that as a part of the tour we still had to play Utah and Colorado. COOOOOOOOOOLLLLLLLDD!!! Tonight I wouldn’t even leave the bus for dinner. I’m freezing.

Luckily the shows have gone pretty well. Boulder last night was GREAT!! We’ve decided that is gonna be a town we love to play for a long, long time. Special thanks to Marquee Magazine the continued love and support. Big thanks too to our ol’ pals Rose Hill Drive for really starting us off on the right foot there. We got the bus stuck in the snow trying to back down the alley to the club. Blocked traffic going both ways. HELLO BOULDER! We dumped the gear, pushed it down the alley. Raised the back end, dropped the front end, floored it and we were free. There was a definite problem with my accent yesterday. Colorado folks don’t like the drawl I guess. A cop comes up while we’re trying to get the bus free and says, “Where’s the driver?!” I say, as we’re working on the bus, “..in the drivers seat.” He quips back, “OH YEAH! Keep on giving me attitude!” “What?! You asked where he was and HE IS IN THE DRIVERS SEAT!!” He said sorry long day and we laughed. He ended up being a good dude and quite helpful. Then at the the end of the night the girl that runs the club says she’s glad I’m not as big an asshole as I was before the show. Huh? I asked for a fax machine. She said, ‘we don’t have one.’ I said, ‘do you know when you’re getting one? I could wait.’ No luck. We go on and do the show and then afterwards she says that was me being an asshole! I explained I thought I was being witty and charming. No. She then says, ‘I shoulda know people from Tennessee would still use fax machines.’ To which I reply, ‘I shoulda known chicks from Boulder don’t have a sense of humor.’ Awkward pause. Now everyone is dying laughing. All is well. She then slips up and calls a fax machine a ’sex machine’. I tell her in Tennessee that’s called a Freudian slip. Russell is crying over this shit. We all part pleasantly and tell her we can’t wait to come back and play when she gets the sex machine installed. Whew! Dodged a bullet there. Good times.
Breckenridge tonight. We’ll see how that goes. SuperBowl tomorrow. Go Colts! Siggi says Go Bears!! I just am praying for rain. Shitty shitty muddy as real deal manly fuckin old school football. Hope it screws up the always boring halftime ‘extravaganza’. I hope all the corporations loose their asses and the final score is like 14-13 in overtime. Now THAT IS FOOTBALL!! Oh yeah, and I hope that Paris Hilton is somehow involved.
Adios

So we’ve just come from hanging on the shores of the Colorado river. It is so beautiful here. What a night.

Recap from the Seattle show, it was killer. Sometimes just from the minute you get off the bus things just feel right. This was one of those shows. Jenny the bartender who was just setting up when we got there was blasting the “Transcedenta Blues” album by Steve Earle when we got there. ALWAYS a good sign. She follows that with Lynyrd Skynyrd. Ok, I think we’ve found our place here. Great crowd. Really responsive/attentive all at once. It was the PERFECT end to this west coast run. We’re already making return plans. If we don’t make it back before the end of the year we’ll DEFINITELY be back in Jan/Feb. So y’all please spread the word.

We stopped at the worlds dumbest interstate exit en route to CO. We’ve driven all night through the middle of nowhere and alas it looks as if Denny’s is our only hope for food. As Russell washes the bus, we go in to get a table. Now the place is a ghost town. There are 14 people inside eating. The girl seems flustered when we come in. I tell her there will be 7 of us. She then says it’ll be AT LEAST an hour before we can get food because they’re so busy. I wait for the punch line……….nope, she’s serious. We figure they just don’t want us hippie-queer type in their fine doin establishment so we decide that Burger King is the better choice. Mind you I won’t eat fast food, but it’s the middle of the night and I can at least get a salad there. BUUUUUUT, Mr. King is out of lettuce(they also couldn’t make any chicken because it was frozen…..no big deal to me, but it went over poorly with other folks). But don’t worry, they’ve sent a trusty employee out to the store for lettuce and she’ll be right back. She shows up to save the day. sidenote: upon arrival she looks as if she’s had a bit of the marijuana…..just me guessing. I don’t care, she’s got the lettuce. Except that it’s CABBAGE!!! Nice one. So no food for me. Dumbshit then goes to the adjoining gas station to buy Visine. To which Rusell yells to the cashier, “..make sure it’s not SuperGlu.” Chick starts yelling and stuff. We run off. Pretty damn funny.

Alright, going back to the river……See y’all soon.