7″ Release Tour Diary
FREE MUSIC DOWNLOAD: BOOTLEG OF ENTIRE SPEAKEASY SET by TASY WAX RECORDINGS
Wow, what a crazy week! This was a great tour. It was the first tour that we booked ourselves in a while, so that meant way more adventure. The northern California shows were all great, especially at The Crepe Place in Santa Cruz, which sold out! Big shout out to Mountain Animal Hospital, the great Santa Cruz band that we played with that night. We definitely felt a whole-lotta-love from Nor Cal. Thank you!
Santa Barbara was interesting. We played at a sporty tequila bar called Sandbar, opening for our friend’s Reggae band Onetwo Tree. When we got there we heard that the owner wanted us to play our “softer, more melodic material”. I guess he was worried we would scare away the party crowd. To be honest, we were a little bit worried too, but as soon as we started people were totally into it. It turned out to be another awesome show. Afterwards I sat in on violin with Onetwo Tree, which was really educational. They are all solid musicians and their drummer, who used to play in Steel Pulse, holds it down with a totally different kind of feel than I am used to. Playing with them was quite a pleasure.
This is the bar that we played at in Santa Barbara
Our LA show was also pretty unusual. It was at this new place called The Bootleg Theater in Echo Park. It is actually a theater – as in dramatic theater. There was a play going on and we were supposed to play in the lobby. It was pretty weird. We loaded in and set up during the first act, then everyone came out for intermission and we just kind of hung out for a bit, then everyone went back in and we had to wait quietly until the second act was over. What made it even weirder was that the play was running about a half hour late, so all of our friends started showing up in the middle of the second act and we had to wait around whispering until the play ended. It was a little bit awkward. As soon as the play got out we were supposed to get up on stage and start playing before all of the play audience left. That was actually kind of cool, because we got to play for a totally different audience, at least for the first couple of songs. There was one little kid who came up and sat right in front of the stage. He was totally feeling it. Future metalhead for sure.
This was the play that was going on at the Bootleg Theater while we were waiting to play.
Our Oceanside show was really special, and probably my favorite show of the tour. I first discovered Speakeasy Studios, an amazing recording studio and art gallery built into a car repair warehouse, during our tour with Dredg in May. There I saw The Burning of Rome play an epic, inspiring show, complete with robots, wedding gowns, fire dancers and the kind of choruses that could get even the most stuck-up, arms-crossed hipster audiences pumping their fists and singing along. Later, I contacted them to tell them to see if they would want to do a show with us and they offered to have us play their next event. It was so awesome playing on the quirky, home-made Speakeasy stage. We got to go on right after nightfall, the perfect time to play, and we got the audience to pack in really close. It was a blast.
Check out this crazy robot and alien art that was showing in the Speakeasy gallery.
After our set the cops came! Everyone had to go home and The Burning of Rome didn’t get to play. LAME! There was one little girl, maybe about 5 years old, who explained to me what happened: “There’s a mean lady on a hill who called the police. And she’s trying to sleep really early.” (You can read the real story of why the cops came HERE) After most of the crowd left we started packing up the stage, which was outside, and moving all of the gear back into the studio. The Burning of Rome set everything back up in the studio and rocked late into the night for all of us after-partiers. It was a great time.
The next day, after a crazy, late night of partying and jamming we woke up at 5:30 am and drove to the Orange County airport. Lewis and I had to catch a plane to meet up with Mates of State in Tahoe for the Wanderlust festival. Jon, always the trooper, drove the van back to the bay by himself. We had a super quick layover at the San Francisco airport. I split up with Lewis to go use the bathroom and I didn’t see him after that. When we landed in Reno I called him to see where he was and he told me that he was still in San Francisco. He had missed the flight! He had used the bathroom too but apparently his trip had been a little more serious.
Check out my sweet ride at Wanderlust!
Well he totally missed out. I picked my rental car at the airport. It was a bright blue 2010 Mustang! So I rolled up phat to the Squaw Valley resort, parked and hopped on the Gondola, which took me way up the mountain to the festival site. It was absolutely amazing. This was the first year of the Wanderlust festival but if I ever have the opportunity to go again I would want to go and camp out. It was just so beautiful. I had a great day, hanging with the Mates and other friends. I met a bunch of really nice musicians from other bands like Broken Social Scene, Rogue Wave and Spoon. Our old friends in Wendy Darling were playing there too, and my friend Tyson, from my other band Devotionals was just there hanging out. So it was a quite party. We drank lots of beer, went wading in a freezing cold pond during the beautiful sounds of Andrew Bird, and got to watch some great bands from the side of the stage. Spoon totally killed! There were parties and fun happening afterwards but I was too tired, so for the first time on the tour, I stayed in. I had a big week. Can you blame me?
-Anton
