Home Again, Home Again

Uncategorized | October 13th, 2012

So tour is over, and for the first time ever, I wasn’t dreading the trip home. Generally, I start getting uncomfortable as the scenery and landscapes begin to take on an air of familiarity…but not this time.

I hit play on the Sony Walkman MP3 player…and hauled ass over the hills West Bound…

The sun was bright and beautiful, and I couldn’t get rid of my shit eating grin.

I actually took this pic on my way out to Spokane, but I pretty much looked like this every time I was driving somewhere. I say hauled ass, because after a 45+ min. construction hold up, I still managed to arrive in Tacoma at a quarter ’till 9, so I must’ve been flying down that desert straight away…couldn’t really say for sure…my speedo says I was going slow as all hell. lol

Generally, I don’t like being in the same town for too long, but I was able to keep myself busy enough that it really didn’t bother me as much as it usually does. I only had one day of total and complete down time.

I mostly stayed with my buddy, Jeff, working on tour plans for April, and working on music. I wound up staying a couple days extra because I met this amazing woman…

Susie hosts a radio show twice a month on a local station in Spokane called Queens of Noise on KYRS. It’s a show that focuses on female musical artists, and I felt absolutely privileged to be on her show. It was one of the most comfortable situations I’ve ever been in. She also has a FaceBook page you should go like, and help spread the word.

I had a fucking blast. It was a bit of a challenge to not cuss on the air, and picking songs that would be easy to edit on the fly was also a bit of a challenge, but I’m pretty sure I made it through successfully without dropping a single F-bomb. 🙂

After the show, we headed down to PJ’s, which is a bar I seem to always find myself at every time I’m in Spokane. They have great Karaoke, and that awesome dive bar, local atmosphere that I love. 🙂

So…um other stuff I’m excited about…going on the road with Jeff. He’s got a project called One Man Train Wreck. He really misses the road, and I know how hard it is to take that first initial step of doing shit by yourself. So I invited him to hit the road with me in Spring. He said his lease is up in April, so why the fuck not? We first met about 3 years ago or so I guess through our mutual friend, Piper, and have always gotten along really well. We didn’t seem to want to kill each other after hanging out for about 6 days solid…so that’s usually a good sign. On his first available day off during the week, we set aside some time to jam. He’s really into the old time country/blues/bluegrass/jazz stuff, back when you recorded into tin cans and shit, and his project reflects a lot of that.

He threw out the idea of me singing one of his songs, so he played it for me once, then I typed up all the lyrics, and tried it. Wish I had been recording the whole time, because the first run through I did seemed a lot better than this take, but whatever…it wouldn’t be the first rough beginnings I’ve thrown up on my YouTube page.

Later on, we went to grab some lunch, and some asshole was hogging up both lanes of the road for a couple blocks trying to avoid or check out a chick on a bicycle (I couldn’t really tell). I don’t have a horn in my truck either, so I did what I usually do, “HEY ASSHOLE, PICK A FUCKING LANE!”, which Jeff followed up with a loogey hurled at his open window. Unfortunately, it didn’t hit the guy…but it did put a smile on my face and made me eager to see what kind of trouble we might be able to get into starting next Spring.

He was telling me that one of his last projects that went on the road, they decided to just show up in these little towns and walk into the bar with their gear as if they were supposed to be there to fill up the in between days. Only got kicked out a few times, but in most cases they got really good responses. Hearing him talk about it, and the smile that crept up on his face took me back to the mobile stage missions from last year. I miss that excitement, that rush of doing things your not really supposed to and then just seeing what happens. It’s exhilarating. Like running through a rain storm in Philadelphia when lightning is touching the ground all around you, and the Thunder is shaking the ground, and your soaked to the bone, but you don’t care because you feel alive.

I’m hoping that touring with Jeff is going to be like that. We shall see…

Well I’m home now, and there’s a million things I want to get started on…brainstorming a better touring rig that’s also gas efficient, saving up for new merch, making buttons, starting a support group for alcoholics that hate AA and religion, and getting back on task for the documentary I started with Amanda. Plus working on another Z.B. tour in 6 months. I’ll probably be on the road sooner than that, but as far as a planned tour goes, that’s when I’m working on my next one…so if you want to see Zebrana Bastard, One Man Train Wreck, and whatever we create together, you should let me know, and I’ll add it to my list of venues/towns we plan to hit up.

Also going on a date with a pretty cool chick in the next 9-10 hours that I’m really stoked on. She seems really fuckin’ cool, and I’m trying not to get my hopes up, but I really look forward to getting to know her better. Gonna pack a lunch and go hiking, seems like a way more rad date than dinner and a movie.

Life is amazing, and it feels good to be home, back with Baker and the puppy. 🙂

Also got another idea, once I finish my next album “I’m The Asshole”, I want to get right to work on an album called “Life After Trauma”. I got the idea during my interview on Queens Of Noise. I mentioned that I feel like my whole existence is to prove that there is life after trauma. With this new-found enjoyment of sobriety, combined with purging a lot of the dark parts with my first album and the songs that are going on my second album, I’d really like to do an album that focuses on living in the moment, and what’s going on in my life now. I really enjoyed the stuff I was jamming on with Jeff too, and Idunno…it just got me thinking. Some fun, bluesy, jazzy style songs would be a lot of fun. Not that I’ll ever give up the darkness, but a change of pace would be nice, and because I’m not a one trick pony.

Idunno, I feel so fucking free, I just want to do everything that feels right. Not that it’s much different from last week or the week before, and so on…but with each new level of confidence, there’s all these possibilities that are just screaming at me, and I’d like to check them out.