The Full Account... Part 2.

During that evening in Redding we discussed the "Cloud of Lee." Now let me explain. Lee, for some inexplicable reason, can lose everything. We decided he is much akin to Pig Pen from the old Peanuts comic strip, but instead of dirt, he has a cloud of his own possessions. At any time, one or more of these possessions can be lost. Just sitting in the front seat of my car, he has the ability to lose his lighter, a pack of cigarettes and his cell phone. It's often times quite comical. I think throughout the trip he lost and bought 4 to 5 lighters. He almost lost his wallet in a Walmart parking lot. Luckily for him a nice woman saw him drop it and handed it back to him. Which made us wonder where he stores his wallet. The best theory was on his head.

Anyway, after leaving the casino/card room we went to the liquor store to get some supplies. You know; pork rinds, pint of Jim Beam and a half rack of beer. As we walked in we heard the strangest noise. It sounded like a fat guy with sleep apnea. Come to find out it was just a very hot and fat bulldog guided by his master on a skateboard.

We got back to the hotel. We had 2 adjoining rooms. We took a peak in on Doug, who was sound asleep. We had a few more beers in the other room while Wes enjoyed his pork rinds and Lee his Jim Beam. Just then we heard an odd chirping noise. Chirp.... Chirp... Chirp.... The fire alarm battery was going out. So I grabbed a chair and hopped up there to pull out the battery. I pulled the whole alarm down and monkeyed with it for awhile to figure out how to get the battery out. Finally figuring it out Wes decided we needed to notify the front desk. He and I walked down to the office. We looked through the window and no one was manning the counter. Then as we got closer to the door we noticed the night attendant sound asleep on the couch in the lobby. We walked in and stared at him for a short time. Kind of wondering what our next action was going to be. Wes looked over to the counter and saw a bell. He walked over there as I stood there kind of shocked that this was actually going to take place. Wes' hand hovered over the bell as he buried his head in the crook of his arm. His finger came down on the bell twice. The night attendant flailed a bit and hopped up all flustered and wiping sleep out of his eyes. Then one of the strangest conversations took place:

Night attendant: "How can I help you?"

Wes: "Hey man, sorry to wake you. I'm not trying to give you hard time or look for a discount or something. We just wanted to let you know the batteries in this fire alarm are going out. You know what happens when the batteries in these things go out?"

Me: "Chirp... Chirp... Chirp..."

Wes: "They chirp."

Me: "Chirp... Chirp... Chirp..."

Wes: "We just wanted to let you know in case there's a fire or something that we get a free room when we burn."

Night Attendant: "Oh ok."

Wes: "Sorry we had to wake you, you can go back to sleep now."

Me: "You were awfully cute sleeping away."

For some reason I was embodied by Flavor Flav during that interaction.

The next morning we enjoyed a nice breakfast at Denny's and set out again on our southern journey. Another day of solid driving and weird conversations and Lee losing everything on his person. Not to mention spilling peanuts all over the front floor boards.

At one point we had to stop for a bathroom break. Doug and Wes were carrying on in the truck. We figured we would catch up with no problem. It took us literally 150 miles to catch up. Which seemed strange. Doug wasn't going to fast and I was doing 80. But we finally caught up right around the town of Lost Hills (The town where James Dean died.) We were texting and calling back and forth. Lee was on the phone with Wes as we tried to figure out where they were. He was getting frustrated trying to figure out any discernible landmarks or mile markers as to their location. At one point he hung up on Wes. Then promptly called them back as they said there was a bumper to watch out for. So I'm looking all over the side of the road for this bumper as a land mark. Then realizing he meant it was in the middle of the freeway. Everyone swerving willy nilly. I know this probably unhinged  Doug a bit trying to navigate the truck and trailer around this bumper. We got off at the next exit. A town called Buttonwillow Junction. Located about 60 miles north of the Grapevine. We pulled into the Super 8. Wes and Doug got a room together. Lee wanted his own room for the night. My wife and I had our own. The edge everyone was feeling from the rough drive and bumper incident was fading a bit. Through our weird conversations we had determined that Lee's new rock name was to be Randy Cooch. I'm not exactly how we came to that. I think it transpired over the coarse of 300 miles.

We were all pretty hungry. My wife and I headed across the street to the TA truck stop. It had a Taco Bell inside. We decided to order a 12 pack of tacos. We took that back to Wes and Doug's room. We sat and watched some Family Guy eating tacos and Top Ramen. We had noticed when we first got to Wes and Doug's room a litany of beer cans and cigarette butts sitting on top of the AC outside. There were few guys just sort of sitting around drinking. We weren't to sure what their deal was. A bunch of guys just partying? Who knows. We had a few beers in the room then went outside to have a smoke. Wes and I got to talking to the guys outside. Come to find out they were seismic drillers out of Canada. They were staying in the area for some 20 more days working up at Lost Hills. For the rest of the night we sat there talking and drinking with these guys. They found out we were in a band touring and playing the Whisky the following night and they were all pretty excited. They bought a bunch of t-shirts and CDs. They had us autograph pretty much everything. Lee retired to his room having some paper work to get done and my wife went back to our to watch the season finale of Master Chef.

Lee came back and made token appearance to sign some autographs. My wife came back after awhile as well after the show was over. Doug made her stop talking about the show because he had DVRed the show at home and wanted to watch it when he got back.

After a couple beer runs across the street to the TA, the night came to a close. We woke up the next morning and enjoyed yet another breakfast at Denny's and headed back out. We hit the Grapevine around 1:00 or so. Doug was having a tough time will his truck up the hill loaded down with all our gear. We buzzed up in the Toyota to a gas station near the top and waited. Doug had to pull over at one point to keep from overheating. Considering at that time the temperature was skirting with cracking 100 degrees, I'm not entirely surprised that he was running hot. He finally rejoined us near the top as we crested the hill into San Fernando Valley. The smog was pretty thick that day. You could just see the haze down in the valley. We ran down the hill and then in to LA. After a few off ramps and freeway swaps we found our way to Hollywood. Passing by Grauman's Chinese Theater and all the characters out front. We finally hit Sunset. We head on down towards the Whisky. We stopped at the light just before it and Lee points to the marque. White City Graves playing tonight! What an awesome sight!

We turned up San Vicente Blvd to find parking. There was a sign that said Whisky parking. It was a squirrely little lot that I'm surprised Doug was able to weasel that trailer up into. The attendant wanted $40 for us to park there. We thought that was a little pricey. So we walked over to The Whisky to see where we should park. We left Doug as collateral that we would be right back. We went and talked to the club and they told us to park on the back side of the club. So we all moved our vehicles over there. In the end we still ended up paying $40 to park. We still had a few hours before we had to load in. So we plopped ourselves down at Duke's next door. We grabbed something to drink while we waited. Finally we came to load in time. My wife at this point was rather cranky because of the hotel prices in the area and lack of availability. She didn't want to burden Wes and his wife and her cousins by crashing on their floor at the Hotel London. But it was looking like we had little choice.

We loaded in our gear and did some quick guitar fixes. My wife went for a walk and to do a little shopping to calm herself down. We did our sound check and I have to give credit to the Whisky staff. They are true pros. 2 guys manning the sound. 1 dedicated to the monitors and stage sound. The other dedicated to the house sound. It's one of the few times that I could hear everything from the stage. We finished up and pushed everything toward the back of the stage. Grabbed our guitars and took them up to our dressing room. Yes we had a dressing room.

I met back up with my wife who wanted to see if we could drive to the outskirts and see if we could find a hotel. But once again the cheapest we could find was $350 for the night. Little too pricey. We went back to the club admitting defeat and realizing we were floor bound. We met back up at Duke's again where we grabbed a bite to eat. A delicious Monte Cristo.

After eating my wife and I headed up to our dressing room. She wanted to change and wash up a bit. While she was doing that the singer for the band Vette was warming up. They were on right before us. She had the strangest warm up method I had ever heard. "By by by BY. Guy guy guy GUY." and so on. My wife finished up and we headed back down stairs to watch the opener.

The open was this girl who was doing a solo singing act. She had kind of an airy sound like Enya or Bjork. Something along those lines. She ran through her set as the crowd looked on. She came to her last song, "Lipstick, Jewels and High Heeled Shoes." A line that she repeat several times throughout the song. Then at the end of the song the music stops and she says it one more time and starts laughing then in a man's voice she says, "You know you love them." Everyone in the audience was beside themselves. She was actually a he! None of us had any idea.

Vette then went on and they played their brand of what would be best described as bubble gum punk. Female fronted local LA band that, vocally, reminded me a little of  the band Aqua. The ones who did that Barbie Girl song. Just with more guitars. They played a good set.

We were up next. I gotta say I was pretty nervous. I don't usually get that nervous before a show. But this time I was pretty worked up. We got set up and they shut down the house lights. It was completely dark. Wes started into the intro and I realized that to start that intro I have a long slide. I can't see my hands at all. A little bit of panic ran through me thinking I was going to screw up right out of the gate. Luckily after playing it enough times, muscle memory kicks in and you just go. We started off a little rocky. I'm sure nerves were in play for all of us. You just think about the people who have played that same stage and it's pretty daunting. We pulled ourselves together and ended up playing one of the best sets ever. People were really diggin it. Even the sound guys. That surprised me because, well they hear hundreds, if not thousands of bands. One of the sound guys actually told us we need to move to LA. He said that we would kill down there.

We played great. Not to brag or anything like that. But the way we played I would have paid to go see us that night. The only real glitch was my mic came unplugged during the last line of Anger. Other than that a true balls to the wall 30 minute set.

We got off stage and loaded out our gear and were immediately mobbed outside by bunches of folks. Some we knew, some we didn't. Folks wanting pictures with us and so on. Later I would ask Wes if he thought people driving by thought we were famous or something because of all the cameras. We got everything loaded back in the trailer and went back in to hear the rest of the music. All the while my wife making a killing on selling merch.

There were 4 more acts after us. The guys right after us were along the lines of more straight laced rock. Then a more blues oriented band, after them was just a guy and girl who apparently were suppose to be there with their whole band. But their band disintegrated in the middle of their tour. They were the only ones left. They just did 2 songs. Then the headliner. A band call The Product. They were originally from Hawaii and had recently transplanted themselves to LA. They played very heavy handed reggae mixed with rock. They were really good. I guess their next stop was heading up here to play Hemp Fest here in Seattle. An oddly perfect band for that kind of venue.

The Whisky actually closes down really early. 11pm. So we were wondering what to do with ourselves then. We didn't want to have to pay a $12 cover to get into the Viper Room, The Rainbow or The Roxy. So we walked on down Sunset looking for something open. A lot of the strip really closes down early. At first we got a table at Mel's Diner. But all of us agreed we didn't really want to sit there and pay $9 for a Budweiser. So we ventured further on down. Lee, Doug, my wife and I found ourselves at the Comedy Store. Since it was late they weren't charging a cover to get in. We went and sat down, ordered a few drinks. I ordered gin and tonic, which I think was a poor choice considering how I felt the next day. We all sat off to the side in a dark corner. The comedian that was on noticed us. He commented that we looked like we were in a band. Everyone laughed at us. Then he started asking us questions. Imagine his joy when he found out we were indeed a band. That really opened a can of worms. He then asked us what we were doing there. We all replied that we were on tour and just played the Whisky. He then clarified by asking what we were doing at The Comedy Store at midnight. Our response was it's the only thing open. From then on every comedian that went up took their shots at us. Calling us Incubus, saying that we know a lot about hookers and blow and so on. It was awesome! Very funny!

We stuck around for 4 or 5 comedians. Then one went on and started to bomb. We decide to leave. We went back to the hotel London. Wes and his wife were still up, but her cousins were out. We stayed up for a little while chatting and watching the drama unfold down below on the strip from the balcony. Police, homeless guy and some random drunk hooker. Good times. Shortly after that we all crashed. My wife and Doug were on the L shaped couch and I got the floor. I only had my shirt as a blanket. Comfy.

That's all for part 2... San Diego and Carlsbad coming soon!