Read
below for our most current tour diary...and check our
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more pics and stories.
U.S.
Summer Tour July 11– August 10, 2005
July
11
SANTA CRUZ CIVIC CENTER—SANTA CRUZ, CA
Jo: Hey tour-diary readers! The
bus picked us up early in the morning from the Sheraton at the SF airport
and drove us to sunny Santa Cruz to get these Le Beckre gigs started.
We got familiar with our new home-away-from-home, chose our bunks, checked
out the VHS tape selection on board etc. The bus parked at the venue and
we wandered around. Drinking coffee on the sidewalk we ran into Will (hey
willpower!),
Dusty (LT crew veteran), and Michelle (who gave us perfect haircuts backstage
after the show). We ate falafel, went shopping at the drug store, and
waited around for soundcheck. I'm reading The Commanders (Bob
Woodward) and JD's reading The Executioner's Song (Norman Mailer).
Soundcheck was brief and traumatic, our set was short and to the point,
but hey, that's the way it goes sometimes.
July
12
SAN JOSE, CA
JD: Today we made it up to San
Jose for our second show with Beck. The show was fun,
especially because we saw our friends, Gravy
Train!!!! dancing crazy while we played. Their new record,
"Are You Wigglin?" came out today! So we got
cds and all kinds of new Gravy Train!!!! merchandise including some turquoise
hotpants. After the show we went onto the bus for our first real bus party!
We ran into a bunch of girls who had made signs and homemade Le Tigre
shirts with keyboards on them that looked super cool. Then we got on the
buzzle and we hung out with The Train and we played a game where we tried
to recreate a picture of Brontez looking at his balls in horror. It was
the best game we ever played. Then there were a couple of imitations etc.
Fun with digital cameras... What else can we say...
Kathleen says... "suck it"
Junx and Jo and Funx and Hunx looking at someone's uncanny replication
of 'The Brontez Ball Picture'
JD showing off Janelle's Sharpie work. Boobs 4 eva.
Seth
imitating JD.
July
14
QUEEN ELIZABETH THEATER—VANCOUVER, BC
JD: Vancouver was a blast!!! We
had the night off before the show and went and had drinks with our pals
from new york who were in Vancouver shooting the next season of The L
Word. Yes you heard it, The L Word. I got to take a beautiful
walk on the water with Bitch (from Bitch
and Animal fame) and Daniella who scored a new role on The
L Word this season. Yippee!!! We had macrobiotic smoothies and went out
for drinks with Alan Cumming and the Le Tigre touring
party. It was a delight to spend some off time with pals. The show in
Vancouver was great too because even though it was a seated theater there
were a bunch of people up and dancing while we played. That hasn't happened
very often during these shows with Beck, so it was really a treat for
us. Vancouver loves us and we love Vancouver. After the show we had a
party backstage which quickly moved out to the bus where we could play
loud music and dance the night away. Since we didn't have a proper record
release party for Gravy Train!!!! we figured we should
really give them props on an amazing record. Kathleen hit the cd player
in the front lounge, cranked up the speakers, flicked on the disco lights
and there it was... The best bus party we have ever had, smiles galore.
We listened to the whole record and then went back for our favorites and
no one got bored. Three cheers for Gravy Train!!!! and for our old and
new friends from Vancouver. Thanks for a great night.
JD
and Alan Cumming trying to look really cute.
Kathleen
and Bitch posing for the camera.
Check
out this rad dance party on our bus!!!
JO
and Kathleen getting down to Gravy Train!!!!
photo by Jonathan Kreinik
July
15
THE PARAMOUNT—SEATTLE, WA
Jo: I woke up early and drank coffee
on the bus, recovering from our Gravy Train dance party the night before,
and waiting for a decent hour to call my friend Shaun so I could make
him take me to breakfast somewhere. He took me to a delicious french place
where he horrified me by eating what looked like a milky-white embryo
on toast, but that's not what it was really. Then we went to a consignment
shop and he almost convinced me to buy a necklace of giant triangular
wooden beads before he had to go to his job (he does hair at Vain). So
then we did our usual boring stuff like our vocal warm-up tape and sound
check blah blah blah. Our show had a calisthenic/vaudeville vibe. The
stage felt like a walk-in freezer and we gave our all to a tough crowd
saving their love for Beck. Post-show I drank some vin rouge and socialized
until suddenly I became very very sleepy.
This
is McRorie, the one man-midi-band who we played with for a few of the
Beck dates.
July
16
MEMORIAL COLISEUM—PORTLAND, OR
JD: Today we woke up in the parking
lot of the Memorial Coliseum. Jo and I worked out at the Holiday Inn and
then I went to Chipotle Grill and Radio Shack which sucked. Then we sound-checked
in the crazy huge metal coliseum that had so much crazy slap delay on
everything that we couldn't tell what was us and what was the echo of
us!!! That was rough. Then we played the show and heard our friends and
Kathleen's family cheering from far into the crowd, which was so nice.
After the show we hung out backstage for a while with Kathleen's awesome
family and family friends until I had to go to my dj gig at The Dunes
with Nathan from The Gossip. The party is called Suicide
Club and it was the same party that we saw Lesbians On Ecstasy
play last year. We had such a good time spinning for all of the happy
lesbians and dancing fags. It pretty much ruled. Then I got picked up
by Jo in a car so that we could make our curfew on the bus... Just in
time... and we were off to San Francisco for a nice day off!
July 18
BILL GRAHAM CIVIC CENTER—SAN FRANCISCO, CA
Jo: This was a fun show, even though they spelled our
name wrong on the marquee and I broke a guitar string in the first 20
seconds of On The Verge (our first song!) I was nervous because
we had so many friends and family-members watching us in a 8,500 capacity
venue, but after a few minutes on stage it just felt like a normal show.
Gina Schock from the GoGo's came back-stage to say hi
and we were totally star-struck! Some people went around the corner to
a bar, I went and found my sister and we watched the Beck show together.
And luckily my mom made brownies for the bus so nobody went to bed hungry.
Kathlenn
and Gina
Backstage,
Kathleen and Jo pose for their Throat Coat Tea ad campaign
July 19
SANTA BARBARA COUNTY BOWL—SANTA BARBARA, CA
Kathleen: This was our first outdoor
show with the Beckster and the crowd was loving us (hahaha). No really,
they warmed up to us after a few songs. The amphitheatre we played in
was like fake ancient Rome AKA the set of The Flintstones. I was sleep-deprived
(as was much of the band and crew) so the show would prove to be an experiment
in sleep deprivation slash delerium. The theme of the show was "this
crowd can suck it" which I know SOUNDS mean, but believe me, after
being on tour, off and on for a year, there are times when it just can't
be about CONNECTING with the crowd , its about SURVIVING them, especially
when you're the opening band and you feel like you are totally on acid.
I'm sure I seemed totally wasted since I was talking to myself off mic
between songs and laughing hysterically at complicated jokes I was making
in my own head. On top that we were using every opportunity to tell each
other secretly to "suck it." At some point JD acted like
there was something wrong with the sampler so I would go over to
her area and find the sneaky piece of bright orange tape she had left
me a little message on. Appropriately, it said "suck it." It
was one of those rare Wonderful/Terrible shows that I will remember for
a long, long time.
July
20
THE AVALON—LOS ANGELES, CA
Jo: We played one of our first
shows ever with Electrelane in London. At the time we
were completely fascinated by their garage-y, haunted space-travel aesthetic
and regal stage presence and they've only gotten better since then. This
summer I painted my kitchen with their new album "Axes" on repeat.
So needless to say we were happy to see them for our first headline show
of the tour, although our pre-show routine was disrupted by some ominous
signs. A huge pipe (part of the lighting rig) came crashing down on to
the stage as Electrelane was walking on for their sound check, nearly
hitting Verity (who plays keyboards for Electrelane). Then, as I was ironing
our pink stage outfits (we wanted them to look good for Ben and Jennie,
who designed them) I somehow ironed a big black mark onto the white neckline
of Kathleen's dress. I went into a superstitious stress-out, but everything
ended up fine. The crowd was on fire straight through the opening song
of Gram Rabbit's acid-head movie score to our fucked-up encore (the DVD
skipped during Deceptacon)! Thanks everybody! After the show we drank
champagne with friends, and planned a pool party at our hotel for the
next day. I was incredibly relieved when Ben and Jennie said they could
fix Kathleen's dress. Outside the club a good-looking kid who claimed
to work at the MAC counter at Nordstrom delivered a scathing-but-loving
critique of the show which we found deeply validating.
Jo
at the pool party, photo by Bil McMillian
JULY 21
DAY
OFF—LOS ANGELES, CA
JD: Today was really great for
me. I stayed at my friend Emily's house and we had a wonderful day full
of delicious breakfast and swimming and then dinner with my aunt and her
girlfriend. And then I djed at two different parties, after watching The
Go Team!! play at the Troubadour. What a wonderful day. The second
party that I djed was our friend Rudy and Jeppe from Junior Senior's
party in downtown LA. I had so much fun! It was absolutely amazing. Electrelane
came and we danced all night. We got so fucking sweaty it was incredible.
Check out these pics!
Jeppe
and Jo and JD behind the dj booth getting really sweaty. Wow check out
the sweat rings!!!
Rudy
and JD and Jeppe partying down at "Little Pedros"
My
pal emily getting down to the tunes at the party! Recognize her from my
arm. I have a portrait tattoo of emily on the back of my arm!!!
July
22
BECK SHOW AT UNIVERSAL AMPHITHEATER—LOS ANGELES, CA
JD: This was our last show of our
short but sweet tour with the Beck-ster.The show was in this really huge
amphitheater in Universal City so there was all kinds of people taking
tours of Universal Studios right outside our dressing room. Weird! It
was a pretty fun show and we had a bunch of fans spread out among the
thousands of Beck fans. So it was nice to see people dancing and singing
along and cheering for us in little pockets all over the place. Then we
got to hang out after the show with our friends and family. Kathleen's
sister and her friend came out to LA to see the show and my aunt and her
pals were there, who I love so much! We just kind of hung out and watched
people all night in the VIP area. Including a bunch of young boys who
i ended up doing a photo shoot with, and some young girls who we met and
hung out with for a while. Then we were off in the bus to Las Vegas. Finally
time to play the slots and hit the roulette wheel. Tomorrow Le Tigre is
playing on "The Strip"!
JD with a group of 11-13 year-old boys. It looks like a band photo,
right?!
Notice
how the girl on the right constructed a tank top out of a men's Le Tigre
blue ringer shirt!
July
23
LAS VEGAS, NV
Kathleen: Tonight we played the
House of Blues inside the Mandalay Bay Casino in Vegas, which I'm sure
sounds like a total nightmare, but it was actually really great.The kids
were total adorable jumping bean weirdos and the sound was awesome (thanks
to the people who run the place for having a decent PA and to our sound
crew, Mary and Jonathan.) It was kind of surreal cuz our bizarre feminist
punk rock/performance type thing was happening inside this gnarly casino
filled with hyper-normal suburban types doing as many boring "bad
things" as possible on their vacations. Electrelane was amazing tonight.
They are so cerebral and soundtracky to me, while at the same time being
completely-absolutely-stunningly moving, i.e. I feel like I am gonna cry
whenever I hear them. Verity has the most perfect voice, it is so effortless
and huge. Mia, their guitar player, reminds me a little of Michelle, the
original bass player for Babes in Toyland, just cuz she has a really intense
stage presence that is so understated and sexy, especially when she does
this thing I like to call the horse hoof dance. She has totally pioneered
her own subtle, just-at-the-right-time, guitar style. The fact that women
can create such swooping dynamics as a team gives me a lot of hope. I
can't really say any of this to their faces though, maybe I'll tell them
to read this so they'll know how I feel. Anyways, after the show we all
went to the New York New York casino and I got kicked out for not having
ID. I guess yelling "but I am 36 years old" all the way to the
door wasn't a great plan. So I returned to the bus with the ten dollars
I was planning to gamble and made a really big sandwich.
Electrelane
rocking in Las fuckin' Vegas
July
24
SOMA—SAN DIEGO, CA
JD: Well, today was another super
fun exciting day in San Diego. Complete with a trip to the gym, Target,
Mexican food, and In and Out Burger. Phew it was actually pretty exhausting.
With the Beck leg of tour over, it was time to say hello to our fans for
good, and this show was the perfect place to do it. San Diego is always
great. We have so much fun with the kids there who love to dance and cheer
and give us so much love. The show was great even though Gram Rabbit couldn't
make it because of flooding... So it was just Electrelane and us and we
just want to say thanks so much for waiting all that time to all of our
fans. We know it can get grueling sometimes when you show up really early
and then no bands come on for a a few hours. yikes. After the show my
friends, Eden and Emily, and I went onto the Electrelane bus for our first
real bus party with those girls. It was really really fun to hang out
together on their super cool bus. Basically kids, it is the beginning
of a beautiful friendship.
July
26
GOTHIC THEATRE—DENVER, CO
Jo: I woke up on the bus to a note
on the dry-erase board in the front lounge that David, our driver was
going to have to take the bus in for a repair, so we were going to have
to get our stuff off the bus early and hang out in the venue. Carmine
and Jonathan were awake, with a fresh pot of coffee, and Carmine had already
conducted a video interview with David regarding the problem with one
of the wheels (I don't know, something about a ball bearing). The only
problem with hanging out in the venue was the overwhelming odor of MOLD.
Frankly, it made everyone a little cranky. And I got a really disgusting
salad at the sandwich place next door which didn't improve my mood. The
pervert Kathleen and I encountered in the supermarket didn't make us very
happy either. But backstage Amy lit a candle, got crazy with the febreeze,
and the vibe improved. After the show, we partied like we had spent the
whole day trapped in a moldy cave and had a day off the next day, which
fortunately we did! Some of us got extremely rowdy with Gram Rabbit and
some strangers on Electrelane's tour bus. Let's just say there was a hot
dispute (still unresolved) regarding proper arm-wrestling form which prevents
me from declaring a champion. Kathleen, strangely, was not not involved
with these antics. She was back on our own bus watching Some Kind
of Monster (the Metallica documentary). We eventually calmed down,
piled back on the bus and began our long drive.
The ingenious parking lot clothesline in St.George
The beautiful sunset in St. George, photo by Jonathan Kreinik
July
28
EMO'S BIG ROOM—AUSTIN, TX
Jo: We arrived in Austin
refreshed by our day off in St. George, Utah where we spent the day at
a top-notch Hampton Inn (pool party, family field trip to see War
of the Worlds which sucked except for a few hilarious moments, non-competitive
badminton in the parking lot, gorgeous sunset). The last time we played
at Emo's it was an unseasonably cold April and it actually snowed the
day of our show. It was so cold we couldn't stretch our video screen onto
the frame, and in an effort to snap it on we heated it up with a hair
dryer and melted little patches of it, causing permanent damage to our
beloved fast-fold! Well, we didn't have that problem this time. It was
so freaking hot it looked like we had just emerged from a jacuzzi together
when we walked off stage. The show was very very fun despite the heat
and the weird support column on stage that isolates the band-member on
the samp side. Someone handed me a pair of sunglasses that I wore intermittently
throughout the set, and that later JD used as a disguise to run unrecognized
(haha) between our bus and Electrelane's.
July 29
ENGINE ROOM—HOUSTON, TX
JD: Tonight was pretty fun, but
it sure was hot again... I can't believe how hot it gets down here in
the summer time. Dana, the sound person for Electrelane, and I tried to
play badminton but we got so sweaty and hot that it was just gross. So
we gave up. I decided to wear my contact lenses for the first time during
the show and it was pretty fucking weird, especially since there was so
much smoke in the club. I felt like my eyes were about to roll offstage
and into the crowd and then people were going to jump on them. I got so
hot. It was crazy. I was wearing a rainbow bandana on my head, and then
out of nowhere someone threw three rainbow visors onstage that matched
my headband perfectly. Can you believe it? That was super duper funny.
And we stole some guys sunglasses the night before (Jo: so he CLAIMS)
and we had to give them back tonight. But not before taunting him with
them from the stage all night. After the show I had to dj at an after
party for the show. At a warehouse. It could have been a lot of fun but
I was exhausted and a bunch of shit wasn't working so I was pretty much
pissed most of the night. But it was fun anyways to just see Houston a
little bit and hang out with the kids from our tour that came along for
support. When we got back I realized how much fun this tour was, and it
made me really happy.
Look very closely and you can see the woman-symbol manicure. This is the
incredible person made us personalized rainbow visors. WE LOVE YOU!
July
30
HOUSE OF BLUES—NEW ORLEANS, LA
Kathleen: Today we went to the
college radio station and did a brief interveiw with a nice young man
named Brad. He was passive and we were tired so it probably wasn't the
most exciting interveiw we've ever done. But, he was nice and had a good
radio show which is cool since so much indie radio is going under from
lack of funding. I did notice that all the bands with a strong female
presence in them had a woman symbol drawn on the spine of their cd's which
was kind of awesome and weird at the same time. Tonight was the first
night I got to watch to watch Oragami who is the opening
band (Electrelane plays second). I met one of them in Australia and she
said they'd be coming to the states so we all hooked up for a short leg
of this tour. The singer for this band is fucking incredible. Tight pants,
converse all stars and a wild patterned shirt. She strutted like the hugest
rockstar ever (a hard thing to do when you are in the first band) and
totally pulled it off. They are a great raw pop punk band with a singer
who rides guitar fuzz like a surfer having a great time on a real big
wave.
August
1
CANE'S BALLROOM—TULSA, OK
Kathleen: This was such a fun show.
I was completely in love with every person in the crowd, and let me tell
you, there was every kind of beautiful weirdo at this one. Distinguished
grey haired male activists, young feminists with cool glasses, handsome
twenty something gay duos, 13 year old girls with crazy make up and matching
tank tops, gorgeous frantic dancing trannies, a girl with a moustache
glued to her forehead (I think her upper lip got overheated so she just
sorta stuck it up there) suburban moms chaperoning their kids, butch lesbians
pumping their fists in the air, and of course, stage left, was home to
the cutest 12 year old bad news bears kids I have ever seen (I am refering
to the 70's bad news bears of course). These kids were like little Matt
Dillon/Leif Garretts and they were having a great time dancing to our
band. It made me really happy.
August
2
GRANADA THEATRE—LAWRENCE, KS
Kathleen: I totally thought no
one was gonna show up to this show!!! I guess I always sort of think no
one is gonna show up. But they did. It was really really hot in the club
and the room had what we, in the biz, like to call "dead sound"
. AKA you know how if you were alone in a theatre on the stage and you
sang, say a song off the dreamgirls soundtrack or something, your voice
would bounce off the walls and kind of echo with a natural reverb. Well,
not tonight. This club was dead, the room was dead, the stage was dead,
but hey, it was hot and the crowd was amazing so it couldn't help but
be a stellar show anyways. I actually got really into looking at people
and some folks were freaked out by it. I guess performers don't typically
look right at audience members and try and goof around with them. The
thing is, I had real bad PMS all day and felt so gross so it was weird
that I was able to look at people. . . I think the show actually put me
in a good mood. I really can't predict what will be a good night or bad
night anymore so there's kind of no reason to stress out about it like
I used to. So far the audiences on our headlining part this tour have
made the shows great. When I am tired or in a bad mood, they just kind
of carry me. We're really lucky that people not only show up to the clubs,
but actually contribute in a huge way. I can't even express how thankful
I am for it.
We will be updating this as much as possible while
we're on the road...so keep checking back for more tour diaries!
Also new in tour diaries . . . European Festival Tour!