Ken Flagg eclectic indie rock

Tour Diary: Days 11-12, Los Angeles (pt. 2) & Fresno

I must admit that it is tough to write this final tour diary entry from the comfort of my dining room.  There is something about typing out these entries in the van, at a cafe, or in someone else's kitchen that lends the whole process a sense of immediacy and authenticity.  Now I am just relating tales of things past, like an aged man capturing his memoirs for posterity.  But relate I must!  For you, the fans, wait hungrily for details of the final tour dates.  Wait no more: they are here.

When we last spoke, it was our day of rest.  No gig, no travel.  We all thought we would be whisked away by our many Los Angeles friends to pool parties and other prototypical Hollywood affairs, but as it turned out we spent the whole day sitting around and doodling on the internet.  Well, not the whole day.  Paul and I did venture out to Shoe City, where I purchased my first pair of Converse (black with white laces) in an attempt to hipsterizer myself (result: failure), and then to Sears, where Paul bought a jacket and I caused mayhem by turning the knob on the multi-purpose music box in the Christmas display from "All Holiday Songs" to "Halloween."  You should have seen the children's faces!

Did I mention there's not much to do without a car in North Hollywood?  But I digress.  The next day I awoke to find that my videocamera would not charge.  Not knowing whether it was a problem with the camera or the power cable, we headed to Fry's to find a replacement power supply.  The replacement worked when I tested it in the car, but when we got back to the house the true cause of the problem became clear: the power receptacle on the camera had snapped internally during a fall at Mr. T's.  What to do?  The battery was only 75% charged.  It was resolved that the tour diary video would be suspended and the juice would be used for that night's show at the Bootleg.

When we got to the venue, however, we were informed that videotaping (even of ourselves!) was not allowed.  Sad!  But at least it allowed us to tape the Fresno gig.  The Bootleg Theater, despite its arcane rules, is an awesome venue, with a bar in the same room as the stage.  Finally!  It made a real difference.  Instead of cowering in the back of the room feeling fidgety and wanting another beer, people were able to cower by the bar instead, purchasing and consuming drinks at will.  Ta-da: no fidgeting!  Our set, which was first, went really well, and my voice (which had been in disrepair since Seattle) was back to full force, allowing us to perform "Mountain Girl" to the appreciative crowd.

Notable guests included acclaimed guitarist Capital, super-talented singer-songwriter Pi Jacobs, film editor and music blogger DJ Ollie Baba and award-winning recording engineer Steve Sykes.  What?  It's LA.  I'm supposed to name-drop.  Everyone else does it.  Here are some more names: The Swagger Sticks, Toy Robot and Hotel St. George.   These are the other bands we played with, and they were ridiculously good.

Trivia time: the bass player from The Swagger Sticks, Matt Morales, is also a stand-up comedian who does shows with Kevin Avery, with whom I used to work.  Funny men, both!  Toy Robot's lead singer and guitarist, Loren Isaac, used to work with Capital, who incidentally was there because our drummer Chris used to be in a band with him.  Hotel St. George is from San Diego, where we have played!  OK, that's not really trivia.  The guitar player likes to break his gear, though, which I thought was cool.  Let me say it again: the show was off the hook.  We met lots of new people, including a particularly nice guy named Big Dave who now sports a Ken Flagg glow-in-the-dark button on his jacket.  Expect to see us doing shows with these bands again in the future.

After the show, despite my best efforts to get the rest of the band to attend, I was dropped off all on my oddy-knocky at an after-party for a women's roller-derby league.  Boy do they know how to party!  Of course, this being LA, there were some movie stars in attendance.  Well, OK, they had bit parts in a movie about roller derby.  But still!  There were shenanigans, as the photo shows, though I am a faithful boyfriend and steered clear.  Not that I was invited to participate.  Later that evening I had one of my favorite late-night snacks: a bacon-wrapped hot dog.  Goddamn those things are good.

The next day DJ Ollie took me to the North Hollywood Diner, which he tells me is one of the few true-blue diners in Los Angeles.  I couldn't find it on Google Maps, sadly, otherwise I'd point you in its general direction.  The food was fantastic, if a bit heavy.  One bite of Ollie's biscuit with gravy and I felt almost unable to move.  Apparently starving to death is not a risk associated with touring.  Afterwards he dropped me off at Frank's house and it was time to pack up and prepare for our final destination: Fresno.

I noted in a previous entry that everything we had heard about Fresno left us in a state of trepidation with regards to actually playing there.  These fears were unfounded.  After plowing through the wall of methane surrounding the town, we found it to be small and uneventful, yet friendly.  Meth-addled truckers and former college-bound youths turned crack dealers were nowhere to be found.  Who makes this stuff up?  There's even a top-notch brewery and restaurant in town.  We ate there, and were sated.

The venue we played, Audie's Olympic, has a great sound system and the only shag-carpet stage we encountered on tour.  Score!  They also have free pool, which helped to kill time while we waited for the other bands and the sound man to appear.  The show got under way at around 10pm with the spaced-out Dia del Astronauta, who weave woozy guitar textures around lilting vocals to create pockets of sonic haze for the audience to bliss out in.  They're playing tonight at Mr. T's Bowl, incidentally, so if you are in LA, check them out.  We followed with our final set of the tour, which for the first time did not include "Ship of Plenty" or our fancy mushroom light, largely due to a) the vibe of the gig and b) the fact that we couldn't use our smoke machine.   It was never the less a great and worthy set, which included plenty of stage banter and one audience member reminding us, emphatically, that we should have "no regrets."

The final set of the night came from the Buffalo Guns, who as far as I know do not hunt bison.  They were highly energetic and generally awesome, and have the distinction of being the only band we played with who not only acknowledged the other bands on the bill, but actually rapped their names repeatedly.  Very cool and somewhat surreal.  They also jump around a lot and generally put on a great stage show.  Beanies off to you, Buffalo Guns, for helping to close out our tour in style!

From that point forward it was simply a matter of driving the 3 hours back to San Francisco, which Chris bravely volunteered to do.  The drive was smooth and stuffed full of Radiohead songs.  While we coasted along the highway I had time to reflect on the ups and downs of the tour, as well as the stuff I've learned about touring and performing in general, none of which I will relate to you here because it would bore you.  Suffice it to say that going on the road was a resounding success and we have nothing but love and thanks for all of the people and bands we met along the way who helped make something that from a statistical standpoint should have been an abject failure riddled with catastrophe (a first tour) into something wonderful and not at all painful to reflect on.

OK, I'm getting sappy.  We'll see you next time we hit the road.  Until then, keep the rock in your heart by saying hello to Cleveland.  Over and over.

Tour Diary: Day 9, Los Angeles (pt. 1)

Hello from sunny, sparkly Los Angeles!  Today is our only true, don't-have-to-drive-anywhere day off.  We are staying at the home of legendary drummer Frank Briggs who has been kind enough to put us up at his lovely home, replete with recording studio and bubbling fountain.  Who could ask for more?  Being on the road rules.

Yesterday's fuzzy morning led to a questionable choice of breakfast spots - the Denny's at the corner of University and Fairmount.  For some totally unfathomable reason, they provide you first with a three-panel laminated nutrition guide.  Did you know that you can feed yourself for a week on a Cheesy 3-Pack?  At least, that's what my napkin calculator told me.  Seriously, it was scary and enlightening.  No wonder the country is expanding rapidly.  I opted for a balance of health and name quality and got a Moons Over My Hammy.  I only ate half.

It was fun to get back on the road with the whole band, until we hit traffic in the middle of LA.  I love parts of LA, but not the traffic.  If I lived here I might become a road rage statistic.  Arriving at Frank's house, we were treated to a delectable dinner of spaghetti and turkey meatballs and got to converse with a jet pilot who used to play guitar for Lou Reed.  Seriously?  Yes. We are nobbers of hob.  Take a number, please.

We came here to play music, though, so we hopped in the van and drove to Mr. T's Bowl, which can only be described as bizarre.  It is an old bowling alley which has been converted into a rock club, but which (sort of) maintains two lanes so that, when the situation requires it, bowling can occur.  We did not witness any.  What we did witness was an awesome onslaught of killer bands to whom we owe a debt of gratitude for inspiring what I think was our best show of the tour.  I broke some pink lights!  Now that's raw.

The bands were: Wrong Way Driver, Republic of Letters, Modern Time Machines and Nightmare Air.  It is hard to describe them all since they were all different and fantastic, but here are some trivia bits to keep things interesting: Wrong Way Driver is from Fresno and has played Audie's Olympic, the last spot on our tour.  We are now scared of Fresno.  The bass player from Republic of Letters was working at our breakfast spot in San Diego when we ate there.  Weird!  They have also played Audie's Olympic and have frightening stories.  A big shout-out to Chanda Dancy of MTM for setting up the videocamera, which once again failed to record our first two songs due to my, er, not turning it on or putting it in front of the band.  When she's not getting psychedelic with MTM, Chanda is scoring films and videogames.  Go Chanda!  MTM also has the best merch - little fluffly cloud pins.  And finally, a big thanks to Swaan from Nightmare Air for eschewing hipster protocol and standing in the middle of the room to watch us play.  OK, another thanks to NA for being so over-the-top energetic that we had no choice but to rock the @#%$ out. (I'd curse, but my mom reads this blog.)

Our set!  Normally I don't go into detail, but this time I will, sort of.  The energy of the set was different from the other shows in a way that I can't explain except to say that nothing mattered but the music.  We were plagued with technical difficulties, including the power cutting out of my entire rig (which takes 2 minutes to reset) at the beginning of "Socks" and Paul yanking the cable out of his bass and amp simultaneously at the start of "Candyman" but none of it mattered.  We were as tight and engaged as we have ever been and the audience appeared to really dig it.  I just didn't want to get off of that stage.  Did I mention that we went on at 1am?  Thank you Mr. T's Bowl and the youth of Highland Park for making our first LA engagement so fucking rad.  Oops!  Sorry, mom.

After loading out, sluggishly, we drove home and stopped at Del Taco for another USDA-approved helath injection.  This time I got a Double Del, which was surprisingly the smallest burger they had.  What happened to the Single Del?  And why did I get a burger at a taco joint?  These questions (and more!) may never be answered.

Our next-to-last gig is this Saturday at the Bootleg Theater, which I have heard is an awesome venue.  If you live in LA, you have no excuse not to be there.  We go on at 8pm.  Until then, be well, and count your calories (in thousands).

Tour Diary: Day 8, San Diego

San Diego is a big place, full of big things: bridges, roadways, hangovers.  We had a little fear & loathing last night, but in the good way.  The Ruby Room is a great venue on University, with an attached restaurant that serves comfort food and bartenders who are unafraid to invent fruity shots for the band to consume.  They also have a great beer selection.  Am I focusing too much on the booze?  Perhaps that is because my head hurts.  Let's move backwards in time...

We arrived at our host's house on Tuesday night.  Her name is Heather Carter, and she is a real swell person for putting us up.  Did you know we were in a band together for a day? (She's on the left)   We got Paul back on Wednesday, and the shenanigans resumed.  We took a tour of lovely San Diego, including Balboa Park, and attempted to go bowling but were thwarted by a 45-minute wait, which is simply too long for busy entertainment professionals like us.  We want it all and we want it now.  As a result we eat a lot of hot dogs from street vendors.

But not yesterday.  We ate at the The Mission at Mission Beach, and it was satiating.  Then it was back home to prep for the show, during the course of which I realized that I had left my razor back in Vegas.  Thanks (again!) to Jan, it will be entirely unlike the evidence of my questionable behavior and not stay there.  We sauntered (in a vehicular fashion) over to the Ruby Room and loaded in.  Aside from the drink selection it really is a cool venue, with free Ms. Pac-Man and Asteroids, two pool tables, and a bizarre punching bag game that was mastered by - say it with me - Chris.  There may be a bonus DVD filled entirely with Chris playing video games.

Our set went well, though there were some camera issues that prevented the first two songs from getting recorded.  Oh well.  The audience was appreciative and the sound was high-quality, and since we went on first it allowed us to enjoy the rest of the night.  The next band, Awesome New Republic, were maddeningly good.  The vocalist had an outrageous range and the keyboardist and drummer, who also sang, were true masters of their craft.  Expect to hear them on an iPhone commercial soon.  After that we bobbed our heads to the psychedelic dance music of Inspired Flight, who are great producers, and got all alternative with the awesome S03.  And then everything gets blurry.

We're packing up now for the long, hard slog to LA, where we will once again come devil-horn-to-devil-horn with a bowling alley that won't let us bowl.  Thankfully, it will let us rock.

Tour Diary: Day 6, Las Vegas

According to Chris, the coffee at the Motel 6 we stayed at in Salt Lake City was far better than it should have been.  The beds were shockingly un-long, though; I can't remember the last time my feet hung off the end of a mattress.  We were somewhat well-rested nevertheless, and ready for the obscenely spectacular drive to Vegas (excluding the part where you actually go through Salt Lake City).

Suffice it to say that the scenery on I-15 as it passes through Utah, Arizona and Nevada makes you feel like donning a wing-suit.  Had we not already committed to a show that night in Vegas we would have most likely taken a detour to explore the canyons.  We almost drove through Zion National Park, but Matt's scheduling prudence (and desire to go someplace where we could ditch the van) kept us on track and in Sin City by 4pm.

After a quick drive down the Strip for the benefit of Matt and Chris (who had never been to Vegas before) we arrived at the home of Jim and Jan Seagrave, our most gracious hosts, for the evening.  Jan showed us to our rooms (one for each of us!) and we prettied ourselves up for the show.  She then proceeded to make us a fantastic multi-course dinner - truly above and beyond!  Afterwards we wobbled to the van and attempted to not crash it on our way to the venue as we shook off the food coma.

Ah yes, the venue.  It is called The Freakin' Frog, and they have the most fantastic popcorn machine, ever.  Ask the owner about it if you ever go there, which you should do because they have a great beer selection.  And of course they book awesome bands.  Like us.  And Sofa City Sweetheart, who killed it (in the good way!) as our opening act, before lending us their lead guitarist and singer to play bass for our set.  He did a stellar job, with exactly no rehearsal.  A pro!  Check out his stuff, it is really catchy.

Highlights of the show: attempting to engage the UNLV crowd by working their mascot (the 'rebels') into my witty stage banter - that one's for you, Richard Simmons - and helping out a table of Scrabble players by letting them know "qi" is a legitimate game word.  They used it!  Lowlights: college kids who refused to buy a CD because they said they'd just steal it and a grumpy bar patron who refused a free glow-in-the-dark button by pushing it back at me and saying "I'm good, dude."  I must respectfully disagree with you, dude.  You are not good.  You have no button.

Again Chris proved his mastery of all games videographic by taking out Axis aircraft in a rousing game of 1942.  But we had to pull him away, because it was my sworn duty to show off my mad Vegas tour-guiding skillz.  Matt's friend Julianne (another killer singer-songwriter) helped us drop off the van and then drove us to the Strip, where I dragged my compatriots to my favorite casinos, such as NYNY, the Bellagio and the Venetian.  We officially love that you can walk down the Strip with a foot-long margarita in your hand.  We officially do not love Carrot Top.

This morning gave way to a tour first: I was awake before anyone else.  The endorphine rush didn't last long, though, because it was too late to go to the breakfast buffet at the Orleans.  So after another home-cooked meal from Jan (thank you! thank you! thank you!), we were on the road and headed for San Diego.  We made a quick dinner stop at Mega Tom's Char-Broiled Burgers in Barstow, where Matt ate his deep-fried fish like some sort of brown, breaded crab.  That pretty much catches us up to right now as we hurl along the 15, our odometer clocking in at 2,500 miles driven and our souls appreciating in retrospect just how nice a lack of city lights and other cars can be.  On the bright side, we don't smell any cow farts.

Tour Diary: Day 4, Seattle

Where did we leave off?  Oh yes, the cowboy hat.  Let me move back a bit and let you know what we did to deserve such a fine fluffy shout-out from the heavens.  Like any band worth our salt, we made a gruelling trek to an important cultural shrine: the grave of the late, great Jimi Hendrix.  So what if our trek only took us 4.9 miles out of our way, and the only gruelling part of the journey was getting our cellphone GPS to work?  This is immaterial.  We came, we saw, we took pictures.  And then the hat appeared.

Seriously, it was a great drive into Seattle if you don't count the parking-lot traffic and a van full of dudes needing very badly to use a restroom.  Thankfully our destination, the prototypical Seattle hangout Cafe Racer, was right off the highway.  It conveniently houses two clean, working restrooms for which I can vouch.  Truth be told it was quite a bit larger than we expected, and is a really hip venue.  So hip that it contains a barber shop called Cafe Razor (sha-zam!), a Ms. Pac-Man Plus table-top game, and allows travelling rock bands to use fog machines.

And use it we did!  After what seemed like (or actually was) two hours of set-up, we set the ambiance to hazetastic and rocked out for a little over an hour.  The video for this event consists mostly of our guitarist, Matt, to whom the camera seemed inextricably drawn, possibly due to the tension of the power cord and the fact that it wasn't actually secured to the tripod.  Or maybe it was his soul patch.

Notable guests abounded at the show, which featured attendence in the double digits. (We've finally made it!)  Two members of my college a-capella group, the Carnegie Mellon Originals, were there, and two other people, a nice couple (I think!) from the University of Washington who were too young to buy beer but seemed happy downing their burgers and soda.  What was most notable about those two was the fact that they engaged in the following steps to get to the show:

1. They searched the internet for all-ages shows they could attend.
2. They found a few, presumably of high quality.
3. They chose our show!

I mean, that is exactly how it is supposed to work.  Hooray for the intertubes, and my friends at the Planetary Group who fill them with favorable factoids about me.  A note to our new collegiate fans: thanks for coming!  And don't forget to wear the t-shirt we gave you.

You're probably asking yourself right now: what kind-hearted souls took upon themselves the burden of hosting such a raucous band of ne'erdogooders?  The answer: Forrest and Wendy Giberson.  Not only did they put us up and bake us cookies, but Forrest went so far as to drive Paul to the airport early in the morning.  That's right - we are Paul-less until Wednesday.  How will we pull off the gig in Las Vegas?  Keep reading to find out.  Oh wait, don't: Juan Lopez of Sofa City Sweetheart is playing bass for us!  And the whole band is playing an opening set.  So, if you live in Vegas, go to the show!

I guess you kept reading after all.  You are nothing if not tenacious.  Right now we are en route to Salt Lake City as we traverse the wild west on our way to Vegas.  Lastly (but not leastly) we'd like to give a shout out to Katrina in Boise.  Enjoy the button!  We're really glad we decided not to go to Chuck-a-Rama.

Tour Diary: Day 3, Olympia

First and foremost I would like to give a shout-out to my girlfriend Penelope, who is at home feeling not-so-well.  I love you, P!  Send her healing vibes.  I know I am.

The Olympia experience can be summed up in three words: Big Buck Hunter.  What a game!  And the 4th Ave Tavern had not one, but two machines.  Let's just say that I have a sore trigger finger.

But seriously - the day was great.  Breakfast at Niki's in Portland (thanks to the gas station guy!) and then, after a brief detour where we got lost attempting to find the 405 skyway, we were on our way.  Olympia is a lovely little town, full of music stores and bars and sidewalks that lead to them.  Once again we had a fantastic dinner, this time at Angel Thai.  Afterward we set up our gear and waited nervously for the second band, The Rhythm Pimps, to arrive.  We almost thought they wouldn't, but they showed up just in the nick of time, and we rocked the house from 9:30-10:30.  The stage there is great, and Paul released generous amounts of fog, sometimes to the point where we couldn't see each other or the audience.  But who cares!  It's rock and roll, people. All we need to see is our name in lights.

By far the highlight of the evening (next to Chris's amazingly rapid mastery of Big Buck Hunter) was the guy who asked me, after we played Ship of Plenty, if he could breakdance to our music.  Thinking it was a slight at the un-danceability of the tune, I told him to do a head spin.  Then, during Candyman, I saw something popping and locking out of the corner of my eye.  The dude was actually breakdancing.  Then he bought an album!  Rock.  Sir, if you are reading this, you made our night.

Afterwards, The Rhythm Pimps rocked it three-piece style, with the lead guitarist and singer donning a black wifebeater in a way that few people can.  Incidentally, they are from Eugene, which apparently has a thriving music scene.  Hats (and sleeves!) off to the Pimps and their awesome brown van.

Like Blanche Dubois, we are relying on the kindness of strangers for accomodations, with the slight difference that we know them.  Last night's host was our friend Ulrike Krotscheck, an archaeologist and professor who does not grade students at Evergreen U.  She even made us breakfast!  Thank you very much, Ulrike.  She also directed us to the local Walgreens, where we procured even more lights.  After the lights, we left for Seattle, the adventures of which will be related to you in the next tour diary entry.  I will, however, leave you with this portentous spectre we caught on camera, which I believe bodes good tidings of rock:

Tour Diary: Day 2, Portland

Today was a good day.  We started out at around 12pm after a well-deserved long sleep.  Breakfast was leftover burritos and a Clif Bar.  We have lots of Clif Bars.  Ask Matt.  Anyhow, the drive to Portland was quick and uneventful, if a bit wet since the rain has invaded this otherwise unspeakably exquisite landscape.  (I will soon run out of positive adjectives.)  We stopped in downtown PDX to get some fog juice and other touring essentials and then headed to our destination, the Tonic Lounge, for scoping-out purposes.

Following a quick tour of the premises, we checked in at the ghetto-quaint Banfield Motel, where we discovered some questionable stains on the ceiling of our room.  Sadly, it appears to be champagne and not blood from a grisly gangland hit.  No cred there.  After that it was off to meet Chris's swell friend Peter, who took us to a nice little Vietnamese joint called Got Pho? for a tasty dinner.  I highly recommend it - the proprietors are actually Vitenamese!  And they have delicious bahn mi.

The Tonic is a nice venue with a big stage, great sound, and killer lights.  Not as killer as our lights, mind you, but sweet none the less.  And they have a secret entrance for performers!  Much cred.  The sound guy, Darren, was super-solid and allowed everyone to perform at the top of their game.

The opener, Josh Nielsen, was really nice and a great singer-songwriter.  He's got an Axl Rose kind of vibe to his voice.  Our show tonight was very strong, and I even engaged in some stage antics like falling to the floor after the end of "Pieces."  This and more will be available on the limited-edition tour DVD.  Our fog machine was at full force as well, though it did give us a false start at the beginning of the set.  Drama!  Fergie would not be proud.   On The Tundra was awesome as always and made great use of the fog machine and lights, which we share with them because we are good kids who know how to share.

We are now back at the motel, waiting for Chris to arrive with the van so we can (joy!) load everthing into the room.  Why?  Because this motel has a rule that you can't have guests in your room after 8pm.  Classy.

Tomorrow: Olympia!

Tour diary: Day 1, Eugene

The first day of the tour was long and satisfying.  We woke up at 5:30am in El Cerrito, loaded the van, and drove for 9 hours up the 5, enjoying amazing views of the California and Oregon terrain as we drove.  Of particular note was Mt. Shasta, which, aside from being gorgeous and awe-inspiring, is also home to a little town of the same name which has a great little coffee shop that sells fireman-approved breakfast burritos.  It is called the Seven Suns Coffee & Cafe.  Yum.

We made it into Springfield, OR at about 3:30 where our good pal Ted was kind enough to put us up for the night.  The Springfield / Eugene area is just breathtaking this time of year - lots of eye-popping colors and serene mountains and rivers.  But we came to rock, so the lollygagging had to be kept to a minimum.  By 7pm we were at our final destination: The Epic Space, an all-ages garage venue abutting a tattoo parlor of the same name. The proprietor, Abe, is a real believer in the importance of music, so if you live in Eugene, go check this place out.

After sound check, we stopped for a bite to eat at a soul food place called Papa's Soul Food Kitchen BBQ. I know I'm being effusive with praise about everything, but Papa's was a true standout. As good as any of the brick-oven joints along San Pablo in Berkeley, for sure.

Oh, right, we played a gig. It went very well! We were first, and busted out our lights and fog machine to wow the kids of Eugene. Buttons and stickers were distributed and memories were permanently etched into the brains of audience members. Next up was Adventure Galley who are from Bend and rock the house with a Killers-esque synth-pop vibe. Really nice guys, as well. Finishing up the night was On The Tundra who were anthemic as always. The lead guitar player, Mark Leahey, is a master of tone. He is also a real swell guy, 'cos he got us this gig!

After all was said and done, we headed back to Ted's house for some well-deserved R&R. How did we get there? I almost forgot to mention her: Naima, our trusty Ford Econoline 350. She's a smooth ride and well-equipped with an iPod hookup and a fold-down flatscreen for DVD viewage. Trivia bit: our first van was named Beth, but she ended up being a non-starter.

Talk to you soon from Portland!

-k