Blog #19: Tour Diary 8.22.25

I stepped out of the van and onto the red rocks, and could have wept in relief when I saw that the Lincoln Monument was at 8,640 feet in elevation. For whatever reason, despite acclimatize and acclimate apparently being synonyms, discussions about acclimating to higher altitudes seem to exclusively use acclimatize. I refuse, personally. I'm annoying enough without being weird verbally. I've been whining about how thin the air is in Denver nonstop since my fiancee and I hit Nebraska on our drive out here. I'd been dreading it for ages, and when I heard we would have to go even higher on our drive after the show I considered booking a flight - something I'm equally bothered by. But on our breathless and breathtaking way through the mountains north of Denver, it was a relief to find myself at nearly 9,000 feet without my brain bleeding. It was all downhill from there.

Which is a metaphor, by the way. When I stepped out onto the stage and in front of 1200 people with nothing but a piano and an unintelligible chart of reminders I could have wept with relief when I saw that I was ready despite not being prepared. The following hour and a half ended up being the most fun I've ever had on stage. I had some ideas, I had half-written some stories out, and remembered to be a wind chime, and it worked out. Even that ridiculous period of intense heckling I was able to work into my show. I guess, to a certain extent, being ready without being ready is a theme in my life right now. Just breathe.

(I will say, and it's crazy I'm still saying it - unless a comedian explicitly invites you to talk to them, anything you say to them while they're working is heckling. That being said, the absolute worst audience member was not the hecklers during the goofy black box warrior monologue, but the 2-3 people who screamed memes at me when I came out. I honestly prefer how it went the last time I was in Denver, when a woman interrupted me to shout "show us your cock!" If you're a "yippee" kid, please let your agoraphobia win. This isn't friendly ribbing, it's me genuinely asking you to stop coming to my shows, because it is so utterly degrading.)

But even during that moment of total chaos toward the end, I was able to respond in precisely the way I had half-planned. It ended up basically being the finale of the show, with how hard my planned response hit. My current strategy in dealing with problem audience members is neither to ignore nor to clap back on the spot, or to snap; but to fully expect it. It's clear that there are almost no shows without some jackass trying to ruin everyone's time, so I need to perform knowing that it WILL happen until such a time comes where the iPad babies and r/willwood top commenters stop showing up.

I never felt more comfortable on stage. Never felt more confident and more like I knew what I was doing. It was deciding "I'm not ready, but I'm doing it anyway" that allowed me to discover I had been ready all along. I think I'll have more to say on that on stage this tour, because I really like that as a subject. It feels really relevant to my life right now, especially with this being a ten year anniversary tour. If I get altitude sickness from this, I'll just descend and re-group, no big deal.

I guess part of it is that I don't mind the idea of failing as much as I used to. If I bomb, that's okay. I've had audiences laugh their heads off at jokes and vocally respond in ways that show they interpreted the joke the exact opposite way I intended, which is way more painful than not getting a laugh at all. That's a literal example, but also a bit of a figurative illustration as to what I'm feeling in a larger sense. There's always One Guy.

My fiancee accidentally dropped my ring down a storm drain yesterday. I was struggling to breathe and bloated from the previous night's foolish attempt at carbo-loading in preparation for the rockies, so I just melted in the doorway of the van and let her retrieve it on her own like some overinflated fascist. I figured eh, she'll solve that super quick and if not - I'll buy us a new one. Eventually I snapped out of that bullshit and tried to take over, because the ring itself as its own object is the point, not the design or product. I feel that way so strongly about her ring, why didn't I assume she felt that way about mine? I've always struggled with that. I feel strongly for other people and obsess over right and wrong, but when it comes to matters of my being loved, my body fails to recognize it. My system lacks the reflex of operating on the assumption that I matter to people.

It took quite some time to get it out of the gutter, and help from an employee at the hotel. But the point in bringing this up is to give an example of how much my life has changed as of late. How ready I find myself feeling without realizing I had been ready for some time already. How I can obsess over altitude sickness, work myself into a self-absorbed panic over it, and then find myself up in the mountains only feeling relief. We're looking for a house now too.

I think that's going to be the point of the show I'm workshopping on this tour. The idea of being ready. You don't always know when you're ready. You might even think you're not. But a leap of faith will often tell you what your body knew long before. Maybe it's not your body, maybe it's a deeper part of your brain. Your heart, as they say, knows things you don't. It doesn't ruminate, it doesn't doubt, it doesn't ask questions. Love isn't a thought, it isn't a word. It's not butterflies in your stomach or lightning bolts. Sunsets happen every night and roses always wilt eventually. You can buy a box of chocolates at CVS, and meet-cutes are for hallmark clean-porn. Love just is. It's a silent fact that acts on your behalf, whether or not you think you're ready for it. Love isn't falling for someone. It's not altitude sickness. It's just being in the mountains with someone, in sickness or in health as they say.

Letting go, on some level, is I think a key theme of all my work. Coming to terms with disorder in Slouching. I know it's hard, but it's all white noise in In Case I Make It. Live as you like because you're going to die in Normal. It doesn't matter who I am in Self-ish. Let everything go, because everything is a lot. I think learning to stop trying to live your life and instead let life live you lets your heart show you what it needs. What you want underneath all your shortcomings, your fears, your selfishness; it's all in there just waiting for you to shut up and let it have its day.

I accepted I wasn't ready when going on stage, let go of my fear of failure, and by doing so learned that being ready isn't something you choose or can necessarily intellectualize. Accept that not every joke will land perfectly, let go of the idea of perfect execution of the keyboard bits. Accept that there will be nuisances, and let go of the idea that I'll be able to stop it completely. Sure, I won't stop being honest about it and won't stop making it clear how I feel, but that doesn't mean I'm going to waste energy on denying the reality of its prevalence or hurt myself by expecting something else. Accept the altitude, let go of the Boost Oxygen tank from King Soopers and find yourself at nearly 9,000 feet kissing the ground.

Tomorrow we're in Portland. Another massive show, one of the largest audiences I've ever taken on alone, and I'm so not ready.

WW

Some announcements:

1. Please don't spoil the contents of my show for the next city! In prior tours asking people not to film was mostly enough, and this time around staff is kicking out anyone who takes out their phone, but I just want to say in case you were thinking of tweeting something or whatever. Please don't spoil the bits, it'll ruin the show!

2. Working on a self-produced studio recording of "And If I Did You Deserved It," with Jim Horvath (guitar on Everything is a Lot, video for You Liked This) on guitar. First time releasing something from my home studio. I'll be getting back to that when I get back from tour. This doesn't mean I'm about to start putting out previously unreleased tracks that have made the rounds. It just means that I liked this particular song enough to do that. The other ones are mostly unfinished garbage, early drafts of other songs, or literally me just fucking around making stuff up as I go along.

3. Tomorrow's the Self-ish anniversary. You should know that Hostile City Distribution is indeed my new physical media provider, and you can get the 2016 self-ish mix on vinyl/CD again for the first time since a run of a few hundred in 2017 there.

4. The Real Will Wood is on streaming now. Apple TV and Youtube Movies.

5. The response to Slouching Towards Branson is blowing my mind. I am so excited to have so many people saying so many positive things about something I did when I was so not ready. Apparently the best way to seem like I know what I'm doing is to recognize I have no idea what I'm doing. I'm so glad y'all are liking it. I'll be submitting it to festivals soon. Some people have asked about screenings - I don't know about that. It feels weird to do a screening event for something that's so live, but if enough people express interest I'll do one or two in NJ, sure. Very little effort on my part to do that haha.

6. I have about a dozen or so songs in various states of completion. Sometime early next year I'll hole up in a private place and turn it into an album of songs. I won't make any promises, but I'd be surprised if I wasn't recording by the end of next year. It is a very weird project and as much of a turn in style as the last two records. Sorry everyone, but I'm never going to be one of those album-a-year artists.

7. Final Masters of the Ealú OST sent off to the developers. Release of the game is early October. I'll put out my soundtrack eventually, but not for a bit.