Archive Sunday #46

  As we were heading back to the East Coast, we were super excited to hit up the 9:30 Club in D.C. Growing up in Virginia, I occasionally made the trip up to this venue to catch artists that couldn't make it to smaller markets down south. It's just one of those perfectly sized venues that almost always sounds good from the audience perspective, so naturally we were pretty stoked to have the opportunity to play there. We got there early to set up and were delighted to find specialty made 9:30 Club cupcakes waiting for us. They kinda reminded me of freshly-made ding dongs, but yeah they definitely hit the spot. The show itself went well, but I mostly remember how much Andrew hated covering Teenage Wildlife by Bowie haha. I don't think it had anything to do with the song per-say, but mostly due to the fact it required him to keep in time with a longer sample we loaded on his SPD. It's kinda one of those things that can go well in practice, but as soon as we move it to the stage with a different monitoring situation it can get increasingly difficult. He powered through though, and luckily we finished the night with a familiar tune Beast Monster Thing.

   Next up, we had another festival up in New York. Still called Governor's Ball even though it's location had been moved to Randall's Island from Governor's Island. The festival helped us organize and promote a venue show the night before at Webster Hall for a series called Governor's Ball After Dark. It's always fun to be in New York because good friends and label reps always come out to hang and see the show. And Webster Hall is especially nice because it's right in the middle of Manhattan. I remember walking around after soundcheck and picked up a bunch of rice pudding to bring back to the green-room to share. Everyone ended up trying it, but I definitely ended up getting too much. The show later on was awesome, and we capped off the night with a New York slice.

   With only a short drive the next day, we all took the opportunity to sleep in a bit. Then we got to the festival grounds on Randall's Island early to check-in. It took us a while to find the right tent, but we eventually got our wristbands. With the unexpected delay we headed straight to the stage to set everything up side-stage while Welles took the stage. Mike our manager met us there while we were setting up and offered to grab us some catering as it didn't look like we'd have time before the performance. Andrew was the most hungry because I'm pretty sure the rest of us had been snacking, so he was especially grateful for the food run offer. But once Mike returned with a few containers of what only looked like corn-tofu slop, Andrew's face looked so dejected haha. Mike apologized and told us this was all he could scrounge up while we all gathered around and curiously forked the mystery slop as we took turns guessing the contents. Honestly I ate most of mine and kinda liked it, but we agreed to seek out something more appetizing after we played.

   It was a fun compact set, and there were more people in the crowd than we expected that early in the day. Once we were done we quickly packed everything up, and grabbed some more substantial food at the festival catering tent. Still have no idea where Mike grabbed the slop from, but we didn't see anything that looked like it there haha. Shortly after we had a record/t-shirt signing for an hour so where we joked around and chatted with some fans that came out to meet us. I think we might have caught some of the Head and Heart's set a little later when we were walking around, but we didn't stick around too long before heading out. We drove an hour or so to a cheap hotel in Jersey so our drive the next morning wouldn't be as bad.

  The next morning we woke up pretty early to start the five hour or so drive down to Virginia. We were slated to play at the historic Jefferson Theater right in downtown Charlottesville. We met back up with Nap Eyes and got more of a chance to hang out with them and the other opener Don Babylon in the green room before the show. Nap Eyes were all super nice guys from Halifax and told us about how they received a grant from the Canadian government that they were using to help fund their tour and recent recordings. Don Babylon drove over from Richmond and we all caught up from the last time they hosted us for a house show there. The show went very well, and I think the other bands did a lot of the heavy lifting filling out the venue. Sometimes Sunday nights in a smaller market like Charlottesville can be tough, but this particular mix of bands seemed to do the trick making sure there was a full night of great music for the crowd. Also, I know it was a great night because I vaguely remember Will smoking a ciggy (which he never does) while we were chilling outside the venue after we played with Will Marsh from Gold Connections.