Rabbits Full of Magic

We lost the charger to the laptop during the tour, hence the halted continuous tour blogging. I'll write here what i can remember from where I previously left off, which I believe was somewhere in Ann Arbor...



After Michigan we drove up to Athens, Ohio, which is a big college town in a nice, hilly city. As soon as we arrived we saw a thrift store and pulled over, delighted to see that only seconds earlier the other car had arrived at the same thrift store! These kind of synchronized events happened quite often on this trip. Two cars driving for 6 hours or so arriving at the same spontaneous destination within seconds of each other!



Athens was great; they had a late-night hot dog stand and a coffee shop filled with board games and beautiful college babes. We played our first show of the tour at a bar (Casa Cantina) and it was a huge success! By now I was feeling partied out so spent most of the time reading Cosmic Trigger Vol. 1 by Robert Anton Wilson, which I had found in Chicago for 50 cents. He discusses the Sirius star system and investigates whether or not the highest occult secrets have to do with ancient knowledge of being visited by beings from the system in mankind's earliest days. He points to the famous example of the Dogon tribe, Egyptian astrological and animist symbolism, Crowleyan magick ceremonies, and psychedelic deities. At one point he says that Mr. Spock of TV's Star Trek is actually a pop incarnation of the peyote trickster god described by Carlos Castaneda in The Teachings of Don Juan.



Back to reality, we drove the next day to Philadelphia and played at Castle Gay, which is a house lived in by Hermit Thrushes, a band that played a house show in Atlanta set up by us a few months ago. The Carnivores were in town so they stopped by to see us and party, and play me their wonderful new forthcoming CD. Andrew WK was DJing down the street and Butch Walker was playing elsewhere. They knew someone in the band so we ended up hanging out with that crew which was great fun (until the morning came!). Luckily the next day's show was in NYC so we drove in and immediately found some greasy, delicious pizza to get us feeling good again!



In between arriving and playing at The Party Expo we walked around Brooklyn and I found a giant keyboard being thrown away, so I took it. It ended up being inoperative so I gave it to Henry, who promptly smashed it during our chaotic show-closing performance of "Leave Me Alone". Everyone was in their underwear and we were all painted with body paint. We got to see the Carnivores play as well! It was really so great to be back in NYC, every time I go I have a terrific time! The next day we made the beautiful drive out to New Haven, Connecticut to play a fun fun fun show at Cafe 9 and then the day after that made the beautiful drive back to NYC to play at Glasslands. Unfortunately that show was early (we went on at 8.30) so it was only seen by a handful of people and we were completely stiffed out of any and all money. The good news was that everyone got to spend another day in NYC, so we ended up laying around in the park on a beautiful early summer afternoon, having Bloody Mary's, partying with my old roommate Alex, checking out his rad, trippy art, watching Three Stooges at 3am with a room full of silly people and a cat named Mister. If it weren't so damn expensive I would live in NYC.



...to be continued...

as always, check out the growing Back Pockets Tour 2k10 flickr photo album

Labels: back pockets tour