I seek to reward you for my rather lackluster output as of late. So, if you're the type of person that enjoys photos, videos, news, and heartwarming tales about impossibly talented and cool children, then this is going to be your sort of blog entry.
Let's start with our two-day reunion with Lola Ray. For those of you who caught either the DC show (um, unlikely) or the NYC show (very likely) you were treated to a melange of emotion, rock and merchandise. We set about our trip to DC early on Saturday March 31st. We don't have a van. Which means when we play shows out of town we are at the (gentle) mercy of our good friends at
Zip Car . If you live in a big city like NY where nobody has cars (except the 25 million people creating traffic jams all over the place), Zip Car is the only way to go. They have cars parked in public parking lots in every corner of NY. You reserve your car online and then it's there waiting for you. They give you a membership card that has some fancy barcode on it - and it acts as a car key as well as proof of membership (I don't work for this company, I'm just giving you the scoop). So - you pay by the hour. They pay for gas. You get 125 miles for free. It's so much better and easier than renting a car. Anywho - we picked up the car, loaded it up with gear and headed South towards our nation's capital.
The drive was smooth - Justin really knows how to keep a car moving. Kudos to XM Radio for keeping us laughing with your very funny comedy channel. Upon our arrival at DC9 we were greeted by the most amazing news. Right next door to the club was a parking lot whose first two parking spots were reserved for Zip Car drivers. Guess what? The gentleman manning the lot had definitely never heard of or seen a Zip Car. He also spoke very little English. Which meant that we were treated to the tuneful refrain of a very confused dude saying, "Zip Car?????" over and over. It started with a sort of "what the fuck is a zip car?" kind of sound. Progressing to a general recognition of the sign designating that this was a spot reserved for somebody important kind of "fuck you losers, this spot's for VIP's" sound. Eventually settling on an "ok, ok, I get it, you're driving the right car, but I've never seen one before and to be perfectly honest, I'm unimpressed" inflection. It's also possible that he wanted to nap in our car because he was homeless. Oh, we'll never know. Regardless, we were stoked to have a parking spot right next door, cos let's face it, DC's a bit grimey round those parts.
Of course along with the great parking news, we were also greeted by Brian Spinna, guitarist, chief blogger and all round Big Haired, Bearded genius of Lola Ray. He's always a site for sore eyes. We exchanged hugs, niceties and hair lice. It was perfect. Here's a photo of Brian, looking angelic as ever:
Lola Ray sound great these days. They've got themselves two new members, Beck on drums and Chris on Bass. Having been on tour for the last couple of months they're a well oiled rock machine. Raw, energized and killing it every night. Nothing quite captures that energy like this photo of lead singer, poet, lover of pork, John Balicanta:
The show wasn't our best. Which was a bit disappointing. But we were served cold Pizza Hut. Which was awe-some. Nothing hits the spot quite like Pizza Hut's brand of nuclear pizza. We did see some old friends from NY who used to come see us play which was nice. So thanks to Nomi and Caroline for coming out. We made some new fans who drove all the way from Richmond, VA. And we got to hang out with DC's favorite son Vince Scheuerman from
Army of Me. They're debut album came out this week. Cop that shit, yo.
We drove back to NY and readied ourselves for our triumphant return to The Knitting Factory. Truth be told, we like playing The Knitting Factory more than any venue in NY. The sound is always good - they treat us well and it's one of the only all ages venues in town. We wanted to redeem ourselves from the previous night's not quite stellar show - so we came to play. Here's a pic of Justin and Cosmo and one of me selling T-Shirts like my life depends on it:
Playing to a packed room full of excited kids is pretty much what it's all about. But there were two special, very young kids in attendance on this night. Eli and Noah Krauss are (soon to officially be) Justin's nephews. They're nine years old. A set of twins who are incredibly talented and smart. Eli appears on the cover of our new record, on our t-shirts and on our website. Justin's always telling me how much they love our band. But nothing could quite prepare me for how MUCH they LOVE our band. Eli showed up in an English Department t-shirt (the fact that this wasn't captured on film will irk me for the rest of my days) - and brought with him a home-made rendering of our album cover mounted on a skinny cardboard tube. Here's what it looks like:
Eli and Noah stood right in front and sang along to every song. I don't think they'd ever been to a rock show before (their dad is a very accomplished violinist in the NY Philharmonic - and they both play instruments very well). But they were rocking the fuck out. It was incredible. Here's some live footage that the good people at
Indigo.TV shot of the show. It's a new song called "How Do You Sleep" that isn't on our record. It's not the greatest footage of all time - but you'll get the point.
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