Before I say anything about the show last Saturday, I must emphasize that in NO WAY is what I'm about to say to imply that we didn't enjoy ourselves immensely. We did. We'd love to play there again, but unfortunately I hear that as of Feb. 20, it'll be an all-male revue club. (We
might be coaxed into that, but...)
OK well we hit the road from Pitman at about 5:30, and made our way to the New Jersey Turnpike (and wow, from exit 7A to exit 16E costs $3.75!). Along the way we stopped at the Joyce Kilmer rest area and emptied bladders, then went and got something to eat. $10+ for two fucking double cheeseburgers and two drinks! Haven't these people ever heard of the fucking
dollar menu???
So we get up to exit 16E and start following the directions, wonderfully provided by MapQuest. And we got lost. Yup. But we eventually found where we were supposed to be, which apparently was on southbound US1/US9, which in my opinion is the worst road in existence. It was so bad, we actually bottomed out a couple times. Yeesh. But we found Secaucus Rd. and thankfully got off the main drag, and finding The Blue Room was easy from there, as it was right next to AJ's Gentleman's Club.
Of course, the Blue Room door was locked and we had to go
through AJ's to get into the club. Once in, we found out from Steve (the very friendly and helpful promoter from GG Layne Productions) that we would be going on third in the lineup. No problem, I thought, because there are four bands. Third is actually kinda cool. We brought our shit in and set it off to the side of the stage. And we had a few words with the sound guy, who was very helpful and understanding about our drummer situation (we had RCA with us this trip).
So, the first band, Warpdrive, set up and took to the stage, and put on a hard show. Good stuff all around, excellent musicianship. I was in awe of the guitarist's massive pedal board (it took two guys to bring it in! Compare that to my one effect pedal and my footswitch!). In fact, the pedal board was so big that they had to put the mic stand off the stage, and it kept losing balance and falling forward. Ah, life without roadies! Good set, though, guys (-:
Next up was Locked, and wow were they loud, especially the vocalist. More fine musicianship from the band, including the left-handed guitarist (with a slightly smaller pedal board than the Warpdrive guitarist). So good that they actually had to play an encore. Muchas kudos, guys (-:
Then came us. And as it turns out, there were only
three bands up that night. The group who came to see Warpdrive left with Warpdrive, and the group who came to see Locked left with Locked about halfway through our set. Which left us with four people: Erin, the sound guy, the bartender, and a girl named Devon. So, I said, "OK I'll dedicate a song to Devon." But the next song up was Eulogy, not exactly a song that most people would want to have dedicated to them. And then, her ride showed up and she left.
So it's the band, my wife, the bartender, and the sound guy.
And they got a helluva show. Because I said, Fuck it, we don't need an audience to rock out! And we had a blast.
Didn't make any money, though. That's OK, sometimes the shows where we lose money are the ones we have the most fun at. That in mind, we better stop having fun or we'll go bankrupt.
Anyway, so we loaded up our shit and pulled out of the parking lot, and the bottom of the car SCRAAAAAPED on the concrete of the driveway. I was like, what the fuck? We pulled into Wendy's on US9/US1, and I got out to check the back, and one of our tires was pancake flat.
FUCK.
So then we were driving SLOWLY around on US1/US9 (my apologies to the many cars that night that we pissed off) looking for a gas station with a working air station. We found one, filled the tire and off we went.
For what it's worth, it's shows like this one that bond us together. We honestly had a blast. And we're really looking forward to our next show, which is at Screwy's in Kearny on Friday, Feb. 13th. Check our
Shows page for details.
Also, if anyone knows what other bands are playing on Friday, please let me know. I really want to know. And I KNOW that more people will be there on Friday, because Justin's girlfriend, Becky, who lives in North Jersey, is bringing some of her friends to see us. Many thanks to Becky for handing fliers out for the show as well.
See you at Screwy's! (-:
