At Home in Bummer City

It's not as bad as I'm making it out to be. After being home for a few weeks now, we're starting to all ground ourselves and think productivly about the future. It's still difficult to determine when we will be able to play again, or rather all live in the same city. Will has been forced to relocate to Cleveland so he can stay with his parents. He left me a voicemail yesturday, and I have yet to call him back, but according to Schreiber, he's working at a restaurant a few miles down the street from his parents house as a line cook, rides his bike to work everyday and has been furiously writing new material. I am now proudly employed by a local body art studio called Evolved. Everyone who works there is super rad, and it's a very comfortable environment for me. I will have to find something else as I currently only have 18 hours on the schedule, but I'm happy there. Schreiber has a line on a Starbucks gig slingin caffeen to the masses. He also had an interview for a job yesturday, and when I asked him what it was or what he would be doing he said, "It's some company that does stuff, they sell things like auctioning or something. I have no idea." So I don't really know what that's all about. I haven't talked to Miller for a while, but I'm assuming he is really busy at the studio. They are closing up shop for a while this month and are trying to finish up a bunch of projects. In other news, my friend Adam and I started a hardcore/metal project last summer (not this past summer, but the summer before) and wrote 3 1/2 songs. Even though I am a bit biased, I must admit, they are super brutal and sick. We are going to get that going again and I think Schreiber is going to hop in on bass. Once we come up with a name, I'll post some tracks online somewhere. Any suggestions?

Something else I've been thinking about posting recently are some old SG tracks. Being that we won't be releasing any new material anytime soon, I though it would be appropriate to release some classic tracks from the old EP's, or even put up some unreleased material. I'm not sure if a lot of our fans are aware we were an instrumental band for 3 years and released 2 EP's. It's music that we are very proud of, and are more than willing to share with the world. I'll let you know when that shit goes up.

All in all, since our tour was abruptly de-railed, we all have a positive outlook on the future. We have all decided that making music in Six Gallery is too important to us. Our label is still behind us, our booking agent is still behind us. I just hope that when we emerge, stronger than ever, you all will still be behind us.

The Shire

Nile Carpenter rules. We had a benefit show for him last Thursday in Columbus, and it was great. I believe everyone involved was able to raise somewhere around $400 for our good friend, which is a small chunk in comparison to his medical bill totals, but it is much appreciated on his behalf. After the Columbus show we drove over to one of our favorite venues in Indianapolis, the Tibbs house for a show. The last time we played there it was only our second show with Dan, and was tons of fun. This time around......I don't even know where to begin. Nile decided to come with us to hang for the night, which is always a good time. We arrived around 7ish to a bunch of familiar faces and a cold thirty pack of PBR. We were slated to play last out of 4 bands, which is always a little concerning. The problem with playing last when out of town is that everyone who came to see the local bands they are friends with will leave before we take the stage, and this has happened to us numerous times in the past. Fortunately this was not the case at the Tibbs house. The room was packed, everyone sang along to every word of every song, and went completely nuts. I've never played a show like this before in Six Gallery, and I must say, it was one of the most fun shows I've ever played. Ben, Dan and myself closed out the set with a cover of Say it Ain't So by Weezer. It was the perfect cap to a near perfect show. We'll be posting some footage Nile took of us playing 'A Live Nativity Scene' here soon. Every time I watch it I can't help but smile.

After Indy, we took a few days off to spend some time with family. On Sunday we drove up to Michigan to spend a few days at Benji's parents place to write. We spent a grueling 4 hours working on about 45 seconds of a song, and consumed our weight in pork, sausage sandwiches, PBR, whisky and coney dogs. As I sit here writing this I can't stop farting. The guy at the merch table next to me is giving me a dirty look right now. We're playing a venue in Pontiac, Michigan called the Crofoot. It's a rad place, but once again we are slated to play last after 3 local bands. There are a decent amount of people here now, but if my butt keeps up our chances of playing in front of a conscious audience are pretty slim.

Check the pic. That is pretty much the view of Benji's parents backyard from the room we were writing in. Not pictured is the hot tub. Boom.

Mama, Mama I'm Coming Home

And we're back......home. 10 days into the tour and we decided to just say 'Fuck it' and quit. Nah, just playin. We in this shit for life. Actually we just had a weekend with no shows booked so we drove home to relax and eat food and take showers and not drink beer for a few days. The last few shows were not great, but there were some definate highlights amongst the past week. In Orlando we pulled up to the front of the venue about an hour before load in, and the bar appeared to be empty. We decided to go for a walk and maybe find a 7-11 or gas station or something. There were three dudes sitting on the curb right in front of our van, and not being familiar with that part of town or the location of anything, we decided to ask them in which direction we might find a convenience store. "We're not from around here, we drove in from Tampa. Hey, you guys wouldn't happen to be in Six Gallery would you?" Slightly astonished we replied, "Yea". "We love you guys! We drove all the way out to see you play!" That was a pretty rad conversation, and made my day. We kicked it with those guys for most of the night. They play in a band and gave us a two song demo, and I must say they rip. Flora Yield. Check them out.

We're heading back on the road again on Wednesday to play in Nashville, then we'll be back Thursday to play a benefit show in Columbus for our friend Nile who was involved in a car accident and shattered bones in both arms and had to have elbow replacement surgery. The bad news is he has about a million dollars in medical bills he has to pay, the good news is he now has bionic arms and somewhat resembles Jax from Mortal Combat. Come out and support our good friend!

And so it begins

Finally the day has come. Tour has started. We kicked the excursion off with a show in Columbus at Kobo with our good friends from NY, Aficionado. They were coming through on tour and needed help with a gig. Being the kind gentlemen that we are, we set something up for them, and the band they were touring with, Summer People. What was supposed to be a bill consisting of just these three bands somehow turned into a bill with 5 bands, the other two also being friends of Aficionado who just so happened to be at the show. Usually this type of situation is a nightmare. On a Sunday night, a bill with 5 bands, we were destined to play at like 1:30 in the morning. It wasn't so bad though, all the bands were great, and we didn't have to play too late. We woke up early on Monday morning to drive to Nashville to crash with some of Millers family. Let me just put it like this; the drummer for Paramore lives down the street from their home. It was nice. We left their place late the next morning to make our way down to Hot Springs, Arkansas, home of Hot Springs water, the venue we played at........and not much else. I think I might have seen a Subway down the street but I could have been mistaken.

The place we played was awesome. It's called Maxine's. They give you free pizza when you play at the club. #1 in my book. Unfortunately, because it was a Tuesday night, the show was free which meant we played for free. Not to worry though because we somehow swindled our way into selling 9 CD's, only 3 of which were sold to patrons who actually saw us play. The rest were total randoms; some drunk dudes who stumbled in the door 20 or so minutes after our set asking me if there was a cover to get in. I simply replied 'No, it's a free show tonight guys' to which they replied 'oh awesome! Did you guys play in one of the bands? Wait, is this your CD right here, man I love music, I'll take two'. And then we proceeded to autograph the shit out of some posters for them. Also, Ben introduced himself to some random grandma/grandpa types and one of them is running for some type of state political office. They bought 2 CD's and 2 t-shirts and gave us $110. An added bonus to the night, 2 of my co-workers from my previous job came out. They both live in Arkansas, one three hours away, and read about the show on a previous blog post (Hi Katie!). It's really nice to see some familiar faces on the road, especially when you're that far away from home. The rest of the night was a blast; we were able to find a hotel for $60 and crashed for a few hours before making the drive to Austin. Now, I haven't spent much time in the south this time of year. All I have to say is, holy shit never go to Texas in August. It sucks. I'm not saying that playing in Austin, Texas sucks, no, that is awesome. I'm saying the state of Texas sucks, and when it's 543254325342 degree's out, things get really shitty real fast. We pulled up to Stubbs, the venue we were playing in Austin, and it appeared that a huge outdoor show was going on. Huge as in like thousands of people huge. After talking to about 7 different security guards, I located the stage manager and figured out what the hell was going on. Hasidic rapper Matisyahu was playing an early concert at their 3,000 capacity outdoor venues, and we were playing a late show in their 150 person capacity room. So we loaded in, keep in mind it was 254354324325 degree's out, and basically waited. The sound guy told us that as soon as the big show was over, we had to start playing immediately but he couldn't sound check us during the other show because it was happening about 10 feet from our stage. So we just had to linger around the stage waiting for the big show to end. The upside to this whole situation; anyone who was at the large show had the option to stick around for our show. So we started playing right when it ended, and before I knew it, the room was relatively packed. We played really well, got paid really well and sold what was remaining of our CD's. That brings me to where I am right this very second. Sitting on a bed at a Ho Jo in Austin. I've already seen a few dead/almost dead cockroaches and the shower only spew's steaming hot water. Not too bad for thirty bucks a night.

We played some shows, gonna play some more

This past weekend we did our first string of shows with our new singer, Daniel, who is not to be confused with our old singer, Daniel. I must say, I was a little nervous getting back into the saddle. Our first show was in Dayton, OH at one of our favorite venue's, Blind Bob's. It was a familiar stage and a familiar crowd which was comforting, and I must say, we slayed. After the show we spent the night at our friend Chip's place and awoke to the smell of bacon, eggs and stale beer. It was a rough night, you'll see some of it in a fourth coming Webisode to be released in a week or so. The next night was at a house in Indianapolis on Tibbs ave. Upon our arrival I spoke to my dad on the phone. 'Tibbs ave?' he said, 'That's not a very good part of town is it?' 'Probably not,' I said after glancing down the block at the boarded up houses and trash covering the sidewalks. After loading in me and Ben decided to walk down to the corner liquor store to purchase some drinks for the evening. Given our current location, we decided to buy a 40 for everyone in the band. '6 king cobra's please' Ben said through a hole in the partition separating us from the booze. 'Honey, if you buy 8 you'll get a discount,' the kind woman behind the impenetrable fortress of bullet proof glass replied. 'How much for 8?' I ask. 'That'll be ohhhhhhh $5.62'. Me and Ben exchange a glance of astonishment. 'Alright, we'll take em' Ben replied. To our disappointment, the woman brought back 8 16oz cans of King Cobra. Bummer. 'Well shit, I mean these are still really cheap, why don't we just get 16, it'll be like ten bucks,' I said to Ben. 'Well if you get an entire case, it's only $13.82' the woman said. 'OK!' The next thing I know, I'm walking down the block carrying 24 16oz cans of King Cobra getting honked at by every car that drives by. 'Oh man, you guys are partying tonight' someone yelled from a passing vehicle. I even had a cute girl in a convertible give me a honk and wave. We arrive back at the house at the exact same time Dan and Will walk in carrying a 30 pack of PBR. Lack of communication can lead to way too much beer. Needless to say, the show was fun, we brought our friend from Dayton, Brandon Hawk, with us. That dude rules. We played well, there were kids singing along to the songs, I even had a cute girl kiss me on the lips! All around successful night. The next night we played in our hometown for our best friends. I don't need to go into details on this one, it's a no brainer. Shit ruled. So, I think we've all realized once again why we're doing this. Why we've put our lives on hold for the time being. We've been cooped up in Columbus for the past 3 months waiting. And now the time has come to dust off the old van, pack our bags, and blow this popsicle stand. See you on the road!

8/17 - Hot Springs, AK @ Maxine's
8/18 - Austin, TX @ Stubb's
8/19 - Dallas, TX @ Prophet Bar
8/20 - Lafayette, LA @ Sadie's
8/21 - New Orleans, LA @ the Den at the Howlin Wolf
8/22 - Birmingham, AL @ TBA
8/24 - Orlando, FL @ Will's Pub
8/26 - Atlanta, GA @ the Drunken Unicorn
8/27 - Asheville, NC @ Lexington Ave. Brewery
9/1 - Louisville, KY @ TBA
9/2 - Columbus, Oh @ the Basement
9/3 - Indianapolis, IN @ 1132 n. Tibbs Ave (House)
9/7 - Pontiac, MI @ Vernors room at the Crofoot
9/8 - Bloomington, IN @ SPAZM House
9/9 - Muncie, IN @ Doc's Music Hall
9/10 - Dayton, OH @ Blind Bob's
9/11 - Athens, Oh @ TBA

More to come!

Making of the Video

I realize our music video came out months ago, but we filmed and edited a little "behind the scene's" video for your viewing pleasure and I thought it appropriate to post on here. A little disclaimer, there is a bit of alcohol consumption involved, and I promise you, no animals were harmed during the filming of this. Enjoy!

Webisode 5 MUSIC VIDEO TIME! from Six Gallery on Vimeo.

In the mean time

Once again, it has been a while since I wrote my last post. Quite a bit has happened in the mean time. I'm going to keep this brief, but here's the skinny on SG happenings:

1. We have a new singer. His name is Daniel Erb, and I can't wait to introduce him to the world.

2. Me and Ben S. have been doing P90X just about everyday. Expect us to be ripped on the next tour.

3. Will got his job back at the UDF gas station. Not much else to say about that.

4. Benji's been logging in some serious time at his studio Central City Recordings.

5. The band Smash Mouth used our gear to practice before a show in Columbus. Srsly.

6. We will soon have our t-shirts for sale on our myspace page. If you couldn't come see us on the road to pick one up, this will be your chance to buy one.

7. We will be back on the road touring again very soon. Details to be released shortly.

That's about it. I'm going to continue to update this while we're home. I promise.

Sick

I am writing this from a very small university in Albany, NY called Saint Rose University. We are playing in one of the university buildings tonight with some friends of ours in Aficionado. It's been a while since I've sent out an update, so here's a quick recap:

Last I left you we were pranking in Wyoming. We spent a night in Boulder, Colorado at Ben S's cousins place the next night. He made us a delicious dinner, and it was the first time I have ever had brussel sprouts. The next night we played a mediocre show in Colorado Springs. To make up for the crappyness of the show, I remembered I had some Marriott rewards points saved up from what seems like a lifetime ago and was able to swing a room in a nearby Fairfield Inn. It was nice to have a clean shower and some HBO to cool every ones nerves. I also stole a shit load of bagels, single serve strawberry jelly's and plastic silverware. Well, I don't know if I would consider it stealing. They do refer to it as an 'all you can eat buffet' not specifying when or where you eat it. We left Colorado Springs and headed straight for the mountains. A few weeks prior to this, we were struggling with a gap in our tour between CO Springs and Illinois. Ben Miller remembered that he has a cousin who lives in Frisco, CO and decided to give him a call to see if he could help us out in any way. Well, as it turns out, Ben's cousin is not just a restaurant owner in Frisco, but owns the living shit out of the entire town. The next thing I know, he has booked us a gig with a $200 guarantee, secured a 2 bedroom condo for us, and promised to feed us at his restaurant. This was the highlight of the tour. We spent two days there, kicking them off with a meal at Chris's(Ben's cousin) restaurant. I had a filet mignon, 2 margarita's, a glass of wine and a shot of top shelf tequila. My meal alone had to be at least $60-$75, not including the appetizers we all shared. This set the tone for the remainder of the weekend. We left Frisco refreshed, and slightly hungover. We made our way to Illinois for a show in Champaign, followed by a show in Madison, Wisconson. Neither were exceptional. Our show in Chicago was decent. It was nice to see some familiar faces, and the venue we played, Martyr's had the nicest green room we've come across thus far stocked with free beer and bottles of water. We left Chicago and headed for Ohio. Dayton was a great night. There were tons of friends in the crowd, we got half price food at the venue and played great. We drove back to Columbus that night to sleep in familiar beds, although not for long. I pulled up to my parents house around 6 in the morning, and had to wake up at 11 to do my taxes and eat lunch with the fam before we left for Morgantown.

That was only a few days ago, and not much has happened since. Oh, except that I'm sick, and have probably infected everyone else in the band. You're welcome guys.

April Fools Day

One of the most successful April Fools Day pranks I've ever executed. We were driving towards Colorado from Montana, and got stuck in a huge snow storm. We pulled over the van in Bolder, Wyoming and found a Super 8 hotel to post up for the night. Once settled, myself, Austin and Will ventured over to a Mc Donalds across the street from the hotel to get some grub, and swung by the gas station next door to scope the beer situation. Apparently in Wyoming, you cannot purchase alcohol in gas stations, and liquor stores close at 10pm. It was 11:15, and our only option for a quick nightcap was to stop in a bar located in the hotel across the street from ours. We got our fill of cheap beer and great conversation with some locals whom we managed to sell 3 CD's to. At around 2, the bartender brought it to our attention that it was officially April Fools Day by closing Will's tab and stating that his card had been declined, and asked if he had another. Will’s face dropped and he replied, “Uhhhhhhhhh, no. Uh Oh.” Then the bartender laughed and said, “Gotcha! April Fools Day!” Now fully aware that it was official, we all came to the conclusion that we need to get the guys who were back at the hotel, as they would surely be as unaware of what date it was as we were. We plotted our scheme. It was flawless. The bar tender picked up the phone and dialed. “Um yes, is this room 108? Ok, well this is officer Spielger down here at the Jackson County Precinct, and I have a William Vokac in custody. We picked him up for public intox and disorderly conduct. He told us this is the room he is staying at, and I want to let you know that you can pick him up from the station tomorrow anytime after 9am, and bail has been set at $5000.” He hangs up the phone, turns to us and says, “All your friend said on the other line was “Okey Dokey”.

Myself and Austin immediately leave the bar to head back to our hotel room to complete the prank with Will straggling behind us. We take a moment outside the door to straighten our faces. The key went into the door and we walk in to a dimly lit room with three very concerned, and awake prankees. “What the fuck happened,” one of them asks, to which I reply, “I don’t know, me and Austin walked outside, and the next thing we know we see Will being cuffed and put into a cop car. How do you guys know, did Will call here?” “No, but the cops did. His bail is set at $5,000. The tour is over, what the fuck are we going to do?” At this very moment Austin loses his composure and bursts into laughter. “What the fuck is so funny about this,” one of the guys sternly asks. “What’s so funny about this is that today is April Fools Day,” I said. “Gotcha.”

Montana, who would have thought?

I am sitting on the floor of the van right now, out side of an apartment complex where the other guys in the band are sleeping nice and warm and cozy. I got stuck with van duty last night, which simply means that I had to sleep in the van to prevent someone from stealing/towing/ticketing our vehicle. I'm not sure what my presence would do to prevent any one of those things from happening though. All I know is, my phone is dead, I have to pee really bad, and there's a bus station directly to my left preventing me from doing so into an empty Ocean Spray bottle. This blows.

The show last night in Billings Montana was spectacular. It was probably the best show we've had thus far. We've had some rough nights these past few weeks. Who would have thought that Seattle Washington on a Saturday would suck so bad? We had literally 4 people in the bar, none of which were watching us play. The door guy dug us though and bought a CD. Last night though, the room was packed, the stage was great and people bought CD's and T-shirts. Also, a girl from the bar offered a floor for us to crash on and bought us pizza. Montana rules.

LA

Our official CD release show was on Monday, in Los Angelas, CA at the infamous Viper Room. It was a weird/great show. For having not played in 10 or so days, we killed it. I was having issues with my bass rig cutting in and out though and Benji had to use their house kit which is always a bit awkward. They also had this curtain pulled across the stage while we were setting up, and right before they drew the curtain to unveil us, the sound guy got over the PA and said "The Viper Room is proud to introduce.....SIX GALLERY!" and then the curtain pulled and we were all just standing there in front of the crowd, not quite sure what to do. We jumped into our set though and all was well.

We are still in LA right now. We had a meeting at the Century Media Records headquarters yesturday, and another industry meeting early tomorrow before we head off to San Francisco and make our way up the coast. I think today we are going to be bums and head over to Venice beach for the day.

The other day I found myself in a Walmart family bathroom, wearing absolutly nothing but a pair of shoes, staring at myself in the mirror. I realized that, given my current situation, my life is pretty awesome right now.

It's been a while my friends. Updating this blog is proving to be harder than I had anticipated. Especially this past week. The last place I wrote you was in NOLA, which we left for SXSW last Wednesday. A few days prior to that, and actually the last time we played a show, we met a bartender at the bar we played in NOLA. Her name is Squirrel and she promised to give us $50 if we drove her to Austin. We agreed that this would be a good idea, being how strapped for cash we knew we would be having to drive from NOLA to Austin, and then from Austin to LA. The drive to Austin wasn't too bad. Squirrel took a sleeping aide/pain killer/muscle relaxer. I'm not sure which it was, but it knocked her out for the majority of the drive. We arrived in Austin really late on Wednesday night/Thursday morning and slept at a Walmart parking lot for a few hours before having to be at our first party. Our marketing guy, Mark Shapiro, was throwing a day party called 'Full Metal Texas'. The doors opened at noon, and we arrived a little early to a line around the block. We found Mark outside the venue and he hooked it up with some wristbands and drink tickets and walked us to the front of the line. The show was very cool. One of my favorite bands, Darkest Hour played, there was an unannounced performance by Dillenger Escape Plan which was probably the best hardcore show I've ever seen, and Mark kept feeding us drink tickets. We left that party around 5ish and headed back to the van for some snacks and a nap. Me and Austin decided we wanted something a bit more substantial than peanut butter crackers or tuna, so we walked back uptown and found a barbeque stand. While waiting in line the incredibly intoxicated guy in front of us turns around and says "Woah, killer stache dude!" He was referring to the hair I have been cultivating under my nose since we left. I told him "thanks" and hoped that he would return to his place in line. Instead, he rambled on about mustaches, and how sweet he thought mine was, and continuously hi-fived me and Austin. This was briefly interrupted by his friend from the front of the line apologizing for his drunk friend, and asking what we wanted. Austin, without skipping a beat says "Chicken plate". We were amused by the drunk guy for a little while longer until his friend brought back two heaping plates of chicken barbeque, potato salad and baked beans. He said, "Here, this is for putting up with my drunk friend, thanks!" and then him and his drunk friend walked away, oddly without any food of their own. That shit made my day. We killed the food and crashed in the van for a few hours before having to be at another party around 10:30 being thrown by the website, Purevolume. We walked up town, and it was the same deal. A line around the block, Mark Shapiro with wristbands, and drink tickets. We got in in no time. There were a bunch of bands, most notably Andrew WK (although we left at around 3am and he had still not played), an open bar and free Taco Bell. They were sponsoring the event, and there were waitresses walking around all night with platters of tacos and burritos. I shit you not(literally, for at least a few days after). I must have eaten six bean burrito's over the course of the evening. The next day, we planned on taking it easy. We had to sleep at Walmart again, and were extremely sleep deprived at this point. We had to be at a show around 4 to see our label mates, And you will know us by the Trail of Dead, and hang once again with Shapiro and the head of our record label, Thomas Waber. After the show, we hung out with Conrad from Trail of Dead in Shapiro's baller ass RV for a few drinks. We left SXSW that night around 11:30 to get a head start on the drive to LA. I'm not going to draw out the next few days, but for a quick recap, it snowed in Texas, we crashed with our friend Farrah in Tucson, I got a cold, we slept in the van some more and didn't shower for 4 or 5 days. We arrived in LA last night and headed straight to a practice space the guys in Tenacious D were kind enough to let us use. Dan went to high school with John, their current touring guitar player, and he let us in to run our set. The radness of the situation didn't quite settle in as we were all so incredibly exhausted. I did manage to snag a little keepsake from the space. My own pick of destiny.

New Orleans

So we've been hanging out in New Orleans for the past 4 days. Our managers girlfriends parents own a building with two apartments, and one is uninhabited. They have been kind enough to let us crash here until we leave for Austin. As much as we all love this town, I think we are starting to get a little restless. Not playing shows for so many days in a row sucks, and I think we are all looking forward to getting to Austin to find some gigs. Some friends of ours in The Builders and the Butchers are crashing with us right now. They are on tour with the RX Bandits, and are playing at the House of Blues here in NOLA tonight. It should be a rad show! We also saw the final cut of our music video this morning. I think we are all stoked on the final product. Keep an eye out for the release of that here in the coming week or so. We had a review in the Dutch version of Revolver Magazine, and they gave us 4/5 stars! Very rad! We also have a review coming out on the AP website sometime this week so keep an eye out for that too. Things are really starting to pick up on the press side of things, and we can't wait till the album hits stores.

Paying our Dues

I suppose in starting out in any industry or field, there is a certain period of adjustment. A time when, as a newcomer, you are "paying your dues". That is about where we are at this moment in time. Let me recap the past 4 days for you. Tuesday we played a show in Johnstown, TN which upon our arrival appeared to be a rad little college town. We later came to find out that the university in that town was on spring break that week, and that is why the only people we saw anywhere were bums. Lots and lots of bums. Unfortunately for us, bums don't like to pay five bucks to hang out at local metal bars. The place we played was super rad, the Hideaway, and the band we played with was really cool, Worn in Red, but there were very few paying customers that evening. We met a dude named Travis who owns a recording studio only a block from the venue, and he was kind enough to key us in and let both bands crash for the night. We woke up early on Wednesday to get a head start on our drive to Asheville, NC, which we were all looking forward to, and arrived fairly early in the afternoon, maybe 2 or 3ish. This gave us plenty of time to walk around town more than a few times. After a few hours of that, and some serious butt chaffing, we found ourselves sitting in the van in front of the venue waiting for someone to let us in. Austin decided to call the promoter around 8 to see what time we could expect to be able to load in, and he informed us that the show had been cancelled, and he thought he had emailed all the bands. He was very apologetic, and gave us the name of a few venues in town that might let us jump on a show. After visiting 7 other bars, we finally found a hooka bar who was having an open mic night. They said we could play last, and that it probably wouldn't be too late. They also were having a $6 all you can drink PBR special which helped us bide more time. After 5 hours of endless music, a million PBR's and a huge brawl in the parking lot (we were not involved, only spectators), we were able to play 3 songs for the few remaining patrons and bartenders. We loaded up our gear, and made our way to a Walmart parking lot only a few miles away to sleep. We woke up Thursday to a fart filled, steamed up van and another serious drive to Birmingham, Alabama. We played a small DIY space, and it was fantastic. There were people there, we were able to play our full set, and we even sold some CD's! All the bands were great, and we were able to get out pretty early, around 11ish, to make another long trek to New Orleans. I drove all through the night, arrived in NO around 6:30 this morning to the sun rising. Our tour managers girlfriends parents own a two story apartment building in town, and the upstairs apartment is unoccupied at the time. They are being gracious enough to allow us to stay here as we take a break from the road for a few days before heading down to Austin for SXSW. When we got here there was beer in the fridge, chili and fresh corn bread, a washer and dryer, a shower and most importantly, a bed to sleep in. Things have been rough the past few days, and I imagine there will be plenty of hardship ahead of us, but this is the price you pay to do something you absolutely love every single day. If this is "paying our dues" I don't have a problem making the investment. It's paying for gas that might become a serious problem here sooner than later. If you feel so inclined to help, here's what you can do. Go to Hollister and buy our album. It's on their shelves as we speak. Or, go to Insound to pre-order our album, or simply help us with some gas money. Our paypal account is Sixgalleryband@gmail. Till next time.

Calloused

I noticed yesturday that my right hand is developing a new set of callouses from carrying heavy ass equipment day in and day out. It also occured to me that if I continue to only use my right arm to carry equipment, I will develop a set of weird muscles not found on the left side of my body. I need to switch some shit up, otherwise I'm going to look really weird.

On a lighter note, we played in Bloomington on Saturday night at one of our favorite venues, the S.P.A.Z.M (the society for the protection against the zombie menace) House. We played there once last October at a Halloween show (see our first webisode). It's always relieving when you can play a show, leave your equipment and sleep all at the same place. We met some rippin dudes, and I want to give a huge *love* to Jules, Josh from Pessoa and all of Opponents. It was a night I will not soon forget. You'll be able to see some of the antics in a webisode we'll release here in a week or two. I'll keep you posted. Tomorrow we head south to warmer pastures. Time to dust off the jean shorts and Pippin jersey!

Home Sweet Home

I recieved a phone call from home a few days ago. My mother informed me that she has been keeping up on the blog, and wants me to know that she thinks we are all drinking too much.

Mom,

I ain't gonna lie, we have been throwing a few back, but you will be happy to know that our drinking has slowed down dramatically, and we are all trying to eat as much fiber as possible. I'm not too sure what one has to do with the other, but you can rest assured that all is well at both ends.

-Alex

Oh Chicago

Last night was a night off in the great city of Chicago, Il. We got the invite to an "industry" party in the basement of a venue called the Double Door. We didn't really know what to expect, as far as who would be there or what would be going down, but we knew there would be free beer and food, so if anything this would be our meal ticket for the night. We were all pretty exhausted from driving the day before, and not sleeping much, so we all agreed that it would be an early night. The party started at 7 and we arrived on the dot with empty stomachs. I'm not sure what "industry" this was a party for, but I met a gentleman who works in video, and a guy who told us he was arrested back in the 80's for purchasing 50 hits of acid from an undercover cop. They were serving Goose Island's winter seasonal on the house, and 7 dollar shots of watered down whisky. After 4 or 5 brews and a shot of Beam we headed across the street to a club who was hosting "the greatest indie dance party in the country". This was according to our buddy Mike we met who works for Century Media records. Being an industry 'insider' he was able to get us to the front of the line at the bar and free shots of whisky. We left after finishing a double fist of complementary PBR cans, and headed back to Wills sisters place for the night. Somewhere along the way, we bought a $28 pizza, and I blacked out. Gotta love free booze.

And so it begins

Today is day 3 of tour. We played a show in Columbus on Friday at one of our favorite bars in town, The Ravari Room. It was pretty epic. The crowd was full of our closest friends, the pizza was free and we blew through our $50 bar tab in record time. It was a fitting farewell for the town we call home (although we'll be back on Friday to hang out for a night before we head to Indiana and then the south). Saturday we had a show in Kent at a venue called Professor Pub. It was a very small bar, and it reached capacity during our set. They have lots of great beers on tap, and hooked it up with three free ones per member and a veggie/hummos tray that turned my breath into farts. My girlfriend came to the show that night, and she was not stoked. We party'd hearty in Kent that night with Wills brother and all of his friends, and hit the road Chicago bound late in the afternoon. We got in last night, have a day off today, and are playing Madison, WI tomorrow. Here's a picture of the couch Wills sister has in her family room......