Shawdanger

Summary/response

It seems I have not made a proper update since Thanksgiving break.

I don’t want to devote too much time to this, since I have a whole bunch of errands and chores to do, but the house is particularly and uncharacteristically quiet, and now is a good time to sit down with my thoughts. Sorry if it is a bit on the longer side. It’s been three months. I’ll try to condense. 

So after my girlfriend got really sick after Thanksgiving, and after she recovered, I worked a lot at the bakery and as a tutor. Somewhere in the beginning of the month we played one of the Farside’s last shows with for The Hell of It and maybe with Gorgeous too. 

Then I took a week or so off before Christmas to go on tour with Gorgeous. We hit mostly Florida, but got into Georgia and South Carolina as well. 

Highlights from tour include:

Deleon Springs: a po-dunk town near Orlando. We played at Junkyard Saloon, which is the self-proclaimed “music capital of Deleon Springs.” The jukebox had a sign that read something along the lines of “do not play rap. It will be skipped and your money will not be refunded.” There were also Confederate flags hanging about. I didn’t have a good feeling about the place, but a couple key folk (shout out to Jack, T-Bone and company) made it worthwhile and awesome. After T-Bone realized we were playing, he got all his friends to come out, buying beers for everyone to shotgun and putting everyone on his bar tab for an hour. Afterward was skate boarding ramps and a firepit. 

Orlando: The first stop on our tour. This stop was special because it showed me that Orlando isn’t all bad, especially Winter Springs. We stayed with some really nice, awkward folk. 

Atlanta: The last stop on our tour. It was probably the biggest show we have ever played. Thanks to my singer’s brother, we can now say we got to play with the guy from the Black Lips and the guy from Deer Tick. We played a good set and got to feel like rock stars for a night. We even had a fan come out who saw us last time we were in Atalanta.

Tampa: The Hold Tight House runs itself like a professional venue. They are legit and nice. They are a model for all house shows. 

Sendaway Stranger/Little League: They were on tour also from Tallahassee and we kept running into them as our bands followed each other around the state. They played the day after us in Deleon Springs. We played the day after them in Tampa. In Gainesville and Miami we played the same day at venues down the street from each other. We also ran into each other at Taco Bus in Tampa. 

The morning after our last show I flew to Japan. It was pretty eventful compared to my usual trips that consist of staring at my family I don’t understand, watching TV I don’t understand and eating too much food. Although, I did plenty of those things too.

Christmas day was the second part of the funeral for my grandfather where we put his urn in a little family tomb. It was sad, but my family kept it light-hearted. The day after that was a visit to some onsen (hot springs), which I had visited a long time ago. I got pretty sick at this point (touring and the recycled airplane air finally got to me), but recovered a day or two later. Then I drank too much with my uncle and felt sick for another day.

My mom had a spa appointment one day in Shinjuku, and I was left to wander the city with my thoughts. New Years day was a temple visit with my grandma where she introduced me to a whole bunch of people and I awkwardly tried to bow to them. We got stuck in Narita trying to get back to the States, and I got to eat at one of the best ramen places ever. I’m not sure if that was worth two days in an airport, though. I barely made it back to Florida in time to work the next morning. 

This month my house, dubbed The Franklin Manor, had it’s first slew of official house shows to pick up the slack of the Farside and Engine Room closing .

The first show was at the beginning of January and included Big Attack, They Eat Their Own God, Volcanus and Gorgeous. A cop showed up to warn us that we “would get complaints,” but we had already talked to the neighbors, so the show went on, ended pretty early and the cop never came back to bother us. There were a lot of crust punks hanging about. They were super nice, even if smelly. 

The second show was Spooky Ladies Night on Friday the 13th. It was a wild success. The ratio of girls to guys at the punk show was inspiring. West Hexas (Texas?), Mystery Date, Kopapods and USAholes all played. It was nice to have all local bands for once, and especially to have all the bands fronted by strong, talented ladies. Kopapods are a surf rock/folk band made up of my roommates. It was their first show. Mystery Date is a band with the drummer from my own band For The Hell of It and it was their second show. West Hexas werethe highlight though with their tight harmonies and angry, loud folk songs about love and redemption. 

The most recent Franklin Manor show was put on by one of the masterminds behind The Farside. It featured Curmudgeon, Moshing X and Descript.  It was fun to see everyone mosh. Overall, they were respectful and I’m glad the ceiling fan is in one piece and hanging straight. 

Next month, both of my bands are recording and then putting out a 12” split. We are trying to rope two more bands in for a four-way punk split. 

March is another tour with Gorgeous. My singer has booked all but two dates.

Exciting stuff to come.  

1. ressurection-test liked this
2. p4tr1ck liked this
3. shawdanger posted this