The first days of tour pt. 1

Got a pretty decent nights sleep last night, with no sleep the night before, a 6am flight, a 2 hour layover, then rehearsal till midnight... I should have knocked out as soon as I got back to the hotel, instead I dicked around on Facebook and kept going down the the lobby to smoke. Bobby the drummer got back to the room and we chatted for a bit, finally knocking out around 4am, as soon as my face hit the pillow I was done. Woke up with bones cracking and sleep staining my eyes around 11am, an hour till check out, and 2 hours till bus call... just enough time to shower and throw all my shit in the bathroom in the suitcase.
I was feeling a little more confident after last nights rehearsal, just tripping a little on all the breakdowns and segues I needed to learn for tonights show... but hey, I'm a fucking professional now so no problem right? Besides, after Sebastian high fived me about 97 times I started to feel a little more comfortable, he's real excited to play with me which is awesome.

I thought about my Father a lot today, wondering if I was passing his house on my way to Guitar Center, or if anyone else in my "family" was near where we were playing. I heard everyone moved here from the east coast years ago, but I don't really give a shit enough about most of them to track them down. There's a few cousins that I still care about and will put on the list if they ask, but for all I care, my "Dad" could live in Africa and I wouldn't know the difference.
I finally make it to the lobby of the hotel and the first thing I do of course, is look for the coffee. I float into the restaurant looking bewildered and completely out of place. The waiter asks me if I'm in a band, then gives me free coffee and a super firm handshake... after I make it well known that I could give two fucks that he plays drums, I hunch down and start rolling my suitcase towards the big white bus parked out front. I have to stay hunched because the airline broke the God damn handle on it. I toss the bag in the first bay, and step onto what used to be George Jones' production bus. I might as well have stepped into a guest room in the Scarface mansion. The bus is so fucking rad, completely white with Christmas lights wrapped around the mirror on the ceiling, a swordfish etched into the glass separating the sink from the couch, grey carpet running from the drivers seat to the back, with another etching of a beach setting with palm trees on the glass in the back lounge. I claim my bunk, then take a walk with Jimbo to find a Starbucks. The daily mission of any tour I've been on in the past 5 years has been to find coffee... and keep drinking it until I can't feel my face.
The venue was close, so right after we jacked up on caffeine, me and Jimbo decided to not wait for the rest of the guys to finish breakfast, and walked over to get things rolling. I was hoping to get one more rehearsal in before tonights show. Sebastian didn't sing last night and one of the guitar players missed a flight and didn't arrive till 11pm. So I was a little on edge, the coffee was not helping that situation at all... but I kept drinking it anyway. I had to go pick up a new bass head, graciously provided to me by my family and other bandmate. The one I had been using for the last 10 years just wasn't cutting it anymore. Unfortunately I had to spend about 3 hours in the Greensboro North Carolina Guitar Center to get it... which in real people time is like 5 days. Everyone was very nice, but it's fucking Guitar Center, I can't be in that place for more than 30 seconds before I want to kick the little bass slapping emo douchebag in the back... it's cool man, I get it, you know your scales and can play some sweet Avenged Sevenfold riffs. Now get back in your room and jerk off to the girls that I have sex with until you get a sweet job at Starbucks, and make sure you practice making soy chai late's for when I come back next year you hopeless little dickfuck.
I finally get the bass head in the back of the runners car, and 3 hours later we start to drive down the freeway in the now pouring rain back to the venue. By the time I get back everyone is all done checking their shit, so I throw my new bass head up onto the 8x10 and plug it in. I didn't even hit a note on my bass before I felt the difference in size, this thing is a fucking monster. Bas finally showed up, high fived me a few times, then ran through some songs. It was my first time playing with him and I thought it went pretty well, then after soundcheck he high fived me like three more times... so I knew I must have done ok.

Touring looked so cool when I was a kid... I would sit on my couch and watch this brand new channel called Mtv, dreaming of one day getting to lick the neck of my guitar and have girls fall all over me. I would stare into the mirror next to the tv practicing my moves with wooden sauce spoons or a broom, my mood would sometimes switch from being a drummer one day, to be a guitar player the next... Videos like "Home sweet Home" or "Dead or alive" would come on, and I would dream of being on the bus with a bottle of Jack Daniels and a grossly hot blonde from some beach village. I would watch bootleg Metallica shows and Live after Death, wishing I could play like Cliff Burton and Steve Harris... now back to the day.....

I'm pretty sure I've got all the segues and little nick nacks down, and I am more confident about the show, even though just a couple of hours before we hit the stage I realized that I had learned 2 of the songs in the wrong key... and had to relearn them all over again. So just to be sure, I threw on the headphones and jammed the songs a few more times in the hallway before we went on. Dave the TM comes out of the dressing room and throws both of his hands in the air giving me a 10 minute warning. I take a deep breath, give my bass to Jimbo, and go into the bathroom to make sure my hair is ok...
Honestly, a good show for me is having a good hair night.

I take a quick peek out into the crowd, see that the room is just about packed, take one more deep breath, then go into the dressing room for a few more high fives and a 10 minute headstand. I like to walk on my hands a lot, and before a show I'll usually go upsidedown against the wall for a generic version of a Keith Richards blood transfusion, just to get my shit pumping..
I walk down the hall stretching and flapping my arms, making sure not to knock my hair out of place. I come up stage right to grab my bass, Johnny the guitar player on my side is already there smiling. We don't high five....
The crowd starts screaming because they see us warming up on the side, it's always a good feeling stepping out onto that stage... even when you know they aren't screaming for you, they could give a fuck if it was me or some other hired gun up there. I'm just stoked cuz in about 35 seconds I'm about to bust into "Slave to the grind," a song from a band I was not to into 25 years ago...
and if you would have told me that when I was 16, sitting in Terry whatever her last name was' T-top Firebird, in the parking lot of the Garden state Plaza mall, smoking Marlboro reds and hating the music her hair sprayed, white tassled leather jacket wearing ass was listening to.. that 25 years later I would be touring the world with the singer of that band, I probably would have punched you in the face... but here I am, standing on this stage, staring at a club full of people screaming for him.
The intro starts to roll, the lights get lower, the crowd gets louder... and as I start to make my way across the stage with bass in hand, I remember why I do this. At first when I was a kid, it was totally about girls, money, and booze... it was the only way I knew how to think, I had never ever picked up an instrument, and I already wanted to be in the back lounge of a tour bus getting a blow job with some stupid sunglasses on. Now it's different, I do like taking pictures with people and signing shit, with an occasional chick to hang with or whatever, I don't drink or do drugs anymore so that's out of the picture... but the real reason I do this, is so I can't move my neck when I wake up in the morning. The feeling that is produced when I lock in with the drummer, and everything is at the right tempo, is undeniably better than any speedball I have ever done. Ok... let's not get too carried away here, maybe it's not as good as a giant speedball, but holy fuck does it come close. The intro stops, Bobby hits the high hat 4 times, and we start Slave... I see Sebastian out of the corner of my left eye, just smiling and waiting. This guy has been doing this since I was in fantasy camp on my living room couch, and it looks like he's about to take the stage for the first time ever. I love that about him, Sebastian is the epitome of a rock star... we roll through the intro to the song, and as the song kicks in, Sebastian runs up on stage screaming, swinging the mic over his head like a helicopter blade. I look up, and he turns back and points and smiles, it's on and we are killing it. About 7 high fives later, we are almost through the 5th song... I am nailing just about all of the stuff we went over during the small rehearsal we had, hitting every ending, and with only a few glitches... I successfully make it to the end of the show. He makes up all come to the front of the stage to take a bow, which totally freaked me out. I'm not in Queen, or Van Halen, I just want to go backstage, crack a bottle of water, and light a cigarette. The best cigarette for me ever is right after a show... I'll suck down like three in a row. Baz tries to get me to come sign some shit at the merch table but again, I know my place.. so I grab like 9 slices of pizza, a coke, and sit on the stage watch it all go down. After about an hour of watching that, and signing some shit here and there, I head back to the bus. I get a light round of applause for a job semi-well done, and I hit my bunk with sweaty balls as we drive to Baltimore...