I had to read this on my last day teaching before I headed off to New York with Brittney Fulton.
I'm sure the children had nightmares.
I also confiscated this note.
New York It is my favourite large city. I've been to Toronto, Sydney, Lima, London, and Vancouver and so far New York is the best. The people, the food, the character of the different areas. It's just an amazing city.
Also in the 3 times I've been there this is the 1st time I saw a rat.
And the first time I peed in a commercial doorway downtown.
It was an emergency. I felt the need to leave a dollar in the door handle for my troubles, but not enough to actually leave one.
This was Brittney's first tour and first time to New York.
Brit's first show outside Canada
It's a difficult area to play. Lots of bars have show cases with 4-7 acts and you get paid if enough people come out to see you. Not easy for touring acts with little to no following.
I always treat it as a musical vacation. Bring a few hundred dollars and expect it to be gone by the end of the tour.
The tour was 5 shows Rochester, Jersey City, Manhattan, and 2 in Brooklyn.
I've never had a problem but I've always been squirrely going over the border.
I think they are going to catch me coming over without a work Visa and throw me in the clink. (I've never used that expression before) .
I mailed down our CD's and shirts to Kelsey Warren from the band pILLOW tHEORY (if you've been following me you will remember that Kelsey came up to Canada for his first north of the border shows late last year) He always has covers that come way out of left field. If you get a chance to see his solo show, please do your self a favour and do so.
This picture is an optical illusion.
Turns out I've got a tiny shrunken Beetlejuice head while,
while Brittney has got a giant bobble head mellon.
I think I'm standing 6 feet in front of her to make our heads appear the same size.
So we hit Rochester for our first gig with no merch aside from one CD and 2 t-shirts I smuggled over. (i'm a smuggler, add that to my resume)
It was a Monday night so I wasn't expecting anything too amazing, but together we made, wait for it.... $5 in tips.
Oh ya.
I did manage to sell my one CD, during Brittney's set.
A fellow walks up while she's singing.
"Can I buy that CD?"
"Sure, but it's not hers."
Gives me an odd look "What do you mean it's not hers?"
"It's mine."
"Who are you?"
"I sang a set before she got on."
"Oh, well I'll go see if my wife still wants it."
I expected him not to return, but he came back with the wife and bought the CD.
We drove out of town and stayed in a motel. We never figured out what town it was. We were probably in limbo.
This is limbo.
On our way down to Jersey we got stuck in a traffic jam outside of Binghampton around 2:00pm
With a quick google search we found that someone had cut off a tractor, flipped the car and died at 11am we were stuck there until about 3:30 then started to slowly move. the accident didn't even happen in our side of the divided highway. Crazy how you know everything with the iphone.
We stopped in a a town that had the word "New" in it's name.
It was not a new town.
We found a bar that we weren't sure was a bar at first. They sold pints for $1.75 gave us a free round and a slice of pizza. Best $3.50 I ever spent.
Pennsylvania does not have a ban on smoking in it's bars.
Brittney was quite pleased.
Me, not so much.
We rolled into Jersey met up with Kelsey at Lucky 7, our venue for the night.
Kelsey did not bring the merch.
There was one fella who was taking pictures and videos of us while we played, and later told Brittney that he was going to come to the Brooklyn shows and bring 10 or 1000 people.
Wow, well I'm sure the places we are playing at have capacity's of 200.
So 800 of your friends may have to stay outside.
Sadly we bever saw Mr. 10 or 1000 again.
Kelsey has said that he is notorious for getting drunk with little or no money.
We got to see that 2 of the 3 times we hung out this trip.
He ends up with drink after drink after drink.
After the show we were trying to get to Brooklyn and since Kelsey knows the area I ignored Brittney and Google maps. I decided to listen to his way word directions.
Big mistake.
He couldn't navigate his way down a straight road.
Brit took over. Got us there in no time.
We stayed in a storage unit/studio space owned by Alex Kelly (also came on the road on the Canadian highways last year) We didn't really get any time to hang because she had to head up to Buffalo for a few weeks.
It was great because we got to stay downtown Brooklyn from Tuesday to Sunday FREE aside from parking, and somehow parking only cost us $48 dollars as well!
The box was windowless, so we never knew what time it was or what the weather was like.
But really that didn't matter because we had the all knowing iPhone.
Weather is no mystery to us!
In the room there was one futon and the floor. I took the futon.
Some would say "Horrible Neil, why would you make Brittney sleep on the floor?"
To that I would say this
"Have you ever sleep on a futon?"
Here's the history of the Futon.
Someone in the Jenga factory accidentally made oversized blocks and threw them haphazardly under a sheet. Then someone sneezed and it sounded like Futon, the guy said that's a good name and sat on the block sheet pile as he sat down the blocks shifted and flattened out a bit. Futon created.
Pretty sure that's the way it happened.
We explored Brooklyn on Wednesday. Heading to The Brooklyn Bridge, The Fulton Mall, Prospect Park, and walking way too long to find a pub. Only to find their pints were $7. (What happened to $1.75?) And it was a den of Hipsters.
Here is the Summer hipster in Brooklyn.
Thick wooly touque perched on the top of the head, big burly unkept lumberjack beard, colourful tight t- shirt ( that isn't tight because the hipster is too skinny) skin tight denim shorts rolled up (perhaps girls' shorts), thick black (probably prescription-less) glasses, and brand new Puma shoes.
They're wondrous creatures.
4 to 5 hours of walking around in the city under the hot sun garnered Brittney a new red undershirt.
She was sunburned.
Her chest was a bright angry red and her neck was her regular pale self.
also only half her face was red.
While drinking that evening Brit was complaining about her half faced tan.
"I can fix that for you." I told her.
"You can?"
I stared at her, wondering if I was going to go through with my joke.
Deciding yes, I slapped the pale side of her face.
"Ow, that hurt!"
"That's how you get it to match."
We played The Delancey that night. It was not a good show. The 4th act was cancelled and they started the night off with a 3 piece followed by 2 solo acts. A few people came out for the 1st act, Rebecca Pearl, and then they all moved to the back of the bar with the musicians and talked through all of Brittney's set not clapping once, then everyone left during my soundcheck song. So I played to 4 people.
This made Kelsey very angry. He is a believer in musicians supporting other musicians.
Needless to say the merch was not needed today.
We travelled around a bit ended up at an open mic and Kelsey kept shouting for pizza.
He had the drunk hunger.
The next day was Adventures on Manhattan. Another day of walking and eating.
We had 2 lunches Taza de Oro, a Puertorican restaurant and then John's a pizza joint. I've been craving both of these since we got in the city. Britt didn't like the black beans, so I ate hers.
Then she was too full and could only eat 1 and a half slices of John's.
I ate the rest.
I also had a giant cookie in between.
We checked out some sites walked around Times square.
I hugged a smurf, told a black person that I don't like black people, and took pictures in front of American flags.
Standard New York afternoon.
(I'm hoping that someone reads that and thinks Sounds about right)
Let me explain. Walking down the strip there are rap artists selling their CD, not selling but giving it to you and then following you and asking for a donation. They usually start off by asking you questions.
This one started off Do you like music? then followed with Do you like black people?
I said yes to the first, no to the latter. We laughed and he asked to shake my hand.
This was 5 Mics! (Yes THE 5Mics!) He tried to get a donation but we gave him a CD in trade. I don't think that's what he wanted. We later heard that he has beaten people up that don't donate.
We listened to the album on the way home. it had tracks such as Licky Licky, in which 5Mics informs us on how he pleases the womenfolk.
Every track had Gun shots, that air horn sound, Vincent Price laughing and a Jay Z sample where he says, Let me introduce you to the mu'fuckin' greatest.
I doubt it will make it in to my everyday song rotation.
Feel free to call her Sassy B.
On Friday we headed up TO Williamsburg. Holy Jews! We walked into a neighbourhood that was all Othodox Jews. Everyone had the hats the curls the long black coats and all the women were dark haired with full length dark dresses.
6 foot tall blonde Brittney with her mascot sized head stuck out like a sore thumb.
At least I had a beard.
Just west of this area we found another fantastic pizza place called San Marco's. Pizza by the slice and free wine. They had think Brooklyn/Italian accents.
It was hard to understand Joe Pesci.
I'm pretty sure that's who served us.
She finished her first glass and he asked if she wanted more.
As she was thinking if she did or not, he pours her another one and said "If you're hesitating you want more."
Here are the results.
Sassy B and F. Wood
We played Hank's Saloon that night a good crowd out, but the best was meeting Frank Wood. He's got a voice like the Wolfman. (not the monster but the old radio DJ)Brit's idea was to get me drunk, as it doesn't happen too easily.
This just ended up in her getting wasted. Pretty funny to watch. She did sell a lot of CD's that night, but she also kept offering her boobs as part of the sale.
She threw up 4 times that night and made me buy her a Big Mac.
Heading back we stopped off at the deli. This place made fantastic sandwiches. I got a roast beef.
Brittney bought 3 bags of chips.
She was tired the next day.
I must have been a little tipsy because I decided it was a good idea to film me sitting crouched over in only my underwear and complain about The Sassy B not buying a sandwich while she ate her chips.
This video will not be shown. As it is not very appealing to the eye.
Our last full day was Saturday. It was St. Patrick's Day and we ignored it all.
We didn't sleep until 3:30 or 4am the night before. I feel we should have gone over to Manhattan and saw the parade and such but instead we stayed in and watch the St. Patty's Episode of 30 Rock.
We stayed in Brooklyn and went to Coney Island. I love seeing the ocean. all the rides were shut down for the season. It was pretty cool. But the best part was Totonno's My new favourite pizza place. I want to go back, right meow.
Totonno's!
I don't know who left this on the side of the road but it's pretty sad looking.
We played in the Red Hook district called Bait & Tackle. An Irish owner who plays down St. Patty's day, in that he doesn't do anything for it. It was a really great spot. The people tipped well, had some great beer. It was the one show where we actually made good money.
We went to Sunny's a few blocks away. This place we were told has a bluegrass jam every saturday. And in the back there were 20 musicians with guitars banjos, even a guy with a harp and a 70 year old lady with a dulcimer. we joined in for a few Brit sang Bobby MacGee. It was a great night. Crazy to see a place like that in Brooklyn.
And that was it. we made our way back home. I drove the whole way because Sassy B said she doesn't like to speed and 110 is fast enough for her. I am on the other side of the fence. so 130-140 was what we did.
We stopped back at that bar in Pennsylvania, New something or other, and it was like heaven for Brit aka Sassy B. Smoking in the bar, $1.75 pints and Nascar!
Ya she's a fan of Nascar.
She starte chattin' with the locals about this and that and what drivers she doesn't like.
She mentioned that she doesn't like Bush.
One moustached wonder says "I ain't no fagot, I like Pussy!"
A few were missing teeth and one fellow's name was Jim Bob.
Like I said Sassy B was in Heaven.
And that was that.
Now for bi'ness.
I've started using Bandcamp. I like it.
It's cheaper for you and has the ability to make more money for me.
Plus has all my concerts listed.
I may focus on this site, rather than all the other things I'm apart of.
Myspace, reverb Nation, CBC Radio 3, Jango...
It's a lot of updating.
I'm giving away my song #22 for free and the whole album download is only $8.00 rather than $9.99 on iTunes.
So head there if you haven't got #22!
I also explain a little bit about all the songs on the album.
Upcoming Shows:
Mar 23, 2012 Groovy Tuesday's Barrie, ONMar 24, 2012 Griffon Gastropub Bracebridge, ONApr 01, 2012 CJ's Cafe Bronte, ONApr 07, 2012 Local Gastropub Barrie,ONApr 26, 2012 Freakin' Frog Las Vegas, NVMay 04, 2012 The Brownstone Orillia, ONMay 11, 2012 Michael & Marion's Barrie, ONMay 12, 2012 Michael & Marion's Barrie, ONMay 25, 2012 The Local Barrie, ONJun 14, 2012 Cafe Concerto Vienna, AUJun 16, 2012 One Eyed Jack Florence, ITJun 22, 2012 Clubhouse Florence, IT
www.eyesiwide.ca
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