Whiskey Daredevils

I awake to hear Leo’s struggle to maintain life. He coughs, spits, and makes horrible noises in an attempt to deal with his spiraling downward health. If I lived in the apartment below, I would consider calling an ambulance. Or a hearse. After showering in the always lovely communal hostel shower, Leo and I walk past some tiny student girl. Leo turns to me and says in his Tour Creepy Voice, “Hey man… That shower really turned me on.” If she spoke English, she must have shuddered.

It’s an uneventful drive to Bremen, one of the only major population centers in Germany we have yet to play on any tour. The one noteworthy incident is when we stop at a faceless Autobahn restaurant. Leo runs into disaster when attempting to order gravy for his pommes and hamburger/meatloaf thing. Instead of gravy, he winds up getting about 16 oz of ketchup on everything. If translated, I believe what the steam table employee heard was this:

Leo: Can I have some ketchup?

Guy: Of course. (applies ketchup)

Leo: No! I want ketchup!

Guy: Huh? You want more ketchup?

Leo: Yes! Ketchup!

Guy: OK. Here’s more ketchup then. That’s gross, but you keep asking for ketchup, so here you go…

His fries look like they have been murdered with an axe, awash in blood. Dig in Lee!


The club we play in Bremen is in some sort of university district. I say this because like every retail strip by a college, there are shops with marijuana paraphanalia, thrift, “word” (i.e. cheap) jewelry, cheap street food, and art supplies. Oh yeah, there’s also tons of 20 year olds on bikes.

The club is the finest example of Euro Club yet on tour. The room is down an impossibly steep staircase complete with crazy turns, additional mini staircases. It is also, of course, mute use. Tonight’s show is with The Sworn Liars opening, with DJ Fuckface spinning 70s soul classic tunes at 10pm for a “Freshman Welcome Party”. This can mean only one thing… We will finish and have to load out up the stairs through a throng of intoxicated freshmen. That is an ugly scenario no matter where you are on the planet.

We arrive promptly at our scheduled 530p load in, and set up in about 11 minutes. Soundcheck is scheduled for 6pm with dinner/showtime at 8pm. The one variable is that this is the soundman’s first day. He does seem like an eager apprentice ready to impress, yet he may not be ready to be thrown into the fire. I say this because it takes about 45 minutes for him to mic us up. He has completely ignored the fact that the main music room is about the size of a good sized American living room, and we probably just need to mic Leo’s kick and my vocals. Our rented amps are big enough for Thin Lizzy to have used on the Isle of Wight concert, so we should have enough power to cover a 10X10 space.

The soundcheck continues. Leo’s drums take the longest of any show I have played with him since 1992. This is not an exaggeration. It is the longest drum soundcheck of all time. They spent less time on the drums at Live Aid. Then we move to Ken. It is now almost 8pm, and I have been sitting in this basement room with nothing to do for 2.5 hours. I am going to lose my mind. We he finally gets to me, we start a song. The monitor mix is awful. If you wanted to make it sound worse up there, you would be hard pressed. Leo and I start to snap at the soundguy. “Take all the guitar out of the monitors.” Nothing changes. “No, ALL guitar out!” Nothing changes. “At least give us some vocals in the mix.” Subtle change. OK, fuck it. It’s going to suck no matter what. I’m leaving before I melt down publicly. It is 8:15, and we have been soundchecking to play a tiny room for almost 3 hours. It is unbelievable.

I stomp down the street by myself to a wine bar I spied earlier. Everyone in the place stops in mid conversation to stare at the cowboy that just walked in. These look like professors and grad students from the college. I feel unwelcome. Fuck ‘em. I pull out a stool from the bar and try to negotiate the German menu. I select a glass of Cahors that is absolutely awful. I try to ask the bar staff about the rest of the list, but they don’t seem to speak much English and appear irritated at me being here at all. I walk around to look at the wine stored on the walls, and spot an interesting CH. Beaucastel which I inquire about. The staff kinda ignores me.

I sit back down and order a glass of very ordinary Rioja, which is at least OK. One thing I have learned about the Germans. They wouldn’t know a good glass of red wine if it bit ‘em in the ass. Eventually I get a price on the Beaucastel after some very delicate negotiations. The whole deal swings on if I am going to drink it there, or take it. The price is actually 50% less if I take it to go, so I do just that. I ask the wine buyer about his options on available Southern Rhone French wines, but he doesn’t really want to talk to me. OK. See you later Hans.

I get back to find the opening band started. They sound like the Rip Offs to me, and are kinda cool. Most of the band is transplanted Americans and Brits, so it’s not really surprising to hear that sound. I like ‘em.

The room is full when we play, and it takes awhile to get used to the fucked stage sound. I think we play OK, and the crowd gets into it. I can see heads bobbing up and down, and hands holding Beck’s beer aloft. That’s a good sign, isn’t it? Afterwards, a weathered woman I saw score some pill from a bartender called Gary “God”. This may be all well and good, but “God” has to load out with the rest of us. The glory is short in the multi use Euro club…

The promoter, Peaches, gets bar staff to help out with the brutal upstairs load out through the now everywhere drunk freshmen. Peaches has been really good to us, and the bar staff has been cool too. Like most of the places we play over here, they treat us as actual human beings, whereas in the States most clubs prefer to go with the “treat them like assholes first” gameplan. The gear is now all collected by the van, which is great. It would be even greater if we could find Mike the Driver, who has the key.

I’ll bet anything he’s talking to his new girlfriend Robin, who alerted him via text and maybe Facebook message, that she is having her period today. Yes, the joys of Facebook and digital communication never end. Sure enough that fucker is chatting it up a block away while we load out. He’s a really nice kid, and all of 26. However, this is the only reason we are paying this guy. I tell him we’re pissed, and he slinks into the van to arrange the gear. It reminds me of when you yell at an employee at work, and for the next hour they become Super Employee.

I realize I haven’t eaten, and run off to get a falafel at a nearby quick service restaurant. It tastes really good, but I already know I will have to brush my teeth 200 times to try and get this scent out of my mouth. Still, it is so worth it right now.