Missed a couple of days, but the show in Louisville, KY was pretty good. There were some issues at the venue, which was underneath a bowling alley that was closed for the night. But, the sound at the club was really clear. In terms of sound quality, this was the best night for Duane and Brando.

The next show was in Chicago, and was originally going to be my last show. On the way there, I stopped at a gas station and saw an article on the front page of some local periodical that had a tape machine. Being into that stuff, I took a closer look, and although it was really about the Beatles, the pictures they used were actually from the 1979 studio I had just been to the other day!

Chicago was the last night for Duane and Brando and the Super 8-Bit Brothers. The crowd was riotous and by far this was everyone's best performance.

Before the show I rode around Chicago a bit. I was a little disappointed by the city at first, lots of trash everywhere, lots of people asking for money, and tons of construction. It's as if the city decided to do construction on nearly every single street, but then decided not to finish it. But, I got to hang out a bit in the downtown area and it was pretty cool. There's a place called Kuma's Corner that serves heavy metal burgers. I got the Black Sabbath burger, which had blackening spice, chili, pepper jack, and red onion.

My brother met me in Chicago and we went to the show together, staying at his friend's house for the night.


We've decided to see the next two shows in Des Moines, Iowa and Springfield, Missouri before heading home. I also decided to ship back my motorcycle so we can deal with just a single vehicle.

We saw some weird stuff on the way to Des Moines. We stopped at a gas station where the 89 octane fuel was actually cheaper than the 87 octane by about 10 cents. There were also two slot machines in the gas station that you could gamble on in order to try and win store credit. That was $5.00 I'm never getting back...

We also saw two really low-flying aircraft. One was a mid-wing sport plane and the other a biplane. The biplane was flying extremely close to the ground, and although it wasn't doing aerobatics, it was doing some pretty tight maneuvers. We saw it go past a hill, and then we didn't see it again. Later, we saw a huge cloud of smoke that filled the same side of the horizon. I hope it made it.

Des Moines is a pretty empty town. I hope it's a good show tonight.

I'll upload some pics later.

The show in Chattanooga, Tennessee the other night was pretty cool.

The venue was in a strip mall, which brought back memories of playing at Curly's Coffee in Amherst, NH. The venue is part of, or is operated by, a church, confirming my belief that the Protomen are gods among men.

However, the sound at the club was terrible. Despite this major setback the Protomen still kicked ass. The next night's show in Murfreesboro was canceled because, according to Panther, the club blew up. To make up for it, the Protomen played an extended set, even doing an encore that lasted close to 30 minutes.

I returned to the Knight's Inn after the show, getting good use out of the jacuzzi.

Today I rode into Murfreesboro, TN, which is where the Protomen are from. On the way, I passed a sign that said I was near the Jack Daniels Distillery. Figuring it was right off the highway, I thought I'd stop by to check it out. In reality, the distillery is about 30 minutes off the highway. I eventually got there and checked out the museum, but didn't end up taking a tour. The tour is about an hour long, I would have had to have waited for one to begin, the tour is mostly outdoors, and I had already taken a chunk of time getting to the distillery. Still, the museum was pretty interesting.

I finally rolled into Murfreesboro and decided to check out the Middle Tennessee State University -- what a nice campus! I guess their school of Mass Communications is one of the best in the United States, and they have an excellent recording program. Don't believe me? Listen to any of the Protomen's recordings.

I hung low in Murfreesboro for the night, making up for lost sleep over the past week. I ate at a Mexican restaurant called Acapulco's, then hung low on Sunday as well at the motel, but did get a chance to go to Nashville to check out the 1979 Recording Studio - which is an awesome, 7,000 square foot all analog recording studio. The staff there were really kind to show me around.




That night I had dinner at a Hardee's, which to me is nearly identical to Carl's, Jr. I wonder if they're owned by the same company or something. A kid that worked there talked to me about motorcycles for awhile, then I headed back to the motel.

Did some laundry this morning where a guy who apparently hangs out there every day talked to me about his upstart ethanol business, motorcycles from the 1970's I've never heard of, and football players from probably two generations ago. It was kinda weird, how he kept going on, but at least it passed the time, somewhat...

Now I'm hanging at a Wendy's in Nashville, watching the skies for rain, and planning my route to Lousiville, Kentucky.

Woke up and had a visitor on my bike. He scared the crap out of me when I first noticed him peering at me.

The ride to Chattanooga was easy. I was able to do it with only one tank of gas. It was cool riding into the Smokey Mountains. I decided for a change to rent a motel before the show, that way I could kind of take it easy beforehand. They screwed up the reservation and gave my non-smoking room away, so I ended up getting a room with a hot tub for the same rate! Not too shabby...

Off to dinner, then it's show-time!

I left for Atlanta, GA after getting some juevos rancheros at a Mexican restaurant. I hit a little bit of rain, but didn't bother putting on the rain gear because it was just a sprinkle and it was really hot and humid. About a half hour later, in the distance I thought I saw fog past an overpass. I thought about stopping to put on the rain gear, but pressed on.

That was my big mistake for the day.

The "fog" was actually a huge rainstorm that I got caught in. Visibility was nil and I left the highway as soon as I could. I stopped at a Home Depot in the contractor's area, changed clothes in the bathroom, dried my seat, and waited for the storm to die down before throwing on the rain gear and heading out again. The rest of the trip wasn't bad, with intermittent sunshine and rain.

I eventually arrived in Atlanta and hung out around the area, which seemed equal parts college town and dangerous. The area we were in, which was called Five Points, had that whole Boulder-hippie vibe, but with lots of graffiti and bars on all the windows. The area looked a like a not as nice version of Columbia, SC, which is odd because that area was called Five Points as well.

I ate an awesome guacamole and pepperjack burger at a place called the Vortex, which had this giant skull you had to walk through in order to get into the door. They also had burgers like the Elvis burger, which has peanut butter, bacon, and a bunch of other things that shouldn't go together in it. Next to the Vortex was a liquor store, and inside they sold flat water in glass bottles, which is something I've been saying they ought to do for years. I bought a couple of bottles over the course of the afternoon and evening.

Figuring there is safety in numbers, I parked my motorcycle next to a couple of other bikes in the parking lot. It must be some meet-up area for bikers, because within a couple hours there must have been 100 bikes there!

The venue, the Star Bar, was right across the street. The venue was pretty small and it didn't seem like the staff knew what they were doing, but everything came out sounding great. The Protomen opened, which meant they had a shorter set, but because of that every song they did was killer. I also got to see How I Became the Bomb, which is a band the Protomen have often played with in their hometown. It was cool to see a different take on the whole snyth-pop/guitar rock thing, my buddy Milvestro would be all about that band.

I left about the time the final band was ending, winding my day down at a really nice Motel 6. I didn't think those words would ever go together in a sentence, but it was a pretty nice establishment.

On to Chattanooga, Tennessee tomorrow!

Each night keeps getting better and better.

Columbia, SC is a cute little college town that reminds me of Boulder, Colorado.

The venue was a cool building with bricks walls inside, but the room was large enough so that the brick didn't present any sound problems.

The Protomen opened with "How the World Fell Under Darkness" and also played "Will of One" and "The Sons of Fate," which is the first time I've heard them do those songs since picking up up this leg of the tour. They also did a cover I wasn't familiar with that I'll have to look up.

Tomorrow in Atlanta they'll be playing with different bands, which will be refreshing, but they won't be headlining.

Checked into the hotel around 3:30, went to sleep at 5, and checked out before 11 - all in the AM. I would think these 5 AM nights would be taking their toll on me, but strangely they haven't affected me much. When I've been sleeping it's been very deep.

More Rain, More Weirdness

I'm starting to establish a routine here. Breakfast at Denny's, got on the road to travel to Columbia, SC. The trip was mostly uneventful, except for two things.

About 30 miles outside of Columbia I could see a huge storm in the distance. Pulled over, through on the gear, and glad I did because it rained buckets for a little while. But, it cleared up pretty quickly, and with the sun baking down on me, my suit dried in about 20 minutes.

As I pulled into Columbia, it reminded me of North Reading's Route 28. Not a big place, not a lot going. Out of nowhere appears this monstrous stadium. Monstrous isn't even a strong enough word to describe the structure, because there is very little around it, so it's such a sharp contrast. I guess the South Carolina Gamecocks play there. That's when things got weird again. The sign was inviting me to buy tickets for the 2001 football season.

This is the second time in just a few days I've been somewhere and there's been something really wrong with the date. There was the whole Ron Paul incident in New Jersey, and now this. Have I been riding my motorcycle so fast that it's torn a hole into the time space continuum? I'm beginning to think that the sign I photographed on the door at Jack Rabbit's wasn't kidding (see Day 4, 3rd picture down).

I'm at the laundromat now, killing time before the show, killing some dirty laundry before the show, too.

Kick ass!

I slept in today, just making the 11 AM checkout time. Breakfast at Denny's, then on the road towards Savannah.

I passed a sign for the Mighty 8th Air Force Museum, which sounded interesting, and I thought would be a great way to kill a couple of hours. It was amazing! When I was younger, I could identify nearly all of the fighter planes and bombers used in WWII, so it was wonderful to be able to see planes like the P-51 and the B-17. The Museum was really well done, and if you have any interest in military aviation at all I'd recommend stopping by.

I stayed at the Museum for about 3 hours before heading to lunch at Ruby Tuesday's, then arriving to the venue. The venue is in an interesting part of Savannah, across the street from the Boys II Men Barber Shop and next to a liquor store where a bunch of people were sipping from brown bags. They were already eying my bike, so I figured when in Savannah, do as the Savannans do and got a small bottle of Morgan David 20 Red. I talked to one gentleman who had moved to the area two months ago, and he told me about the government upstart program that allowed him to take college classes for free through government grants. Across the street was a mission and we watched a drunken man collapse off of the five gallon bucket he was sitting on right into the street. My new friend told me to watch out, that people would be going after him in a minute to go through his pockets. Fortunately one of his friends -- or at least someone who was concerned and not afraid of him -- helped him up and set him back in a better spot.

Some other Protofans arrived and we began talking about other shows, where everyone was from, etc. A limping man who worked at the club approached me and asked me to help him to get some ice for the night. I got in his car, which made my messy car look immaculately clean and organized in comparison. I jokingly asked if he was living out of his car, but it impossible hard to tell in spite of his response whether he was sincere or not. There were bits of food scraps all over the place, it seriously looked like he may have been foraging for his food. We sarcastically took jabs at each other the whole time as I realized that he was righteously stoned. The ice machine gave us trouble and we only ended up getting one bag. He played loud techno music, so I think his car also functions as a dance club. He asked me if I minded if he smoked;, I told him since were were in his house, it was his rules.

I met a few more fans of the band and resisted the urge, as best I could, to bother the band while they were loading in. I figured after the show would be a better time to bother them.

Duane and Brando rocked the house. It was really cool because they switched up their set quite a bit from last night. I didn't really hang around for 8-bit Brothers.

The Protomen absolutely destroyed the place. They made up for the shortcomings of last night's set by at least 300%. The again opened with "Give Us the Rope," into "How the World Fell Under Darkness," and then, if memory serves correctly they played "Breaking Out," "Keep Quiet," "Father of Death," and "The Hounds." They also did a cover of "Shadows of the Night," which Gambler totally kicked ass on, and Turbo Lover annihilated a cover of "Ballroom Blitz." I'm fuzzy on the order for the last few songs, but I remember that "Hope Rides Alone" and "Due Vendetta" were played. They sound checked with an entertaining cover of "Love Isn't Always on Time." One of the fans had a prosthetic leg to which he had a affixed a giant Protoman sticker. During the show, he removed the appendage and pumped it in the air in rhythm to the music. I've never seen anything so badass. After the show, he got his leg signed by everyone in the band.

I can't overemphasize how awesome it was to see the Protomen to be in their element, with everything appearing to work correctly. The crowd went insane.

I apologize for the lack of coherence during this post, but it's after 5 AM and I'm still up from after the show.