So were home. Finally. I feel it would be wrong of us to end the blog without the last 10 days of the trip. Even though its been a week or two, I'm gonna try and remember everything that happened Post-Broadway Calls dates...
So After we said our goodbyes to Broadway Calls we took off for Texas. We drove through the panhandle of Oklahoma and stopped at the strangest gas station I've ever seen. See Eric and I love rednecks. Seriously they are our favorite people in the world. Whats better then getting drunk, supin up lawnmowers, and breaking things? Nothing. Everyone knew eachother at the gas station. I'm not just saying that. Literally everyone that walked in there knew everyone else there. My master plan was ruined of asking the townsmen if they wanna drink tonight with 5 guys from PA when the chief townsmen left the gas station with 1 thirty rack thrown in the back of the truck and the other in the front seat. Road sodas!
We left the gas station and drove for hours. We stopped in a small town outside of Amarillo, TX and got a crummy motel for the night. We watched Green Day on some late night show play a boring song about guns or about me being an American Idiot or something. Sleeep.
We woke up realizing we only drove 6 out of the 16 1/2 hours and were beyond bummed. 10 1/2 hours later we were in San Antonio sweating our asses off. It was our first night hooking up with O Pioneers!!! and were stoked on meeting them all. Last time we met them we got wasted with the brothers at Titan sometime during the winter... The show was fun. The Anchor and O Pioneers!!! were awesome and after the show we decided to stay in town at a super swanky Best Western. I got a bed and watched Rancid bum me out. Oh well.
The next day we went to Houston to play a loft show Eric from O Pioneers!!! set up. The show was great and the loft space was beyond awesome. We stayed at the I Heart You headquarters that night and ate pie and talked about screen printing. Good times.

June 16th Atlanta, GA

So this is pretty much the end of our first full US tour. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't tired at this point. The closest thing to home has been a spot in the van that rotates everyday from the back, to the middle, to the front. Lunch rotates to whatever fast food we didnt have the day before. Music selection is played to either piss everyone off or cheer them up. Regardless of these things, this has been the best experience of my life. In an old journal I wrote in when I was 15, I made a list of goals I wanted to achieve while playing in a band. I wanted to play a show one day then a show the next, I wanted to get signed to a record label, and finally to go on tour. The last two I wrote off as impossible. They were intangible. But here I am doing what I've always wanted to do. Its a good feeling. Its also a good feeling to be back on the east coast. Once Florida came around everything was familiar again. Its nice to see familiar faces. but lets get back to where I left off...

The desert was fun. Vegas was definitely an experience.
We played 2 shows that day with the first being at East Side Joes. East Side Joes is kinda a house/ kinda a warehouse. I dont know how to describe it but they have an awesome mini ramp inside the living room that I was beyond excited to skate. We played an alright show there and then had to pack up before our late show. I did forget to mention that a dude said he was going to "knock me in the face" if I didn't give him a free EP. Good start to Vegas....
Next show was at The Rockroom. The Rockroom is technically a strip club/venue. You have to go through another entrance to get to the strip club but yeah. Strange strange show. We played with The Voodoo Glow Skulls and at first (according to our iteneray) this show was gonna be solid. The promoter didnt show up and someone told us that they were giving all the money to Voodoo but we could have free drinks. We did some talkin and in the end we actually ended up getting more money then we were supposed to and hotel rooms. Funny how those things work out. The show was alright but the free drinks were better. After the show we packed up and went downtown. I cant remember all the casinos we went to but I do remember the Paris one. Eric won 60 and I won 50 by the end of the night. Around 4:30 we went to Dennys and Eric and I shared our earnings. While walking into the bathroom I saw a man hurling into a garbage can. I really love this town... After we ate way to much food for 4:30am, we went back to the hotel and got some much needed sleep.
Phoenix. Good times in Phoenix. We played an awesome show at The Phix and stayed with our new friend Erica. Us and BC all crammed into her hot tub and drank beers all night. The next day we played Tucson and again went back to Ericas in Phoenix.
After day 2 at Ericas house in Phoenix we took off for Albuquerque. We were playing a last minute house show so I didn't really know what to expect. Turns out the place was packed (cops came during the first band to basically tell us nothing but they're here) and the show was a blast. We hung out and made some new friends and then Tom, Eric, and I went out to eat with Broadway. They took us to an awesome restaurant before we went back to Jakes house.
The house was huge and everyone there was awesome. We passed around a guitar for a bit and Tom and I played some songs before going to bed. We had a long drive to Denver the next day.... So the drive was brutal but Denver was amazing. It was our last day of tour with Broadway Calls and it had to be a good one. We played at The Marquis Theater which was a really cool place. Tom and I skipped the pop band playing for pints of Guinness next door. Everyone assured us we didn't miss anything. I thought we played a good set. BC killed it of course. After the show we all went out to a bar and said our goodbyes. Well actually the goodbyes came at 8 in the morning when BC left for Utah but I was still half asleep and don't really remember that. The next day we had off and stayed somewhere in Texas. That state is too damn big.. More to come. Gotta grab a shower before the line starts....

This tour is going too fast. Today is June 4th and if my math is correct we have 17 days left. The idea of going home is freaking the hell out of me. Sure living with 4 other dudes in a van for 40 days can get rough. There are times that I would love nothing more then to snap everyone's neck. There are also times that everyone would love nothing more then to snap my neck. In the end I could never imagine sharing this experience with anyone else. That's about as sappy as I'm going to get with these idiots...
So whats been going on? Olympia was awesome. Tom busted his leg up pretty hard while playing Frisbee. I jumped on a trampoline with some fucks then we played a sweet garage show. We stayed with Ty that night and his mom cooked us some amazing food in the morning. I stunk up his bed along with Tony and Eric so Ty if you're reading this I'm sorry....
Portland ruled. I think out of everywhere on the west coast I'd consider moving there first. Well along with the bay area. Regardless the show was one of the best of the tour and the arcade/bar across the street was totally worth my 5 bucks. We stayed with our good friends from back home Colin and Nicole, which always is a good time. We stayed up all night talking politics, religion, and whatever we could think to compare between the east and west coasts. I love drunken conversations with Colin because unlike me and the majority of my friends, he has a really positive outlook on everything. Its a nice change from the standard defeatist attitude that tends to overwhelm drunken conversations.

Redding was wild! The Seperation dudes took us swimming at these cliffs called Whiskeytown Lake. We had a crew of about 20 in their van and I couldn't help but feel like it was the 1970's, sessioning classic rock while crammed on the floor of a van driving through Northern California. Or maybe that's the typical vision an east coast kid would have of Northern California in the 70's. Regardless I wussed out on the bridge but managed to get myself to jump off the big cliff. Of course I made Tom go first... The show sold out and it killed. The kids were insane and I dont think I've ever seen as much crowd surfing as I did during BC's set. They kill it every night and its so sick to see one of your favorite bands play every night. We've all come really close with those dudes and their crew (Erica is actually sitting right next to me at Eddies house fixin' up my horrible grammar). If we didn't mention it earlier... Erica and Eddie are from LA and they've been with Broadway Calls since the North West. Ericas been taking pictures and Eddie works for Adeline Records. Totally stoked on meeting both of them and having them on the tour.
RENOISTHEBESTPLACEONEARTHORATLEASTUNTILIGOTOVEGAS!!!!!!!

















I had no idea what to expect out of Reno. We rolled into town and it was super depressing. We went to a laundromat and the vibes were down. We rolled over to the place that we were staying and vibes were immediately back to stoked worthy. They fed us and gave us tons of beer. The show was great and good times were had. We went gambling and I won $45! Josh was up too but everyone else lost from what I remember. Now in Reno the bars are open 24hrs so of course we had to take advantage of that. We left the bar at 6:30am and watched the sun come up over Reno on a trampoline. I felt like hell the next day but it was worth every second. Cant wait to see all of them at Fest 8!
Berkeley was amazing. We played at Gilman and that was a childhood dream come true. Tom and I cracked the biggest smiles our stupid faces could conjure up while playing.
LA is sweet. We played another awesome show at The Knitting Factory and sold a ton of merch. We went out to eat at a great restaurant after the show where Tony and I managed to get a Ramones singalong going. LA was a blast. Definitely a personal highlight so far. Thats all I got. I'll leave ya with this.

-Greg

Maggots, Michael. You're eating maggots. How do they taste?

So we're a bit behind. Is anyone even reading this anyway? Well we're having a blast. The Broadway Calls dudes are such nice guys. Their songs are incredible, and they're hilarious. Extremely nice bunch of cats. Laser too, and Erica and Eddie.

Sooo we played in Santa Cruz (apparently where they filmed Lost Boys) and had a day off so we hung out pretty hard. We went down to the boardwalk and got wild in the arcade. Silent scope rules. We met up with Tallia, Eddie and Erica. We also ended up with some peeps from Hear the Sirens and made plans to go to the beach later that night and burn shit under the influence of cheap alcohol. Some of us rode a boardwalk roller coaster complete with a pretty gnarly "U.S.A." chant. After that some very nice ladies let us borrow their volleyball and the tournament was on!!




After getting wiped out at the beach all day we crewed up and headed to the beach. We bought beer and supplies then headed behind a dollar store to rob some pallets. Some security guard showed up to wag a finger but Oscar took off with some pallets before he had the chance to do anything. We rolled up to the beach around 20 deep and proceeded to get drunk and burn pallets. It was great, hanging out at the pacific ocean.






We ended up crashing in Eliott's dorm's common rooms at the University of California Santa Cruz. That college is really cool. Their were a bunch of overtly anti-political elite murals outside of the dorm and the university was set in the woods. It was really a beautiful campus. Everyone was so nice. In fact, everybody is really really nice out here. They seem to be more laid back and willing to help each other than the riff raff of the east coast. That could also just be the groups of kids that broadway calls hang out with. Those dudes from Redding were incredible.

So the next day we played in Fresno at the Chinatown Youth Center. The show went over well and the venue was cool. We ended up at Eddie's house and he rules. So do his parents. We'll check in again...


Kisses xoxo
-Tom