Tuesday, April 08, 2008
AUZ TOUR 3/1
Alright fine I'll write another one.
Woke up, went to the Laneway Festival, Brisbane edition. This one was set up with the main stage in some sort of open space next to a fence. I don't know what to call it, but it wasn't an alley. Then the 2nd stage was in fact in an alley around the corner from the main stage. Then the 3rd stage was in a big venue called the Zoo that had doors leading out onto the 2nd stage alley. I'd say it was about the same size as the 40 Watt. This is where we played.
When I first got there I watched some of Via Tanya. My bro's Evelyn and Indra and SF's own Doyle Corndog made up the backing band. After they were done I saw some of the Brunittes before I had to leave to help T-Shaq with the gear.
I think I may've liked this Laneway the best because the backstage area was directly through the food court. It was just a big room to hang out in and they had sausages and potato salad and stuff piled up on a table and a cooler full of brews. You could look out the windows and see the bands playing outside and feel sorry for the people standing at the front of the crowd against the stage because it didn't seem like there was any way for them to ever sift their way out of the crowd. Shit was so crowded. Again.
It was so crowded that when it was time for us to play they brought vans for us on the street and drove us around the block to the outside of the venue because there was no way we were going to be able to walk our guitars and stuff through the crowd.
The Zoo is notorious for not having AC so we were ready for a total sweatjam. I always sweat a lake anyways so bring it on. Thrill wore some short shorts and people seemed to be into that. I should note that the bathroom in the venue had a trough with faucets for a sink and Thrill took a leak in it and then stopped when someone came up next to him and started washing his hands. There was some kind of great feeling for all of us to be hanging out at the side of the stage waiting for Dazza Hanlon to finish his set-- sweating, pounding beers, and just knowing that you're about to break off a piece of sweatjam.
Dazza put on a good set. Probably saw about half of it. A very nice and stand-up fella. We started setting up and I think our confidence was so high because this time we had Haima mixing sound for us. Haima was working for Feist so he couldn't do our sound in Melbourne, but this time we weren't up against the great one so he was free for his bro's. He's usually AIH's soundman and whenever he does sound for us it is the best we have ever sounded (no offense to Scope). We knew we were going to nail it. And whattaya know? We did. The place was packed from the start. What happened was the crowd went from attentive but sort of confused to full-on going apeshit by the end. I love the challenge of converting a skeptical audience. I think maybe Brisbane has some wild people there, because these people were ready to fucking party. Case in point: a dude BEGGED for Yosh to play with his drumsticks for a song, which lead to a dude BEGGING Zach to use his hat as a guitar pick for a song (he did). Something else weird happened but I can't remember. But the capper, which was told to me after the fact, was that we passsed the boogie board out into the crowd and apparently some REALLY wild kid went and dove down a flight of stairs on the boogie board. And somehow didn't get hurt. Anyway, THAT'S what kind of jam we were having.
As I was walking from the venue to the backstage room I was stopped by the BSS dude. He said some super nice things about us and said he was interested in putting out our album. Pretty awesome. Some girl walked by carrying our boogie board and I took it back from her. She said she was going to give it to Feyst but the BSS dude told her Feyst didn't want it.
Immediately after that I went backstage and met some dude named "Styles" who wanted my contact info so we could play a festival in Calgary that he's curating. He said we were his favorite band at the festival. After talking to him for a while T-Shaq told me he was in Pvmnt and my mind blew. The guy was Spyral Stairs and I heard him wrong. Totally looked like him too but just kind of older and wearing a hat (I feel lame talking about this kind of stuff but this is what you guys have been asking me about mostly so I figured I gotta include all the semi-famous people stuff).
Hmm. What next? Hung out backstage for a while. I think there were some dog piles. Then I went and watched Clappy Hands from a secret location and ran into Izzo and Gary there and then hung out with them and Styles off to the side of the stage after their set.
The festival afterparty was in the Zoo but the drinks weren't free and they were expensive and the party just seemed really lame. That place was too big for an afterparty. So we went to our various places that we were staying and went to bed because we had an early flight the next morning.
DUN DUN DUNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN.
Alright fine I'll write another one.
Woke up, went to the Laneway Festival, Brisbane edition. This one was set up with the main stage in some sort of open space next to a fence. I don't know what to call it, but it wasn't an alley. Then the 2nd stage was in fact in an alley around the corner from the main stage. Then the 3rd stage was in a big venue called the Zoo that had doors leading out onto the 2nd stage alley. I'd say it was about the same size as the 40 Watt. This is where we played.
When I first got there I watched some of Via Tanya. My bro's Evelyn and Indra and SF's own Doyle Corndog made up the backing band. After they were done I saw some of the Brunittes before I had to leave to help T-Shaq with the gear.
I think I may've liked this Laneway the best because the backstage area was directly through the food court. It was just a big room to hang out in and they had sausages and potato salad and stuff piled up on a table and a cooler full of brews. You could look out the windows and see the bands playing outside and feel sorry for the people standing at the front of the crowd against the stage because it didn't seem like there was any way for them to ever sift their way out of the crowd. Shit was so crowded. Again.
It was so crowded that when it was time for us to play they brought vans for us on the street and drove us around the block to the outside of the venue because there was no way we were going to be able to walk our guitars and stuff through the crowd.
The Zoo is notorious for not having AC so we were ready for a total sweatjam. I always sweat a lake anyways so bring it on. Thrill wore some short shorts and people seemed to be into that. I should note that the bathroom in the venue had a trough with faucets for a sink and Thrill took a leak in it and then stopped when someone came up next to him and started washing his hands. There was some kind of great feeling for all of us to be hanging out at the side of the stage waiting for Dazza Hanlon to finish his set-- sweating, pounding beers, and just knowing that you're about to break off a piece of sweatjam.
Dazza put on a good set. Probably saw about half of it. A very nice and stand-up fella. We started setting up and I think our confidence was so high because this time we had Haima mixing sound for us. Haima was working for Feist so he couldn't do our sound in Melbourne, but this time we weren't up against the great one so he was free for his bro's. He's usually AIH's soundman and whenever he does sound for us it is the best we have ever sounded (no offense to Scope). We knew we were going to nail it. And whattaya know? We did. The place was packed from the start. What happened was the crowd went from attentive but sort of confused to full-on going apeshit by the end. I love the challenge of converting a skeptical audience. I think maybe Brisbane has some wild people there, because these people were ready to fucking party. Case in point: a dude BEGGED for Yosh to play with his drumsticks for a song, which lead to a dude BEGGING Zach to use his hat as a guitar pick for a song (he did). Something else weird happened but I can't remember. But the capper, which was told to me after the fact, was that we passsed the boogie board out into the crowd and apparently some REALLY wild kid went and dove down a flight of stairs on the boogie board. And somehow didn't get hurt. Anyway, THAT'S what kind of jam we were having.
As I was walking from the venue to the backstage room I was stopped by the BSS dude. He said some super nice things about us and said he was interested in putting out our album. Pretty awesome. Some girl walked by carrying our boogie board and I took it back from her. She said she was going to give it to Feyst but the BSS dude told her Feyst didn't want it.
Immediately after that I went backstage and met some dude named "Styles" who wanted my contact info so we could play a festival in Calgary that he's curating. He said we were his favorite band at the festival. After talking to him for a while T-Shaq told me he was in Pvmnt and my mind blew. The guy was Spyral Stairs and I heard him wrong. Totally looked like him too but just kind of older and wearing a hat (I feel lame talking about this kind of stuff but this is what you guys have been asking me about mostly so I figured I gotta include all the semi-famous people stuff).
Hmm. What next? Hung out backstage for a while. I think there were some dog piles. Then I went and watched Clappy Hands from a secret location and ran into Izzo and Gary there and then hung out with them and Styles off to the side of the stage after their set.
The festival afterparty was in the Zoo but the drinks weren't free and they were expensive and the party just seemed really lame. That place was too big for an afterparty. So we went to our various places that we were staying and went to bed because we had an early flight the next morning.
DUN DUN DUNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN.
