yo yo, this past weekend deep pockets to a ride down to pennsylvania to play a couple of rock shows with our buddies in fellow project

we attempted to get a head start and leave a bit early so as to avoid traffic. not bad actually. conair was coming off a super early day and drove the first leg and i took over the second half because as it turns out the spot we were playing at was only about five blocks from where charlotte grew up. i know that route like the back of my hand by now.

we got into west philly about an hour or so before the show was scheduled to begin. the one thing about the spot, the crystal palace, is that it’s located on the side of west philly where there aren’t many businesses or anything to kill time at.

we just decided to take a short walk to kill some time anyway while fellow project got closer.

one of the best things about philadelphia is the architecture is pretty much unchanged in the last hundred years for the most part. amazing buildings like this are still in existence.

of course they are located across the street from a chinese food place with 2 inches of bullet proof glass…

check out that little guy, actin like he owns the place.

so what was weird is we actually passed by charlotte’s old house on our loop. the painting is so insanely bland now that i hardly recognized it. i’m always able to identify it by the historical landmark / 1904 sign down in the front. what a cool house that is.

we made our way back to the gig after a few more blocks.

fellow project showed up a few minutes later and we all went inside the house where we were greeted with some amazing dinner. some brown rice mixture and vegetarian chili. good work, crystal palace.

the show was really cool, an ambient spacey band opened up, we played next (and ryan filmed), then fellow project played (and i filmed), followed by one win choice. we went hung out, chatted with some cool folks about everything from lightning to abc no rio, and grabbed some cheesesteaks afterwards. we set up shop on the floor and got ready to crash out. the night was plagued with farts and farty smelling vents in the floor. kind of a weird thing. lou kept making everyone sample the floor vent located near his head. instead of move his head away he covered it with a soft pillow and stayed put.

i sleep with earplugs on the road and normally doze right off, but i was told no one was comfortable, the mockingbird outside the window sang throughout the night, someone may have snored, and the cat peed on ryan’s sleeping bag. (he took it surprisingly calmly though.)

lou claimed justin’s sleep pants were “broken” because the polar bear was black.

he also ranted about letting his balls breathe for the night, which is on point… can’t wear boxers when you sleep. basically he had us all laughing our asses off.

matt taking a smoking break while tia and joe check in with the outside world.

3 of 5 string players could resist that guitar.

we all slowly moved about for a while and discussed the breakfast situation

one of the main things on my mind was where i was going to try and watch the rangers / caps game which was starting in two hours or so.

we eventually decided to go to satellite cafe which is a few blocks over from where we were. i wanted to greasy pancakes or something but whatever worked.

check this little cutie out. he’s the pee culprit.

the troops gather

i grabbed a quick group pic at an opportune moment, however i don’t think lou was aware of what was going on so he ended up looking like the grumpy uncle. there’s ryan, joe and tia to his right.

before i got my last pee in i saw lou pick up the ravaged bunny head and threw it over the top of him.

for some reason satellite cafe is a weird hub for hip philly kids i think. for example, we saw this rockabilly looking guy about three times around different parts of the neighborhood the day before.

bagels and coffee

i wish i was eating a bagel right now

this cat is so freakin cute. little calico bean.

joe bumped into jared, this fella who i ate brunch with the last time i was in philly that crozier is buddies with.

we eventually headed to tattooed moms to watch the rangers lose to the caps. that sucked, though they won game five. they’ll win tonight too. anyway, matt actually asked me to take a picture of a snake biting a dick in the men’s bathroom. that’s right, he asked me to. what’s happening in the world? 2012 is real.

we all kept going separate ways and reconvening. getting comics, cheesesteaks, vegan cheesesteaks, records, vegan baked goods, whole foods, whatever.

we lost matt for a while because he went in to basement of repo and these two didn’t know that there was a basement. then matt left his phone in the van and didn’t know that conor moved it a bit earlier. so i’m guessing he wandered for a while.

conor snapped the token one shot of darren while we waited for ryan and joe to get jim’s on south street. check out that pimped out dude next to me.

we went into a pawn shop and saw some cool shit. ryan was telling me about how he started building amps and pedals and shit recently so he must’ve been in his glory.

when we took off for the next show, in bethlehem, matt decided he would be the one to drive. this made us all (including him) nervous because the last tour he didn’t drive a single day. he started off by scraping the luxury step on the passenger side on a curb and conor screamed “WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?!” forgetting that matt was in a bit of a state even driving. he quickly calmed his demeanor and matt slowly began to shake less and less. i’m not takin’ the piss, he admitted to the shaking so don’t get it twisted. the drive was short, maybe an hour or so, most of which we listened and laughed along to spinal tap songs. no one can quote tap like conor hickey.

when we were only a few blocks from the venue i noticed a record store on the main strip.

we talked about a tell tale sign of a good shop – faded signs in the front window. you know they’re gonna have some old good shit in there.

lehigh valley or whatever you call it was really pretty beautiful. it just sucked that they shut down at 6 apparently. we couldn’t find coffee or even food open. maybe they all celebrate cinco de mayo as a religious holiday?

we just wandered until we got to fuggin’ johnny’s spot. i dunno.

turned out that the secret art space was around the corner from where we parked and was pretty well hidden. the gig was awesome, another opener who’s name i can’t remember because i was too busy trying to find the bathroom. then us, then fellow project then slingshot dakota.

they were all awesome.

tia and i both kind of said the same thing the day before – even if the shows didn’t go well we still get to see each other’s bands. i love fellow project. i hate that they exist in the year 2012 because if they existed in 1998 or something they’d be HUGE.

the kids these days suck.

i hadn’t seen slingshot for about 3 years maybe, they got a lot better and much tighter. although i don’t put them on at home i do highly enjoy seeing them live, great presence. after the show ended we just made the trek home. said goodbye to our buddies in fellow project (who we’ll be playing with tomorrow) and got back to queens for the comfort of pita hot. great weekend.