A very weird thing happens when you’re on tour. The passage of time seems to shift all over the bloomin place. There are moments when an hour feels like an eternity. Other times it feels like seconds. Then at the end of it you’re left asking yourself; ‘did we really do ALL that in XX amount of days?!’…
…which is exactly how I felt after my most recent trip away. It went a little bit like this:
On Sept 20th I set out on an East Coast tour with Doug and Telisha from Wild Ponies. We played 8 extremely fun shows in 6 different States.
Brooklyn Americana Fest, New York, New Yooooooork
I’ve been to NY a handful of times and this is generally how it makes me feel:
Days 1-4: I absolutely LOVE New York. I love that there’s so much going on and that everything is just go, go, go all the time.
Days 4+: Ok I’ve had enough. I hate that there’s so much going on and that everything is just go, go, go all the time.
I caught a 6am flight out of Austin and a few hours later landed in Newark, NY. I had a taxi driver take me from the airport to Manhattan, where I was staying with D & T. On this 30min taxi ride through down town, I felt a mixture of intense fear combined with utter amazement that no one was either killed or run over. The driver seemed to possess Jedi-like powers and was able to make a rather large passenger van shrink down and fit through the tiniest of gaps. Random people just walked out into the road, seemingly oblivious to any thoughts of self preservation. Cars, trucks and motorbikes casually pulled out in front of each other at speed, as if they were surrounded by an invisible forcefield preventing anything from simply ploughing straight into them. The one thing everyone did have in common was driving like they were in some sort of drag race, where you get extra points if you take out pedestrians and other road users.
As we would say in the UK, it was totally bonkers.
And yet, despite all of this – nothing bad happened. No-one crashed and everything was fine.
How? I’ve absolutely NO idea.
We played 2 shows at the Brooklyn Americana Festival. First at The Jalopy Theatre and then the second under a railway bridge.
I realise the second venue sounds a little unusual – but it was actually a lot of fun. We played under the Dumbo Archway with trains passing overhead every few minutes. I absolutely loved it.`
Friendly River Music, Maine
Having spent some time in New York, I couldn’t wait to see some green stuff. By green stuff I mean trees, fields and birds (Yes I know birds aren’t green…but like me, they enjoy hanging out in green stuff). I’m an earthy, hippy, outdoorsy kind of gal and my natural habitat is being close to water, plants and wildlife. It re-charges my batteries and brings me back to centre.
Friendly River Music is one of my FAVOURITE places to play. It’s a live music venue and a freakin music shop, in arse-end-of-no-where Maine surrounded by nothing but nature.
The show was sold out. The crowd and our hosts John and Charlene (as always) were lovely. Such a magical night ❤ Can’t wait to go back.
Café 9, Connecticut
We played this venue on the Galax release tour last year. My memory of this is that our show was a lot of fun and afterwards I went outside to get a bit of fresh air. I was wearing my Wild Ponies baseball T – which has the band name clearly written across the front of it. A random male driver with his window fully down drove past me, wolf whistled, pointed in my direction and at the top of his voice yelled out
‘Whoooo! Look at them titties!!’.
I suppose there are some people in the world who would consider this flattering. I however find it rude, kind of yucky and not ok. My first reaction was to flip the guy off, but as I was wearing a Wild Ponies shirt thought better of it. So I did nothing. Later in the van I told D & T about what happened and the first thing they said was, ‘I hope you flipped the guy off!’. So just for future reference, I have been actively encouraged to express my feelings should this happen again. Thankfully it hasn’t. Let’s hope it stays that way.
Just like our previous show, this one was also a blast. However there was no mention of my boobs, just my drumming. Yay. Progress.
While we were in Connecticut we wanted to sample some pizza from what has been labelled by many as ‘the best pizza joint in the world’.
That place was Frank Pepe’s Pizza and legend has it that Frank Sinatra himself would regularly stop by and order a clam pizza (Doug did in fact put in an order for clam pizza, you’ll have to ask him what it was like 😉 ).
Frank Pepe’s is a pretty cool place and, as per the legend, the pizza was indeed A-MAZING. Check it out:
2 Days off in Virginia
This is the second year I’ve spent my birthday on the road with D & T. My birthday eve and birthday were spent with Doug’s lovely family in their equally lovely house in Virginia.
Everyone put in so much time and effort into making the day special ❤ For dinner we had an authentic British meal of Jacket Potatoes with baked beans and cheese. Doug’s Mum also made a delicious vegetarian soup and desert was a specially made birthday apple crumble which yes, was bloody lovely.
Hurrah and yay 🙂 ❤
Tin Pan, Virginia
I’ve never played at this venue before but it was a lovely space. Like a little kid I get super excited when I look at old gig posters and see the faces of people I grew up listening to (Joan Osborne, Paula Cole etc) and think to myself ‘they played on this stage!’.
It was awesome to meet a lot of people who saw us playing at the Richmond Folk Festival last year (THAT was fun).
Footlight Theatre, South Carolina
My first ever trip to S. Carolina. My Mother-in-law is from here and always brags about how awesome it is. She wasn’t wrong. It’s very cool (definitely not temperature wise though!).
The theatre was a super characterful place located in the French quarter of Charleston. There were a TON of historical buildings in that area (from the 1670s), the oldest I’ve seen since moving to the USA.
The show was great, but we had a looooonnnnggg drive ahead of us – as we were playing a live radio show in Tampa, FL at 12pm the following day! 😮
Suncoast Songwriters Weekend, Don CeSar Hotel, Florida
We made it to the radio show, then travelled onwards towards the Don CeSar hotel – the venue for the Suncoast Songwriters Weekend. As we drove across a bridge covering a large stretch of water, far off into the distance we could see a HUGE pink building that towered over the land like some sort of giant pink castle.
Surely that’s not where we’re staying? I kept thinking as we got closer and closer.
Yep, it was.
The hotel is absolutely beautiful, and get this – it’s right slap-bang next to the beach!! 😮
The first night I went and sat on the beautiful white sand for a good hour. I listened to the sound of the waves moving gently back and forth and gazed up at the clear night sky.
While sitting there I recorded this voice memo:
The Don CeSar hotel is by far one of the most magical places I’ve ever stayed ❤ I really hope one day I’ll be lucky enough to go back there.
Back to Austin
Sunday I flew back home and that evening got to hear my dear friend Sarah McQuaid play her wonderful music. She’s from Cornwall (which is right next to Devon in the UK) and is currently on an epic US tour. She very kindly gave me a copy of her new album (which btw is rad, been listening to it in my car since I’ve been home) and I can’t wait to nerd out on her DADGAD guitar book.
All in all, it was an amazing 10 days.
I know. All that in 10 days. Like I said earlier: touring = time warp.
I think it’s safe to say that next to my adventures in Norway back in June, this trip will definitely be one of my highlights of 2018.
Thank you so much as always for reading this far 🙂 Appreciate you coming on these adventures with me ❤
Touring Muso 
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