Pictures & Wrap Up

What a fitting car to pass on the way to Portland on the No Gods, No Care tour. The front reads "FAITH IS JESUS' ONLY ENEMY." I don't really get it, but it was cool anyway.

The Hawthorne Theatre - Portland, OR


Recent changes in my lifestyle yielded lots of joking...this was just ridiculous though. $89.99.


A shot inside the Hawthorne Theatre. Cool place.


Lounging in the van.


This was an interesting cat. It belonged to the girl we stayed with in Portland. It would be really cool and chill then randomly spaz out and run around.


Again, fitting for the No Gods, No Care tour. Pentagram doughnut at Voodoo Doughnuts.


The Cock and Balls. A $5.75 doughnut that Nicky somehow ended up not paying for.


His reaction after the first bite: "It's so good!!"


Vine monster outside of Voodoo Doughnuts.


Typical van ride. I'm driving.


Here's where we slept on Highway 50 near Lake Tahoe.


Coming down Kingsbury Grade. The Sierras...home.


A picture with the legendary smile of Chris from Chelsea Grin. Seriously, look at this kid's teeth.


Another typical van scene. Me playing Tetris...my latest obsession. Chris is way better than me though.


No Gods, No Care Tour 2009:I Declare War & Open Fire!
Chris missed being in this because he went home early.

I went into this tour with a ton of apprehension. We left with $100. We made contacts over Myspace and anyone who has booked a show knows that promoters are sketchy. We returned with $1100.
I had good times. There were times when I thought I wanted to do nothing else for the rest of my life.
I had bad times. There were times when I honestly thought to myself "I can't do this anymore."
Nicky did a great job for learning the songs in two practices. I definitely missed Randy a ton, though. I talked to him every day and let him know what was going on.

I have been pondering my dedication and debating the pros and cons of doing this band. I planned on useing this tour as a gauge to see if it would push me in one direction or the other. Like I said, there were times when I wanted nothing else to do it forever...but there were times when I wanted nothing to do with it. I have been thinking about many things lately and what this band means to me is the second thing on the list. I hoped that doing the tour would give me a clear view and an answer to my question. Did it? No. All it did was pull me even further in both directions of yes and no. Only time will tell whether my heart is truly in it or not.

For this week though, I had fun. I wanted it. It was good. I made a few friends and strengthened others. I discovered things I liked about people and discovered things I didn't like. I did things I have been wanting to for a long time. I missed out on things I wanted to be there for. I got another aspect of my life in perspective and unfortunately was left with more questions. Overall it was a positive experience and great for the band. It definitely took its toll on my emotions though.

No Gods, No Care Tour 2009. Video possibly coming soon...

Day 7 - Spokane, WA

We woke up in Twin Falls after maybe four hours of sleep on a hardwood floor. No Gods No Sleep continues. Jon drove to Spokane while the rest of us chilled and tried to sleep. Not much exciting happened. I drove the last hour and we got into Spokane around 5. We met up with our friends Alex and Shane. We walked around and got some DayQuil for Chris. Sometime in Utah he got sick and only got sicker. We went to a Starbucks then went to load in. The first band played while we sat in the bar and ate some food. Open Fire played next. We played third and it was one of the best shows of the tour, if not the best. Shows like that make me want to do this more than anything in the world. We probably would have sold a ton of merch if we had more...people wanted stuff but we had no medium or large in anything. Chris decided to go home with Alex and Shane since he was so sick while the rest of us went to stay the night at the promoter's house. There were a ton of people there partying but me, Brent, and Chug went upstairs and hung out in an empty room. Chug is hilarious. I have known him a long time and we've talked, but I've never seen him be so funny. We got online and talked for a while then just went to sleep. We woke up today around 10 but didn't leave until about 11:30. We took a group picture and said our goodbyes. On the way out of town we stopped at a Taco Bell for some food before we hit the road.

Tour is over. We are going home with $1108 in the box...insane, considering we left with a mere $100 in the cash box. Tour pics and wrap up coming tonight or tomorrow.

Day 6 - Burley, ID

I think I want to rename this tour the No Gods, No Sleep Tour. Or maybe Sleep Depravation '09. No matter where we go none of us get much sleep at all. We stayed in Sandy, UT just outside of Salt Lake. Jon slept in the van while we split a hotel room. Chris and I shared a bed and neither of us slept well. We kept waking up way too hot. We got up later than we should have. We finally got a chance to stop at a Les Schwab and get some chains. Hopefully we won't need them, but itd be nice to have in case we do again. Jon drove to Idaho while the rest of us tried to sleep more. He seems to have more energy than any of us for some reason. We got to Twin Falls pretty early and hung out with an old friend for a while. We went to McDonalds, a Target, and then to his friends barber shop. Chris, Brent, and I walked around down where the shop was because we were really bored just sitting around. The town had a really eerie ghost town vibe. Everything was already closed just past 6 and there was no one else out on the street. The show wasn't supposed to start until 9, so we drove to the venue and got there early. It was this little underground club that was probably a strip club at some point. The owner told us he used to DJ at strip clubs for about 20 years. That explained the awful 80's hair metal he played excruciatingly loud in between bands. It was really, really cold and loading in down a flight of stairs was not fun. About halfway through our set my amp just cut out. I tried everything I thought could be wrong but nothing worked. Fisch from Open Fire helped me out and we discovered Brent's speaker cable had just shorted out. I was a little frustrated with that since it took us a song and a half to get it fixed. Then Jon was talking in between songs and was talking about our CD. He said "Go buy it, its not very good, but whatever." That seriously makes me so mad for so many reasons. One: sure, I may not be all that proud of it anymore, but it is what it is and it is who we are. Two: these kids came and paid money to hear the songs on that CD. If you're telling them they paid to hear bad music, how does that make them feel? Three: we put a lot of hard work, especially myself, into making that CD and for him to publicly bash it while trying to sell it is just insulting. Insulting not only to us but to whoever is paying money for it as well. Four: what the hell are we doing out here anyway if the CD is bad? Why are we out here promoting ourselves and playing these songs if its so bad? I just can't believe he would say things like that when its the reason we're doing what we're doing. I was a little upset about that for a while but tried to shake it off as best I could. We finished the set and began packing up. Jon had some bug up his ass before we loaded in and didn't help load in; he chose to not help load out either. Immaturity like that is something I just can't handle. We drove back to Twin Falls to stay with a friend of a friend. There were a bunch of people there being loud. It was already past 2 when we got in and we were planning on leaving at 7. Sleep Depravation '09 continues. On our way to Spokane today.

Day 5 - Provo, UT

We woke up early at my dad's house and headed out to Provo at about 8. My mom left some food for us and my dad packed a cooler full of stuff too. Parents are great. The drive was long. Brent drove the first shift. I was actually happy he was driving because I was not awake yet. I pointed out some stuff to the guys on the way through Carson City and Reno then I tried to sleep. One awful thing about tour is that there's really no way to totally block out what's going on around you. I tried to sleep but couldn't because of the blaring hip hop coming from the seat in front of me. I drifted off here and there but got no real sleep. I got up and sat around for a bit before it was my turn to drive. After I was driving for a couple hours I completely envied Brent's shift. I-80 through Nevada is the most boring, long, and painfully dull drive ever. Most of the roads were straight lines with one slight turn every few dozen miles. Its totally flat with mountains in the distance in every direction. When you finally make it to the mountains, you go around a turn and are faced with another straight shot for miles. So boring, so long. With the time zone change we ended up being a little late, but not a big deal. My sister lives in Provo so she came to the show and we got to hang out for a while. The show was good, there were more people than I expected and they all had fun. We sold some merch and made some money from the door. My sister treated us to Sonic and hung out. Sisters are great too. We had a place to stay lined up but we heard that this place was pretty gross, so we all agreed that splitting a hotel room for the night would be a wise choice. Hopefully I will get some rest tonight. The drive to Idaho should be an easy one and the show should be pretty good too.

Day 4 - Minden, NV

After leaving Sacramento the night before, we headed up the Sierras towards my hometown of Minden, NV for a day off. The Sierras are notoriously dangerous in the winter and we were faced with some snow and ice. We hit a road block about 60 miles from Minden and were stopped for about a half hour while they tried to make the road safer. We drove another 20 minutes then were stopped again. This one lasted longer. Much longer. We had to wait for the sun to come up and help melt some of the ice. We were on the side of the road for at least six hours. The windows fogged up and condensation formed on the inside which subsequently froze. We managed to keep pretty warm with what blankets we had but moving out of our perfect spots meant we'd freeze for a little bit. At about 9:30 we got moving and finished the 37 miles we had left. We had breakfast at my dad's house and just hung out for a bit. We took care of some instrument maintenance. Joe, my best friend from Nevada, came over to hang out for a bit. His friend Cam came with him. They have a band called Disfiguring the Goddess that gets a lot of Myspace and YouTube attention. We talked about writing a collaborative song. While we ate dinner they started writing it. We went to Cam's at about 8 and spent the rest of the night writing and recording this ridiculous song. It was a lot of fun and Jon was in heaven singing alongside Cam. We all contributed and played little bits of the song. The song turned out great and has already gotten a huge response online in the less than 12 hours it has been up. It was a great time and I'd love to get a chance to do that with them again. We went to bed around 2 and are on our way to Provo, Utah right now where we'll play tonight and I'll get to see my sister.

Day 3 - Ceres, CA

Today I woke up in a rest stop. It was about 9:30. I took a few of my over-the-counter sleep aids and crashed out after we left Eugene last night. I vaguely remember everyone getting out at one point in the night but other than that I actually got some sleep. I got up and went to the bathroom and woke everyone up in the process. It was my first time to drive. After everyone got up and ready we hit the road right around 10:30. We started to go up in the mountains and it got snowy. I was a little nervous since I didn't have much experience with the trailer and I don't like driving in snow in the first place, but I held it together and made it through. After we got through the mountains it rained non-stop throughout Northern California. It was so loud and constant, like a TV with static on full-blast on top of all the other noises bouncing around the van. We stopped at a Round Table an hour in and had some pizza then were back on our way. I drove...and drove...and drove. We made it to Ceres at about 5:30. I drove at least 6 hours. The venue, The Workshop, was indescribably sketchy. We drove by it and didn't think it was the venue, but soon found out this little blue shack behind a barbed-wire fence was indeed the venue. Kids showed up and it actually turned out to be a decent show. An older guy asked me where we were from and said "oh, the northwest...how's the weed up there?" I just couldn't resist playing along, so I said "awesome, man!" Then he said "how's the crystal up there?" I almost laughed as I said "psh, its the best!" That's when I got a little scared. He stood up straight, looked me directly in the eyes and said "Mine is the best." and proceeded to stare at me for a good 5 seconds. I just acted like I didn't hear him and began to talk about how cool our shirt designs were. The woman that was with him came up and started feeling the shirts and telling me what great quality they were. I said "yeah, the designs are awesome too...only $10, you should get one." She leaned into me and said "Would you trade a shirt for some crank?" I again almost laughed, but decided not to play along this time and said "oh, no, we are really poor and need cash to drive to the next show." Its true, but still...wow. I made sure Open Fire's merch guy knew about that so he'd stay on top of it while we played. We had an okay set. Chris' amp broke and it wasn't putting out much sound. After the show we discovered the input jack on the cab was broken. Kids danced really hard but I didn't feel like many people were that into it. We got $80 from the door and about that much in merch. Much better than last night. Now we're on our way to my dad's house in Minden for a day off tomorrow since our show in San Francisco got canceled. I'm a little nervous for the drive since we'll be going over the Sierras, but Jon is a good driver so hopefully it won't be too bad. I am stoked to be home for a day and hopefully see some friends.

Day 2 - Eugene, OR

I didn't sleep much last night. I kept waking up and was too hot. Based on how I felt, I estimated about two hours of sleep. We had breakfast at Brent's brother's house. We heard about this doughnut shop that makes ridiculous, insane doughnuts so we had to go check it out. They make ones with Cocoa Puffs, bacon, and pretty much anything else you could imagine. We hung out there for a while. Nicky got one shaped like a penis on a dare. We left and drove to Eugene. I was so tired I tried to sleep on the way there, but everyone was listening to music and singing along extremely loud, so I didn't really get any. I zoned out once but for some reason Chris slapped me on the leg right as I was getting to sleep and I woke up again. We got to Eugene really early and hung out in a parking lot for a while. We found a Guitar Center and hung out there for a while. We headed to the venue. It was a little bar and the first 21+ show I've played. No one was there. It was pretty much a bust. There were a couple fights and a few people hung around to watch us play. I didn't have too much fun. I tried to entertain myself by attempting to play the songs without looking at my hands...had some success, but it was pretty sloppy. We sold a shirt and a couple of CDs for cheap and made less than $20. I knew it would be bad so I wasn't too bummed about it. It was a pretty uneventful day for the most part. Now we're headed to Ceres, California for a show tomorrow. Its a long drive so Brent is going to drive as far as he can tonight. We'll find a place to park and sleep for a while then I'll drive the rest of the way tomorrow. Hopefully I can actually get some sleep tonight...

Day 1 - Portland, OR

Last night was technically the first night of the tour, but since it was Tacoma I don't really count it.
(Quick recap: Good show. Great turnout. We sold a good amount of merch and made good money from the door to help us get going.)

Today we drove to Portland after staying with Jon's parents in Olympia. It was an easy 2.5 hour drive and we got to the venue really early. We parked in a bank parking lot across the street since the venue doesn't have parking and went to a Fred Meyer to hang out. We moved the van to load in and got everything out then moved it back. We forgot the heads for the guitars so we decided to run back and get them. Upon walking across the street, we see a tow truck and some guys putting our trailer onto their hitch. We bolted to the parking lot and tried to get them to put it back. They were pretty cool about it but still made us pay $125 to get it taken off. They would have charged us $145 but they broke our lock off so he gave us a little break and took $20 off. We chose to pay out of pocket instead of using band cash. We had to buy a new lock so we went back to Fred Meyer to get one then moved the van to some random spot on a residential street.

The venue, The Hawthorne Theatre, is really cool. The turnout was a little low, but more than I actually expected. The show went really really well. We haven't played here before and people were stoked. We had to turn our amps down unusually low and it was easily the quietest on stage sound I've ever had. There was a light directly in my face the whole time and the only time I could see anything was when I walked to the very edge of the stage. We played pretty well and our fill-in drummer did a lot better than last night. He's doing well, I just miss having Randy around. We got packed up and kind of stiffed from the venue, we only got $20. Lame, but I kind of expected it. We went to a girls house who was kind enough to let us stay the night. She's pretty cool. Chris had to sleep in the van to make sure nothing happened to it and Brent and I bunked up together on a futon. The day definitely had its ups and downs but an alright start to the tour. We'll see what happens tomorrow.