Post by Dan the G-Man on Dec 4, 2003 14:59:11 GMT -5
Road Report Four For 98
Happy to report that things are going quite well on the Garbage North American tour 98. This was not a forgone conclusion at the time of the first road report -- we were in Denver frantically trying to rework some of the old songs, learn the new ones better, and force several truckloads of new equipment into submission. Now, with about fifty shows behind us, things are really swinging-- in the past if something went wrong technically or one of us wasn't feeling right, the show could suffer. Now it feels like no matter what happens, we've got this new and growing connection with the audience that lets us put on the kind of concert we've always wanted to put on.
If you're reading this, you're probably a Garbage fan to some degree, so it's mostly you and all the others like you that we have to thank for this heartening stepping-up of our live shows. It's not much fun slogging around the country in a bus, eating crappy food and never sleeping, if there isn't a reward waiting at the next gig. For us the reward is thinking that we put on a good show and the fans appreciated and reacted strongly to it. You've been giving us this just about every night, and we love it. Thanks.
For instance, we go to a place like Las Cruces, New Mexico, which might not be one's first idea of a hotbed of Garbage-mania. And we get to the venue, which we'd played a couple of years back, and this time it's set up like a full-on rock concert venue -- twice the seats as last time, and they're all full. And the kids go nuts. And after the show the screams as we go out to the bus are enough to make us think we've time-travelled back to a Beatles concert, or at least that someone is playing a joke on us. But they're real, and they made us feel really good about Las Cruces, New Mexico.
Some of the coolest places we play are totally off the beaten track. If you ever get to see a show at Cain's Ballroom in Tulsa, go. It's an ancient dance hall famous for hosting bands like Bob Will and his Texas Playboys, as well as one of the last Sex Pistols shows. Your feet will stick to the floor, but chances are the night will rock uncontrollably. It felt that way to us, anyway. A band at our level has to play all different kinds of venues depending on where we are, so it stays interesting for us every night -- you never know what the place is going to be like. So we go from arenas in DC to posh outdoor amphitheaters in Santa Barbara overlooking the Pacific to college auditoriums in Massachusetts, and they're all fun in their own way. Maybe this is even better than the next level up, where you play the local Enormodome in whatever city you're in. We did this on the Pumpkins tour, and it gets a bit same-y sometimes -- they're all the same inside pretty much. A bit of local character never hurt anybody, we say.
We were a bit concerned, however, seeing the name Bronco Bowl on the itinerary for Dallas, not being known for our ability to defend ourselves in country and western bar-brawl situations. It turned out to be one of the few places we have run into that was built with the sole purpose of presenting concerts -- it was great! And we got to go bowling before the show! Sadly, we didn't break 100, but the shoes were fabulous. We did our first web-cast that night, which went well from all reports -- maybe we'll get to actually hear it someday.
The next Internet Garbage performance will be from the Riviera Theatre in Chicago on Wed, November 25 -- this time with JamTV/Rollingstone Networks -- and will include video as well as sound. We will begin this event with a live chat at 7:30 pm (Central Time), and then an audio and video webcast of our entire show beginning at 9:00pm (Central Time). Visit our website www.garbage.com in the coming days (look in the "News Section") for specific links and additional info. Also, as part of this webcast, we will be giving away an incredible Guild guitar (personally autographed by us). Finally, if you haven't already done so, you can download a free full-length version of "Driving Lesson"--- It's our gift to you. The link for the free download is right on the homepage of our site.
Famous people report: Courtney Love and Michael Stipe came to one of the LA shows, and invited us to a party afterwards, where we celebrated in good spirits after playing what we felt was a really good concert (we've always had some trouble in NY, London, and LA, because we get intimidated and the crowds don't seem to be as wild as in other places, but we've gotten over that now -- even the Roseland show in NYC was awesome this time). And Bob Saget and Winona Ryder were there too (LA that is)! Dr. Hunter S. Thompson told us we nailed it after we got done with our latest Letterman show, but luckily we didn't get to go out partying with him. Dave seemed surprised by Steve's new haircut, but we didn't see Ozzy, who was playing after us. Butch snuck behind the Sabbath double bass drum kit and got to live out a childhood fantasy for a minute or so. Howard Stern was very nice to us when we went on his show, which may have something to do with Shirley, but maybe he just respects us for our highly-trained musical abilities. In any event, he really seems to like #1 Crush, which we played acoustically for the first time on his show.
Garbage was pretty busy in NYC (see Butch's accompanying article elsewhere at garbage.com), so we spaced out getting Halloween outfits in time for Halloween, but luckily our master of the bass Daniel picked up some cheap masks in Asbury Park, and at the last minute we were transformed into some super lo-fi trick or treaters. Duke claimed he was a happy pirate, although we thought he looked more like the bass player in Metallica. Steve was Frankenstein's monster, sort of, if Frankenstein's monster had glowed in the dark and worn glasses, and Butch was rocking the Jason psycho-killer vibe, which added a certain air of menace to "You Look So Fine". Shirley refused to take part in such nonsense, other than wearing a beautiful feathered boa and proudly displaying a lovely red pumpkin with a Shirley face that had been given to her in Washington. The singing Roswell alien will have to wait until next year. Daniel impressed everyone with his blood drooling act, but the highlight of the evening was our road crew. Billy, for no apparent reason, was fitted out as some sort of magical pimp, while Chad was a very realistic Young Elvis, and T looked just like Old Elvis if you didn't look too closely. T ended the night with a stirring rendition of the classic Presley concert exit, complete with cape and grandiose gestures. In the end, there could be no doubt, as the magic pimp informed us, that T had indeed left the building.
We are also excited about our "homecoming" (for the boys anyway) concert in Madison Nov. 18. It's in the local huge arena that we all went to as kids to see bands, and none of us ever imagined ever playing there. Steve is excited because he finally gets to bring his dogs to a show (the worlds biggest canine Garbage fans). It will be a wild night, playing for thousands of our closest friends, with an aftershow party to end all aftershow parties no doubt. Everybody over to Duke’s house! We’re also going to Green Bay, which the Packer fans in Garbage (all of us) are pretty hyped up about -- there's a game the next day and maybe some of our favorite gridiron warriors will come down to the show, or at least we can buy crappy Packer memorabilia at some gas station on the way up there.
What else is coming up? Select magazine cover story early next year, Shirley and Butch's reviews of this years radio hits in Spin's year-end issue, maybe a live When I Grow Up video? Lots of big radio station shows in December -- we're really looking forward to the one in Boston, since we're big fans of Hole (these days we often play their new record before we go onstage), and it looks like Pittsburgh will be a special acoustic concert, which we haven't done in front of a big audience before. And the LA dates always turn into crazy events with lots of star-spotting news. Then, we get a week or two off and its back to Europe, including headlining Wembly Arena, the idea of which has got Shirley all in a tizzy -- this is big-time stuff for a wee Edinburgh lass. As if going back there wasn't enough, it now looks like we're going to Russia! And Estonia! And Belfast! This is so amazing to us we can't believe it. We're lucky. Till next time, thanks everybody, see you on the road that never ends,
Steve
Happy to report that things are going quite well on the Garbage North American tour 98. This was not a forgone conclusion at the time of the first road report -- we were in Denver frantically trying to rework some of the old songs, learn the new ones better, and force several truckloads of new equipment into submission. Now, with about fifty shows behind us, things are really swinging-- in the past if something went wrong technically or one of us wasn't feeling right, the show could suffer. Now it feels like no matter what happens, we've got this new and growing connection with the audience that lets us put on the kind of concert we've always wanted to put on.
If you're reading this, you're probably a Garbage fan to some degree, so it's mostly you and all the others like you that we have to thank for this heartening stepping-up of our live shows. It's not much fun slogging around the country in a bus, eating crappy food and never sleeping, if there isn't a reward waiting at the next gig. For us the reward is thinking that we put on a good show and the fans appreciated and reacted strongly to it. You've been giving us this just about every night, and we love it. Thanks.
For instance, we go to a place like Las Cruces, New Mexico, which might not be one's first idea of a hotbed of Garbage-mania. And we get to the venue, which we'd played a couple of years back, and this time it's set up like a full-on rock concert venue -- twice the seats as last time, and they're all full. And the kids go nuts. And after the show the screams as we go out to the bus are enough to make us think we've time-travelled back to a Beatles concert, or at least that someone is playing a joke on us. But they're real, and they made us feel really good about Las Cruces, New Mexico.
Some of the coolest places we play are totally off the beaten track. If you ever get to see a show at Cain's Ballroom in Tulsa, go. It's an ancient dance hall famous for hosting bands like Bob Will and his Texas Playboys, as well as one of the last Sex Pistols shows. Your feet will stick to the floor, but chances are the night will rock uncontrollably. It felt that way to us, anyway. A band at our level has to play all different kinds of venues depending on where we are, so it stays interesting for us every night -- you never know what the place is going to be like. So we go from arenas in DC to posh outdoor amphitheaters in Santa Barbara overlooking the Pacific to college auditoriums in Massachusetts, and they're all fun in their own way. Maybe this is even better than the next level up, where you play the local Enormodome in whatever city you're in. We did this on the Pumpkins tour, and it gets a bit same-y sometimes -- they're all the same inside pretty much. A bit of local character never hurt anybody, we say.
We were a bit concerned, however, seeing the name Bronco Bowl on the itinerary for Dallas, not being known for our ability to defend ourselves in country and western bar-brawl situations. It turned out to be one of the few places we have run into that was built with the sole purpose of presenting concerts -- it was great! And we got to go bowling before the show! Sadly, we didn't break 100, but the shoes were fabulous. We did our first web-cast that night, which went well from all reports -- maybe we'll get to actually hear it someday.
The next Internet Garbage performance will be from the Riviera Theatre in Chicago on Wed, November 25 -- this time with JamTV/Rollingstone Networks -- and will include video as well as sound. We will begin this event with a live chat at 7:30 pm (Central Time), and then an audio and video webcast of our entire show beginning at 9:00pm (Central Time). Visit our website www.garbage.com in the coming days (look in the "News Section") for specific links and additional info. Also, as part of this webcast, we will be giving away an incredible Guild guitar (personally autographed by us). Finally, if you haven't already done so, you can download a free full-length version of "Driving Lesson"--- It's our gift to you. The link for the free download is right on the homepage of our site.
Famous people report: Courtney Love and Michael Stipe came to one of the LA shows, and invited us to a party afterwards, where we celebrated in good spirits after playing what we felt was a really good concert (we've always had some trouble in NY, London, and LA, because we get intimidated and the crowds don't seem to be as wild as in other places, but we've gotten over that now -- even the Roseland show in NYC was awesome this time). And Bob Saget and Winona Ryder were there too (LA that is)! Dr. Hunter S. Thompson told us we nailed it after we got done with our latest Letterman show, but luckily we didn't get to go out partying with him. Dave seemed surprised by Steve's new haircut, but we didn't see Ozzy, who was playing after us. Butch snuck behind the Sabbath double bass drum kit and got to live out a childhood fantasy for a minute or so. Howard Stern was very nice to us when we went on his show, which may have something to do with Shirley, but maybe he just respects us for our highly-trained musical abilities. In any event, he really seems to like #1 Crush, which we played acoustically for the first time on his show.
Garbage was pretty busy in NYC (see Butch's accompanying article elsewhere at garbage.com), so we spaced out getting Halloween outfits in time for Halloween, but luckily our master of the bass Daniel picked up some cheap masks in Asbury Park, and at the last minute we were transformed into some super lo-fi trick or treaters. Duke claimed he was a happy pirate, although we thought he looked more like the bass player in Metallica. Steve was Frankenstein's monster, sort of, if Frankenstein's monster had glowed in the dark and worn glasses, and Butch was rocking the Jason psycho-killer vibe, which added a certain air of menace to "You Look So Fine". Shirley refused to take part in such nonsense, other than wearing a beautiful feathered boa and proudly displaying a lovely red pumpkin with a Shirley face that had been given to her in Washington. The singing Roswell alien will have to wait until next year. Daniel impressed everyone with his blood drooling act, but the highlight of the evening was our road crew. Billy, for no apparent reason, was fitted out as some sort of magical pimp, while Chad was a very realistic Young Elvis, and T looked just like Old Elvis if you didn't look too closely. T ended the night with a stirring rendition of the classic Presley concert exit, complete with cape and grandiose gestures. In the end, there could be no doubt, as the magic pimp informed us, that T had indeed left the building.
We are also excited about our "homecoming" (for the boys anyway) concert in Madison Nov. 18. It's in the local huge arena that we all went to as kids to see bands, and none of us ever imagined ever playing there. Steve is excited because he finally gets to bring his dogs to a show (the worlds biggest canine Garbage fans). It will be a wild night, playing for thousands of our closest friends, with an aftershow party to end all aftershow parties no doubt. Everybody over to Duke’s house! We’re also going to Green Bay, which the Packer fans in Garbage (all of us) are pretty hyped up about -- there's a game the next day and maybe some of our favorite gridiron warriors will come down to the show, or at least we can buy crappy Packer memorabilia at some gas station on the way up there.
What else is coming up? Select magazine cover story early next year, Shirley and Butch's reviews of this years radio hits in Spin's year-end issue, maybe a live When I Grow Up video? Lots of big radio station shows in December -- we're really looking forward to the one in Boston, since we're big fans of Hole (these days we often play their new record before we go onstage), and it looks like Pittsburgh will be a special acoustic concert, which we haven't done in front of a big audience before. And the LA dates always turn into crazy events with lots of star-spotting news. Then, we get a week or two off and its back to Europe, including headlining Wembly Arena, the idea of which has got Shirley all in a tizzy -- this is big-time stuff for a wee Edinburgh lass. As if going back there wasn't enough, it now looks like we're going to Russia! And Estonia! And Belfast! This is so amazing to us we can't believe it. We're lucky. Till next time, thanks everybody, see you on the road that never ends,
Steve