Newsbarfly and tarmac
time on the tarmac i will never get back.
the most annoying last few hours of a tour, ever. everything was great up until that point. the very end of our UK tour. until then, it was great times and blue
slash
grey skies(its the UK, what do you expect?). our flight back was actually pretty nice considering...i got a cold the day before we left, i spent a little too much time in the rain. what a great time to get a fucking cold, right before an 11 hour flight. so i packed up all the extra strong english cold medicines i could get my hands on(hooray for codeine!), a lot of kleenex, and i was ready for the long journey back home. with a window seat and the new Potter book in tow, i was ready and quite content. this plane ride was turning out to be a shite load better than anticipated. and i also had one of those 'its great to be alive' moments - a few hours into the flight, joe, sitting right behind me, told me to look out of the window. we were right above greenland. the endless masses of snow and barren miles. it was amazing...so i'm thinking, wow this is a terrific flight. the book is exciting, time is flying as fast as we are, and we had one of the smoothest landings possible. i'm happy to be back home and ready for some R & R. then, the captain gets on the speaker. he says the plane ahead of us is having issues and it will be another 10 to 15 minutes til we can exit the plane. just sit tight, keep your seatbelts fastened, and be patient. CUT TO: TWO hours later, they finally get their shit together and let us off the aircraft. during that time, the claustrophobia and the stuffy-ness and the leaking nose and the headache and the antsy-ness of sitting for 11 hours straight hit me really hard. so close, yet so fucking far. and to top it off, it took about two more hours to retrieve our luggage and get through customs. welcome home...
all the worlds a barfly, and sspu merely players.
had a great time in the UK. the shows, various barfly venues and festivals alike, have been tons of fun and the people have been tops. looking forward to get back to US soil where the dollar sucks and the wireless internet access is accessible. but we shall return in a month for more buckfast and irn bru, bangers and mash, sambuca and music. here are a few of my highlights...
london. xfm taping. 4.00pm. the resurrection of Shadowplay.
we played the Joy Division cover again. it was nice to play it after all these years. and what a better place to resurrect it than in the UK...
glasgow. indian summer festival. 3.30pm.
what do you do if members of Wilco are stage right of you as you're about to start your set? you wipe the crust from your eyes, hold the hangover at bay, suck it up and hope they don't have blasters. i haven't been that nervous for a show in a long long time. i kept peeking to my right, seeing if Jeff Tweedy had enough. each moment thinking, "please please don't fuck this song up. if i can just finish this song without dropping a stick..." no sticks were dropped. considering all the whiskey and Wii-play that pablo supplied us the night before, we got through the set in one piece as they watched our whole set...
suffolk. latitude festival. 1.20pm. one thing is certain when you get to a festival on a sunday - you lose a little bit of your soul when you use the portapotty. hell hath no fury than a portajohn scorn. three days of non stop usage of a bathroom is bad enough, but you add alcohol and festival food into the mix, and you get pure evil...other than that, good vibes all around. we saw a stunning performance by sir Jarvis Cocker. the man is a genius. his rendition of Eye of the Tiger will never be duplicated. we met one of the sweet ladys from Au Revoir Simone at catering, and checked out LA counterparts Cold War Kids at the main stage. as for our show, we were stunned to see so many people cram into the tent where our stage was situated, especially for an early sunday afternoon. for the girl who had the Play Creation Lake sign - sorry. next time we promise... london. bbc radio 2. 10.00am did a cover of a Bjork song for BBC 2. Big Time Sensuality. it was a lot of fun to do. hand claps and acoustic guitar. its exclusive for BBC 2 but hopefully it will pop up somewhere in the web...
london. 100 club and pub crawl. 23.00pm
it was nice to play a proper show in london. afterwards our friend sara took us to a couple after-hour pubs for some whiskey, vintage 45's and a small dance party. london never felt so underground before that night.
surrey. redhill festival. 8.40pm
. not many people due to the floods, but festive just the same. brian ran out to the audience/rolling green hills during Lazy Eye. the wireless frequency on his guitar was tested and passed with flying colors. we also did our impromtu bjork cover with the crowd as percussion(hand claps). it was a beautiful end to a hectic two weeks...
thanks to everybody who went to our shows, bought us drinks, stroked our egos, and shuttled us around from place to place. it was a blast and we shall see you shortly...
see you in seattle.
~xoxopher
Posted by Silversun Pickups on Mar 04, 2009 Dont Call It a Comeback...don't call it a comeback...
hello. how are you? nice to see you again.
i am now 35650 feet above sea level, shooting through the sky at a wee 589 mph. we just left a quick accidental pit stop in salt lake city, from LA to NYC. i have a jack and ginger in one hand while my other rapidly flips through all the tv channels ol' jet blue has to offer. since i don't watch much tv, i'm now full of useless knowledge, por ejemplo: the hoola hoop was invented by egyptians, the original mr. potato head toy was just the pieces to make the face while you supplied your own potato, and 94% of americans think paris hilton was treated justly. awww people... we just love tearing down the ones we deliver fame. so much has happened since we last spoke. i'll just kinda brain bubble it, wing it if you will...
the snow patrol tour was a great experience for us. we had an amazing time. snow patrol and ok go were the nicest bunch of bands you could imagine. "they make all the other bands we've toured with look like dicks". yep, i quoted myself. some highlights? sure. salt lake city and edmonton were two of the most amazing shows we have ever played, only to be eclipsed by montreal. i am not even sure what happened that night. it was unreal. merci. making a jungle gym out of wardrobe racks, in our dressing room in minneapolis, listening to prince songs and swinging the night away. that was nice. our week long stint by ourselves in the south, meeting new bands and blowing up PAs, and playing some of the rowdiest shows we have ever done. again, merci to you. the haunted baton rouge dressing room was a nice touch. nikki still has nightmares. the sspu SP dance party in houston. in fact, the many sspu SP dance parties. when dave dupuis (our soundie), nikki, marie (one of our managementies), mcrae (our tour manager), and i went down to the beach in miami after the show. it was so nice with our feet in the atlantic, drinking beers and seriously, and i mean seriously, contemplating pikul tatoos. that was good. i was this close. pablo (SP bass player and sspu guru) and dan (okgo drumhead) joining us on lazy eye for the last half of the tour. in particular, the final night when johnny (SP drumhead) played as well and tim (okgo all around chap) did a silver pants elvis dance on the video screen behind us during little lover's so polite (seriously... you can youtube it). and on and on and on. we really made some great friends. pablo flew to LA to play guitar on lazy eye for our secret silverlake lounge show. yep, we're tight. whoah... we just got slammed with some serious turbulence. i'll take that as fate telling me to move on.
but before i do, i think i'm in a very emotional mood. i just watched the last bit of spiderman 2 on the plane and i felt really really bad for peter parker. give the guy a break, right?
yes yes, you little detectives, you are correct. we shot a video for little lover's so polite in downtown los angeles with jaoquin phoenix in the director's chair. mark this one down as one of those bizarre things you experience when you are in our business... the business of smiles. why was it so nuts? because each and every one of us stood up in the back of a speeding truck where we played our song at double speed zipping through the streets of LA at 4 in the morn with nothing strapping us down. the whole while, jaoquin screaming "beautiful" which i'm pretty sure he was right. the cherry on the video sunday was the donut truck. this is a stunt truck that is specifically designed to do donuts at 45mph. christopher had a whole drum set strapped down in the back of this thing. i was tied to the chair. it was fucking insane and worth the price of admission and will probably only be seen for a second or two. ok, wait... we are now flying over iowa city. i promised myself i would change the subject by then.
but before i do, i watched pretty in pink for the first time in my life a couple of weeks ago. now, i agree with all of you. duckie should've got the girl. everyone knows this and it's the common thing one talks about when referencing this film. i just learned that originally in the film, he did get the girl, but because of audience testing, they changed the ending. how poetic is that? everyone believes duckie should've won, but the only reason he didn't was because people didn't want him to. wow. no, this isn't a theme i'm trying to set up. i feel way worse for duckie than paris...
coachella was a dream. better than i could ever have imagined. i'm not talking about our set (which i loved dearly), but the whole dealie. they set you up in this area that looks like a retirement home for bands. we all have our own little trailer with a garden and what not. it's really amazing. we had friends and visitors and previous touring partners stop by and say hi. i borrowed some sugar from jarvis cocker and wrote blonde redhead a love note (seriously the best band the universe). i accidentally ran into amy winehouse. she then hugged me and whispered "totally" in my ear. she is so little that it felt like a nibble from the breeze. dancing in a secret spot with my girlfriend 10 feet away from bjork during her whole show was a little bit of alright. jesus and mary chain was so amazing. thank god. i was worried. even despite that weird scarlett joe (so over her) duet, they were stunning. arcade fire pretty much was a game over situation. what are you gonna do? they were unreal. siting on the stage watching willie nelson kind of completed the whole weekend. it was also nice to be home... sort of... oh, our friend cece took blonde redhead's souvenir painting (we all got one specifically made for each band) that they left behind. it is now proudly hanging up in my bathroom....... and our lovely sound man dave dupuis took acid watching regina spektor. that is one hell of a commitment.
we've got a ton of stuff coming up. we're really excited about it all. playing some shows with our friend's amazing band sea wolf is a great way for us to start the next phase of our lives. europe and radio festivals and all that jazz is in the immediate works. thanks sincerely for paying atention. we owe you one.
alright. no more yelling at me. i'm doing my best. i will talk to you sooner than later. sooner. totally.
love brian
Posted by Silversun Pickups on Mar 04, 2009 amberi miss amber. i shipped her away to the UK so i won't see her again til mid may. she's going to live there for good, and even though i'm the one that told her to go, i'm not quite sure if i made the right decision. amber and i were inseperable these last couple months. she rocked my world as i did hers. and now i'm left with a loneliness that is hard to bare, and yet i'm the one who pushed her a world away. i hope she is safe on her journey, for i can't wait to see her again. amber is the best drumset i ever owned. she will always be my fave...
~xoxopher Posted by Silversun Pickups on Mar 04, 2009 susan lucci and silversun pickups
7 Plug award nominations. 0 Pluggies. we totally Lucci-ed it. no matter. we pretty much forgot that this was an awards thingy. we were just excited to play with our heroes Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks and Deerhoof. and we got to hang out with the great David Cross. what more could you ask for. if you voted for us, thanks so much for the support. either way, we had a great time.
~xoxopher
by the by - for all of you across the atlantic ocean - it's a done deal. look out for us. we'll see you soon.
Posted by Silversun Pickups on Mar 04, 2009 a bull and explosions.
ok. i'm back.
sorry about the absence. i've been busy.
how are you?
good?
good.
i'm watching a jeff tweedy dvd nikki gave me for xmas and getting ready to watch a lucille ball documentary (that one where she tells ricky about the baby... ooh...). i'm trying to figure out what to write about. i know we're gearing up for our tour of the universe beginning with snow patrol soon, and i last night i spent a bizarre evening in downtown LA watching a video shoot for the band TWILIGHT SLEEP which had an exploding phone booth and a live bull running through the streets. oh, also, i've been doing all these crazy interviews on things like KROQ (which i thought was weird until i heard the shins on there... whew...) and what not. and yes, christopher kinda summed up sundance pretty well, except he left out the night of a thousand different colored vodkas. no, i don't wanna talk about that either.
all i really wanna talk about is this. some friends of ours were in england recently and they knew a guy who knew a guy who was at a party where he was tripping on some new experimental drug. during the party, he kept seeing a goblin who was chasing him. after being terrified by this party goblin, he finally traps it in a cupboard where the goblin stayed all night. the next morning revealed that the goblin was the downstairs neighbor's 8 year old daughter who had down syndrome.
now, how fucked up is that?
love brian
Posted by Silversun Pickups on Mar 04, 2009 Land Of A Thousand Uggs
4 shows in 3 days, countless interviews and photo ops, gifting suites, one drunken after party in our hotel suite featuring fruit flavored Absolut vodka - and we still managed a day off for recreation...
so this is what we did on our day off.
EXT. Brian, Joe and Tracy atop a mountain.
Rented skis and snowsuits at hand. i picture
On Her Majesty's Secret Service
ala
Help!
ala
Better Off Dead
. They zig and zag, they chris and cross down the mountain. They fly like speed demons, in between trees and negotiating jumps over snowboarders and curlers alike.
CUT TO
INT. Me, Nikki, Becca and Dave Dupuis sit in a make shift movie theater in a hotel conference room.
Courtesy of Nikki's friend Kathy, we were able to score passes to an industry screening of
Son Of Rambow
. An awesome, heartwarming film from the directing duo of Hammer and Tongs. We laugh, we cry, we stand in ovation...
FADE TO BLACK
THE END
our sundance experience is complete.
a quick thanks to Jane Magazine, AOL, ASCAP and Filter Magazine for giving us a reason to go to sundance in the first place. we had a great time.
~xoxopher
Posted by Silversun Pickups on Mar 04, 2009 butch cassidy and the silversun pickupstomorrow we leave for sundance. i have no idea what to expect. a rock band at a film festival? are we out of our element? perhaps. but fuck it, i want to hobnob with movie stars, drink from an open bar, freeze my ass off in Park City and talk about favorite films. speaking of which... since we've been busy on the road, i was disgusted with myself when i realized the last film(in a theater) that i saw in 2006 was Little Miss Sunshine. to remedy the situation, i have made it my mission to watch as many films as i can before we hit the road once more. here's what i've seen so far... Pan's Labyrinth. one part gritty realism, one part amazing, nightmarish fantasy. stunning. Children of Men. i have never seen a future look so realistic. there are awesome shots in this film that seem to never end. very intense. amazing. and at moments, surprisingly funny. Little Children. didn't really enjoy it as much as the other films i mentioned, but the acting is pretty superb. and Jackie Earle Haley is in it. Charlotte's Web. read the book. Thank You For Smoking(via netflix). Aaron Eckhart is great... there you have it. it's not a ton of movies, but it's a start... see you when we get back from sundance. i'll let you know if the hobbing had been nobbed. ~xoxopher Posted by Silversun Pickups on Mar 04, 2009 Happy Holidaysheat up the virtual fireside dvd on the telly, boil up some Dickens cider, make sure the Egg Nog hasn't gone bad and watch The Christmas Story for 24 hours straight. this should be a good holiday season... we have a lot to be thankful for this past year. a lot of the thanks has to go to all the people out there who have supported us. with all the encouragement and hospitality we've received, you have given four friends in a little rock band a bit more meaning to their lives. it's not lost on us, and we appreciate it tremendously. thank you, everyone, for the great memories of this past year and for the warm welcomes in each city we've been to. we look forward to seeing you again in the new year... happy holidays. happy new year. ~xoxopher Posted by Silversun Pickups on Mar 04, 2009 My Highlights Of Our Winter TourSharing stages with the likes of Wolfmother, Modest Mouse, The Shins, The Raconteurs, Dead Meadow, Pete Yorn, Simon Dawes, The Killers...shaking David Letterman's hand...not spinning the van and trailer out of control and dying in a Texas snow storm...Paul Shaffer digging sspu...bringing enough thermal underwear...meeting Johnny Marr...taking a lot of pictures...having a home cooked thanksgiving meal far away from home...not having too many van or trailer issues...getting snowed in at a hotel in Texas while a Laker game was nationally televised...Bif giving me the go ahead to start Lazy Eye...my parents meeting Andrew from Wolfmother(when two worlds collide!)...playing to a sold out crowd at The Hammerstein Ballroom and The Fillmore...not fucking up on drums(too much). see you soon. ~xoxopher Posted by Silversun Pickups on Mar 04, 2009 Real Life Stuff
so the thing that blew me away on our last night with wolfmother in las vegas was the ROCKATERIA. in the hard rock hotel, where we played, there is a 24 hour cafeteria just for the employees, that has a bunch of chefs cooking every hour of the day/night so they could feed the army of people who work at the club/hotel/casino. it is free and we were treated to a huge meal at 3 in the morning. it's insane. yes the show was fun. yes it was nice to hang out and say goodbye to all the wolfies (get better guys), yes it was lovely to meet all you vegas kids that've been waiting for us to play there. yes it was alright to only have lost one dollar to the green eyed monster. but the rockateria really made me smile.
NOT SO SILENT NIGHT in san francisco was really one of the coolest things we've ever done. the show was so amazing it was almost surreal. highlights: pretending to be playing in THE SHINS while they were soundchecking (i was onstage with them playing my unplugged guitar while they were performing, so technically...), running into our friends dean and brendan from THE RACONTEURS who we haven't seen since touring with brendan benson (it's fun to catch up with familliar faces during such insane nights like that one), joe and isaac (MODEST MOUSE) getting critical on a tour cook book, the makeshift hospital wing we built up for nikki due to her ever so not going away illness in the dressing room, our tour manager mcrae watching my every move on stage due to my constant instrument cable entanglements, falling asleep during THE KILLERS (i tried), our friend scotty who now drum techs for modest mouse asking me "how the hell did you guys get on this bill?" (nice), and so on and so forth. it was an amazing night. all the bands were great, but i thought THE RACONTEURS pretty much just owned the show. i've never seen them before and i've haven't heard much of their record, but what i saw that night, they are an amazing band.
what did i not like?
the not so silent van ride out of the city right after the show. we had to. we needed to be in...
san diego had us play on a similar show. this one was without THE RACONTEURS and THE KILLERS. PETE YORN jumped in though (nice chap). this night i thought belonged to THE SHINS. it was amazing to watch them that night. they just have some of the best songs around nowadays. i also liked it when isaac brock tried to semi engage the audience by asking them how school was going and if they liked track and field. the response from the crowd was somewhat like when i step outside at 4 in the morning and i can kinda hear a cricket. maybe two. i was laughing though. i like banter that's kinda mean. tee hee. the show was kind of a nightmare due to major technical issues and sound disasters, but we had fun anyway. it was our last night of the tour so there was plenty of mixed emotions. for me especially.
and now i'm home wondering why my dvd player doesn't work and why my car didn't start this morning. bewildered a bit. happy. sad. confused. maybe it's time to relax. our tour manager mcrae stayed at my place last night. we got in at 4 in the morning, i had to take him to the airport early this morning. so of course, we had a couple of drinks last night and hung out talking shit til the even wee-er hours.
are you happy you're going home?
mcrae "oh yeah, it's time to do some real life stuff."
what if we just said fuck it, and decided to keep touring right now. would you do it?
mcrae "oh yeah."
why?
mcrae "because it's time to do real life stuff"
totally.
love brian
Posted by Silversun Pickups on Mar 04, 2009 |
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