East Coast '02 Tour Diary

East Coast '02 Tour Diary

Friday, June 14th

We loaded up the van and hit the road by like 7:30 this morning. Driving through New York and Jersey kinda sucked. Traffic was pretty heavy, but I slept most of the way so my opinion doesn't really matter on that subject. We hit the Royal Lee in Arlington about 5:00, so we headed up to the local mall to get some grub and hang out for a bit. The show was amazing. The club was packed, about 100 or so people. We played for about 25 mins. or so and the kids were really into it. At one point I found myself taking a step back from the mic to avoid getting my teeth knocked out. We love teen angst!! That night we crashed at the show promoter Doug's house. Great guy. We slept in this room that was supposed to be a bedroom but his girlfriend's clothes were spread all over it. Basically it was a huge closet with a bunch of futon mattresses on the floor. I got some sleep but Dan was snoring like a bastard and in the middle of the night we had a huge lightning storm.

Saturday, June 15th

We started out for Roanoke pretty early. We stopped in to eat at a little dinner in Virginia called the tastee 29, and I made the mistake of asking for pancakes instead of "Hotcakes." Another Rhode Island favorite, just like coffee milk! I slept most of the way to Roanoke, so I can't really tell you what the hell went on in the van. Out of boredom and lack of a better thing to do, we headed off the highway to explore Luray Caverns. Needless to say the tour sucked and our tour guide was a complete loser. It took about an hour and once we saw the first room we saw em all. At that point we decided to jump groups and get the hell out of there. After our little escapade in the caverns we headed all the way down to Roanoke and got a camp site at Dixie Caverns. Talk about Rednecks. The place was weird. You needed a code to get in the bathroom, just to take a shit. Go figure. We needed food so we tried to find a place to get something to make to eat. We first hit a gas station near the campground. Bad Idea. I think I saw Uncle Jesse and Cooter hanging out in the woods. After that experience we decided it might be better if we drive into downtown Roanoke to find a supermarket. We hit up the Kroger and got some fried chicken and beer. Beer makes the hard ground much easier to sleep on.

Sunday, June 16th

Now this day is probably the most retarded day on the whole tour. Jeff from the Creeps told us that we should be at the free mason hall for 12pm. Well we were and no one else was. After a half hour or so, we took off down the road to seven eleven for odds and ends. I guess people in Roanoke have never seen a Rhode Island drivers license. The lady had to look up Tim's ID in a book of US sate ID's. How fucked up is that? We went back to the hall to see if anyone showed up and two girls had pulled in under the same mis information we had that the show started at 1pm. Well Tim instantly decided he was going to try to pick up this girl. But anyway I'll get to that part. We noticed the back door was open a bit so we opened it and went in to see if anyone was there. Well little did we know that we set off the alarm. Tim being stupid as usual picks up the phone and says hello. No one was on the other end. After that we decide to screw before we get busted for B&E. After much pressure from our do good dad we decided to go back and tell the cops that we went in. The guy was really nice. He told my dad how Roanoke had more cops than the Virginia State Police. Did you know that? I sure as hell didn't. This is where we find out that the show is at 3 and not 1. So we just hung out in the parking lot for the rest of the time. This is where Tim starts laying on his mojo. He is such a pot head that he forgot the girl's name and I had to remind him like 10 minuets later. People showed up in large numbers. The show went great. Kids were going nuts and we got some good pictures from it. Many of the good ole folks invited us to drink with them and come back to their places to party. Get this. We even met a chick named Dallas. No she was'nt a porn star, but she was sure as hell nice to us. Her dog Brew Miester was rad and she had a really awesome Koi and Dragon tattoo. Props to Joe from the Piss Ants for such a bad ass show. After the show we got some Burger King (nasty) and went back to sleep. Remember no cops will bother a three colored truck with tags that say farm use on them. Anyway the girl that Tim met left in the middle of our set to go find her friends band. Later we find out that she was only 16. Go Tim!!

Monday, June 17th

We got up and packed our shit and started out for Tampa right away. We stopped at the Waffle House for breakfast. Did you know that there is 1,582 ways to enjoy their hash browns. One way I enjoyed them was with indigestion. Nasty! Shots of Pepto Bismol all around. The convenience store we stopped at so Tim could get smokes smelled like complete ass. I ducked out of there asap. The drive to Tampa was pretty much flat out and boring. Hott as hell too. I wanted to see palm trees bad and the fuckers of South Carolina and Georgia teased me with these small ass palm trees. Assholes!!! We stopped for the night in Fernandina Beach Florida and got a camp ground in a state park. The weirdest thing here was that when we came back from eating there was a band trying to get into the park. The fucked up part is that a week before this The Usual Suspex played with them at the living room and I decided not to stay cuz I would never see them again. Pretty nuts if you ask me.

Tuesday, June 18th

Tampa was almost in sight. So we hit the road for about 4 hours and headed into Tampa. Gainesville was white trash central. Trailer parks and trashy cars everywhere. We were met by our friend Jeff who was also in Pulling Out. We hung out at Dave's ( Pulling Out ) house and grabbed some food and beer and just hung out. Just a note. Dan completely sucks at Tony Hawk. But Dave's dog Dolly was awesome. She was a mini Schnauzer. Me and Dolly hit it off well. How cute right. We just crashed and thats that. Pretty un productive day.

Wednesday, June 19th

Jeff showed us around Tampa in the afternoon after we woke up. Well we pretty much woke up in the afternoon. He took us through Ybor City which is Tampa's happening spot. It was pretty much Federal Hill with palm trees. After that we got some food at this environmentally friendly restaurant. Food was good but the vibe was weird. We chilled in the pool for a while then got ready to go to the show. We got to the Brass Mug around 7:30 or so. It was your typical small bar room atmosphere. The turn out was pretty shitty. Good Ridance was in town on the same night so they pretty much stole away any and all crowd that we would have had. Thanks guys. Fuck sXe!!! We played second after this band called Awesome. What a name huh? We almost got their stage banner, but they came back and got it. Pulling out was last up and they weren't half bad. They were fast poppy punk. We said our good-byes and loaded up the van. It was a flat out burn to Greensboro North Carolina. It was going to take us about 15 or so hours so we had to leave that night.

Thursday, June 20th

This day and the 19th rolled right into each other. Just like how shit rolls down hill. We spent all morning driving to Greensboro, stopping here and there for short sleep sessions and such. I wanted to go to the topless coffee shop but we decided on the Huddle House somewhere in South Carolina for breakfast. Now the Huddle House coffee sucked and so did the food but this is really fucked. The Huddle House and the Waffle House are set up the same way and serve practically the same shit. The same signs and everything. But the Huddle House had lunch. I thought that was kinda screwed up. The rest of the drive was pretty boring just like all the drives. The road we had to take in North Carolina was like Rte. 6 in Conn. Two lanes and farm land all around. Again I just slept so I didn't see much. We got to Greensboro a little after 1 or 2 sometime. We got lunch and for some odd reason my dad decided he wanted to wash his van. Who knows. But anyway we staked out a spot at the local college to play some wiffel ball and toss the Frisbee around for a while. The club was odd. They had two bands set up at once, so when we finished the next band just started playing. Sort of like the Warped Tour but on a much less grand scale. The kids kinda didn't know what to think of us so when we were finished we just packed up and bailed out. We gunned in straight home to Rhode Island and made it back around noon time on the 21st.

Overall I would say that the tour was a success. We plan to attack the West Coast next summer.