Band Tour Stories
of 2006
Quick links: Top 5 DVDs | Most Anticipated Albums of 2007 | Reasons The Fresh Prince was awesome | Top 5 Singles | Big Comebacks of 2006 | Top 5 Shows | Top 5 Things That Sucked | Top 5 Things That Ruled | Noteworthy Songs | Top Reissues | Reasons the BBC Is Killing UK Music | Top 5 Vinyl-Only Releases | Worst Cover Art | Band Tour Stories
When you're on tour the majority of time is spent crammed in a van with people who smell just as bad as the socks you've been wearing for a week straight. And while you do tour to play shows, in between those and the long highway stretches memorable stories are cast in memory. We asked a few touring bands of 2006 to share a memorable story from this year...
Ryan Mattos of Ceremony
When we were in Evansville Indiana, on tour with Lights Out, we got to the show WAY early. We had been having freeway fights with LO the last few days, throwing jelly, peanut butter, bottles of urine, slices of american cheese, various other gross things at each other's vans while driving. Like i said, we got to the show super early, so we went to find a grocery store, to stock up on ammo for the drive to st. louis that night. We go to leave the store, just as Tom Arnold was walking in with a group of people. We didn't recognize him at first cause he was way skinnier than i thought he'd be, but he noticed us all just gawking at the dude from Roseanne, so he said hi. TURNS OUT he was in town for his niece's high school graduation. His neice was there, we started talking, turns out that the younger arnold (fuck, im totally blanking on her name, but she was really nice) was going to the show with her friends after graduation as an after party thing.
We start talking to Tom, who I guess grew up in DC, it comes up that we sometimes cover Red C, and starts freaking out about it. He tells us all these stories about all those old DC dudes, seeing Bad Brains, getting wasted with Rollins, all kinds of crazy shit. We finished talking and said good bye, figuring he was full of shit, but his niece came to the show with a bunch of friends, some punkish, some not, and sure enough, there's this tall ass old dude up front when we play, headbanging for Red C. He was super nice, told us some stories about Roseanne, showed us his "Rosie" tattoo, said had just finished shooting some movie in Palo Alto or San Jose or something, dude ruled.
George of Blacklisted
Hmm, We have toured so much, so many stories, narrowing it down can prove to be difficult, My most memorable that sticks out is not so much a tour but a small string of shows all put together last minute. Anyone into blacklisted knows 2006 was a rough period and we were gonna call it quits. So while we were driving out to california to play what was to be our second to last show at sound and fury, I got a bunch of phone calls asking us to play a couple cities on our ride home, Most of the shows selling points were, we were driving 6000 miles (philadelphia to california and back) to only play one show, so why not add two or three more.
So while that was getting worked out we had sound and fury to play, which was probably one of the most intense moments ive ever been apart of, So we played sound and fury and picked up two of our friends in california and drove back to philadelphia playing 3 shows on the way home to people who really just wanted us to play one more time, pretty much cutting us back down to size and making me, bean and shawn realize that there is so much more we want to do with this band, so much more we could give to people.
I guess this is my most memorable because it was a moment in my life where I really got to step out of the box I live in and see things clear, I started this band and have dealt with the highs and lows. To be at my lowest point one minute with the band , dealing with the reality that nothing lasts forever, one of my best friends could have died on tour and left the band, so much uncertainty laying ahead, then playing sound and fury and having so many kind words said and then continuing on to play across the country to even more people just happy to see us play. It restored any doubt I may have ever had in Hardcore, It was a good Life moment, Not just tour moment/story.
Kenny from Comadre
Our most memorable tour story from 2006 has to be our whole Japanese tour that we did in April. We all were absolutly stoked when Endzweck (amazing hardcore band from Japan) asked us if we wanted to come over to Japan and do a 10-day tour with them. Uchuu, the drummer of the band, even offered to put out our newest album over there on his label and have it ready for that tour. It was fuckin amazing; we got hooked up WAY hard. But anyways, the whole experience is definetly something all of us will remember for the rest of our lives.
Being on the other side of the world playing shows, getting the chance to meet some of the most amazing (and genuine) people i've ever met in punk/hardcore, getting to play with and see some AMAZING bands, taking in and living in such an awesome culture, (and of course) just getting to fuckin hang out in Japan with best friends is seriously something i'm never gonna forget. The shows were all super rad too, and the kids there were ridiculously fun and REALLY energetic; it was WELL worth all the money that we spent to do the tour. But i think that the best part of that whole experience was the fact that we realized how amazing the punk/hardcore culture really is, and how much it really does bring people together.
When we first arrived in Japan, we really had no clue what to expect and/or how the shows and kids were gonna differ from here in the US. And for the first few days, we were definitely all kinda shy and just not "in our element". But after a while, we realized that these people in Japan, the ones that were coming to multiple shows, the ones that were singing along to songs, the ones that were diving off stages, piling on each other, starting circle pits, the ones that were wearing the same band shirts were absolutly no different than any other punk/hardcore kid. I mean, we realized that even though we were living on opposite sides of the world, we were no different from each other.
We were all involved in punk/hardcore and were going to these shows for the same fuckin reason: to have fun. And even though there was clearly a language-barrier, we were still able to communicate and hang out and talk about bands we loved and the kids there showed us an AMAZING time. We all made some great friends there for sure. Can't wait to go back.
(Zed)
JP from Rise And Fall
Top 5 Tour Events of 2006:
- "A Season in Hell" Eastcoast Tour April 2006 w/Guns Up! & Blacklisted
- Deathwish Inc.
- A lot of touring in 06 and even more to come in 07.
- European tour with Fearless Vampire Killers/Cro-Mags, hanging out with John Joseph and Mackie Jayson was more than an experience and was truly awesome.
- Rise and Fall/Doomriders European Tour - Get into it!! Awesome tour with awesome people.
Tour stories are countless, all of them with their good and bad things but in the end of the day the only thing we know is that we keep asking for more. We really look forward to get back on the road in 2007 with a lot of plans, including 2 U.S. tours in the works so hopefuly we'll see you guys out there.
