This Past Friday

Buck, Corey, and I were on our way to the Cakeshop in Manhattan for a show with a friend of ours' band, sitting in Holland Tunnel traffic. The temperature was in the mid to upper 90's, and with no air conditioning in Buck's van, we were reduced to manually oscillating a small-ish clip fan, which was designed to oscillate, but had lost that function several hours before.
I was sitting shotgun, and with the window open I heard a man's voice calling from my right.
"Hey, you've got a leak there".
At this point, traffic was completely stopped and I got out for a look. The fluid was dark red and gushing. Transmission fluid- not good. We were about 500 feet from the mouth of the tunnel and there was only one turn-off point left before the toll booth. Somehow we managed to signal to the drivers on our right to let us through and the van limped its way in to the parking lot of the Holland Motor Lodge, an aged but otherwise nondescript-looking brick hotel whose lot was continuous with that of the Burger King to its right.
We sat outside in the heat as winds gathered and the sky darkened, making phone calls and just generally trying to figure out what to do. The transmission had completely cracked open and there was basically no hope of fixing it that would have been worth the money or effort. I was on hold with AAA to try and get a free tow to the gig when Buck told us he'd found a guy with a van that could pick up us and our equipment and take us there. Not free, but if we'd have sat around and waited two hours for the AAA guy, there was a good chance we would miss our set. I hung up. Still, the guy coming to get us lived in Williamsburg and Friday night traffic was heavy, so we were going to be waiting a while.
I went over to the Burger King and got cokes for everyone. Leaves, dust, and bits of paper blew over the concrete and opaque purple clouds drew closer. After a few minutes of this, thunder cracked and heralded a ferocious downpour and we were back in the van, using the last of its battery to power the non-oscillating oscillating clip fan as we watched through the rain for approaching headlights.

Waking the Naga

Here's a video I made for a project I put together that has a record coming out next month. The band (Coil Sea) is Michael Kuhl, Michael Lowry, Matt Pierce, Walker Teret, Jimmy Clay Wallace, and myself. Enjoy.

Coil Sea - Waking the Naga from Thrill Jockey Records on Vimeo.

This Weekend and Next Week

Haven't written here in a while. We actually have a fairly big and action-packed week coming up. Tonight (fri 2nd) we are heading down to Ocean City Maryland to mess around by the water and to get ready for a show we have there tomorrow. We're playing at Pepper's Tavern, right at 16th street and the boardwalk. Being that it's the 4th of July weekend and 16th street is known as "the party block", we expect nothing less than absolute insanity. We're sharing the bill (on the two that follow later in the week) with This Frontier Needs Heroes, a duo from Brooklyn NY who are really good friends of ours. They are a great time to watch and to hang out with. That's why they're coming.

Wednesday night finds us in Wilmington NC at Reggie's 42nd Street Tavern, and Thursday we will be at the Tin Roof in Charleston.
This trip is going to be awesome- things are gonna get wild, it's going to be very hot, we're all going swimming, and we're going to film it all. Hope you can make it.