I'm really sorry!!!!

well it's kinda clear that i'm not that good with that whole Blogspot thing. I actually never finished my story from the states, i got it somewhere on my computer i think.
So yeah where were we....

musically:
the states tour, that has been a while ago, after that i did another tour with Laura Stevenson and Mike Cambell, lovely people. I did some small tour and some nice festivals this summer.
Last weekend i started my first tour of the new touring season, i did some awesome shows in Germany, great places, with great bands, did 3 shows on saturday which actually killed me. At the moment of writing i've to be in Sweden, i was supposed to play a show in Sweden yesterday night, but my health is not that good, i got a throat, ear and tooth infection, yeah why not...... it's getting a bit better, and i'm starting to pack my bags, to leave tonight a 3h, together with my good friend/tourmanager/labelowner/graphicdesigner/vegetarian/womanizer Marcus Lundquist, we will head north for a 16h drive to the middle of Sweden, where we will play 6 shows, and than go to Holland for the last show.

Personally:
Even more things happened in my personal life, offcourse i won't share all, but some of the things i can share. Last June i moved to Germany, i live in Wegberg now, a small town next to the Dutch Border, i've got an appartement with my girl, and it's actually after 2 months finally finished (we had to wait for the kitchen, for all the german people, never order a kitchen at shaffrath, or how you spell it). So yeah i live in Germany now, i've to speak german, which sounds ridicolous and mostly people are laughing when i try to speak german, but at least i try. It's quiet here, and i mis the good old times, but things are changing anyway and we've to accept it.
I also try to pick-up the screenprint stuff, and my basement looks like one big mess, but it's cool.

i still have to print some shirts for the tour, so i'd better leave now. I will try to do my best to keep some of us up-to-date with this blog.

02-05 Fuck Fuck Fuck and uhm…… Fuck

This was going to be our last day at the T&T house, those guys are great guys.
Before we say goodbye we are playing all together at the Basement of this guy called Paul Blast, nice guy, but not that many people. As soon as Chris played Paul’s mom came downstairs to talk with her son, that we should stop swearing in our song, hurray, at least 3 songs of mine are included the word fuck, so we had to change that, yeah lame. After that we are heading for a 4 hour drive at night to Johnstown to Chris his house.

01-05 My sweet sixteen

Today we would play at Dan’s auto body, some kind of festival, didn’t know what to expect, they warned me before, for little teenagers under influence of alcohol and drugs. As soon as we arrived I thought I was in the middle of a drug edition of my sweet sixteen. Kids screaming for attention and saying bullshit all the time and wasting their lives away. I had a conversation with this guy, which actually ended up nowhere, talked about him who wanna to join the air force, but at the same time he agreed that the missions right now where some kind of bullshit, but at the other side he agreed and then not and then he did, and he asked me if I was more pro Russia or USA. Yeah good luck in the Air Force, with your drinking and drugs problem.
But luckily there where nice bands and guys playing, and at the end all the little drugged kids where doing some synchronal throwing-up sessions.

30-04 American toilets: too much water, it’s splashing all the time, good for nothing.

This tour was all because of one reason, the cottage sessions, Luke, Greg and I were supposed to release this split record for this record label called the dead format cassette, but it didn’t work out that well for me, so it got delayed and we won’t have it on this tour. But the guys from DFC putted us up for a show anyway. Which turned out really good, it was a good night, around 50 people, we got some money for the gas.
I was walking around with the question why American toilets are filled with so much water, it’s good for nothing, when you’re having a shit, the water will splash way too much, just think about when you’ve got the spray-can. Actually having a piss is not good either, it will splash out of the toilet and will hit the ground and if you are lucky and wearing short pants……
Nobody could give me a good reason.

29-04 Europe isn’t a country it’s a cat with the largest penis

We will play another house show today in Philadelphia, but not before we go for a south street challenge, and they promised us we would die. South Street Challenge: You go to this Pizza place where you order a huge slice of pizza, than go to Jim’s where you order a Cheese Steak roll, you put the roll on the pizza and wrap the pizza around the Cheese steak, 2000 calories, but to be honest it wasn’t that bad, until the moment you have to go to the toilet. After the pizza and cheese steak you will top it off with some Italian ice (what the Americans call Italian ice, it’s just slush) which will give you some brain freezes like you never had before, horrible.
After our challenge we went into a record store, which we better not do anymore, it’s too dangerous for my wallet.


After our tour-de-record-store, we go to Jim’s house where we will play a set. The set was okay, it was nice. As soon as we were ready people went out for a smoke, I went outside to hang around with the other people, while they were talking with this homeless guy called Marvin, talked about tons of bullshit, he asked me where I’m from and I told him Europe, he talked about Europe being a country, so I told him what Europe was.
He told me he liked the song sweet home Alabama, so I grabbed a guitar took it outside, before I know, we were singin old songs together with 15 man outside, it was amazing, these moments make it worth to tour, these are the moments which will stay with me for a while.
Afterwards we went inside, and went to another place to have another drink and a pizza, then we go back to house.

28-04 Is this Holiday or what?

Waking up at a comfortable couch at the place of trunks and tales, in the middle of 4 crazy cats, and I’m not the biggest fan of cats, but these 4 hairy monsters are going to be my roomies for the next 3 nights.
I’m happy, the place looks good and clean, and the couch was damn good.
Today we decide to go for some shopping, I need new shoes, so we went to the vans shop, where we almost bought the whole vans store, I bought myself 3 pair of shoes, 2 shirts, some vinyl’s at another shop, good day, the dollar rate is good for us Europeans.
Afterwards we go to the music shop where Luke will buy his banjo, lovely piece of instrument.
We decided to get some drinks for the night, which will promise us a funny night.

27-04 Are you sure you are playing?

Woke up in this hotel, had a good night, had some breakfast, not without noises, the fire alarm went off twice because I was toasting my bagels.
So we left the hotel and went towards New Jersey, where we are going to play at the Millhill basement.


We crossed New York city, saw Manhattan from a distance, it was a nice ride. We arrived at the Millhill, ordered some food, then the bartender called our promoter to tell him that we where there, and later the bartender told us our promoter was kinda shocked as he expected us a week later. Good job, this will explain why there would be no crowd, we had fun and free drinks, but it was kinda useless. After the show we are packing the car to go towards Spring City, where we stay at the house of the guys from Trunks and Tales.

26-04 I don't like days off

The sleep was good, but i made this promise yesterday, so there we went into this cold cold lake, so cold it hurts. But it feels good as soon as you get out.
Launched some more potato's, and we headed towards a friend of Chris to stay there for the night as this was our day off. Not much happened today, saw a roadkill (bear), we ended up in a hotel as Chris' friend didn't know about us comming to sleep. Miss my girl.

25-04 How many drunk guys does it take to fire a potato launcher?

We will take it easy today, we have to drive for something like 5 hours. I don't feel that well, i'm quiet and that's good for my tour buddy's.
The car is fully packed and that makes it hard to travel with 4 guys but the road shows us some nice pictures, lovely nature.

We will arrive in front of this bar, as it was called the monkey house we tought it would be another house, but luckily we will play in this good looking bar. Lovely people, and we meet Matt our promoter for that night, and he's going to play with his band as well. It's finally a normal show with a small p.a. system, we all play very well, and i had such a good time, watching everybody playing so good.

Matt offered us to sleep at his place, and he told us he lives next to this huge lake with a small beach. Before i knew i promised to have a dive the next morning.


So we headed to Matt's house, where he wanted to show us his new best friend, his potato launcher, a big iron tube which looks lika a bazooka, you put a potato in one side and gas at the other side and launch it. It's not going to make any sense as we couldn't she a shit, but fun we had.

24-04 Yeah you think freedom of speech is bullshit, shut up then!!!!

Last night was weird, didn't know what to think about that.
We woke up kinda early, me and Luke wanted to go out for a walk, but Chris really didn't wanted to go out for a walk, and leave the place as soon as possible, we didn't get it. As soon as we where in the car he told us his story:
Yesterday night Chris was looking for the guy who was in charge of the planning, he asked some guy where HE was. Then the guy told him Chris wasn't aloud to call him HE as he was a ZON, to be honest i never heard of it, but it means that you're not living like a male or female. The guy actually started to make a problem of it, it was strange, i was lucky i missed it.
The place was full of this anarchists, well they thought they where, they called themselve anarchists. As i'm always interested in what other people think, i loved to have some conversations with them. But as soon as i tried it, i found out that i was surrounded by bullshit, like these discussions about all television is bad, freedom of speech is bullshit, and they where complaining about supporting the big companies by buying their stuff, but they actually didn't even know where their weed they bought was from, known as weed can be from some terrorist organisation, but they wouldn't care. I don't get it anymore. Just a reason to kick against the world.

We had this nice breakfast at Eddy's, good place, but i have to take more care of my money as it is flying and hardly comes back.

After that we head forward to Naugatuck where we have to play, we will take it easy for the rest of the day, sitting on the porch, and me and Luke go out for a walk and some "little" food, we ended up in the Subways with this massive bucket of Coke. As soon as we where walking back, i got this stomach attack, that means i had to run for a shit, i hate it, american food is killing me.

The show of tonight is cool, not that many people, but i guess i just have to deal with that, people are nice, it's time to sleep.

23-04 Please tell the guy at the couch next to me, that he can't sing

Because of my jetlag, i will wake up way too early. not good. i found out that i wasn't the only one, and i decided to go to find some breakfast with Luke. We had this walk for 45 minutes and then we ended up at the Dennies. Typically American food, eggs, sausages, big Pancakes, bacon and a refill on coffee, good start.
It cost us quite a lot of money, but we where happy with our filled belly's.

We had our walk back, and found out that the others where awake and we got our stuff together and up to the next town, Allston.

After a Lumch (as the others didn't had breakfast) we headed forward to our next house where we would have a show. I had enough time to have some conversation with my home base and my girl (what i needed).

The show itself was nothing special, actually the same as yesterday, this house show infront of a handfull of people. We have to deal with it.

My jetlag is still killing me, hope tomorrow will be better.

22-04 I still hate Paris and i'm afraid it won't change

as i couldn’t get on the plane towards geneva, cause of the ashes of the volcano, I will drive with my dad straight towards Paris to catch up with Luke and Greg, thanks a million dad.
As soon as I arrived on the Airport I found out that I wasn’t the only one with some flight problems, I was surrounded by 1000’s of (smelly)france and Korean people. I had to drop my luggage and that will take me 4 hours, which was stressfull as I didn’t know if I was going to make it, but luckily the flight got delayed and with a smelly shirt I will jump on the plane with my friends for an 7 hour flight.

We will arrive in Boston, where we are a little scared for the customs, as the States are known for their hard customs. But we made it without any problems, so that’s a good start.
Meanwhile it’s 16h o clock in the states, and 22h in Europe, the jetlag is going well but that will change later on.

Chris of the Anniversary Club is waiting for us and its good to meet him, such a nice guy, who will be surrounded by European idiots, and we will make that clear in the car towards our first show of the tour. We can’t stop making fun of eachother, but yeah making fun of france people is the easiest thing do to, they ask for it.

To be really honest, I don’t know where I’m going, I haven’t fixed anything for this tour, all the credits are going towards Luke and Chris, who did an amazing job. So I will just talk a lot of bullshit and sit in the back of the car.

We arrive in this ghetto something kind of neighborhood, with these nice big houses, which are not in good conditions, but it looks cool, where some kids are sitting on the stairs waiting for us, and actually those are the kids where we are going to play for, just a couple of them will show up. The show is nothing special, playing some songs and make bad jokes in front of 10 people or something. Maybe I’m too spoiled with Europe, I don’t know. If we will keep on having these shows, I will end up so damn broke, and there won’t be any USA tour.
I played 2nd, and it’s cool to see Chris playing, what a lovely vocals, and as soon as it was Luke’s turn, I was going to lose myself in my jetlag and will fall asleep at his set, nothing personal, but the jetlag was kicking me. I went out for some fresh air with Chris and had some good serious talk about touring full-time and that not that many people do understand you, it’s not always that good as you might think.
Suddenly we heard this weird ass high scream, and I saw my first couple of Racoon’s, probably one of them was getting raped, horrible sound.

The rest decided to drink a lot, I’m taking it easy I think for this tour.

A good start, is half of die arbeit

So here we go, or actually i was supposed to go. I packed my bags, really slowly, did some last work, really slowly, checked my flights on the internet, really slowly. Everything was just chill, until the moment i had to go to the airport. My parents where going to drop me off and my good friend Lucy would say goodbye. At the end i ended up drinking coffee and talking for hours with Lucy. MY FLIGHT WAS CANCELLED. The whole day it looked like everything was okay, but at the end it got cancelled. I was kinda pissed off.

They've got this myth going on, it's about this little dutch guy who put his finger in the dike, as it was leaking. I wish they had this guy in Island who would have put his dick into some kind of volcano, that would be a better story.

Plan B: my dad and i will drive to Paris this night at 4 o clock to get the plane from Paris till Boston. Let's hope for the best.

I should pack my bags

It's almost time, to leave the home base.
This time i will go away for a 3,5 weeks tour in the USA, the Eastcoast.
I will hit the road with my good friends and tourbuddy's Luke Hilly, Greg Laraigne and Anniversary Club. I'm looking forward to the tour, it's going to be great.


The last days i was in complete Chilling mode, it's has been a long time ago, since i'd just turned off the computer, and didn't even thought about working. It was nice, but yeah it's a part of the job, if i want to keep on playing.
I spend my last day with my girl in a bungalow next to the beach, just what i needed. Went to the beach, did some shopping (that's what girls need, we man need food, girls need shops), had some dinner with my parents in a traditional Pannekoeken huis, and had a lot of sleep.
And it's sad to leave her for 3,5 weeks, i will miss her. But hurray for the digital world, we will survive this. I'm now in germany, enjoying my last day together (she's on school now, so that's why i use the computer).


It's still a big question i'm going to make it to the states because of the ashes up in the air, people keep on asking me, but i will just see how it goes, it's looking good for now, but you will never know, we will see.

8-4-2010 Road Sweet Road

Well here we go....

i usually write everything down in a word document, but nobody has ever seen what i've done the last half a year. My friends and family ask me how things are going, if i can send them a little diary thing... untill today it never happened, im sorry for that.

At this moment, i've got 3 weeks off, after 3 months of almost full-time touring, it has been amazing it has been hard so now and then, but i can look back to an awesome period. Playing infront of 2 payed people up to 500, playing in art galleries, small living rooms (with 60 people), Squads, Nice and Shitty places, Huge venues. Played with my Road Sweet Road buddy's, some old friends, Chuck Ragan, Digger Barnes and Jon Guant.

Yeah so many things happened in such a short time. It's time to keep some of you more up to date.

For now on, i'm happy to be at home, to got some time with my family, and with some good friends. Those i miss when i'm on the Road Sweet Road