Witch Mountain 2001 Tour Diary Part 2
10-3 We arrived at the venue Emo`s in Austin Texas with a mere 20 minutes before we were supposed to play. We set up and blasted through our standard set: Indian Passage, Rock On, Victim of Chord Changes, Wing of the Lord and we finished with Iron Long II. We were the first of 4 bands so our set was 30 minutes which was fine considering I had spent much of the afternoon in the back of the van curled up in a fetal position trying to keep myself from puking. Seems I got the same stomach flu that Danno was sporting back in Missoula/Salt Lake. By the time we set up I felt completely recovered. Men of Porn took the stage and completely blew everyone that had seen them before away. This was the best Porn show I have seen to date and Randolfio ripped it up, along with the drummer from Spilth. Karma to Burn were next with there instrumental mayhem and were the band of the night as far as most were concerned. Clutch was the last band of the evening, and Neil came out and sang a ripping version of La Grange with K2B. This was great to do in Texas to the packed house at Emo`s. Clutch did over an hour set of their best material.
10-4 I got one of the hand silk screened poster the next day at Emo`s where the booking agent invited us back on our day off to check out "Captured by Robots" who were simply amazing. It`s one guy Jaybot that plays with a band of robots that he built. Simply an amazing thing to see, and the music was great!
10-5The next day we hit the road for our October the 5th show at the Dixie Tavern in New Orleans with 5 other bands. Slow Horse and Calumus were among the bands and it was good to see the Slow Horse guys again and to finally meet the guys behind Calamus/Daredevil... Floor, Destro were both killer as were Slow Horse (as always) and Calumus. We didn`t take the stage until 3AM which seems to be a normal occurrence down there where the bars are open 24 hours. You can drink on the street , unreal... Josh (ex- Bass player from Sour Vein) showed up with weed in hand to greet our humid sweaty selfs. The air was so thick, you could cut`er with a butt`a knife! We played a short whiskey drenched set to a hand full of people that were there to see the rock, I broke a string halfway through the last song so we called it and Josh took us downtown for some late night beers and to meet some interesting people. Very cool people down there willing to do just about anything for a stranger. It might be a strong contender for my favorite out-of-state place- tying only with Missoula at this point. I wanna go back soon!
10-6 We went to bed real late, slept in at Josh`s girlfriends (Katie from the Famous/Fabulous Monsters) cool house about 4 miles from the downtown area of mayhem. They made us breakfast and we watched some Sabbath and Almost Famous on DVD. Right now as I am typing we are on our way to Dallas for the show that we booked the tour around...SHoD III!
10-7 SHoD III was a blast, we missed the much talked about performances of Place of Skulls and Las Cruces from the day before though. We were there from the start of Sunday til the end. All the bands were great and it was good to finally meet some of these people. Slowhorse, The Glasspack and Calamus were in attendance as were various faces...Some of the bands that really caught my attention were Zero the Hero, Die Daily, Sour Vein, Oversoul...Solitude Aeturnus were the topping of the cake for me though, these guys just flat out fucking rule the doom! I saw each and every band that day and can honestly say that I liked them all. Great bill for sure. Our set included Scientists Confession with Dennis from Oversoul and John Perez on guitars...best show on the tour so far.
10-8 We headed to Houston the next morning after a good night sleep. The place that we played in Houston was called "Fitzgerald`s"... It`s a pretty famous old night club/spot...there were pictures of James Brown when he played there and a poster/flyer of a Stevie Ray Vaughn show that took place there as well. Cool atmosphere and great staff who dug our sounds. It was a Monday night of course so we didn`t expect too many people to be in attendance. The quality of the crowd was definitely better with Warped Pig and Isis from the forums in attendance. Warped Pig (Mark) was very hospitable letting us stay in his deluxe suave apartment complete with a pool that Dave and Danno took full advantage of the next day. This was also our first show with The Glasspack, some of the coolest dudes you will ever meet. The Glasspack played a blistering set of high energy soul ridden rock and roll, they are also sporting 3-piece status since there bass player was ill and had to split with the band back home after the gig they had in Tennessee. Those guys also had a spill of bad luck and jack-knived their brand new truck and trailer on the freeway. Luckily it didn`t damage the truck too badly and the guys are alright, but from what I understand it could have been fatal. Heading to Austin for more fun with The Glasspack.
