Our host, Pistola and his amigos graciously invited and led us here. Fortunately, our gig tonight in Villareal is less than a two hour drive, but I guarantee you it will be muy difícil to leave this paradise in the orange groves of Valencia. I could see myself staying here for an extended sabbatical.

Last night’s gig in Valencia at the Durango club was spectacular. The band was on fire, and we had a bevy of Spanish beauties join us onstage to dance for the encore numbers. I’m sure that shit’ll end up on YouTube soon enough.

Certainly I always post about the good times and misadventures, and rarely do I post about the humdrum drives, the bickering, and other everyday routines that go into touring. It seems like it’s all fun and games, but make no mistake, this is WORK. One of the last few nights, some girls were trying to drag us to a disco after party, which fair enough coulda been fun, but my companions and I were somewhat exhausted. I said, “I’d love to come, but we still have work to do now and tomorrow.”

She said (en español) something to the effect of “you only worked two hours tonight” — I really had to think about it, and tried in my broken ‘gringlish’ to explain what went into the alleged two hours of work, which included waking up after 5 hours of sleep, reorganizing the tetris packing of the highway schooner, throwing out trash and cleaning the public van space, driving 6 hours directly to the club, unloading equipment, scrambling to grab a quick sandwich while soundczecking, playing a few songs to get the sound right, stuffing a backpack full of beer and snacks for later consumption, organizing everyone back to the bus, driving around in circles trying to follow an outdated gps to the hotel, checking in, dealing with incompetent and frightened hotel staff, squeezing in a 20 minute power nap, showering, shaving, making ourselves purty, following locals to our designated restaurant, eating a nice dinner then rushing off to the club to start our 2 hour set a half hour late, afterwards, drying off, signing autographs, talking to all the people as best we can with the mishmash of known languages, looking out for our personal bags, coats, equipment, each other, packing equipment from the stage, organizing plans for loading/partying, physically loading the van, Tetris again, all the while trying not to get too fucked up in the process that we can’t find our way back to the hotel… So next time someone says, “you call that WORK?” — I will backhand slap him/her.

That being said, it’s the rare little excursions like this that make it all worth the hassle.

However, was very displeased to see that the support band was using my bass amp without my knowledge or permission. This is fucked for a number of reasons, respect being only one of them. In our tech rider, we are to be supplied with two guitar amps at every venue, and the clubs usually avoid rental fees by asking the support band to provide amps. Fair enough. This was also the case last night, so one can easily make the argument that we are using their guitar amps, so why shouldn’t they use our bass amp. If I were the support band I would use the same logic, BUT I would surely ASK before doing so, and not just assume that it is okay to use. I do not blame the bass player, though had it been me, I would’ve at least asked the sound man if it was okay. The promoter however never sent the club the tech rider, and everybody always claims they never got it anyway. In the end I only blame myself for not making it clear to the sound engineers that my bass amp is NOT to be used by support bands, and here is the reason why:

A support band is usually local, and if something goes wrong, they know where to fix it or get another piece of equipment. A touring band that carries their own gear is out in the wilderness with schedules that leave little margin for extra excursions. If a support band spills beer on or blows the speakers of my amp, I am fucked. I have no backup, and it’s not a rental I can just have replaced at the next town. It’s mine, and if it’s out of commission, then it’s an ordeal to wrangle one on foreign territory. If I myself fuck up the amp, then it’s my fault and still my responsibility to get fixed or replaced, but then I at least know how it happened and don’t have to deal with blame and extortion. End of story.

We stayed in a very crappy hotel though with no breakfast, so this morning I made a pilgrimage by public transport to one of the only Taco Bells in Europe… Only to find they open at :30, which is the time I was scheduled to be back at the hotel or at the club loading our gear. Thrilled to know it at least exists.

The tour is going well in most respects, and it’s great to be on the battlefield with the gang. I was never much into camping as a youngster, but touring is very similar in a lot of respects, and for me, this is roughing it. The iPad is an amazing companion when touring with a rock band, I gotta say. All the frustrations and mood swings that are par for the course can be assuaged easily with a game of scrabble or catching up on news feeds. It’s value increases tenfold if you can successfully get your mobile wifi devices working properly. I however am still part caveman.

Today we take a relatively short drive to the city of Valladolid, which I remember being a pretty wild and raucous time when we were there last in 2010. There is a bar called Fuzztones which seems like a lock for the after party…

I think there are 4 more shows before we head back to headquarters before the brief Greek campaign. I am very much looking forward to the paella and the beach in Valencia this weekend.

Receptionists are always helpful, and they provide nice amenities like toothbrushes and sponges packaged in day glow orange plastic.

So far, Algeciras h been the highlight of this tour. The audience and the club were fully energized, and the band hit on all cylinders that night… What a crowd, what a night. So many fans who’d travelled to Granada or Madrid in the past to see the band got to see us in their hometown for the first time ever. Pretty frikkin’ cool!

We spent the night in Murcia, where I played poker in the local casino for 2 hours late last night (earning a measly 40€ after playing my aces poorly), and today, my taks are to find a tailor, a laundromat, a music store, and be at soundczeck by 19:00.

Wish me luck!

Back at the hotel, an older biker fan found us as we were sitting down to a very mediocre dinner, and brought a stack of LPs for Rudi to sign. Guess we’ll have protection if we need it tonight. Happily we get a rest before the gig, so ima gonna power nap, maybe post some boring travel pictures and foodporn later. Tomorrow we have our only day off of the tour, so I guess we’ll go on a beach hunt and soak some rays.mor go see the monkeys on Gibralter. Tough call.

I’ll be posting more on this tour since acquiring my new iPad…(poker has been yielding good results lately), so be forewarned…

In Fuzz we trust,
In Fez, we must!

(L-R): Fez, Glen Murrell, Robby 'Gil' Naefke. The Abramson garage on Calle Colina, Poway, CA.

Wishing Missy a happy birthday and a special toast to Hank & Kris for encouragingly tolerating our noise all those years ago.

Gigantic thank you’s go out to all the people who brought their talents together for this momentous evening, and the dazzling audience that came out in droves dressed to the nines… Wednesday is the new Thursday in Berlin!

This spectacle was made possible by :

The dolls & dudes of the Bassy Club:

Pinky’s Peepshow co-founders Trixie Trainwreck & Christopher Rose, fearless rock’n'roll souldier Lloyd Clark, the golden goddess April Walz, the fearless Toby J, the snide Christoph, all the BBBs (Beautiful Bar Broads), Tammi, Pamela, everyone else …

Also big shout out to the fabulous crew:

Heisenburg – the Gaujin of the garderobe,

Stage Kitty – Little Miss Piss,

Regisseur – Danny Oslo, the film crew,

Aufnahme – Gerrt Hslar, http://www.blackstonestudios.de

the  Shaman of the Shutter – Heinrich von Schimmer,

& thanks could never be enough for the outstanding performers who brought their magic to the masses!

Frank Sinazi, Coco, Fez Wrecker, Tallulah Freeway, Lada Redstar, Anita Drink, Damon Zurawski & Champagne Sparkles

and the heart & soul of the evening’s program, the band “Lenny’s Lo-Ball Combo”:

Leonard Svilar – guitar

Malte Tönißen – bass

x x -drummer

Stefan Kapitzke – sax

Steffen Zimmer – trumpet

Videos of the event available in November!