New song by Lark!

Lark (AKA Rachel our singer) just released the first single from her solo album.  Give it a listen!

Shudders by oaklandlark

New Album On Ze Way!

Well, we figure what the heck else are we going to do with all these songs?

 

Tentative release date is April 20th, 2012

 

Stay tuned for updates!

 

Antioquia Does Burning Man

Burning Man 2010 sure was a beauty.  It’s hard to boil such an event down with all its random moments (here’s an example) into a few paragraphs but here goes:

Beats & bum-bums at Eggchtropolis

The first day felt like Hell.  It was a cold and lonely Hell when Maddy and I finally arrived at our camp’s address.  The night was already dark and nobody knew where Camp Anita Cocktail was.  Everything, of course, was as it should be as it usually is on the Playa and we set up camp on the corner of 7:30 and Florence next to a super friendly and super prepared crew.  We were, alas, not alone.  But we were cold.  But our neighbor had a fireplace and we cooked soup to warm our insides.  Then a paradigm shift came in the form of a lost virgin (first time burner) who hitched in, had no camp, and had misplaced his gear.  I was cold, but he was shivering.

Part of the Burning Man ethos is the concept of radical self-reliance, and another part is helping your brothers and sisters in need.  The lost stranger and I warmed our hands by the fireplace, I gave him a blanket and my hat and fed him soup.  I was warmed by warming my fellow Burner.  Then my brothers Trout (who would become Safari) and Adley (who would become Vanilla) showed up and led us to Camp Anita Cocktail, 7:45 and Florence.  So close yet so far, as my mom would say.  We put the lost virgin, no longer a stranger, to bed in our van, Bessie.  He was thankful and went right to sleep in the front seat.  We went to sleep soon after, we were cold, but not lost.  We were together and we were ready to rock the playa.

our new friends at Camp Anita Cocktail

Antioquia was in good company at Camp Anita Cocktail.  Friendly bar by day and empty tent village by night, it was a great place to hang out and to escape the madness.  We were often in the center of the madness, twisted, worshipping light and art and humans and their various innovations and personalities.  Our adventure through the desert included nine shows at sweet camps with sweet people in them, and a West African drumming set in the Fire Conclave (nice work Solar Flare spinners).

I must give the Department Of Tethered Aviation the coveted Antioquia Hospitality Award for feeding us, and feeding us again, and taking me and Maddy out on a Mutant Vehicle sunrise adventure, and being loving and beautiful and letting us fly their kites.

Antioquia, with guest Crazy Dinosaur, rock the dome at the Dep't of Tethered Aviation (DOTA). Photo by Cesar Cortes.

Congratulations DOTA.  We hope we can be your prom date next year.

We also had an amazing time playing at Dustfish, Reverbia (oh so psychedelic set), Eggchtropolis, ElephantBird, Burners Without Borders, Transmorphagon, Mystical Misfits, and Center Camp.  The commitment that some burners show to providing live music on the unforgiving Playa was truly inspiring, sacrificing time, money, and gear to bring the real deal.  Thanks y’all.

The peoples came to Burn the candle at both ends this year.  I was exhausted and energized, blown away and overwhelmed, happy, sad, excited, bored, and everything in between.  I felt over-stimulated but seriously impressed with the extreme creativity of all the artists, builders, and camp organizers, not to mention the festival organizers who bring it all together in one of the remotest places imaginable.  I love the spirit of participation and the self policing and self reliant fervor that happens in Black Rock City.

Two sculptors get major props this year, the artists behind the Blissful Dancer and the Temple.  Blissful Dancer speaks for herself in the myriad photos circulating the web, but the Temple Burn’s beauty could only truly be experienced in person. The odd design proved itself fitting both in form and function when the flames were set to it and spirits were released in the form of floating, crackling embers and spectacular swirling towers of playa dust.  It would be futile to try and describe it much more.

Thanks to all the volunteers and everyone who helps to keep Burning Man alive and well. You’re the angels that transform this hellish landscape into a heavenly, unique and wonderful community experience.

Love from Paul Alexander Martin

PS: Bay Area folks… On OCTOBER 10 come play at the San Francisco Decompression Party with us! We’re rockin a 45-minute set at 5:40pm on the 19th Street stage!  Admission’s only $10 if you come dressed up. {Full info}

There’s No Place Like Home

Maddy tries to jump forward in time to when we'll be home at the Ranch

We’re back!  After a short and lucky seven weeks on middle America’s impressive Interstate system and an unexpected five day vacation with some new friends in Ketchum, Idaho, Antioquia is home in the beautiful (and chilly!) San Francisco Bay.  It’s almost two o’clock and the sun is just now poking through the foggy clouds and I’m still wearing Trout’s Roll Tide hoodie.  Damn, where’d summer go?  Midwesterners like it hot and cold and windy and rainy and the blazing sun that can transform into a tornado in no seconds flat.

So here’s what I’m going to do: I’m going to write a tour retrospective that includes every show and maybe some stuff in between.  I’ll try to keep it short and sweet, like my girl Maddy.

As Willie Nelson says, "we're on the road again."

June 11: Harmony Festival, Santa Rosa, California – What a big-time fest this one is!  We had a fun show at the famous Goddess Grove stage, Craig bonded with Drew, Toubab Krewe‘s guitar player (future tour mates? that’d be sweet), and our mind was blown wide open by Dweezil and the Zappa Plays Zappa band (although I personally was a little put off by his strange attitude, maybe because their singer stole the show:).

June 16: Front Range BBQ, Colorado Springs, Colorado – After running water through the engine (forgot to check the veggie oil, rookie mistake) blowing a coolant hose, then a fuel line, we finally made it to our favorite barbeque spot in the world and played for a beautiful and enthusiastic bunch (after eating an amazing meal, wow, banana pudding just like granny made it, i swear!).  Then, after eating another delicious meal at the Happy Times Cafe (correct me if I’m wrong on the name) I tried to get the water out of the veggie oil filter and put dag blasted air in the lines.  Damn.  Trout and I tried to get Bussie going again (we even bought new batteries, we’d been jumping it almost every time) but she wouldn’t budge so our buddies Qiana and Alexis put in the calls and found emergency rides down to Boulder.  Thanks Juliette, Eric, and Chuck for bringing the sweet rescue vans!  Meanwhile, Trout and Bussie road a tow truck to Denver to get her fixed up.  We wouldn’t run veggie oil again the whole tour.  Bummer.

June 17: Topo Ranch, Boulder, Colorado – I can’t believe we made it here!  I can’t believe we played a show at a t-shirt shop!  I can’t believe we got paid in t-shirts!  HA!

Sons of the Addicted rockin' the Hi-Dive

June 18: Hi-Dive, Denver, Colorado – Juliette and Eric are still rollin’ with us (booming Hunter S. Thompson style, gettin’ pulled over and escaping unscathed) and our amazing and beautiful friend Mitra replaced Chuck and his Vanagon, picking us up in B-town and got us to D-town to play this show with good buddies and great band Sons of the Addicted.  Bussie needed a new fuel lift pump, damn water.  But as Fela Kuti says, “water, he no get enemy.”  Whatever.

Ain't she purty?

June 19: Quixote’s, Denver, Colorado – Bussie showed up right before we went on, spewing diesel and oil on the streets of Denver.  Our boys fixed up the diesel leak (damn fuel lines!), I fixed the oil leak, then she didn’t want to shift!  What the hell?  We stashed her with me and Maddy on guard duty and figured out the transmission thing in the morning.  Jeez.  We met Pinot, a sweet funk band from the big LA, and kicked it with New Riders of the Purple Sage and our good buddy Dieter (who the night before got hit by a car and the day after set his backyard on fire, Maddy saved the day with a green hose).  I guess Denver International Airport is kind of freaky.  There’s all sorts of conspiracy theories surrounding it, check it out, you might not want to fly there any more.

June 21: Pop’s Blue Moon, St. Louis, Missouri – We picked up Annie and a new alternator, a well lubricated mechanic named Hollywood threw it in for a nice price.  We were beat from a long first week and nobody was at the bar (except our bud Matt Brown, engineer on Gringolandia) so we played like shit.  Oh well, at least we got Annie.

June 22: Norb Andy’s Tabarin, Springfield, Illinois – Damn.  Bussie’s was still dying on us, so we called for our fourth tow.  The tow-truck driver busted us for having a short school bus, AAA don’t like that.  But he fixed our problem, loose alternator belt.  Man, I coulda figured that one out!  The show was great, Antioquia loves Springfield and Jeremy, the Bill Graham of Illinois.

The ladies loving the Summerfest Green Man.

June 24: Summerfest, Milwaukee, Wisconsin – Yay!  We made it to Miller town, Craig’s folks and their friends put us up and made us feel safe again.  Summerfest is flippin’ huge man.  Like whoa.  The advertising is at a new level.  It’s bigger than the music!  Sheryl Crow played a show in front of an enormous screen with a Miller Lite bottle pouring beer into a glass.  That was the entire backdrop.  “I’mmmmm, gonna soak up the beer!”  After jammin’ to The Wailers (Aston “Family Man” Barrett is still the best reggae bassist on Earth!) we escaped to go to…

June 26: Project Earth, Harmony Park, Minnesota – What a beauty of a fest this was!  Folks were dancing in the mud.  Tornados were ripping around a few miles away, so close the whole festival, all the sound equipment and people (supposedly) were evacuated and lots of bands got canceled the day before.  We played for sunny skies, loved Useful Jenkins and later ducked into the shower stalls to avoid a tornado storm.

The beautiful stage at Project Earth

Wookiefoot, the masterminds of the festival played a great show an hour late to a loving crowd shin deep in muddy water.  Applause!

The Harmony Park Mud Lady

July 4: Summerfest, Miller Town -  After playing every day on the Tiki Stage, a pirate stage right next to Lake Michigan, we had lots of names on the mailing list and a little money (very little) and we were beat again.  That’s what we get for playing at noon every day and staying all night to check out the headliners.    Highlights: Roster McCabe, Heatbox, Shoeless Revolution, Umphrey’s McGee, The Levon Helm Band, Elsinore, War.

Craig getting schooled by Masami Tempel

July 9: Ed’s No Name Bar, Winona, Wisconsin – We love Ed.  He barbecued for us in true

Annie turned 21, we decided to throw a 100,000 people festival and get her a cake

summer-time style and we played our hearts out to him and a hundred of his friends.

July 10: Lettuce Jam and Guu’s, Stevens Point, Wisconsin – More festival, more stormy weather, more outdoor music fun, more barbeque!  The Martins were defeated in a huge upset by the Canadians in a heated match of Testicle Golf (not as painful as it sounds).  Elf Lettuce rocked and 100 Monkey Theory played their first show.  Congrats, boys!  Then we were honored to play drums for our friends Zach and Maggie who are getting married because a whale told them to.

Antioquia being blessed by the Green Wizard at Lettuce Jam

July 12: Cardinal Bar, Madison, Wisconsin – Maddy shot her voice at Guu’s (two shows in one day, the second one with no stage  monitors) so we played a whole show with no Maddy voice!  It wasn’t quite the same but we did it.  Thanks to Elf Lettuce for being awesome and helping us crack the Madison scene a little.  Check ‘em out.

July 13: Reggie’s Music Joint, Chicago, Illinois – Pinot!  We meet again.  Funk yeah, these boys went to NYC and back by the time we crossed paths in Chi-town.  Impressive, keep it funky fellas.

July 14: Cabooze, Minneapolis, Minnesota – Bussie was almost blown off the Interstate by a flippin’ tornado!  Then another one!  Whoa man!  Trout floored it and blew open a fuel injector line!  Damn.

Our new buddy Eric fabricated a tool to fix a diesel leak, as Salt 'n' Pepa say, "what a mighty good man."

But we made it and played great and saw Cymatic play a great version of Benny and the Jets.  I also sat on my first bidet.  Yay!

Thanks to John Snell and his bidet, Antioquia feels quite light in the pants

July 15: The Red Sky, Mankato, Minnesota – You have to try the burger here.  Wow.  And listen to local heroes Useful Jenkins.  Maddy fell asleep during set break and Annie got harrased, but we had fun anyway damn it!  Then we partied all night with Fatman and the crew.

July 16: Cabooze, Minneapolis, Minnesota – That’s right, we went back and rocked it once again.

Antioquia under the bright lights of the Cabooze

This time we got to hear the impressive improvisational stylings of PB and the Jam.  You’ll hear this name sooner or later.  The bassist is a Jaco head (Jaco Pastorius, legendary bassist who made his name in 70s fusion band Weather Report then with his influential debut album, Jaco) and is basically the lead instrument.  Absolut Groove was great too.  And really cool.  Everyone’s so nice in the Midwest, not that they’re not in Cali, but it’s a different kind of nice.  It’s nice, you know?  Nice.

Annie hosts two dragonflies as they make sweet love on her arm

July 17: Kathy’s Pub, Rochester, Minnesota – We didn’t get to go to Fargo due to construction by the Nestor but Craig made some quick calls and got us another gig.  Applause!  Before the show we thought it’d be nice to drum up the town so we set up on a corner with a nice statue of a swan riding a turtle with a hat on and started grooving.  A couple minutes into Sunu a woman with a perfectly cicular face stuck her head out the window of her grey Buick and yelled “No talent!” careful not to let the cigarette fall from her mouth.  Antioquia exchanged amused looks.  We packed up and head back to the club and I recognized a circle faced woman sitting on a bench, “No talent,” she assured me.  “No friends,” I replied.  Adley asked her to teach us something about music, “No talent,” she repeated.  We shook it off and got ready to impress Rochester with our talent but most folks in the club seemed to be of the same mind as the circle faced woman.  Thankfully, by the second set, we caught the ears of a few folks ready to boogie down and one guy told me this when I thanked him for dancing: “You guys rock!  All I had to do was listen.”           Yeah, take that circle face.

Getting ready for the show

July 19: Red Eye Bar, Sioux Falls, South Dakota – We got a tip from our new buddy Jordan on a campground called Albert Lee, or Meyer-Big Island and fought skeeters all night while eating delicious food cooked over the fire by our man Trout.  Red Eye was a peculiar spot, kind of a music venue connected to a trucker bar right off the Interstate.  It was pretty empty, but what’re ya gonna do on a Monday in Dakota?  At least a friendly put us up for the night in cozy digs.

Can you spot the box of PBR?

July 22: Backporch, Spearfish, South Dakota – After the Red Eye we booked it to Custer State Park to stay a couple days at Center Lake Campground.  It’s funny how such a beautiful place can be named for such an ugly man.  More fire, food and PBR, less skeeters.  More lake to splash around in, and two of the friendliest neighbors a band could hope to meet.  David and Kaitlyn were immediately attracted to Bussie, then when they saw the half case of Pabst and heard the guitars and drums and balaphone they knew they had some buddies.  David took me and Trout fishin’ in the lake and Trout caught his first trout!

Trout caught a trout!

We had fresh fish and a whole mess of stuff to eat before a storm rolled over the hill and side swiped us.  David and “Crazy Legs” Kaitlyn were even kind enough to alter their trip and joined us at the Backporch where they broke the icy dance floor with style and grace.  Sidenote: the owner of the club gave us some delicious fresh organic sausage grown by his brother, what a guy!  The next morning, our hosts (names escape me at the moment) gave us an earful of government conspiracy including an especially scary one having to do with implantables.  Oh shit, here they come folks.  Don’t let the government computer chip in you or your kid, no matter how they try to scare you into it.

Just call us the Tornado Chasers, or maybe it's the other way around.

July 23, 24: Evil Olive, Dickinson, North Dakota – We just barely beat the weather to this one watching from the parking lot as gigantic clouds rolled and flashed their way toward us and dumped about a foot of water on this oiler town.  Cool.  It’s nice getting out of the Bay Area to see some real weather patterns.  It felt like we were driving through the Weather Channel’s Greatest Hits!  The rest of the weekend is funny farm history recorded in my blog entitled We Never Made it to Kansas but we Might be in Oz (which features a sweet photo of Antioquia at Mt. Rushmore).  I’ll just say Maddy’s maracas have never been so profitable.

A classic Antioquia drum scrum

July 27: Top Hat Lounge, Missoula, Montana – They say it’s so windy in the Dakotas because Minnesota sucks and Montana blows.  I don’t know much about that but it sure was pretty driving through big sky country watching the ocean of tall grass sway and dance.  We stopped in Bozeman for some good ol’ Tuscaloosa, Alabama hospitality (go figure) and a couple days rest before blazing the rest of the way across cowboy’s paradise to the hippie enclave known as Missoula to open for Yo Mama’s Big Fat Booty Band at the sweetest spot in town.  What a crowd!  They loved us and we loved them right back!

July 28: Forester’s Club, McCall, Idaho – Idaho?  Then, you da pimp?  We learned that it’s illegal to be shirtless indoors in Idaho.  I guess the state wants everyone to know that they are NOT a ho.

Trout jams with a fully clothed Antioquia at the Forrester's Club

July 29: Whiskey Jacques, Ketchum, Idaho – No no no, the feng shui here is all wrong.  Folks walked in behind the stage and went to the bar beside the stage and Antioquia played to a big empty room.  But we played pretty good and we ate eat free pizza and watched our buddies Free Peoples.  Antioquia wins again!

July 31: Sawtooth Festival, Stanley, Idaho – Trout and I woke up this morning and thought “Wow, wouldn’t an oil change just be lovely for Bussie?”  So we tooted on down to Ketchum Auto only to discover that ol’ Bussie was just tired of starting.  She was just grinding and clattering and being all around stubborn.  Damn.  Well, at least we made the discovery at a shop, funny how that worked out.  And check this out, Ryan, the shop owner, was gonna be damned if he let us miss the last show on our tour, especially one as gorgeous as Sawtooth.  So he pulled around a fifteen passenger church van he had just fixed up and told us to throw our gear in and be ready to go at

Paul shows Craig and Adley how to properly jump into Ernest Hemingway's favorite swimming hole

six.  Giddyup!  After some veggie burgers and dips in Ernest Hemingway’s favorite Idaho swimming hole and meeting up with our old buddies David and “Crazy Legs” Kaitlyn, we were ready to go over the hill into the wild west town of Stanley.  We loaded up the church van and arrived at Sawtooth in style, covered our gear behind the stage, set up camp and commenced to have one of the most amazing weekends of our lives.  Hospitality?  These guys got it down.  Scenery?  Huge craggy mountains that you stare at through the stage.  Good music?  You’re damn skippy.  Free Peoples headlined Friday night and we got up to do our traditional “Wild West” drum jam in front of possibly the largest crowd we’ve played for.  What a rush!  We hit the tents pretty early to be ready to rock Saturday afternoon.

The Free Peoples absolutely killin at the Sawtooth Music Festival

Saturday high noon: Maddy and Crazy Legs went out dancing to Four Stroke Bus led by Wade and Lisa who would later become our dear friends, hosts, and spine adjusters (Wade chiropracts in Ketchum).  We stood in awe of the Sawtooth Mountains and prepared our bodies and minds for a 3:30pm set.  At 3:15 we hit the stage with our gear (actually Free Peoples‘ gear, we left most of ours in Bussie back in Ketchum) and got set for sound check in front of a sizable crowd of expecting music lovers.  I turned around to see a massive rain cloud pouring over the mountain range and heading right toward us.  Damn.  Trout told me not to worry about that so we got on with our sound check.  Then I felt the mist.  I threw Gloria (my bass guit) in her case and covered Mark Anthony’s amp as festival staff began to shoo us off the stage in case of a lightning storm.  We danced in the rain in front of the stage.  The cloud passed and we hopped back on the stage to discover that Maddy’s delay pedal and the keyboard she borrowed from Mike Dyson had been directly below a puddle in the rain and shade cover and got dumped on.  Damn.  Shit.  We sat.  We pondered.  We sulked a little.  We didn’t know if we would get to play a full set.  We thought of songs with no keys.  But the keyboardist of Equaleyes had a keyboard exactly like Maddy’s that we could borrow!  It’s on!  We got up and played a great set for an amazing group of people who really poured out massive amounts of love and energy for us.

Dig that toothy backdrop

What a view

It was intense going from such a high to such a low and back high again, but we stayed high the rest of the weekend thanks to the beauty of the place and the organizers and volunteers and the camaraderie of the Free Peoples.  We played another set that night down in Stanley then the next day went rafting with the festival staff and other musicians and came back to a feast and fireside jam.  Wow.  It doesn’t get much better than that folks.

Free Peoples jamming with Antioquia

August 1-5: Vacation, Ketchum, Idaho – We got a ride back to town with Town Mountain, some bluegrassers from Asheville to find a Bussie that was still grinding up her starter.  Wade and Lisa from Four Stroke Bus had brought some of our gear down and they promised a big southern breakfast if we stayed the night with them.  We accepted the

Trout catchin' Zs in Ketchum

invitation and then some.  Their record collection, backyard hot spring and full band spine adjustment entertained us as the boys at Ketchum Auto fixed Bussie up proper.  Check out Tom Tom Club‘s debut album, oh so funky.  Trout had a nice conversation with a woman who ended up footing about half the repair bill.  Ain’t that something?

Then we booked it home to El Rancho, Oakland, California in our little yellow tornado.  And here we are!

The fellas measure up against the maters

Prologue: El Rancho blew up with life while we were away.  The tomato plants are big and

Don't Panic, It's Organic's (subsidiary of El Rancho) number 1 squash

tall, we’ve got prize winning squash and flowers pretty enough to woo the Queen of Kazahkstan.  And the kicker: Mamacita had babies!  She’s a pretty little hen that lives in our back yard farm and she’s now the proud mama of five beautiful chicks.  Ah life, it’s a trip.

Mamacita with her babies

Love, Paul

Mas Moolah for Fellowship of Reconciliation Colombia

As promised, Antioquia is donating one US dollar from each My piano CD we sell to Fellowship of Reconciliation Colombia … here’s a status report with some great news:

Cover art by Tobias Greene (drawinginthedark.com). Printing by F Street Letterpress (fstreetpress.com)

After our tour to the midwest we just sent a check for $153.30
First check we sent was for $80.00
So that makes $233.30 donated so far to help support the great work of FOR Colombia… thanks to all the coolest people in the world who’ve purchased our newest album! Good on ya, mates.

Don’t have the CD? Want to join the club? Go here: http://antioquia.bandcamp.com and choose the physical CD package, which includes download online too!

Note: We only donate a dollar per CD sold, not per download. So get the CD too,  folks!

We never made it to Kansas but we might be in Oz

So here we are, bombing down the I-90 toward Bozeman, Montana.  Bussie’s humming along at a rip-roaring 45 mph, just slow enough to catch the Dakota Badland’s scenic landscape, just fast enough to get us there by tomorrow.  We’re traveling from Dickinson, North Dakota (or as some of the locals call it, Dicklickinson) where we played a two night stand at the Evil Olive pizza restaurant and bar.

Friday night opened with gracious hospitality by Jason, the owner of the Olive, as well as the entire staff.  Delicious pizza was augmented by a delicious Dakota rain storm while the Queen City Band bickered their way to the stage.  These old-timers could lay down the fat polka groove as good as anybody and their buddies did the old folks boogie to movin’ Johnny Cash two-steppers.  They played from 8 to 11.  I hope I still have 3 hours of rock and roll in me when I’m 80.  Maddy threw up a video on our facebook page if you want to check it out.  We got set up by 11:45 and played our set for about 10 enthusiastic Dickinsonians who promised they’d bring the peeps out the next night.  The old folks were unimpressed.

There is a town called Sturgis that hosts the biggest biker rally in the world.  800,000 bikers converge on a town of about 8,000 and rage like only bikers can rage.  The rally spill off extends all over the Dakotas and Dickinson has cultivated it’s own biker gang called the Sick Bastards.  Saturday was the Sick Bastards’ pre-Sturgis rager starting at high noon with a 4 hour ride starting and ending at the Evil Olive.  (Meanwhile Craig, Trout, me, and a couple locals shot birdies and dodged killer cacti on a sweet disc golf course.)  We figured if we could unimpress the Dickinsonian geriatric community, we could sure as hell do the same for the biker community.  And that we did my friends, that is until the set break wet t-shirt contest.

After a quick trip to the bus and a round of shots with some new buddies I pushed through the gathering crowd and guess who I saw standing in front of the stage sporting a new snow white tank top.  Come on, guess.  You probably guessed Maddy and you’d be dead right.  “Why not show some nip for a $350 prize?” she thought to herself.  And of course, being the supreme show-woman that she is, Maddy quickly pulled away from the competition.  After the initial jug pours spectators were given the chance to donate $10 to pour water on the lady of their choice.  One innovator stepped in the inflatable pool with his lady, pulled the front of his pants out, and dumped the entire jug of ice water right on his crotch.  But Maddy had the moves, man.  I got out there a couple of times and was more than honored to pour water on my wife’s beautiful chest.  Oh yes.  Before we knew it the prize money was up to $1000 and Maddy was in the lead, Antioquia could barely contain themselves, then the final crowd volume test was administered and none other than Madeline Tasquin Streicek became a thousandaire.  That’s right folks.  Goodbye money troubles.  Hello Hamptons.  Antioquia’s looking to invest.  Know anyone with some ocean front property for sale?

We carried the momentum into the second set which was highlighted by our intergalactic debut performance of a new tune I wrote called There’s a Man Jumping off the Planet featuring Troutman aka the Greatest Man Alive on the blues harp.  The song was interrupted by a brief scuffle near the bar.  We pulled out our peace and love line and dude man hollered “Shut up, hippies!  Learn how to be a punk if you’re gonna have a mohawk!”  That one was directed at me.  He got it wrong, though.  I don’t wear a mohawk, I wear a mullet-hawk.  “It’s not a mohawk,” I wanted to say.  But all that came out was something I thought a Buddha might say.  Oh well, I’ll totally burn him next time.

So we finished the set, made some dough, ate some dough (baked with cheese and veggies), signed some boobs (well, Maddy did, a babe fell in love with her even before she became a thousandaire), partied hardy (with a full on drum circle), got some sleep after the sun came up and got back to Bussie’s business of burning up the yellow brick road.  What a weekend!

what if these were the founding fathers & mother? (maddy, you ain't foolin anyone with that Tofurky moustache)

The days before Dickinson we camped at an epic campground called Custer (“was a murderer“) State Park near Center Lake.  Troutman and I caught some trout, his first, with our new buddies David and Kaitlin from North Carolina.  And we checked out Mt. Rushmore and the new Crazy Horse mountain sculpture.  Ah yeah, I love America.  The people and the landscape is too incredible not to keep doing what we’re doing so we’re just gonna keep doing it.

To the Dickinsonians: Antioquia loves you.  See you next go round.  To our friends back home: Antioquia misses you and we’re excited to get back home.  We’re on the home stretch y’all.

with love in the groove,
understated paul

Tornado Warning no. 2

Tornado Warning no. 2, whoa!

So we’re driving from Chicago to Minneapolis and the sky turns green.  As Thich Nat Hanh would say, the blowing is the wind, and the spinning is the tornado.  Trout spots it out the back window at the same time Ann sees it touch the ground through a clearing in the trees as she’s driving. They sound the alarm which sounds something like this, “Oh shit!  There’s a tornado!” or “F***!”

Here’s what we do: we pull over.  Do we get out?  Do we jump in the ditch on the side of the road?  We stop under a bridge and look around.  The tornado’s gone behind us just a little so Trout takes the driver seat from Annie and guns it which causes a small fuel leak.  Can’t worry about that now, got to get the hell outta dodge.  Then, the rain starts and the Rain-X does the job that the windshield wipers don’t do anymore.  We lost that function when the control stick (for lack of a proper term) broke off early in the tour.

Trout sounds the alarm again, “Oh shit!  There’s another one!”  So he pulls over, “It’s right in front of us. You guys want to get out?”  Hesitation, it’s wet out there.  We gun it again and swerve down an exit into a gas station parking lot to take shelter but by now the thunder has started.  We made it out, we get back on the road hoping the rest of our diesel doesn’t squirt out onto the freeway before we make it to Minneapolis.         And now there’s a beautiful sunset, no need for the red ruby shoes and “no place like home chant” yet, but we make sure they’re on top of the shoe bin cause you just never know do you?

For the love of weather,
Just Paul Martin

Maddy telling that tornado to make us veggie sandwiches.

It’s All Practice

Thanks for showing us how to practice Ms. Kegel.

That’s what good buddy and Manitoid (a citizen of Manitou Colorado) Alexis Kegel told me when I asked her how much she practiced hooping.  And she’s a damn good hooper so she must be on to something.  But the question that statement raises is when is the performance?  Never?  The day of my Death?  Maybe, but the assurance it gives me is that every show we play is preparation for the next show and every little mistake we make is part of a learning process.  And even if I feel like I’ve mastered the bass guitar there’s still something I can learn and do better.  It’s as if the practice and the performance is one and the same.  We’re always looking and listening for the magic moments when our music takes us and our audience to that place of thoughtless bliss.  It seems to be happening more and more but we’re still practicing and preparing for the day when we can sustain musical magic from the moment we walk on stage to the moment we walk off and the house music comes on to bring us back to reality (whatever that may be).

The appreciation we feel for those of you who come to our shows and pour your energy onto the dance floor and the stage is inexpressible.  Without that energy the process is incomplete and magic does not happen.  Without that energy we’re just some shmucks trying to play music that’s almost to difficult for us to play.  Without that energy we call it quits because we become drained of our musical life force.

Listen: If it’s really all practice like Alexis said then there’s no pressure to get it right!  We’re all allowed to screw up and then try again.  And if we screw up again, well, we’re just practicing.  And if we get it right, we’re still just practicing.  And when the day comes when it’s time for my body to lay in the earth I hope that all my practicing has inspired someone else to practice something.  Of course, who needs Paul to inspire them?  You’re practicing right now.  You are now better at reading than you were five minutes ago.  Nice work.  Keep up your practice schedule and you’ll make magic.

Love Paul

The Things are Falling Apart Tour!

Before I say anything else, I just want to say YEA! Wisconsin just changed the law so that you can’t smoke in bars! We can play shows here and not get sick doing them! With that said, let me talk about the tour:

This tour has many names. And most of them are really positive. We just finished an amazing run at a huge festival called Summerfest in Milwaukee, WI. We played seven days straight at the Tiki Hut Stage, which is right on Lake Michigan, an extremely powerful body of water that at first glance could be confused with the Atlantic.

But not everything has come easy. Our home, our place of comfort, our temple…has not been a happy camper. Good ol’ Bussie. Please, if you are reading this, STOP! just for five minutes and pray for Bussie. Literally, get down on your knees or cross legged or whatever you do, breathe a little bit, and send out a prayer that Bussie gets us to all of our gigs and back to the Bay area.

We are so appreciative that Paul and Brett learned some stuff about mechanics. I don’t know what we would have done if they hadn’t taken care of that department. A quick side note: Tow truck drivers (we’ve met quite a few of them in the last two months) tend to be really solid people. If I ever need help with something and am looking for outside help, I’ll probably call a tow truck driver.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t end there. While playing a show at the Tiki Hut, Adley’s amp decided it was time to take a nap. And we haven’t been able to wake it up since. I don’t know how many of you are familiar with Adley’s history with guitar amps, but this wasn’t actually that strange. If the day ever comes that Adley has a working guitar amp that he can count on, our reality we have grown up to know and trust will have completely changed.

The only other negative thing I’ll mention is that half the band is having serious dental problems and are in need of good dentists soon. We support local clinics for sure, but sometimes having students work on you doesn’t fix the problem. Capitalism, which we have obvious opinions about based on our lyrics, can be quite simple in that way. You often get what you pay for.

To sum it up, we love being on tour. We feel like we are spreading our art to lots of people who are hungry for it. And we feel very passionate about sharing this energy with all of you. We’ve taken the last few post July 4th days off to ground ourselves a bit. Staying at three different houses: Ellen and Larry(who are my parents and always help out so much), Melissa and Gene(very supportive of musicians), and Carl Quindel(he’s the man). Thank you all so much. I wish I could actually express how thankful we are with simple English words, but I can’t. We head back out on the road on Friday ready for three more weeks of movement, slowly working our way back West.

Cheers,

Craig

Tornado Warning!

When I first heard the announcement from a megaphone-wielding and oh-so-slightly-frantic festival staff member that a tornado had apparently touched down about 3 miles east of where we were and that everyone should return to their vehicles, I thought to myself “shit, i guess if I’m gonna die, I’m gonna die. And that’ll just have to be it, whether I like it or not.” So I stayed at the Asase Ya where I was waiting for my bowl of greens, rice & plantains, thanked them once the bowl reached my hands and faked a casual stroll as I headed over to Bussie. There I found our crew and Minnesotan camping neighbors totally chillin on a few blankets, talkin & laughin it up as if there was no tornado warning at all. Sprinkles of rain starting to fall, spaces between lightning and thunder become shorter. I sat stiffly for about 2 minutes taking little bites of yummy warm food and feeling like one of those prairie dogs standing on their hind legs to stare at the horizon… while pretending I felt as casual about the whole thing as the locals we were with. I asked  the group “are we all gonna die?” and found some comfort in my Minneapolan friend Jesse’s assurances that if we were gonna go anywhere, it’d be Oz, because she was wearing her red crocs and would just have to tap them together if a Tornado hit us. Sweet, we’re good.

But when the rain started to pour and the wind really picked up I sprang to my feet and darted to our bus with my bowl of food. When no one ran in the bus behind me I went to find them. They were all hiding behind the bus to escape the wind but didn’t think the bus was much of a safe haven. Good call. I suggested we run like hell to the concrete shower house nearby and didn’t wait for an answer. By that time the wind was gushing hard and we were all running straight into it. I was praying a branch wouldn’t snap off and knock one of us out, and hoping I wouldn’t run into a wall because I couldn’t see a damn thing and my contacts were fighting not to pop off my eyeballs.
We all made it safely to the shower house and ran inside where about 50 other people were hunkered down. Craig & Alana stayed on Bussie and, I presume, had romantic storm relations.

In the shower bunk we had a grand ol time… started with some beatboxing, accompanying a fellow with a drum… I’m sure most of us were praying the sky would stay where it was and the roof would stay connected to the walls.

When the storm finally died down Adley ran to the bus to grab the gaitas and we had a beautiful jam with a fellow travelling from Pakistan named Wakas. The musical delights finished with a group rendition of Adley’s Bicycle Song… “woh woh, carry my weight for me…”

I’d like to say I kept my cool and faced the storm with bravery, but shit Mama Nature is a force to be reckoned with and all the philosophical thoughts in the world couldn’t change my animal response of “tornados kill people. i’m people. don’t like tornado…. aaaaaaah!!!!!”

Mud, mud, and more mud at beautiful Project Earth. Source: www.wookiefoot.com

Thanks to Jesse for the comforting words about Oz (I’ve always wanted to go), and to Music for calming everyone’s nerves, or at least helping to pass the time, while waiting it out in the shower block. Oh, and to Wookie Foot — the organizers of Project Earth Festival — who rolled with the punches, adapted to Mama Nature and played a version of their show after the storm passed, without all the costumes and visual candy and guest performances they had planned out probably for weeks or months. Inspiring.

Love Maddy