More from Spain!

This is the third communique from your hopelessly romantic, musical, photographin' man. I am now in Trysil, Norway visiting my family and will be here for the next week travelling around the eastern central part of the country. But before we get too ahead of ourselves, lets turn the clock back about one week...

Zaragoza, Spain. I spent the morning of the show trying to figure out how to order coffee in the plaza cafes with relatively little luck. I found a buffet for €9.99 and decided to go for it, Zaragoza (pronounced thar-ah-GO-thah) style. This wasn't the Spanish "Ponderosa," as they had Paella, Jamon, and variations of some of the tapas dishes I'd seen the last evening. The weather was simply amazing. This was one of the few places we visited where there were considerable amounts of leaves on the trees. The sun was shining, I left full and my camera empty.


Walked around in the luminous Zaragozan afternoon, trotting down the plazas lined with sleek, angular, modern buildings that were built with the intention to change peoples lives and cure social ills. They have succeeded in part due to Siesta. Place these buildings from the "Good Ol' Future" with some centuries old churches, fountains, hotels, apartment blocks and tapas bars, and you get close to the feeling of what this part of Spain is all about.

Found the club, Oasis (pronounced oh-AH-sees). I knew that this tour would put us in some places we'd never been, and some stages that would barely fit us all. This was one of them. It was an old burlesque house that had glass cases in the lobby filled with photographs, peacock feathers, a red suit, articles of undergarments, and old posters. It was not the typical venue for us, regardless of whether we were in Spain or not.

We went out to dinner before the show with the promoter, and had an oily Spanish meal. I had chicken & french fries (which isn't as low brow of a food in Europe as it seems in the US). Sounds simple enough. When my plate arrived, it looked as if the following method was used to prepare my food:

1. De-feather and de-gizzardize the bird.
2. Start up the wood chipper
3. Create a waterfall of batter just after the nozzle of the wood chipper
4. Place a vat of hot oil in an appropriate place so the pieces of flying chicken land in the oil after being chipped & battered.
5. Serve with fries and eat!

I felt like I needed a powerwasher to get all the grease off my hands after meddling with my chicken. I was also thinking about dabbling in bulimia to make sure I made it through the show. Fortunately it proved not to be a problem.

The show was totally fun. The crowd was enthusiastic and lively. We played long and hard. The suit was treating me well again! We got the rock out for the Spaniards and I think everyone was pleased. I went back to the hotel and to bed after the sweaty show to wake up for our two hour drive to Vitoria.

Now I didn't think it would be possible for us to play a stage any smaller than in Zaragoza. I'm going to give it up for the crew who did an amazing job getting all of our equipment working and wedged onto this impossibly small stage for us. My rig had to be consolidated into a triple threat keyboard assault tower, which was a right pain in the ass at first, but once the show got going it was fine.

Sitting for most of the night makes it a bit difficult to properly get the heart rate up, but this night was something else. We were all dripping with sweat by the third song. Of course it was this night that I decided to just wear jeans with my new jacket instead of changing into the pants as no one was going to see me in the corner anyhow. This was a twofold mistake. The first being, never break up the suit. The second is that the moisture hungry denim acted like glue once it got sticky. It was so incredibly uncomfortable and juicy for the 2+ hour show. I can't really remember if the show was particularly tight, but the humid smokey atmosphere really provided an additional energy to the music.

The projector must have been wearing some denim that night as well. At one point late in the main set it entered some kind of self-preservation mode and flashed the sign "Check Airflow" on the screen. While completely unintentional, it was magically appropriate.

We dried off a bit and went back to the hotel and watched Lewis Black on the internet. Climb onto the bus and enjoy a night of iPod wars in the back lounge and drift off to sleep listening to Juana Molina's "Tres Cosas" record.

I woke up at 8am, about 40km outside Barcelona with my back thrashed by the awful bunk mattress, filled with anticipation. I stayed up until we arrived at the venue, and upon realizing that it was 9:00 in the morning, I decided to go back to bed after downing some water and ibuprofen.

This was a great venue; Big honkin' wood stage, GA floor and balconies around the perimeter. There was a disconcerting amount of schmutz on the dance floor, yet I said nothing. We soundcheck and had dinner at the venue, which was in an industrial part of Barcelona, so there wasn't much close within walking distance.

The crowd in Barcelona was, close to the size of both of the previous nights audiences combined and equally if not more enthusiastic about the show. I was so surprised at how many songs the entire audience sang along to and knew every word! Audiences sometimes sing along to Hummingbird, but peter out around the 2nd verse or so. This was not the case in Barcelona mind you! The audience sang strong through the entire song, and for the rest of the show, nearly every other song too! Amazing!

I've changed my keyboard part in the song Spiders, very subtly, but enough to make it my favorite song in the set to play these days. Chugging along with the bass and drums for 10 minutes is so oddly liberating, as it's not what I usually do in the rest of the set.


Had a few big ol' glasses of beer on the bus that night. Hung out in the back lounge and had a very spirited iPod duel. Zzzzzzz.

More soon...

Mid European Tour Update

We've been in Europe just under a week now. Three shows: Nottingham, London & Paris. The tour bus reminds me of what life must have been like in WWII submarines. Being tall & lanky, there is no room to stand fully upright except in the stairwell. On the European roads, this becomes a tricky balancing act, especially after a few Boddingtons, or Leffes.

Nottingham was our first stop, and it was great to be back on stage playing the music for the people. I had been in Nottingham in February of 2004 with Nobukazu Takemura at The Rescue Rooms. It's such a sublimely bizarre experience to return to the same place, thousands of miles away from home, and recognize certain roads, shops, & cafes, and then even stranger still to kind of know your way around town.

We battled the jet lag by heading out to some pubs. Saturday night in Nottingham had the locals with just one thing on their mind: Partying. Our first attempt to go to a club in an old church was met with the following response from the bouncer: "Too many scarves and longhairs." We then tried to find some conversation-friendly pubs, but even when we were able to turn the music down on the sly, within 20 seconds, it would then return to the volume and sound that makes you blink & wince involuntarily. The hotel bar was our final destination, and at about midnight, I turned in.

The next day began with the traditional MUJI pilgramage. After some coffee at Pret A Manger, I found the MUJI in Nottingham & bought a few things. I've been on the lookout for a nice sport jacket, and found a suit shoppe near the Marks & Spencer. Inside I found a black pinstripe suit that fit damn near perfect & decided to wear it for every show on this tour & probably beyond. I'm three for three right now with only four to go.

The show was really fun. I'm really becoming accustomed to how the US audience reacts & behaves during a show, and in England it's a bit different. The crowd was really really quiet, which is typically great, but they were on the unnervingly quiet side. Either way, we played solidly and I think, made some new friends and fans.

A short ride to London's West End for the Big One. Spent the day getting some internet time and concocting a setlist that wouldn't too closely resemble the show we played in July of '04. We invited Bill Fay to come to the show with the hopes that maybe he'd sing "Be Not So Fearful" with us. He chose to simply watch the show, and then came backstage afterwards. It was quite an honor to finally meet this person who's music has had such a lasting impact on us all. A real treat. Photos to come....

The London show was pretty fun. The seated theater show is such a different experience than a GA show. It's difficult to tell if you're connecting with the audience when 99% of them are sitting down, crossing their legs and watching intently. Again, we just marched forward with our dynamic blend of rock music. I was having some monitor troubles which in retrospect was kind of funny. I had asked our new monitor engineer for "more volume" and his interpretation of that was to put more of my keyboards into the sidefill monitors. After the song Hummingbird, my piano was louder in the monitors than from my amp. Normally it's the other way around. So I kept turning my volume down, and he kept inching it up. I turned down. He turned up. I started the next song, and FWEEEEEEEAAAWWWWWWHHEEEEEER!! I Am Trying To Break Your Heart was off to the friggin races!!

Met up with some old friends from London at the aftershow, drank a few Carlings & then it's off to Paris. We listened to about an hours worth of select Led Zeppelin before heading off to sleep. I had my first Chunnel experience last summer and deliberately went to bed long before we got there. Something about being in a bus, in a train car, in a tunnel, under water for 45 minutes makes me uneasy. ZZZZZZZ.

Wake up 30 minutes outside of Paris! Check into our hotel. I don't sleep all that well on our very German bus, so I took a couple hour nap and woke up and decided to explore the city solo. Walked for hours and hours taking photographs with my new camera. The museums were closed on Tuesday, but I still went down to the museum district and sat in the plaza for a while. I successfully navigated back to the hotel on the Metro & met the guys for dinner.

The next morning, we got on the bus to take us to the venue. Once my stuff was in the dressing room, a few of us headed out into an incredible Parisian spring day. Walking down by the Seine, Notre Dame, St. Germain & Marais districts, I snapped a ton of photos. For lunch we had the greatest Falafel sandwich in the universe. How is it possible that a falafel sandwich can change your life? A great afternoon in Paris & delicious olives are necessary. A metro ride took us back to the venue for soundcheck. Afterwards we headed up the hill behind the venue to Sacre Coeur. Fans of the film Amelie will recognize this place from the scene where she draws chalk arrows to the phone booth to contact her mystery man. Romance fills the air in this city and it's absolutely no joke. PDA abounds. The walk to the top of the hill rewards you with a near panoramic view of Paris.

The show rocked. Everything was clicking, gear was behaving, everyone was playing fantastically. The stage sounded fantastic and the crowd was gracious and energetic, just like our show there last summer, except this time with 500 more Parisians! We had a long bus ride [16 hours!] to Zaragoza, España (where we are right now) so the normal post show bar hang didn't happen. We did however meet a score of young Americans outside the Elysee Montmartre, and had a lovely time talking with them before it was time to get one last Crepe with Nutella & Banane before hopping on the bus for the only real long drive of the tour. Au revoir Paris!

Now I am in my hotel room in Zaragoza, España, checking the email etc., writing to you, mysterious reader. Thanks for joining in the fun and I'll update when time permits!

Lotsa Love,

Mikael

Greetings

Hello there family, friends and curiosity seekers. 2005 has begun in an outrageous fashion. The rock band I play in had the distinct pleasure of ringing in the new year at Madison Square Garden in New York City. Our second to last LP (which I didn't play on, but toured on healthily) has been certified gold and our most recent record just won two Grammys. I've never anticipated or aspired to this kind of attention or praise, but it is certainly humbling and exhilarating to know that people in the world are listening.

More to come...