House of Lords USA Tour - by Chris McCarvill

Jan. 9
Here we go again. House of Lords is out touring of the east coast of the USA. Characters this time include Jimi Bell - guitar, BJ Zampa - Drums, Marty something or other - doing sound/lights and various unlikeable technical activities. I’ll find out Marty’s last name by the next installment. He’s worked with Jimi, BJ and James Christian many times before. I’m coming into this like the usual new guy I tend to be. Makes me realize how sheltered my musical beginnings were. There was a whole music scene in CT that I completely missed from locking myself in my bedroom through high school, then upon graduation moving right to Hollywood, CA for music school, but that is another story...

Anyways, we left CT at night to avoid the traffic spewing forth from NYC, Washington DC, etc. Apparently there was some kind of gas cloud over NYC the day before. BJ, always a fatalist, says “yeah, tomorrow we’ll be losing arms...” We stopped kind of a lot. We were assigned about 2 days to get to Florida. BJ says he can do it in 18 hours. I’ve done it in 22 hours before. Either way, we aren’t rushing. BJ’s SUV is packed to the gills, and in this day and age of tight budget touring, it can get pretty comical whimsically dreaming of things like tour buses and limousines. As we roll down route 95, Jimi is constantly practicing on his Shred Neck. Marty has a constant occupation of checking the radar detector, GPS, and satellite radio, not to mention the EZ Pass, which allows you to go through tolls without stopping, you’re billed later. Marty is a fidgeter. Marty! Stop turning your knobs! We only got lost once, and the GPS lady got us back on track. We’re trying to see if we can get it to announce the directions in a sexy Asian female voice. Probably not. I figured out that I’m able to do most of my photoshop work in a moving vehicle.

I need to lose weight. Usually before I tour, I work out and eat healthy. Last year I even lost 20 pounds before the Jeff Scott Soto tour. This time it’s post holidays, so I’m heavy. It doesn’t help stopping in Maryland and having a strawberry Moon Pie, chased with a McDonald’s steak and egg bagel at 3 am from the recommendation of BJ. He’s right, they’re great, but now I feel like crap.

Right now I’m typing this at Jimi Bell’s father’s (Joe’s) house in Lumberton, North Carolina. Gracious, hospitable host he is too. Always asking what he can make us to eat or drink. He’s got a kick ass white leather couch that I fell asleep on reading “The Historian” by Elizabeth Kostova. Joe makes a mean stuffed bread as well. Spinach, cheese and salami. I have decided to stop my eating frenzy now. We’re halfway to Florida. I’ll try not to be so verbose when there’s nothing incredible going on. All right. Here’s something you don’t see every day...at the Flash Gas Gas Station in Georgia somewhere. Red SUV pulls up. Heavyset girl in not enough clothing gets out and saunters into the gas station convenience store. Guy behind the wheel looks to see that she’s gone into the store, opens the driver side door and deposits a purse and a coat or blanket or something on the ground next to the SUV and high tails it out of the parking lot at warp speed. Red tail lights trail off into the dark. Girl returns to the space where the SUV was, and instead of freaking out, sighs, and casually gathers her pile like this is a common occurrence and walks away. Home of the brave, baby...

Jan. 10
Midnight at the Casa Del Rio. Daytona, Florida. Let me introduce you to Magnanimous Mr. Chris Cook. We show up at about 1:30 am to Chris’ house, unannounced, as BJ only has Chris’ cell number. BJ walks around the house a couple times, looking like a mob henchmen in his leather coat. Finally, BJ knocks on the door...Hey, the band’s here... Even though it’s the middle of the night, and we look like a bunch of degenerate Vikings, (what’s in your wallet?) Chris and his lady, May, both take us in with open arms. Chris is totally exuberant, loud, jovial, kind of like the ghost of Christmas Present. Constantly smiling, he grabs a weapon from his stack of basses and pounds the hell out of it, regaling us with tales of gigs gone wrong, how we’re all beating a dead horse as much as we can, of course, in a way that kept us all in stitches. He’s got a rack of Fenders, a carbon fiber neck Alembic, a huge Gibson Thunderbird. Plus he made us wear hats most of the time. I like being made to wear a hat sometimes. Chris has got to be one of the best rock bass players I’ve heard in a long time. Real aggressive, real zany, someone call
him and give him a gig. He’ll probably turn it down, but it’s worth it just to talk to this character. Chris and May, we can’t thank you enough for your hospitality. That was a lot to ask to have 4 idiots crash at your house in the middle of the night. We owe you. See you guys at the show next week.

Jan. 11
On our way to James’ now, riding past the Daytona 500 speedway. I’ll have more later. Oh, Marty’s last name is Weiand, by the way.

Well, It normally takes 18-24 hours to get to Florida from good ol’ CT. It takes the House of Lords tour wagon 3 days. Yes, we stopped a few times and sampled the pallette of the American South. No one has diarrhea yet that I know of. We pulled into James Christian’s house around 2pm. Robin Beck is his wife, and tail kicker of the house, which is beautiful. We get settled in and head out to rehearsal (which is another hour away) and blast through that at massive, ear crushing volume. Turns out Chris Cook has planted us all Happy New Year cards in my bass case. He is a fine fellow. Now we’re all starving, so we head beck to James’ for hamburgers, hot dogs, I made guacamole. We chow down, settle down and I’m in James’ 10 year old daughter’s room (no, she’s not in here) for my sleeping arrangements. The wind is rustling the stiff palms out the window, which sounds like rain showers in the spring. I should turn in. G-night, y’all. I wonder what tales of scum and villainy will ensue tomorrow...

Jan. 13
Here we are in Murfreesboro, Georgia. Let’s rewind a bit, shall we? We had our first show after driving all the way across the interior of Florida. It was cramped in the GMC Envoy, and there were tons of flat dogs (alligators) out in the little creeks running along the roadside. Took too long to get there.

We rolled in to the club and met the Dropouts. Nice guys from Jersey. Drummer is wearing the same Bettie Page shirt as me. We feel like idiots. Black drum set w/ red hardware. Tiny little bass amp that I can plug my pod into and tear the roof off. It works. We do a quick soundcheck. Starving for anything.

Pizza shows up. We chow. Back to the hotel for about an hour where we get all cleaned up and gussied up. Then we head back to the venue and wait upstairs in the black upstairs artist area. I change my strings. Not a ton of people in the room. The club owner apologizes for not promoting his own show, but is a big HoL fan...

Bang Tango finishes up with some ACDC covers and we go out and set up. Chris Cook and Mei are in the house, videotaping, so I screw up one of the first major changes in the first song. Perfect first gig. We’re a little loose, but we all definitely let the people there have it. I have my new shades on. They don’t fall off, which is nice. Plus I can actually see...I even made it all the way through Demon Wheel, my bass solo, without going blind. All in all, not the most eventful gig. No technical problems except for half the drumset caving in on poor BJ. Plus the kick drums were slipping around on him a lot. He always has problems like that. It’s a decent start though.

We meet some new friends, sign some autographs, head back to the hotel and pack up as we have to drive through the night just to make it to GA in time for the next gig. I get to sit in the middle, in the back. Great... It’s ok, it only takes about 10 hours in a half sleep kind of gelatinous state. We have to do the same thing tonight after the show, only it’s 12 hours to get to NC. We made it to the hotel around 1:30pm, and sorted out, Jimi and Marty are butting heads kind of a lot. We’ll see how that goes. BJ had to use dad voice on them. Now it’s 5:45, we got a few hours sleep, we gotta go soundcheck, back here to get all pretty-like and hit the stage, followed by another hell ride through the night. You sure you still want to be a rockstar?

Jan. 14
It gets hard to remember what day and time it is out here. I know there’s a little clock in my laptop and all, but it feels wrong. Yesterday was another example of how being a traveling musician is not always what people believe. To take it from yesterday, soundcheck was fine. The club was a big black box made out of cinder blocks, airbrushed with all kinds of fluorescent monstrosities lit up with black lights. Ordering food in the south is different from New England. The internal clock speed of people here is so much slower. That’s not a dig or anything. It’s got to be nice to live that way. I bet people here don’t have the stress or attitude problems of say, the average New Yorker. I just can’t imagine being relaxed and nice like this all the time.

I didn’t have to wait long for things to change, either. We hit the stage around 10, and promptly had technical problems. Once they were sorted out we put on a really good show. I definitely sharpened up my game from the night before, and the band is just about on all cylinders. Regardless of how bad I rank on everybody in person, HoL is an extremely good band. Long story short, with the 12 hour drive looming ahead of us, we hit the last note, tore down and left town. We were on the way out by 1am.

We re-arranged all our crap at a gas station in south Atlanta. Our new buddy who we named Mudfoot, tried to help us make everything fit while asking for money. This dude was really aggressive (like his breath) about trying to put our bags in the truck, especially when we didn’t want them in there. Turned into a bit of a comedy routine. Good intentions, I realize, but we were shot, hungry and had a long, long way to go. We gave Mudfoot all our change combined after repeatedly asking him to not help. Finally the gas station dismissed him of his duties. We pulled into Murfreesboro at 10am today. It literally took 10 hours to get here. I’m fully conscious of my 6'2-ness every time I’m stuffed in the backseat with the band. We stop at gas stations where I exploded a glass bottle chocolate something. Clerk starts mopping, line starts forming. Finally a guy in line takes over mopping and tells the clerk to go start ringing customers cause he’s in a hurry. BJ’s over there telling people that I really have to get a hold of myself. I’m dying.

Finally we’re back on the road. Marty’s a mess since he passed out and can’t move around all the time. He’s limping on both legs. Between the radar detector and the GPS, it’s like little alarm clocks going off every couple of minutes. Sleep is not an option. I think I did here and there though. Jimi Bell can’t sleep at all. It’s a hellride. Of course, the rooms aren’t paid for yet, there’s no cell service here at all, but we can at lest get into the rooms and HoL is finally able to stop moving for a few hours.

Here we are again, repeating the same thing as the last 2 nights. Soundcheck, food, change, show, road. At least by tomorrow morning we’ll be back in CT for one day off. Then we’re off again.

The show was uneventful as was the town. They did a live webcast and the opening band (Ballistic) the came down last minute was totally great. We stomped through and packed up again at the hotel, with me at the wheel for a few hours before I passed out. We drove all the way back home to CT for a day and a half off.

Jan. 16
Webster Theater in Hartford. It’s really weird to be on our in my own backyard. We still have the same soundcheck procedures, same technical issues, same massive volume and same cast of characters, but this time I can drive myself home after the show. It was great to see Andre, Clint, and all my local favorite people as well as a lot of new people come out, not to mention the 4 chapters of motorcycle clubs in the house. The drummer for the opening band, the Dropouts, had quit during the tour. United Artists sent out Tim from the Bulletboys to fill in. He’s from LA, and not real psyched about the icy CT weather. Show must go on.

The Webster was ice cold most of the night. By the time we hit the stage, too many of my friends had bought me drinks and I had happily obliged them, so needless to say it took some extra concentration to get through the set. I’m pretty sure it was ok though. I didn’t fall down or anything. I’m finding that I play better after a couple of drinks. I guess it keeps me from thinking too much. Hate to set a bad example, but it’s the truth.

Jan. 17
We played the Lucky Dog, in Worchester, this time opening for Bang Tango. Joe, the singer for BT, gave us a million compliments on the band and all. Very cool dude. He’s got the whole LA glam package down. I have to up my wardrobe...

Lucky Dog is a semi-famous nightclub in that the Rolling Stones have shown up and played, it’s full of lowbrow and hot rod kulture type accouterments. Turns out the Dropouts had nowhere to stay overnight the night before, so they slept in the RV, and the pilot light went out (no heat). They could’ve died in the cold. Since then we started giving them our rooms if we weren’t staying overnight, since we seem to leave town directly after the shows. Sometimes we run into resistance from the club owners on a move like that, but it’s ridiculous. It’s too cold to nitpick.

Jan. 19
Newport Blues Café in Rhode Island. If you haven’t been there, Newport is a shining example of the best that New England has to offer. Killer food, architecture, and of course, crazy party people. I’ve started upping my wardrobe. I’ve always liked this stuff, it’s just kind of cheesy to do it halfway. You either have to go all out, or it’s pointless. I got the shirtsleeve headband, the scarf, totally pretentious dark glasses. More hardware. This stuff bothers some musicians, but I’m pretty confident in my playing. It’s probably a phase, but like I said, I’ve always liked this stuff. Who knows/cares?

Bang Tango worked the crowd, which included a few rocked out cover songs. Lots of people dancing. Weird. We got up and did our whole gossamer production and people kept dancing like they knew what was going on. We had the ubiquitous pretty drunk girl fall on her backside right in front of the stage. Funny. I didn’t drink, and made a bunch of stupid mistakes. Whatever. We packed up, handed the hotel keys to the Dropouts and bolted for Virginia.

Jan. 20
Jaxx in Virginia. We’re playing really near Washington DC capitol area. I slept in the truck overnight, and we got here somewhere around 10am. I ended up going out to CVS and getting eye liner, mascara, and some cheap gloves that I cut the fingers off of. Yup. Going all out. I probably look more like Bang Tango than House of Lords, but I still have my blond curly hair and orange bass. There are some things I just won’t change. Lots of guys cut, straighten and dye their hair black. That’s really the protocol. So, by the time we got over to the club, I looked like a total LA glam fag. I started drinking as much as I could, and sat through half the HoL intro at the bar screaming at the poor bar maid to finish my shot fast so I could go play. She did. I ran up to the stage and got my bass on just in time for the first notes or Sahara.

I made far fewer mistakes and had waaaaay more fun. It’s noticeably different reaction from people when you dress like this too. Especially the fairer sex. Enough said. We spent a relaxing night in Virginia at a killer hotel James hooked up and recharged for the trip up to Long Island.

Jan 21
Crazy Donkey, Farmingdale, NY. BJ and I had sbarro pizza at a Maryland rest area. Really, really good, since we’re all shot, tired and hungry. I half slept more on the ride also. Marty’s Garmin GPS and radar detector helped keep me awake. Once we found the venue, and got in there, the cook had whipped up some pasta with killer, killer vodka sauce. I ate waaaay too much. Whatever. Now we’re at one of the cheesiest hotels in the world. Condoms and needles out in the parking lot. Shifty shadows floating around too. Ice cold shower. But I’m dressed and all made up and crap. We’re off to the show in a few.

The singer from Warrior Soul had a band and was tearing it up as we arrived. The backstage was a cramped little kitchen area that the staff were using to unload ice, so it was beyond freezing. I went out and hung around. Dropouts stomped the stage as usual. Those guys are great. I got up there and the bass amp was blown. Sort of half working. I had no amp on stage and the front system kept cutting out, so I was doing the Milli Vanilli thing for a little while there. I tried to get help too, but it didn’t happen.

Can’t win ‘em all. We got off the stage, Bang Tango went up there. Tonight, the girl traveling w/ the Dropouts had to leave the tour. There were tears in her eyes. Touring is really tough and crazy, some people can’t hack it, others can’t hack without it. I’m definitely the latter...

So, it was back to CT for a day and a half before we head out on the 3rd and final leg of this crazy journey...

Jan 22
Marty set up an interview on XM radio for James tonight. James was totally sick, and had a fever, but still did a compelling interview on the past, present and future of HoL....

Jan. 23
I drove to my friend’s (Clint Potter’s) house in Milford CT about 8:30pm. We got his little Hyundai Santa Fe all packed up and headed to BJ’s over in East Haven. James was really, really sick. He was wrapped up in a sleeping bag like a tamale in the backseat. Almost immediately he asked to get put into BJ’s slightly larger ride so we took Jimi Bell in his place. Of course it probably had nothing to do with Clint’s obsession with Dream Theater and Primus...
Our destination was near Detriot, MI. BJ said it would be about 3 hours quicker to go through Canada than around Lake Eire to the south, so that was our course.

It only took us 14 hours to drive through the frozen tundra.

Jimi Bell was at the wheel as we pulled up to border control. He instinctively tried to follow BJ through the gate without stopping...The guards slowed us down real quick. Of course, the whole time we wouldn’t stop ribbing him about making a run for the border. Then we saw Santa Claus at a truck stop somewhere in Canada. 7 feet tall, huge pot belly, huge beard, fur hat with flaps, big overalls, red thermal shirt. Santa. I’m sure I looked just as funny to him as he to me. Canada is bitter cold.

We finally made it to the Holiday Inn and slept. It snowed. Kind of a lot, but it didn’t stick. It snowed pretty much the whole time on this section of the tour. After sleeping the whole time, James Christian emerged restored to nearly functional. Thank God. We went to the venue, set up, soundchecked, hung out with the Dropouts/Bang Tango in the bar for a couple of hours, ate the cold ziti and warm cold cut sandwiches. The show wasn’t super eventful. It was a weeknight in the snow, so the attendance was down. People seemed to really like it though. Had to sign a lot of autographs over by the merch counter.

One girl in corn rows wanted one of my bracelets and when I couldn’t get it off, she pulled a big serrated knife out of her bra and slashed it off of me. I guess that’s one way to do it. We actually slept overnight in Detroit as the ride to Cincinnati would be a lot shorter than the last trek.

Jan 24
On the road to Cincinnati. Snow. Ohio is basically flat without a lot going on. We ate at Wendy’s for lunch and pulled into Rhino’s live around 5:30pm, which is kind of late for soundcheck. Took about 6 hours to get down there. There’s a town called Xenia. Isn’t that cool?

Rhino’s is like a big Chili’s restaurant. We ate again, set up, and went to the hotel. We nicknamed a helper “Sausage Jaw” and we all tried to not laugh. Back at the hotel we got all gussied up again and chilled for awhile. Rhino’s was a pretty cool show. Mackie active PA, so the sound was pretty good. I helped establish a HoL tab at the bar. I hung out with some of the Dropouts and Bang Tango. I went on the RV back to the hotel with them. As we got lost, the only apparent option seemed to be driving it over a median, which Dave did fearlessly, only it crunched the muffler pretty good, so it was scraping pretty bad. Oh well...we made it!

Again, we crashed at the hotel overnight, Didi from the Droputs tackled Lance from Bang Tango in the hallway. We could hear Jimi Bell talking through the wall, so totally deadpan BJ called the front office and asked if he could get the really loud and annoying group removed from the room next to us.

Jan 25
Near Pittsburgh, PA, club called RPM’s. This place had 2 real stock cars on the roof, and you access the stage through a garage door. Of course, the bar is on the other side of the door, and when I opened it to put in our food order I felt like I had walked into a Dukes of Hazzard episode. The whole bar stopped and gave me fish eye. Great. Back at the stage, the carrots in the veggie tray were getting consumed like crack. No one knows why they were so good, but they were...

The Dropouts/Bang Tango showed up after spending a groggy morning at the muffler place. That had to suck...
This show went well. I’ve been yelling a lot on stage, I guess like Keith Moon used to. Also been taping my right hand thumb with Marty’s special black gaffer tape. Since I basically destroy my hands while I play, this kind of helps it from overly hurting. Hung out all over the place after the show. Cool people at the bar. The bass player of the Bulletboys showed up and bought me a shot. I owe you one dude. Met a lot of really cool people. Then we all headed back to the hotel and partied with some of Bang Tango. Tequila shots at 4am...

Jan 26
I drove today. All the way back to Ohio. Turns out the venue we were supposed to play at didn’t get inspected in time so we had to play Rhino’s again. It was a Saturday night, so no one cared. It was a lot more packed as well. There was some talk of getting hazed, but nothing much happened except for Clint putting a TIPS jar up in front of the Dropouts while they played.

Everyone was in rare form since this was the last night. We were all determined to go out with a bang. Mickey from Dropouts was jumping around from table to table, starting trouble. I made friends with a little organization called Rockstars Glued. Mickey initiated one of the ladies into her first proper spanking. Funny. We went on in a wash of low end feedback. Jimi kept staring at me, but I turned all the way down and muted the amp, so it definitely wasn’t me. Looks like a floor tom got all crazy. The Dropouts and Bang Tango guys watched the set. Going to miss them actually.

I’m not sure what I learned, but I got the usual “Dude, your bass is too high and too orange” thing. Michael Thomas, guitarist from Bang Tango had that discussion with me. Yeah, you’re right dude. One of these days I’ll figure it out... HoL got off stage pretty quick, and Bang Tango got up there. As usual they screamed and swaggered through their set, by the end of it they were playing “You shook me all night long” and some of the Dropouts and myself got up there and sang backup vocals. Lance put me in a headlock. The end sucks, don’t it?