West Indian Girl

Fran’s Flashback
i kinda like costa mesa, call me crazy but i rarely get to venture into the OC so it always seems like a mini vacation when i do. life seems easier in the oc….maybe its because they have wider well lit roads, im not sure. the show itself was an adventure in looseness to say the least. the set was vision, monterey, northern sky, indian ocean, solar eyes, still lost, trip, hollywood, get up, up the coast, all my friends, and what are you afraid of. high points for me were vision and solar eyes. vision has a simple hypnotic bass line that i love playing and solar eyes is always changing so it keeps me on my toes every second. i didnt fully enjoy my time on the detroit bar stage simply because i hate the light set up there. they use red lights and red lights really do some weird things to my eyes. it’s a vision problem i have – when im in red light i become semi-blind when it comes to seeing my fretboard. its sort of like playing in the dark which ultimately limits my performance. as a band we were way too loose..i fucked up way too much and am somewhat disgusted with myself. if i was a football team i would feel like the minnesota vikings if that makes any sense. i also had to piss halfway through the set and because of that the show became painful. i should have taken a break during the set to go…would’ve, could’ve, should’ve right?

dressing room and rider wrap up: chris and ken treated us well and ken was very helpful working with cristophe. there wasnt really a dressing room or regular “rider” stuff but we got drink tickets and the bartenders were excellent. overall chris run’s a smooth operation and it was a no hassle deal all the way around. they did GREAT promotion (excellent posters) and have a solid merch set up – it’s band friendly. the staff in general was real accommodating. load in and load out was smooth. im giving costa mesa a 6 – but a strong six. ironically one good thing about not getting food at the club was that q took me to a cool sushi place near where she used to live. it was tasty and great way to get away before the show.

mosta mesa thanx to: the hard core west indian girl friends like chad, yvonne, kampy, frank and raquel. it warms my heart seeing these guys at the shows. kampy even stuck around and helped us load out. i also want to thank eric from orthodox clothing for coming out to the show. go check out his clothes now. thanx again to cristophe for doing sound again and also to Northern for playing the show with us.

Tony’s Take
yeahhhhhh! stuck in the van once again. the ride down was ok – i spooned fran for most of the trip. when we got to the club and i was only able to stretch my legs for a few minutes. then i stayed in the van prison until fran and q took me for a ride in q’s benz. i dont think she digs me getting hair all over her nice seats but she seemed to deal with that drawback well. after spending an hour in the benz prison it was back to my old cell in the van until after the show when kampy took me for a walk. fran let me off leash after that and i really got to run around that parking lot. that was the by far the best part of my night – running free and not answering to my name.

a kevin and fran momenta jess and nathan moment
a vivi and q moment
omar gets the 2 for 1 deal
lewscious in the lot
night vision on my digi camera – classic shot

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