The original plan today was to set off early and start the journey to El Paso. Some of us are awake around 8am including Johnny who is in a strange mood, which I would say was reflective but that would give too much credit to it because it was more moody school boy if I’m honest. This kind of mood swing is extremely common but today it seems like it’s gonna be a problem because nobody can get any answers from him. After around 2 hours of waiting for some movement we decide to bugger off to find food. A short walk later and we find a Wendy’s where we can get a breakfast meal and coffee etc and then head back to the bus. When we arrive there is still absolutely no plan in action and nobody can tell us who is making the plans. This is a very weird situation to be in cause there is nothing to keep us here. Skee is trying to find somewhere that can replace our two front tires but is getting as much sense as us out of the TM guys.
Next move is for us to go and find showers. The whole Riot:Noise mob including Rob, Bill and Skee jump in the van and go on the hunt. We find an RV park and ask them if we can pay a little cash to use the showers – they wont have any of it and tell us to come on in and use them for free. Result! They are boiling hot and powerful and each in individual lockable cubicles with a toilet too. My hair at this point is in the worse state it has ever been in, with knots aplenty and within about 2 minutes the handle has snapped off whilst battling with my dreadlocks. 2 washes, 2 loads of conditioner and a wigs worth of lost hair later and my hair is not sorted, but acceptable enough to get by.
Soon enough the call comes in from back at the bus and we are summonsed back to base. One thing that we forget to mention is that when you come on tour and you roll into amazing cities like Austin & Dallas etc, is that we never get any time to actually see what they have to offer. You arrive at a gig venue, try to find showers and food, then generally go on around midnight or later and then party until the bar closes and kicks us out. I’m not complaining about it – just don’t ask too many questions when we get back cause you could probably see more of the city centres if you watch the travel channel for a few minutes.
Anyway, we manage to get on the road some time in the afternoon and locate a place that can do the two front tires. It takes about 20 minutes and another $500 out of the TM’s budget. We all need to start working hard at gigs to raise money through merch or we are gonna be in trouble financially. We know we’ll get through it but it does get a bit concerning at times.
We get back on the road again to try and make up for lost time. At this point I retire to my bunk and most of Riot:Noise do the same or at least sit at the back of the bus in what we have renamed the ‘English Lounge’. I have my iPod on listening to a podcast when I hear a loud ‘bang’ and I assume that we have hit a very rough bit of road – that is until burnt rubber fumes pour in through the rear windows and Ash looks like he has seen a ghost. We’ve had a blow-out on a rear tire on the freeway at 60mph. Luckily it is on one of the double axel ones so it doesn’t kill us all. Skee manages to get us as far as the picnic area at the side of the freeway. Dan & Bill jump into crisis management mode and have the LED torches out and the fluorescent jackets on before I even have time to get out of my bunk. Bill has traffic cones set up and Dan is directing big-rigs around the danger zone. Okay that was an exaggeration but those two guys to come to life in these situations. Not long before Johnny has his breakdown recovery people on the phone and they will be about 45 minutes. We need to make ourselves scarce cause it’s insured as an RV and not a tour bus so it might be a bit dodgy if there’s 12 long haired guys milling around. After a brief tantrum from Rob, some of us jump in the van in search of food. After a treacherous journey of winding roads and other near-death experiences we find a gas station that has hot pizza slices and other delights, including a big pack of beer. We all get back there and the bus is almost fixed. Skee is really tired so we decide to stay the night here and set off early in the morning. I have no idea what time I went to bed. I left the others sat at the front drinking and listening to Johnny Jetson stories about the time he was recording for a week with Tommy Lee and Snoop Dogg. What I haven’t really gone into before is that Johnny is very well known on the local LA scene. It is no big deal that he regularly hangs at the Rainbow with Cypress Hill, that almost all the LA rockers that we all know and love wish him well whenever they pass and it seems a shame he is one of the ones that hasn’t yet ‘made it’. Maybe his time is still to come. Back in places like Vegas and Arizona TM’s are able to command fees anywhere from $500-$3000 to play and today they got confirmation of an opening slot for a private party in Vegas with a big payment and lots of press invited. We have already been told by Sarah at Covet (the people that put us on all that time ago in Vegas) that she could get us some very well paid gigs with no problem at all should we decide to visit again. I think it’s almost a given that most of us can see ourselves back here on the road again as soon and finances and logistical bullshit allow.
Marty:Riot
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