Hi kids,
It's Johnny here, and for once I'm going to try and type with proper grammar/punctuation. I really don't know why I am doing this, it's quite hard for me and i probably won't do very well but bear with me. We recently went on a three day tour (two of which were spent driving/partying/farting in the van) and it was a time and a half! We played at Bulldogs in Fernie B.C. with
3 Inches of Blood. It went a little like this.
We loaded up Mike's van at around 2pm on Friday (the show was Saturday so we decided to leave a day early, thank god we did) and waited until our driver Matt was off work. We picked him up in Coquitlam around 4:30 and immediately hit the road. This particular "road" would be paved with drugs and alcohol before we even made it to the on-ramp of the number 1.
On our way out of town Adam pulls out the cheeseburger Doritos and his pipe and the party gets started, come to think of it, that was even before we picked up Matt. As we were enjoying the coquitlam scenery Eug starts to freak out and says "Oh my god look who's driving in the car behind us! fuckin Mr. Feenie! We all turn around and sure enough, this guy looks exactly like Feenie! Me, being the biggest Boy Meets World fan of us all, whip out my camera and try to get a shot of him. There's too much gear in the way to get a nice one so I climb back over the terribly smelling bleached merch and jagged drum hardware to get a picture of this fucking guy. And i did. I think he looks almost exactly like Feenie, but you be the judge.
About 3 or 4 hours in we made the first rest break in Princeton B.C. to get food and wait for the car full of chicks half an hour behind us. I grabbed some tea at the gas station while Adam and Kyle stocked up on more liquor. Adam replaced the bottle of fireball he finished in the van and kyle bought a case of Keystone™, but he forgot his wallet in the van so he had to run back.
It was pretty fucking freezing there so they decided to warm up by shotgunning some of Eug's warm beers as opposed to the ice cold Keystones™. We all decided it was a good idea to walk into the only pub in Princeton - come to think of it, it was an Irish pub - and warm up. The place was full of Affliction and Tapout shirts and we got the stares. Right off the bat Kyle asks if they have any pitchers on special toady and the server replies "no, but we have shooters on special". She recommends the "Burt Reynolds" and he orders a round for everyone (except Matt who was stuck shotgunning his coffee).
Time passes and so do the drinks. I got a sandwich and soup and Eug got some fucking thing i don't remember. The girls arrived and we smoked in the parking lot and then went to the gas station to fill up.
I went to piss while Matt filled the van up and when i came back, kyle was chatting it up with a couple of locals who couldn't have been over 16. I walked over and joined them, he was giving them Black Wizard Cd's. Then they asked him if he would buy them alcohol. Now kyle, being an infamous underage drinker knows how shitty it is to be high and dry on a Friday night in the freezing cold. So he does what any other good Samaritan would do; he buys them a two-six of vodka and keeps the change. When he returned with the goods, he comes up to me and says "I bought them this booze, but you know what I'm going to tell them? I'm going to tell them there's a tax on it. and the tax is that I get to have a sip" so there we are drinking these kids' vodka in the freezing cold weather of Princeton shamelessly promoting our band (not to mention underage drinking). Wouldn't mama be proud!
We hit the road again with a van full of gas and liquor. Matt was still driving and i think Adam passed out cause i put on Wooden Shjips, but kyle was still going strong. I was sleeping on the first bench and i would drift in and out and hear kyle and Matt playing the ever-so-popular tour game "would you rather...". One of my personal favorites to pull out during that game is one Adam made up on the
Black Sensae tour. "Would you rather be semi-retarded or have the Friends theme song playing in your head for the rest of your life". And on and on it went. Personally, I'd choose the former.
We pulled into Fernie around 7 am, but with the time zone change it was already 8 and the promoter Kyle (not to be confused with the bangmaster) had arranged for us to be able to check into our room at 8 am. So we pull up to the hotel that Eug directs us to and asked if there were any bookings under Black Wizard, Eugene or Kyle Hudon. No luck. What the hell man? At this point were thinking Kyle forgot to book our rooms and so we stood outside and racked up some long distance minutes trying to get a hold of him. Finally we found out that we were at the wrong hotel after Eug insisted that "this is the one we stayed at last time, i know cause i swam in that pool!". So we drove over to the Red Cedar inn, checked into our rooms and we all fell peacefully asleep for a few hours.
Around 4 pm I woke up and everyone was gone. Apparently they had only slept for a couple hours and were going to hit the pool. Classic Wiz™ right?. I got up very refreshed and decided to soak in the sauna for a while. So I trolled down there and after about 15 mins kyle walks in fully clothed and says "sweatin it out eh? I'm gonna join ya!". He returned in a flash ready to sweat in his Russian briefs and we roasted for another 20 minutes then lounged around and drank beer in the hot tub for a while. Just a regular Saturday afternoon, no big d.
I decided to continue the feel-good kick i was on and go for a run so I walked across the street to the Bargain Shop and picked up some ten dollar seniors Velcro™ jogging shoes and two pairs of boxer shorts that could pass for jogging shorts. I went and knocked on kyles door and convinced him to come with me instead of watching the tube.
We were just about to leave as kyle pipes up "Hold on, I have to grab my smokes" I told him that you can't smoke and jog and he replied "Why not?". So there we are, half of Black Wizard, jogging around Fernie in underwear, smoking. Just when you thought you'd seen it all eh. There were some bear warning signs and we discussed what we would do if a bear jumped out of the woods in front of us. I said I'd go jump in the river but apparently bears cans swim really fast. So we both agreed that I should get on Kyle's shoulders and start screaming as loudly as possible. As if that would work, that bear would have torn us skinny bastards apart and still be hungry! too bad Eug wasn't there to give him thanksgiving dinner while we ran away.
When we got back they were all gone to the bar to load in. So we jumped in the shower (not together, dream on Daniel!) and headed over there. When we arrived, Adam had informed us that we were graciously given two flats of beer for the night and anything on the menu we wanted. So of course Kyle and I all order the most expensive things. A Jack Daniels™ steak for Him and the roast chicken dinner for me. I forget what the other two had, but i think it came with yam fries. Damn, save me a bite.
There was an opening band, they were alright. Then we were on at about 11:15. Right before we went on, everyone went and smoked a bunch of pot without me outside while I was setting up, so I had no choice but to go smoke a joint in the bathroom by myself like in that one
song. We played and it was really fun. some chick yelled "give me your shirt" after we played and I said that I couldn't cause its the only one I brought with me. I met a new friend Alan Gregson that night, he took some rad pictures of us, thanks dude!
3 Inches really drove it home that night. I hadn't seen them in about 4 years. it was a completely different lineup but it was really fucking good. They played some old stuff, notably Swordmaster and Wykydtron. Kyle and I were pretty pumped on that. So for about an hour and fifteen minutes, Fernie went fucking crazy and there were about 4 fights. One of which I caught on film, but I still have to develop that roll.
After everyone was done, one of the guys in the first band came up to kyle and handed him a huge box full of bags of chips. So apparently this guy works for Lays™ or something and it's his job to go around and give out free chips to people. He had no idea how happy that made us. I'm talkin ketchup, cheesies, tostitos, smartfood popcorn (it was this weird caramel kind that sorta sucked) and regular. So hats off to that guy, i don't know his name but thanks chip fairy!
On the way back to the hotel, Honey, Geneva and I hit up sev for some late night cheese dogs and granola bars. We Watched t.v. for a bit and then passed out. Matt got a $238 ticket from a cop for all of our open liquor in the van while driving the van back to the hotel to take a shit. Sorry Matt! at least we finished it before the drive back. Meanwhile, Kyle Eug and Adam stayed up through the night partying with the 3 Inches guys til around 8 am I'm told.
We checked out around 11 and Kyle was nervous about returning his room key cause he broke it in the lock the night before. Nice goin there Conan. We left our gear in the bar after the show with the intent of the promoter coming down in the morning and opening up so we could load out and hit the road around 11:30. Little did we know that was a bad fucking choice cause he had also been up til 8 partying the night before. So there we are, waiting in the van behind the bar eating Hortons B.E.L.T.C.H'S complimentary of the girls (thanks!) in the pouring rain. Needless to say, we made a solid dent in that box of chips. We did this for the next three hours. I went for a couple nature walks and found some abandoned buses filled with insulation and cool pieces of metal. Took some pictures of a skate park and a church and got a coffee at Big Bang Bagels. Come to think of it, i think i gave the Aussies working there a CD.
Bored to death, we drove to the cop shop to see if Matt could pay his ticket, but they said he had to go to the courthouse to do it and that was definitely closed on a Sunday long weekend. The cop did help us try and contact the owners of the bar to come let us in but the only person she could get a hold of was the owners mum. While we were smoking, I plugged my ipod into an outlet on the police station wall and when the cop came around she says to kyle "have a good night last night?" we replied "yeah". "Your eyes are pretty red hey? tired?" "yeah, i am" he replies. Then she turns to me and says "That's stealin power y'know?" and I thought she was kidding and i laughed it off. I said "yeah right, really?" "people can get in a lot of trouble for that" she says. I thought to myself "GIVE ME A FUCKING BREAK BITCH ARE YOU SERIOUS?". She left and I spit on the wall as we left to go sit behind the bar for what seemed like another eternity.
Finally Kyle showed up and let us in. It was three thirty by this time so we were about 4 hours behind schedule. You never saw us load gear faster than we did right there. We were out the door and on the road in no time looking for the next A&W to raid.
Matt drove the whole trip straight, no rest stops other than to pick up some thanksgiving dinner; valley bird, meatball subs and big macs. About half way i cranked the Eminem and Kyle Adam and I did some road tokes and zoned out to the Marshall Mathers Lp. Eug slept the entire fucking ride, we made it home in like 9 hours, take that google maps. 12 hours my ass!
And that was that. I missed Thanksgiving dinner with my family, but had a great, yet dysfunctional holiday with my other slightly-retarded-but-loving family that I'll never forget. I'll leave ya with a few quotes from the weekend.
"I'm not a gynecologist, but I do play one on t.v." - Kyle on compasses.
"Warm that up with some chicken!" - Adam on brain freeze
"Black Wizard doesn't eat apples" Adam on apples."God bless" - Kyle, to anyone and everyone that sells him bird.
til next time and god bless,
The Wiz
