Vancouver Show Cancellation
We just received word that the show in Vancouver Tuesday night has been cancelled by the promoter. We are sorry for the inconvenience.
Michael Timmins
About Michael Timmins
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Tour Diary – Southern California, San Diego and LA (July 15 and 16)
Southern California – San Diego and LA (July 15 and 16)
I don’t hate Southern California, I hate LA. I don’t care if it’s fashionable or unfashionable to hate LA. I just hate LA. But San Diego is another matter. I know nothing about the city or whether a city actually exists, but the weather here, the light here, the breezes here are so beautiful, they almost compensate for all that concrete. It’s an oddly soothing place especially if you spend the day in the confines of Humphry’s-By-The-Bay….so my perspective is slightly skewed. Coming down from our three day sojourn through the desert, the cooling breezes coming off the San Diego Bay were all the welcome that we needed as we stepped off the bus. We never got the air-conditioning unit fixed but the #2 unit did a bearable job.
The gig at Humphrey’s is always fun because it’s such a great set-up for the travelling musician. It’s on a great piece of real estate: an outdoor venue sitting in the courtyard of the hotel, with the stage backing on to an immense marina. It is mere steps from backstage to ones hotel room. I think our performances here have been inconsistent over the years. Tonight was one of those shows that I couldn’t get a read on. My sound on stage wasn’t great. I wasn’t even enjoying my guitar sound, but I feel that we played well. It took its own course so we rearranged the set list mid-way through in order to go with the flow. Not a huge crowd tonight, but some pockets of real enthusiasm. Overall, a very good day.
*****
I guess the truth is that I don’t really “get” LA. Maybe saying that I hate LA is a bit strong. Perhaps if I lived here or visited it more often or was given a tour by a native Los Angelino I wouldn’t find the place so ugly, so devoid of character, so uninteresting at street level. In any case when we arrived, Alan, Jeff and I hopped a cab and when to the one place here we knew we would find something unique and peculiar to this city: the Hollywood Cemetery. It’s odd that in all my visits to LA I have never visited this place. I love graveyards and it makes a visit all the more interesting when you trip over a small, modest grave marker for someone like Fay Wray or Jane Mansfield or John Ford. Then there are the monuments to eternal greatness like Douglas Fairbanks mausoleum or Cecil B De Mille’s twin sarcophaguses. In any case, it was nice to be in a quiet green space. The oddest marker was the one for Johnny Ramone. We couldn’t decide if his monument was an actual grave marker, or a prop for a movie, or some kind of ironic, cruel, post-mortem joke played on the ultimate New York punk rocker by some of his rich Angelino pals. In any case he looked very out place sitting there across from Douglas Fairbanks, just a stones throw away from Tyrone Power.
The gig tonight was at The Wiltern: a very large venue which we haven’t played in about twenty years (back when we were hip with the LA in-crowd). I think that, back in the day, it was a proper sit down theater. It has since been renovated and turned into one of those extremely cavernous theater-clubs. I suppose it wouldn’t be so cavernous if it were filled with a screaming audience, but tonight it felt awful cavernous. We had a tough time with the sound on stage and fought through a low end swamp for the entire performance. We had a few people who told us that it sounded great out front, so, for the health of our psyche, we’ll believe them….
Rumour has it that Michael Jackson is dead….I heard it on TV.
Tour Diary – Tucson and Mesa (July 12 – 14)
Tucson and Mesa, AZ (July 12 – 14)
It was 109 degrees in Tucson today. There were a few half-hearted attempts to escape our air conditioned pod, but none were very successful. At one point I decided I needed to at least stretch my legs and get some blood moving, so I headed off for the railway museum which was just a couple of blocks away. It didn’t take long for my skin to start sizzling and my brain to start melting. I tried to take a different route home, basically walking around the block, and I got completely disorientated. Since it was Sunday in downtown Tuscon (and it was 109 degrees outside) there wasn’t anyone on the streets to point me in the right direction. I was pretty sure that I had met my end, death by melting, but a little more staggering around through the baking, empty street of downtown Tucson and I eventually found my way back to the bus. I crawled into my bunk and hid there for a couple of hours like any self-respecting reptile. At one point during my walk I could have sworn that I heard an orchestra tuning up in the distance or some kind of avant-garde music piece being performed. It kind of sounded like the synth at the beginning of Shine On You Crazy Diamond. So I began to walk toward where I thought the music was coming from. When I finally found myself lost and disorientated in amongst the office towers I realized that the music was being created by the din of all of the air conditioning units in the buildings, together they were creating some kind of harmonic which was echoing off the buildings and, it being a Sunday, there was no traffic noise to drown it out. Very strange, I felt like I was walking around in a credit sequence. I told you my brain was melting.
We got news yesterday that Son Volts van never made it off the top of the mountain in Utah. They went to leave and the transmission sprang a leak. While the band stayed behind to wait for the van to get fixed, Jay and Mark flew in to Tucson to do tonight’s show as a duo. They put on a good show for the faithful. We also had a decent show, not great; we were a little tired due to this being our fifth show in five nights. The audience, although it was very sparse, was very supportive. It’s always fun to play this town, even on a Sunday in July with the temperature in triple digits.
*****
It was 113 degrees in Mesa for our day off. It was almost like being in some kind of bizarre reality TV game show: points given for how long you could go for a walk in this heat without completely losing your mind. Pete went for a too long walk, came back to the hotel, stepped in to the elevator and promptly punched his room number, instead of the floor number, into the keypad…..drool.
Some of us decided to stay in air-conditioned environs and went to see Bruno. The drive to the theater almost killed us. The hotel was kind enough to drive us in their shuttle but it had been sitting in the sun all day. It was a 20 minute drive across the barrens of suburban Phoenix….I felt like a suffocating dog. Bruno was disturbing and pretty darn hilarious. It’s a very subversive movie and I doubt that it will do anything close to Borat at the box office. It pushes too many uncomfortable buttons so it probably won’t have the return rate that Borat had. Five of us guys went together and despite the fact that the theater was empty we chose to sit side by side by side.
The gig tonight was at The Mesa Arts Center which is a beautiful venue but probably a bit big for this double –bill. It was a very excited and responsive audience despite it being swamped by the venue. We had an ok show. There were some very good moments and a few average moments. Son Volt rocked. One of the two air conditioning units on the bus has packed it in. This could be a very uncomfortable ride to San Diego.
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Some of you have no doubt noticed that the download section is not retaining your CC info, which is forcing you to re-enter the info each time you purchase a download. The company responsible for this is aware of the situation and is working on correcting it. Sorry, about this, we know that it is a hassle and we appreciate your patience. We’ll hopefully have it fixed soon.
Tour Diary – Snowbird, UT and Santa Fe, NM (July 10 and 11)
Snowbird, Utah (July 10, 2009)
We spent today half way up a mountain at the Snowbird Ski Resort. Not a bad way to spend a beautiful mountain day. Snowbird is just one of the many ski resorts that sit above the Great Salt Basin, above Salt Lake City. Ski resorts like this one all over the country have gotten smart over the years and realized that their chalets and restaurants don’t have to sit empty during the summer months. The growth in summer sports like mountain biking have helped the bottom line and a lot of these resorts have added music festivals to their summer schedules. We usually have the good fortune of playing a couple of these every summer: no pressure gigs surrounded by some of the most beautiful scenery in the country. Snowbird also has the added bonus of “fun time activities”, like a toboggan slide, bungi trampoline, zip line, a climbing wall and other cool stuff for kids and not-so-kids. There is also a gondola that brings you to the top of the mountain so you can look down on the rest of the world. It was a fun day, especially for Ed.
The gig was as enjoyable as the rest of the day: a Friday night crowd, the first night of the festival, a beautiful summer evening…..rock on.
Santa Fe, NM (July 11, 2009)
A long 14 hour drive from the mountains of Utah to the deserts of New Mexico. There is only so much sleeping one can do so we watched some really bad movies on the newly named SYFY channel (apparently Sci Fi was too confusing to us all). We didn’t see one square block of downtown Santa Fe, which is ok by me. I love this area but I find the city a bit too Disney….”visit olde time Santa Fe-land”….but I like the land and I like the light and I like the people.
The gig was at a decent little outdoor venue attached to the Santa Fe Brewing Company: a relatively small space with a good sound system out in the middle of nowhere. Son Volt was not part of the bill tonight. We had a very fun time tonight, it was very loose, with a few technical problems and a few guitar clangs and vocal miscues, but it still had a good feel and lots of good moments. It was helped along by an enthused audience. It was freakin’ hot out there today.
Tour Diary – Aspen, CO (July 9)
Aspen, CO (July 9, 2009)
We have been to Aspen four times in the last four years, which is way too often to play any market, no matter how “transient” the population is suppose to be, which might explain the very small turnout at The Belly Up. We were on first tonight and when we started there might have been thirty people in the audience, which has to be the smallest audience that we have perfomed to in years. By the end of the set the number was edging closer to two hundred, but it made for a very interesting show. The Belly Up isn’t our favourite room. It is a tiered club which is great for sightlines and great for those who are really into the music, because they can get up close to the stage, but the back tier is where the bar is and attracts geese in great numbers. The low ceiling projects their honking to the stage and throughout the club which can be very disruptive. Since there wasn’t anyone there at the beginning of the set we didn’t have to compete with the chatter and were able to settle in to our own groove. We had a very good night of music. Too bad there weren’t more there to enjoy it.
This isn’t my favourite town, as I’ve mentioned in past diaries. It’s hard to not enjoy being in the mountains, but the town is awash in wealth, dripping with rubies and pearls….in a decadent kind of way. It’s just a tad overwhelming. I enjoy watching all of the hyper-fit women (of all ages) sashay around town in their latest Lululemon apparel, it’s great to see such healthy, blond, blue-eyed, white-teethed children enjoying their summer vacations, I like that all of the Range Rovers slow to a crawl when you enter a crosswalk, but it’s all a little too much. Nevertheless, it’s always a welcome stop. After four years I know where to find the best coffee (Ink), the best bookstore (Explore), the best sandwich shop (The Butcher Block) and if I want to go for a hike I know where to find the trail head. All in all a very pleasant day.
I also got a chance to catch Son Volts set. They seemed to be firing on all cylinders as well. They’ve got a great sonic roar going on, which envelopes Jay Farrar’s voice and smacks you in the face, in a most entertaining way. I’m looking forward to hearing more.
Tour Diary – Denver, CO (July 7 and 8)
Denver, CO (July 7 and 8, 2009)
We had the misfortune of travelling on Michael Jackson Memorial day. If I was at home I would have been able to avoid the TV coverage, but sitting in terminals and bars and hotel rooms it was kind of hard to not see some of it. Is there anyone else out there that was disturbed by the fact that the family trotted up Michael’s grieving eleven year old daughter in front of millions of people? Is there anyone else out there that thought the family members hovering around her look like a pack of predatory animals smelling fresh meat? Is there anyone else out there that doubts that right now, in some opulent office in LA, there is a meeting going on of the Jackson Family brain trust, who are trying to figure out how to best exploit this beautiful little girls pain, who in the last couple of days has had more face time on TV, the internet, print media than anyone since…well….Michael Jackson (I could write the premise for the reality TV show)? Wasn’t Michael eleven years old when he burst on the scene? Didn’t Michael go out of his way to keep his children out of the public eye, even covering their faces with towels whenever they were in public (even while dangling them from hotel balconies)? Does anyone see the irony, the tragedy the hypocrisy in all of this? Repugnant, salacious, hypocritical, decadent, distasteful, unsavoury..…I don’t know which word best describes the whole event and the media coverage. Watching it made me feel complicit and dirty….the sloooow decline. Rest in peace Michael, you supremely talented fish-faced freak. I’m not sure where you are, but it’s got to be a better place than the cesspool you escaped. May your children escape your fate.
****
We always seem to start our west coast tours in Denver. It’s the most obvious jumping off point. We fly in from Toronto are greeted by a bus and off we go. It’s a great place to begin: as you drive in to the city from the airport you see the Rocky Mountains looming up from the horizon, much like those original rock bands must have seen when they first crossed the country in covered wagons. We landed as the sun was setting and were treated to a spectacular sunset as the sun and the plains and the mountains all did their part, as if to say, “welcome to the West, it aint like the East”.
This is a start of a two and a half week tour with Son Volt. It’s a co-headlining bill where we will be swapping opening and closing positions each night. We are doing sixteen shows in eighteen nights, so it will be a brutal pace. Co-bills are interesting animals, especially if the two acts have never worked together or don’t even know each other (like the two of us). For the artists they can be fun, exciting, inspiring events or nasty, petty affairs….The goal is to turn a co-bill into a great night of music, despite any drama that may be happening behind the scenes. Stay tuned.
****
Opening night was at the Ogden Theater. Opening nights are always difficult no matter how many opening nights one has had in a career. In a co-bill situation there are all sorts of logistical issues that need to be ironed out, so that adds to the stress. The Ogden Theater is a theater in name only. It’s one of those venues that was once a movie theater but has long ago been gutted, had a bar put in to the back of the room, outfitted with a shitty soundsystems and had a couple of storage closets turned into dressing rooms; voila, a music club. These types of venues are all over the country and we usually try and avoid them. They are uncomfortable for the audience, uncomfortable for the band and crew and don’t usually inspire the most memorable night of music: tonight held true to form. We had a tough time with our sound on stage, fought it throughout the show and never really settled in to a groove. Despite the venue and despite our troubles, the audience seemed happy enough and they maintained a generous energy level throughout the show. Sometimes the gulf between what is happening on stage and what is happening in the audience is huge: it seemed that most people were having a good time and in the end that is what really matters. I didn’t catch any of Son Volts set….it was just one of those days.
New songs added to ‘neath your covers, part 2
We’ve added three new cover songs to ‘neath your covers, part 2 in the Exclusive section of the site. Just click and scroll down until you find the section or you can access them directly through the players located at the bottom of this blog entry. You can listen for free and hopefully that will inspire you to throw a few bucks into our hat by downloading a song or two.
The songs we’ve added are two Neil Young songs, Don’t Let It Bring You Down and Love In Mind, which we performed at the Massey Hall tribute show. We recorded these during rehearsals for the show so we caught them in their early phase. We have been performing Don’t Let It Bring You Down at pretty much every concert over the past couple of months so it has already begun to spin in a different direction and it is quickly becoming one of our favourite live “moments” each night. I think Love In Mind is one of Neil’s hidden gems. It’s a very quirky song which he composed on piano and, as far as I know, played it exclusively as a solo piano piece, so we had to do a bit of re-arranging to transform it into a guitar based, band song. It’ one of those pining love songs inspired by the road (our contribution to that genre is At The End Of The Rainbow from the Miles From Our Home album. Its a hidden track…remember that craze….so you have to play Those Final Feet and use the player to advance forward) The third song that we’ve added is a cover of the Rolling Stones No Expectations. We were asked to contribute a song to an alt-country tribute to the Rolling Stones. We recorded Moonlight Mile for the album, but while we were at it we decided to also take a crack at No Expectations for the sheer fun of it (and also so that I could fool around with my newly purchased National Resolectric guitar). Once the tribute album is released (there is no fixed release date just yet but it will probably be this Fall) you will be able to listen to and purchase Moonlight Mile from this site as well, but in the meantime …there is No Expectations. Enjoy.
Monsters of Alt Country Tour
If you live west of the Mississippi (or are planning to be in the West in the coming few weeks) make sure that you check out our tour schedule. We are doing a bunch of dates with Son Volt as a co-bill. It should make for an excellent night of music. If you can’t be there in person then follow along by checking back to this page every few days. I’ll try and keep it updated with photos and incoherent ramblings.
Neil Young Tribute show now streaming
CBC Radio is broadcasting the June 10th Massey Hall Tribute to Neil Young live in two parts on June 29th and July 6th.
Check it out at: http://www.cbc.ca/radio2/programs/canadalive/2009/06/29/neil_young.html
And, the show is available for streaming in its entirety for the next 12 months at: http://www.cbc.ca/radio2/cod/concerts/20090610young
Be gentle; this is my first blog post!