“Tour” Prep School

First things first, nothing we do makes sense. There’s no template. We forge our own path - it’s like the homie in Pluribus that has to trek through the jungle with the venomous spikes and we’re like yo we’re doing our own thing only to pass out cause we got some poison flowing in veins and I’m like yessssss that’s rock n roll babbbbbbyyyy. 

Tour Prep: we packed up last week. this is the most economical we’ve ever been. Fewest cases. Lighter bags. One - it costs less to travel and Two - it’s only 4 shows. Three - rock n roll. 

Technically, this is a “run.”  It’s not a weekender cause it goes into the next week but it’s not really a tour. Can I argue that tours are 7 or more day? Or is this a tour? Doesn’t matter. 

3 promoters have posted the fliers. South Bend still hasn’t. But all the shows have locals and posters so here’s hoping it all works out. 

We’ll take a red eye (Southwest) to Nashville on Thursday night. First time doing the red eye thing. Usually, we’ll take full day to travel but this lets everyone work or spend time with family. In my case, Thursday is the kids last day of school so I can go pick them up. Anyways, we typically use Southwest. Johnny has their credit card. They were more user friendly with 2 free checked bags and sit wherever, but times change and so do the Southwest policies. We adapt. We react. We survive. 

We’ll rent our little Chrysler Pacifica and we’ll fart around middle America for a couple days. We’re borrowing Idle Threats gear (TIA boys). 

Oh - a note about shows. Weird reality is if you want Idle Threat to play the west coast, these four shows are more important than you realize. If these shows are good, that’ll tell IT that their live show is in demand. If no one comes to the shows, they might not play more shows. I can’t actually speak on their behalf, but that’s the general mindset. Nothing WE do makes sense, so we’ll play shows to no one and then keep playing more shows. Why do we do this to ourselves? HEY IDLE THREAT - COME TO THE WEST COAST!

Tour Prep - I think we’re ready. For what? TBD. Follow along on socials and hopefully next Tuesday, I’ll have a rad update that all the shows crushed. 

AUGUST BURNS RED - honestly, ABR doesn’t do it for me. I’m not into that type of metal. So, going in, it doesn’t matter my opinion on the album BUT holy moly, you gotta applaud ABR for doing their thing and doing it well. No trend chasing. No obligation to shift their process to the modern industry. Oddly refreshing. Same goes to Converge too. I’ve learned to really appreciate bands that know what they are and they do that one thing very well. I got frustrated the other day thinking about how often bands chase trends. Whether it’s a social gimmick or a band gimmick (masks anyone?). Do your thing. Do it well. 

New Converge. Cool. New ABR. Its fine. New Death Cab For Cutie. Neato. Oh oh oh - Death Cab just played in Pasadena and had people ditch their phones. I love this idea. Phoebe Bridgers (Bridges? SP?) is doing a whole tour where you gotta put your phone in a Faraday bag. I LOVE IT. Let’s be more present. You don’t need your phone. Also, please follow us on socials and tag and post any and all videos you take of us. Thanks. Hahaha. I have realized over time, the show videos I take on my phone are rarely re-watched. The only ones I got back to are my old ETID videos and I’ll lament about Eisley not being active by watching bad videos from 2018 that I took. 

If you’ve made it this far, maybe consider snagging a shirt before we leave. It’s really important that we sell a bunch of merch this weekend. Fingers crossed. We have a good spread, we just need people to buy it. I’m guessing most of you newsletter readers have already purchased stuff, which we appreciate it. In theory, if we sold 100 windbreakers, that’d be pay for the trip. Ok, go. 

Song of the Week (whoa, just learned I can drop a youtube video in the email like a dummy) - shout out Dads Who Mosh for the song rec in our discord this week.