2003-10-19 - 3:48 a.m.
While in California I have taken the liberty -as I often do- to ask political questions of the locals. The recall vote is coming right up so the question on my mind is, “Are you voting for the recall?” I ask 20 or so folks and the answers are surprising and a little disturbing. Of the people I asked, only one said they were voting against the recall! That was a woman who worked at the hotel in Sacramento. Not a single person I spoke to was voting for Arnold. Only 2 were voting for Bustamonte. All of the others were voting for whoever the wackiest candidate was! “I’m voting for the striper,” or “I’m voting for the midget actor…what was his name?”, or something similar was the typical response. Nobody seemed to take it seriously. They seemed shocked when I told them that the recall was costing them 85 million dollars or that Arnold being elected would make it that much harder to un-seat Bush, although I realize there are some people that are happy that the “appointment” of G.W. meant that “our long nightmare of peace and prosperity was finally over.”
The drive to Shoebe Fest took us through the most mundane part of California. The center of the state looks like a giant brown paper bag that has been crumpled up and then shook out. Mile after mile of bald, rolling brown hills with the occasional tree or lake was what made up the bulk of the sights on our journey. Towards the end of the trip we started to see some really large farms. Shoebe Fest started out as a private party that grew into a festival. It’s held on a small organic farm in the hills southeast of Santa Barbara near the town of Carpenteria. It’s still “private” in a way; however, the owner of the farm told me it’s now a word of mouth sort of thing. The terraced hills of the farm yield a wide variety of fruits and vegetables and since a large part seems to have been harvested (except the mangos) the terraces make good vantage points to view the stage. Backstage I feast on the best tamales I have ever had and sample some excellent wines from local vintners. It’s pretty laid back with two or three hundred people just chilling out in the beautiful, California sunshine; listening to some nice music and watching their kids run around. When we start playing it doesn’t take long for the crowd to get into it and by the end a large number of them are on their feet and dancing. It was a lot of fun but, of course, we couldn’t hang out and enjoy the rest of the evening. We had to pack up lickety split and head over to Santa Barbara to play Club Absinthe. After we load in Carey realizes his drum stool is broken and will need to be welded or replaced. Amazingly, the bartender is a welder and offers to take the stool to his shop and weld it; which is exactly what he does! A young girl is promoting the show and she orders out Mexican for us. It turns out to be the real deal and some of the best Mexican food I’ve ever had. Today has been a culinary delight. Alan shows up from San Fran with Jimmy Sapia and the shots come stage side. Whoo hoo! The crowd is small and I feel bad for the promoter but she seems in good spirits and loved the show, as did everyone else it seems.
It is decided that we should head down to L.A. after the show and take up residence for two nights in our swanky, price-lined rooms at the Hyatt Regency downtown. Hell yeah they were nice rooms. Do you know what's the best thing about overpriced, upscale hotels? The beds! The beds are frickin’ amazing! I got up late- too late for breakfast-and had to make do with a carrot juice and pita sandwich from a shop in the mall below the hotel.
The Key Club is a beautiful club with a fantastic sound system. The staff is friendly and courteous. It’s anyone’s guess how many people will show up in Hollywood on a Sunday night. Our friend Tim and his girl show up. We met them in Fayetteville, Arkansas just before they moved out to California. They enjoy the show and afterwards we have a nice long conversation. It’s Alan’s last night on tour so we head over to an Irish pub and have a couple of drinks to send him off. Then it’s back to our swanky rooms and to bed. We have a breakfast/lunch meeting with our manager the following day where the topic of conversation revolves around our plans to make a new record. After the meeting we head over to an incredible record store called Amoeba (I think). Holy smokes what a great record store. It’s huge and packed with great new and used CD’s and vinyl. I’m looking for a record by a prospective producer and don’t have much time. I could spend the day in here. Shortly we are heading out of LA and as we leave Barstow on I-40 we plug in the movie “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” just in time to hear Johnny Depp’s voice over say, “We left Barstow on I-40 heading to Vegas.” We have a day to get to Flagstaff. As the sun sets we say goodbye to California.
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