Tour 2010 Part 4: New Bedford MA (April 3rd)
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A later rise than the day before had us eating late breakfast at the same dunkin donuts as the night before (and the last tour for that matter), and on the road by 11. Cruella and her Husband Michael are spending some time living in Middleborough MA, fixing up the house Michael grew up in so his Mom can sell it. Middleborough is close to our gig in New Bedford, so we stayed there. After lunch of subs at Middleborough House of Pizza (a old school mom and pop pizzeria and the best subs i’ve had since leave NJ 12 years ago), there was more hangout time before leaving for the venue. (Side Note: I hear that, unlike the east coast, touring on the west coast has very little chill-at-the-hotel-before-the-gig time, as the cities are so far apart it takes all day to drive to the next date.)
Previously I had dealt with the club owner of the New Wave Cafe in terms of bookings, and that can go either way: either they are very hands on or they are total hacks who let everything fuck up. We were also supposed to be one of 6 bands playing, so we did not have great expectations for the show.
Driving to the gig we found Lake Apponequet overflowing right over the roadway! as we plowed through the water I envisioned the rental van going under, but we got through ok. Whew! Despite being in a really shitty neighborhood, the club had a big stage and a good PA, with lots of monitors, both front wedges and side fills. Paul the owner turned out to be the hands on type of bar owner, and they were really organized, right down to how the gear for all bands flows in through one door and out through another. Two bands had dropped off the bill, so we ended up going on earlier than originally planned but we got to play longer. Though we were not paid, they bought us pizza, and thus we did not have to buy ourselves dinner, so in effect we were paid.
Sound onstage was very good, we played really well, and the crowd really liked us. Cruella really belted it out. Afterwards Paul said that he had purposefully put us on this meat market bill to check us out, and next time he’ll put us on a better bill. We’ll see. We chatted with a lot of other musicians, some playing that night, some not, all of whom offered to hook us up with more gigs. So in terms of making contacts alone it was a good night. After us was Cortez, a band from Boston that Tony D’Agostino used to be in. The were FANTASTIC! Very Sabbath with and interesting tempo/groove twist. The Singer looked a lot like Reuben Little with the Fuge’s face under the beard. Very odd to look at their dopplegangers rolled into one guy. Pics from the show can bee seen here.
After getting back to Cruella and Michael’s place we all change into our PJ’s and hung out. Cruella offered to make tea, and then rattled off like NINE different kinds of tea she had. That woman is serious about her tea!