Pagosa Springs and the Hot Springs!

We make our way south from Telluride earlyish. I use the word ‘early’ loosely… When we are on the road we rarely get on the road before 2 pm so leaving around noon is early… We get to Pagosa about 5 and the sun is just starting to go behind the mountains. We have a few hours to kill and Pagosa Springs is known for its hot springs. Everytime we mention Pagosa people say, “Did you visit the hot springs?” and until now we always said “no”.. But I can now happily say we have been to the hot springs and it was just what a back that’s been sleeping on floors needed! When I heard springs I expected some sort of rock landing with water spewing out of the ground… But it was really nothing like that… It was a nice resort type place. They had tubs indoors as well as outdoors on the roof. The roof was pretty crowded but it’s still sweet to check out the sunset and stars over the mountains while soaking in the tubs filled with spring water. After a couple hours of soaking our tired bones we head to the venue. The Bear Creek always takes care of us. The staff there is super friendly and the locals are awesome too. We play a long 4 hour set and then we hit the road to head back to Austin. That does it for the Colorado tour. It’s been a blast as always and if we weren’t heading back to Austin it would be hard to leave! 23 hours and we are home! Hooch over and out!

Salida: A last minute show to remember!

Today we are traveling from Preblo, CO to Telluride, CO. We got a late start and didn’t get out of town until about 2 PM. We have a night off so we decided to stop in Salida to see a friend of ours Ty. We met Ty through couchsurfing a couple years ago and have been tight ever since. We also decided since we had the night off we should see if we could find a place to play. We hit up a couple of bars and they were all very receptive to live music but were booked. There was also a place with a patio that we could play on. But playing a show in 20 degree temperatures didn’t sound too appealing… The last place we popped in was the Tenderfoot. Ryan did the talking and the Bartender Mary was more than happy to let us play. We decided to go have dinner and make a decision about whether we were going to play a show or drive across an icy mountain pass after dark. Looking back now, it seems like the obvious decision was to play the show… The show was awesome. We had the bar packed all night. People were dancing and having a great time just like we were! It was another one of those times where we are on tour and randomly things come together for an awesome night of music. We will definitely be back in Salida. A big thanks to the Mary’s at Tenderfoot for having us play. It was such a blast!

Motherloaded in Breck Pt. 2

We started our day off right with breakfast out our Couchsurfer Mark’s home outside of Durango. The night before we arrived at Mark’s place and managed to get the van stuck in the driveway… Turns out the tires aren’t as good as they were new! After some slipping and sliding and pushing and well… all that fun stuff that comes along with having a 2 wheel drive van on the snow… We finally managed to get the chains on the tires and drove out of the driveway with ease. Man I’m glad we picked up those chains! So moving on… We had a 6 hour drive from Durango to Breckenridge through some amazing mountain passes including the Red Mountain Pass. Fortunately the passes were clear of snow and it was just a gorgeous drive. We arrived in Breckenridge around 8 pm and the Motherloaded was already hopping. The Motherloaded Tavern is such a fun venue. It’s the perfect environment for funky upbeat music like ours. They have a table that is bolted to the floor so you can dance on the table and people use it! The drinks were flowing and the crowd was dancing and eating up every bit of funk we could cook for them. It was such a fun night. I really can’t say enough about the Motherloaded. They really take care of us(check out the pic of the tip jar, lol)  and this place is just a blast!

Ft. Collins at Hodi’s

Ahh we are back in Ft. Collins. We have had so many good times taking brewery tours, hosting jams, and playing jams. This is our first real showcase type show in Ft. Collins at a great venue Hodi’s Halfnote. Hodi’s is a great place to hang out as far as just having a good vibe but then on top of that there is a great room with a big stage and excellent sound. We played with another band from Colorado called Able Minds. They are a cool mix of electronic and traditional (guitar, drum, etc.) type music. It made for a great night of upbeat danceable music. We had fun catching up with a friend of ours Liza as well. You may remember her as our merchandise representative for our last west coast tour. It was great to catch up and it was just a great night in Ft. Collins. Hooch over and out!

Quixotes: Bring the funk!

Old friends from Stillwater

Quixotes is what you would call a ‘Dead’ bar. Not ‘dead’ in the sense that it’s no longer an establishment in the community. ‘Dead’ in that every decoration on the wall (and there are hundreds of decorations) is in some way tied to The Grateful Dead or the Jam Band Culture that revolves around it. Everything from old concert posters to paintings of Jerry Garcia are represented. As you can imagine this makes the venue feel like a flashback to a different psychadelic time. This is our second time at Quixotes and this time around we played with local Denver funk band ‘In Due Time’. It was such a fun night of music. With fiery vocals and a funkin’ awesome horn section ‘In Due Time’ kept the crowd shaking their booties. To add to the musical excitement of the evening the ‘In Due Time’ horn section sat in with us on ‘Rock People’ and ‘Get Funky’. Man horns really make our songs more dynamic. So sweet…
I also got on stage with ‘In Due Time’ to help sing ‘Superstitious’ by Stevie Wonder. It was so much fun. The whole night was just great. I had several old friends from different times in my life show up to the show and that was really just icing on the cake. So as you can tell I love Denver and I think it’s safe to say the other guys do too. Thanks to my friends, our fans, and ‘In Due Time’ for making it an awesome night. Until next time Hooch over and out!

Pagosa Springs

Pagosa Springs is a beautiful town in the mountains of Colorado. Because we have been to Pagosa and played at The Bear Creek Saloon several times I totally feel at home there. It’s pretty awesome in that we really didn’t know anyone in Pagosa Springs before we played a few shows and now we have a solid fans and friends that come out to our shows. There is a stange dynamic in Pagosa because it is a small tourist town. You will have a mix of people that are in town for the hot springs or the rafting as well as native ‘Pagosans’. That being said every time we play the crowd is responsive and just a ton of fun regardless of whether it’s tourists or ‘Pagosans’. This time around we met some new friends through couchsurfing. Our new friend Jarrett and his family welcomed us into their home and we had yet another great couchsurfing experience. We had great food and spent time sharing our stories about traveling and playing music. Really great times in Pagosa Springs. This is yet another one of those places that is very hard to leave… That being said we have to keep moving on to the rest of Colorado! Hooch over and out!

College Bar not just for College students….

One of my best friends Coleman and I

What can I say about The College Bar in Stillwater, Oklahoma?  Well for starters it was my favorite bar in Stillwater when I lived there... We always have a great crowd even on a Monday night which is amazing. As far as this time at the College Bar it was business as usual. We had a fun crowd including a big group of my friends. Playing for old friends always makes a show more fun for sure. The show went great aside from a moment when I was playing Jordan's guitar on 'Fight for Your Right' and it decided to stop working. Jordan and Ryan kept going with the song while I tried to get the guitar working to no avail. After the song ended Jordan figured out the issue (only Jordan knows how to fix his set up...) and the show went on without a hitch. It was once again just a great time with old friends and new friends in Stillwater and it is always a pleasure to come back to another home away from home!

Angry Ryan

Jordan and Coleman

Achachay! on a small couch

Moab and the long drives…

We’ve had some interesting times in Moab. The first time here we toured Arches National Park (my favorite National Park thus far) and this time was interesting in it’s own way… We were supposed to have a show in Reno the day before on our way from Lake Tahoe to Moab but because a booking agent at a club failed at his job the show didn’t happen… So we drove straight from Tahoe to Moab. In case you haven’t looked at a map of the area lately is a super long drive… 13 hours to be exact… This isn’t the longest drive we’ve encountered but it did make it hard to sleep comfortably… We arrived in Moab at 9 am and set up camp to try to sleep. Fortunately we found a nice shady spot and it was nice and cool so sleep came easy. After a few hours of rest we headed up to Eddie McStiff’s our venue for the evening. It’s a cool restaurant/bar and although we had to keep it quiet, it was a good show. We made some new friends and ran into some friends from Austin actually (Hello Devra!) which always makes life more fun. After the show we had a 7 hour drive to Denver. As you can tell our booking manager (aka the members of Achachay!) forgot to look at the map when booking this section of the tour…. But we did end up surviving and sleeping well when we finally got to Denver super early the next morning… Ahh the life of a touring musician… It can’t always be one with the luxury of sleep….

A pic of me on the small stage...

Gameday in Eugene with a funk jam twist!

It’s gameday in Eugene, OR and we are pulling into town from California on a Thursday afternoon. We are set to play at a sports bar, The Maize Lounge, following the game and it looks to be a fun show. Phil a friend of ours from Couchsurfing has set up the show for us. Phil plays with a funk/jam/awesome band in Eugene and he has been booking for the club for a few weeks now. The Maize Lounge is pretty much a standard sports bar. A few TV’s, decent bar food, and of course beers. On another couchsurfing front… Todd a good friend of ours we met through couchsurfing who was living in Austin for a bit ends up meeting us in Eugene to hang out. Anytime Todd is around you know it’s going to be a good time! After waiting around for Oregon to beat Cal we get to start the show. We have a small crowd of dancers that makes the show fun and we make a great impression on everyone at the bar. Following the show we hear that there is a funk jam at another bar downtown. We pack up our stuff and head to the funk jam. The funk jam was a blast! Jordan ended up jumping on guitar for a bit. I ended up getting on the microphone for a long song. Every once in a while I have to get the “front man” out of my system and jump on the microphone to do some singing. It was such a great time and such a great release to just go crazy on the microphone for a while. After the jam we headed back to Phil’s place to hang out. It seems like everyone that lives with Phil plays music and that makes us all kindred souls at least to some extent. So needless to say we had a great night of hanging out and playing music. Couldn’t have asked for a better day on tour!

Paso Robles: It’s my birthday!

The day started off with a free birthday burger at Sylvester’s in Atascadero on our way to Paso Robles. Sylvester’s has awesome huge burgers so it was totally awesome to get a huge mushroom burger for free… After stopping by the club to set up we head over to our buddy Ruben’s place to chill before the show. After a short nap at Ruben’s place we head back to the venue for the show. This time we played at the 463 Club in Paso Robles. The 463 Club is a sports bar/music venue. We ended up having a pretty small crowd but the few that were there were our good friends and we had a blast playing for them. After the show we let Ruben show us downtown to do some birthday partying. The first bar we stop into has one of my favorite pastimes going on…. Karaoke… To say that I have a good time singing Karaoke would be a bit of an understatement. So Ryan and I sang a few songs and Liza even ended up singing a couple of songs. It was a ton of fun. After the karaoke we headed back to Ruben’s place and finished the night with a few drinks and a lot of laughs. Great food, great friends, a fun show, and Karaoke. All and all it was a great birthday!