Well I am back home decompressing (and detoxing) from the last West Coast run. All I can say is “WOW”. What a great experience. From the beaches of San Diego to the trees of northwest, the West Coast is an amazing place to tour. There were some long days in the van, but we would each take turns driving and picking the tunes. I got turned on to a lot of great music from other people's iPods; bands like Stereo Lab and Tortoise...there are a lot of great sounds out there The weather was mostly cooperative and the crowds were very accepting. It is always tough to tour on a new CD. The fans do not know the tunes yet and it can be a challenge to woo them over, but I was pleasantly surprised by the acceptance of my new songs. There is a fine line I have to ride between playing older stuff and trying out the new material, but I guess that is part of the deal.
We all had a blast playing with Zach Gill. I really dug his sound and his incredible stage presence. He is a great songwriter and performer. And the dual keyboard encores were a lot of fun. I hope to do it again with him soon.
The beer was awesome as well. I visited Stone Brewery in San Diego. This place has to be one of my favorite breweries in the country. I love the beer, but the restaurant is an event unto itself. With botanical gardens and waterfalls, Stone ranks (in my book) a must see in Southern California.
On the way up north, I stopped by a friend's brewery in Fairfax CA, called Iron Springs. We came in for some lunch and beers. Mike Altman has done a great job up there and I was impressed by the wide selection. The Casey Jones Imperial IPA was tasty.
Lastly, I spent some time over at the Deschutes pub in Portland. I met about a dozen fans and we had beers and food and then went on a brewery tour together. There are some good folks up there. And Deschutes took very good care of all of us. They rock!
So the show is still on the road. We hit the East Coast in November going from Burlington, VT, down to Athens, GA. There will be plenty of more great shows to be had and beers to be drunk. So we will see you out there.
Check out some new videos from tour on my YouTube Channel.
Kyle