#evenhand

draw your trollsonas ancestor with their decendants grub, if you'd like. original image here

art by:

@cityyliights, @exesaturated

@luc1d4, @stewkid

BROOKLYN, PICKLE BACKS, SHIT YEAH

Recommended listening: Shellshag “Gary’s Note” Ghostface Killah “Iron Man” Bruce Springsteen “I’m on Fire”

Booking a show in New York City has always been a gamble for me. 8.5 million people may live in NYC, but there’s no guarantee that even fifty people are aware of the show you’re playing or that of that 50 people even 20 of them are going to show up. I mean, that’s not always the case and I’ve actually played a few pretty cool shows there in the past, but for the most part they’re usually more of a pain than anything else. That said, I was keeping a more positive outlook about this show since we were playing with some very cool bands and the people in charge of the show seemed to actually give a shit.

After leaving Katie and Keith’s place in Holbrook on Long Island, I was running a little behind on time and was going to have to keep a quick pace in order to make it to Brooklyn in time to eat before heading to the show. I took a southern route along the shore of Long Island for quite a while but eventually got sick of getting lost on the back streets so I cut north and onto a main artery, HWY 24. I took it all the way to Queens before getting a little lost again, but quickly found my way by following the descending sun. I was heading directly east to Brooklyn so this required minimal navigation. The one thing that was a factor in slowing me down at first was the traffic. When I go on road rides in Oakland or SF I usually follow all the traffic laws and wait until I’m in the mountains or hills to really start cooking, but on this day, because I was running on such a tight schedule I decided to abandon this style. I only stopped at the lights that were so congested that there was no safe route through the traffic and I split lanes at 20+ mph all the way from Queens to Brooklyn. It felt more like riding in a solo alley cat than it did a casual cruise.

In Brooklyn, I met up with Krista who was putting on our show and we grabbed a couple things from her practice space to bring to the venue. Jeff was hanging at the show when we arrived. I ate my food and changed into more comfortable clothes at the van. There looked to be a few punk types hanging around and we still had at least an hour before show time so that was a good sign.

From what I’ve been told Lulu’s in it’s current incarnation has been a staple in the neighborhood for the last 9 or 10 years. I mention this because the bar was scheduled to close less than a week after our show. They host free shows and bands get a percentage from bar sales. The show space is separated from the bar by a set of stairs but it all feels like one big comfortable room space. By the time the first band (Even Hand) began playing the space had really filled up and there was enough people there to actually make me a little nervous. Acid Fast has been playing for years now, but this is still the very beginning for Pigeon Island and just our 3rd show with Jeff on drums.

It’s hard to write about a night like this because it was so fun and full of awesome moments that it would take a lot more than a simple blog entry to really capture the depth of the night. So many old and new friends were there. Pat and the Inklblot family are some of my oldest friends in Brooklyn at this point and it felt very satisfying to see there faces in the crowd while we played.

Pigeon Island was a lot of fun to do that night and it’s awesome being able to play every night with two of my favorite people and musicians. It’s a privilege for sure. Acid Fast also had a great set and it feels good to finally being hitting the road with them again. The last time we played NYC was back in the Fall of 2011 and our show was nothing like this night. It was October but there was a snowstorm and the show was very poorly attended. We blew out a tire on the BQE that night and changed it while getting snowed on. Ugh.

So our Brooklyn show was worlds better this time and probably the most fun I’ve ever had playoff a show in NYC. After Acid Fast finished, Chumped played and people were very stoked on them. I was getting pretty drunk on pickle backs and after changing into my borrowed Hawaiian shirt I started drinking Coronas. Spring break in August. Ended up closing out the bar or at least staying until getting kicked out, but I honestly can’t remember which came first.

Cool moments: seeing a bunch of people who probably haven’t cared about NOFX in 15 years singing along to our version of Linoleum. Also, getting to hang with Bill from Protagonist.