instruments alone: documenting blind pilot's west coast bike tour

Welcome to the 7th best car/bike travel tour blog ever of 2009

2009-07-07T13:55:00.000-07:00

We are still loving our simple life in California although our departure date at the end of August (after the Blackberry Festiva l) is rapidly approaching. We have been on some fun trips around California and up to Oregon in recent months, but have not been terribly inspired to blog. Partially because the editing process is not nearly as exciting on a day to day basis to write about, and because we thought that most people read our site during the tour to find out what was going on with Blind Pilot and perhaps were not as interested to now read about our new life in the woods.

Then we received an email yesterday from Tripbase.com notifying us that we had placed 7th in their 2009 blog awards in the Car/Bike travel category. We thought it was interesting that they placed cars and bike travel in the same category, but didn't really mind because we were people in cars who followed people riding bicycles, so it kind of fits for us at least. They gave us a link to a nifty badge to put on our blog and said that this award is "a sign that you are in the top echelons of the blogosphere." Cool. Max calls it an "awardvertisement" for tripbase, but has allowed it to be displayed here. Emily thinks its sweet that someone noticed us.

So thank you Tripbase for inspiring us to keep blogging. The focus might switch a bit more (as it has been in recent postings) to our life right now, as well as the film making process, instead of solely on the whereabouts and activities of Blind Pilot. Ryan said in his most recent post on their blog that he will try to be better with updates. As we begin to travel again, we will share our experiences in states we haven't driven through yet, as well as our attempts to screen the film on the road and to secure festival screenings and distribution.

Emily did go to Eugene, OR last week to see her parents who were in town, catch a few delightful concerts at the Bach Festival and watch an amazing 15-5 win by the Eugene Emeralds. She got to visit with Ryan, Sarah and his parents as well. Ryan looked good, and it is quite amazing to hear his experiences with the music industry and how many people are now helping them do all the tasks that they had to self manage on bike tour - booking, merchandise, promotion, etc. He did bicycle back to Portland for some exercise and alone time and almost made it all the way. It's good to hear that bicycling and bike touring are still on their minds.

We are appreciating the arid climate of this region in contrast to the high heat and humidity that Baltimore is famous for at this time of year, except that Emily's kitchen garden of herbs and pickling cucumbers are requiring more aggressive watering than her old garden. Luckily, our friend's mother's giant canning garden is growing like crazy and Emily has been helping with weeding and eating all of the beautiful fresh produce.

We spent Friday, July 3 at Frontier Days in nearby Willits, CA - "California's oldest continuously run rodeo" - with our friends from the Bay Area and celebrated the 4th of July up at the Black Butte River Ranch's annual shindig in the mountains. Good food and good music always ensures a fun evening will be had by all, but the overwhelming hospitality of Tom and Margie, who run the place, really put this party over the top and reminded us of the truly special community we have found here.

If you are just tuning in...

2009-04-21T21:12:00.000-07:00

Last May we traveled from our home in Baltimore, MD to Portland, OR for a long weekend. It had been a while since we had seen Ryan, one of Emily's oldest friends, but he was about to leave town to do a short tour of the Oregon coast with his band, Blind Pilot. So we tagged along and had the pleasure of meeting the rest of the band and seeing their live set three times. It was after the first of the three shows that they started talking about the bike tour they were planning to take starting that August. On a whim we asked if we could film it. For some reason they agreed.

We wanted to film Blind Pilot’s bike tour because we were moved by their music and their adventurous attitude towards life, and thought that by filming the bike tour they were planning, we could help others realize how great both of those things were. This was before they were an iTunes band of the week, before NPR fell in love with Oviedo, before anyone knew that Blind Pilot wouldn't end up being another brilliant band that no one would get to hear. By the time last July rolled around and we came out to film the bike tour, iTunes had happened, NPR had happened, even a standing ovation opening up for Aimee Mann at the Aladdin had already happened, but we decided to do it anyway.

We were also feeling a lack of excitement and spark in our own day to day lives last May, and saw this project as a way shaking up our own existence. They no longer needed the promotion or exposure so much, but we still needed the adventure, and they were gracious enough to hold up their end and let us film their bike tour. And even though we are now engulfed by the prospect of turning the 250 hours of footage captured on tour into a single film, we are really glad they did. It was inspiring to witness what happens when you stretch your comfort zone, allow yourself to be vulnerable, and let the world take care of you.

Since the tour ended, we have been in post-production in a small town in Northern California and staying with a friend of ours from college. We have continued the adventure started on tour, meeting a wonderful group of people here. We recently moved back into the tent we lived in on tour and onto the property where we are helping our friend build his cabin. We move between a nearby music studio, where the Garden Community Land Trust has generously allowed us the space to set up our computer and several hard drives and edit, to an also generously donated carport for cooking and eating and general social merriment, and back to a tepee and our tent to sleep in the so far hospitable Mendocino Interior wilderness. Buzz the traveling cat has familiarized herself with all of the structures and spends most of her day sleeping out of the sun under a pile of lumber. We both found ourselves part time jobs to support our living expenses and be more involved in the community here (Emily is a pizza chef, Max is a small-engine mechanic) and we have discovered how busy you can be when you are engaged by your environment and largely in charge of your own schedule.

Somehow we are still finding time to edit the film. We even managed to leave the valley to catch up with Blind Pilot on Monday, April 13 in San Francisco at their last show of their first van tour at Café du Nord. The show was tight and fast. Ryan contracted food poisoning right before they went on, but he pounded heroically through the entire set. We are sad to report that there was no skinny dipping after this tour ended, in fact, it seemed like the trip had been exciting but also draining for all of them. That said, the tour also seems to have been a huge success for them, and there were many highlights, including a great interview on NPR's Morning Edition, all of which they covered on their website. They will be continuing on an exciting 2009 tour through Europe and the US with the Decemberists and the Counting Crows and playing many festivals - see their tour schedule for information.

Now that spring has arrived and the days are longer, our inspiration is renewed by warmer weather and fast approaching festival deadlines. The goal of finishing the documentary is very high on our priority list (as well as taking some time to use the National Parks pass that we bought last July before it expires). We appreciate all the emails, comments and interest in this film and hope to be able to share what we think will be the happiest documentary film of 2009.

We are still self-financing this project and although we are extremely optimistic about the chances of this film being picked up, there is nothing certain in life and we still want to be able to show the film to all of you who have been so supportive of this project. We have to return back East for Max’s sister’s wedding over Labor Day weekend and are hoping to have a screenable “work in progress” cut that we can tour as we drive east in late August, and possibly raise funds. If you have any suggestions of places that would like to host a screening, contact us and let us know, we will be traveling with a projector and would love to appear for an impromptu screening on a white surface near you. Look for information about those screenings and (hopefully) festival screenings either on our blog, the film website, or our Facebook page.

Blind Pilot Live! (again) and on TV! (for the first time)

2009-02-13T21:41:00.000-08:00

We had a great time in San Francisco this week catching Blind Pilot's show at Hotel Utah on Tuesday evening. The venue was only slightly larger than their last San Francisco show at the hole in the wall Mojo Bicycle Cafe, but their fans packed in like sardines to hear a great set played by Israel, Ryan, Luke, Kati, Ian and Kristine on violin and Joel on pedal steel.

There was a particular song, a cover, that the band played only twice on tour, and both times (one was at Mojo incidentally, the other a house party in Arcata) the venue's acoustics, lack of sound system, and a capacity crowd left us with a recording that could be charitably refered to as "in your face." Luckily, the band was gearing up to perform this particular song for Carson Daly's big time summer concert cover song extravaganza, so they had it down pat, and were down to perform it again at their show this past Tuesday and we were able to re-record it. The Hotel Utah may not have much on the Mojo in the way of space, but it fills that space with a top notch sound system, expertly tuned by their sound guy Jeff. Thank you Jeff.

We hadn't seen them play since last October, and it was exciting to see how tight their sets have become, and hear subtle differences, like a somewhat new vocal pattern for "Oviedo." We were blown away by Israel's latest song, "White Apple," which seems to be a real departure in terms of working with sound, going to different places in different ways musically and in terms of imagery (very much enhanced by Joel's haunting pedal steel at this particular performance). Yet somehow it remains so familiar in terms of where it comes from. It is worth seeing a show just for this song, and anything else the Pilot comes up with trapped in a van for the next couple of months, until it is available on their album next winter.

Due to our lack of constant access to television, we sadly missed the television debut of Blind Pilot on Carson Daly on Wednesday night (Thursday morning). But, thanks to the internet, we caught it online. And if your connection is high speedy enough, so can you!

Rain, Bluegrass in Arcata, upcoming Blind Pilot shows

2009-02-08T16:56:00.000-08:00

It's finally started raining here in Round Valley, which makes it a bit easier to buckle down and not be distracted by sunny weather. We've successfully broken up the footage into 33 smaller sections, enabling us to slowly work through all of it. We had some issues with our uploads to Vimeo last week, but all seems to work now - sorry for any inconvenience.

So we should really be buckling down, but it's not every day that three outstanding bluegrass bands play only three hours away at Humboldt Brews, in Arcata, CA (where Blind Pilot played an open mic night when we stopped through last September) like it was this past Friday. Ms. Kati Claborn (so really it can be considered research) was playing with another band of hers, The Clampitt Family, on a "Portland Invasion Tour" with Whiskey Puppy, great folks and smokin' pickers who we met in Bellingham when they played with Blind Pilot last August, and Jackstraw, the highly talented third prong of what was to be a Shermanesque march through California on their way to the Bluegrass and Americana festival underway in San Francisco. We enjoyed a fabulous night of bluegrass music and the chance to catch up with Kati, whom we sadly missed during our New Year's trip up to Portland, and sleep in a Super 8 with 8 super musicians, which we don't do nearly often enough.

Enough about us... and bluegrass - if you didn't know already, Blind Pilot will be making their television debut on Late Night with Carson Daly this week - airing at 1:30am on February 12th (that's Wednesday night). We will be at their show at the Hotel Utah in San Francisco on Tuesday night, and if you live somewhere else - here is their upcoming spring touring schedule. They are a great live show (take it from us, we saw over 40 last fall).

(from Bigshot Touring)

03/05/09. Portland, OR - Mississippi Studios

03/06/09. Spokane, WA - The Empyrean

03/07/09. Boise, ID - Neurolux

03/09/09. Salt Lake City, UT - Urban Lounge

03/11/09. Denver, CO - Hi-Dive

03/12/09. Omaha, NE - The Waiting Room

03/13/09. Iowa City, IA - The Picador

03/14/09. Madison, WI - Orpheum Stage Door

03/16/09. Chicago, IL - Schubas Tavern

03/24/09. Nashville, TN - Mercy Lounge

03/26/09. Greensboro, NC - Studio B

03/27/09. Arlington, VA - IOTA

03/28/09. Philadelphia, PA - Theatre of Living Arts

03/30/09. Cambridge, MA - Middle East

03/31/09. New York, NY - Mercury Lounge

04/01/09. Pittsburgh, PA - Club Cafe

04/02/09. Cleveland, OH - Beachland Ballroom

04/04/09. Minneapolis, MN - 400 Bar

04/07/09. Austin, TX - The Mohawk

04/09/09. Tucson, AZ - Plush

04/10/09. San Diego, CA - Casbah

04/11/09. Los Angeles, CA - Spaceland

04/13/09. San Francisco, CA - Cafe Du Nord

New trailer and website - we've been busy!

2009-01-26T15:21:00.000-08:00

It took us a while to settle into the editing process. It took us a while to get used to waking up in the same town every day. And although we found the time to rock New Year's in Portland with Ryan, Israel and Sarah, and take off Inauguration Day to throw a party, for the most part we have been very busy!

We now have:

a working title - WE ARE THE TIDE: blind pilot's west coast bike tour,
a new website to get information about the film, AND
a brand new trailer for the film!

We are still enjoying our editing location, making sure to take walks regularly and enjoy the unseasonably warm and dry weather we have been having here in Round Valley. With over 250 hours of footage to look through, the trailer represents the tip of the iceberg. Please enjoy it as we pour over the rest and hammer out the story that lies within.

WE ARE THE TIDE: blind pilot's west coast bike tour (trailer) from IAVIDEO on Vimeo.

Happy Boxing Day!

2008-12-26T12:25:00.000-08:00

It's been two months since we last posted; Thanksgiving and Christmas have come and gone and we are finally semi-settled in with our friend from college in a rustic (with hot water, internet and heat!) cabin in Northern California. Apparently, finding a free place to live and work takes a little longer than we expected.

We have been setting up an editing suite and are happy to report that all the hard drives still contain the 250+ hours of footage that we shot over two months traveling with Blind Pilot, a feat considering the many miles that the drives traveled in the car through changing weather conditions.

Emily is pleased to have a real kitchen to cook in after four months of camping and staying in other people's houses. We hosted a small Christmas eve dinner with meatballs that would have made her Swedish great-grandmother proud. Buzz has claimed a chair in the house and spends a lot of time sleeping. She deserves it after being in the car for so long. It's been snowing here, like most areas throughout the country, and we have been enjoying long walks in the mountains, getting ourselves back into pre-sitting-in-the-car-all-the-time shape. Max found a 1976 Moto Guzzi police cruiser motorcycle and finally can fully enjoy the windy roads of California.

We hope that this holiday season was merry and bright - keep an eye out for more posts and updates as we work.

And! If you haven't heard already, congratulations to Blind Pilot for being Starbucks' "Pick of the Week" for the week of January 3. Pick up a code that week for a free song download from any Starbucks locations throughout Canada and the US.

The End?

2008-10-17T17:22:00.001-07:00

The Band traveled the final 20 miles to San Diego without much difficulty and then started on the logistics of getting everyone back up to Portland. Israel's friend Kate welcomed us into her home and everybody became very tired. Kati and Luke mustered the energy to ride to the train station and see if they could bribe a baggage handler to put his bass trailer on the train the next day. Amtrak wouldn't take it, and Luke ended up having to send his trailer via Greyhound, who had no problem taking the beautiful monstrosity back to Portland for only $32. They returned later that night and after some Big Kahuna burgers, it became clear that the band was not going to play a show on their last night of bike tour, and they began to feel like they needed a "finish line." Israel proposed (maintains he was joking) that they should either sit outside and meditate- "speak without speaking"- or ride naked to the bay and jump in. Maybe it was a reluctance to meditate, but Ryan jumped at the latter idea. So they celebrated by skinny dipping in the bay and then relaxing in Kate's apartment complex hot tub (clothed.) After only 3 hours of sleep, we all got up and headed to the train station for the 30 hour long ride back up to Portland.

Max boarded the train with the band in order to do interviews while Emily drove to the Bay Area to visit Jamie again and wait for him. The train ride, with the pacific coast on fast rewind through the windows, was a very compelling backdrop and the interviews were going really well, but the train ended up being a bit noisier and bumpier than the romantic notion we had in our heads. Despite the less than ideal shooting conditions, within the first 16 hours, Max had filled up the hard drive on his laptop with about eight hours of interview, and with only a USB1.0 portable hard drive to offload footage to very slowly (if given eight to ten hours to transfer what was already shot, it would have yielded space enough for another hour or so of footage,) he hastily disembarked in Oakland, where Emily could easily pick him up.

We are off for a little time off to relax with a friend here and then will be back up to Portland to do final interviews and figure out where we are going to edit the 250+ hours of footage that we now have stored in hard drives throughout the car. We will keep posting with updates about the film and our whereabouts over the next few months. Thank you Blind Pilot for a great ride.

Goodbye LA and Hello San Diego!

2008-10-14T12:07:00.000-07:00

After playing an awesome set at KCRW in Santa Monica, the band rode the 15 miles back to Los Angeles to make it in time for their sound check at Molly Malone's. After having a relatively easy time with the folks at Spaceland allowing us to film in their venue, we figured that an Irish bar would be a cinch. This was not the case. After many phone calls and Max being as persuasive as he could be, they allowed us to film and gave us a copy of the board recording, for only $20, instead of the $125 they wanted to charge us for being there. Ah, L.A. Blind Pilot was the second on a bill of four bands- the other three were local Los Angeles bands- but they definately drew the biggest crowd. Pumped with the energy from the afternoon at KCRW, set list ready, they put on the tightest show so far. Israel even told a story that was funny AND audible. Ryan looked so proud. Our biking friends from Venice (Josh, Steve and Bennett) came out and Brooke flew in from Florida to visit again. Josh also generously offered to bring and shoot with a second camera for us, which was awesome.

After the show at Molly Malone's the band decided to take it easy for a few days. They didn't have any more shows scheduled and only needed to make the train back to Portland Thursday morning, so could instead take the time to sit in cafes, work on some new music and relax in general. Late Sunday, they made their way to Venice Beach, stopping to play along the Santa Monica pier with the sun setting behind them. After the band had some dinner and we hung out with Ian for a few hours in LA beore he took the train back to Portland, we met up with Bennett and Steve in Venice Beach. They both put us up in their apartments, and Buzz looked happier than she's been in a while and seemed to really warm up to Steve. It was hard to pull her out of his place.

Monday morning we all headed out of the Los Angeles area to begin the trek to San Diego. It's not as easy to have late starts when the sun sets by 6:30, so after 50 miles we all packed into a small motel in Laguna Beach. We were all looking forward to having one last night of camping, so instead of making the final push to San Diego on Tuesday, we spent the night at San Elijo State Beach with plans to do the last 25 miles on Wednesday. We and Kati spent a long time body surfing on the waves, once our bodies had adjusted to the temperature of the water. It was beautiful, and astounding that we hadn't gone swimming since the lake in Bellingham, WA, where we started this tour.

TV and Radio in Los Angeles

2008-10-10T15:25:00.000-07:00

After a relaxing morning at Emily's cousin Owen's house in W. Hollywood (who is awesome and letting us stay with him during our time in LA), we met up with the band at the studios of the internet television station, ManiaTV. They have a great studio space, with a performance stage and a talk show set, on which Kati and Israel couldn't resist posing for a snapshot.

After consuming most of the snacks provided for them in the green room, they recorded two tracks (One Red Thread and Three Rounds and a Sound), with their bikes displayed in front of the stage. They also recorded a short interview and did some "IDs" for the station. Then we shot an ID for the documentary. Hopefully the zoomed-in shot of Ryan goofing around and then stopping to say "We're Blind Pilot, and you're watching Blind Pilot documentary" directly into the camera will be featured somewhere prominantly.

They biked back to the Silverlake neighborhood to spend the night, while we went out to dinner at Garden's of Taxco with Emily's cousin Owen, a delicious five course meal and a fantastic show. The waiter informed us that there were no menus and that he would describe each dish for us with an amazing Hollywood/Mexican accent. Emily could not resist ordering the chicken mole - "the best mole in TOWN." After the five courses and some fruity margaritas, we walked back to Owen's house and checked in on Buzz, who is staying in the den and as far away from Owen's two dogs as possible.

The band had discussed the possibility of renting a van while in the Los Angeles area to get around to all the interviews and gigs they had, but have continued to bike through the streets and seem to be getting pretty good at it. Today they rode out to the KCRW studios in Santa Monica to record a segment for Chris Douridas' Saturday show. The station has been playing the album quite a bit over the past few months, and it is pretty special that they get to do an in-studio interview and performance there. The bicycles also provide a lot of conversation starters for the interviews.

They are off to their last show in Los Angeles at Molly Malone's tonight (Friday). Then we head to San Diego, where they still do not have a confirmed gig. It's hard to believe that we are this close to the end of this part of our adventure with them, and that Molly's may be the last show (in a proper venue) we film. Time flies when you're bike touring.

Sunny Southern California and not-so-scary Los Angeles

2008-10-09T14:07:00.000-07:00

Southern California has been a big unknown for us and the band since the beginning of the tour. Not only is Los Angeles the largest city that the band will visit on their tour, but none of us have really any first hand experience with navigating its streets and inhabitants.

Rolling into Santa Barbara Monday night, it definitely felt like we had arrived in SoCal. The night air was warmer, the architecture more Spanish and palm trees lined the streets. We went straight to Ryan's cousin Bridget's house where we spent the evening eating good food and relaxing. The band sleepily played a few songs for her and her roommates and we all went to bed early. It was lovely to not have to rush to play a show and instead be able to simply relax and enjoy good company.

The next day's ride was a short 30 miles to Ventura, CA, where they were playing the lovely Zoey's Cafe and Entertainment Loft and meeting up with Kati, who had taken a 25 hour train ride from Portland to rejoin the tour for the last week. After a giant breakfast at the original Sambo's on the Beach in Santa Barbara, we headed down the coastline to Ventura. Kati arrived on her bike moments after we did at Zoey's with lots of energy to spare. Apparently it is quite boring when one is not bicycling 40 miles everyday. The audience consisted of many of Kati's relatives as well as locals who were intrigued by the few songs that they played on the street in front of the venue before the show, a great way to bring in a crowd on a Tuesday night.

After spending the a fun night at Kati's aunt Ginny's house with her cousin John, we all awoke at 7am to start the 75 mile trek to Los Angeles. While hanging out in LA for the week, Ian had hooked up a show opening for some local bands at the Spaceland Theater in Silverlake for Wednesday night, which was great but put some strain on the schedule. Figuring out how to get out of Ventura and back onto the Pacific Coast Highway took much longer than expected, and by the time they reached Malibu for a late lunch it was 2pm. After lingering over burritos and fixing Israel's brake cable, they hit the road again at 4pm to finish the final 30 miles and arrive before 8pm. They had a vague route to get from the PCH in Santa Monica up to Spaceland, and we immediately lost them as soon as they left the beach bicycle path. Although it would have been interesting to film their first trip through the streets of LA, it was all we could do make it through the rush hour traffic and make it to the venue in time. The set was short, but it allowed more time to hang out with the three bicyclists that we met in Big Sur (Josh, Steve and Bennett), who rode their bikes out to the show from Venice.

So far, being in Los Angeles has not been as intimidating as we had feared - driving took Emily a little while to get used to, especially in contrast to the tiny towns that we have been traversing as of late - but in general it seems like a fairly laid-back, albeit expansive city. What were we worried about again?

Chance encounters of the close kind along the Central Coast

2008-10-06T15:34:00.000-07:00

Ryan and Amber got an early start leaving Kirk Creek campground on Friday morning and Israel and Luke stayed behind to cook some food and hang out around the scenic hiker biker site and watch the fog and smoke intermingle above the mountains.

We had a bit of a hard time keeping up with Ryan whilst still getting shots of Luke and Israel bringing up the rear. After the last of the mountains were behind us, and the terrain began to level out we decided to push on ahead to San Simeon and stop driving back and forth between the two pairs. We were distracted by a beach full of elephant seals, though, and spent a while watching them belch and roll around on the sand.

We met up with Ryan at the visitor center for the Hearst Castle - an astounding building perched up about San Simeon built for the wealthy William Hearst at the turn of the last century. Emily began to panic about finding a spot to camp in so late in the afternoon on a Friday and left Max on the side of the road for about an hour as he talked to Ryan, met up with the rest of the band, and then watched them bike away. Two friendly girls also on adventure, April and Vicki stopped to see if Max would take their picture in front of the sign. They had seen the band up the road and were interested in the project and what we were up to. Emily found a beautiful spot in the more primitive part of San Simeon State Park, but forgot completely that a storm was coming and managed to choose the only site without two trees to hang a tarp from. This required Max to climb the only tree and use the car as the other "tree." Our distance from the main campsite also thwarted us from hanging out with the band and a new group of touring bicyclists down at the hiker/biker site. We did manage to stay dry, though.

After stopping in Cambria for some breakfast, the band easily made the 30 mile push to San Luis Obispo, where randomly, April and Vicki drove past us at a burrito stand and yelled hello. Jayson in Big Sur had given the band the phone number of his friend Abbey who runs the Spirits of Africa gallery in the Creamery building in San Luis Obsipo. Once the foursome had arrived, we headed over to meet him. Abbey was awesome and provided a needed burst of energy for the afternoon. He didn't know that they were touring by bicycle and hoped that they would make it for a drum rally for Obama that he held at his gallery the night before. The gallery walls were adorned with brightly colored paintings of African vistas and many portraits of Barack Obama. His friend played a bit of hand drums for us before Abbey began trying to figure out where they might be able to play that night. San Luis is a pretty big town and trying to find an opening on a Saturday night proved to be quite difficult. The band stored their bikes behind the gallery and began to walk around for a few hours trying to find a show, and when that seemed to not be a possibility, tried to figure out a plan for lodging. Israel decided to take a walk around town, while we hung out at the Frog and Peach trying to find a close enough campsite for them to ride to, and talking to some friendly locals. Emily met one who had also attended the tiny Pinewood School in Thessaloniki Greece, that she had also attended 12 years ago. Small world.

Israel returned from his walk feeling ready to busk on the street before riding to the campsite. They set up in front of a little archway up the street from the Frog and Peach and almost immediately had a small crowd watching them play. It was a great, diverse group of traveling 'street' kids, college students from Cal Poly and people heading home after a dinner out on the town. Vicki and April (who began to see Blind Pilot as a theme in their road trip adventure) also happened by and were really excited to see them play. After Emily chatted with them for a while, April mentioned she was from Eugene, and Emily helped her make the connection that she went to school with Ryan's older brother Paul. Once again, this world is small.

One couple, Barry and Joanie, stayed for the entire set and when Israel asked if anyone would take them home, they offered their place a few miles away. We continued on to the campsite to set up camp and took advantage of the hot spring pool the next morning before driving back into town to find them.

Amber called the next morning to let us know that Barry had invited a few friends over to hear the band, so we hopped over to catch it. They were really kind couple and it was great to see another example how good music can move people to open their hearts and their homes.

After getting a bit of a late start, the band set their sights on Lompoc. Almost immediately, we began having logistical troubles including: one of the hard drives almost crashed and needed to do a full backup, Max realized that he didn't have his debit card anymore and Emily sat on the modem, breaking it. It took us many hours to visit Verizon and Best Buy, find out that it would cost about $200 to replace the modem, then have Max use his wizard skills to fix the modem using tape and a screwdriver, and then park the car in Pismo Beach and tear it apart and put it back together again in an attempt to find the debit card. By 5pm, we realized that we weren't going to be able to track the band and that we really needed some time off from shooting. We headed to Lompoc, did laundry and searched for a good restaurant with steaks. By the time we tried to go eat, though, everything in Lompoc was closed, so we chose the nicest looking steaks from Albertson's and headed to River Community Park for the night. We were able to stay in an RV site with power, complete the backup of the data and enjoy Max's famous steaks cooked over a fire. The band came by around 9:30 to wish us goodnight.

We woke up this morning and made pancakes with the band and have been having fun today trying out various ways to attach the camera to Ryan's B.O.B. trailer to get some in motion shots. It's a beautiful sunny day and it's hard to believe that we will be in Santa Barbara tonight and in L.A. on Wednesday.

Sur, Yes, Sur: Out of the Spirit Garden and into the Fire

2008-10-03T16:59:00.000-07:00

Luke and Amber spent the day in Big Sur waiting for Israel and Ryan to arrive, and looked for a show for them to play Wednesday night. They found the Big Sur Spirit Garden - a beautiful garden and performing space run by Jayson, an extremely friendly guy. What sold Luke on the space was the two giant "nests" that Jayson had constructed and said we could all sleep in that night.

The ride to Big Sur was spectacular - Highway 1 hugs the coastline for most of the ride, featuring giant cliffs with pounding surf. It was hard not to stop almost every mile as it seemed that every curve led us to an even more beautiful location. The three bicyclists that we met along the way didn't believe that we don't always stop that frequently. We arrived before dark to find Luke relaxing in one of the nests and Amber exploring the garden area. A few people arrived who saw the posters that Luke had hung up around town, and some even drove down from Monterey to see them too. It was still a small show and after a short set, they asked if Jayson would come up and accompany them on the hand drum for "We are the Tide." He's an excellent percussionist and they had so much fun they all played a few more songs for the audience.

After an interesting but not the most comfortable night sleep in the smaller of the two nests (Buzz was not so pleased to be that high up in the air and we couldn't really stretch out), we woke up to start the relatively short day down to Kirk Creek Campground near the Los Padres National Forest.

We had heard that there were fires south of Big Sur, and rumors were flying that Highway 1 was closed and that we couldn't leave. Luke and Ryan rode down to the Forest Service Station to get accurate information, and were told that the road wasn't closed but some campsites were on evacuation watch. We made it to the small town of Lucia at 3pm, right as the fire update meeting was being conducted by local fire fighting officials. The fire was still blazing up in the hills, but they all seemed pretty sure it wouldn't spread and cross the road. We did camp at Kirk Creek (where the ranger told us that the only campfires that night were the ones up on the hill) and settled in to watch a forest fire about 2 miles away. The noise of the helicopters that were gathering ocean water and dropping it on the fires died down around six, but the fire raged on. We ate dinner and talked while splitting our attention between a fairy tale moon setting over the vast Pacific and the inferno crawling down the mountains. Travelling down the coast has been a constant reminder of the intense beauty and power that this planet is made of. Travelling with cyclists has made us stop and reflect in places like this that we might have otherwise passed through because it was the "smart thing to do." Although the fire did spread down to Highway 1 a bit further north of us, we were able to sleep well and not get woken up by firemen, but it was a bit surreal to fall asleep worrying about the possibility of evacuation and wake up to find bits of ash on our tent.

Monterey: Rock Salt and Broken Spokes

2008-10-01T13:34:00.000-07:00

The ride to Monterey from Santa Cruz was described in The Book (Bicycling the Pacific Coast: A Complete Route, Canada to Mexico - our best friend when following bicyclists) as "completely lacking in scenic interest."

This wasn't completely true; we drove through fields upon fields of strawberry and lettuce farms, and drove through Castroville, CA - Artichoke Capital of the World. Although the coastline we have been traveling on has been spectacular, it was actually nice to see a different type of landscape. The three band members still bicycling (Israel, Ryan and Luke) made the relatively flat 40 mile trip in under four hours, and met up with the van traveling with them containing Kati and Ian as well as Sarah, Fen and Olaf. Amber, another touring bicyclist who we met along the way, also joined up with us again in Monterey and plans to ride along to San Diego. All eleven of us made our way over to Monterey Live, a great venue in Central California with really friendly ownership and staff. They sounded great, and the crowd was surprisingly large for a late September Monday night. Ryan's awesome cousin David shuttled us all up to his house in Salinas and generously put all eleven of us up for the night. Thanks David and Nina!

The next morning, the band returned to Monterey to get some errands taken care of before they headed off for a 30 mile ride to Big Sur. After some deliberation, Ian decided to take the train to Los Angeles and visit with his friend for the next ten days before the show at Molly Malone's on October 10. It was sad to see him go, but we really admire his drive to keep going on the tour. Ryan had a broken spoke, and was told by the bike mechanic that more looked like they were going to break soon. Wanting to push on and not wait, they decided to ride to Big Sur anyway. A half mile down the road, another spoke broke and Ryan and Israel headed back to Monterey to get the wheel fixed. Luke and Amber had already biked ahead about eight miles when we caught up with them. They were happy to be back on bicycles and decided to push ahead and camp by themselves in Big Sur. We drove back to Monterey to find Israel and Ryan looking for a place to busk. Not having a permit to play made this a bit more difficult, but on the advice of a nice volunteer police officer they headed down to Fisherman's Wharf to play (sans donation bucket as to not appear to be panhandlers). It was nice to see the two of them exploring the city and playing together - we got a glimpse of what it was like on their last bike tour. The sound was stripped down, but they got the attention of many passerbys and were not harrassed by the police.

Ryan and Israel headed off to spend the night with Amanda, a friendly local who is planning her own biking adventure for next summer, and we camped amongst many raccoons again in Veteren's Memorial Park in the center of Monterey. Ryan was able to fix his spokes this morning, have a leasurely time in Monterey and then begin a stunning ride to Big Sur, where Luke found them a show at the Big Sur Spirit Garden, which not only hosts a lovely looking garden and stage but also giant nests for them to sleep in tonight. Hold tight for pictures tomorrow...

If you're going to San Francisco...

2008-09-29T11:56:00.000-07:00

We spent three days in the Bay Area, which was a blast - and busy, which is why we are posting from our campsite in Santa Cruz.

Their only show in San Francisco was at the Mojo Bicycle Cafe, a wonderfully accommodating venue, although very, very small. You never know how packed a Blind Pilot show is going to be. San Francisco turned out to be a city where they have quite a fan base. Andrew, the manager at Mojo, said that people had been calling all day asking about the show, and the turnout was amazing. People were overflowing out of the small cafe into the street, as the band played tucked away in the small area leading into the bike shop area of the cafe.

Kati and Ryan's friend Sarah drove down to the show and picked Ian up in Fort Bragg, where the rest seemed to have done him a lot of good. He had been riding everyday and the head cold seemed to be clearing up. Unfortunately, they ran out of gas along Highway 1 south of Mendocino, and showed up about an hour late. That didn't discourage the crowd, though, who hung out and actually seemed to get larger as we waited for the van to show up. Also, all of the biking buddies that we had met along the route since Brookings, OR, came out to see the band. The sidewalk bench was host to a little reunion, with bikers sharing stories about the past couple of weeks and lamenting that they had to return to their own lives and jobs so soon.

The band was unable to book any other shows in San Francisco, but they were able to jump on Point Juncture WA's bill (featuring Skylar Norwood of Team Evil, and the producer of Blind Pilot's album) at Sofia's Thai Kitchen in Davis, CA and play a few songs on KDVS before the show. They broke from the bike tour a bit and took the van up to Davis, which seemed ironic, considering that Davis and the UC campus there have some of the most bike-friendly streets in the country. The time in the studio was fun. They played a few songs and answered a few questions, and the Micheal, the DJ there and the booking agent for Sofia's, promoted their concert that night.

The band ended up staying in Davis on Saturday for a lot longer than they expected, and arrived back in San Francisco at 5pm. A stop at Mojo for a new tire for Luke's trailer and then over to where their gear was stashed whiled away another hour and a half. They decided to try to ride at least a little bit in order to break up the mileage, but weren't counting on the sun setting at 7:30 (yup, it is Fall now) and an intense, thick fog to roll in as they reached Daly City, about 10 miles south of San Francisco. Ryan decided that the best option was to get a cheap motel room and cram all eight of us in (Buzz was able to come in too). This threw them off of their course a bit the next day, adding an extra 10 miles to their route back to Highway 1. Ian decided to catch a ride with Kati and Sarah after reaching Half Moon Bay (and Olaf and Fen, who we picked up in San Francisco) as Israel, Ryan and Luke made an incredible 50 mile push down to Santa Cruz. Ian is not riding today, and he's not quite sure what he's going to do after their show at Monterey Live tonight, and Kati, Sarah, Olaf and Fen head back up to Oregon tomorrow.

Recipes from the Road

2008-09-24T19:17:00.000-07:00

Emily has been creating some yummy meals around our campsite, using her Sigg camp pots, a miniature cast iron pan and one tiny camping stove. Here are two recipes that have worked pretty well, don't cost too much and are easy to make. They also don't require much prep, or access to a real kitchen. We also like acronyms, if you can't tell.

Campstove recipes by Emily.

STP (Sausage, Tomatoes and Potatoes) for two.

Buy two tomatoes and two potatoes from a farm stand, or a local market. Pick up two links or more of sausage - whatever kind you like. We've made STP from Italian sausage, Feta and Spinach Sausage and "Brown and Serve" frozen precooked sausage patties. They each add a different flavor, but still taste good.

Boil salted water in a pot and cook the potatoes until almost done.
Chop up the tomatoes into wedges, salt and pepper and place to the side.
Drain and remove potatoes and keep to the side in the lid.
Brown sausage in oil or butter.
Add potatoes and salted/peppered tomatoes to browned sausage.
Stir and let simmer covered for about 15-20 minutes until the tomatoes are soft.
Remove cover and cook for another 5 minutes.
Serve in bowls with some bread and enjoy!

Variation - you can also precook some rice and add to the mixture for a heartier meal.

Soviet Simmer - CCCP (Chicken, Corn, Couscous and Peppers) for two.

Note: This meal was simplified by purchasing smoked chicken (from Roundman's Smokehouse in Fort Bragg, CA), which added a nice smokey flavor and eliminated the need to keep and cook raw meat, a plus when your cooler is not always guaranteed to be food-safe cold.

Ingredients:

1 small can of corn
3/4 cup Israeli Couscous
1 red pepper, diced
1/2 lb. smoked chicken, cut into strips
(I also added 6 chopped mushrooms and 2 cloves of garlic, but adding those letters in would make a really long acronym, and not be as clever)

Bring 3/4 cup water to boil and add couscous. Stir and remove from heat.
In a second pot, saute garlic, mushrooms, corn and pepper in oil or butter for 3-4 minutes.
Remove from heat, cover and finish cooking the couscous.
Return the vegetable mixture to the stove, add couscous and chicken.
Cook for another 5-10 minutes, then serve.
Add pepper to taste.

Feel free to share recipes with friends, hopefully there will be more to come!

Next stop - San Francisco (pausing in Gualala and Bodega Dunes)

2008-09-24T10:46:00.000-07:00

Ryan and Israel rode all the way to San Francisco on their last bike tour two years ago, so it is understandable that they have been trying a bit to recreate some of their last adventure, but it hasn't been easy to do. The Peg House show the last tour was packed, and although the venue had built a new outdoor stage, the crowd was much smaller. In Gualala on the last tour, they weren't planning on playing a show, just getting groceries, when the cashier asked them if they were playing at the hotel across the street. They went over and ended up with free rooms (for them and the two German bike tourers they had befriended) in exchange for a set at the Gualala Hotel. Things have changed in Gualala, CA and the manager wasn't too keen on giving them too much in exchange for playing to a very small Monday night crowd.

Not discouraged, the band went across the street to Bone's Roadhouse restaurant to try to rustle up a crowd to come to their show. Ryan had contacted the owner of Bone's Roadhouse before the trip to try to set up a show, but it was never confirmed, so when they walked in they suggested they just play there for the late dinner crowd. They were all miked up, which was great for Israel, as he was on the verge of losing his voice after straining it a bit in Mendocino.

We camped that night amongst beautifully smelling eucalyptus trees and some very aggressive raccoons. They luckily left us alone and Buzz is slowly regaining her feeling of well being while in the tent.

The next day's ride was beautiful. Highway 1 hugs the rugged coastine, offering breathtaking views of the ocean. We spent some time along a turnout feeling like we were on top of the world. We ended the day in Bodega Dunes and for the first time it was obvious that we have left the more renegade counties in Northern California and had reached the weekend hangouts for rich Bay Area folk. Campsites at the state park were $25 a night, the priciest so far, but we were treated to a walk by visit by a badger. Ah, wildlife.

The band today made the 65-mile push into San Francisco look like a walk in the park. They did the first 30 miles without stopping, passing the other touring bicyclers that we have met along the way.

Yesterday was the first day of fall, and our two month anniversary of being on the road. Hopefully we'll be able to enjoy some down time/alone time in the Bay Area to go out to dinner and celebrate and reflect on what a wild ride it's been.

Beautiful days in Mendocino, CA

2008-09-22T12:18:00.000-07:00

Saturday morning the band biked into Fort Bragg to look for a show and use the library's wifi. The two miles into town made Ian dizzy. It was about time he listened to his body, and when the band couldn't get a show in Fort Bragg, and decided to go 13 more miles to Mendocino, Ian checked into a motel for some much needed bed rest and healing time. They did find a last minute show at Patterson's Pub in Mendocino. It was a great time - an intimate set by the three-piece to a very friendly crowd, all done under a stuffed moose head. Mendocino is beautiful, and Emily has spent time here in the past visiting her friend Imil from college, so it was nice to be able to be in a semi-familiar place for a while.

It was so beautiful, and sunny for the first time in a while, that the band decided to take a rest day and explore the headlands and sit on sunny rocks looking at the ocean. They also had a brilliant idea to play on the sidewalk for the visiting tourists until they had enough money to get a sauna and soak in a hot tub. Not surprisingly, they did pretty well fairly quickly and took the time for some luxury. We decided to visit Ian and see how he was doing and talk to him on camera about the trip so far. We found him at the Colombi Motel in Fort Bragg, looking better, but still feeling pretty rough. He ended up getting a fever the night before, which had broke by the time we arrived, and was trying to rehydrate and recouperate. Still determined, he decided to wait in Fort Bragg at the campsite and warm up his muscles again until Kati and Ryan's friend Sarah drive down to San Francisco on Thursday and pick him up on the way.

We drove quickly back to Mendocino to catch the band's second impromptu show at Dick's Place, a great divey bar right next to the headlands. It was a smaller, more local crowd than the night before, and the band was pretty relaxed from their saunas. It was one of the more mellow shows on the tour. The band does have a quartet of bikers traveling with them now - Olaf, Luke's brother, his friend Fen and two lovely girls they met up with on the road in Oregon, Brooke and Amber. You can get their perspective on the trip at their blog as well. They have been coming to every show for the past week and do add liveliness to even mellow shows. Brooke showed off some of her dance moves at the show at Dick's Place.

We returned to our campsite after the show at Van Damme State Park, where the friendly ranger there set us up with a site right across from the hiker/biker site and let the other bikers stay in our site and gave them their payment back. The band met some nice women at the show at Dick's Place and offered them a place to say indoors, which they readily accepted.It's been nice that although we aren't on bikes, we've met a lot of touring bicyclists through our affiliation with the band. There is such a variety of people who are tackling the coast and it's fun to have the camradarie around the campsite that you don't find in the car/RV areas.

We are heading out of Mendocino today (Monday) and aren't quite sure where everyone will end up tonight - probably somewhere between Gualala and Jenner, CA. The next few days are up in the air, they may try to play a show in Santa Rosa, and have to end up in San Francisco for a show at Mojo Bicycle Cafe on Thursday night. Stay tuned...

Avenue of the Giants and Confusion Hill, from Humboldt to Mendocino

2008-09-20T16:17:00.000-07:00

Once again, we are recapping the week for our fine readers at home. We are relaxing this afternoon in the lovely Fort Bragg library, and enjoying some free wifi.

Tuesday night's house party in Arcata, CA was quite a blow-out. It was the last show that Kati played with the group before she had to head back up to Portland to be a part of a wedding. She promises to be back by the time they reach San Francisco, though. The young crowd dug the group and declared that the band keep playing until the cops showed up. And the cops did show up. After they left, they told the band to keep on playing and so they did. Once the cops came back a second time to quiet down the party, the band ended their two hour set and called it a night.

Wednesday morning, Kati headed back up to Portland, catching a ride with Ian's dad who had driven him down two days before. There were lots of hugs goodbye, and Kati wondered what she was going to do all day if she weren't biking 50 miles. The band got off to a very early start to make it out to Ferndale, CA, where they were interviewed and played a set for KSLG and KHUM, very cool independent radio stations in Humboldt county. After the first 25 miles of the day, they pushed on to make it to their campsite in the redwoods that evening. Ian plowed through the difficult day of riding, and although he was a bit slower than the rest of the group, still made it the whole ride. We stayed with the group most of the first day, arriving much after dark to a beautiful campsite nestled in the redwoods off of the Avenue of the Giants. It was quite magical and very quiet. Buzz the traveling cat frolicked for awhile amongst them.

Thursday's ride began fairly early as well, as they were on their way to The Peg House, across the street from the Standish-Hickey Campground, for a show that evening. It was a long, hilly ride with lots of small shoulders. We hung out with Ian for a while in Garberville as he had arrived after the others had already come, had lunch and left again. The second day with all the hills was really wearing on him, but he was determined to finish the ride. We decided to drive ahead to the campground and see how the rest of the group was fairing up ahead. Toward the end of the ride, we rode over Confusion Hill - one of only 8 vortexes in the world, we learned when we stopped to check it out and use the restroom. Apparently, the "vortex" refers to strange magnetic fields that affect gravity, and our hard drives. As we drove over the hill, the external drive that Max had been offloading to was mysterously disconnected and then disappeared from his finder. Although scary, it soon came back after we left the Hill. We are now believers. Max dropped Emily off at the campsite to set up and cook some pasta while he went back to find Ian along the road and tell him to find a place to stay as the road was far too dangerous to ride at night. As Max pulled out of the campsite, the ancient G4 laptop that he uses to offload footage from the camera fell off the handmade passenger seat table, onto the camera, and broke the internal hard drive. We had just enough time on the card to catch Ian arriving by pick up truck (the rest of the band had sent a kind stranger to rescue him) and play a small, but cool show at the very friendly Peg House. We sat out under the stars with Gary, the owner, and saw a few falling from the sky. We headed to bed early to be able to make it out to Santa Rosa, 130 miles south, the next day to find a place to repair the hard drive so we could continue this project.

The next day we woke up and packed up camp before it started to pour and made it to Santa Rosa and Mac Advantage (a great Apple repair store, friendly and helpful) by noon. They replaced the hard drive and disc drive and we killed five hours by hanging out at coffee shops and Costco, where we ate lots of free samples and got massages from display massage chairs, while the band tackled some of the largest hills (including the infamous Leggett Hill) so far on this journey. We found them at a campsite north of Fort Bragg and caught them playing for a group of girls from a seventh day adventist boarding school on a field trip. Ian made it through the day again, showing up after dark, more tired and sore than the day before and developing a head cold.

Coasting on the coast and when animals attack... us

2008-09-15T13:03:00.000-07:00

Once again, although Verizon has the best coverage out west, it doesn't cover all the places we go, which makes it more difficult to post everyday.

We left Coos Bay on Thursday morning heading for Port Orford. Lia from the Broadway Theater in Coos Bay helped to arrange a show at Paula's Bistro in Port Orford that evening. It was a beautiful ride, and we took a side trip to the pose with Buzz the traveling cat in front of the westernmost point in the US at Cape Blanco lighthouse. Unfortunately it was very very foggy, and we could not see the lighthouse that afternoon, but we were told it is quite lovely. We also partook in a famous Langois Hot Dog at the Langois Market, which was so delicious Emily bought some of the homemade mustard to make sandwiches with. They played to a friendly dinner crowd at Paula's that night, and joined us at our foggy spot at the nearby Evergreen RV park for the night.

Friday morning, we explored around Port Orford, which is a great small town that seems to still have a healthy fishing industry. We ate some of the most delicious fish and chips we've ever had at the Crazy Norweigans restaurant and then Emily posed with a boat appropriately named "Miss Emily." We had also learned the day before that all the towns along the coast were settled 25 miles apart because that was as far as a horse and buggy could travel. Fun facts. On the way down to our last destination in Oregon, we visited Prehistoric Gardens, an awesome garden built in the 1950's with full size statues of dinosaurs amidst Oregon's rain forest setting. Kati and Luke spent most of their money that day on fun things from the gift shop.

We arrived at Harris Beach State Park almost at dark, as Israel had biked a bit further ahead of the rest of the band without them realizing it. They spent a few hours waiting for him, and then had to pedal fast to make it to the hiker-biker site at the park before Highway 101 became too dangerous. We, sadly, were not allowed to camp with them at the hiker-biker site and proceeded to have two pretty awful nights camping at the overpopulated park. The first night we were somehow unaware that Highway 101 was right next to our campsite until we tried to fall asleep and felt like the cars were actually driving through our tent. The second night, we are pretty sure that a raccoon that must have looked like the one in the picture to the right, circled our tent three times throughout the night. This caused Buzz to growl, hiss and then throw herself at the tent. The tent would then strike back. This was terrifying and made for a very poor night of sleep. Max thought it was a cougar, but the woman at the Forest Service seemed to think that the behavior fit a raccoon better.
On Saturday, Blind Pilot played an outdoor concert with Cameron McVay at Azalea Park in Brookings as part of the American Music Festival. Emily was reminded of her old job working with the parks department and putting on concerts in a park. It was a bit cold and foggy, so the crowd was not as large as one would hope, but they received a warm reception.

After two nights in Brookings, we crossed the border into California and drove through some absolutely beautiful, fog-filled redwood stands and ended up at Elk Prairie campground. Emily had found another campsite, Gold Bluffs Beach, right on the ocean from a map that she picked up at the National Park Service in Crescent City. We drove down a dark and winding dirt road for six miles until we reached a gorgeous, semi empty campground and realized we wouldn't be able to make it back up to the camp where the band would be that night. We made a yummy supper of STP (sausage, tomatoes and potatoes) and a beautiful fire, fell asleep listening to the waves crashing and remembered that we did like camping after all.

The next day the band set their sights on Arcata, where Ian was to meet up with them and start bike touring. What they thought would be an easy flat forty miles turned out to be an exhausting push. The fog is weighing heavily on all of us. Upon arriving, thoroughly fatigued and with no show planned until the next day, the band found a bar with an open mic and signed up for a twenty minute slot at 10:30. Ian arrived at 10:25 and was able to play his first show on the bike tour immediately. Somehow they all found the energy to play a great, but short set, culminating in an especially raucous version of "We are the Tide" that belied their weary state.

We are still in Arcata, CA waiting with the band to head over to a house party where they are scheduled to play. We are writing from a house where Derek, a local bike mechanic, and his roommates, Chris and Ted, live and generously offered to put the band up in last night. So far the people in California have been very friendly, and we are looking forward to meeting more travelers and locals along the way.

Smith River Road is a must and Coos Bay is amazing

2008-09-11T10:18:00.000-07:00

We are writing from beautiful Coos Bay, back in the verizon coverage area and ready to lay down a long post. We left Eugene Monday afternoon, after a long morning of packing and eating carrot cake that Emily's dad bought. The band pushed even their standards of a late start, leaving Ryan's parents house in Springfield to hit Trader Joe's and an REI on the way out of town at around 2:30. While we prepared to meet up with them at Trader Joe's, Max got a call from Ian, who plays vibes with Blind Pilot (and Team Evil) in Portland. It seems he got laid off from his job and was planning on making a trailer for the vibes- an instrument that weighs about as much as a person- and joining the bike tour in a week or so.

We left the house to bring the news to the band at Trader Joe's. Once there, we spotted the band and Max jumped out with the camera to film their reaction to the news. Emily parked the car, cracked the windows, and went in to stock up on cheap organic foodstuffs for our night in the Oregon wilderness.

Twenty minutes later the band had called Ian to make sure Max was not playing a joke on them, reacted to the news and gone on their way. When we returned to the car, the cat was not there. One of Emily's biggest fears is that some 'good samaritan' will see Buzz in the car on a hot day and decide to liberate her. With that fear in mind Max found the number for the nearest humane society and gave a description in case anyone managed to wrangle her away. Apparently the Buzzer managed to squeeze through the 4" openings in the windows and walk across a very busy parking lot to take a nap behind the Bed, Bath and Beyond's shopping cart area. We spent about an hour searching, Emily cried, and Max called every animal hospital in town before Randy, the really nice security guard, found her there. It was pretty terrifying and we didn't hit the road to start following them until about 5pm.

Ryan and Israel had taken a route to Reedsport on their last bike tour that we found again, not using Google maps as we usually do, but instead on a 1973 map of Oregon parks that Emily had bought in a Clatskanie, OR antique shop (to which Max jeered "did you also get a flux capacitor," and hadn't really stopped making fun of Emily for until that day when it proved its timelessness.) A Bureau of Land Management map that Emily's dad tracked down at the Eugene headquarters helped give a name to the road and it's context. The road was amazing. Connecting Eugene and Reedsport, it is a deserted stretch of county road and BLM road referred to as Wolf Creek Road and Smith Rive r Road respectively. They follow their namesakes' twists and turns through beautiful forests and stream valleys and over some serious hills, while carrying almost no traffic. Max missed his motorcycle deeply.

As night began to fall we passed the Lane county Inmate Forest Work Camp, and with visions of Johnny Cash, the band decided to double back and see if they could play there. Unfortunately, the camp had closed down, but the one guy who was there was very friendly. The luckiest band ever pushed on and we soon arrived at the edge of the BLM land and found a great area to dispersed camp, made dinner, and then enjoyed a Blind Pilot practice session in the woods. In the morning, we (us and Luke and Kati) discovered that apparently the area is popular with hunters, and used the empty shotgun shells and bullet casings to create a beautiful display of found object art on top of our car.

The road continued to be beautiful, as we made our way to Reedsport and onto Umpqua Lighthouse State Park where we were to stay the night. Although the road was windy and pretty narrow, we had it pretty much all to ourselves, which made stopping to get shots of the band so much easier than on busy highways. Although they had a another leisurely start, they were able to make it to the campsite just after dark and prepare for the short ride to Coos Bay the next day.

As the title of this post declares: Coos Bay is amazing. It's a pretty town, on the Bay, with lots of logging trucks and a great downtown area that feels like it is quickly becoming an arts area. But, it's the people that really blew us away. We and the band were welcomed with open arms from the start. Brian and Lia, the owners of the Broadway Theater (and the rest of the building, including Waxers Surf & Skate Shop and Shark Bites restaurant) had worked hard to get publicity for the show prior to their arrival, offered us dinner and along with Sam, the manager, a place to stay upstairs. The travel and tourism bureau had the welcome to Coos Bay sign flash "Welcome Blind Pilots" and then footed the bill for a room at the Red Lion up the street for the band to stay in after the show. The audience, while smaller than the shows in Portland, warmed up to the band immediately, especially when the band decided to go acoustic and come down to the main area. We met a lovely couple from Reedsport that has been following the tour and came down to watch the band because they love the music and the idea of the tour.

All in all, it felt like the shows that we first saw when we visited in May- an intimate setting with a small crowd feeding off and returning the energy of the band's songs. Watching this band share their love of music with others who respond like this is the immersive feeling we hoped to convey with a documentary. Their music moves people - almost regardless of what genre or style they call their own and not because of anything but the sounds and energy that fill the room. It remains elusive, but we have to believe that the more shows like this there are the closer we will be to getting that feeling on film.

Music Fest Northwest Recap

2008-09-07T13:04:00.000-07:00

We are packing up out of Luke's garage, preparing to set out on the road again. We had an interesting, and also fun, weekend here in Portland for Music Fest Northwest.

We began the musical weekend back at the Doug Fir Lounge on Friday morning at 11am to film Seattle radio KEXP's live broadcast of Blind Pilot's set. Bryan, the manager who gave us permission to film their show on August 30, was extremely helpful with giving us a location release again and introducing us to the staff of KEXP and getting their ok - with the condition that we stay out of the way and share footage. Jim and Kyle from KEXP was great to work with and gave us free reign of the area and Jim, the audio engineer even hooked us up with a cd of the broadcast. We also realized that morning that we had forgotten to complete another logistical aspect - getting permission from the festival to shoot Blind Pilot's set on Saturday at the Fez Ballroom, and anywhere else that the band might go. Jim had introduced us to Dave Allen, previously, and until recently, of Gang of Four, and now blogging at Pampelmoose music blog, and after Emily fretted for a bit about our lack of access to the festival, she decided to ask Dave (not really knowing who he was) how he got a press pass. He gave her a number and Max called up, explained who we were, sent her an email when we got back and the day before the show we were in possession of press passes for both of us. I guess luck is back to smiling on us.

After receiving our passes, we started looking at who the other acts were at this fest and realized we didn't now any of them. We knew that Blind Pilot was playing before Sir Mix-a-Lot, but beyond that we hadn't really paid much attention to who else would be playing. In general, we are not up on new music. Most of our music collection in Baltimore consisted of 30 year old records, and Max was fairly active in the NJ/NY hardcore scene in the late 1990s. Deciding to document Blind Pilot's tour is the most cutting edge decision we have made in a long time.

After the band loaded in their equipment, and we got our forms signed, at the Fez, we went to the Roseland Ballroom and saw the first part of Bouncing Souls' set. Max wanted to express his Jersey pride, and see how the intervening twelve years had treated them. It was cool to see that three out of four 'Souls were still the same, but they were definately much older than when Max last saw them. Although they did still have a lot of energy and the 16 year-olds there were moshing in the front, singing along. We left and went back to the Fez Ballroom to set up for Blind Pilot's show. There were a lot of the bands on the lineup, and they did a quick sound check before they went on, which is difficult when there are nine musicians to mix. The result was that the vocals were too soft, and the feedback from their monitors was awful. After seeing them at so many venues, we have gotten fairly used to what it sounds like when well mixed and well delivered. They played through the feedback, and not being able to hear themselves play and the audience stayed enthusiastic - another testament to their ability to engage a crowd.

After the show, we figured we'd check out Helio Sequence at the Crystal Ballroom, a Portland-based band that people at the festival had been buzzing about. We caught the last part of the show and their final song when they were joined by Menomena, one of the Luke's favorite bands. It was great music that made us pretty happy. In addition, Isreal met Helio Sequence after the show, gave them a CD and was told that they already had the album and had listened to it (all the way through and more than once)and really liked it. Israel was visibly honored- glowing even.

We met up with some of the band outside the Crystal ballroom afterward, and all headed over to see if we could catch Sir Mix-a-Lot, and for the first time that weekend, the press passes could not get us into the show. We did manage to send a camera up with Israel to get this photo, as the band said they had to go get their instruments from backstage. We also hung out with some fans who couldn't get in, and then watched them get escorted off the premesis after they posed for a photo of them begging to get in.

After getting our camera back, we saw the last two songs of Flipper, the legendary San Francisco-based band that now features Krist Novaselic on bass - which was funny after our time in Elma, WA where he was referenced a lot and Blind Pilot was compared to Nirvana. Bruce was spot on, pitcher of beer in hand. They were loud, awesome and a great way to end the evening. We headed back to Luke's garage, making one last pit stop at Potato Champion, before we head out of Portland- and this time we won't be coming back any time soon.

Our week in the Willamette Valley

2008-09-06T12:08:00.000-07:00

As mentioned, we are back in Portland for Music Fest NW, trying to catch up on work and preparing for the big push south starting on Monday. We had a nice week traveling south with Blind Pilot, stopping for shows in Corvallis and Eugene. The ride started at Tiny's, a coffee shop near our favorite fry stand, Potato Champion, where we met up with Ryan's friends Sarah and Erin, who wanted to ride along for a couple of hours but soldiered on for the entire first day, Kristine, one of two violinists who play with the band in Portland, and Ezra, a friend and reporter for the Portland Mercury who planned to embed himself with the band. Ezra and Kristine planned to ride along until their show in Eugene on Wednesday. Neither of them are avid bikers, but managed to keep up with the group and get into the daily groove after the first day.

The band had two days to make it to a scheduled gig in Corvallis at FireWorks Lounge. The roads where fast and the flat tires were minimal, so they made it to their planned midway point Monday night. That point was McMinnville, chosen simply for its midwayness between Portland and Corvallis. There are no places to camp anywhere near McMinnville, and for the first time, the band could not convince any of the establishments there to let them play.

In Corvallis, they played FireWorks, which had by the far the most interesting acoustics yet. They played in the corner of the outside patio, which featured glass walls, a sloping wooden roof and a large brick pizza oven. *(see corrections below, 2/14/09) We determined that the best sound would probably be found right on the edge of the oven, but didn't want to risk melting our plastic coated wires. We were generously hosted by Nate and Lillian, Luke's friends from Astoria, although it was a bit cramped to have all eight of us in their apartment.

The next stop was in Eugene, where Israel and Ryan met at the University of Oregon. They played Sam Bond's Garage, a great venue with extremely helpful people. After getting lots of up close shots, Max hung back a bit to see if he could get a long shot over the crowd. Todd, one of the owners, tapped him on the shoulder and led up to the supply attic, where he was able to get a free crane shot of the entire venue for the last three songs. Very cool.

One of the nicest parts of this trip was that Emily's parents flew in to visit and to help celebrate her birthday. The visit felt far too short, as we were busy working and only in town for a few days, but it was wonderful to see them.

The band headed back to Portland via van on Thursday, and we headed to Silver Falls State Park for the evening. We have been on the road for about six weeks now and have been so appreciative of all the people who have generously put us up along the way. We have found though, that campsites are now what really feel like home, as it is technically "ours" for the evening. Max made some yummy corn chili for Emily's birthday dinner and we befriended our campsite neighbors, Johnney and Kate, who travel to festivals selling really beautiful water bottles. They brought over Fizzgig, the cutest Pomeranian puppy ever, for us to play with (Buzz stayed in the car) and Emily had a great birthday.

* Update 2/14/09. Thanks to Ocean Liff-Anderson, Proprietor, FireWorks Venue in Corvallis who recently commented and gave us the accurate building materials in the courtyard. The courtyard walls are "cob", a free-form version of adobe earthen construction, not glass and the oven is also made of earth, not brick. Very cool. He also sent us a picture of a wood fired apple gorgonzola pizza fresh from the oven. Yum.

Please Stand By: Technical Difficulties

2008-09-05T14:05:00.000-07:00

Keeping in sync with the band, shooting, logging, editing, and trying to maintain this blog is only possible when we are lucky, and over the past week we have not been lucky enough to keep everything up to date. From time to time we will run up against situations that are downright luckless and that makes us cranky and frustrated. Then we have to try and get over that so that luck may smile on us again.

As soon as those lazy days in SE Portland came to a close and we hit the road again, Buzz the traveling cat had a bad couple of days. She stopped eating and became listless. This led us to think about taking her to the vet, but first we went to the interVet. We learned that diabetic cats need a grain free, protein rich food, and were astonished to find that the food our vet back home prescribed is really neither of these things. It seems the veterinary industry runs much like the human health care industry. Companies donate money to the Veterinary Association and in turn veterinarians prescribe their product. We are mad that it took us this long (she was diagnosed diabetic more than two years ago) to realize we were not doing the best thing for her condition, but never thought to verify the advice of a trained health care professional. Luckily we were on our way to Corvallis when we discovered this, and found the friendliest, most well stocked pet store imaginable called Animal Crackers. The staff helped us find a food that was good for her and offered to let us return it if she didn't start eating again. She did, and is looking and feeling much better (as shown in photo)

Then the hard drive with all of our footage pretended to crash. Yes, we should back that up, but haven't had the extra hours to do so. This scare led us to take the time to do so, but we became a little out of sync with the bike touring as a result. But there's no point in risking all the footage we have in order to keep getting all the footage we can. We keep having to remind ourselves that we will make the film out of what we were able to get and must let go of the rest.

Luckily Blind Pilot covered that week pretty well on their blog, so those who need to know how it went can look there, but please stand by for our take on it, which should be here soon. Right now we are back in Portland for the band's set at Music Fest Northwest, back in Luke's garage, and this time have no intention of getting comfortable, just getting back up to speed.

What's a Doug Fir?

2008-09-02T12:41:00.000-07:00

The show at Doug Fir Lounge, the reason for our return to the band's home base, was on Saturday, August 30. They played a perfect set with the non-bike-touring members of the band, Dave (Trumpet, Keys,) Joel (pedal steel,) Ian (vibraphone,) Shawn and Kristine (violins,) although sans Kati, as she was in a wedding that weekend in Bellingham, to a sold out and captivated crowd. To do so at a place that was very recently too high profile to return their calls was an amazing thing to witness. Israel and Luke encored with " Rock Salt and Nails", a beautiful old song by Bruce "Utah" Phillips that Kati had taught them while in Gearhart. It was the perfect compliment to the high energy set of the full band and a reminder that Kati was with them in spirit.

It felt odd to be back in PDX so soon, and for so long, but we got to stay with Luke and his wonderfully welcoming housemates, Melissa, Adan, and Max, in SE Portland. The neighborhood was as different as you could find from the Pearl District in which Ryan's gallery, where we stayed with Ryan before the tour, sits fishbowl-like. The house was lovely, with a big porch, a yard, and lots of really nice people to sit, drink coffee, and talk with. The downtime was a welcome distraction, but always felt undeserved so early in the tour. The band felt restless, itching to get back on the road, but needed the time to tie up yet more loose ends. In the greenroom of the Doug Fir, Luke remarked that they where excited to be playing for such a large group of people, and with such good sound, but the consensus was that they all wanted to be back on the road. "Back in that tent. I miss the smell of all of us after a day of biking," Ryan quipped. To which Israel reflected, "I miss the smell too. It's the smell of freedom."

The road back home and how do the filmmakers in "when bears attack" do it?

2008-08-29T16:00:00.000-07:00

The band departed from Astoria on Tuesday morning to begin the two-day ride back to Portland for their show at the Doug Fir lounge on Saturday, August 30. It was nice to get back on the road. Although it felt good to have a few days of downtime while we were in Gearhart for the Concert for Big Red, it was hard for us to relax. Max was working on the most recent video we have posted, and Emily is still trying to learn about sound.

So far on the journey, we have been pretty astounded at how well the biking part of the tour has been going. There have been a few flat tires and some other mishaps along the way, but no injuries or major delays. In fact, their incredibly good luck has made following them even more difficult for us, as anticipating luck striking is not the easiest task.

About 10 miles into their trip back to Portland, Israel noticed that his hand painted flag (which he had already lost and found once) had fallen off of his trailer at some point along their ride. He decided to go back to look for it and left his trailer and backpack (still holding our wireless microphone, which he now requests in the morning) in some bushes. He then got a flat at about the same time that the rest of the group arrived at a Shell station in Westport and began enjoying some make-your-own burgers. Finally! we thought, some drama on this trip. We filmed the trio at the gas station as they discussed Israel's predicament and then headed up the road to find Israel to see how he was doing. It was really hard to watch him struggle with a ripped tube, trying to inflate it, as it got darker and darker and then began to drizzle. We finally left Israel to walk along the road and eventually get picked up by a kind person who also helped him collect his trailer.

Being objective observers and documenters of people you consider to be good friends is harder than one might think. We have always said that we would put down the camera and help them if they found themselves in a dangerous situation or if someone was hurt. But what about these minor errors in preparation? It would have been simple for us to go get a new tube for Israel, but we were instructed to remain separate and not "cheat." The band is dead set on handling thse situations as if we are not there. Still, a problem solver by nature, Max found it hard to not suggest ideas, and Emily could not help herself from offering Israel water. We just hope that our documentation of this tour will make up for any impact that may come along with our presence.

Strange Sounds on the Waterfront: Blind Pilot plays the Concert for Big Red in Astoria, OR

2008-08-28T13:42:00.000-07:00

We left the show in Elma, WA at about midnight and arrived in Gearhart, OR two hours later at the house where the band was staying for the three days of the Concert for Big Red festival. One of Israel's parent's friends had donated their beautiful house for the band to stay in for the weekend. Blind Pilot was scheduled to play both on Friday and on Sunday, and it felt luxurious to spend four days in one location and be able to use a kitchen to make awesome breakfasts together.

The Concert for Big Red was a benefit to help restore the historic net loft in Astoria, OR, a building that Israel's father, Royal Nebeker, purchased in 1997 and transformed into artist studios and living spaces.

Ryan and Israel spent the winter of 2005-2006 living in Big Red, painting, writing the songs for their current album, Three Rounds and a Sound, and planning their first bike tour that they took in the summer of 2006. During the Great Gale in December 2007, the building suffered major damage and the third floor was torn off. Royal has been rebuilding since the storm, but the project is beyond what anyone can do on their own. The concert was a benefit to raise funds and awareness for the effort to rebuild the space even better than before and help cement a home base for the Astoria arts community. The event was organized by Gordon "Gordo" Styler, with the help of a lot of great folks and truly inspirational musicians.

It was an honor to be invited to be there and to film Blind Pilot's set. This video is our way of saying thanks, as well as the reason it took us this long to post about the concert.

Strange Sounds on the Waterfront: Blind Pilot plays the concert for Big Red.

Blind Pilot Conquers Washington State

2008-08-27T14:10:00.000-07:00

Our first tour video is now complete. Sound and video gathering on the road are coming together, and we are pleased to present the state of our progress here. We are also trying out viddler.com as the host for this short as opposed to vimeo, which always seems to be maintaining itself when we want to upload.

Camping with waterfalls and rocking Elma, WA

2008-08-23T13:21:00.001-07:00

Israel did arrive at 8am as promised, but we lingered around Britta's apartment for a few hours finishing laundry and eating breakfast. We all began to head towards Pier 52 in Seattle to catch our third ferry so far. The ferry ride to Bremerton would begin the ride to Astoria.

We drove onto the ferry, sure that the band would be making the earliest ferry possible in hopes of covering some real ground that day. We were wrong and ended up arriving to a hard rain in Bremerton two hours before they were destined to show up.

The rain let up for a brief time as soon as they arrived, and we all started moving towards Twanoh State Park for the night. Twanoh has separate campsites for hiker/bikers and motorized travelers. We arrived and found a semi-remote campsite near a waterfall, thanks to the helpful advice of Robin, the park ranger.

Following them in a car has been frustrating. Can we be unobtrusive and also expect to be there for the good stuff? Will their experience be drastically altered by the presence of us and our car? These questions and more led us to believe separate campsites would do us some good. The band was thinking the same thing, but the same rush hour traffic we hit slowed them down a lot and they set sites on a closer park than the one we camped at. We got the call as we were settling in and thanked them for giving us the time off. We thought it might be better to let them do their thing and have something to tell us about next time we rolled up in the car. It poured that night, and we, safe under our tarp, worried about their precarious rain flies and if they had set up before the rain and dark settled in.

When we caught up with them the next morning we found that they did indeed have a great story to tell us. About a mile from their campsite, in the pouring rain, they happened upon a tavern with a sign out front that read simply "songwriters." They described venturing in to see what this meant and finding a great band playing country songs from the 50s and 60s. The guitarist was apparently enormous, his gigantic hands somehow touching only the right places on the fretboard to produce beautiful music. The bass player was painted as an intriguing man with a mustache that curled round in a fantastic way. When the band was done playing, our intrepid travellers asked if they could set up and play, and were welcomed warmly. This allowed their perfect streak of playing a show every night, no matter where they ended up, to continue.

Lady luck would grin widely once more that night when one of the patrons recognized them from the ferry to Port Townsend, introduced himself, and invited them to sleep at his house- a warm dry place complete with surplus hospital mattresses. We will never worry about these folks again.

The next morning it was decided that the best they could hope to do was make it to a rendezvous point in Elma, WA, where Israel's father would meet them in his car, U-Haul trailer attached for their instruments. The band hit Highway 101 for the first time and made it to Elma before dark.

As we were packing up their bikes with Israel's dad Royal outside Shujacks, one of four bars in Elma (the locals informed us that only three were worth our time, though), we were approached by the owner. Although they weren't expecting to play that night, almost immediately a deal was struck to have the band play a show before they hit the road again.

The carpeted room provided awful acoustics, and a wireless microphone was rigged up halfway through the set for the vocals. They set up by the pool table and the crowd soon warmed up to them, and began making references to Nirvana, which had originated in that area. It seemed that every person had a personal connection to Krist Novaselic. Elma, WA was impressed, and the streak continued. Six shows in six days, not bad.

Another ferry ride, this time to the big city

2008-08-22T12:24:00.000-07:00

The one downside to sleeping over at a coffee house would be having to get up at 5:30am so that they could start selling coffee, right? Well it would, if the coffeehouse wasn't run by teenagers. In fact, the only pressure to get up early came from the fact, learned late the night before, that the Port Townsend to Seattle ferry no longer runs, and the band would need to ride 40 extra miles to catch the one at Bainbridge. Still there was time enough for Kati to demonstrate her espresso making abilities and make us all lattes. A real master of the craft (She and Ryan met while working at Common Grounds) it was quite the treat after a few days of gas station coffee. After a leisurely breakfast, we hit the road by noon and promptly lost them. Max had written down what appeared to be their route for the day, but turned out to be only the second half of their directions, and Emily had missed Ryan's call alerting us to their route. We ended up finding them at a gas station where they were engaging in a corn dog eating contest. They had a show that night at the High Dive in Seattle, and were planning on meeting up with members of the .83 bicycle group, who Ryan and Israel had met two summers ago on their first bike tour, at 7pm for a group bike ride. They made it by seven, but as we approached Seattle, the rain that had been following us so far began again. The bike ride was put off, but the .83 bikers still showed up at the High Dive anyway to encourage their favorite biking band.

The Seattle Weekly had a nice blurb and picture about their concert, and a sizable crowd braved the rain to see them play. Although we are not on bicycles, we are still able to experience the wonderful slowness of a bike tour. Seattle was the first major city that we had visited since starting the tour 5 days prior, which would be unheard of in a typical tour. Although the band was fully miked, they still managed to create an intimate sound in the noisy venue. We were able to plug into a board for the first time to record sound (thanks, Robert!) We then spent a much appreciated dry night at Luke's friend from Astoria, Britta's, apartment, which was only 6 blocks away, albeit the steepest 6 blocks you ever did see. The plan was to meet Israel, who stayed with some other friends, at pier 52 at 8am, where the ferry would take them from Seattle to Bremerton. The ferry would begin the long ride to Astoria to make it to their next show at the Concert for Big Red. Due to some scheduling issues, they had to arrive for their first set Friday morning instead of Sunday, and the 180 miles that separated them loomed large.

The Boiler Room

2008-08-21T10:29:00.000-07:00

The name led us to imagine a basement dive bar, perhaps full of gruff sea dogs quietly mulling over their beers. Instead we found a nonprofit, volunteer run, drug, alcohol, and jerk free youth-oriented coffeeshop. The all-ages crowd was a great audience, and pretty jazzed on espresso.

Over the door in the Boiler Room was the following quote: "Be not inhospitable to strangers, lest they be angels in disguise." We and the band had not figured out where we would stay that night, and as the day's drizzling rain continued into the night, camping did not seem like a great option. After the show, they asked the manager, Jason, if it might be alright if we crashed on the floor so they wouldn't have to bike and camp in the rain. Not only did he welcome all of us with open arms, but he made tea, handed out cookies and generally increased our love of the Boiler Room and Port Townsend to a glowing level. Kati, Luke and Israel worked on harmonies in one corner while Ryan and I worked on our respective blogs. It was warm and dry and wonderfully hospitable.

Since coming out west, we have been working on shaking off some of the East coast cynicism and general mistrust of strangers. Our night in Port Townsend was a great step in the right direction.

Through Deception Pass and into the Boiler Room

2008-08-19T01:05:00.000-07:00

One of the challenges of documenting this tour is sound, not only recording shows at a wide variety of venues from campsites to coffee shops to large clubs, but capturing their conversations about the journey and the band's interactions with strangers that they meet along the way. We want to be as unobtrusive as possible, and holding a directional microphone a few feet away from them as they have casual conversations on the side of the road doesn't seem like the best tactic.

We had briefly discussed at dinner the night before the idea of Israel wearing the wireless lavalier microphone so we could capture sound while still maintaining some distance, which he was into. In Anacortes, the rest of the group headed out away from camp to start the ride towards Port Townsend and left Israel to finish packing up his trailer. We took this opportunity to ask him to wear the lav- more because he was not talking to anyone else and we had his full attention than to keep it a secret from the other members.

The process had an undercover informant feel to it nonetheless and we joked about it. Adding to the mob movie feel of the whole operation was how perfectly Israel's Camelback concealed the wire. It provided a mesh pocket on the shoulder strap to both filter out some wind noise and hide the mic.

Besides being a less obtrusive way to gather sound, the wireless mic also provided a way for us to know when they are close. This is invaluable when we have gone ahead to find a shot and once we are set up have no idea how long it will be before they pass through it.

Even with our covert operative / makeshift tracking system in the form of Israel and the bug, we ended up losing them shortly after they passed through ironically named Deception Pass. We knew they where headed to the Keystone-Port Townsend ferry later that afternoon so we headed there monitoring for signal through the car stereo.

When they rolled up to where the car was we where no longer sitting in it, and our eyes saw them before the receiver picked them up. Not thinking to unplug the car audio hookup, the jig soon became up when the whole band heard Israel's usually soft voice booming out of the speakers. Before this it hadn't occurred to us that there was any real jig, but as the rain was closing in and the skies turned grey, the ominous clouds added to our realization that perhaps the bug was a violation of the band's trust.

The other members where taken aback that we had done this secretly, more that Israel had not told them about it, but after we talked about our intentions things seemed to smooth over, and we all sailed to Port Townsend for their show that evening at the Boiler Room. Communication on all levels is not to be underestimated here. It is the backbone of covering their story as well as maintaining the mutual trust and understanding that will lead to a great documentary.

Do we need David Attenborough to narrate this documentary?

2008-08-18T11:30:00.000-07:00

After more last minute bike preparations, including fixing Kati's brakes and putting the finishing decorating touches on Luke's trailer, the intrepid quartet headed off to their first stop on the bike tour in Anacortes, WA.

We had a vague sense of their route that they would take for the day, and kept doubling back to try to catch good shots of them as they rode their first 40 miles of their journey. Ryan later joked that he expected Max to be hiding in the bushes wearing full camo gear, or up against a red building, wearing all red. We did lose them for a few miles, when we diverted ourselves onto a parallel road to route. Purchasing a copy of their bicycle route map is on the to do list.

There was no planned show in Anacortes, so the band members began asking at the restaurants and venues along the main route in town if they would let them play. After some persistance and encouraging the bar manager to check out their songs (Israel gave him an iPod, but he found them on Myspace), it was agreed that they could play a set that night at the Brown Lantern Ale House. Although they were competing with a plasma TV playing the Olympics coverage of men's gymnastics, the dinner crowd quickly ended their conversations and began paying attention to the music. Somehow, their energy level seemed even higher than the night before, despite having spent the better part of the afternoon riding bikes.

Around 10pm, Max and Emily headed to the nearby Washington Park to set up a large tarp to ward off the forecasts of hail and get Buzz settled in for the night after her evening spent patiently sitting in the car. Despite some noisy neighbors and drama that apparently goes with camping overnight in a city owned park, it was nice to set up camp and feel satisfied with competing a full day of tracking, filming at a venue and successfully finding a place to sleep. Only 59 days to go.

The adventure begins...

2008-08-17T12:37:00.000-07:00

After enjoying a champagne toast and a delicious quiche provided by Ryan's friend Sarah, we made it out of Portland with just enough time to make it to Bellingham, WA for their first show at The Hub Community Bike Shop. Just enough time didn't account for the Saturday rush hour traffic jam we encountered in Seattle on I-5, so we arrived halfway through Kati's other band, The Mighty Ghosts of Heaven's set.

Under the full moon, Blind Pilot began their tour playing to a small crowd of bike enthusiasts in the lovely backyard garden of The Hub. It was quite beautiful, but made us realize that we may need to set up two lights in the near future for similarly light (i.e., no light) shows. Jared, from The Hub, stayed late and volunteered to give tune-ups to all of them. Tired and anticipating a big next day of riding for them, and our first experience with attempting to film them on the road, we headed back to Kati's bandmate Linnea's family's house on the shores of Lake Samish. We set up our tent by the edge of the lake and fell asleep gazing at the full moon. A good start.

And we're off!

2008-08-16T11:16:00.000-07:00

The car is all packed up, and the bikes and trailers are awaiting to be loaded into Ryan's minivan for the journey to Bellingham, WA for their first show at The Hub this evening. Ryan's friend Sarah has been texting with updates about a delicious quiche that she is making for us to enjoy before the journey. We completed most of our to do list yesterday (including waking up early enough to film the sunrise over Portland from the top of Mt. Tabor and getting an oil change and tune up for the Subaru). We still have not purchased a can opener, which will make enjoying the chili and tuna we have difficult. It's all terribly exciting.

Flags, Studio and Mighty Ghosts

2008-08-13T23:53:00.000-07:00

We and the band are busily preparing for departing for Bellingham, WA on Saturday. Although we already packed up the car once to make the cross country trip, we are modifying the set up to make it easier for Max to transfer footage to the computer and are planning on tinting out the back windows to make it less hot for Buzz.

Monday night Ryan, Israel, Luke and Kati gathered for "arts and crafts night" where each band member painted their flag for their trailers and discussed the nitty gritty of the trip. A four sided toothbrush and towel were longed for, and Kati put her foot down about communal deodorant. It is still undecided if single drip or if a french press will be the preferred coffee maker. Cliffhangers abound with only a couple days left before go time.

What would you do if you had two days to pack it up and hit the road? Record a new song? No? Well, that's what Blind Pilot did today. All nine Portland based members of the band gathered throughout the day to lay down "We Are The Tide", which happens to be the primary song featured in our recently posted video. Jake Portrait expertly mastered the track at Audible Alchemy in North Portland, which is superbly nearby to Por Que No? Taqueria (have wementioned the importance of blood sugar enough?).

Ryan's friend Sarah treated us to a lovely evening tour of Portland after our time at the studio, taking us to Mt. Tabor to film the sunset and eat an exorbitant amount of Thai food from Pad Thai Kitchen on Belmont. We then caught the last half of Kati's band, The Mighty Ghosts of Heaven, at the Laurelthirst. Kati gave us a CD when we came out in May, and it is an impressive recording, but their live show blew us away. They have been playing together for eight years, and it was obvious in their mastery of the material and the rapport they had as a band on stage. They will also be playing on Saturday with Blind Pilot as they begin their bike tour and we can't wait to see them again.

Bike Trailer

2008-08-12T19:13:00.000-07:00

Blind Pilot performs "We Are the Tide" at the Providence Bridge Pedal in Portland, OR

We finally had a morning of downtime yesterday. Emily worked on the blog and Max edited a five minute trailer with some of the footage we have been gathering.

Musical Sunday in Portland

2008-08-11T12:58:00.000-07:00

Blind Pilot's last show in Portland before their tour begins was at the finish line of the 13th annual Providence Bike Pedal, a great bike friendly event where most of the bridges spanning the Willamette River are closed to motorized traffic and open to over 17,000 bikers and walkers for most of the morning and early afternoon. Kati and her husband Aaron showed up at Ryan's gallery at 8am, with Kati's bike trailer filled with her banjo, mountain dulcimer, and ukulele. Israel and Ryan soon followed (Luke was meeting us at the stage) and they set off for their first show traveled to by bike. The crowd loved their two sets, and Max loved shooting a show in the daylight.

Later that evening, we went to see Gabe Rozzell & The Decency (Ryan's friend Sarah is the drummer) play at the Alberta St. Public House in NE Portland. It was a pleasure to see a show and not have to think about lighting, sound quality and filming. The Decency plays a great set of country music, something we became quite fond of during our drive out to Oregon.

Prior to The Decency playing, we caught the last half The Crying Shame's set, a Seattle-based band that was in town for the night. The lead singer's Leonard Cohen-esque vocals draped themselves beautifully over a blistering string duo and the singer's own aggressive acoustic guitsr strumming. Sarah referred to it as "face-melting." Yes, indeed.

Ode to Luke's trailer

2008-08-10T17:38:00.000-07:00

We have loved traveling to Astoria, OR during the last week to capture the final stages of construction on Luke's upright bass trailer. It's a beautiful coastal town with cute shops, delicious bakeries and a much slower speed than Portland. Watching Luke build and work through design issues, while maintaining the most positive attitude we have experienced in a long time, has also helped us work through some of the issues and difficulties that we have come upon in the past week.

Here is Luke in the epoxy tent in Astoria, OR:

(left) Bass case at Luke's home in Astoria, waiting to be transported back to Portland.

(right) Case inspiring awe at the Portland bridge pedal show, where it made it's debut. It is an aluminum frame, with wooden pillow blocks and a handmade case with epoxy coating. It weighs about 80 lbs. when loaded.

New working title?

2008-08-09T21:32:00.000-07:00

We have been joking over the past week that our new working title should be "logistical nightmare," and we haven't even hit the road yet! We are trying to gather a baseline on the band members to show them in their day-to-day lives here in Portland as well as what they are doing to prepare for the tour which is only complicated by the fact that with only a week to go, they are busy, and, all in different locations. We are actually looking forward to when they will be no more than a mile apart at all times...

Over the course of the last week we have:

Met up and staged initial interviews with all four members, both at home and at work,
Traveled to Astoria, OR (80 miles away) three times to catch up with Luke as he finished construction on the awesome bass bike trailer that he designed and built,
Filmed Israel rerecording vocals at Miracle Lake Studios with Skylar Norwood, the producer of 3 Rounds and a Sound
Caught Luke's interview by Liam Dunne on KMUN coastal radio in Astoria,
Discovered that food is our best friend in fighting of exhaustion, low-blood sugar induced stress, and moments where we ask ourselves why we are trying to do something this difficult. Our favorite place in Portland for a shot of enthusiasm is Potato Champion!, a wonderful late night fry stand at the corner of 12th and Hawthorne in SE Portland.

Speaking of logistics, we also have decided that we need a second camera, which we have been referring to as the "band cam." Our primary camera, a Panasonic HVX200A, produces beautiful crisp images during daylight hours, but the low-light capabilities leave much to be desired. We do have a light kit and the ability to light venues, and the guests at the birthday party on Sauvie Island on Friday night were kind enough to not mind the 200-watt paper lantern that we hung in order to augment the candles and string of Christmas tree lights. Cosy lighting is lovely, but not film friendly. Now we are searching for the ideal second camera: great in low-light, easy to use auto functions so the band members can pick it up at campsites or backstage, and with a price that fits our already stretched budget. Any and all suggestions are welcome!

Preparing in Portland, more shows, more interviews

2008-08-04T09:41:00.000-07:00

We (us and Buzz, she was pleased to get out of the car but actually seemed like she could have kept going) settled in at Ryan's gallery/living space in the Pearl District of Portland. On Saturday, Ryan's friend Sarah came over and showed Emily where the Trader Joe's in the area is, very important for cheap living. We'd love to eat out every meal at Portland's fine restaurants, but we might not make it to October with the band.

Blind Pilot had their second of three shows that weekend on Saturday at the "How Oregon Are You?" party, a fundraiser for the nonprofit p:ear, which mentors homeless youth in Portland. Emily easily passed through the "border patrol" and received a green sticker for being born in Oregon. Max's 24 hours in Portland earned him the dreaded orange sticker. Although we did not know any of the answers to the Oregon trivia questions, we did get to sample some tasty Oregon microbrews and discuss lighting for future shows. Although the band looks cool being backlit by porch lights, we are glad we brought a DIY lighting kit for future shows.

After waking up Sunday, we recuperated from the night before with some yummy breakfast sandwiches courtesy of Sarah and her roommate Ethan in their apartment overlooking the the Portland's Union Station. Blind Pilot's third and final show of the weekend was at Ron Tom's on E. Burnside. A bit before 6pm, Ryan and Israel headed out to the show and we jumped into the Subaru to follow them but discovered that our car battery was dead. Perhaps having the power inverter plugged in while we weren't using the car was not a smart move. We managed to jump start the car, park near where we thought the venue was, relized we were three blocks away and returned to move the car and found that the short drive was not enough to charge up the battery. We called AAA (the best investment one can buy before a long road trip) and a we were soon visited by AAA's version of Car Talk's Click and Clack, or as they soon proved to be: the most helpful battery truck team ever. They gave us the sad news that we needed a new battery for the car but then proceeded to tell us where we could buy one that would be cheaper than AAA. We made a stop at a nearby Fred Meyer where Max navigated the customer service lines three times in order to return our dead battery, buy a new one and then return the tools that he purchased as we had left our tool set at Ryan's. We made it back in time to Ron Tom's to see some of the opening band and made a quick detour to the B-side next door for a PBR and a microwave corndog. Yum. The crowd at Ron Tom's was at capacity, so Max had to be extra careful to not trip over any excited fans as he tested out the low light capabilities of the camera. Although dark, the footage still looked good, and the band concurred that the lighting was particularly low at that venue.

After the show, we returned to Ryan's to prep for the next day. The band members were all going to be working at their day jobs for the next few days and Luke was heading down to Astoria to finish building the bike trailer for his upright bass. We have lots on interviews ahead of us and plenty of work to do.

Saved by an angel...

2008-08-02T17:05:00.000-07:00

No hot spring action at Lolo, but with the help of a guardian angel, we made it to Portland unscathed by Friday night. We spent Thursday night at Lolo Hot Springs in Lolo, MT, but arrived too late to have a soak in their springs, which close at 9:30. On our way there, the 75 mph speed limit eventually led to Max pushing it a bit too far and cruising at around 90 to help us try to make it by closing time.

I suppose it was only a matter of time before the red and blues flashed behind us and we calmly pulled over despite the teenage nostalgia that image inspired in our driver. A very friendly Montana Highway Patrol officer informed us that we "picked the worst possible day to speed through Montana." Why was this day more speed conscious than any other? He went on to explain that it was due to the fact that not only were the Hells Angels were rallying in Missoula, MT that weekend, but the Testicle Festival was also about to go down in nearby Clinton. It was hard to keep a straight face when the officer said 'Testicle Festival,' but we did, and as Max looked around for the registration, our faithful MHP-man got a blip on his radio and said he had to go. It seems we were saved by an Angel that night as we saw our man giving some perfectly nice looking motorcycle enthusiasts the business about a mile later.

We slowed it down, and arrived too late to soak it up at Lolo. Instead we played some pool and shared some stories with Derek and Ryan, two brothers on their yearly motorcycle/camping trip. With a GPS and internet to guide us, it is easy to avoid talking to strangers. They reminded us of the importance of talking to other humans as you travel. We stayed up way too late and don't regret it at all.

After finding out in the morning that the hot springs were not part of the admission fee for our campsite, we turned the car towards Portland, OR and ended our quest to sit in hot water on this journey. There have to be hot springs along the west coast, right?

The last 500 miles of our journey were quite uneventful. Ryan texted us during the drive that Blind Pilot had a show at Portland State University at 9:30pm, an arrival time that would have been very achievable if we did not get sidetracked by Cabela's in Post Falls, ID. Max bought a cool retractable fishing pole as he had begun to regret leaving his back east. Emily really wanted to buy a 12-volt coffee maker for the car but was persuaded otherwise.

We pulled into Portland at 9:55pm, ate our first McDonalds of our entire journey (we didn't want to, but nothing else was open and we were in a hurry) and found our way to the basement show at Portland State University. The show had just started and we could hear "One Red Thread" as we walked down the stairs. We got our first taste of being on the guest list for a band and walked in to listen to the set. This was our first time hearing the entire ensemble live as the three shows we attended on the Coast in May were played by the biking quartet of Isreal, Ryan, Kati and Luke. After the show, we returned to Ryan's gallery and apartment in the Pearl District and we learned that there were two more shows that weekend. Maybe we'll rest next week.

Huckleberried

2008-08-01T21:28:00.000-07:00

Max awoke after a night sleeping at the base of the Grand Tetons, made some coffee and befriended the horses that had been grazing next to our tent during the previous night.

We got on the road by 8:30am, which was the earliest we had started a day of driving yet. After deciding that Thermopolis was too out of the way, and that surely we would find another hot spring in Wyoming, we drove due West to Grand Teton National Park, and then headed north. We stopped to ask at the ranger station about a more remote spring that we could partake in. Ranger Dan was very helpful, drew us a map showing a short one-mile hike to Huckleberry Springs, which he described as undeveloped but encouraged us to go explore. We set off down a dirt path with our swimsuits and a towel ready for a quick 45 minute detour. We forded a quickly moving stream, continued down the path swatting at horse flies and finally found Huckleberry Springs. The quaint name evoked a peaceful pool of bubbling warm water surrounded by flowers and berry bushes. We found a foot of murky, algae-filled, hot water. Thanks Ranger Dan. It took two hours in total and the one saving grace was that it let us see how Buzz would react to being left in the car for two hours in the middle of the day. We found her happy, cool, and asleep by the gas pedal.

We continued our drive into Yellowstone National Park, which was filled with cars of tourists gawking at the sites. After being amazed by the variety of the previous day's drive through southern Wyoming, Yellowstone was both grand and somehow uninspiring. Old faithful had a six flags vibe to it, but gave us a nice place to sit and write post cards to friends back home. Yellowstone emptied us out into Montana, which we soon realized is what happens when you add water to Wyoming. Like an expanding foam dinosaur Montana unfurled in front of us, dwarfing the beauty of Wyoming which had impressed us so much. The Mountains got bigger and greener, rivers and lakes emerged, and we were glad that we were traveling west and had seen Wyoming first, making it a primer for Montana's sublime landscape rather than a disappointment.

We decided to try and make it to Lolo Hot Springs, MT to camp. Surely there would be a hot spring in our future there.

The journey continues through Wyoming

2008-07-31T20:30:00.000-07:00

After waking up in the Medicine Bow National Forest and drinking coffee to warm us enough to pack up camp, we headed back down the mountain to Laramie, WY and the free wi-fi at their Safeway to figure out what else Wyoming had to offer us. It turned out that Wyoming has a lot to offer. Hot springs (Thermopolis has a free one in accordance with Chief Washakie's agreement), Devil's Tower (Emily thought this was just a figment of Steven Spielberg's imagination), Yellowstone (we had our pic-a-nic basket), the Grand Tetons, a rodeo in Jackson, WY and so much more. It became clear that there was too much to see and do if we wanted to keep our schedule of reaching Portland by August 1. Making it to Jackson, WY for the evening and catching their rodeo, perhaps checking out a hot spring on the way and driving through the Grand Tetons in the morning seemed like a reasonable plan.

Our drive criss-crossed us over the Continental Divide and through vast empty areas. We have never been to a part of the country that was as unpopulated that it was possible to run out of gas if you didn't plan ahead. As we drove across the treeless landscape, Emily grew hungrier and hungrier and wanted to stop and make sandwiches with the Laramie salami and Iowa cukes. Just as blood sugar was dwindling to a bickering level, Wyoming DOT's Sweetwater Station rest area appeared on the horizon. We dined in a windy picnic shelter. As we were preparing to head out, three bicylists that we had passed a few miles earlier rode in to take a break. As we are on our way to document a similar journey, we struck up a conversation and learned that they too had left from the Baltimore area and were making their way to Astoria, OR. Small world.

Internet and cellular signals continued to be weak, leading us to drastic measures to find a wifi signal. Max found one behind the Exxon that we stopped at in Dubois, WY.

It turns out that Jackson, WY is a pretty happening town. To keep out the rif-raf (us,) hotel rooms were $200 and up, and all the campgrounds in the area were filled. As darkness was quickly approaching and the cost of a hotel room was way out of our budget, we decided to drive towards the Grand Tetons and hope to find the perfect campsite/RV park: cheap, with a restaurant so we wouldn't have to set up the camp stove and eat beans again for dinner, and with free wifi so we could catch up on our blogging.

As we approached the National Park, we spotted the Grand Teton Park RV 'Resort', called and found that it was $40 to stay the night. As previously mentioned, we (Emily in particular) are quite scared of bears entering our camp and decided that the perceived safety, and wifi signal, were worth the price. We checked in, met a real cowboy in the convenience store (he was advertised as a horse whisperer on the cowboy church flyer in the bathroom), bought a can of chili for dinner and a Wyoming sticker for our rooftop carrier and set up our tent as the sun set behind the Teton mountain range. Our tent had wi-fi, so we sat side by side in our layered clothes and sleeping bag and typed away.

The quiet of the evening, albeit interupted occasionally by the humming of RV generators, was broken by the sound of galloping hooves punctuated by snorts. Buzz immediately sat up and we peered out the mesh door of our tent to see that the field next to us was now inhabited by horses grazing about ten feet away. Horses beat out bears any day.

Wyoming - Day 1 (and the rest of Nebraska)

2008-07-30T08:30:00.000-07:00

We spent most of the morning and afternoon driving over the vast spaces that Nebraska inhabits. It's the longest state that we have driven through as yet. We did enjoy a few of the state owned rest areas, where Buzz ventured out of the car to relax under a tree while we ate sandwiches. As the mile markers drew closer to zero, our excitement of conquering Nebraska was tempered by the fear that the seemingly endless prairie would merely continue into Wyoming.

Admittedly, we have not done too much planning for our trip out west. Although we had a general sense of the route we would take, we planned on using the EVDO Verizon Modem to plan where to go and where to stay. But as I-80 through Nebraska transformed from an information superhighway into a slow trickle of random cellular signals, we had to quickly estimate where we would end up and locate a suitable place to camp.

Shoshone sounded nice, but -possibly for the first time on this trip -we decided to be realistic and aim for the Libby Creek Willow campground in Medicine Bow National Forest. Worst case scenario would be showing up way before sunset and being able to go further into the forest to cover more ground and maybe even try to do some dispersed camping.

We were wrong about the endless prairie. Wyoming exploded into our field of vision as soon as the the sign announced its welcoming attitude. Immediately, mountain ridges rose from the horizon and we quickly passed through Cheyenne, WY. We made a quick stop in the Safeway in Laramie, WY for some salami and beans to add to the rice we had brought along and headed down Snowy Range Road to Medicine Bow. Max had called ahead to find out more information about the campsites available, and on the second call learned that there had been a bear sighting at Libby Creek. As we carry along our own bear bait (Buzz) wherever we go, we decided to try to camp as far away as possible from that particular site. We drove up into the mountain, and around the mountain, until we found an available site in Nash Fork Campground near some other friendly campers who lent us a can opener as we had forgotten to repack ours after the farewell tuna sandwiches we made in Baltimore.

We set up the tent, cooked dinner, nestled into our sleeping bags and proceeded to freeze throughout the night. Wyoming is beautiful and also very, very cold at night in the mountains. No bears came by and we did see some of the brightest stars that we have seen in a while, so a little lesson learned about the importance of layered clothes is not so bad in the larger scheme of things.

What has five 'I's but cannot see?

2008-07-29T22:11:00.000-07:00

Our goal was to make it as far across Nebraska as possible, but making it to Lincoln, a mere 60 miles into the behemoth that is NE, before Lazlo's shut its doors, and 'camping' in the nearby Motel 6 was the best we could do.

As this is the first time that either of us has driven across the country, it's hard to resist stopping at the many landmarks, rest stops, and vistas along the way. The Mississippi River was one of these milestones. A milestone into which Emily felt the deep need to dip her toes.

Two hours later we set out to conquer Nebraska, but first a little thing called Iowa stood in our way. Amongst the endless rows of King Corn, one highlight of this leg was finding fruitstands.com. This bare bones cornucopia of information was clearly assembled an earlier internet epoch, and so must be verified by calling the listed contacts or scoping out the area, but we were able to find a farmer's market in Urbandale, IA where we bought some delicious granola and three-seed bread from Big Sky Bakery and cucumbers and peppers from another stand which were much tastier than the avocados and cukes from the Bi-lo in Pennsylvania.

Chicagoland

2008-07-28T17:32:00.000-07:00

We made it to Chicago late Saturday night and made our way to Max's sister Karen's apartment. Through the kind of magic that only Craigslist can lead to, she happens to be subletting from everyone's favorite alcoholic older brother from an early 90's TV show, Micheal Stoyanov. Before we left Baltimore we were able to catch his performance as 'Dopey' in The Dark Knight at the Bengies Drive-In, and so were even more stoked to sleep on his floor.

After sleeping in, we spent the day walking around Karen's neighborhood. We stopped in Grant Park to watch the Criterium Bike Race and went to Millenium Park to take in the Bean. For those unfamiliar, the Bean is an enormous chrome... well, bean. It reflected an enraptured throng of tourists, busy gazing into it and back out at the city, proving that shiney objects attract people like moths to... well, a shiney object. Every city should get one.

Dinner and uplifting conversation were generously provided by Max's Chicago cousins, Tom and Debbie at Club Lucky in Wicker Park. It was a rare treat to see them and their daughter Sarah, and the night quickly passed.

Right now we are en route to Lincoln, Nebraska. We have two goals for Lincoln: 1) try and make it there in time to have a beer at Lazlo's Brewery and Grill- where Emily's friends Tiffany and Gretchen worked, met, and fell in love twelve years ago. and 2) get the hell out early so we can cover some real ground tomorrow.

Buzz

2008-07-27T21:35:00.000-07:00

One thing we have failed to give its due on this blog is the fact that we are traveling with our cat, Buzz.

Buzz was already a troubled teen when we took her in, and has grown to show us a capacity for love no one thought she had. She will still tear apart anyone who isn't us, but what can we say- nothing better for the ego than a creature that loves you and only you.

Ego boost that it is, we would still rather have left her, and her never ending stream of shed hair, with a friend. But you see, Buzz is not only unpleasant to other people, she is also diabetic. It seems that her childhood of being left alone in a NYC music studio with only a pile of food to console her has led to both her distrust of humans and the type two diabeties that requires her to be shot up every day with insulin. Vicious cycle. Vicious kitty.

Being a city kitty, she shows no desire to leave the apartment, let alone go camping. She spent the first part of the day yesterday in the car complaining and panting. And by the afternoon she looked like this.

She always likes the car, but the heat seems to stress her out sometimes. When we began to prepare to make this film, we knew it would be contingent on Buzz being a happy camper. We practiced a few times and she was better at it than we were. She doesn't scratch the tent, just gives a gentle people-in-the-walls nudge with her face to let us know she wants out. And when she does get out of the tent, 90% of the time it's because she wants to sit in the car instead. Couldn't ask for a better camping buddy.

But this extra soul in the car, with her diabetic food, insulin that must be kept cool, litter box, and box of syringes (no officer, I swear, those are for the cat) is not helping our chances of fitting everything we need to make the documentary in our trusty steed, or being truly able to go anywhere and do anything to get the shots we need. At some point she is sure to ruin our day, but she has brought her special secret love to so many of our days past that we have to take that risk.

Hit It

2008-07-26T19:36:00.000-07:00

A day late, but still on pace to make the coast by August, we are making the push to Chicago as I type. (thank you EV-DO) Saying goodbye to friends and neighbors was harder than we thought and we ended up getting the truck to Jersey late Thursday night. So we took Friday as an organizational day, as well as an opportunity to visit Max's Grandmother and Aunt in NY.

After a long and enjoyable dinner at Ardsley's own Pumpernickel, we headed back to Jersey to pack the car. The truck was already unloaded, but the car sat empty with an intimidating amount of gear- everything we thought we needed to camp and shoot- laid out in my mom's garage, threatening to keep us up too late to be safe drivers today.

Emily went to sleep and I pulled an all-nighter packing the car with only the 'essentials,' tetris- style. The deal was Emily would wake up this morning to a ready vehicle, refreshed and willing to drive the 750 or so miles to Chicago. It actually worked out and we are now just about 106 miles from Chi-town. While not exactly well rested, I am excited to be back in the Second City for the second time in my life (the first was in 1999 for Los Crudos' final show at the Fireside) and Emily, My Lady of Blessed Acceleration, is excited to stop driving soon.

Friday we head out - if I ever get off of hold talking to Verizon

2008-07-21T11:10:00.000-07:00

I'm on hold with the phone company. I have been for almost two hours, and can't seem to drag myself away from it now that I have so much time invested. We are trading our Verizon DSL service for their "Enhanced EV-DO Rev. A technology Wireless Modem" so we can post on the road. I am still in disbelief that the word extreme was nowhere on the packaging. I just hope it works and we can keep up with this blog without wasting time searching for wifi hotspots.

We have been busy the past week trying to clear out our little house in Baltimore. Emily had her last day at work on Thursday and can now focus completely on packing. Emily's mom Debbie came by yesterday and brought her packing guru skills and a massive rental car. We brought four loads of furniture and I'm not sure what else to our local thrift store. I don't know why they left it all outside, but all of it piled out there on asphalt was a bit depressing. Especially when it started pouring later that night.

Luckily we know that at least some of our stuff found a good home before the rain came. Max went back to shoot the lot full of our crap,and ran into a nice couple who live out of doors liberating our possessions from what would have been a watery grave. We hope they and the stuff they rescued stayed dry last night.

Our plan is this - pack for the next two days. Get a rental truck and pack it up Wednesday. Drive up to Max's mom's house in New Jersey on Thursday. Unload. Hang out and relax. Friday - drive 12 hours to Chicago and stay with Max's sister. Totally doable, right?

We'll see...

By the way, if you live in the Baltimore area and want to cancel your Verizon service, the direct number to a real person who can do that for you is (410)594-8493. Live outside the Baltimore area? While on hold with the main number, take a separate phone, (so you can still listen to that sweet hold music) and call all the local numbers you can find for your provider and eventually someone will take pity on you and give you the secret number. It is not listed. That's how you find it.

Good things are happening... why are we still in Baltimore?

2008-07-08T15:11:00.001-07:00

We had a great day selling a good amount of the possessions that we have acquired over the past six years this past Saturday at the Station North Flea Market (great place to de-excess and meet friendly people,) and yet - there is still more to pack and put on craigslist, the last throes of employment, and a whole country to cross.

Every day that goes by it seems like another milestone has gone unfilmed. Their record release party was packed; Aimee Mann invited them to open for her in Portland; and this week they were chosen as the itunes download of the week. This is a lot to have all gone down in our absence.

This is both inspiring and overwhelming as we had originally hoped to offer the band some exposure, and now it seems they are quite capable of exposing themselves. We now find ourselves frantically trying to tie up our loose ends so we can get out there before we miss any more.

By the way, the single is free, but the rest of the album is also discounted, so seize the opportunity to get the whole album for a low low price. The chosen single, "Go On, Say It," is an awesome song, and probably the most universally appealing of the bunch, but "One Red Thread" is my personal favorite.

The Tour

2008-06-27T23:22:00.000-07:00

Current Itinerary (subject to change)

Sat. August 16 Bellingham
Sun, August 17 Anacortes
Mon. August 18 Port Townsend
Tues August 19 Seattle
Fri. Aug 22-24 Astoria Festival
Mon. August 25 Cannon Beach Bonfire
Tue. August 26 Tillamook
Thu. August 28-31 Portland
Tues Sept. 2 Corvallis
Wed. Sept. 3-4 Eugene
Sun. Sept. 7 Coos Bay
Tue Sept. 9 Pistol River
Wed. Sept. 10 Brookings
Fri. Sept. 12-13 Arcata
Mon. Sept. 15 Standish Hickey Peg House
Wed. Sept. 17 Mendocino
Thu. Sept. 18 Gualala
Sat. Sept. 20 Marin
Sun. Sept. 21 - 27 Bay Area
Mon. Sept. 29 Santa Cruz
Tue. Sept. 30 Monterey
Wed. Oct. 1 Big Sur
Thu. Oct. 2 San Simeon
Fri. Oct. 3 TBA
Sat. Oct. 4 TBA
Sun. Oct. 5 Santa Barbara
Mon. Oct. 6 Malibu
Tue. Oct. 7-10 LA
Sat. Oct. 11 TBA
Sun. Oct 12 TBA
Mon. Oct 13 San Diego
Tue. Oct 14 Mexico

The Film

2008-06-27T23:21:00.001-07:00

In May 2008, we (Max and Emily) flew out to Portland, Oregon. Emily's job had sent her to a conference and Max came out for a long weekend. We were hoping to explore Portland and see our friend Ryan. Ryan had bad news though- his band had three shows on the northern coast and he would be out of town all weekend. Exploring the coast seemed like even more fun than staying in Portland anyway, so we tagged along.

The first gig was a 10am Cinco de Mayo blowout at Israel's old high school.
Watching from the back row of the classroom, we witnessed a group of otherwise apathetic teens grow more and more engaged as they played.

Afterwards, over some excellent tacos and virgin margaritas, we talked about their plans to tour the coast by bicycle, and remarked that following Blind Pilot's bike tour was the documentary we had been looking to make. We traveled with them to Astoria and Seaside, and fell in love with the joy and energy that these four musicians travel with. We saw people moved by their music everywhere they went.

People talk a lot about doing things that never get done, but we were determined to not let this opportunity slip away. So we sold most of our worldly possessions, gave our jobs notice we would be leaving, bought a tent, tuned up the car, and are about to head out to follow some wonderful people on bikes as they play their way down highway 101.

The Band

2008-06-27T23:17:00.000-07:00

Blind Pilot was formed in the summer of 2006 by Israel and Ryan. After touring the west coast from Vancouver to San Francisco by bicycle, they returned to Oregon to record 3 Rounds and a Sound, recently released on Expunged Records.

Along with band members Luke and Kati, Blind Pilot is kicking off their second west coast tour on bicycles. Leaving Bellingham, WA on August 16, 2008 they will wind their way down highway 101, playing shows along the way until they reach San Diego, CA.

Visit Blind Pilot's website and myspace page.