Best of Texas Review

So i am a terrible blogger, i had high hopes of writing everyday, that turned into once a week, and then that slipped to me writing notes on napkins again.

I am sorry i will get on it, i know there are millions of people waiting for our next update. We got a camera and will post some rad stuff soon.

We are off to the studio right now..... to make history and eat lots of cheese sandwiches.

But here's some kind words a better blogger wrote about us in The Best of Texas:

Thanks Kelly Dearmore from The Gobblers Knob:

http://www.thegobblersknob.com/

There is also a link to a free download

in the article:

http://blog.bestoftexas.com/?tag=the-lonesome-heroes

The Western Saloon & Run in with Ramblin' Jack Elliot

As I mentioned in an earlier post we tend to play some of the more out of the way, yet World Famous places and tonight Ramblin’ Jack Elliot was sitting at the bar at our show at The Great Western Saloon in Point Reyes. Apparently a few of our friends in Flagstaff are friends with his friends and told them to come check us out.

Point Reyes is only about 30 miles as a bird flies from San Fransisco, but a million worlds away. It was Jeff Manson’s 30^th birthday and we were surrounded by the most wonderful collection of Hippies, cowboys and general weirdos that I could ever imagine. We played with our friends Windy Gap & Leopold & His Fiction.

Ramblin' Jack used to travel with Woody Guthrie (is from Brooklyn like me) and is one of our biggest heroes.

Here he is singing San Francisco Bay Blues on an old TV set.

http://ramblinjack.com/

He bought me a Budweiser and we chatted about Brooklyn and his turn of the century row boat. He found it rotting in an old boat house in Massachusetts and drove it to California to rebuilt it. I imagine it's not exactly the luxury yacht that the Rolling Stones probably have, but he did it himself, which is what we love. I could see a million miles of highways in his eyes, and yet he looked so relaxed and in his element surrounded by all the crazy characters from Jeff's Birthday.

I used to have a picture of him and Woody Guthrie playing in Washington Square Park hanging on my wall. Landry and I have played there many times, and I love the photo because Woody looks like a bearded Hippie and Ramblin' Jack looks like a Brooklyn Cowboy.

I myself would like to split the difference.

The show erupted into a sweet booty-shakin' dance party and all three bands played a bit of Musical Chairs.

Leopold and his Fiction are one of our favorite new bands.

We met them in Nashville at a show we were both on at the Springwater Super Club a few months back. It was some sort of mystical meeting. It turns out we had tons of mutual friends from Santa Cruz way back, and I went on tour with Micayla and Little Wings to the K Records "What the Heck Fest" about 10 years ago.

They are one of the few bands we know that sound just as awesome in a backwater Saloon as a hip venue in San Fransisco.

Here they are on the web.

Check them out:

http://www.leopoldandhisfiction.com/

We will have many more awesome shows in the future

Longbeach: The Pike & QSC Audio.

The Pike is owned by Social Distortion’s former drummer Chris Reece, which makes it a legendary place for us to play in Southern California. They also serve the best Lobster Tacos ever and all our friends from Element Skateboards live in the neighborhood, so we play there every time we are in Southern California.

Our friend David brought a pair of QSC speakers for us to try straight from the QSC factory down the road in Costa Mesa. We have been travelling for 5 years with the same beat up set of QSC 8” 82 H’s that were donated to us after The Austin Music CO-OP broke up a few years back. No one can ever believe that we can get so much sound out of a pair of 8” speakers, and try and make us use whatever giant rig the club has, but the secret is not in the size, its in the design, they don’t color the sound at all, so we can, and together we sound totally awesome.

David brought a pair of the new powered 12” speakers for us to try and they felt just as awesome, but with a whole lot more volume. It was really amazing to have a company as big as QSC come out and help a band like us. Last summer they gave us a personal tour of the factory and a care package of sodas and cookies to bring on tour. I got to meet the guy who designed our speakers and we all agreed that our pair of speakers might have the most dents and miles on them that anyone had ever seen.

At first we thought they realized just how famous The Lonesome Heroes are in the underworld of Psychedelic Country Music, but it turns out they were impressed with our Vantastic lifestyle, and were stoked that we came out to see how they create their magic. Which is just the sort of thing that keeps a small band like us on the road.

Here we are after the show with The Speakers & The QSC sound team:

http://www.qscaudio.com/

Afterparty.....

We had an after Party at the Hager Brothers house. They are the raddest bunch of Lonesome Heroes we have ever met. Twin Brothers that skate, bike, and build bow drill fires across America.

Here they are sliding a rail:

You should see them build a fire.

Our friend Leo Rondeau and his band stopped by for some late night trouble on their way up to the Bay

Area for a show. They are almost as cool as the Hager Brother, but in a more musical way. Landry designed Leo's new record cover:

http://www.leorondeau.net/

We will be playing some shows together in Wyoming this summer.

Hollywood, Santa Monica, keeping a blog, & Stretch Pants

Played Hollywood last night.

2 hours in traffic, getting lost, $8 beers, and a red velvet stage… we got the full Hollywood experience at Room 5. The sound was incredible and we opened for the songwriter swap.

Our good friend Ben sensed our non-Hollywood tendencies and smuggled us in Kosher Burritos and Tofu eggless salad Sandwiches. He pretty much saved the day, because all of our Hollywood Producers forgot to come and buy us dinner.

I couldn’t help thinking about what a strange world we live in where we can go from The Doll Hut in Anaheim to Room 5 in West Hollywood in less than 24 hours.

Santa Monica

We got a coffee machine that plugs into the Cigarette Lighter in our van so I can work on the Blog without having to stop for frapachinos every 15 minutes. Landry just fell asleep under a palm tree playing dobro, and our neighbor in Austin just texted me a photo of our VW bus Helga Covered in Snow in Austin.

I am realty diggin’ this blogosphere, and will probably buy some stretch pants and begin my daily Yoga Routine in no time if I stay here in Santa Monica. Fortunatly we are rolling down to Long Beach to play at The Pike tonight.

All our skater friends live there and they are going to be thrilled about our recent rollerblading adventures.

Also our friend David is going to bring a million dollar sound system from QSC Audio for our show tonight. He used to run sound for Selena, and has offered his brilliant ears for our show tonight. We met him last summer when we toured the QSC factory.

Somebody donated a pair of QSC speakers to us many years ago and we wanted to thank them for the awesome sound, we ended up with a bunch of new friends.

Can’t wait for the Show and the Tacos….

The Lonesome Heroes play the World Famous Doll Hut in The OC. in the OC!

No not on the Television show. Orange County has about as bad a rep as Texas. Everyone thinks it’s just a bunch of right wing republicans with bleach blond girlfriends with boob jobs, but that is only most of the people in the OC. We happen to know lots of awesome people and always hide out on the Balboa Peninsula with our friends Luke, James, and Drew. The live in a set of 1940s cottages that are about to fall down and no one wants to buy them because the lot is about 2 blocks from the ocean and worth somewhere around a trillion dollars. So they live in Squalor next door to Millionaires and spend most weekends on fancy yachts drinking bourbon that cost more per bottle than their rent.

I told everyone about my soon to be published Blog: Living in a postcard… and they suggested we start living in it. Mai Tai's at Sunset were ordered at the fancy Bar on the Pier and I ate a plate of French fries for dinner.

The Mai thai was well worth the $7 for these shots:

We all piled into the van for our big show at The World Famous Doll Hut.

It’s just a mile from the front gate of Disneyland in Anaheim, but seemingly in a different world. It struck me that for a band as off the radar as we are; we tend to play at world Famous places all the time. We have a Live Record from The World Famous Hole in the Wall in Austin, Our picture up at The World Famous Buckhorn Bar in Laramie, WY, a summer residency at The World famous Silver Dollar Bar, but I will tell you they all have nothing on the World Famous Doll Hut. Just about every OC Punk rock band in history has played there and they even arranged for Disneyland to time their Firework celebration with our show so we stood in the Parking lot with some of OC’s finest Punk Rockers while we celebrated freedom and gunpowder in the Parking lot.

The Matson Two opened for us and were the best Jazz two piece (or 10 piece) I have ever seen. I was truly in awe of there talent. They are twins (I think) or else look a lot a like. I am never sure if its rude to ask, because maybe one of them thinks the other one is really ugly, but I think they look the same?

You should check them out:

http://mattson2.com

It turns out that they play music with our friend Ray Barbee and have toured all over Japan and the world, so I guess the Doll Hut, truly is world Famous, if it had two world famous bands on the same night.

Here's a link to Ray's Skate & Music pages:

www.elementskateboards.com/team/RAY-BARBEE

www.myspace.com/raybarbeeisgod

Rich gets scalped and a Rollerblading Oddesy on Venice Beach…

With Saturday off in the big City there was only one thing Landry and I wanted to do:

Strap on our new Rollerblades and hit the boardwalk in Venice.

We like to keep in shape when we are on the road, people always laugh when I tell them about my 5 am morning jog, but Landry and I are some real fitness buffs. We used to skateboard and tear up the half pipes, but ever since Landry broke her arm skating during SXSW 2 years ago we have been a bit more careful, so we took up a real extreme sport.

Here’s Landry Skating:

Venice is just the sort of place where a bunch of Lonesome Heroes can hang out & blend in.

Landry decided that I look too much like a hippy so she cut my hair off on the beach (I personally think that grooming on a public beach makes you look like a hippy, but who cares.)

Here’s the last Picture of my golden locks:

It didn’t hurt my feelings one bit, as I have never considered myself a hippie, I just happen to have graduated from UCSC and drive a VW van out of practicality, not as some sort of statement. I decided to go to American Apparel to fully make myself hip, but all the clothes looked like what I wore in middle school and were overpriced. So I bought some sunglasses and a new hip dress for Landry at a cute African Boutique instead.

Echo Curio and Exclusive After party on Sunset BLVD:

The Echo Curio is an art/performance space in Echo Park just down the street from the Echoplex. There was an odd mingling of hipsters, anarchists, artists, general weirdoes, and a few cowboy boots assembled for our show. We passed up a happy hour gig at The Joshua Tree Saloon to play there, so we were hoping that it would be a good show. Sometimes it seems that backwater saloons and Anarchist Artspaces are the only place that we truly make sense, even though we don’t really fit into either.

We played with four awesome Bands:

C-horse

C-horse was our favorite band with awesome Harmonies and some sweet pop songs sung by two total babes (& their two handsome counterparts.) Here’s a bad photo of them:

We will play with them again for sure either here, or back home in Texas.

We had an awesome show with a packed crowd standing in total silence for every song, so I am glad we ventured past the deserts of Eastern California. Our drummer from NYC surprised us with his wife and my friend Will from High school. They were vacationing in California and heard we were in town from the hot Hollywood blogs…

We took this reunion of sorts as a great opportunity to have a party in the new tour bus so we distributed Lonestars from our secret smuggled stash and got this sweet picture inside the new tour bus on Sunset Blvd.

Now that we have made it to the big time I know how it must have felt to be in Guns & Roses during the 1990s. There were fans and bums knocking on the door trying to get our autographs, but we just played it cool inside our new oasis.

Here’s some footage of us playing the Curio edited by our Drummer Nima on his Flipcam:

Meeting with Everloving

Meeting with Everloving

After 3 hours of sleep and a 450 mile drive we made it to Claremont CA to meet with our new friend and owner of Everloving JP Plunier. JP is a Lonesome Hero of sorts running like 9 businesses at once while keeping a very positive attitude. We met at his warehouse from which he runs a record label, clothing company, designs clothes, has about a million bicycles/skateboards/amp parts, and is managing some of our favorite bands.

JP worked with both Ben Harper and Jack Johnston to get there careers started, and I remember very clearly the first time I ever saw a lap steel at my first Ben Harper show in the late 1900s. He currently works with Herman Dune, The Entrance Band, Akron Family, The Growlers, and our new friends Leslie & The Badgers.

You should check them all out here:

http://www.everloving.com/site/index.php

It’s a really awesome collection of eclectic sounds and all these bands make the sort of music we respect

We got our picture with JP in our new van; he seemed equally impressed with our DIY van conversion as our music. It seems everyone we meet is always amazed by our ability to drive around like modern day hunter-gatherers hocking CDs, T-shirts and Art from our collection of vintage suitcases. We even convinced JP to buy a T Shirt for his wife.

I have never been to Music Business school so I am not sure if selling t shirts to people you would like to work with in the future is a good idea or not, but our business is generally conducted out of the back of a van and if they had a masters program in van living both Landry and I would be teaching at Harvard by now.

We drove on into Los Angeles in a soft afternoon glow feeling happy that we met with JP and had picked up a few great insights into what he has done and what we need to do in the future. We arrived four hours early to our gig at the Echo Curio so stopped in Chinatown for a bite to eat and a nap in the Van.

Terlingua Texas.

Load in @ The Starlight Theatre in Terlingua 2/15/2010

We have decided to join the 20th Century and begin keeping a Blog.

We will try to write interesting things that y'all want to read. A random assortment of Dutch oven recipes, hidden campsites, Landry's new art projects, and all the rad people we meet on the road.

No more will I write in my journal with the weird feeling of someone reading over my shoulder in the distant future when they find my mispelled scribblings at the bottom of a Goodwill bulk bin. So now all our exaggerations and forgotten memories have a new space called:

Vantastic...

It's a concept that predates the World Wide Web for me (most everything predates the World Wide Web for me.) It's some sort of Walt Whitman wanna be Jack Kerouac compulsion to drive through the night and sleep on the side of the road with cars rushing past, afraid of bears, insane truckers, ghosts, or whatever, so that you can wake up in the morning and discover something new and distant, and feel like perhaps for that moment all your rushing was worth it, because you are living inside a postcard.

Here's our postcard from this morning:

It was 22 degrees when we woke up this morning at a "roadside table," as we call it, somewhere outside Balmorhea TX. There was ice on the ceiling of the van and Landry and I were safe and warm sleeping in our clothes under two down blankets.

A few months ago we toured down the East Coast in a snowstorm in our sweet old van Helga, with no heat, no cigarette lighter to charge our phones, a very out of date Blackberry, and no worries beyond getting to the next gig.

Now we are in the new van with a palm pre broadcasting the internet as we go... seemingly carefree...

So to misquote old Uncle Walt a bit:

"Afoot and light-hearted I take to the open road,
Healthy, free, [Ipod, palm pre?] the world before me,

The long brown path before me leading wherever I choose.

Henceforth I ask not good-fortune, I myself am good-fortune,
Henceforth I whimper no more, postpone no more, need nothing,
Done with indoor complaints, libraries, querulous criticisms,
Strong and content I travel the open road.

The earth, that is sufficient,
I do not want the constellations any nearer,
I know they are very well where they are,
I know they suffice for those who belong to them.

[Not to the world wide web, but we will embrace it at least till the first bill,

Then return to our mispelled scribblings on napkins]"

- A very poor adaption of Walt Whitman's:

"Song of The Open Road."

from Leaves of Grass

read it here: http://www.daypoems.net/poems/1957.html

Yours trully Rich

Flagstaff AZ, 2, 18, 2010

Flagstaff AZ

Flagstaff rules!

We drove up from the desert into the snow-covered mountains to stay with our amazing friend Chelsea Jr. She is a sculptor, river raft guide, and recently became our Arizona promoter. Rumor has it that she always has a flask of whiskey & bottle rockets stashed away in her cowgirl boots, however she sleeps in her boots and is cunning as a cat, so we have no confirmation other than a vague memory of a wild night in Veedawoo, Wyoming from a few summers back that ended with a flash of lights, a dozen police cars, and a high speed chase through the mountains in our lightning fast VW Van.

The Flagstaff weekly wrote a nice write up about our show, it said we are:

“Like a hooker at the church bake sale…”

We are not exactly sure what they mean, but it sounds pretty punk

rock and we do love baking, so we think it’s great.

You can read the article here:

My new fancy phone fell into a bucket of mud at Chelsea’s art studio.

This is the last photo from my new fancy phone:

It makes me remember not to put so much meaning in things. Chelsea is in the process of making a million porcelain casts of Ram Horns for an art show and that is a lot more important than some new stupid technology anyway.

We played till 1am @ Mia’s to one of the kindest crowds ever. We had about 20 people dancing in their odd collection of snow boots, cowboy boots, and flip-flops. We loaded out at 2am in preparation to leave at 7am for the big meeting with Everloving in, Los Angeles CA.