What’s up people, I usually like to have road reports posted more promply but I sustained a hyper-extended knee during this last outing and I have been operating in super slow motion while I nurse my injury. For the record in my career I have now sustained injuries on both of my knees during performances. So you can say anything you want about me and my music just don’t ever say I don’t give it my all. That being said here’s a Gautama-eye-view recollection of our recent trip to West Virginia, the land of my birth.
Day One (5/14/2010) The Inferno, Parkersburg WV
Rolled out of Atlanta around 9:30 am with the entire United Underworld crew in tow. Landed at our base of operations at B Rude’s place in Charleston around 7:00 pm. Headed out to The Inferno in Parkersburg around 9:00 pm and got to the venue around 10:00 pm. West Virginia is one of my favorite places to play because we get such great reactions from the people when we go and B Rude treats us so well. We had never played in Parkersburg before so we didn’t know what to expect and let me say this was definitely an experience. The venue, The Inferno, reminded me of the basement from the first Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie where the Foot Clan recruited all of the kids into their organization. Reguardless, the drinks were cheap, the staff was accomodating and the people–despite being unsure of what to make of us–seemed ready for some action. Action they got.
We kicked things off around 11:00 and the fine folks of Parkersburg were at first tentative about letting that boom-bap move them, but when music is delivered by such masterful hands as ours it doesn’t take long for people to warm up. I’m pretty sure Parkersburg doesn’t really get too many folks like us coming through their parts but that is what sets us apart from the others who do what we do. See they may do what we do but they don’t go where we go and because of that they never get the pleasure truly rocking a town. Once we wound our set down, B Rude and DJ Sqeezel collectively known as Dinosaur Burps kept the chaos going, treating their fellow West Virginians to their own raucous brand of rapid fire rap fury and turntable terrorism.
However the music was not the end of the exitement. While we were mixing and mingling with our new freinds a cadre of shirtless bat wielding hillbillies ascended upon the club and they were not there to play a late night game of baseball. If I would have had to guess who would have been the rowdy ones out of the bunch that night I would have guessed the confederate flag adorned biker gang. However they turned out to be extremely cool and played the role of peace keepers once the fisticuffs began. After a few minutes of shoving and rollinging in the dirt and someone nearly getting hit by a car the melee came to a close when the main bat wielder ended up dropping his bat ang getting chased down the street with it by his target. Soon the police arrived at which time we went back inside, waited for things to clear out, got our money and got the hell out of Parkersburg.
Day Two (5/15/2010) Shamrock’s, Huntington WV
Upon our safe return from Parkersburg we returned to our base camp at B Rude’s house in Charleston for some hard earned rest. When Metrognome, Evaready RAW and I were awake we took an adventure down McCorkle Ave. in search of nourishment and we stumbled across Tudor’s World of Biscuits and enjoyed some of West Virginia’s finest culinary offerings. We killed some time during the day in downtown Charleston until supper time when Quanstar treated us to his kitchen wizardry as we shot episode four of “Cooking With Quanstar” (check that out at www.raizingdough.blogspot.com) Now that we were fed it was time to get ready for the show. So we piled into the car and made the trip to Huntington. We arrived at Shamrock’s around 9:00 pm and even did a soundcheck (imagine that.) Shamrock’s was my kind of place, as the name might suggest it was a classic Irish pub with a performance room in the back. Thanks to the capable hand’s of Ryan the soundman everything sounded great, save for a little feedback caused by our inability to keep even remotely still on stage. It was directly across the street from Marshall Stadium in downtown Huntington and struck me as the type of place that get’s out of control on Saturday evenings from September to December. The show got started around 11:00 pm and unlike the previous evening this crowd had come to be rocked. As our set progressed the room filled thicker and thicker and swelled into a full blown frenzy. A few highlights included Quanstar’s rendition of “Ice Ice Baby” Evaready RAWs drunken freestyle version of “Why You Wasting Time” and me nearly blowing out my ACL about two thirds of the way through the set leaving me to hobble and whince my way through the remainder of the evening.
As our sound and fury dwindled Dinosaur Burp’s was just getting turned up. Bear in mind my recollection of events beyond this point is a bit blurry due to the throbbing pain in my knee and the copious amounts of alchohol I consumed in attempts to dull that pain. What I do recall is Squeezel cutting like a barber on the day before Easter and B Rude commanding an impressive ammount of “brown party liquors” to the stage. Closing out the evening were the Wizards of Ghetto Mountain who’s Early Man/ Sleep style of “stoner” metal thrashed and thudded as only an ensamble of West Virginians fronted by a mountain of a man could.
In closing, despite the injury and the domino effect of problems it is sure to cause, I had a wonderful time. Having played four shows in West Virginia it quite easily ranks high on the list of my favorite states to play and I am looking forward to getting back soon. Thanks to all of my United Underworld co-conspiritors (Quanstar, Evaready RAW, and Metrognome) we are onto something truly special and I am a fortunate man indeed to be granted the privilige of traversing this nation and playing music with such an incredibly talented group of people.
talk to y’all soon, wish me a speedy recovery, I love y’all
GG