Let's talk about heart. Heart of a community. Heart of brothers. Heart of a friend.

Maybe it was because this was our backyard. Maybe it was because we lost friends. Maybe it's because we were horrified. Maybe it's simply because we cared. But the Roanoke music community stepped up in a huge way to help the families and victims of that horrible day.

The world of booking bands is a notoriously difficult job. From payment negations and contracts to scheduling conflicts, to book one band for a single show can be a lengthy process for both the bands and club personnel. So, for a single club manager to get the ball rolling and have not one but 15 bands organized into a single event in a few short hours is incredible. But that's exactly what Barry Caldwell of Awful Arthur's did. With the help of Eventzone, corporate sponsors, personal volunteers and dozens of local musicians, Roanoke saw probably the single biggest day of music in it's modern history. It should make each and everyone one of us proud of our community.

The weather started off beautifully that day. Sunny, mid-70's with only a slight chance of scattered storms. "Scattered," I thought, "maybe they'll just scatter somewhere else." I rushing home from work early to catch as many of the 4-11 shift of bands that I could when I noticed the big dark cloud starting to form over top of Elmwood Park. I called Bill Schlueter (TK-421, who was scheduled to go on last) and told him, "It doesn't look good Bubba."

Despite the darkening skies and occasional drops of rain, it seemed that the storm was going to miss us. Then at around 9:00, the occasional drops became more steady and then the skies just opened up and our mini-monsoon began. Chinese Fire Drill seem to take the brunt of the "Superbowl Prince-ish" show. Not only did they play through the downpour but they seemed inspired by every drop of rain.

While I expected to see everyone run for their cars, the people that remained not only stayed but rushed to the edge of the stage to dance and sing along with all the bands that were playing through the rain. Finally just as TK was to close out the show, the rain subsided. Even though they were cold and wet, not only did the crowd stick around but they all squeezed as close as they possibly could to TK.

One thing you may not have seen was all that the musicians were doing behind the scenes to help the event. CFD actually gave up a paid gig in order to offer their support to this night. The Pop Rivets and TK-421 donated drums, cabinets and other stuff I have no idea what it's called and would sound stupid trying to pretend I did. Ted from The Pop Rivets gave a tv interview and insisted it be done in front of TK-421's merch board because TK was donating all of the profits from the event to Hokie Spirit Memorial Fund.

I think I may have seen nearly every local musician I know at the event that night even if they weren't playing. It was heartwarming despite our cold, wet clothes.

Thanks to a late Thursday night because of the benefit and a late Friday Burning Bridges night, my Saturday started off very sluggish. I honestly wanted to just stay home and sleep. Me, stay home on a Saturday? You know I was tired! But I had some new, old friends to meet. Yes, I know that doesn't make sense, stick with me here.

Anyone remember waaaaaaaay back to my second Band Girl blog about what a jerk I thought Brett Michaels from Poison had been? Long story short, Brett's back up band is a band called Evick. I saw Evick years ago when they opened for Brett in Harrisonburg. The singer, Pete was a smiling ball of energy and after the show, even before I started in this whole band scene thing, I would follow Evick through their website. So I was excited to see Pete playing that night and it broke my heart when Brett started yelling at him on stage and stopping in the middle of songs to berate Pete. Click here for the full version if you don't remember it.

A few years later I actually became friends of Evick's good friends in the band, JunkFood and of their guitar player, Brad Puckett. So I was excited when Evick booked their first show in Roanoke. Pete was there with that same big, huge smile and that same energy I remembered from the past. I kept waiting for the band to take a break so I could introduce myself. They never did.

From 9:30 until 1:30, these guys through out everything from Warrant, the essentially required Poison songs to Vanilla Ice (yes, that Vanilla Ice) and Rage Against The Machine. After the show finally ended I was able to talk to Pete who it turns out actually read my silly little blog. Pete was as nice in person as you would expect from that smile.

Pete was very adamant about telling me how everything really unfolded at that show years ago in Waynesboro. How Brett had apologized to Pete that night for the show, how great a person Brett was, how great a friend Brett had been to him and how supportive Brett was of Evick. How could you not believe a guy like that?

It was evident that Pete's heart was as big as his smile.

Shows you should check out this week:
TK-421 at The Clinic all weekend in Wytheville.
Bitter Rain at Turn One all weekend in Wytheville.
Burning Bridges at Rocktown in Harrisonburg on Friday and Club Rio's/Rivals in Charlottesville
The Worx at The Fifth Quarter in Danville Friday.
Drivn at Mulligans in Staunton on Saturday.
The Pop Rivets are at the new Awful Arthurs in Blacksburg on Friday.

Also as a reminder, pictures from Thursday's benefit are available on my website at www.bndgrl.com/Benefit. I am making these pictures available for purchase only and then I will donate all the proceeds to The Hokie Spirit Memorial Fund.

Just a quick post to remind everyone to come out Thursday, April, 26 to the Roanoke's Rockn Remembrance show to benefit the United Way's efforts to help the victims of the horrible events at Virginia Tech last week.

I will be there taking pictures of all the bands I can get to. After the event I will be selling all photographs for $1 ea. ALL proceeds will go to United In Caring Fund for Victims of the Virginia Tech Tragedy through United Way. Details to come after the event.

Also TK-421 has announced that all profits from the sale of any merchandise that night they will be donating to the same charity. So, come out and buy some TK swag, not only because they rock but for a good cause! I challenge all other bands to be equally as generous.

To Barry, of Awful Arthur's, and all the people who helped him put this event together in amazing time, Thank You.

See you there! Here's the line up:

12 noon -11pm12:00-2:00pm - FREE (No admission)
The Kind
Groova Scape
Electric Chameleon

4:00pm-11:00pm ($5 Donation at door)
Jerry Wimmer
Half Moon
Chinese Fire Drill
Shayar & Krooshal Force
The Pop Rivets
Hot Like Cajun
Illbotz
Built To Write
Mid Atlantic Kingz
Crobar Cane
Drivn
TK-421

Schlueter (Bill, from TK-421) asked me the other day, "So do you still write that Roanoke Times thing?" I guess the fact that we are all sitting here together right now means, "YES!" (I also just totally pictured us all sitting in a circle, Indian-style, holding hands.)

There's a reason I haven't been writing much lately (well, not here anyway) and that's because I simply haven't had anything interesting to write about. Aside from the occasional waking up on Saturday morning with my pants stuffed full of Fruit Loops and no idea how they got there...coughCHADcough...(King, from Bitter Rain,) it's been a lot of weekends of the same old, same old.

Things seem to be picking up around here though. In the past couple of weeks I actually saw a new band for the first time in ages!

I get requests from bands on Myspace all the time, shocking, I know. Usually I'll add them if they are local just because they are local. If it's a regional band, I don't add them unless they are really good. I don't add very many regional bands because quite honestly, I just don't like very many of them.

A few weeks ago however, I got a request from the fan club of a North Carolina band called DL Token. I took a listen to their songs and loved what I heard. It turns out that their singer, Jeremy Strothers, was an alternate on the tv-reality show, INXS Rockstar. His guitar player, Xeno, was actually in one of the Children of the Corn movies as well (not that that has anything to do with the band but still kind of cool.) So I added the fan club and the band. Also noting that they were going to be playing in the area soon, I made contact with Jeremy so I could say "Hi" before the show.

Oh and I have mentioned these guys were super hot? I mean SUPER hot.

Nikki had been begging me to go see some new bands with her so we could hear some new music and make some new friends. But it's hard sometimes to leave your comfort zone. It's hard to leave the spotlight of being friends with the band to go somewhere where no one will know you and you are just two more people in the crowd. It's also hard to justify not going to see my friends like The Pop Rivets or Bitter Rain who I hardly ever get to see when I actually have a free weekend away from TK-421 or Burning Bridges. Not to mention the fact that TK had added an impromptu show the same night that Nikki wanted to see DL Token. But I acquiesced and decided a night of anonymity might do me (and my over inflated ego) some good.

We had been at the club just long enough to order our first drinks when I saw Jeremy approaching us. He introduced himself and his other guitar player, Jayme. Not only were these guys super hot but they were super nice.

For the rest of the night Nikki and I danced around like fools, got followed around by an adorable little 18 year-old who loved taking pictures of us on his cell phone (which oddly also included pictures of Chuck and Troy, Johnson and Winemiller, from TK-421.) But strangely enough our assumed anonymity was short lived. The owner of Parrot Bay, John, walked up to me and said, "You're The Band B****!" I said, "You want to talk about TK, right?" Really, could the night get any better?

Uhm, apparently not. Nikki and I headed back downstairs to talk to the guys in the band at the end of the night when we were stopped by the bouncer and told no one was allowed back down there. So we yelled over the railing to Jeremy that we had to leave. He rushed up the stairs and tried to convince the bouncer that we were helping them load out by "wrapping cables." See? I told you, super nice! But, I guess we didn't really have the "wrapping cables" look about us and the bouncer sent us on our way.

But, Jeremy said he'd stop by after load out so we could hang out some more. Have you ever had to wait on load out at 2:00 am after a long night of drinking and dancing? It's very long, very boring and will put you straight to sleep just like it did to us. Sometime around dawn:30 Jeremy came to our room and invited us over to hear some acoustic tunes they were working on. I sat up, looked at Nikki, yelled her name a couple of times, she slept like a baby. Finally, in one last ditch valiant effort to salvage a night with super hot, super nice guys, I picked up the phone book and flung it as hard as I could at her. It whacked her hard and loud right on the arm. Did she move? No.

Well so much for being able to hang out with a new band. But at least we've seemed to have made some new friends (hot musicians, 18 year-olds and club owners.)

OK, here's some stuff for ya:
-There's a new band in town you need to check out, Bad Casper. Craig, Chuck, Gary and Josh are all local music vets you will recognize and are sure to rock!! So, go see them!

-The Sweetwater Ampitheater (the proposed Smith Mountain Lake Amphitheater that will hold 7,000) received another round of good news when their re-zoning request was approved unanimously by Bedford County Planning Commission. Only one more hearing next month by the Board of Supervisors before they can receive final approval. This is a great project that will bring lots of quality entertainment to our area so everyone needs to get behind it!

Visit their website: http://www.sweetwateramphitheater.com/ to learn more or find out how you can support them!

Have I ever told you the story about a bar called The Warehouse and their fabulous band room? I've only been to The Warehouse once but that band room made it one of the most memorable nights of my lights. There was the faux Mardi Gras, left over bottles of New Years Eve champagne and of course that big pile of people in the loft.

There aren't many clubs left that have an official "band room," most don't have anything close. Awful Arthur's at Towers has a hall with some folding chairs, The Pub in Harrisonburg has a tiny room that's big enough for three small people standing shoulder to shoulder and a couch that would probably light up brighter than The Roanoke Star under a black light. Oh and a ladder, for some reason there's always an extension ladder beside the couch (don't ask me.)

So when Ginger was telling me over The New Year's weekend about the club her band, TMI and TK-421 were playing at the following weekend in Burlington, NC called, The Raven, I asked what the club was like. In her description she talked about the two floors, the pool tables, the leather couches, the band room. Wait! What? Did she say, "band room?!" I regaled her with my Warehouse story, the leather couches, the loft, the mini-kitchen. She seemed unimpressed.

After a rainy, foggy drive down 220, 68 and 40, Liz (aka, "Punk") and I finally made it to Burlington where we met my friend Lori, who lives in the area, at The Raven. The rest of the band, et al. were meeting at Ginger's house first and coming over from there but knowing how I am late everywhere I go I wasn't even sure we'd make it to the club before the show started so we went directly there. Walking up the side of the building, I said to Punk and Lori, "This place looks like an old Golden Corral, I hope the salad bar is good."

We walked into the bar and headed straight for the bathroom (I don't believe in stopping on a road trip.) We laughed as we looked around at the bathroom with the horseshoe door handle and the stall without a door. "Uhhhh, this should be interesting," I said.

We wandered around the club looking for the guys who I assumed would all ready be in the "band room" Ginger mentioned to me the weekend before. I expected this "band room" wouldn't be much more than a hallway or a closet with a disgusting couch. The security guard (who was extremely hot in case you were wondering,) removed the chain blocking the steps, pointed upstairs and said, "first door on the left," when we asked where this "band room" was.

It was like opening the gates of heaven. Our mouths dropped open but instead of being greeted by a choir of angels we were met by an 7 foot Elvis with rotating disco lights coming out his crotch. It was rock-n-roll heaven baby! Oh and Wayne, Wayne was there stretched out on one of the three white leather sofas in front of the big screen tv. As we walked in we screamed like little girls at the mere thought of all the debauchery that could be had in this room that was probably bigger than my entire apartment. The couches, the big screen, the air hockey table, the Elvis!! Pointing to a door behind him, Wayne said, "Go in there." "Huh?" I said, "What is it? A closet?" "No," he said laughing, "Just go in there."

I opened the door, one of a couple in the room, and again my mouth was agape. This time I was speechless. There sat a lone leather love seat and a single full-length mirror turned sideways on the wall. "Uhh," I said, "Remind me not to sit on THAT couch." Wayne just laughed.

When TMI, TK and the rest of the crew finally arrived I ran around like a 5 year-old at Christmas opening the door to the smaller room and making the same tired joke about not sticking to the couch to anyone who was within my reach. They all had the same, "I'm not sitting on that couch" reaction.


We didn't make it back up to the band room until between the TK and TMI sets when we had all had enough alcohol in us that whatever remained on that couch no longer mattered to us. We piled various configurations of people onto the couch acting silly, taking pictures and even though there were three other couches outside everyone seemed to congregate to the one couch that was probably hazardous to our health.

TK and TMI both put on great shows! Ginger Loy did one hell of a great job singing her heart out for TMI. This was an especially nerve racking, special show for her since she has spent many years following the guys in TK-421 and now they were watching her on stage. The rest of bar turned out to be great as well. There was a small but energetic crowd who was buying merch and definitely buying drinks. The security staff was hot, the bartenders (all male, yay) were way hot, it was a great night indeed. But it was the band room that was the star of this night. The little room, Elvis and his lighted crotch, the big pile of TK on a couch, air hockey. It's going to be hard to go back to those folding chairs.



Thanks for sticking around to the end. Since you've been good boys and girls here are the results MY 2006 Music Poll. Thanks to everybody who voted! I know there were a lot of voting things going on at once so to those of you who took a few more minutes to show some appreciation to the musicians in this town, I definitely appreciate it and I'm going to go out on a limb and say they do too. My comments are in red.

Best Guitar Player:
(1) Troy Winemiller, TK-421
(2) Kenny Seay, Burning Bridges
(3) Jason Hill, The Pop Rivets (tie)
Chris Rakes, Drivn (tie)

Best Bass Player:
(1) Steven Layne, TK-421
(2) Brian Holt, The Pop Rivets
(3) Dave Porter, Burning Bridges

Best Drummer:
(1) Bill Schlueter, TK-421
(2) Cameron Vaught, Drivn
(3) Mike Feamster, Burning Bridges

Best Rock Band:
(1) TK-421
(2) Drivn
no clear 3rd

Best Cover or Tribute Band:
(1) Burning Bridges
(2) TK-421
(3) Bitter Rain

Best Metal Band:
(1) TK-421 (uhhh, ok.)
(2) Dark Ruin
no clear 3rd

Best Jam Band:
(1) The Seed
(2) TK-421 (Really people?? TK certainly can jam but isn't a "Jam" band by any stretch of the imagination, but thanks for the support I suppose. *Looks for tie-dye shirt*)
(3) What? Huh? Who cares?

Best Rap Group/DJ:
(1) Illbotz
(2) I don't know, no answer, huh?
Definitely nothing even close to a 3rd, I couldn't even get a second choice out of this category.

Best Country Band:
(1) Cimmaron
(2) Burning Bridges (1st set maybe)
No enough responses for a 3rd place.

Best Original Song:
(1) Disengaged-TK-421
(2) Bed of Stone-TK-421
(3) View from Heaven-Drivn

Best Cover of a Song (by local artist):
(1) Crazy Bitch-Everybody
It seemed in this category everyone had their own favorite except for Crazy Bitch. Everybody loves Crazy Bitch apparently. It's a good thing nearly every band is covering it right now.

Now for the fun ones:

Miss Congeniality (Best Band Attitude):
(1) TK-421
(2) The Pop Rivets
No clear winner for 3rd

Best Band No one Ever Sees:
(1) Bitter Rain
(2) TK-421 (Apparently someone is going to see them since they have won nearly every category, I'm confused.)

Most Fun Band:
(1) TK-421
(2) Burning Bridges
(3) The Pop Rivets

Most Drunk Band
(1) TK-421
(2) Burning Bridges
(3) Drivn

Best Dressed Band:
(1) TK-421
(2) Drivn
(3) The Pop Rivets

Here's a shocker!
Best Looking Musician:
(1) Troy Winemiller, TK-421 (Uhm, wow!! Aww, he's gonna hate this. ;))
(2) Trampus Stamper, Drivn
(3) Chuck Johnson, TK-421
And you thought, The Seed winning Band of The Year was surprising!

And finally another shocker. I honestly debated a lot on whether or not to post the results of this category. But I decided to definitely do it after seeing the results. This category proves that opinions and polls are so subjective. So for the band that had the most votes in this category, know that the second place band is the undoubtebly one of the biggest, most successful bands in the state and/or region. Obviously there are many people that will disagree with these results and hopefully they'll take the time to vote next year. No matter what people think, one thing I know is that anyone that steps on stage and plays every weekend has more balls than me.
Worst Band:
(1) Cobalt Media
(2) The Worx (WOW! HUH? I suspect there was a little more personal motivation here.)
No clear third but that's because nearly every band in this area received at least one or two votes. My favorite response was, "This can be any band if they aren't careful." So true.
PS-Don't shoot the messenger!!

Biggest Supporter of Local Music:
(1) ME!! (THANKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I love you guys!!)

The next couple of categories had so many different answers I wanted to share them all:

Song you never, ever want to hear played again (song and artist)

• anything by pink floyd
• Anything by the Worx
• anything from the Carpenters
• anything in which Jerry Wimmer raps
• Anything the Worx does
• Brickhouse
• brickhouse (tim wilson)
• dance dance
• Enter Sandman - Metallica
• Enter SandMan in the Box - Metallica n Chains
• ENTER SANDMAN-METALLICA
• Fight for Your Right To PARTY!!!! TK 421
• FIGHT FOR YOUR RIGHT TO PARTY---ANYONE WHO COVERS IT
• Free Bird
• Free Bird - Skynard
• Free Bird, by anyone ever.
• freebird by anybody
• Hard to Handle, Black Crowes (Please, please, pleeeeease!!!!)
• KISS medley- you know who you are
• Lips of an Angel (Hinder)
• Lips of an Angel (Hinder)
• man in the box
• Not enough space
• Prince- ANY
• Rapper's Delight, Burning Bridges
• Rocky Top
• Rocky Top (this is VA, not Tenn.)
• slow ride-foghat
• Song you never, ever want to hear played again (song and artist)
• Stairway to Heaven; Led Zepplin
• Sweet Home Alabama
• Tush zz top

Create Your Own Category and Winner:

• Saxophones--Don Clifton
• Sound- Wayne
• Musician Most Likely to Destroy A Low Ceiling Above a Stage-Isiah Osbourn
• most supportive to the local community....Dark Ruin
• Most Make-up - TK421
• Most Likely to be found on MySpace Mike Lindsey
• Drunkest Groupie: Jessica Hot
• Biggest Jerk band_ The Worx
• Biggest Ego Band: The Worx
• BEST SPEAKER DANCER---TRACY MORRIS
• Best plugger of band website Chad King
• Best Place to Hear Live Music: Martin's Bar and Grill
• Best Eyes - Travis Trip 9
• BEST BAND TO EVER PLAY @ 5TH QTR TK-421!!!!!!!!!!!! LOVE 'EM
• Best Band After Parties-Drivn
• BAND MOST LIKELY TO MAKE THEIR FEMALE FANS FLASH THEIR TITTIES... AND THE WINNER IS ...TK IV II I
• Uh, best hair flip? Oh, Best soundman - Wayne
• Best Keyboardist: Jim Davis (Shakedown) Best Stage Show: TK421 Best Place to See Live Music: The Clinic, Wytheville Best Place to After-Party: Super 8, Wytheville
  

First let's start with a few business items this week but stay tuned for the end because there is some exciting news:

• Vote for me to be Santa's Helper here! Thanks to all who have voted so far!
  

• Vote in the Roanoke Times 2006 Music Poll here!
  

• Apparently Greystone Tavern (aka-TopRail/Rail/Howlers/Shooters) has switched ownership yet again. From what I hear (completely unconfirmed from anyone at Greystone) Dale and Derrek Cupp have recently purchased the business from the current owner. Hopefully they will continue with Jeff's (current owner) hopes of bringing in quality national acts to the area ala Cattle Annies.
  

• Speaking of Cattle Annie's, by now you've heard that the TK-421 and Breaking Benjamin show was rescheduled...sort of. Despite an assurance that when the show was rescheduled TK would still be playing, apparently Breaking Benjamin decided to give TK the shaft and bring in their own bands to open. It was in fact a raw deal that I'm certain could have been handled much differently especially considering TK accepted the gig last minute after the original opener couldn't do the show. I scratch your back and you stab me in mine. Nice Breaking Benjamin, very nice! I can't really fault the club much I'm sure it was totally out of their control but you can't tell me there wasn't room to squeeze another band on that show. Again, all of this completely unconfirmed and totally my opinion. Either way it sucks.
  

• Also Josh Bittinger, bassist for Cobalt Media has decided to leave the band due to personality differences within the band. Josh is working a new project that we should be seeing very soon.
  

• A New Year's update for you as well. Not only do we have a big Burning Bridges and Worx show but apparently the rock juggernauts in the area are teaming up as well. Drivn and TK-421 will be playing together on NYE at The Clinic in Wytheville. Two dream shows, one night, different cities. What am I supposed to do with that???

Ok, blah, blah, blah enough of that....

Last week Jessica and I hit The Big City! It's not like neither one of us had ever been to Washington DC before but we had never been on a serious road trip together before. As usual, it's never dull with us.

We were headed to DC to see Hinder at the 9:30 Club where were meeting up with Jackie (or Jackhole as you may prefer to call her) and her friend Diane. I had told Jackie that I didn't want to come to the show unless I was right up front. I can't stand to watch a concert from the back. Might as well watch it on tv. Jackie however didn't like all the craziness that being upfront entailed (I'm currently envisioning Jackie slam dancing and crowd surfing.) "I'll meet you after the show," she said to me jokingly...sort of.

In order to get a spot up front Jackie said we'd need to be there to stand in line at 6:30 for the 8:00 show. No problem I thought, I had taken the day off from work, we could leave whenever. Ooops, I forgot Jessica had class. Ok, so we'd be leaving right after she got out which would put us there at 7ish. So needless to say, when we actually got to the show at 9:30 after somehow finding our way through DC without getting lost (despite oddly shaped street signs) we assumed we'd be far, far away from the stage. Especially considering the show had been sold-out for weeks.

But never underestimate the power of The Band Girl and Jessica Hot. We maneuvered our way right up front to the corner of the stage almost instantly, how I'll never know. I can find a hole in a crowd like nobody's business though! About 10 pictures in, the bouncer decided my camera was too "professional" so he escorted us back through the club so I could have my camera confiscated. We were certain now we'd never make it back up to the front so we stopped to get a drink at the bar where we found Jackie and Diane (and no you can't make the obvious Mellencamp joke because I all ready did.)

We grabbed the girls (and some over priced drinks) and headed back to the other side of the room to see if we could maneuver our way back up front which somehow we did! This time like a running back following his blocker we got behind some really big lady who wasn't going to let anyone stand in her way. She pushed the crowd aside like she was parting the Sea of GalHOlea. We found our corner spot again where we watched Hinder, an awesome band called 18 Visions and Jackie in all of her drunkenness ("Oh my god y'all, I can't believe I'm drunk on a Thursday night" "No, Jackie, for the hundredth time the bouncer will not take our picture now get behind the red line") for the rest of the show. You know we loves ya Jackie.

After the show, the crowd dispersed outside where a couple of guys from the opening band, Lynam, were selling cds and taking pictures. It didn't take long for Jessica and I go right over to them and start taking pictures (even though we had spent all of our money on the 18 Visions cds so we couldn't buy theirs.) But we hugged on them, joked around with them, while drunk Jackie attempted to take pictures whilst holding the shutter button down (click, click, click, click, click) and taking pictures of the wrong guy in the band. He in turn repaid the favor by mooning her. I'm not really sure why but I'm almost positive he had duct tape on his butt too. I dunno, I just work here.

As Jessica and I plotted about how to get on the tour bus that stood directly in front of us, Jackie was screaming at us, "I'm not leaving until you get in a cab!I'm not leaving until you get in a cab!" Eventually we just got tired of her yelling at us and gave up on our tour bus plan and got ready to hop in a cab. Until I realized, "OH SH*T! We just spent all of our money on cds! Uhm, Jackie, can we have some money?"

After we finally got back to our hotel room, Jessica and I noticed that it was only 11:30. We can't go to bed in DC at 11:30! So we do the smart, prudent thing and we decide to go visit the monuments. The great thing about visiting the monuments in DC at midnight is that there are no crowds and if you are just going to the Washington Monument, there's great parking. However, the downside is anytime you see another person you are certain you are about to be stabbed and if you are trying to get to the other monuments there is absolutely nowhere safe or close by to park. Feel free however to jump in the lap of a random statue and take pictures.

After making dozens of trips around in a circle trying to find a way to the see the other monuments, we ended up making a wrong turn and another wrong turn where we quickly found ourselves on a one-way road into the Forrest of Death. There was no where to turn around, one strange, lone vehicle following us and a fox on the side of the road eating a dead deer (although he looked embarrassed when we caught him and quickly scurried away.) I was certain of death or ending up in Delaware, either way, it wasn't going to be good. After much prayer and an Axl Rose dance, we found our saving grace! A "No U-turn" sign in front of the CIA. "I don't give a bleep, bleep, bleep, bleep," said Jessica, "This is where we are turning around." And we did. I'm sure we are right under Wayne's name on the some kind of CIA watch-list now, but at least we made it out of the Forrest of Death alive. Oh Deer.

Then we drove home, Maryland is lovely this time of year. Sheesh.


OK, enough of our silly shenanigans, let's get to the big stuff!

As we are all aware, The Roanoke Times is currently conducting their annual Music Poll. I've heard from a bunch of people, myself included (because that's usually the best conversation I have all day,) that their poll just doesn't go far enough. What about the drummers, the bass players and guitar players in the area? Why aren't they mentioned? Why is it just the singers (like they need bigger egos)? So I am conducting the first official "Band Girl Music Poll" as an addendum to the Roanoke Times Poll.

Here are the rules:
-Vote
-Tell all your friends
-Polls close at 5:00 pm, Friday, December 15.

Here's the survey: http://bndgrl.com/survey/index.php?sid=2&newtest=Y

Now go forth and vote!


This weekend everyone is playing somewhere!

• TK is at AA's Towers on Friday and the 5th Quarter in Danville on Saturday.
• The Pop Rivets make their debut it Marion all weekend.
• JunkFood is at The Pub in Harrisonburg on Saturday.
• Drivn is in Abington all weekend.
• Burning Bridges is at The Clinic Friday and in South Boston on Saturday
• The Worx is at Wolfies in C'ville on Fri. (Yea, look me plugging 'em)
• Bitter Rain is at Mulligan's in Staunton
  

Thanksgiving isn't officially over until the all the leftovers are gone, right? So I'd better hurry because cold stuffing makes a great breakfast.

Before I give you my list of all the things I am thankful for this year, we have some business to take care of. Coming into the end of the year, if you weren't paying attention you may have missed the Great Bass Player Trade of Aught Six. Hmm, who to start with...Justin Tolley is rejoining The Worx (again) where he replaced Dave Porter (again) who is rejoining Burning Bridges (again.) Matt Owens from Burning Bridges is joining Bad Dog (for the first time) after Tim Wilson left Bad Dog (for the first time) to rejoin Shakedown (again.) Got all that? All Roanoke area bass players please take two steps to the left.

I should hurry, I just polished off all the deviled eggs.

Ok, here we go. This year once again has been full of great times, great people and great adventures (some printable, the best ones not printable.) Looking back at last year at this time I had just met Jackie, Nikki was all boyfriended up, I had just had one really great Friday night at Chisholm's, I was still living in Harrisonburg and hating every minute of it. Fast forward to this year, Jackie just left my apartment after making me sick, I see boyfriend potential for Nikki soon, I just spent a really great Friday night at Mulligans in Staunton and I finally got the hell out of Harrisonburg even though I'm driving more now by moving to Roanoke than I did by living in Harrisonburg.

So this year I am thankful for obviously my family first. But I am also thankful for hillbilly teeth, go cart tracks, leaping across meadows, getting banned from hotels, The Super 8, lightning striking twice (or three times,) Blazing Saddles, movies on the ceiling and great naps. I am thankful for $300 room service bills, jumping in the pool with our clothes on, African Ant-eater rituals even if Patrick Dempsey missed them, popcorn balls and WWKD. I am thankful for Hopanese, spicy chicken birthday cakes with cigarette candles, Saturday afternoons and best friends who get you through the day. I am thankful for friends that'll help you move, friends that'll find you jobs and jobs you find on your own. I am thankful for the best birthday party in the history of birthday parties, promises for my next birthday and hot men in feathers on my couch. I am thankful for Wednesday Date Night, the Office, Guest Lists when the line is out the door, text messages, turkey buckets, Snickers fairies, boxes of wine and gallons of Jager. I am thankful for my camera and all the people who say nice things about my pictures. I am thankful for secret rooms in Wytheville and staying up all night talking. I am thankful for laying around with the tv off talking all day and sharing parts of you no one else would ever see. I am thankful for Nikki, Jessica, Jackie, TK-421, Burning Bridges, Drivn, Bitter Rain and The Pop Rivets and all the craziness that follows them all.

OK, so the stuffing is gone (it was actually gone about 10 minutes ago but I was on a roll. Yea, I ate them too.) So it's officially the end of Thanksgiving but that doesn't mean I'm not thankful each and everyday of the year for everybody that stops by here and reads my insane ramblings. So, Thanks. Now, I'm off to the Y to work off the massive amounts of turkey I have just ingested in the past two days.

*waddles to the door*


This weekend go see:
TK at The Clinic (I heart the Clinic) Friday and Saturday.
The Pop Rivets at Awful Arthurs Downtown Friday.
The Worx at Cattle Annies Friday. Welcome back JT!!

I'm going to share with you a profound discovery I've made. Call it my contribution to man/musician kind. I really have no use for it myself so I will bestow my great wisdom on you (what can I say, I'm a giver.) So here it goes, are you ready? If you are planning a family and would like your future unborn child to be a musician (god help you) then you need to become pregnant within the months of December through February. Plan yourself a little Libra or Scorpio and the chances of you having a teeny tiny little rockstar of your very own increase enormously. Wait till March and you're having an accountant.

Somehow I went from being the Band Girl to being the Birthday Girl. The keeper of some sort of un-official birthday calendar for the local music scene. Which is funny/sad since I completely missed both of my best friends from high school and college's birthdays this year (and plenty of years past as well.) If my birthday wasn't 04/04 (yes, that's a hint) then I probably would have even forgotten it. So what started off as a way for me to not be such a birthday flake, turned into some kind of massive list of where the local musical birthday soirees would be.

It didn't take long for me to notice a pattern though. Maybe it was the fact that I suddenly was attending birthday parties at an alarming rate or maybe I just actually looked at the calendar (yea, I'm bright like that.) Anyway, so what I noticed is that pretty much every musician I know has a birthday that falls sometime between mid-September and the end of November.

Starting in mid-September (9/15) we celebrated Sarah's Birthday (ok so technically she's not a musician but a musician-in-law) at the Drivn show with the normal goofy Barbie birthday hats and noise makers. Next up was Shane from Trip 9's birthday on September 23 where we presented him with a pretty pink birthday cake and a giant pickle balloon (well, duh.)

Next stop on the birthday train were Wayne Sowder (Soundgod,) Chuck Johnson (TK-421,) and Kip Gaudette (formerly of Chameleon and Staxx fame.) For those of you keeping score at home, Troy and Steve (TK-421, Staxx and Chameleon) had lead singers with the same birthdays. Weird but, true. We celebrated Wayne and Chuck's birthday in Wytheville by having all the girls at the show come dressed in pig-tails. Someone likes pig-tails (but I suspect neither one hated them.) It was all good until Crippler decided to wear Jessica's pig-tail wig. If you've never met Crippler, sweet as he is, he does not make a pretty girl. Uh yea, Happy Birthday guys.

On October 9, the world was graced with presence of Jody Hanschew of Bitter Rain and Bart Harris of JunkFood. Although we weren't there, I'm sure both Jody and Bart managed to have a dandy birthday without us. Certainly the Boone's was flowing freely for Bart and Jody was probably partying it up in the periodicals.

The following week proved just as full. There was a surprise birthday party for Mike Feamster of Burning Bridges (10/11) at O'Charley's were we dined on Jager cake and made jokes about the great mullet-ish hair Mike had in his High School band days.

Then we headed to Winston-Salem, NC to celebrate Bill and Steve's birthday by freezing our arse's off in sub-freezing temperatures at Ziggy's for a TK-421 show where we all rocked out clad in our winter coats because apparently Ziggy's doesn't really feel the need to supply heat when it's 20 degrees outside. The weekend heated up nicely though with TK playing the Fashion Rox Fashion Show at The Garage in Winston-Salem. Chuck got Crippler in pig-tails, Bill and Steve got models. Sorry Chuck.

At this point we are still only at Mid-October. See what I mean? How does this happen? What is it about these months? Sorry I digress, let's continue with the birthday ho-haa's.

Dave "Johnson" Johnson was on deck next with yet another surprise birthday party this time at Red Dragon where suprisingly we ended up talking "shop" with the manager of Red Dragon, Stan Thorn. What's so significant about this? Stan was a founding member of the country group Shenandoah. If I was betting gal, I'd say his birthday was probably somewhere in September-November.

We rounded out the TK birthday season with Troy's birthday on October 24th where we donned "Did you just push me" shirts made especially for Troy (in honor of him defending me from a drunken moron at Greystone one night.) In lieu of a birthday cake, we got Troy a birthday spicy chicken. Spicy Chicken is synonymous with Troy. Although since 7-11 was out of birthday candles, he had to settle for a birthday cigarette candle in his spicy chicken. Ewww.

Currently we are in the midst of Jessica's (again not a musician but a Rockstar nonetheless) birthday weekends (because she deserves more than one.) Last weekend was spent celebrating all weekend in Wytheville (it's the best place to live according to the napkins) at Burning Bridges and Drivn shows. Jackie even made it all the way from DC to help us celebrate with Jesus candles and Suck-n-blows (not together.) Jess' birthday dinner was last night at Kabuki with lots liquor in various flavors and various shaped glasses. Then we headed to Awful Arthur's Towers to listen to Kevin Self and hang out with some of the hottest guys we know. We'll finish her off this weekend at Drivn and TK.

We aren't done yet, there's more birthday work to be done. Jason Hill has a birthday coming up on November 9th which is sure to be a good time. Then Drakyn's birthday is November 17 (even if he is only turning 4, he's all ready started playing the drums.)
Kenny Seay of raygun, soupcan, popcorn ball and Burning Bridges fame brings us to the end of birthday overload on November 25th. *Update-Apparently there are two more birthdays to support my theory. Mike Lindsey of Bitter Rain celebrates on November 21st and our very own Phanton Blogger, the fabulously sarcastic and talented, Mr. John Persinger (big round of applause) celebrates on November 10.
*Updated again to add Tim Wilson's of Shakedown's on October 8.

Whew! If I have to buy one more birthday bottle of Jager...


Shows this weekend for you to pay particular attention to:

Burning Bridges will be at Greystone all weekend.
Drivn will be celebrating Jessica's birthday again at Awful Arthur's Towers on Friday night.
TK-421 makes their debut and caps of the Jessica Birthday Weeks at Awful Arthur's Salem.

(First of all, check me out in the TimesCast from Wednesday HERE!!)

The best part of the night is the stories. Not that the music isn't incredible and fun but really I live for the moments that happen around the show.

Sometimes there are those moments when someone says something or makes an observation that even though it was an ordinary comment for some reason it becomes ridicously funny and begins to morph into way more than it was ever intended. Take for instance the night Jessica and I went to the Danielle Peck show at Greystone to see Burning Bridges (no, we didn't know who she was either. But she's a great performer and her band mates were incredibly nice!) Jessica made a quick jaunt to the bathroom before we headed home for the night. Having made jokes all night about it being a different crowd than we are used to (don't see many cowboy hats at a TK show,) Jess came out of the bathroom giggling. "I was in the bathroom," she said, "and this lady says, 'That was a right good show.' " Typing it out, reading back over it, it's not funny at all but, to hear Jessica say it has become the source of many jokes there after. "I swur fer gawd, the good lord willing and the creek don't rise, that was a right good show."

It's especially funny when you are completely sober and someone who's not so completely sober makes what appears to them to be a rational comment, notsomuch to the sober. Jessica had worn a pair of hot cream-colored tights underneath her shorts as only she can. As "hot" as they were, they eventually became really "hot" and she decided to take them off and just wear the shorts. A few minutes later on a set break, Troy walks up and is talking with us. He looks down and in drunken Triz he says, "Where'd your pants go?" Again, here, right this very second, I'm wondering why I even bothered to type that story out but then, it was absolutely hilarious.

That same night I was the uh..."lucky"...recipient of sweet young girl who "just wanted to get to know the band better." She was an aspiring second year student studying to become a record producer in San Francisco...cough...bulls**t...cough... Wonder why I'm so cynical of her alleged major? It might have been the fact that she was professing her love for the "guitar player in the white shirt" while looking right at Steve, the bass player. I said, "You mean the bass player?" "Uh, yea," she said. Then began flailing her arms about in what I can only assume is some type of weird mating dance she picked up in Haight Ashbury.

The best stories are always the "you had to be there" moments. The moments when someone says something to you that no matter how much inflection or emotion you put into retelling the story, it never quite gets the same reaction from other people. The stories you tell and just wait for an exclamation of your comedic prowess but are usually met by blank stares. As we were winding down our night back at our favorite little Super 8, Liz decided to show us every picture in her cell phone, which suddenly made me want to look at mine.

I flipped open my cell phone and looked at the first picture. "Hmm," I thought quizzically to myself. *Yea, I know that's the most retarded sentence I've ever written but it's true.* I looked a little harder, "I have no idea what that is." "Jess, what is this?" I asked Jessica. "Hmmm?" She said. "Hmmmmmmm?" We said. So there we sat for about 10 minutes trying to figure it out.

"OH! There's a white shirt collar! It must be Chuck!" Jessica deduced. "Oh yea, I said, it's his fist right there too." I noticed. "And there's part of a cymbal!" I continued. So there it was, it was Chuck in his Rebel Yell Billy Idol fist in the air pose. Until this followed:

*Tracy flips phone upside down*
Tracy and Jess in unison: Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh! It's Troy!
*It was so obviously Troy*
Uproarious laughter.

See? Not funny now, but then, Jessica stopped breathing and I had tears streaming down my face from laughing so hard. Although here's the part you can appreciate. We wanted everyone to play our little "What's this a picture of" game. We handed Bill the phone in it's really confusing original orientation. As Bill looks at the phone for a moment he says, "I see a poodle."

Ok, I guess you really did have to be there. But I'm cracking up just thinking about it.

Lots of great shows to see this week!
Thursday-Need a road trip? Go see The Pop Rivets at Bogarts in Richmond. Or just catch them Friday Night at Martins. Jason is playing playing with Charlie Hamill Saturday night at The Fork in the Alley.

Friday-You heard the forecast! It's Burning Bridges in Danville at The 5th Quarter. You can also check out the big show at AA's Towers with National Act, Jimmie's Chicken Shack with our very own Cobalt Media opening the show for them.

Saturday-BB stays in Danville. TK-421 finally makes their way back to AA's Towers (hopefully someone will clean up all the chicken feathers from Friday night.)

By the way people, it's not too early to start thinking about New Year's Eve. There are some great shows this year! TK-421 will be at the Clinic in Wytheville (where else would they be?) and Bitter Rain will be down the street at Turn One (what an after party that will be!) Also a big show with Burning Bridges AND The Worx at The 5th Quarter in Danville. Damned the choices!!

They say, "you can never go home again." It's not that you actually "can't", it's more so just that you probably don't want to. If you've just joined us here in bndgrllnd, I moved to Roanoke about 7 months ago from Harrisonburg where I had lived nearly all my life. It really bothers me to hear people in Roanoke whine about the music scene in this town. Be grateful folks because for whatever Roanoke is lacking in, it's a hell of a lot more than Harrisonburg even has.

There used to be at least 4 or 5 clubs you could go to to hear live music there. I've had some GREAT times at those clubs. How could you not love Chisholms for all it's broken nastiness? The toilets over flowed every night, there were holes in the stage, the ceiling was falling down and unindentifiable stains all over the hotel rooms but goodness did we ever have some great times in that place. Who could forget such classics as, "Watch Kenny break his face," "Let's sneak some Jello Shots in," "Let's get the camera phone out," "Josh has a trashcan on his head," "Where's the rest of Rude Dog's headphones" and "Let me see your..." But that's all ended now since they closed their old broken doors earlier this year.

Now really the only places left in Harrisonburg to listen to live music is a couple of bars and a half with The Pub, Mainstreet and Rocktown (formerly High"I don't wanna get shot"Lawn.) So, that half a bar is where we headed this past weekend to see Burning Bridges. Technically, "Rocktown" is a full size bar, with a pretty big room. Unfortunately, it's a big concrete room with one table and horrible acoustics (big props to Jeremy Nichols for making it virtually unoticeable.) But when last call is at midnight, I can't really consider you a real bar.

Occasionally the selfish b**** in me likes it when I get a "private" show where the crowd is so dismal that the band is essentially playing to me. This weekend however, was not one of those weekends. We had established Friday night as "girls night" and gathered up a rare appearance by nearly all of my girlfriends. Jackie, Nikki, Jessica and myself were geared up for a great night of drunken bonding. Although since Jessica and I were still recovering from Thursday night's record Jager setting performance at the Drivn show we had deferred the "drunkenness" to Jackie and Nikki. They were gracious enough to kindly take care of that without any problems.

Nikki and Ronnie went ahead a little early to get "a table" (I didn't realize that there was only one to get.) While Jackie, Jessica and I made a stop for a shoebox full of hotdogs from Jess' Quick Lunch (now THAT is something I can go home for.) *Please note-Cold Chilidogs during a show are the best food you will ever eat and unless you are Jackie and continually forget that you ate all yours.

Since the band started at 9:00 (another reason I can't consider it a real bar, who starts a band at 9:00? I don't even take a shower to get ready until 9 sometimes) we missed most of the first set in hotdog heaven so we assumed it would be packed when we got there. We were wrong. We watched as some lone couple line danced to every song, "Bring these people with you from Greystone?," I asked Jeremy. Apparently it seemed, that not only had Harrisonburg clubs given up on live music the people had as well.

I was also wrong about not wanting a private show. It's been a while since I've seen a show where the turnout had been less than stellar. It was definitely cool to have Kenny lean down to us at one point near the end of the night and say, "There's no one here but you guys, tell us what you want us to play." Still I would have much rather these guys had a packed house.

So next the time you find your self saying, "the music scene here sucks." Remember, it could be worse, you could live in Harrisonburg. Also keep in mind if you don't support local music in Roanoke, we will end up just like Harrisonburg.

(Side note: They had a great crowd Saturday night so maybe not all hope is lost.)

Check these shows out:
Fri/Sat-Burning Bridges at Mulligan's in Staunton
Fri-Drivn at Awful Arthur's Towers
Sat-Drivn at The Buckhead Saloon in Charlotte
Sat-Bad Dog at The Clinic in Wytheville

Saturday, Sept 23rd-The best band in DC (according to The Washington Post), JunkFood, comes to AA's Towers. Don't MISS IT! Hey Jeff-BYOB (Bring your own bucket.)

I've tried being funny and witty. I've tried being serious and contemplative. But sometimes these things just don't come to you too easily. So I'm just going to give it to you straight. Here are the high and low lights from the past couple of weekends.

We had one really crazy Friday night in Wytheville a couple of Friday's ago. We are pretty sure at this point that someone put something in Jess' drink at the bar that caused her to black out (not pass out people, BLACK OUT) and fall out of Bill's truck into the gravel parking lot where the only thing catching her was her face. Trust me you never want 3 drunks to be your Emergency Medical Team either, especially when you realize upon sobering up that you probably had a concussion. Luckily Jess heals mighty quick.

As if one set of injuries wasn't enough, I decide to break my foot just a few hours later. Now if you've ever seen me, chances are good that you've seen me fall at least once. Why? Because I'm a big ol' klutz. I fall at least once a night for no reason. Maybe I have bad ankles, maybe it has something to do with the size of my butt and gravity, I just don't know. All I know is I go down a lot (there's an emoticon that goes there but Tad would probably be mad if I actually typed it out.) So you would think I would have injured myself more frequently. Despite this at 30..cough..something years old I am proud to say I've never broken a bone, until now. How did it happen? You might ask. It's simple. Lesbian Ninjas. Lesbian Ninjas? You might ask. Yes, Lesbian Ninjas.

So we hobbled all broken and bent back to Roanoke for some out of town guests, a Bachelorette/Bachelor Party and a near on-stage orgy.

It wasn't too long after I met Kel that I introduced her to the soundman (and my first and only groupie) for The Pop Rivet's at the time, Dave Nipper. None of us ever imagined they would begin dating much less end up engaged. Well here we are with the wedding coming this weekend so it was time to throw the kid's a little party. Dave and Kel decided to do a joint Bachelor/Bachelorette party so that all of our friends could just get together in one spot to celebrate. We did dinner and Margaritas and then headed over to Greystone Tavern (after a failed attempt at Bachelorette Laser Tag) for TK-421. We made Kel wear ridiculous things and drink ridiculous amounts while Troy pulled Nipper up on stage to do play a song. I hope they had a great time and will have many, many, many more.

We also had visitors for the weekend. Jenn is from South Carolina and she really is the SC version of me. She used to follow Troy and Steve around 10 years ago with their old band, Staxx, like I do with TK now. Well 1o years is way too long to go without seeing those boys play! So Jenn grabbed her husband "Dirty" and their crew and headed to VA for a little Rock-N-Roll show. Boy did they ever get a show.

I'm not sure what was in the Jager that Friday night in Greystone but I'm pretty sure that everyone in that bar got kissed at least once by somebody up on a speaker. There were girls kissing girls. There were girls kissing boys. There were boys kissing girls and girls. There were chicks all over the stage, all night long. It was complete and total decedant mayhem. Good times indeed. Also, if you drink a lot your broken foot doesn't hurt nearly as much. Funny how that works out.

Ok, that's all I got. Is that enough? Oh, the Lesbian Ninja thing? Not true. I really just fell down for no reason.


Shows for the week:
Thursday, TK-421 at Schooner's.
Friday, The Pop Rivets at AA's Towers
Friday, Cobalt Media and Burning Bridges at Greystone
Saturday, TK-421 plays their last show for a MONTH (boo) at AA's Towers
Saturday, Naughty Schoolgirl Night at Greystone with Burning Bridges again.

Edit-Two shows I forgot!! Especially for you folks in Staunton/Harrisonburg.

Saturday-JunkFood is back at The Pub in Harrisonburg. F'you Ladder!! These guys ROCK go support them. They'll be at Towers soon!

Saturday-Bitter Rain is at Mulligan's in Staunton. Stay outta the pool CFK!!

One More I forgot!! Ugh, there's way too much going on!
Bad Dog is at Schooner's on Saturday!

A few more things really quickly:

*Here's a little private message for someone and I hope they are reading it. The local bands around here who are playing "small local bars" are doing it with THEIR music. Music they have put their blood, sweat and tears into. You are playing big clubs across the country on someone elses hard work. You are succesful at imitating not creating. So let's keep that in perspective shall we?

*If you haven't heard, Tommy Nunley has rejoined Drivn as it's bass player. Good luck to him and the guys in Drivn as they make their way across the country and especially to Justin Tolley who I'm sure you will hear from again very soon!

*I'm sorry to say that I missed one awesome Pop Rivets show at Mango's this past weekend. It started to rain and my boys played IN the rain. Talk about "never stop the show." I heard from several people how awesome this show was! Not that The Pop Rivets aren't always awesome but every musician always has that one show where everything is on and perfect! So, good job guys! I heart you!

I LOVE MY LIFE. I really, really do. There are not many people that have more fun than I do.

Two weeks ago I was set to spend another nomal two nighter in WytheVegas. We've done this a million times (I really should buy property there.) There was no reason to suspect anything would be any different this time. Maybe Troy breaks a chair instead of the table? But that would be the extent of it. Apparently though Jessica forgot to read my blog about the "Saturday Afternoon."

My friend, Jessica, decided to make her first trek to Wytheville for the TK-421/Drivn double header weekend. Friday night was typical great shows from both bands as well as a the typical late night after the shows. So Saturday I assumed would be the typical "Saturday Afternoon." Well I found out pretty quickly there really is nothing typical about Jess.

After a measly 3 or so hours of sleep (I hate you Red Bull) we were both wide awake. Jess immediately jumps up and starts cleaning. Me? I immediately rolled over to the other side. Bill eventually made his way up to our room to hang out. With nothing left to clean, Jess exclaims, "I'm not sitting here all day, let's go to the go cart track!" "Whu huh?" I said confused. "Hmmm, ok," I said suprising even myself.

So after getting lost looking for some really bad Chinesse food and hitting a outlet mall that only had two stores, we were off to the Galewinds go-cart track. We hit the arcade first getting chased by some kid who was convinced he was better at shooting deer than me (he was right, annoying, but right.) Bill gave him 2 bucks (the paper kind not the animal kind) to go away. He left and much to our dismay never returned even after sending him off with orders to get us some birthday cake from the party in the next room.

After some mad arcade playing skills, despite getting screwed by the skee ball machine, we racked up enough tickets to purchase a whoopie cushion, 2 sets of hillbilly teeth and a beeeaaaauuuutiful ring that we got at a discount because the lady behind the counter felt sorry for us (or was annoyed by us, whatever.)

Let me just tell you one thing, there is nothing funnier in this world than two grown women walking around with fake hillbilly teeth at a go-cart track. Oh wait, I'm wrong, there is one thing funnier. There is nothing funnier in this world than seeing Jess with hillbilly teeth in her mouth in super high heels from the night before driving a go-cart!

The rest of the afternoon was spent doubled over from laughter each time we grinned at someone new. If you've never sat in Applebee's before with fake hillbilly teeth in, I would highly suggest it. It's a riot. As if that wasn't enough excitement for one day, we made sure to keep our new teeth in for the Trip 9 and TK-421 show. My abs hurt the next day from laughing so hard for so long.

By the way, the Trip 9 and TK-421 show was amazing! Trip 9 is awesome and hopefully we'll be seeing these guys out more very soon! There's nothing like having a killer opening band to make you step your game up and TK, whose shows are always top-notch, found a way to exceed even their normally high standards.

As if that wasn't enough, I had a whole week full of shows to look forward to. The big Theory of a Deadman show at Greystone, TK at Schooners, Burning Bridges at the Coffee Pot and then TK had another incredible band opening for them on Saturday, Mudjunkie, from Winston-Salem.

Jess and I hit the Theory show together, sans the teeth (not completely sans teeth mind you, just sans the weekend teeth.) I got my first chance to hear Madrone, who rocked, and then my first chance to see the new Chinese Fire Drill line-up who completely rocked my socks (although it was a little sad for me not seeing Jason up there. I'm a huge Jaymo fan!) Theory of a Deadman of course put on a great show! I was so thrilled to see the place packed as well. It's really important for Roanoke to support shows like this and they really came through. But as usual, the best part of the night happened after the show.

As Jess and I were drunkingly milling around Greystone, I was told that the drummer was looking for me. ME? Huh? Well all-righty then! I went over to the autograph table where the drummer, Jay Deachman, asks me, "Are you the girl who was taking pictures all night?" Jay, Jess and I actually ended up hanging out for a little while after the show but alas, with nothing to do in Salem at 1 am, Jess and I headed home.

A tired Thursday night brought another rare mid-week TK show at Schooner's. This would have another typical TK show had I-81 not been shut down. I sat on Peter's Creek with no way out for an hour just trying to get to the show. Chuck didn't even get there until 15 minutes after they were supposed to start. Did I mention the neighborhood had been evacuated? "Everybody out except for the drunks and the band!" A conspiracy maybe? Hmmmm...

Friday night was spent on top of a speaker dancing all night with my Ikki at Burning Bridges 'outting at the Coffee Pot. Seriously, who else's life has this many stories in less than a week?

I finally made it to Saturday night despite my liver's protest. I had been looking forward to seeing Mudjunkie for months! If you've not heard these guys, head directly to their Myspace site right now (ok well maybe wait until I finish 'War and Piece' here) and take a listen! They are awesome! Mudjunkie did not disapoint either! They put on an outstanding show! But the highlight of my night was TK. Remember before when I talked about having to step it up when you have a great opening band (yea, sorry I know it was a while ago, try to stick with me?)

Saturday night was THE best TK-421 show I have ever seen. The crowd was on their feet all night (as well as the speakers) and the band was isane! For some reason there was an abundance of musicians at the show and Chuck brought nearly every single one of them on stage at one point! I think there was probably at least 6 different bands represented on stage. It was an amazing night musically!

In the process of trying to recall everything that has happened over the past two weeks, there were some stories I've just remembered, some others that didn't really fit but were worth mentioning. So here, in no particular order are more random reasons why nobody has more fun than I do:

• Jackie doing a u-turn in the middle of the road and a rolling stop/grab to retrieve Steve's hat that had just flown off my head when I decided I needed to pop my head out of her sunroof on the way back to the hotel. But I didn't lose Carrie's sunglasses!
  
• Mudjunkie's bass player swallowing the worm. Tequilla people! I'm talking about Tequilla!
• Fake tattoo's from the arcade and the girl at the bar asking me, "How'd you get your tattoo so sparkly?"
• Good talks with good friends late at night.
  
• Neon Green Meter Reader shirts when you've got nothing left to wear.
• Jess trying on tennis shoes and sprinting around the Reebok Store.
• Jess wanting to skip through the meadow across from the hotel.
• Kicking 12 year olds out of our room because well, they were 12.
• Ikki and I trying to push the weird chick off the speaker.
  
• Having Pooh Bear tell the waitress at Applebee's he didn't want anything to eat because "it makes me poop."

I LOVE MY LIFE!!

Shows this weekend:

TK and Mudjunkie do it again but in Greensboro at The Flying Anvil. Can they repeat? I'm pretty sure.

Burning Bridges is at Highlawn/Rocktown Grille or whatever they are calling it this week to keep their liquor license on Saturday in Harrisonburg.

Drivn is at Awful Arthurs Towers.

Bitter Rain is at The Clinic in WytheVegas.

So it's been a couple of weeks since I checked in. Sorry, I've been swamped! You might be asking, "Whatcha been up to Band Girl?" Of course you might not be asking that in which case you're about to receive more information than you really care for. Between vacation and shows, it's been a crazy couple of weeks. But I wouldn't have it any other way!

Ikki and I had been planning for the past couple of months to take a trip to Cancun. We didn't find out until the last minute that she had the wrong type of birth certificate to get us into Mexico (or I guess out of Mexico, which was the most important part.) We rush ordered her one and prayed that it would get here in time although that seemed unlikely with Fourth of July easily disrupting the approximate 2-5 day wait time. As it approached 4:30 on the evening before our trip and without a knock from FedEx, I picked up the phone and called my Travel Agent to cancel the trip (thank god for travel insurance.) I was on hold when my other line rang. It was Ikki calling to tell me that it definitely hadn't come and I should just cancel. Just as I answered Ikki's call the UPS man knocked on her door with a very important envelope in his hand! "Uh, never mind" I said nearly screaming into the TA's ear. Look out Mexico, here comes TrIkki!!

It wasn't long after arriving in Mexico we were on the look out for bands! We flipped through every pamphlet and map we had been handed trying to find clubs with bands. We started with Senor Frog's where I'm pretty sure I accidentally married our Mexican waiter and we were molested by Melon Ball shot wielding waitresses. Don't go to Mexico expecting to keep your "personal space" in tact. Also at Senor Frog's apparently all the bus boys are from Virginia. "Where you from?" "Virginia" "Me, too!" Of course we could have said "Mars" and the answer would have been "Me, too!"

Not finding a band at Senor Frogs we headed off to Daddy Rocks where we saw a band who's set was four whole songs. Yep, four songs. We quickly found out that apparently it is law in Mexico that all bands know Sweet Child of Mine. I think we heard it at least 4 times in the two days we went out. The only saving grace at Daddy Rocks was that we were quickly escorted into a VIP section. Apparently my reputation preceded me (either that or the waiter saw an opportunity to get lots of tips from a couple of drunk Americans.) We did however leave with the one and only bottle of "Trikki" brand tequila! It cost 150 pesos which I'm pretty sure equals about 2,832,834,293,474 dollars or something like that. I hate math.

The rest of the weekend went pretty much the same way, searching for bands, tequila, searching for bands, tequila, tequila, tequila. We risked our lives on the buses for $13 pesos (again like a trillion dollars or something) but we always held onto our drinks! We met some famous British athletes but we never found who they were. Nikki tried to console me after I had a some of my daquiri spilled down my shirt by taking her shirt off in the parking lot (hey what are friends for?) We ate iguana (they said it was chicken, whatever,) drunk dialed from Mexico (which was way more effort than it was worth,) and parasailed (which was AWESOME!) Then it was time to go home, thank god. After a brief trip to Immigration to replace the "don't lose this paper you can't get back into the county without it" paper we lost. We actually made it home.

A couple of days later it was time for another road trip for me. This time a quick 3 1/2 hour drive to Petersburg after work on Thursday night to catch TK-421 at somewhere that wasn't Wytheville. It was a great show, despite Troy's breaking a guitar, a string and a strap after never having any kind of mechanical failures in his 6 or so years with TK. Good thing the guy has a sense of humor otherwise he would have been really mad at Monica and I for laughing so hard at him. He did a great job of working through it though with a few quick fixes backstage.

The best part of Petersburg though were the people! The gig came about from a fan of TK's, Barry Sarver. Barry is the male version of me on that side of the state, getting TK shows whenever he can in the Richmond area. But he has me beat by a long shot. Not only did he get them a show and helped them make a ton of new fans but he and his family were the most open and gracious people I've ever encountered while hanging out with bands. They not only opened their refrigerator full of beer to us but their home as well. It was a TK slumber party complete with chicken wings and toquito's after the show. Barry's wife, Dawn even got up early (since some of us still had to drive back to work) and made biscuits, gravy and most importantly, coffee for us!!

Friday night, I headed out for some much needed Pop Rivets time. We celebrated Jason Hill's return to stage after being stuck in Florida for work with blue balloons, banners, blue beads and neon blue necklaces! Just in time for Jason to have to leave again. Boo. Welcome home Jay, see you in a few weeks?!

Hang in there folks, we are almost done!


Luckily I found out last minute that Bad Dog had picked up a show at Schooner's on Saturday night. The place was packed, lots of my friends made it out and it was another great show by Bad Dog especially considering Schooner's electricity kept going out on them. Nothing like a little improvising an acoustic tune with the whole crowd joining in! There was a moment of brief panic though when I lost my camera. Well remember those friends I was talking about a second ago? They completely came through for me tenfold! As soon as I realized that my camera was missing, literally half the bar began looking for it. Bill Schuelter made the bouncers lock the bar down ("Don't let anyone out of here!") Luckily it was found quickly close by.

Ok, whew! I think that was it! See I told you I'd been busy!

There are some GREAT upcoming shows, so hopefully you stuck around until the end!

Wytheville is the place to be this weekend:
Friday- TK-421 at Turn One. Drivn at The Clinic.
Saturday- Bitter Rain is at the Hungry Mother Arts Festival at 5 pm then it's on to TK-421 at Turn One with special guests, Trip 9!! Trip 9 is awesome and their live debut is way overdue! Drivn is also back at The Clinic. Sorry, I won't have biscuits and gravy for you.

Next Wednesday is the BIG, BIG, Theory of a Deadman show at Greystone Tavern with special guests CFD and Madrone! Join me, WROV and hopefully half of Roanoke at the show! It'll be awesome! Tickets are on sale now at Greystone for $20 which includes dinner! What a great deal!

Next Friday, July 28-The Band Girl hits the airwaves! I'll be on K92's Morning Thang radio show. I have no idea what I'll be doing or what it will entail, just make sure you tune in!

On a serious note people, the clubs in the area, specifically Awful Arthur's Towers and Greystone Tavern are working their butts off to get this area top notch, national shows! They can't continue to do this without the support of the community! So please, please, for the love of Kenny Seay, go to these shows!!!!

I'm going to let you in on a little secret. It's just between us though, ok?

Have you ever seen one of those silly Myspace quizzes that ask you, "What is your favorite day of the week?" My answer is always the same for this question, "Saturday Afternoon." Yes, "Saturday Afternoon" is to a whole day! Well if you know how to do it right it is.

The Saturday in between a two-nighter (a Friday night and Saturday night with the same band at the same hotel) is a unique time to hang out, it's a rare treat and if you don't do it right you may not get a chance to do it again. There are rules that must be obeyed.

Rule #1 - Two nap minimum. You will wake up around 11'ish (unless Jackie is around then bump that up to 8:00 am and add an extra nap.) Eat fast-food (Typically a Spicy Chicken sandwich.) Nap. Wake up, watch mindless tv for a few hours. Eat more fast-food, nap until time to shower for Saturday night.

Rule #2 - You fly, I'll buy. Someone has to leave to purchase the food, its just got to be done. You must spend at least 15 minutes arguing about who has to drive the mile and a half to pick up the food. At some point there after someone will become desperate enough to utter the words "You fly, I'll buy." Also known as, "I'm so hungover, I can barely lift my head off this pillow. If you go get our food I'll pay for it all." It's at this point, the cheapest person in the bunch is usually halfway out the door with his 4 orders for Spicy Chicken.

Rule #2 - Amendment A - "You fly, I'll buy" is null and void when Room Service is available. Then you must order Room Service for every meal, even if you are not hungry just because it's available. Then you must pile all your dishes in the corner as homage to the great "Saturday Afternoon."

Rule #2 - Amendment A - Clause 1 - If the room is your name, you get to pay for all of the room service. Expect a $300 charge to your credit card for the room and food.


Rule 3 - All unnecessary movement is strictly prohibited.- Necessary movement includes only the following: leaving to purchase food, bathroom breaks. Some movement may be excused if you need to go shopping because the stuff you brought to wear on Saturday night you wore on Friday night instead. Otherwise, you must stay in bed, typically in one spot, wrapped up like a cocoon all day long.

Rule 4 - You are only allowed to watch bad TV.- Are you man enough to handle 8 hours of Elimidate? How about back to back cheesy dragon movies on the Sci-Fi Channel? Channel surfing is also allowed if you refuse to stop on one channel, the faster the better. Exceptions can be made for remodeling shows on HGTV featuring rednecks and The History Channel.

Rule 4 - Amendment 1- You can negate the "Bad TV" rule if someone from the band brings an LCD projector and shows movies on the ceiling. Bonus points if he can hang a sheet on the ceiling to make a better screen.

Follow these directions carefully and the next thing you know it'll be showtime again. So there you have it. Now you know. It is entirely possible to turn one afternoon into a whole day.


Shows to catch this week:

Thursday- It's TK Thursday! It's TK Thursday! A rare Thursday night, TK-421 show at Schooner's. It's their first time there so come out and show the boys some support!

Friday/Saturday-Burning Bridges is at Greystone Tavern all weekend.

Saturday-Bitter Rain is at Awful Arthur's Towers.

I'm an attention whore. I am. I admit it. But if there is one thing I love more than getting mounds of attention, it's doing nice things for my friends. It's not that I do things for my friends just to get attention, I don't. I take pictures because I love to take pictures. I buy drinks because I want to buy you a drink. I go out of my way to promote your band because I want you to be successful. I buy trips to Cancun because I want you with me (woohoo CANCUN!) I love making my friends happy even if it means nothing for me in return. But, one of my biggest pet peeves in the world is when people can't say, "Thank You" for the things I do for them. Two syllables, eight letters, it's not that hard people! Enter Burning Bridges...

After a brief stop at the "Callieabration" for Callie's extra pink birthday party, Nikki and I headed to Wiffle to see Burning Bridges at Turn One. I had been having an unusually lousy, grouchy, self-loathing Saturday for some reason and I assured Ikki the entire way that the rest of the night was bound to go the same way my day had.

Upon hitting the club, we headed straight to the bar hoping that multitudes of alcohol would force me to lighten up a little. After spending a quick $20 at the bar, we headed over to the band table where we were greeted with tons of hugs and lots of "what took you guys so long?" Awww, thanks, it's nice to be missed. One of my favorite things about da Bridges is that no matter how long it's been since we've seen them, a week or 3 months, they are always happy to see us and they always tell us so. That in itself is worth any trip to go see them but, it gets better.

A few moments later, Jody shoves his Econolodge key in my face and says, "Here, Yoda (Steve) and I are going home, you can have our room." Wow, thanks Jody! That sure beats having to pay another $60 for a hotel room in Wytheville after spending a $140 the weekend before in the same town. So far we had lots of attention and a free room but, it got better.

Just as our $20 fill of Jager Bombs and Beam and Cokes had come to an abrupt end, we suddenly had new, free Beam and Cokes, Jager shots and Jager Bombs. Since I'm usually the one always buying rounds for the band, it was awesome to actually get them FROM the band instead. Again, wow and thanks! So now we were up to lots of attention, a free room and free drinks but, it got better.

As Nikki and I stood in line for the bathroom (lots of free drinks will do that to a girl,) one of the guys in the band happened to walk out of the men's bathroom at the same time. He stopped, looked at us and said, "You two are the prettiest girls in here." Aww, wow and thanks so much! So to recap we had lots of attention, a free room, free drinks, and hot guys saying nice things to us (that pretty much cured the self loathing.) But, you guessed it, it got better.

It's no secret that I haven't exactly been on the best terms with a member of Burning Bridges but we had to come to an unspoken understanding of "let's just ignore each other so there's no more drama." It worked for us, we both seemed o.k. with it. As I sat there Saturday night, feeling all warm and fuzzy from the earlier events of the evening, I heard someone say, "Tracy, those pictures you took from Greystone were great!" Wait, what? Is he talking to me? Really? Wow, that was nice, thanks. But wait, it gets better. He said, "Thank you for taking them." Wow, thanks, considering our history, that's huge!

It doesn't get any better than that.


My shows for the week:
There are two shows that I missed promoting this week because I was so late in writing this blog but I still wanted to mention them. First of which is band that I think will definitely be added to the all ready crowded, Trikki band rotation, Mudjunkie. These guys rock and I can not wait until July 29th when they open up for TK-421 at AA's Towers. Definitely check them out!

Secondly, tonight I missed a show with my old Pop Rivets friend, James Pace, who is now playing keys around the country with recording artist, Harper. So go check out his music online and hopefully they'll stop around here again soon!

Friday:
Bitter Rain at Awful Arthur's Downtown
Burning Bridges at Awful Arthur's Towers
I see that The Pop Rivets are listed for the Brambleton Deli but I'm not sure if that is still on or not, but I'll let you know if it's not.

Saturday:
Drivn is at AA's Towers.
Burning Bridges is at Highlawn in Harrisonburg if you want a road trip.

I had planned this week to only talk about last week's King's X show at Awful Arthur's Towers. But instead I need to vent. I need to yell and scream and tell a few people exactly what I think about them. So to the ABC Board, this one's for you. Somebody get some bail money ready I think I'll need it one day.

This little rant started off as a letter to the K92 Mornin' Thang radio show DJ's Danny and Zack. As I was driving into work this morning listening to their broadcast as I do everyday, my ears perked up when I heard them bringing the band, The Worx into the studio. The Worx were there to discuss an incident that happened at the Smith Mountain Lake bar, Mango's, where several of their fans were arrested for being intoxicated in a bar. Not driving while drunk, not starting a fight, not passing out on a sidewalk but DRINKING IN A BAR. These were not underage kids buying Boone's Farm from 7-11, these were not the multitude of 16 year olds hanging over the railings on the upper deck of Mango's sneaking down and taking sips of Pina Coloda's from their parent's cups. These were adults over the age of 21 doing what you do in a bar, drinking.

What a lot of people may not realize is that this incident happened LAST summer. But the ABC board is just now going public with this incident almost A YEAR after the initial investigation. Why? I'm assuming it's because it's Memorial Day weekend and someone is trying to teach someone a lesson. "Good luck with your summer Mango's when we've just announced to the world that if you get drunk in your bar you are going to get arrested."

The ABC claims that it was The Worx themselves that caused this situation. From the board's decision, "Agent Mark Scott told the general manager that he blamed the type of entertainment hosted by Mango's, saying that certain types of music create 'a whole lot of havoc.' Scott went on to cite popular Roanoke band the Worx as a group that 'draws the wrong crowd and entices the consumption of alcoholic beverages."

Now last time I checked (ok so I haven't really checked but I think it's pretty safe to assume) the duties of an ABC officer don't typically cover making biased judgments about the music any band plays. But here's the kicker! On the radio show, Agent Mark Scott's wife called in to say that she and her husband have gone to numerous Worx shows, traveling as far as Wintergreen to see the band. So essentially Agent Scott just called his wife and himself "the wrong crowd." I wonder if while watching The Worx if Agent Scott or his wife ever had a couple of drinks? I wonder if they were ever intoxicated at a Worx show? Pot...Kettle...

If the ABC agents involved were honestly doing this for the welfare of the community, then instead of arresting people inside the bar why didn't they just set up road blocks? How did they know those intoxicated people didn't have Designated Drivers? This wasn't a situation of bar fight breaking out or anything physical happening, this was the result of adults over the age of 21 drinking at a bar while enjoying a band on a warm summer night at The Lake.

Yes, it may be illegal to be intoxicated in a bar in the state of Virginia but it's also illegal to have sex with the lights on this state. Should I be expecting a knock at my bedroom door at any moment (Dear Mom, if you are reading this please pretend that last sentence never happened. I've never had sex in my life.)

My question is doesn't the ABC "bored" have anything better to do than to arrest people who are of legal age for drinking inside a bar? Shouldn't you be on the road stopping drunk drivers from killing people? Or maybe putting more resources into dealing with the Meth problems in this state? Or maybe patrolling The Lake for people driving their boats drunk and killing people. Nope it's definitely a much better use of your resources to arrest adults of legal age for being drunk inside a bar.

Now let's talk about this whole noise ordinance thing at the lake. Mango's, in my opinion, was always very respectful of the area by having the bands stop at 11:30. But apparently that wasn't good enough for the people who purchased land near a RECREATIONAL area. If you want peace and quiet during the summer, might I suggest buying property in the mountains. It is summertime, there are parties, there are cookouts, there are loud boats. But did anyone complain about these things? How about the SML Wine Festival? The decibel level at the Wine Festival was well over the 67dB level now in place. How do I know this? Because the FOH who ran sound at the Festival told me so. Did anyone complain about the noise level from the Wine Festival? Will the people at the Wine Festival keep it under 67dB this year? I'm guessing at the Wine Festival there were plenty of drunk people, did anyone get arrested there? I think not.

Have The Worx and Mango's been unfairly targeted? Yes they sure have because the music they play is not what the surrounding residents or ABC board chooses to listen to. So my advice is that if you go to The Smith Mountain Lake Wine Festival don't drink any wine because you'll be arrested...oh wait, it doesn't happen there.

Everybody Footloose!

Somehow you'll escape
all that waiting and staying.
You'll find the bright places
where Boom Bands are playing.--Dr. Seuss

I am slowing coming out my band "funk." The routine is slowly starting to fall back in place. I've met new friends. I've seen old friends. I've gotten off the couch and out the door. Despite my lack of blog, doesn't that sound like a medical condition? Something I might have needed a good antibiotic salve for? Ahem, anyway, despite my lack of blog, I have been "band" busy the past couple of weeks.

My boys from the Dee Cizzle (yep, that's the dumbest thing I've ever written,) JunkFood finally hit the NRV at Awful Arthur's Towers. The crowd was a bit sparse for a Friday night, I assume only because no one really knew who they were. You really have no idea what you missed Roanoke, these guys ROCK. Even when their drummer catches a nasty bug from his daughters and needs a bucket beside the drumkit, they still brought "it." Although poor Essex (Drummer, Jeff) seemed to have brought more of "it" than he have probably liked. Eww.

As Jeff was led back to the hotel to bury his head in his bucket without an audience after the first set, the rest of the JunkFood boys whipped up a couple of impromptu accoustic sets. Major props go out to these guys for turning what could have been a disaster into quite a cool little show. Also, just so you know everyone at the show looked at me and said, "These guys are really good!" Huh? Ya think? Why is it people don't ever seem to believe I know good music when I hear it? The same thing happens whenever I bring someone new to a TK show. They always say, "Wow you were right! These guys are awesome!" Seriously people, I know a good band when I hear one, trust me. Sorry, I digress. Anyway, JunkFood well, they just rock. Hopefully they'll be back in the area soon. Their new cd drops June 3 so go buy one or ten.

I also got a chance to catch up with some old friends and meet some new ones when I went to see Bad Dog at The Coffee Pot. I had seen Bad Dog before a while back but the line up had changed once or twice since then including my friend, Tim, taking over on bass. Each time I see this band they seem to get better and better. I finally got to meet Rusty (let's all say it together, "mmmm Rusty") and even Troy from TK showed up. This is a band I will definitely go see again. I had an awesome time! My only complaint is that they don't play out nearly enough. They are a band that could be booked solid every month but seem quite content just to play once or twice a month around town somewhere.

Speaking of Rusty, those of you who might remember him from his days in Staxx, it looks like there may be yet another Staxx reunion this summer in Myrtle Beach around Labor Day. If you are looking for an amazing once (or twice) in a lifetime show this one would be worth the road trip! I'll let you know when I hear more details.

Finally, this past Saturday I got to spend a little much needed time with the guys in Burning Bridges. It seems weird to me that I used to spend every weekend with these guys and now I feel like I never see them anymore. But we had a great time as always. There was a jello as always although spiced up this time with a little whip cream and a HUGE bag of movie theater popcorn that I'm sure Kenny's kids have gotten lost in (it was huge!) I did however manage to stay dry this time even thought the pool was calling my name (literally.)


Now that I'm on the right track again (funny, usually I'm on the wrong side of the tracks) it's time for a killer mid-week show! Yes folks, Wednesday night will be the biggest little rock show Roanoke has seen in quite awhile. Awful Arthur's Towers has scored quite a coup in bringing in national act, King's X to grace it's quaint little stage. But first my favorites, TK-421 get to open the night with a set (albeit much abbreviated) of TK originals! In the middle of this rock sandwich will be a great band out of LA, Mardo (think Silvertide-ish.) It's going to be an AMAZING show! WROV will also be on hand to lead the festivities and from what I hear, they've got some goodies! Sweet! I can't wait!!

By the way, I just heard that King's X was at The Green Dolphin tonight and even played for a little bit. They said they were "looking forward to hearing TK."

So in conclusion...I'm back and Wednesday will rock!

Shows for this week:

Wednesday-See above! TK-421/Mardo/King's X at AA's Towers. Show starts at 9:00!! I said 9:00 !!!!!!

Friday & Sat-Burning Bridges at Greystone Tavern (RailHowlersShooters)

Saturday-TK-421 finishes the rest of their show from Wednesday night at Awful Arthur's Towers.

Also on Saturday-The boys in The Pop Rivets play a benefit show at The Green Dolphin for a local family who lost everything in a fire.

I didn't write a blog last week because I didn't feel like I had anything to talk about. I still don't and that's what I'm going to talk about. Make sense? I thought so.

I feel like I'm not being a very good "Band Girl" lately. When I lived in Harrisonburg I would drive to Roanoke about twice a week to see bands. Sometimes driving down on a Thursday, going back Friday morning and then returning Friday night. Now here I sit on a Thursday night, there's a new band not 10 minutes from my apartment and I just don't feel like going. I can't tell you the last time I went to a mid-week show.

The weekend before last, I went to see TK-421 in Wytheville for the second weekend in a row. Not much to write home about, same great music, same alcohol consumption (maybe a little extra on Friday and a little less on Satruday.) But no good stories to report back with. I suppose you can't get banned from hotels every weekend. As much as I love those guys, I'm kind of glad they are off for a few weeks. Hopefully it'll give me a chance to check out some other bands if I can manage to get off my couch.

This past weekend, I went to Harrisonburg to see one of my favorite bands, Drivn. I haven't got to see a full show from them in what feels like forever. So it was good to spend all weekend with them. I drank more Friday night than I ever have in my life. Not good. There were some funny stories I'm sure but, I really don't remember any of them. I remember sitting on the floor with Justin looking at the pictures I had just taken from the show and saying "I took those? Really? I don't remember that" only an hour after taking them. I remember climbing into an armoire. I remember Cameron posing with the cardboard hottie. I remember the seeing the same hottie headless later. I guess I should have Nikki start writing these things because it's hard to write blogs about things you don't remember. Eeesh.

But, if I can manage to get off my couch there are a ton of things I'm looking forward to this weekend. JunkFood FINALLY makes it to Roanoke on Friday night for Cinco de Mayo. I can't wait! It has been far too long since I've seen these guys. It'll be an awesome show! Then of course Saturday will be the Strawberry Festival. Strawberry Shortcake, Chocolate Dipped Strawberries...Mmmmm and lots of good bands...Mmmm. I'm very excited about seeing some new bands. Also, Saturday night I get to finally see my old friend Tim Wilson playing with his new band, Bad Dog (Rusty...Mmmmm.) So with more bands and hopefully less alcohol, stay tuned for the return of the real Band Girl next week!

Here's everything going on this weekend:

*Friday*

~JunkFood @ AA's Towers
~First Friday's in Downtown Roanoke
~Burning Bridges @ Wolfies in Charlottesville
~The Worx @ The Clinic in Wiffle
~Bitter Rain @ The Best Western in Marion

*Saturday*

The Annual Strawberry Festival!!!!

YAY KATRINA and Community School!!!

*Saturday Night*

~Burning Bridges @ the Highlawn Pavilion in Harrisonburg
~Bad Dog @ the Coffee Pot
~Bitter Rain @ The Best Western in Marion

Just when I think I've seen it all, done it all, I get banned from the hotel. Yes, somewhere in an Econolodge database is the name "Tracy Morris" signifying that I am a danger to pressboard furniture, stained floors, broken tv's and godonlyknowswhatsonthatbedspread's everywhere. Well at least in Wytheville.

Let's recap shall we?

Lamp Javelin
Bedframe Explosion
Paint the ceiling with blood
Miss the Toilet
Just have the Cops park here
2 bands in the Armoire
Ride the door/ fix the door
How much weight can the pressboard table hold?
Truck Trampoline from the Hotel Balcony
Brief Chandelier Swing

© T.Winemiller

The aforementioned are just a few of the hotel after party games I have either heard hilarious stories about or have been directly involved with, mostly the latter (which is why I get to write this blog.)

So when we looked around the "band room" Saturday morning (well technically it was early afternoon but you know what I mean,) we were all commenting on what great shape the room was in. There had been no blood spilled, nothing broken on either person or property. The only thing that remained out of place were remnants of the Wendy's wrappers that had been beamed at Bill's head a few minutes earlier.

If you think you know where this story is going, you are probably wrong. Saturday night was just as uneventful. Nikki and I headed over to the Clinic to see Drivn after spending the first set with TK-421 at Turn One. We finally got to meet the newest Drivn's (Drivni?) Jason Litz and Justin Tolley. Great guys, great players and super nice!

Later we went back to the hotel and a few people from The Clinic followed. Nikki and I hung out in my room with the people from The Clinic and aside from a few phone calls from Bill accosting me for not coming back to the TK show as we had promised, I didn't see the rest of the TK's all night. All seemed to be relatively quiet on that side of the hotel as well. Now remember, I said "relatively." We did have about 20 people in our room and I'm sure there were plenty on the TK side as well. But it really was just a ton of people sitting around talking, drinking and telling stories. No one swinging from anything or breaking anything (they were "fixing" the heater.) I will admit though over the course of Friday and Saturday the cops were called three times for excessive noise. But I believe they never even got out of the car though, instead just driving through the parking lot yelling "keep it down." ("YELLING, 'KEEP IT DOWN'" I love irony.)

So imagine the look of shock and surprise on my face when after making yet another online reservation for the Wytheville Econolodge for the upcoming weekend, I received a phone call from the hotel. "This is Amy from the Econolodge and you and the band have been put on our do not reserve list because your room was trashed." Ok, first of all my room was NOT trashed. Not even close. But whatever, I know what they really meant. They really meant take your loud parties and party games somewhere else. So this weekend, it'll be a new hotel and I'm sure a new party game. Hopefully.

Sincerely,
Banned Girl


Oops I forgot this! Shows of the week:

Fri/Sat- Bad Dog at Cheers! (It's Tim's first show!)
TK-421 at The Clinic

Fri-Drivn at The Best Western in Marion

Sat-Drivn at AA's Towers
Bitter Rain at The Best Western in Marion

I wish I could tell you more. I wish I could remember more. I know there were 2 3/4 awesome bands, I know there was speaker dancing, I know I was on stage and I know there were shots, lots and lots of birthday shots.

The Innagural "Band Girl Birthday Bash" started off with a hotel room filled full of 140 or so Jello Shots and several bottles of liquor for the "pre-game." We stumbled over to Awful Arthur's just in time for the first song from The Pop Rivets and my first shot from Roger and Denise. It was all sort of down hill from there. Next thing I know I had been given so many shots I had to start giving some of them away. Jager Bombs, Jelly Donuts, Fire Drills, Jager shots, etc, etc, etc. I honestly don't think I've drank that much in my entire life. The running bet, I believe, was that I would be passed out by 10:30. But not only did I manage to make it all night I believe I was one of the last ones to go to bed. I didn't want to miss a minute of it (although now I am missing many minutes of it. Eeesh.)

But the best part of the evening was that I've never had so many of my friends on one spot. I wish I could name every single person that was there but there's no way I could do it and not forget someone. But I did at least try my best to get around and say "Hi" to everyone. Thank you, Thank you, Thank you ALL for coming out!! I believe everyone in the bar was equally as drunk as me, luckily only one of us had to leave a little early. It also seems that there was no drama at all. Just a bar full of people having a great time. Even people who didn't like each other seemed to have put down their swords for one night.

It's funny, I remember most of the after show though. We had two hotel rooms full of people continuing the party. Suprisingly we were only threatened with a call to the police once and there wasn't anything broken, neither people or property. Although it take a little convincing from me for some people to realize that it really wouldn't be very much fun to jump from the second floor of the Ramaduh onto the tops of the trucks below.

I wish I had some more sordid details for you (I do have some incremenating photographs on the way of some hot faux boy loving) but alas, I honestly don't remember much more. Which means that the night turned out exactly as planned!

Some quick, extra special thanks to TK-421, The Pop Rivets, CFD (minus Isaiah plus Troy,) Barry at Awful Arthur's and all their respective staffs. Also Tad Dickens and everyone at the Roanoke Time's for pimping my party all week long!

Now onto some news:
Tommy Nunley has announced that he is leaving Drivn as their bass player (but not as their friend.) Which means that Justin Tolley, formerly of The Worx will be filling that spot permantely. Tommy is an unbelievable guy, loads of fun, a great bass player and will have no problems finding success at whatever path he chooses next! Good luck Tommy!!

Also, big ups to my friends in Burning Bridges on Saturday. Even after their equipment had been vandalized after Friday's show, they were able to pull everything together in mere minutes and put on their normally fantastic show. All while the punk morons who actually perputrated the destruction stood by defeated and watched how REAL MUSICIANS work.

Shows for this week:

Thursday: Hamill and Hill at Corned Beef.
Friday: I dunno?? Anybody have any ideas?
Saturday: Drivn's (apparently Florida survived) cd release party at the Rural Retreat High School in Rural Retreat and The Pop Rivets at AA's Towers

Sometimes you can just tell it's going to be an interesting weekend before it even gets started. The first amp hadn't even been loaded in yet when there had all ready been one flat tire, one massive oil leak, one wreck on the interstate that had traffic at a standstill and one fully shattered front hotel door. But the tire was fixed, Shamika (The TK van) limped up the interstate guzzling oil as she went (she's such a trooper,) traffic eventually cleared up and the hotel finally decided to eat the cost of the door that their karaoke guy had broke while trying to help Wayne load in equipment.

Just when you thought all the drama was over it really had barely begun. Whenever there is a NASCAR race within 239429387298472983420391024093489324 miles of Marion all the hotels are booked up months in advance. So, we were stuck spending the weekend at the "Crackhouse Inn" across the street from the club. You will remember the Crackhouse from such hits as "Mobile Recording Studio" and "Giant White Ash Tray Coffee Can" from one of my earlier blogs.

Apparently a fan of my work, the staff at the hotel left us some lovely gifts in our room upon arrival. No, there weren't any mints on the pillow but there was a half empty bottle of Mt. Dew and and an unflushed toilet it with a cigarette in it awaiting us. Wow, I felt so pampered. After checking the shower for needles, we got all got ready and headed back over to the club.

The show itself was kind of a blur for me. The bar had $5 Jager Bombs which is $3 or $4 cheaper than most places. Being the smart shopper I am I decided I should take advantage of this deal by getting two each time I went to the bar. So by the end of the first set I was in the bathroom cussing my frugality. The funny thing was was that there was someone in the other stall apparently subscribing to my same economic plan. "I'm sorry honey, I feel ya pain," I shouted to her.

Somewhere in between my trips to the bathroom and my trips to the bar (besides my double Jager fists, I'm pretty sure I bought the band at least 4 rounds of shots and multiple beers according to my bar tab) someone fell off the speaker and into Troy's amp (apparently I started a trend from my spill at Shooters into the same amp. Can't have nothing.)

We were able to get out of the club without anymore injuries or accidents but weren't so lucky back at the hotel. Have you seen Troy? He's pretty stacked and it's pretty apparent that he works out a lot. But I think even he was surprised by his own
strength when he accidentally crushed a beer bottle in his hand. I'm not so sure how you "accidentally" crush a beer bottle in your hand but I've now started calling him "He-Man." We bandaged Troy's bleeding finger up with a wash cloth and his hair tie. You'd think this band of all bands would know to bring band-aids with them, just in case. Somehow our makeshift bandage didn't last long and before we realized it Troy had spread blood streaks across the ceiling in his normal "walk" across the room. Oops. Nikki asked the next day, "Is that blood on the ceiling?" I said "Don't worry it's ours."

Besides Troy kicking a bunch of unknown obnoxious chicks out of his room, the rest of the night was pretty quiet (and I would know because I didn't sleep at all after my 384834792384792834 Red Bulls.)

Saturday night was pretty uneventful...oh wait, there was the shoe melee at the end of the night. What happens when you get local bouncers and a bunch of out of town hot boys together in one bar? Yep, there's going to be a fight. One Hot Boy wasn't ready to give up his beer at the end of the night when the bouncer tried to take it so instead he decided to beat up the bouncer (god, I hate stupid people even if they are hot.) Then we realized that hot stupid fighting idiot had taken off his shoe and was beating the bouncer with it. I've yet to figure out at what point in the middle of a fight does your brain stop you and say "Hey, maybe you should take off your loafer." What the ??? People are stupid. Fights are stupid. People that fight are stupid.

So it was just another normal TK weekend, broken vehicles, broken doors, broken people. So who's ready for a double dose this weekend?

Ok so this is where I would normally do my picks for shows of the week. But while there are other good shows going on this weekend that my good friends are playing I'm going to be selfish (shocking I know) and only tell you about the two that you need to worry about.

Tonight- Starter's in Salem. My birthday pre-party and Super Dave's birthday party.

Tomorrow- THE Band Girl Birthday Bash. TK-421 and The Pop Rivets at Awful Arthur's Towers. Come and be apart of next week's blog!



I need to say a big, fat, huge THANK YOU in advance to TK-421, The Pop Rivets, Barry from Awful Arthur's and especially to Tad Dicken's at the Roanoke Time's!! Please everyone come out and help me celebrate! Also a quick thanks to the Frotter boys for the birthday shout out last night!

There were no rowdy parties, there were no rockstars misbehaving, there was no drinking mass quantities of alcohol (ok so that's a lie) this past weekend but I still have plenty to talk about.

First let's get this out of the way. Friday night I headed over to the Brambleton Deli for The Pop Rivet's annual St. Patty's day show. The place was packed and the show was full of lots of green silliness. No big exciting stories to tell here except for maybe my $86 dollar bar tab (you think maybe I can write any of this off on my taxes? Note to self: call Handy Dandy Tax Man Johnson.)

Saturday, Ikki and I headed down to Galax for a surprise visit to a Burning Bridges show at The Branding Iron. We absolutely love going to shows when people don't expect to see us. We had a great time at The Branding Iron and met a very cool contingent of area teachers/coaches. We also had a chance to talk to the owners a little bit who were equally as cool. So if you just happen to be way down in Galax sometime, stop by The Branding Iron and make sure you stay for breakfast after the show too! Yum.

So that's it for the weekend, pretty uneventful but still a big ball of green fun. Now onto to some other business. Lots of musical chairs in the local band scene as of late. Let's see if I can keep this all straight: Justin Tolley formerly of The Worx heads over to Drivn to fill in for Tommy Nunley on a few Spring Break shows in Florida, Dave Porter formerly of Bad Dog returns to the Worx to replace Justin (who originally replaced Dave the first time around.) This left Bad Dog with an empty bass spot which has just been filled as of last night with Tim Wilson, former Bananas At Large and Cradlejack (except not really "former" Cradlejack because they are in the studio right now working on their follow up to Crazy Desert Animals.) Got all that? Need a map? Really it's pretty much just one big circle. Stay tuned it's never dull around here.

That's about it from me. Don't forget NEXT WEEKEND is my big Birthday Bash with TK-421 and The Pop Rivets at AA's (Towers.) You are not going to want to miss this one! I am going to work on setting up special rates at the Ramada for discounted rooms because we are certainly not going to be in any condition to drive anywhere. So check out my Myspace page for details. Also there will be two pre-party shows on Thursday at Shooters with Frotter and Friday at Starters with TK (and it's Super Dave's Birthday Party too! WOOHOO!)

There are some HUGE shows this weekend to get through first:

Tonight: Thursday, The Roanoke All Star Jam with Charlie Hamill, Crobar Cane, BeeBop Hoedown and The Pop Rivets at Cornbeef to benefit the Downtown Music Lab. There will also be performances by some of the lab students. It's a hefty $15 at the door but it's for a good cause so don't be so cheap. Starts at 7 so hurry up and get down there!!

Friday and Saturday-TK-421 returns to Marion at the Best Western. Everyone is staying at Beth's house. I hope she has a drill.

ALSO, in Wytheville, it's CFK's Birthday!!!!! Bitter Rain takes over The Clinic. CFK on his birthday will be off the hook, I guarantee. HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHAD!!!!! He's the male me.

ALSO, ALSO!! The Pop Rivets make their Staunton debut at Mulligans. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE go out and support these guys!! It's a pretty safe bet if you dare Jason to jump in the pool he just may do it. They'll be at AA's in Salem on Saturday night as well.

ALSO, ALSO, ALSO!!! If you are staying around Roanoke on Saturday and just want to shake your booty a little bit, go to the new Noketown Downtown and listen to some jams from my boy K92 dj Kidd Carter! Show the boy some love he's had a rough few months!

That's enough right?

So a little background for ya if you haven't been following our little weekly (or close enough) serial here. My bff, Nikki (she puts the "Ikki" in "TRIkki") and I scour the earth (or at least the SWVA portion of it) each weekend in search of "rock stars." We've made a couple of feeble attempts at meeting musicians on the national scene but it has never quite worked out for us (and I still don't like Brett Michaels.)

So imagine my excitement when I found out my Ikki would be going backstage to see Motley Crue (we kind of owed them anyway after ditching them for a much hotter band, The Pop Rivets, over the summer.) Unfortunately my excitement was tempered just a smidge when she couldn't wrangle a way to get me a ticket too but never the less I was thrilled there'd be some kind of Trikki representation back stage with The Crue.

I decided to skip the show personally because for $70 a ticket I had better been sitting on Tommy Lee's lap during the show. But I figured the least I would do was show up at Awful Arthurs to see Vince Neil after the show and to throw a little support Barry's (AA's Manager) way since he's letting me have one kick-as...errr butt...birthday party there (April 1, mark your calendars, TK AND The Rivets. It's going to be insane!!)

Sorry I digress, back to Nikki. So fast forward to today, Wednesday. By now we've all heard the news accounts of Vince Neil not showing up at AA's for some mysterious questionable medical condition. Luckily for me I had gotten lazy Monday night and decided not to go to AA's. I hadn't gotten a chance to talk to Nikki about the show yet when I saw a blog she posted about it on MySpace. So instead of trying to give you a third person account of what went on back stage, I'll let her do it for you. So if you haven't seen it yet or heard what happened here's what really went on backstage (sorry, I do have to edit for language. My lil' Ikki cusses like a sailor.)

Motley Crue...What a waste!

Here are a few things I will say now.. I am trying not to think about the suck a*s concert.. Good thing it was free..

I love Heidi.. the 96.3 chick.. she is extremely cool.. and worked her a*s off so we would have a kick a*s experience..

I love Fred.. the limo driver.. He is the coolest guy in the world...

I love Likki.. She and my sis made my night awesome..

I love beer..

I love Johnson.. even though I only saw him for moments in the beer garden..

I love Tracy, even though she couldnt be there.. BOO..

I hate Vince Neil.. Really.. He is an a*s.. and he thinks his s*** doesn't stink.. and the plastic surgery... he should get more.. really..

Nikki Sixx is a d**khead.. He spit water on a girl after nodding his head 'yes' when she asked if she could take a pic of him with her cam phone.. he could have just nodded no.. but his cocky a*s had to do it.. as soon as she opened her phone, he spit water on her phone, and in her face..

Mick Mars is probably the only one in the band that didn't act like his s**t didn't stink..

Tommy Lee just needs to get over it.. Everybody knows about the Hep C and he seriously looks like s**t.. Your old, man... get over it.. We hang out with the real rock stars almost every weekend.. Go ahead, make out your wills, and just disappear.. a**hole..

Don't shake their hands to hard.. its not like they haven't had those hands in some nasty s**t.. what are we gonna do by shaking his hand hard??? Pour out some of the puss from their diseases??? dumb a**es..

Don't ask for autographs or photos.. No.. don't do that.. that would cause them to have to use 1 min of their time.. gosh no, I dont know why half of the seats were empty.. hmmm.. lets think.. A**HOLES..

Ok. I got into more than I was going too.. but I am not going any further.. Lets just say, if you wanna spend money on seeing a good band... Travel to the roanoke area.. and we will take you to see some bands.. that not only have talent coming out of their a**es, but they are also nice guys as well..

A friend of mine just told me.. that when Vince Neil got off the stage.. he said something to the effect of 'Lets get out of this lame a** town' .. You can quote yourself.. If you read this.. Explain to these people what you saw.. I would not recommend anyone spending their money on them..

Ill shut up now.. Ugh..

When I get a copy of the pic that they posted on the news.. I will post it on here.. Only to show that we were there.. and I dont think any of us really looked intrigued.. everyone was pi**ed off when we received our 'rules' before we met them..

There ya have it folks. This is how Motley Crue treats their fans. The people that made them who they are. These are how they treat people who paid $70 (not including taxes and fees) of their hard earned money (not to mention another $15 if they went to AA's) to see a show that was wrought with other problems as well. Apparently the security at the Civic Center made it nearly impossible to have a good time. I've also heard from a professional soundman that their sound was absolutely horrid.

So the next time you go out and want to buy a cd or a concert ticket, spend your money wisely. Buy something from people who appreciate it, your local musicians. As for myself, I'll continue to hang out with the "real rockstars" of SWVA.

Dear Vince, don't go away mad. Just go away (and take Brett Micheals with you.)

Shows that are worth your money this weekend:
Thursday- CFD at AA's Downtown
Fri/Sat- Drivn at the BW in Marion
Fri-The Pop Rivets annual St. Patty's Day extravaganza at The Brambleton Deli. James pops back in for a visit as well as some other familiar faces. Bagpipes and lots of green stuff.

Well I thought Teri's Birthday Party last year would be hard to top but somehow we managed to come pretty close on Friday night.

Of course my nights never go quite as expected. The plan was to drop my son off at his grandparents, go back to Staunton and get ready at the hotel where Jackie and Nikki were waiting on me. Then we were going to jump back in the car and catch the first couple of sets of JunkFood at the Pub in Harrisonburg. Then turn around and finish the night out at Mulligan’s with Burning Bridges for Teri's birthday. Ahhh, the best laid plans.

I should have known better. Predictably I was running way behind and didn't even get to the hotel until 8:45. Not only had I not had a shower but there were people all ready congregating in our room waiting on my Jell-O Shots. Nikki and Jackie then made the executive decision that we were skipping JunkFood and we going straight to Jell-O. I kept muttering between shots, "Ugh, Essex is going to hate me. Essex is going to hate me." Sorry Essex!!

It was a typical Burning Bridges first set for the most part. Great crowd (except for one jerk at the bar who kept insisting I move even though I was standing there before he was and when he tried to get his girlfriend to yell at me she rolled her eyes at him,) great band, great fun! We danced, we took a ton of pictures, we drank a lot, we put anatomically incorrect straws in Teri's drinks. But then it kind of went down hill from there (but in the best kind of way.)

Between the first and second most of us convened back in our room to have some more Jell-O and it took about 2.2 seconds for them all to disappear!! Even though we are Jell-O veterans, we were all a little surprised at how fast they were gone this time. As we prepared to head back downstairs for the second set, we opened the door to see Mike lining the hotel hallway with the empty Jell-O cups. I guess he figured with all that Jell-O we might have problems finding our way back to our rooms later. Unfortunately the "Jell-O Brick Road" didn't last long between the games of Jell-O Soccer and Jell-O Whack a Mole. Luckily, Jackie has OCD and was right behind us picking up all the cups.

Second and Third set were spent much of the same way the first one was. Music, drinking, dancing, naughty straws, hilarity ensued. But it was mid-way through the last set that the trouble began. You see, Mulligan’s has this great indoor pool that is in a room that sits directly behind the stage. There is this one door that seems to stay unlocked (I'm sure not much longer) right beside the light board that leads to the pool.

For some reason, Nikki, Jody and myself went back there and were just sitting there talking about all sorts of weird things. For example, I was completely freaked out by the fact that Jody used to live above the apartment where Colleen MacDonald was murdered. For those of you who don't know who this is, read the book Fatal Vision. It's my favorite book ever! He said he had even snuck into the apartment at one point and could still see all the evidence (the potted plant still standing, the writing on the headboards.) It seriously FREAKED me out but in a cool way.

After Nikki and Jody traded freaky stories and I sat there with my mouthing hanging agape we realized that band had stopped playing. As we got up to leave, inevitably the "we should jump in" suggestions started. First, we rolled up our pants legs and just stood in the shallow water on the steps. Man! It was soooo warm! But we got out, took some silly pictures with life preservers and started to walk back into the club. That's when I heard Nikki utter those famous last words "I'm getting in the pool." I said "Let's go." She said "No way, I was kidding." I said "Come on, let's go!" She said "But these are the only pants I brought." I said "Who cares, they'll dry, come on." That was it, that's all she wrote. Next thing I know Nikki and I are in the middle of the pool in our clothes.

As soon as we did it though, it was over. We jumped out of the pool, grabbed some towels, and took some more pictures. I'm not sure how but Nikki and got separated at this point. Sarah and I went upstairs to the room; Nikki apparently hit the pool again. In the room, we thought it would be hysterical if I went back downstairs and walked in the bar as if nothing had happened still dripping wet. So of course being full of not only myself but mass quantities of Jell-O, back downstairs we went.

Now here's the funniest part (or not so funny depending on who you are.) I went back down to the bar, dripping wet, hair soaked. The reactions varied between some people not even noticing (I made sure I got them wet out of spite,) to looks of shock and disbelief, to a whole lot of "Oh my god, I can't believe you did that."

Next thing I know Teri wanted to jump in the pool as well because she's always been stopped by management when she tried before. I was all ready wet and had gotten away with it once so I was all for it! We went back into the pool area and I'm ready to jump in but Teri needs to sit down to take her boots off first. As she was fumbling around with the zipper, the doors opened. It was the bar manager. Jody and I ran off as fast as we could laughing as hard as we could to the elevators while poor Teri and Rude Dog were left standing there to endure the wrath of Kim the Bar Manager, Pool Nazi. Sorry guys, thanks for taking one for the team.

After Teri and Rude Dog were verbally berated by Pool Nazi, the rest of the night was pretty uneventful. I had to climb around the room without touching the floor in an "Ode to Troy." We were laughing loud enough that the Manager came by twice and yelled at Jackie (although secretly I think he just wanted to hang out with us.) At this point Jackie decided to kick (yes, literally physically kick) everyone out of the room and that was the end. But just like the year before we had some great stories from Teri's birthday. Happy Birthday Teri!

Shows of the week:

Friday, The Pop Rivets at AA's Downtown
Saturday, Drivn at AA's Towers and The Rivets at Martin's Downtown.

If you are in the Harrisonburg/Staunton area, Burning Bridges will be at Mulligan's again this weekend but I'm thinking the doors to the pool may be locked or at least better guarded.

If you are in Abingdon, Check out Bitter Rain at Wither's Hardware. Show the boys some love they've had a tough week.

Don't forget...It's officially ONE month until the Band Girl Birthday Bash with The Pop Rivets and TK IV II I at Awful Arthur's Towers.

PS-Thanks for all the great pictures Sarah!

I really don't have much to talk about this week. It was a pretty slow weekend for me bandwise. The only show I went to was The Pop Rivets at Awful Arthur's Towers on Friday night (yes I stayed home Saturday night! Shocking I know!) Luckily there was plenty going on Friday night.

We celebrated Dave Nipper's 29th birthday with cake and an original tune from Nipper on stage. Finally I got to be his groupie for once! There should have been funny hats and noise makers too but I'm a slacker friend and completely didn't have time to pick them up. Sorry Dave, I'll bring some to the next Rivets show to make up for it.

We were also recreating Katrina's birthday celebration from the weekend before. Katrina's camera was lost on the night of her birthday and she lost all of the pictures from Katrinnakkauh. It was quite sad really but Johnson tried to make up for it by bringing his camera out to the show and then hijacking Nipper's birthday cake for a fake group birthday photo (which I missed as well because I'm a slacker friend.) So happy 92nd birthday K!

Despite the fact that I had to get up and move at 8 am the next morning, we closed the night out with the typical Pop Rivets after party, IHOP. Even though it was about 3:00 am when we got there and I could barely keep my eyes open, Brain Holy and I managed to close the table down (let's hear it for Eastside!)

So this week I won't be the slacker friend because it's time to celebrate Teri's birthday again and I'll be bringing the Jell-O. One day when I've got nothing to write about (maybe I should have done it today) I'll tell the story of Teri's last birthday party at The Warehouse in North Carolina. Now THAT was an insanely fun night. One of my favorite band memories ever. I'm sure this year will be equally as debaucharious (yes I know that's not a word.)

This week's shows:
Thursday-Head out to Shooters for a three band show featuring Cobalt Media, Speak of the Devil and Signal 7.

Friday- Two, yes TWO big shows and somehow I will make it to both. First half of the night, JunkFood (LOVE LOVE LOVE these guys! They need to play in Roanoke...did you hear that club owners) is playing at The Pub in Harrisonburg and the second half of the night will be spent with Burning Bridges at Mulligan's in Staunton for the birthday hoo-ha.

Saturday-TK-421 at AA's Towers! Don't miss it. If you are still in Harrisonburg make sure you check out Drivn at The Pub or BB will still be in Harrisonburg at Highlawn. If you are in SWVA, make sure you go see Bitter Rain at Turn One in Marion (these guys don't like to promote themselves much so I have to do it for them...haha!)

Side Note: There's a new band out there that you probably have not heard of with some incredibly, amazingly talented friends of mine. They are from North Carolina but hopefully can make up here for a show sometime in the future. They are just starting out so send them some love and support. So check Ethereal out and plan a road trip to see them!

PS-Thanks to the Nippers for letting me steal their pictures!

Yea, yea, I know it's been way too long since I've done one of these. My apologies to you all but I've been swamped with a new job and finally making the move to Roanoke (although I wonder if I'll still be as cool to all the bands if I'm only driving 10 miles to see them instead of a 100.) I probably would have been done moving a lot sooner if I had actually stayed home a few nights instead of going out to shows but what kind of Band Girl would I be if I started missing shows? So I’ll try my best to do a little recap for you of the past two weeks. Also make sure you stick around until the end, I’ve got some exciting news!

TK-421-Turn One, Wytheville

Despite the fact that I had barely packed a thing in my house, I hit the road for my semi-monthly trip to Wytheville to see TK. I expected a slow night crowd-wise because everyone I spoke with were all going to the Saturday night show instead. I was running way behind, as usual (we call it “Tracy time”) and got to the hotel with just enough time to shower; change; get ogled by the guys a few doors down; have them call me repeatedly on my room phone; and finally threaten them with bodily harm if they didn’t stop calling me. See I can multitask.

Once we got to the club I was happily surprised by the great turnout. It was a great crowd and they were ready to rock (got to love Wytheville!) I had decided that I needed a night “off” from taking pictures. Even though I love, love, love taking pictures I feel like a lot of times I miss the entire show because of it. So instead of spending all night taking pictures, I spent all night, buying drinks for myself and the band, dancing, jumping on stage, trying to get Troy to unbutton his shirt on stage (prude,) pouring drinks down the bands throats while they were playing. You know, your typical Saturday night. But in the end I realized that their shows go by entirely too fast whether I have a camera in my hands or not.

The Pop Rivets-Mugg’s Taproom, Lexington

The last time I saw TPR in Lexington they were shoved into a little tiny corner in a little tiny bar so my expectations for their latest LexVegas show weren’t that high but it was only 45 minutes from my house which meant that I could get more packing done than driving all
the way back down to Wytheville. Besides, no matter where they are at, I’ve yet to see a bad show from The Pop Rivets.

The Rivets and Cobalt Media were playing in a fairly new club, Mugg’s Taproom which had previously been a Shoney’s. When Ikki and I got there right before the show started, the place was all ready packed. It turned out to be the first time since they opened the club about a year ago that they were at capacity. They didn’t disappoint either.

This was definitely one of the best Pop Rivet shows I had been to. Everyone was having a great time dancing, both bands were jumping around all over the place (still not sure how Josh could walk in those shoes he was wearing much less jump on a ledge!) There was this crazy carpet that was causing everyone to slip all over the place but they were pulling it off like they completely meant to do it. Sam Nash, CFD, got the “Magic Carpet Ride” award for the night by going down several times due to the slippery situation but never missing a beat or a lyric.

Mugg’s turned out to be a great little bar and far exceeded my expectations even if the old Shoney’s no longer had a breakfast bar (“Please tip your waitresses and salad bar attendants-” J. Hill) After the show some of us even went back for my first ever Pop Rivets after party (although I guess technically it was more a Cobalt Media after party.) Although nothing got broken and there was no nakedness we did manage to get about 20 people on one bed for a funny picture, it’s a start right? I’ll teach those boys yet.

Chinese Fire Drill, AA’s Salem

This was not just any CFD show, this was the start of Katrinakkuah! Katrina was celebrating her birthday on Saturday but we decided to start the festivities a little early and dub the event “Katrinakkuah.” There were a ton of my friends at AA’s Thursday night. All of the CFD regulars (Yo, Crystal, Katrina, Callie, etc.) as well as a bunch of the Burning Bridges/Cobalt Media crowd (Mike, Matt, Kevin, Jeff/Leah, Jody, Stephanie, Tracy, etc.) and people there to celebrate Katrinakkuah (LA, Forrest, Chris, Jessica, Hunter, Val, etc.) Note: Dear etc’s, if I forgot you were there, I’m sorry, I drink a lot.

I just love watching CFD shows! I get to hear songs that I don’t hear from any other bands and their originals are absolutely hilarious! Vertical Taco had me laughing so hard I had to stop taking pictures (sorry Callie.) Also, only
these guys would have enough nerve to sing “I Hate Sports” in a sports bar.

There never seems to be an after party after CFD shows (I think a few people may have gone to breakfast) because they are usually mid week which means everyone has to get up and go to work the next morning (but I was so happy I didn’t have to get up and drive home at 6:00 am this time!) But, it doesn’t matter because I have more than enough fun at the show themselves.

Burning Bridges, Chisholm’s, Harrisonburg

I hadn’t planned on going to this show at all. It was Day 2 of Katrinakkuah and we all had plans for dinner and dancing Downtown. I had even told Isaiah and Mike when they asked at the CFD show that there was no way I could get out Saturday. I was extremely bummed though because Chisholms was closing and it had been a huge part of my past. Several of my most favorite memories are of BB and Chisholms. But sometimes these things seem to have a way of working themselves out.

The plan for the night was to meet everyone for Katrina’s fancy-schmanzy dinner at Wertz’s Downtown and then head over to Dolce for dancing and general silliness. But with the impending snow forecast I knew I’d have to head back to Harrisonburg on Friday night so I wouldn’t get stuck in Roanoke on Saturday (this was the last day I would have to finish packing the house.) So I decided to just have dinner and then head home. I cut out of dinner by 11 so I could get to Harrisonburg in time for the last set of Bridges.

The evening was quite the tale of two cities, I sat early in the night sharing a $40 bottle of German Riesling with Johnson, being waited on hand and foot by three waiters, ordering items on the menu that I could barely pronounce and hardly pay for and having a fabulous time! The rest of the night was just as much fun downing free Jager Bombs, Jell-O and Foreplay shots. The first half of the night was spent listening about the delicate art of wine swirling, the second half of the night was spent attempting to light someone’s grill on fire and then offering him a beer when you were busted. The first half of the night was all about having a great time with friends; the second half of the night was about exactly the same thing.

OK I think that’s it. Oh no, wait, I saw two more shows too! TK-421 at Awful Arthur's and The Pop Rivets at BT's in Radford. OK, I think that's really it. Any questions?

And finally...Are you ready for it? Have you been waiting patiently? Good boy. So here it is. My BIG news I told you about earlier. Mark your calendars!! Saturday, April 1^st, 2006 it’s the “Band Girl Birthday Bash” at Awful Arthur’s Towers. We have scheduled for the night TK-421 AND The Pop Rivets!!! There may be a couple of other surprise bands that are checking their schedules to see if they can do the show too so, stay tuned!! I wanted to wait until those bands were firmed up before I made an announcement but I know that there are people anxious to get the word out since this will be a HUGE show. I need to thank Barry from AA’s for letting us take over the place for a night, TK-421 for letting me hijack their show and The Pop Rivets for their “wherever, whenever you need us we are there” attitude! Hopefully I'll have more info soon!!

Shows for the week:

Burning Bridges all weekend at Shooters

The Pop Rivets at AA Tower's Friday night

Bad Dog at Schooner's on Saturday night

I had waited 6 weeks, 42 days, 1,008 hours, 60,480 minutes and 3,628,800 seconds (not that I was counting and please, do not double check my math) since I had seen TK-421. In that time we had celebrated a couple of holidays, seen the exodus of an old year, watched the entrance of a new one, cried over some bad play-off games and waited patiently (except not) for the re-emergence of The CTSB.

Was it worth the wait? How would they sound after not playing for so long (except for Bill who I'm sure practiced every single day?) Would Steve be able to make it through his cold? Hmmm, let's see, I could simply say "yes" but then there would really be nothing else to read. So then let me throw at you the highlights of my two-nighter with the "TK Boys" (by the way, other bands, if you happen to do "Fight for Your Right," Likki and I will always yell "It's the TK Boys" please accept our apologies in advance.)

Highlight 1: Ginger and Suzi bring 3 gallons of Grain Punch with multi-day "Marion"ated fruit. I hadn't had this stuff since High School...errrr...I mean since I turned legally old enough to consume alcoholic beverages. It's the fruit, it gets you every time.

Highlight 2: The crowd. Both nights there were great crowds. Friday night saw lots of familiar faces from The Wytheville contingent and Saturday night brought loads of new Myspace friends out.

Highlight 3: Four new songs! Apparently they really had been practicing because they knocked out awesome renditions of Panama (or Granama for Jackie,) The Stroke (which I suggested last time in Marion even if Steve claims he's been thinking about it for years,) some Rage Against the Machine song that I can't remember the name of but I will never forget seeing because right in the middle of the song Troy jumped up and banged his head on the wooden overhang (but he kept playing despite the obvious concussion,) and an absolutely incredible, goose bump making version of Fools Shine On by Brother Cane (click here to see the video.) Chuck Johnson is a freaking MONSTER on this song, his voice is AMAZING, and seriously it gave me chills. But the absolute coolest part of the whole weekend was when I got to hear that song for the first time in an acoustic, pajama clad version in the hotel room. Wow, wow, wow. Chuck, seriously, wow.

Highlight 4: Bitter Rain. I had never gotten to hear my friend, ChadFCKNKing sing before (unless you count drunken screaming in my ear.) So I was thrilled when TK asked (and I forcibly pushed) Chad's new band, Bitter Rain to stage. Bitter Rain is full of several familiar faces, Jody Hanshew, Mike Lindsay, Jason Litz (who was MIA) all formerly with Drivn and drummer, Chad Brooks from various local bands. I was completely impressed by their impromptu performance despite their obvious reluctance to even get on stage. Make sure you catch these guys on February 10 in Wytheville.

Highlight 5: The Hotel. Once again we had nearly every room on an entire floor reserved with band related guests. There was a great little acoustic jam in one room, silly string across many rooms, a flying chair over a balcony and the near javelin toss of a lamp. I also saw a metamorphous of my role from Band Girl to Band Mom. "Hey put that down," "Don't do that again," "Don't swallow that," "You can't mix those," "Let me get you some ice for that broken ankle." By the way, that job stinks, I resign.

TK-421 sounded incredible as usual and Steve was even able to sing lead on a few songs despite all the nasty things exiting his body. Was it worth the wait? YES!! But don't do that again!

Shows for the week:

Friday-Another night with Teh TK's at Awful Arthur's Towers. If Bill can play drums with a broken foot, you can bring yourself out to support him!! Now that's rock-n-roll folks!!

Saturday-There's a G-n-R tribute band at Awful's but if you don't mind a road-trip, there is an incredible tribute band from the Roanoke area, Frontiers, at Amos' Southend in Charlotte.

One last thing, I've been hard at work along with The Pop Rivets and web guru Jitendra Shrestha, on the new TPR website. Go take a look around, leave a comment in the guestbook, sign up for the message board, have fun!

One really last thing! Check these guys out! So chances are you'll probably never get to see The Marmots since the are from Kansas but, you need to go listen to their songs because they are funny as...well they are just freaking funny! Swim Jim Swim!!

Pop Rivets blog version 3.6.

So I've been trying to write this thing for days now. I completely missed writing one last week, sorry, sometimes life just gets in the way. It should have been an easy write because I spent two really fun days with The Pop Rivets last weekend that was full of blog-worthy material. I've started it several times with several witty, clever lines but never could come up with a whole theme or way to carry the blog through until the end. So now I'm at the time where Tad Dickens may threaten to drop me from the blog line up if I don't put something down soon. So just for Tad, who is one of my favorite people, I'm putting together one of my infamous (and by infamous I mean not really but it makes me feel important saying it) "What I learned this weekend" MySpace blogs. So here is what I learned last weekend with The Pop Rivets:

Friday night at Awful Arthur's Downtown:

-I learned that getting flowers for working on a website even if you did completely crash it is awesome. Thanks Ted!

-I learned that coming to a show after having surgery the day before is not a great idea unless you remember to bring your pain killers with you. Hope you are feeling better Katrina.

-I learned that Katrina and Callie make the best tshirts ever! I really need to get in on this hobby!

-I learned to never drink multiple shots of Jager on an empty stomach. I was lap dancing at a Pop Rivets show!! Who does that at a Pop Rivets show? TK, yes, Pop Rivets, no. Ugh.

-I learned that I'd have more to write about Friday night if I didn't do the stuff in the above statement.


Saturday at The Hotel Roanoke

-I learned that being friends with the band means you get to go to the private shows. Yay for the band!!

-I learned that the people of the Kappa Alpha Order are wonderfully nice and a whole lot of fun!!

-I learned that Dina Dudley must be a great person to have such a wonderful retirement party thrown for her.

-I learned that it's ok for Kel and Nipper to eat Arby's on the floor while the rest of the guests are going through the very nice buffet line. Ok, well maybe it's not really but it was funny!

-I learned that sometimes you can replace your keyboard player with a 2 year old.

-I learned that James is Huuuhlarious!!

-I learned that The Pop Rivets put on a great show even when they have an audience of one, one 2 year old.

-I learned that two year olds have great taste in music and they don't like it when you stop playing said music.

-I learned that the people of KA love to dance and have some pretty snazzy moves!

-I learned you should probably not let Kel lick the cake even if it does make a really funny picture. We may not get asked back to fancy shin-digs anymore.

-I learned that it's ok to steal party favors from the other rooms if they are crashing your party.

-I learned that you can have an impromptu Mardi Gras parade in the middle of a retirement party.

-I learned that The Rivets look great in feathers!

-I learned that you can never have enough cow bell ("More cowbell") or enough encores (One more song, one more song, ten more songs, oh wait the guest of honor wants a song.)

-I learned you can always have a great time even if you aren't drunk!

-I learned that I love The Pop Rivets. Wait, I all ready knew that!


Ok so most of this I all ready knew and this was sort of an easy way out this week but right now I am trying to change my entire life in about two weeks so I guess I'm a little too stressed out to be creative. The blogs the next few weeks might not be very good and might even be a little sparse but hang with me because all will return to normal soon.

One last thing though, I'd like to really thank TC McCoy and the rest of the Kappa Alpha order for letting me come to Dina Dudley's retirement dinner. They were all super nice people and were more than welcoming to the crazy stranger running around taking their pictures. Also thanks to The Pop Rivets for inviting me to their show!

I heart The Pop Rivets.



There are A LOT of great shows this weekend. I kind of hate weekends like this because I won't get to see everyone.

Friday and Saturday- TK-421 at Marion!!! These guys are hitting the stage for the first time since before Christmas and good gawd have I missed them. It's Jackie and Ginger's birthday parties and I can all ready tell Saturday morning will be painful.

Friday-The Pop Rivets at Brambleton Deli for keyboard player, James Pace's last show!! James is heading on the road to play with Australian musician, Harper. Check them out at www.harper.biz. GOOD LUCK JAMES!! We'll miss you.

Friday-Burning Bridges at Awful Arthur's Towers

Saturday-Drivn is at Turn One in Wytheville

Saturday-Hamill and Hill at Martin's Downtown

If you are in Northern Virginia, please go catch JunkFood at The State Theater on Saturday! It's a big show for them and they rock!!!

I remember last year sitting on a sidewalk in front of the Hustler store, it was 10:59 Central Standard Time. I dialed Nikki's phone number so we could ring in the New Year together Eastern Standard Time. I had realized at that point that it's not really where you are for the holidays, it's who you are with.

Being in New Orleans on New Year's Eve is just one of those cool things that everyone should do once in their life. Las Vegas, New York City, New Orleans and there I sat on Bourbon Street. It should have been the coolest nights of my life and in some ways it was but at the same time I really just wanted to be hanging out with my friends even if there were just in Galax. I felt like I was missing something and someone.

As I've mentioned ad nauseum in my past blogs, I've had some great NYE the past few years. South Florida, Key Largo, New Orleans and I was a little concerned that this year would be a let down for me. All ready I had found out that again I wouldn't be spending it with Nikki. Not a great omen, I thought. But I had tried to convince myself that this year was going to just be about spending time with my friends and not where I was going. I have met so many incredible people over the past year and nearly all of them had planned on spending NYE with me at Awful Arthur's to see Drivn. I convinced myself that it wasn't about the location, hooking up or even a kiss at midnight, it was just about friends. I should probably engage this philosphy every time I go out because I could not have asked for a better night.

The entire top floor and much of the third floor of the Ramada had been reserved for the band and their FOB's (Friends of the Band.) I had bought enough liquor for the before and after party to sufficinetly inebriate myself , the entire rest of our crew and maybe a small third world country. I was excited (although a little bit annoyed) because my phone was ringing non-stop on the drive to Roanoke, while I was checking into the hotel and even as I was trying to carry all of my bags. But apparently I'm not quite the multitasker I thought I was because while juggling all that I managed to drop the bag of liquor...wait...moment of silence please......

OK so that's not a very good (or cheap) way to start the night. Luckily only one bottle broke and the Jager survived the fall. Really, saving the Jager was the most important thing. Whew!

Luckily the rest of the night went off without a hitch and was probably one of the best New Year's Eve's ever. Everyone in the bar was in a great mood and ready to help Trampus Stamper (singer, Drivn) celebrate his 21st birthday. Kel and I had even made a mad dash to Kroger to pick up a birthday cake for him (we assumed there'd be enough people buying him shots.)

Almost everyone who had said they were coming showed up. The gang (minus Nikki) was nearly all there, Kel, Nipper, Katrina, Callie, Johnson, Ashley, Krista, Tina, Bez, Amber, AJ, Phil, Fred and Deb along with most of the Wiffle crew, Jackie, CFK, Hot Shane, Likki and her Krista, Rick, Wes, Kevin, Crystal and Beth (and their hubbies,) Ronnie and Jeremy had driven down from Harrisonburg and there were many, many more.

There was also much, much more liquor. I walked into the bar with $50 in my pocket, spent it somehow and then managed to have to put another $70 on my credit card. I was drinking mulitple drinks, buying drinks for everyone else, people were handing me shots left and right. Luckily Jackie was gracious enough to play DD cabbie for us all night. I believe she made about 6 trips between AA's and the Ramada. I won't even get into the after-party. Let's just say I'm not sure how a single person can drink that much alcohol and still be able to stand much less be coherent but it was indeed a very good birthday for Tram (probably not a very good day after his birthday though.)

Except for the premature death of a bottle of Sour Apple Martinis, this New Year's Eve was just as good if not better than sitting on Bourbon Street or on a dock in Key Largo because I was with the people I love. It didn't matter where I was but rather who was there with me.


Shows of the week: Hmm, kind of a slow weekend. I'm staying in Harrisonburg for Drivn. Frotter is at the Green Dolphin on Friday. That's about all I've got so you're on your own for Saturday.

By the way since it's a New Year, here are my New Year's Band Resolutions. For 2006 I will:

Go see for the first time:
Trip-9
Bitter Rain
PushStart
Kenny Seay and Jeremey Hunnsicker's yet to be named duo.
Frotter

I will see more of these bands:
JunkFood
Bad Dog

I will continue to stalk these bands:
TK-421
Drivn
The Pop Rivets
Burning Bridges
Chinese Fire Drill

It's time for another, "It's not a blog" blog.

I need a new job and I want to move. Seriously, this needs to happen soon.

I've looked at the Roanoke Times' job site everyday along with Monster, Career Builder and Hot Jobs with very little success.

I was waiting for the "right job" to come along but at this point I'm willing to settle for "a decent job" that'll do until I can find the right job. How's that for selling myself?? ;) I swore I'd never go back to being anyone's secretary...errr, Administrative Assistant...but if it'll get my foot in the door somewhere I'll do it (and do it well I might add.)

So I'm looking for anything in the Roanoke area. I have experience in IT, Management, Human Resources, Customer Service and the Administrative work.

I have a resume online and will gladly send the link to anyone who might know of something or could pass it around for me. Obviously, I'm not going to post it here for the world to see but if you think you can help please email me!!

Thanks!

Friends,
I hope everyone has a kick-ass, drunken New Year's Eve. But please, please, please do not drink and drive.

If you drink and drive and are lucky enough (yes I said lucky) to get pulled over before you kill someone or yourself, at the very least you will not be able to drive for A YEAR, you will go to jail, and you will pay thousands in court fees and lawyers.

But chances are good that you will not just get pulled over but that you will kill yourself or someone else so make arrangements now while you are sober to get home safely!!

Love,
Band Girl.

So here I sit. It's the Thursday night I had been looking forward to all week. As much as I despise being at work, I've been quite bored this week sitting at home (although apparently not bored enough to clean my disgusting house) so I've really been jonesing for a night out with my friends.

Tonight was supposed to be New Year's Eve for Nikki and I since we aren't going to be able to spend the real one together. We were even going all out with NYE party hats and noisemakers. I was desperately trying to recruit every singer I know to break into Auld Lang Syne at midnight for us. I'm not sure how CFD would have felt when the table of 20 was singing Auld Lang Syne while they were trying to rock out with "My Microwave." But I thought it would be hilarious!

Instead my babysitter cancelled on me at the last minute. So here I am snuggled under this fabulous down-filled blanket my mother bought me for Christmas while nearly all of my friends are where I want to be. They are having fun, drinking, laughing, singing, dancing, drunk dialing and taking shoe pictures without me. What's a Band Girl to do in this situation? Pout.

I've done plenty of pouting tonight (I know you're shocked) and drowning my sorrows in a Dairy Queen Blizzard (because my butt needs to be just a little bit bigger.) Maybe I need to be looking at the positive side instead with this year coming quickly to an end. Maybe I should be reflecting instead of pouting.

Looking at my list of friends (I'm on MySpace so I really do have a list,) most of the people who are my friends now I didn't even know last year at this time. I have made so many new friends that are such a huge part of my life now. I would love to try and name them all here but I'm afraid I'd forget someone. But let's just say these days when my cell phone rings, it isn't just Nikki anymore.

I also have gotten to learn my old friends so much better. Nikki and I have made so many great memories together this year. I can't count the number of times we were laughing until we couldn't breathe. While Johnson and I were friends last year as well, this year we seem to spend at least 2 or 3 days a week together. I've pretty much moved into his house. Last week when I arrived at Hotel de Johnson, I even had my bed turned down and a mint on the pillow awaiting me. There are others: Kenny, Jeremy, Ashley, April to name a few but again I don't want to forget people so I'll stop there.

Of course there are the bands. The only reason any of you are even reading this (not that my consumption of a Blizzard isn't riveting reading,) the only reason this year has been so memorable, the only reason I've been able to make so many new friends are the bands. Last year at this time I was pretty much a one-band Band Girl. I spent most of my time on the road following Burning Bridges. Now, it's hard for me to imagine a time when TK-421, The Pop Rivets and Drivn weren't in my life. I've not only been enriched by their music in 2005 but moreso by their friendships.

As typical with anyone's life, it wasn't all good. There was a breakup that somehow I managed to get passed without even realizing it. There were the rumors and innuendoes. There were the people that judged me because they were either jealous or bored with their own lives or both. There was the needless drama and games. There was Metal Rebel. There was the failed attempt at a benefit show. There was the jeep on my brand new car. But there was far much more good than bad.

This has been the best year of my life and I can't imagine how 2006 could be any better but I know it will be. Thank you to all my new friends, to all of my old friends and especially to anyone who is reading this for putting a year long smile on my face (even if I'm still pouting just a little bit.)


My show for the week:
There is only one show this week. Drivn at Awful Arthurs Towers for New Years Eve. The whole 4th floor of the Ramada has been reserved for the after-party and rooms on the 3rd floor are quickly disappearing. It also happens to be Trampus' 21st birthday.

We love making up new words. My friends and I regurlary cut, butcher and fuse different versions of the English language in order to perfectly describe a situation that may be beyond our current language restrictions. But as much as I liked to pretend it is a deliberate act, most of the time it's just me tripping over my own tongue or our attempt to form coherent conversations under the influence of absurd amounts of alcohol. Here are some of my favorite words from this weekend.

Slore (n., Slut + Whore) - Slore is a combination of whore and slut that explains a certain type of dress, mainly reserved for birthdays and halloween and identified by large amounts of flesh. Contributed to Ashley, this word would be used appropriately in the following sentence, "Ashley said she was going to look like a slore for her birthday party on Saturday night but instead she really looked cute in her new pink shirt from Express."

Editor's note: during the creation of this sentence I just made a new word...Exprenssive.


Heavilier (adj., Heavily and Heavier) - Heavilier would attempt to describe an state greater than a typical state. For example, you could use "heavilier" in the following way, "I had a really bad day on Saturday so I plan on drinking heavilier tonight."


Faffle Mouse (n., Waffle House)- "Faffle House" would be drunken attempt to say "Waffle House." Created by Mike Feamster in an attempt to gather friends for an after show breakfast, "Meet us at Faffle Mouse, I mean Waffle Mouse, I mean Faffle House, I mean... just follow us."


Grossiest (adj., derived from Gross or Grossest)-The act of being extremely gross. "That was the grossiest story I've ever heard."


So let's try and use all of these fun new words to describe my Saturday night:

The much anticipated return of Trikki (the first and most famous of our made up words) began at our friend, Ashley's 25th birthday party. We all wore our favorite black, silver or pink slore shirts for the event. We stayed at Wildwood long enough to shove a few Jager Bombs in front of Ashley to ensure that she would be sufficiently drunk enough to lose her purse, an Ashley trademark. Apparently from the reports from the rest of her party, it worked. She also managed to misplace her keys and her car but thanks to some good Drivn Samaratins she was able to retrieve the keys and eventually found her Jeep in one of the many parking garages in Roanoke. The purse however remains at large...thank you Jager.

After a brief stop to check out Hamill and Hill at the new Martins Downtown, The heavilier drinking began. I drank a few beers and shots then I picked up a couple of men I had never met before and they took me to Shooters to see Burning Bridges. (Don't worry Mom, it was just Tad from the Roanoke Times and I know him, I had just never met him before.)

It was a typical Burning Bridges night, the dance floor was packed and the Jager flowed freely. When I say "freely," I mean that it was literally free so I continued with the heavilier drinking. I'm sure Tad was able to get some good laughs at his first official live "Band Girl" viewing. I can only imagine it was like watching a monkey, a drunk monkey, in a cage.

After the show, considering I hadn't eaten all day and had been drinking for several hours now, I decided I should really get something to eat before I got sick. As we headed out of the club, BB Drummer Mike had the same thought and was trying to organize our group for a late night Waffle House outing. Although, his Jager consumption probably exceeded mine and all he could manage to get out was, "meet us at Faffle Mouse, I mean Waffle Mouse, I mean Faffle House, I mean...just follow us."

Johnson, our driver (since it would obviously NOT be me,) decided he wanted to go to IHOP instead (remember one of my first blogs about IHOPing with Johnson? It's classic, just classic.) Although, by this time Mike was on his way to the Faffle House, Waffle Mouse, Faffle Mouse, whatever. The rest of use made it to IHOP long enough for me to realize my plan had failed miserably. Tonight there would be no funny Johnson IHOP story. There would just be me in the IHOP bathroom feeling grossiest.

I'm not even going to bother spell check this one.


Here are some shows you should check out this week:

Thursday- Hamill and Hill from 9-11 at Corned Beef then a little electric jam from 11-1 with Charlie Hamill, Jason Hill, Jim Ayers and Cuz'n Rob.

CHECK OUT CHARLIE AND JASON'S PODCAST HERE!!

Friday-Drivn and Cobalt Media will split a few sets at Shooters.

Hope everyone has a fabulous, wonderful, happy, merry Chrismahannakwanzativus (wish I could lay claim to making up that word because it cracks me up!)

Don't forget, NEW YEAR'S EVE w/DRIVN at AWFUL ARTHURS TOWERS!!

Sometimes I forget that I'm not 21 anymore. Sometimes, even with the best of intentions, I can't make it to all the shows I'd like to see in one weekend. Sometimes I can.

It is unfortunately a rare opportunity since I don't live near Roanoke for me to see three days worth of bands without having to make multiple trips up and down the interstate. But after seeing that TK-421 would be playing for the first time at their old stomping grounds since it re-opened as Shooters and then a full weekend in Wytheville, I knew I had better take some vacation time and line up a babysitter.

My original plan was to take the whole day off work, do some things around the house and then head down to Roanoke while it was still daylight before the forecasted snow/ice storm was scheduled to hit. But of course, my life is never quite that easy. I had some major things go wrong at work that forced me to spend part of my day off there and repeatedly answering the question "what are you doing here?" Ugh.

Once I finally made it to Shooters just barely missing the beginning of the snow, I was greeted by bright neon green drink of unknown ingredients and the sounds of my friend Shane and his bandmate Ben doing an acoustic set before TK came on. I was thrilled to finally get to hear "Hot Shane" perform even if it was a little more low key than he had hoped his pre-TK debut would have been. I was completely impressed though by both Shane and Ben. They did a fantastic job for only having been asked to do the show a few days before.

The rest of night went a little like this...Drink of unknown ingredients...TK....Drink of unknown ingredients...more rockin' TK...Drink of unknown ingredients...Crazy dancing girl....Drink of unknown ingredients...Crazy dancing girl falls onto the stage into the guitar player...Drink of unknown ingredients...Speaker dancing...Drink of unknown ingredients....Opens door to check on storm...ice...ice...ice...ice. Luckily someone who was a lot more sober and definitely a lot better driver than me made sure I was safe and secure in the little ice storm. I have the best friends in the world.

In an unusual move for me, I decided to skip a "No Load Out Friday" with TK in favor of a night at Brambleton with The Pop Rivets especially considering that I'm not a big Brambleton fan plus there had been rumors of Elvis Christmas songs of which I abhor (not just Elvis but any holiday-esque tune.)

Of course, in my usual fashion, I was running late and by the time I had gotten to Brambleton it was packed. OK, so here's my beef with Brambleton: In the few times I've been there the place is always packed but it's packed with people sitting in their chairs and booths. There is music you can sit down and enjoy, some nice jazz comes to mind, The Pop Rivets however do not. They are full of fun and energy and to watch them with your butt glued to a chair is a disservice to not only them but especially to yourself.

Since there weren't any available chairs we (myself, Kel, Katrina and Callie) shared a teeny tiny spot standing beside the sound console. We even ate standing up. The band had just started to play, when I felt someone tap me on my shoulder. "Can you sit down, we can't see the band," said the Big Hair. Thinking that our food was on the way and I sure would like to eat sitting down, I replied "If you can find me a table, I'd be happy to sit down." "There are some in the back," responded Da Hair. I turned to her once again and kind of laughed. "I can't see the band from the back," I said snidely. Then I heard the derogatory comments from the chattering behind me in the booth.


Uh-oh...I can feel it...here it comes...watch out...it's Obnoxious, Drunk Tracy. Besides my lovely qualities of laziness, self-centeredness and no self control, I also have a problem with becoming very obnoxious and belligerent when I consume mass quantities of alcohol. So, dear Big Hair, game on. I spent the next few minutes making sure that not only could Big Hair not see but that the entire booth of four people couldn't see. Was it nice? No. Were they nice? No. Was it funny? Yes.

Eventually Big Hair called over their waiter and asked the waiter to have us sit down. The waiter, who found this statement just as hilarious as I had said, "I'm sorry I can't make them sit down." I heard "chatterchatterchatterwhinewhinewhine" from La Hair. "I'm sorry mam, they are with the band, I can't make them move." It's at this point I fell in love with Mr. Waiter Man. He looked at me and in an obvious sacrifice of any tip he would have received he said "They want you to move, I can't make you move, would you like to move?" I said "No." He smiled and walked away.

So now I'm obnoxious on 11, trying to get random people to sit down in the booth with the hair squad. Then I started taking pictures of them so that we could laugh at them later. So in one last ditch attempt to get us to move, they called the restaurant manager over. Repeat above conversation, "Make them move," "I can't make them move," "Make them move chatterchatterchatterwhinewhinewhine."

Eventually the Hair Apparents decided they had had enough and left. Since we really did want a place to sit down we immediately grabbed their empty booth. Katrina noticed that they had only left the waiter a $2 tip (which was two more than I thought they would leave.) Now, while they were obviously upset with the waiter, by the time all of this had taken place, they had all ready eaten a full dinner for four including drinks. So when Mr. WaiterMan came back Katrina showed him the tip. He then did what was the coolest thing in the history of waiters, he followed them to the parking lot with me clumsily chasing behind in my spiky heels with Katrina's camera to document what was about to go down. Although, in addition to my other fine qualities, I am extremely slow and missed the entire event. But apparently, Mr. WaiterMan handed the Hairistotles, their two dollars back and said "Here I think you forgot this and please don't come back." There was Multiple high five's and cheering when Mr. WaiterMan relayed this story to us. We even made Mr. WaiterMan dance with us later in the night. I made sure that I more than made up for their tip with mine later in the night.

The rest of the night couldn't have been anymore fun!! I just can't describe to you how fun The Pop Rivets are to watch. Katrina had brought a bag full of Santa hats and candy canes which made their way through out our group, the band and even random people in the bar. I even survived not one but two Christmas songs.

As soon as the show was over, Kel and I hit the road to head down to Wytheville to try and at least catch the party portion of "No Load Out Friday." Apparently we had missed the party and were only left with Bill, Troy and a room full of crushed peanuts. We hung out long enough and to let Troy puncture his foot with my cute spiky heels and that was extent of the second half of our night.

Like I said before, I forget that I'm not 21 anymore and I can't drink excessively for multiple days in a row. So most of Saturday was spent lying around in a Red Bull induced state of awake that really started to annoy me because I was really tired and just wanted to sleep. There was some nice moments of Kel's mac-n-cheese and listening to the guys discuss new ideas for songs but mostly it was a long day of no sleep.

Saturday night finally came but I was so tired I didn't really feel like drinking. Knowing that we were going to try and hit both the TK and Drivn shows in Wytheville, I didn't even attempt to try and drink much. Kel, on the other hand, took care of my share. We stayed and listened to TK for the first set and as guilty as I felt (how retarded is that?) we left and went to see Drivn down the road for the second set.

This was the first time I had ever left one show for another and as cool as it was to hear both bands in one night, I didn't feel like we got to hang out much at either place. We listened to Drivn's second set, hung out with the band during their break, I danced with Brent a little and then we were off again to head back to TK.

The rest of night unfortunately was more eventful than I had hoped. One of the bar patrons who had been asked to leave because he was so drunk, decided it would be a good idea to pass out in his jeep. Apparently as he passed out he knocked Bubba the Jeep into gear and it rolled into my brand new car. The impact of the crash never even woke him up. Again Obnoxious Tracy reared her ugly head and I began yelling and demanding this guy go to jail for hitting my precious car. His friends thought it would be a great idea to pull him from his jeep before the cops came and I uhm...disagreed....loudly. So the rest of the night was spent hanging out in the freezing cold with the hot cops while they tried to figure out where Bubba the Jeep's owner went.

So three days later, I realize that I am indeed not 21. I can't drink for three days straight but I can manage to see all my favorite bands in one weekend (with only minor damage to my car.)

Picks for shows this week:

Friday-Burning Bridges at Shooters (they'll be there all weekend.)
Saturday-Hamill and Hill at the new Martin's Downtown.

PS-Thanks to Katrina for letting me use all of her pictures!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ASHLEY!!!!

Of all the things I have learned from hanging out with bands, the most important lesson might be this one: Do not ever let them have the after party in your room....ever.

Whether it be your local musician on the road for the weekend or a full-time gigging musician, it seems that every musician probably has at least one story about something that they broke during an after party...some more than others.

One of my friends, after much alcohol is consumed, is infamous for having to "walk" around the room at each hotel without touching the floor. The first time you see it, there is usually yelling and pleading to stop because the ________ (insert anything you'd find in a hotel room here) won't hold the full body weight of an adult male with a 12 oz. beer. But after seeing it every weekend, you come to realize that hotel TV's are suprisingly quite strong and built to hold more weight than you would expect.

Also, who knew you could swing from a coat rack like monkey bars? Bathroom towel racks however are a completely different story and apparently are only built to support the weight of a two bath towels and a dirty washcloth.

Here's the funny thing about hotels though, apparently the tv's are made to withstand an adult male straddling them but the beds always seem to collapse when people jump on them. Although, any seasoned musician almost insticntively knows how to fix a hotel room bed. It's as if they are taught the fine art of bed repair after they learn how to play scales. If they are smart they are sure to always carry a drill with them in their gig bag or at the very least a screwdriver.

Some other important facts to know when traveling with a musician:

-You can fix a door with a nail file.

-Those little tables aren't as sturdy as they look...they should really consult the tv people and design some new ones. Nail files don't work in this situation.

-Lamp shades, as cliche as it may seem, really do make some funny hats. Of course you have endure the multiple people telling you, "you look like Buckethead!"

-It's important to invite the hotel manager to party with you so they can speak to the cops when they show up.

-It is not advisable to leave large quantities of food especially things like crackers, chips and nuts laying around. They usually end up flying through the air at some point, crushed down pants or into carpets.

-Leave the maid a big tip (see above.)

-Some people just need to be physically contained to one room (it's a shame ankle monitors aren't more readily accessible.) It's easier to keep the destruction confined to one room rather than spread out over multiple rooms. If people say with regularity when you walk into the room, "Who let him in here?" Then that might be your clue not to stray too far from your abode.

-Usually it's best to avoid hotels that have any kind of lamps that hang from the ceiling. If you see those, just turn around and walk out, don't bother to unpack. Sleeping in glass is not fun.

On second thought actually, the most important lesson here might be instead to always, always pay in cash, never hold your room with a credit card and if at all possible go under an assumed name.


Now some important business to get to:

-Go here to vote for my boys, JunkFood for best local band in DC.

-This weekend K92 and the Marines (yum Marines) are putting on a two day concert event, "Toy Storm," with lots of bands at Valley View for Toys for Tots. Go out, take a toy or ten and listen to some local music! Click here for more information.

-The amazing new cd from TK-421, Disengaged, is now available online so go buy a copy. I promise you won't be dissapointed. Click here.

Here are my shows for this week:

-Thursday- TK-421 at Shooters!! And it's 18+!! TK comes home again. This was always their "home field" when it was Howlers. This will be their first time back since it became Shooters. Come show the boys some love. They never, ever have 18 and over shows so if you've ever wanted to catch them but aren't 21...you'd better come out!

OK some AWESOME AWESOME news...Apparently this show will be ORIGINAL heavy with very few covers...YAY, YAY, YAY!!!! Also, Shane from Trip 9 and his friend Ben will be opening the show at 8:30!!

-Friday-The Pop Rivets are at Brambleton Deli, Frotter (who've I not heard so I may try to pop in on) will be at the Coffee Pot and TK-421 will be at the Turn One in Wytheville.

-Saturday-TK-421 at the Turn again and Drivn will be at The Clinic. Yes, it's another Rock Summit at the Swamps...I hear rumors of Jello...mmmm....

So it's that time of year again, my favorite holiday of the year...Thanksgiving. So let's be a little mushy like my mamma's mashed potatos and talk about all the things I am thankful this year:

I am thankful for my family. I have the best kid on the planet and hopefully I won't have scarred him too much from all those weekend nights at gramma's house because Mom's off doing blog-worthy things. I am thankful for my ex-mother-in-law because without her I would have no babysitter and be stuck at home every single night of my life.

I am thankful for Jello Shots and free Jager Bombs with Burning Bridges last Friday night. I am thankful that I got to hang out with two of my favorite people on the planet, Kenny and Jeremy. The two of them together make my abs hurt from laughing so much. I promise I will watch Devil's Rejects and Blazing Saddles so I can keep up with the conversation next time. I am also thankful for Isaiah doing the elbow thing and drunk dialing with me. I am extremely thankful for my boy Mike for hooking me up with free drinks all night.

I am thankful for Likki so that I didn't drink the whole bottle by myself Saturday night. I am thankful for lots of girl talk and clearing up any old issues we might have had together. I am thankful for whoever got me to the club because I don't remember (I think it may have been Steve so, Thanks Steve) and Bill for taking me back to the hotel before I yarfed all over his van (although I'm sure he didn't mind cutting out of load out a bit early.) I am also thankful for Jackie's camera because I left my battery home again.

I am thankful for Cobalt Media's drummer, Jeff's rock and roll spirit and the fact that he had enough nerve to run around the hotel completely naked except for his black socks. I am thankful for Megan having enough nerve to jump on stage and sing my favorite song, Love Song with the TKivy's. I am thankful that we got to dance on the stage whenever we wanted and I'm also thankful that we never have to go back to Fredericksburg because I really hate that drive.

I am thankful for my Ikki. She is my other half and it makes me sad that we don't see each other nearly as often as we used to. I am thankful for the way she makes me laugh even when I don't expect it ("He can play with your Heman toys and take a nap on your kindergarten mat.") I am thankful for the fact that we know what the other person is thinking even before it is said aloud. I am thankful for anatomy shaped balloons and trips to the porn shop together. I am thankful for her listening patiently to all my crazy whining about boys and always telling me what I want to hear.

I am thankful for MySpace and all that it has brought to me this year. I am thankful for all the new friends I have made through MySpace. I am thankful for Tad Dickens from The Roanoke Times for finding my ridiculous blogs on MySpace and thinking there were interesting enough to put up for the rest of the world to see.

I am thankful that Dave and I finally found a way to become friends. I am also thankful that I no longer cry over him or stress about him and extremely thankful that I found a way to move on.

I am thankful for smiles, laughter, music, Snickers, Elmo and Spongebob party hats, Wytheville, The Swamps, the best kisses ever, my infamous list, the Redskins, shoe pictures, free porn, black socks, Kenny's camera phone, purses full of leaves, my car, my camera, my wonderful bed, balloons, kazoo's, earning tshirts, elevators, Red Bull, Johnson, running from security, fountains, thongs, low-cut shirts, CFK, CTSB, TPR, GOSG, shots of Jack, girls gone censored, feather boa's, climbing the walls, skinny dipping, armoires, sharpies, stripper shoes, ladders, apples, three!, Cornuts, Spicy Chicken, Potato cakes with Horsey and Arby Sauce, portable recording, being oreo's, no-tell motels, redneck yacht clubs, groupie love, coin flips and cross dressers.

But most importantly...I am thankful for every single person who takes the time to read this thing every week, you really have no idea what it means to me.

Lots of great shows this week!
Wednesday-Drivn at Awful Arthurs Towers, Burning Bridges annual Turkey Bash at Shooters
Friday-TK-421 at The Village Pub in Marion, The Pop Rivets at Awful Arthurs-Salem
Saturday-TK-421 still in Marion, Drivn at Turn One in Wytheville.

It was a sadly uneventful weekend wrapped in between two fantastic mid-week parties. I'm finding now that my Wednesday and Thursday band trips seem to be a little more blog-worthy than the weekend ones.

I started my "weekend" off last Thursday with a trip to Corned Beef for a Hamill and Hill show. This was no ordinary Hamill and Hill performance though, this was the official Jason B. Hill 35th Birthday Bash (although he didn't know that.) After our infamous Motley Crue concert skipping birthday soiree for Chico, I had to make sure Jason's birthday was equally as "hill"arious.

Earlier I had picked up all the necessary adult birthday party supplies at Walmart: Elmo birthday hats, Elmo blow-out horns (someone please tell me what those things are called,) little miniature hand clappers (just for Callie) and a large blue "birthday boy" button (just for the birthday boy.)

I then stopped in Waynesboro and picked up balloons from my friend "The Other Nikki." She owns a flower shop so I asked her to throw together a little balloon bouquet that I could throw in the back of my car on the way to Roanoke. When I got there, she brought the balloons out, I started laughing uncontrollably. The balloons were "ginormous." They were huge! After about 10 minutes of trying to figure out how to get my back seats down, we managed to stuff all 12 into my back seat and trunk. We couldn't have squeezed one more balloon into that car if we had tried.

After fighting with a yellow balloon the whole way, I finally made it to Downtown and attempted to park. Ever try to parrallel park when you can't see out of the back of your car? Not easy. I required assistance. Luckily, my friend April and her boyfriend, the other Jason, were all ready waiting at the Beef came outside and helped me. I was a little worried though because the balloons were actually bigger than April and I fully expected to look up and see her floating away at any point. Seriously, these balloons were huge.

Jason seemed to love all the birthday attention. Of course if you know Jason, he pretty much loves any kind of attention. He even happily wore the goofy "birthday boy" button proudly during the entire show. Katrina brought a brownie "cake" and Val brought a cookie in the shape of a bus. "It just reminded me of you for some reason," she said when she handed it to a perplexed Jason. The rest of the night was spent making a lot of bad "clap" jokes, wearing our birthday hats in various provocative areas and watching Katrina play with knives. Now I just have to find out when the other Rivets birthdays are.


After the Thursday night festivities, Friday night I was whipped and decided to spend a quiet uneventful night at home. I had wanted to go see Moosa at Awful Arthurs but I was just too tired to make that drive again so instead I sent the Trikki street team, Johnson, to represent. From what I heard (and I definitely heard because I got two drunken phone calls from all who were there) it was a great time as well!


Saturday night I promised Ikki that we would go see a band that she had been wanting to check out, Sun Dried Oposum. I had heard of Sun Dried for years because they are a popular college band around Harrisonburg so I was excited to finally see them and I don't get a chance to check out new bands as much as I would like. They were playing in a club in Staunton that I had never been to, The Clocktower Tavern. The set up of the room with the stage was cool and I kept thinking what a great place it would be for some of my favorite bands.

Sundried was a great band, the music was really solid. I was completely intrigued by the fact that they had two drummers playing at the same time and a bongo player on top of it. But, it was just not my kind of crowd. Luckily for me "The Other Nikki" was there as well and was just as uncomfortable as I was so we just kind of stood in the back and cracked jokes about some of the other people there (go ahead and tell me how horrible that is but everyone does it, just admit it.)

Not long after, I convinced Ikki that we should leave and go somewhere else. We had every intention of going to another bar but by the time we had headed a few miles down the road, Ikki was curled up in her usual drunken passenger side fetal position so we just decided to go back to my house and crash. Blah, boring night, at home in bed by 12:30. Bad Saturday. My only consolation was that The Pop Rivets were playing on Wednesday so I didn't have to wait another full week to see a show.

The Wednesday night Rivet show more than made up for my boring weekend. It was definitely the best Pop Rivet show I had ever seen. The crowd at BT's loved them some Rivets!! There were people crammed up front dancing all night and having a great time. The band sounded fantastic. They played this great extended little jam where Chico rapped, played tamborine and the kazoo! Jason jumped on drums which he does in CFD shows but I've never seen at a Rivets show. Brian was going crazy on his bass and I don't know that I've ever seen James' fingers move that fast before on his keys. Dave Nipper even got to play longer than normal which is always a treat! What an incredibly fun night!

So let's recap...Thursday-Birthday fun, Friday-Fun without me, Saturday-Boo no fun, Wednesday-The fun-est. Hmmm, funny...I didn't think I had anything to write about this week.

On a side note: Looks as if due to schedule and touring conflicts, guitar player Jody Hanshew is leaving Drivn. I know all of Drivn wishes Jody the very best and so do I. I have had so much fun hanging out with Jody! He is absolutely hillarious and a super nice guy on top of it!! I am also really excited for the new project Jody is working on!! Details soon to come I'm sure.

My show picks for the week:
Friday-The Pop Rivets at Brambelton Deli (Hey Chuck, you were only a couple of days early;) )
Saturday-TK-421 and Cobalt Media at KC's Music Alley in Fredericksburg. If you are staying around Roanoke go see Jason and Charlie at 309.
Wednesday-Drivn at Awful Arthur's Towers or Burning Bridges at Shooters.

It was one of those shows where anything that could possibly go wrong...did.

Most of us common, everyday, ordinary fans really have no idea what actually happens in putting on even the smallest of shows. From scheduling to travel arrangements to setlists there is usually a flurry of behind the scene action that no one sees just so that we can enjoy a few hours of music. It's amazing the amount of work that musicians do before they even step foot on stage.

Imagine then, what it would be like to try and put together a show for the release of your new cd that people had been talking about for nearly 3 years. Probably one of the most important shows of your life and hitting roadblocks at nearly every turn.

First, a few weeks before the show you have problems with the design of the new tshirts and the cd artwork. Then more issues with the new drumheads and finally most importantly the company who is manufacturing your brand spanking new highly anticpated cd tells you that they are extremely doubtful that the cd will be ready in time for the cd release party. Insert straight jacket here.

Ok so you get the tshirt and drum head thing worked out and it all looks great. You contact a local recording studio who is going to make you 100 cd's real quick like and while they probably won't be exactly like what you had hoped at least you'll have cd's. It's the day of the big show and you enlisted an army of support to help with all the extra lights and sound. Your light guy sets up all 106 lights and goes to turn them on...nothing...hmmm...looks like the controller for the lights is the wrong one. Figures. Light guy runs all the way back from Lynchburg to Roanoke to pick up right controller.

Meanwhile, while setting up his drums, your drummer cracks his head open on the drums and has a really good stream of blood flowing out of his noggin. He probably needs stitches but we don't really have time for that so let's just slap a spider band-aid on it and have him finish setting up.

Finally, Finally. Everything is set up. All the lights are working, the sound sounds fantastic, everyone is ready to play. Head back to the hotel, all of the "family" is their waiting. We've got an entire floor of the hotel to ourselves, the liquor bottles have all ready been cracked and are waiting on us, we even have free porn in every single room thanks to the manager. Yea, it's all falling into place now.

Get back to the show and now Light Guy finds his computer had crashed and lost ALL of his work. Show must go on, can't wait around for lights. So ya hit the stage, crowd is loving it and the band sounds as tight at they ever have.

Light guy is feverishly re-installing the programs and programming DURING the first set...came back for second set and the computer had crashed AGAIN! Repeat re-load and re-program duing second set. Third set computer still running and Light Guy finally gets to have a little fun with the show!

But in the end, the show was amazing. The band was magnificant. The lights, the sound...incredible. So make sure you pick up a copy of TK-421's new cd, Disengaged. The next time you see any of TK (Steve, Troy, Chuck, Bill) or Joey Mayo (stressed out light guy,) Wayne Sowder, Jon Perdue, Ken Stephenson and Wes Bradley tell them what a fantastic job they did putting on one of the best damned live shows I've ever seen.
It was one of those shows where everything that was supposed to be great...was.

My picks for shows of the week-
Friday- Go check out Moosa at Awful Arthur's downtown. I heard these guys a while back, great show!! Definitely check them out.
Saturday- Awful Arthur's Towers a band called Monkey Fuzz. I've never heard them personally but they come highly recommended so I'm anxious to hear them!

I know there are some people who might be expecting me to whine more about the most hilarious Halloween costume idea since last year’s Trikki attempt at the “Constitutional Amendment” costume. I’m going to try and just drop it so as not to continue to annoy everyone with my pouting. But I will offer you a little sage advice from oft Halloween disappointments. Never wear a costume that you have to a, explain or b, you probably really look like at some point in the night. That’s all I’m going to say about that, maybe.

Nikki suggested to me that I make a list of my favorite things (don’t get all excited, I’m not Oprah and nobody’s getting any gifts) from the night. So here are my favorite things from the TK-421 Halloween party at Awful Arthur’s Towers this past Saturday night.

My favorite costume:

Winner-Chuck Johnson as Mary Lou Retton. “I can’t do a handstand but I’m going to try one right now here on stage.”

Runner Up-JDereck as Sober. Unfortunately, his costume was about as successful as mine. Passing out at the table and getting tossed from the bar blew all chances of making it believable.

Honorable Mention-Phil and Bez dressed up in a Chicken and Bunny suit respectively. The only reason they didn’t win was because they weren’t actually at Awful Arthur’s but, if you’ve seen the pictures you know why I had to find a way to squeeze them in here some how.

My favorite couple:
W inner-Steve and Kristen. The way Steve was looking at his wife from the stage was sweeter t han candy corn (btw, that’s the most retarded analogy I’ve ever made.) This was the first time I met Kristen so I had never seen her a nd Steve together. Nikki and I both noticed the goofy, silly, “in-love” kind of face that Steve would make when he looked at Kristen. I don’t even think h e realized he was doing it. But don’t tell him I was talking about it because it’ll ruin his bad-boy rock star image.

Runner Up-There’s no way to compare to that.


My favorite quote:

Winner- Kristen. “When my husband puts his make up on, I know it’s Saturday.”

Runner Up-Me to Stephanie. “Hey I’ve heard some songs about you.”

Honorable Mention- Ashley. “Tracy you were right, these guys are awesome. I will go to all their shows from now on.” Anytime someone validates me it’s worth mentioning.

My favorite Awful Arthur’s employees:

Winner-The bouncers. They are nicest bouncers I have ever met in my entire life even when they are throwing my friends out.

Runner Up-The waitresses from “Awful Hooters” because they obviously were working at the wrong place. If you look that good in orange shorts you really should head on over to Hooters. Just be careful when you bend over in front of men because they will stare at your butt and all that will come out of their mouth when you bust them is “hey.”

Honorable Mention-The bartender in the pink wig and cheerleading skirt. Anytime that Nikki can’t order a drink from you all night because she’s laughing to hard at every trip to the bar, you’ve done well.

My favorite Trikki moments:

Winner-Nikki poking me in the middle of the night because she thought I was dead. I really didn’t drink that much but I do appreciate her concern. Ok so that wasn’t from AA’s either but I thought it was hilarious and sweet (as candy corn.)

Runner Up-The fact Nikki was able to stay awake through the entire night! She didn’t have to pass out in the car once!

Honorable Mention-The trip to 7-11 with $2.09 gas, no Big Bites and dog poo nachos. A winner indeed but it’s all about location, location, location right?

So that’s all I’ve and aren’t you glad I didn’t mention how absolutely sad it was that no one “got” my costume and that apparently I always look that bad around third set? Yes, it might take me until next Halloween to get over this.

Side Note-I went to Shooters last night to catch the shows from A Brave New World and Cobalt Media. ABNW kicked some serious rock butt! Those guys were super tight and did a great job. I finally got to see my first full Cobalt show!! It was visually a killer show and lots of great energy on that stage! Awesome shows from both bands!

This weeks picks for shows:

Friday night- TK-421 DISENGAGED RELEASE SHOW…IT’S GOING TO BE HUGE…DO NOT MISS IT. Cattle Annie’s, Lynchburg.

Saturday-I’m probably going to be recovering from Friday but you should go see Burning Bridges at Shooters.

After the horrible weekend I had a couple of weeks ago I was really starting to question my whole role in the local music scene. Had I wore out my welcome? Had I gone to the proverbial well for one too many fun times? Were the bands worth all the inevitable drama that seems to follow them? But after the past few days, TK-421 and The Pop Rivets have wholly restored my faith in the good time.

I began to believe that this weekend would be a horrible repeat of the one before. I had my perfect weekend all lined out. Friday night I would make my frequent, much loved trip to Wytheville for TK and then Saturday I would stay home and go see Drivn at The Pub in Harrisonburg. I’m very lucky to have grandparents close by that are willing to baby-sit for me pretty much whenever I need them. I tend to just assume sometimes that they will be available. When I discovered last minute last week that would indeed be unable to sit for me, I got agitated and I’ll admit, even a little pouty.

With those plans ruined I went to Plan B. I would go down to Roanoke early on Saturday instead to catch the The Pop Rivets who were playing at Octoberfest, then head over to Katrina’s house for her Harvest Party and finally heading down to Wytheville to catch the one night of TK. Although a Friday night “no load out night” would have been ideal at least this way I could still catch two bands over the course of my partial weekend.

Again, I assumed I would have a sitter and again those plans fell completely through. I really worried that I might have to spend an entire weekend without a show. That would have made one really grumpy Band Girl. Finally my sitter came through but only with enough time for me to get to Wytheville. At this point I was just relieved I was going anywhere.

TK-421 never ever disappoints me either musically or personally. Their performance is always so heart felt and energetic. Personally I’m so grateful that these four guys have actually become my friends as well. There is no other band that will make me rock as hard or laugh even harder (usually not at the same time.) I just love spending time in their presence.

The show of course rocked and the after “party” turned into just five friends hanging out. Bill didn’t stay long this time (Boo Bill) but I was happy that the usually sleepy Steve managed to stay up a little past his bedtime and hang out with us (although I suspect it was mainly due to the Red Bull I had forced on him earlier keeping him there) for a little while. Chuck, Troy and I sat there the rest of the night just laughing at each other, deciding on the new TK mascot, helping Troy find his shoes that were actually on his feet and finally trying to see which one of them could out drink the other. They both put up an amazingly strong performance. Eventually though, I got tired of waiting on a winner so as I headed off to bed I suggested they just end it with a coin flip or we may have still been sitting there. It might not have been as crazy or wild a night as others had been but there was no drama and a lot of laughter and that was all I really wanted out of my weekend.

That was the extent of my weekend and as much as I loved Saturday night it felt all too short. So I was so happy to see that The Pop Rivets were playing a Wednesday night show at Awful Arthur’s Towers so I wouldn’t have to wait another full week for more music.

I had declared Wednesday a holiday and renamed it “Rivet Wednesday.” I then recruited everyone I knew and made them recruit everyone they knew for the show. I even was able to get my Ikki to go along, a rare mid-week treat. We were especially excited that our old, newly single friend, April would be joining us. I was so excited for this show so I thought again I would probably be disappointed.

My night with The Rivets, however could not have been anymore fun. Do you know why this night was so much fun? Aside of course from one of the area’s best bands, again, there was NO drama. Everyone in that bar Wednesday night was just there to enjoy themselves and to have a good time with the people around them. There was no cattiness, there were no egos, there was no dishonesty, no backstabbing, and no whispering.

It was a night exactly like a night out is supposed to be. Rivet Wednesday was just a bar full of people laughing, drinking, dancing, enjoying new people and just simply having a good time. The perfect way to rejuvenate my love of Roanoke music.

Shows of the week:

-Hamill and Hill at the Village Grill on Friday
-If you are in Northen VA go check out JunkFood at Auld Shebeen (formerly Ned Devine's) on Friday.
-TK-421 Saturday at Awful Arthur's Towers. My costume will be SOOOOO funny!!

-Thursday, November 3-Cobalt Media at Shooters w/Madrone and This Brave New World.

-FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 4!!!!! The TK-421 "Disengaged" CD Release Party at Cattle Annie's in Lynchburg. The show that has been three years in the making so make your plans now! It's going to be huge!

I've been very fortunate to have some amazingly fun weekends over the past couple of years with rarely a bad night in sight. But I guess eventually everyone's luck runs out at some point. This weekend my luck ran so far out I needed binoculars to find it. But I really don't want to dwell on it any longer. I spent more than enough time this past weekend being annoyed, angry, frustrated and any other negative word that comes to mind so it's time to put some positive thoughts in my head.

Sorry I know you want all the juicy details of my weekend but since this is my blog I get to talk about whatever I want. So to make me feel better I'm just going to relive one of my favorite band moments that I never got the chance to talk about before because there was no Band Girl blog. Maybe I'll do this from time to time when I don't have anything else to talk about or if I'm just choosing not talk about the things you really want to hear. So let's start from the very beginning.

It's no wonder I became addicted to the band scene, even from the very start it was a crazy night. Dave and I had been friends in college and then lost touch for 10 years when I happen to run across his website one day at work. Of course I contacted him instantly only to find out that we were both going through divorces. Immediately we renewed our friendship and then some.

New Year's Eve was quickly approaching and the thought of spending it alone nauseated me. Dave was excited when he was asked by his former band, Transcendent, to fill in on bass for their NYE show in Staunton. He had started that band and these guys were his best friends for years. After a bitter break up he was anxious to play one last show with them to get a little "closure." But unfortunately Dave's newly ex-wife (who wasn't really "ex" yet) was also very close with the band which meant she would probably be there for the show. So it looked like I would be sitting home alone after all (they hadn't yet signed separation papers and Dave didn't want to risk making her mad before they did.)

I did end up having some friends call me to go out with them. So there I sat being the 5th wheel between two New Year's couple when my phone rang and it was Dave. He said the ex wasn't coming and that I should leave where I was at and come to the show. He also said though that we would have to pretend that we knew each other in college but hadn't seen each other since and just happen to run into each other there so that some of the band girlfriends wouldn't run back and tell his ex.

The only problem was I didn't know anyone there and who just "happens" to go to a NYE show alone and run into an old friend? Dave said "My friend Nikki is here and she said she would pretend that she knows you." I think I like this girl all ready.

As I walk into the ballroom of Ingelside Resort, I got to say for the first time "I'm on the list." Whew, didn't I feel important for a split second! So as I stood there all alone looking around the room, I realized I didn't even think to ask what my new/old friend Nikki even looked like. Luckily Dave noticed my bewilderment from the back of the room and managed a sly, ingenious, covert move to show me my "friend"...he pointed at her. Slick Dave, very slick.

So during their next break we did the ubiquitous "Oh my gawd is that really you"'s and everyone seemed to fall for it except for Johnson's (who was the singer of the band) girlfriend who immediately jumped on her cell phone to promptly inform the ex-wife "he's up to something."

So as the evening wore on Nikki and I pretended to be friends from way back which wasn't hard because instantly I hit it off with this girl. She was so much fun to talk to and we just sat there and laughed together all night. It's so funny looking back on it now, I can remember trying to persuade her to get up to dance with me which was obviously was a very tough sale. But she did and I was grateful but it wasn't until I got to really know Nikki did I realize how grateful I really should have been because Nikki never dances.

We rang in the New Year and the show ended about an hour later. Luckily the band was able to snag a next day load out so we headed straight upstairs for our real New Year's celebration. My first introduction into the world of the after party was a prescedent setting one. I recall luggage cart races down the hallways complete with a driver and a rider, I recall grown men wrestling like teenagers and breaking things, I recall a chair that some how was able to stick sideways out of the wall without doing any damage to the wall or the chair, I recall Scott doing his best "President of the Dance" imitation (I don't even know how to explain this one but trust me it was hilarious) but most importantly I recall staying awake until 8 am reliving all of the time Dave and I had spent in college together as well as the paths our lives had taken since then.

8 am rolls around and as much as I want to sleep, Dave decides we should sneak out quietly while everyone else is asleep so that he can grab his stuff and doesn't have to help load out. Of course the best laid plans... I go to put on my boots on and realize somehow I managed to acquire two left shoes and no right one. Knowing full well that's not the way I arrived, I had to inform Dave that apparently Scott had walked out of the room with one of my boots and one of his (they were both black boots that in a drunken stupor were obviously similar.) So instead of sneaking quietly out, I made Dave knock on every single band door until we found Scott's room. Then Scott had to wake up and search for my other boot so that I could leave.

Not coherent enough after only a couple hours of sleep, no one seemed to notice (or care) at that point that he was leaving without helping. So in a final farewell to his old friends we waited just long enough for everyone to go back to sleep then we picked up the phone, dialed their room number and when they answered the phone we screamed into as loud as we could. We hung the phone up, high tailed it to the elevator, while hearing mad, loud grumbling coming from the room across the hall.


Here's the actual email sent to Dave later on from Nikki about the birth of "Trikki."

>From: "Nikki Flint"
>To: davet
>Subject: wHassssssup??
>Date: Wed, 01 Jan 2003 23:32:02 -0500
>
>
>HEY MAN.. HAD A BALL LAST NIGHT.. I WAS SOOOO TIRED.. BUT I HAD TO GO AS
>LONG AS I COULD. TRACY SEEMED TO HIT IT OFF WITH EVERYONE.. I LIKE HER..
>GIRL IS A TRIP..
>
>WRITE BACK SOON AND TELL ME HOW EVERYTHING WENT!! HOPE TO PARTY AGAIN
>SOON..
>
>MEANT TO ASK YOU.. WOULD YOU GIVE TRACY MY EMAIL ADDY.. I TOLD HER YOU HAD
>IT.. I FIGURED SHE WOULDN'T REMEMBER IF I JUST TOLD HER.. LOL
>
>NIKKI

It actually ended up being over a year before Nikki and I would hang out again but we've been going strong every since. If it hadn't been for Nikki I don't know how I would have made it through this past horrible weekend. Even through all of it we still managed to laugh ourselves silly the whole way back. Now that's how you make a bad weekend good.

My picks for shows of the week: Finally there are a bunch:

Friday:

• A very special show:

6^th ANNUAL ENCORE AWARDS SHOW
A “mini Grammy's” for students of the Downtown Music Lab.
Featuring local celebrity presenters, live performances and after show meet and greet party.
Mill Mountain Theater, 7:OOPM

• Drivn will be at Awful Arthurs in Salem
• TK-421 will be at Turn One in Wytheville (that's always a party!)
• The Pop Rivets will be at The Brambelton Deli

Saturday:

• TK still at the Turn with Trikki!!!!!!
  
• Drivn will be at The Pub in Harrisonburg
• Charlie Hamill and Jason Hill accoustic show at 309 Market Street (let me know if you see any good magic tricks this time.)
  

Another "not a blog" blog...

THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!!!!!

Last night this blog had it's 10,000th hit!!! It continually amazes that anyone reads this stuff besides Nikki. So to everyone who has ever clicked on this page either on purpose or by accident thank you so much for the support!! You really have no idea what it means to me!!

Rock on!!

Usually when I am looking forward to an event, something always tends to go wrong and it seems I get disappointed. So when all my friends started canceling on me last week for a show I had waited patiently on for months I figured we would be repeating this exact same scenario. Even Ikki had planned on going to Roanoke to check out another band.

I had struck up an email friendship a few months ago with a drummer from the Northern Virginian band, JunkFood. Jeff Essex and I immediately hit if off after I discovered JunkFood on MySpace and through a mutual friend. As it turned out Jeff had gone to school at Radford and even played in a band with a guy that played in a band with my ex-boyfriend. It was a tad bit freaky and cool all at the same time.

So Jeff had been on me since we began talking to seeing JunkFood. I made the usual promises to get up there "when we got a chance." Barely missing their show after the "almost" Motley Crue concert over the summer. But as I said in an earlier blog, it sometimes tough to go out and see new bands when you'd much rather go and support the bands you all ready know. Couple that with having to drive somewhere completely new as well and I thought it might be kind of a hard sell with Ikki. So when I found out a while back that JunkFood had inked a show at bar in Harrisonburg, I was thrilled.

In addition to my friends all bailing, it was Parents Weekend at JMU. So while The Pub is not typically a college bar on the weekends, I still assumed this would take at least part of the crowd. I also happened to notice earlier in the day that The Worx were playing in town about 2 blocks up the road. "Great," I thought, "I really will be there all alone."

But I was adamant about seeing JunkFood since I had promised Jeff and wasn't about to back out. I had also been listening to some of their music online and it was honestly really cool. So, I was thrilled when Ikki ended up having to cancel her other plans because of work and she was free to hang out with me. Ikki and I decided that no matter what happened, what the band sounded like or even if there wasn't anyone else there, whatever, WE were going to have a great time together.

But it didn't take long once we got there to realize we weren't going to have to put forth much effort with this gang. I had wondered, as I always do, if Jeff would recognize me when he walked in since we had never met in person. But he walked right up to us as soon as he entered the club (I'm not sure if he really knew or it was just a process of elimination.) While Jeff sat down with us, I noticed the rest of the band headed over the table of people next to us filled full of all women except one very lucky guy.

Jeff leaned over and introduced us to their friends, Lisa, Dani, Jodi, Eric and Tina that had come from Arlington to see them play. I was so excited to see they had "groupies" too! I was a little concerned though because sometimes with women it's hard to know how they'll react to other women. There can be lots of jealousy and snideness when you put too many women in close proximity to hot band guys. But these chicks (and guy,) oh my gawd, these chicks could not have been more like us. It really was like being in an alternate band universe and watching yourself from the outside. They were so cool, so much fun, so crazy and so much like us! Instantly I love these people. I kept telling Ikki all night, "they are so us!"

I was equally as excited once I heard JunkFood hit the stage. Even though they claimed to be at only 75% because they had played so hard the night before, we thought they were awesome. They had so much energy on stage, everyone in the bar was on their feet all night long. I do not recall sitting down once during the night. If that was 75% ability then 100% just might kill me.

The great thing about The Pub is that they have the coolest little band room off the side of the stage that Ikki and I love to go in and goof off in during the show when we know the band. It is situated perfectly so that the band can see clearly into the room but people in the audience can not. It's hilarious to see a band try to keep up with their show at the same time they are keeping on eye on us to see what kind of silly things we are doing. This Saturday was no different. I was standing on stage trying take some pictures of the band but I kept catching Nikki out of the corner of my eye attempting to climb up a ladder in the band room. So every few seconds I'd turn around and try to take a picture of her on the ladder in between shots of the band. All of a sudden though I turned around to see Nikki falling backwards off of the ladder and landing upright on the couch behind her. Then with the most serious of expressions as if just scorned by her best friend she looks up at the ladder and says "F* you ladder."

Then Nikki decided that I needed to take a picture with the band...while they were playing. "Go sit on the stage," she said. Without even questioning it, I said "Hmm, ok." Then off I went during the middle of the song and sat down on the stage right beside Jeff so that Nikki could take my picture. Ahhh, liquid courage is grand thing.

We had so much fun with these people it's really hard to put into words. From dancing all night with the crew from Arlington to goofing off backstage during the show but more importantly listening to some incredibly fun new music. This night lived up to everything I had hoped. I can not wait to see these guys again!

My picks for shows of the week: I really don't have much this weekend, I am completely open for suggestions so let me know if you have any! Friday: Hammill and Hill at The Village Grill. Saturday: ???? Suggestions???

Side Note: I need to send out current and belated birthday wishes to ALL the Libra musicians (and musically related) that I know. How is it that nearly every single musician I know is a Libra? So, Wayne, Feamster, Chuckles, Steven, Trizzy, Slutter, Johnson, Bartilicious and Hot Jesus Jody and anyone I may have missed...Happy freaking Birthday.

But most importantly to my FAVORITE Libra ever and the cutest one I might add!!! Happy big 0-5 Dara! :D

I used to think that I hung out with different bands for all the same reasons: drink, dance, listen to great music, party with friends. But this past weekend I had sort of an epiphany, albeit a somewhat pointless one, about how unique and individual my friendships are with each band.

As you can probably tell if you've read any of my previous blogs, there are four particular bands that I spend most of my time with: TK-421, The Pop Rivets, Burning Bridges and Drivn. Despite an obvious difference in musical styles, I've found that I have a different reason for hanging out with each band.

Burning Bridges, for example is my fun band. When I go to see Burning Bridges, it's always just a plain ol' good time. Without my experiences with the Bridges I probably would not even be doing this whole blog so I've felt somewhat guilty lately that I haven't spent very much time watching them recently.

This past Friday though we more than made up for the absence, just like old times. After a great show with some killer new songs (I LOVED Scars and When September Ends,) we headed back to the nasty notel motel where we had plenty of Jello shots on hand (the best ones ever I might add) and even their notoriously sober soundman, Wayne had two! You know it's going to be a good night if even Wayne has Jello!

The reason I love hanging out with these guys is everyone is just there to have a good time. It's the one point where any other drama that has happened during the previous week is put aside and there are just girls sitting on each other lap's rubbing ice all over themselves, boys drinking frightening looking liquid out of a mason jar and of course the usual guy trading clothes with Ikki (how we continue to get away with that I'll never know.)

On the contrary is my relationship with The Pop Rivets. They are my silly band (although you probably won't see that description on their business card.) All of the silliness happening with them seems to happen during the show though. I've said it before and I'll say it again but you can not NOT have fun with these guys. Whether it's someone wearing silly glasses, a game of twister during the show or Brian playing Sweet Caroline with Rivet colored kazoos you can always count on a smile with their music. There's always some sort of silliness going on in the audience as well from Katrina's mini-mic to taking pictures of our feet (why did it seem so much funnier at the time?)

Saturday night I went to the Southern Inn in Lexington to see them and despite the fact that they were 4 grown men with musical instruments shoved into a tiny corner of a tiny bar they put on the same gregarious show as always. Watching them in their little corner I kept thinking in my best Patrick Swayze voice "Nobody puts Chico in a corner." Poor James had to set his keyboards on top of a table that seemed to have shorter than normal chairs. Remaining in this position would have made it awkward for him to play properly so he really only had one option left...play from a booster seat. That was indeed one of the funniest things I've ever seen during a show.

The rest of the show was spent with Trikki groupie/Pop Rivet soundman, Dave Nipper laughing at people and trying our best to distract James who practically had us in his lap because we were sitting so close. I actually suggested at one point that James sit on my lap while playing since the booster seat was a little bit uncomfortable. Apparently they just aren't really made for the butt of a 27 year old. But in typical Pop Rivet style Nipper and I weren't the only people enjoying ourselves. I could not have imagined while sitting there that there could have been anywhere in that room to dance but, somehow TPR brought everyone in the restaurant to their feet and I honestly almost thought that the floor was going to give way from all those people dancing at once.

TK-421 is my music band. They are the band that I will go see every time they play if at all possible because I just can't get enough of their music. Now, I'm not saying that TK can't throw an after party with the best of them, as a matter of fact some of my favorite after show memories are TK ones but, I would still be at every show in every city no matter the miles just to hear their music. The good news is their much anticipated second CD, Disengaged just went to production this week and with any luck will be here in time for the CD Release Party at Cattle Annie's on November 4. Now that will be a party!!

Then of course there are the "Drivn boys." Drivn have the disticnt and rare qualities that allow them to be just the right mix of a TK and Bridges. A perfect combination of "party" and "fun." Always great music and always a great time afterwards.

Hmm, apparently despite their different roles in my life maybe I really do seem to hang out with them all for the same reasons: drink, dance, listen to great music, party with friends. I love my life.


My picks for show of the week: Saturday, Sun-Dried Opposum is playing at Awful Arthur's Tower's. Of course if you are anywhere near Harrisonburg you are going to want to go to with me to The Pub and see JunkFood who were named "Best Local Band" by the Washington Post recently. Who's up for a road trip?!! I'm so excited for this show!!!

Sorry I'm a little late on this one but apparently even I am at a loss for words sometimes. Seriously, stop laughing (and by laughing I mean rolling your eyes.)

I love seeing private a show whether they are intentionally private or not.

We started the weekend a little early last week on Thursday which while in itself is pretty common for me these days but, the thing that was unusual was that it was Trikki night. Normally on Thursdays, Nikki and I go our seperate ways, her to her regular bar in Staunton (which we have a nickname for it just can't be written here) and I'm usually off to Roanoke. Somehow I was able to convince "Ikki" how much I needed her to go along with me, not only that but she even drove so I was able to do a little "pre-game" on the way down. I'm still not sure how I was able to woo her away from her normal Thursday night drunk because we were headed to Corned Beef which Ikki hates even more than the "Tr." I heart the Ikki.

Charlie Hamil and Jason Hill were playing an accoustic on the deck of Corned Beef and as much as I dislike the Beef, I was excited to be able to sit outside while the weather was still conducive to deck shows and listen to some great music with some great friends. When we arrived nearly all the tables on the deck were full of people eating dinner and enjoying the show which was a welcome site. I love to see my friends music being supported.

I immediately hit the bar where I made several new friends (by new friends I mean other drunk people I conversated with briefly while standing at the bar) and ogled the hot bartender. I repeated this scenario multiple times throughout the evening, eventually hot bartender stopped asking me what I wanted and just started making my drinks when I wallked up to the bar. I heart Hot Bartender.

After all those trips to see my new friends and Hot Bartender, Ikki and I headed off to the bathroom (geez, how exciting is this blog?) When we returned all tables were clear and the only people that remained were the people with us, Johnson, Katrina, Callie and Nipper. But Hot Bartender was still there and that's all that really mattered to me at that point.

You would think that this means we would have a boring night being the only people on the deck but I have the most fun friends in the world! Katrina and Ikki kept me laughing all night as usual. Nipper sat quietly by as usual, I'm sure trying to figure out when his life took such a wrong turn to bring him to the Beef on a Thursday night with three goofy chicks. Best of all though, we had our own private concert!! Charlie and Jason played like the room was full despite the fact that were chattering and laughing over top of nearly every song. I heart Hamill and Hill.

That was pretty much the Thursday night highlights with the exception of having to refrain myself from "accidentally" knocking over two girls over the deck railing. H-I-L-L-O-R-I and Big Sexy Hair had obviously visited Hot Bartender way more than I had and apparently thought they knew us from somewhere else and proceeded to argue with us about not only our imaginary meeting but how to spell H-I-L-L-O-R-I and where to buy the "best" hair spray. Hot Bartender was nice enough to escort them out for us. I still heart Hot Bartender.

Somewhat luckily for me I couldn't go out Friday night because of babysitter problems. Although I had missed the debut headlining show for my friends in Cobalt Media (which I heard went great!! Way to go Josh, Jeff, Wes and Meagan!!) I had to get up early Saturday morning to leave for a private show TK-421 was doing at a yacht club outside of Richmond. They had asked me to come along to be "Merch Girl" for the day although in my heart I know it was just because they couldn't stand to play a show with out me in the audience (I can just picture all four of them collectively rolling their eyes and throwing empty beer cups at me. Troy says "Boo.")

Not sure what to expect from not only an afternoon TK show but at a yacht club nonetheless, I'll definitely admint I was pleasantly suprised by both. I had been warned that the set list had been drastically changed to better fit this venue so I was expecting lots of non-TK kind of music and I quite honestly wasn't sure I'd like it.

TK is a band that prides themselves on playing original music as much as possible and filling those gaps with covers that no other area band plays. I was afraid at this show that I'd be hearing those same bland boring old covers that I could hear from any other band. Nightmarish thoughts of "Old Time Rock and Roll" and "Sweet Home Alabama" filled my head. As it turned out though, these guys rock as much during the daylight as they do at night and the only "sell-out" covers they added to the set list were Alice and Chains and Metallica. I can live with that.

What was even better were the people at the Yacht Club. What I had envisioned before my arrival was a stuffy older crowd clad in Izod, Liz Claiborne and Tommy Hilfiger sitting in folding chairs, mouths agape at guys on stage flipping their hair. Again, my initial thoughts were totally off base. I could tell the minute I stepped out of my car that this was going to be a fun afternoon by all the jean shorts, tshirts and people who just looked like there were ready for a good time!

What a great afternoon it turned out to be! The crowd was loving my boys (again ducking those cups because I just said "my boys") and I met a lot of great new people (and by met I mean the ones that continually came up to me and asked which band member I was "with" and after getting tired of saying "none, they are just friends," I just started to say "all of them" because I thought it was funny to see their reactions!!) Not only did I meet some cool new folks and TK sounded awesome but there was a free beer truck a mere 20 feet from the stage! I know that local bands don't typically have contract riders but I would like to request TK start having one and that they include "free beer truck" in their newly created rider.

Despite the fact that after such a long afternoon and the guys barely finished their last bite of Wendy's before falling asleep by 9:30 pm (Steve said at one point, "Why are all these cars on the road? Oh that's right it's not 4 am,") all in all it was a great day! I heart "teh" TK.


My picks for this weeks shows: Thursday night you'll find me behind a really big glass of Strawberry Margarita at Rancho Viejo (across from Tanglewood) for The Pop Rivets. Friday, I have no idea what's happening in Roanoke but I'm SOOOO excited that Burning Bridges is returning to Chisholms is Harrisonburg. Not only because I heart my Bridges but because I only have to drive NINE miles to see them. Saturday, let's meet half way in Lexington for another Pop Rivets show at the Southern Inn. If you are in Southwest VA, check out Drivn at the Best Western. Sorry but I really have no idea what's going on around Roanoke this weekend so you're on your own!

First of all a note about last week’s blog. Immediately after hitting the “send” button, I began questioning what I had written. Was it too harsh? Was it not harsh enough? Yes, in some instances it was both. But the overwhelming response I got not only in the blog comments but in my personal email as well showed me that at least I got the attention of some people. It was my theory all along that since I didn’t call out anyone by name that if there was something in that blog that you felt was about you then it maybe it was your guilty conscience speaking for not doing more. Was that accurate? Was that a false assumption? Yes, in some instances it was both.

There were many people who tried very hard to make this event happen even after I accepted it’s demise. Last week was truly a roller coaster week of it’s on, it’s off, it’s on but finally I needed to get off the ride and we decided it was most definitely off no matter how much Nikki begged. So there are a few people I just need to thank quickly for hanging in there with me last week and trying like mad to make this happen:

Nikki Flint, (Guilt Trip Cruise Director)
Kenny Seay (Who was going to put together an all-star band just for this show and have them ready to go in a week.)
Wayne Sowder (Who no matter how much he thinks I rock was probably really sick of the “on again,” “off again,” emails.)
TK-421 (Who were the first people on board and the last people off the ship. Thanks guys.)
CFD
The Pop Rivets (Jason and Chico promised until the very end “It doesn’t matter what else we have going on you know we will be there. We’ll make it work.”)
Sun dried Opossum (Who were steering Nikki’s Guilt Trip ship.)

So once again, thanks to EVERYONE for all the support last week and all the great comments. I honestly didn’t think anyone was reading this blog other than Nikki.

So on to the fun stuff!!

First impressions are often wrong.

As I headed down I-Trikki (or I-81 as VDOT prefers to call it) on Friday night I was a little concerned that the night was going to be a bust. I actually had to talk myself into getting on the interstate. I was heading to downtown Roanoke to a Jason Hill and Charlie Hamill acoustic show at the 309 Market Street Grille that I wasn’t sure was even going to happen. Jason had apparently been traveling through several states for the past couple of days for work and from what I heard may not even make it back in time for the show. Actually at one point I had heard the show was cancelled and had I not been so close to Roanoke, I probably would have jumped off the interstate and headed to Nikki’s who was mad because she thought she was going to have to sit at home on a Friday night. I’m glad I didn’t.

The last time I went to the 309 was the first time I met Katrina. I had only stopped by to drop off some cd’s with pictures I had taken from an earlier Pop Rivets show for Jason. He introduced me to his friend Katrina who I recognized from her pretty pink preppy picture on MySpace. Her MySpace moniker even read “The Geek in Pink.” Uhm, yea nice to meet you but I’ve never really hung out with the sorority girl type so buh-bye. From later conversations apparently the feelings were pretty mutual for whatever reason. I get that a lot apparently.

But as I said first impressions are often wrong and had I taken five seconds to actually talk to Katrina I would have seen how much fun she really was. The turning point came over a bottle of wine and a can of nuts (kind of appropriate if you ask me.) I had gone to a wine festival in Lexington to see the Rivets (really, at some point this has to be considered stalking.) Katrina, Chico’s girlfriend Kameron and Jason’s wife Robey sat down next to me. As wine usually does to me, my mouth opened and it had a hard time closing.

Katrina and I laughed and talked the whole time, nearly missing all of the Rivets show. I found out that she was actually the anti-sorority girl and people had actually laughed at her when she showed up in the pink sweater from her MySpace mug because it was completely not her. I hope, I think, her impressions of me changed as well.

It wasn’t until I stopped talking for a second though did I realize that I had just went consumed an entire bottle of wine (mmm, Wintergreen Apple wine.) Ask Nikki next time you see her how funny I am drunk at 3 pm. As much as I practice, I could never be a real alcoholic because after my bottle of wine wore off I just became grumpy and certainly didn’t even want to think about more alcohol. There were many people at the TK show that night who almost passed out at the sight of me drinking water.

So anyway, Friday night I had planned on meeting Katrina and her friend Callie at 309. After some confusion, it appeared that the show was on. Just as Katrina, Callie and their friend Chris Bez (with the funniest shirt ever) walked in, I notice out of the corner of my eye that Patrick Swayze was sitting at the bar. Ok so it wasn’t really Patrick Swayze but it sure looked like him! So instead of saying hello to them as they walked through the door, the only thing I did was point and say “Patrick Swayze!!” Apparently I really didn’t to be any more expressive because Katrina and Callie both turned to look and then screamed in agreement!!

The night went downhill from there (in the funniest kind of way.) There was Fabio with his magic trick (although dropping your keys behind your head and bending over to pick them up so that we can see your butt is probably not something ever attempted by Houdini. Because it’s STUPID.) Then there were creepy guy at the door who kept staring at us. There was Mr. Nubby who frightened me with his partial finger, well actually it was just Callie pretending to have a partial finger, but still frightening nonetheless. I honestly must have had a death grip on the bar stool because there were several times I should have fallen out of the chair from laughing so hard. What a great time! What great people!

Saturday night had a somewhat similar theme. We went to see Drivn at Awful Arthur’s Towers. There had been some people there that had said some not so nice things about me because of some of those same false first impressions and even possibly some unsubstantiated, unfounded, incorrect stated opinions of me. I had become unusually obnoxious over the entire event during the night. Although obnoxious with me is still quite funny.

But Blonde Nikki (who I am now being referring to as Blikki because Blonde Nikki is just too many words to say when I’m drunk,) realized that the opinions on both sides of this contention were completely invalid. So she spent all night discussing the problems with the other person and then once I became less obnoxious she gave me a little talking to as well. In the end, we all talked it out and realized that we all had also been wrong.

So the Band Girl motto of this story is before you rush to judge someone make sure you have all your facts and don’t jump to premature conclusions about anyone. You might miss out on some really great people if you do.

Oh yea and of course there were the normal 25 people crammed into a hotel room, slamming people on beds, Chad “Bedhawg” King triples, broken bed frames…you know normal Saturday night stuff.

Whew! That was long, thanks for hanging in until the end…again.

My picks for shows of the week: Thursday, Hamill and Hill without the magic tricks (I hope) at Corned Beef on the deck!! Friday, COBALT MEDIA makes their headlining debut at Mango’s. Don’t miss this show, it’s supposed to be full of surprises! The Pop Rivets will also open up for COBALT MEDIA before they jet off in true rock star fashion to Brambleton Deli for their second show of the night.

This is a, this isn't a blog, blog....

The blog will come tonight but for now I need to do some shameless self promotion and what better place to do than somewhere that apparently has everyone's attention (who knew?!)

Before I rush off to the telephone booth and turn into Band Girl on Friday nights, I am actually an IT Manager during the week. But this IT Manager is looking for a new job, desperately looking for a new job!

I would like to find a job anywhere from Harrisonburg to Radford and all stops in between. Ideally I would like find a job where I can be a techie nerd still but use some creativity (web ideally) although I am open to any and all possibilities at this point. I'm willing to try almost anything...almost...

So if you know of anyone who is hiring or have any suggestions of where I can look please let me know. I have a resume with lots fancy words just waiting to fall into the right hands so if it'll help I can forward you a copy.

Thanks for any and all help you can give!!

~~BG

PS-How funny is it that the word "blog" is not in the spell check dictionary on BLOGspot?? :)

So yea, about that big news I had last week...it's a big fat bust instead.

Here was the plan...bring all the big bands in Roanoke together for one show, charge a nominal yet beneficial cover charge and then donate all that money to the Red Cross and Habitat for Humanity. Sound easy enough huh? Yea, not so much.

My first step was to recruit someone to handle the technical side of a show like this because quite honestly as much as I like to think I know, I really don't know squat how to set up an amp or a monitor or especially how to set them up for six different bands. So of course the first person I call is my friend and sound genius, Wayne Sowder. Wayne in his infinite wisdom and experience warns me of the issues I'm about to face when it comes to putting all these people together on one stage from left handed drummers to egos and line ups. But he said he was definitely in and would take care of everything technical for me. I heart Wayne.

I took Wayne's cautionary message but utilizing my big "Band Girl" ego I thought, "I can do this." It's my theory in life that if you want something all you need to ask for it. Many times people make excuses for why something can't or won't happen when in reality no one has ever asked. I knew I could get these bands together, I just knew it. How could anyone really say no to a benefit right now in our country's condition? I just thought that everyone would picture those same children sitting on rooftops for days at time with out food or water or those people pushing a shopping cart with all that was left of their lives down what was left of I-10 or people who had sit among the dead in the Superdome...I guess it was just me.

So I made a list of the bands I wanted, their names unimportant at this point. But trust me, they were everyone you've heard of, everyone I talk about and even some I've not ever mentioned because quite honestly they don't need my support because they would draw a crowd singing Mary Had a Little Lamb (insert sheeppeople comment here for those of you who understand that reference.)

Initially the planning went amazingly well. Shooters was the venue of choice because of its size and they said yes in a second. I contacted my friends in TK-421, The Pop Rivets , Chinesse Fire Drill and DJ Samson (to keep the music flowing in between sets) and each one of them said yes without blinking an eye. I quickly had support from Tad Dickens from the Roanoke Times and had even got some very positive responses from Kidd Carter from K-92. Everything was just falling into place, almost too good to be true.

Then I began contacting the other bands I wanted to fill out the final spots, the big names, the ones that would draw the crowds in. I checked schedules and even changed the date because some of them all ready had commitments. I was initially met with great enthusiasm from several of the bands with the most part them saying "Great idea, I just need to to check with so and so." Well, "I'll check with so-and-so," turned into "Oh I forgot" and "Oh well we are playing a show next Wednesday, I'll ask then." Understandable I thought. Obviously you can't commit a band without support of the whole band. So I tried not to push even though I didn't quite understand why you couldn't just pick up the phone and call the band? I knew it obviously wasn't their top priority but to keep "forgetting" to ask seemed obviously to me to be a brush off. This wasn't any band any particular actually, it was several of them.

But the thing that has bothered me the most through out this whole ordeal was the people who's larger than deserved ego's got in the way of this entire event. I'm not calling out any names because it was many people which was both suprising and sad to me. People who were annoyed with the suggestion that they would have to give up 30 minutes of their precious time to donate to people who's lives were destroyed. People who didn't even have enough dignity to at least return my calls and emails. People who couldn't sit on stage for 30 minutes to sing songs that they sing every weekend anyway because they may have had some sort of personal problem with me. People who expected to be PAID...what?? It's a benefit for cripe's sake!!! People who made up lame excuses or even if they had a somewhat valid excuses were all in the end just excuses.

So excuse if I'm a little bitter today and not singing the praises of the entire Roanoke music scene but I'm little jaded and quite honestly still a little offended. But I'll get over it. I'll find some other way to help out those in need and I'll sleep just fine at night. There are some other people in this town who should probably reevaluate their priorities in life.

The good news is though that there are some very good and decent people in this community who didn't even blink at the suggestion of offering their services for free without expecting anything in return. So thanks to everyone who offered their support and talents to what I still believe is a worthy cause. Also thanks to the other people for allowing me to realize that not everyone’s vision extends past the mountains that surround Roanoke.

If you'd like to contribute to our fellow Americans who need our help, you can do so at http://www.habitat.org/ or http://www.redcross.org/.

My picks for shows of the week: Tonight, Jason Hill and Charlie Hamill at the 309 Market Grille. Three really good shows to choose from on Saturday, Culdera, a great band out of the Richmond area will be at Champs in Blacksburg , Frotter will be at the Green Dolphin and Drivn will be Awful Arthurs Towers. Also if you are going to the VT game on Saturday (or even if you aren't) check out The Pop Rivets at Newman Library before the game at 11. Let's go Hokies!

Three Days Down!

I’m working on some BIG, BIG, BIG news…but I can’t tell you yet…it’s killing me… So instead maybe I’ll just tell you about last weekend instead…It’s BIG though!!

My “weekend” started a little early on Wednesday night for the Three Doors Down concert in Roanoke. It’s a good thing I was running typically late because I really didn’t know who was going with me until about 10 minutes before I walked out the door. Luckily, my friend, Liz was able to coordinate work, boyfriend and the drive from Lynchburg to meet me at the show. The show started at 6:30 and while I wasn’t too concerned about seeing No Address, I was excited to see one of my favorite new bands, Breaking Benjamin. BreakBen (we’ll call them that from now on because the other is just too long to keep typing and they’ll reappear later in this story.)

Did I tell you I have really BIG news? Uggghhh…

Anyway, so after a stressful afternoon of rushing around work trying to get to the point that I could leave, rushing around all afternoon trying to figure out who was going with me to the show, then rushing around at home so I could leave in time to actually make the concert, and finally rushing down the interstate, I needed a beer…badly. So as soon as we got inside the Coliseum we began our hunt for the beer stand.

We did at least 3 laps around the building before we finally found the wristband stand. Whew, finally, I really needed a beer. So where was the beer stand? Uhm, I think I remember it being on the other side of the building…nope. Ok, let’s go over here…nope. Ok, it’s got to be by the wristband stand…nope. I swear I think it’s back at the first place because I saw Budweiser signs…nope. This went on for about 20 minutes or so. Finally Liz says, “I think it’s over in the auditorium.” I said “Liz why in the world would they put it all the way over there?” Guess who was right? So we trekked across the courtyard area to go stand in line for our Coliseum instituted three-beer limit (I guess they thought it was some sort of “theme” concert.) Unfortunately you could only buy one at a time. So we drank our beer, ran into some friends, chatted, got in line to get another beer, chatted some more then we realized not only had we missed No Address and BreakBen if we didn't hurry we’d miss Staind as well.

Luckily this had not been a Trikki trip or we probably would have lasted just as long at this concert as we had at the Motley Crue concert once I saw our seats. Not having my glasses all I could see of Staind was some really bright lights. But I was glad we didn’t leave because at least they sounded awesome!! A funny thing happened as we sat there not being able to see Staind. We started noticing all the security or lack there of around us. Then Liz and I starting joking around about sneaking past security and to get back stage. Then our joking turned to “we should really do it!” Then our “we should really do it” turned into flat out planning and plotting.

Once Three Doors Down came on I realized in actuality we had some great seats. Our view was perfectly clear and unobstructed because of their stage set up. I could actually see and hear Three Doors Down. What a great show they put on! Many times I can be disappointed in concerts because the artist never sounds quite as good live as they do on the cd but 3DD sounded great!! As we continued throughout the concert to formulate our plan we realized there would only be one perfect opportunity to run past the little old lady security guard to get behind the stage.

Once 3DD finished their “last” song we knew we’d have to take off running while the crowd cheered for the obligatory encore (seriously what would the band do if no one cheered for the encore, if everyone just left? Would they still try to come out? Does that ever really happen?) So as they finished their last song, Liz grabbed my hand and said, “Let’s go!!” I paused, still not realizing that we were going to actually do this, but then with a burst of adrenaline, realizing we were really going to do this, we took off!! We ran across the unfilled seats, stopping only to check out the location of the security guard, crouching down when we thought she was looking our way finally reaching a clearing where we knew there was no security. We ran excitedly down to the ledge overlooking the back stage area concurrently proud and in disbelief that it worked so well.

At that point it had become painfully obvious we had spent so much time figuring out how to get back stage that we had no clue what to do once we got there. So there we stood there for a few minutes just watching all the goings-on underneath us. Then we saw a flashlight shine up in our faces, instantly I flashed back to the moment I thought Trikki was going backstage to see Bret Michaels. Not sure what to do we waved in our cutest little “let us come play too” wave. Then there was another flashlight. We waved again. Then another flashlight “Uh, Liz what now?” I asked. She shrugged her shoulders and gave the flashlights her best “come on let us down” look. Then we see the 3DD guitar player look up! Sweet! Then at least three (see a pattern here) more flashlights except now they were starting to yell at us and come towards us.

We looked at each other and knew it was time to leave; once again I wasn’t going to hang out with the band. We bolted through the closest doors not even knowing where they led. “I don’t know where to go, “ said Liz, “Just keep running!” Luckily as we exited the double doors, our 6 (you thought I was going to say 3 didn’t you) beerless trips around the Coliseum proved to be beneficial because we knew exactly where we were at and continued running until we reached our cars several blocks away.

With post backstage, nearly attacked by flashlight wielding real security excitement running through our veins neither one of us were ready to head home quite yet. We decided to hit the concert after party at Corned Beef because BreakBen was supposed to be there. At the ‘Beef we had a few drinks, ran into some friends, stole some posters off the wall (they eventually were giving them away so technically I was just a little early.) BreakBen finally showed up about a half hour later along with the crowd. Because we had been there so early I was the second person in line to get autographs.

Not knowing what to say I made my way through the line mumbling some very nice “thank you”s to the band as they signed (sorry I can’t always be the “Band Girl” I guess) my not really stolen poster. Liz however got to the lead singer, Ben, and made some comment about his beer. He said to her “you want it?” She said, “No, I can’t take your beer.” He replied, “Here have it, I only took a sip.” She took the beer and tried her best to maintain a cool, calm collected facial demeanor although all she really wanted to do was jump up and down like a schoolgirl that just got asked to prom by the quarterback of the football team. We spent the rest of the night trying to figure out how to sneak her precious beer bottle out of the club. Finally settling on strapping it on the inside of her shoe with her shoelaces, Liz limped out the bar with our second cool story of the night.

Hey, did I tell you I’m going to have BIG news soon?

So, Thursday night I met some friends at Rancho Viejo Mexican Restaurant across from Tanglewood (can’t miss it, it’s got a big fountain right in front and Chuck E. Cheese right behind) to see The Pop Rivets. What a fun night that it turned out to be despite the small turnout! You can never have a bad time watching TPR, they make you have fun! Here are some pictures of the show. If you are ever in the mood for Mexican food, make sure you go to Rancho Viejo!! I had never been there before but it was a great little restaurant/bar and I got a chance to chat with the owner Saul early in the night and he was just a really cool guy!! What an amazingly fun night!

Finally, Friday I headed back down to see that cool, crazy bunch in Wytheville where TK-421 was playing. As usual, they never disappoint. We headed over to the Swamps, Fred and Deb’s, first for a little pre-game party and then over to Turn One for the show. I can’t tell you how refreshing it was to see a crowd again who loves their TK. Here are some pictures and some videos from the show. Yet another great night!!


I think that about sums it up for last weekend so just keep checking back for details on some very BIG news!! Seriously, this is killing me!!

My pick for shows of the week: Friday, Burning Bridges will be at Awful Arthur’s in Salem. I can’t wait to see them!! It’s been far, far too long!! Also if you are looking for something to do before the show head over to the Fork in the Alley from 2-8 for a hurricane relief show with Jason Hill/Charlie Hamill and many others.

Saturday, seriously people, Saturday is your chance to prove that rock music is not dead in Roanoke!! Come support the regions top pure rock band, TK-421 as they return to Roanoke for the first time in a very long time at Awful Arthur’s Towers. If you haven’t seen TK, you do not know what you are missing. TK’s first cd, Hollow, was voted the number one album from the Roanoke Times readers poll two years ago and still placed in the top 3 last year not to mention that lead vox, Chuck Johnson, has been voted in the top three singers, the band has been top three overall band and they were voted most likely to hit the big time!

This week I was going to write about the great adventures of my purple feather boa. It was quite a journey for that little furry thing but then I sit here and watch the news and I just feel somewhat shallow at this point seeing all the hurricane coverage, knowing that I was just there a few months ago. Knowing that the New Orleans that I saw doesn't even exist anymore. But when I think of New Orleans, I will always think of the time I spent there last year never even realizing then how special that trip would indeed be.

I had been involved in a deeply engrossing, traumatic, tremendous, wonderful, horrible relationship for the past 3 years. Dave and I had met in college, recently found each other again and then 6 months later he moved to South Florida to pursue his dream of musical success (oh come on now, you knew it had to be a band guy!! But he was the original band guy!) We would go a few months and everything would be wonderful and then inevitably one of us, usually him, would do something stupid and selfish and our relationship would self destruct. We wouldn't speak for a few weeks, although it always felt like months, then we would realize how much we missed our friendship and we'd begin it all again. It was a "vicious cycle" indeed.

We had just begun another round of "we can just be friends and pretend like there's no other deeper emotions involved" when Dave's dad bought him Va Tech Sugar Bowl tickets as his Christmas present. Dave and I (ok it was more "I") thought it would be cool to spend New Year's Eve in New Orleans together and then go to the game. New Year's Eve always held special meaning for us and I was really bummed at the earlier thoughts I had of not spending it with him (I'm so not looking forward to this year.)

Our trip didn't start off too well though. I came down with a horrible case of strep throat the day before we were supposed to leave. While I tend to get it every few months anyway and am in serious need of a tonsilectomoy, this was probably the worst case I had ever had. I was trying to decide whether I should either go to the hospital or go to the airport. So, I had my doctor load me up on antibiotics and we headed for BWI. Dave was incredibly sweet and was taking excellent care of me except that he kept making me laugh and it really hurt.

But it definitely got so much better. New Orleans was so unique!! I loved just walking the streets and I wanted to take a picture of every building, every person, every street sign. Of course the pictures probably would have looked like this...bar with band...daquiri shop...porn shop...bar with band...daquiri shop...porn shop...repeat...

What an amazing time New Year's Eve on Bourbon Street was. We stopped at a jazz club and listened to some great authentic Orlean's Jazz music while Dave egged on the piano/trumpet player to play some Take 5 while playing both the piano and trumpet...yep, he did it too. Then we headed over to this great bar that had dueling pianos and two very hilarious piano players. Ever hear Ice, Ice Baby on dueling pianos? Everyone should at least once in their life. We had to hit all of the famous Orlean's' tourist traps obviously, Cafe du Monde, Pat O's, bar with band, daquiri shop (frozen daiquiris work wonders on sore throats,) porn shop. Although the "live sex show" frightened me just a little so we skipped that ride.

The streets however were just so slammed with people it was difficult to even walk. Every corner was packed with football fans chanting for their team and as much as I love Va Tech I swear if I ever hear "Let's go HOKIES" again, it'll be entirely too soon. I did manage to get a ton of beads and never even lifted my shirt once (obviously I was still sick.)

As much fun as New Orleans was I really missed all of my friends back home and knew they were having a great time partying it up with out me, so around 11:00 I found a somewhat "quiet" place to give Nikki a call so we could ring in New Year's together. The funny thing is that the "quiet" place was sitting on the ground in front of the Hustler store where I just had talked myself out of buying $35 tshirts for us that said "Groupie in search of musicians." Apparently I hadn't had nearly enough daiquiris.

So we followed the crowd to a park to ring in the New Year's and see the fireworks display. But it was extremely foggy and you could barely see anything in front of you at this point so no one even knew that they were going off. The people to the left of us counted down and we rang in the New Year. The people to the right of us had a different time on their watches so, again we counted down and rang in the New Year. I can definitely say that'll I probably never again be able to see the New Year's come in three different times in one night!

As we left we stopped to share a champagne toast with some random people. What a great world it would be if people were this nice every day of the year? Wouldn't be cool if random people just stopped you everywhere you went and offered you free alcohol? Would make my Walmart trips much more fun!

I know this isn't the type of blog you expected but it's hard for me to sit here in my bedroom that is covered in reminders of New Orleans, the feather boa's (yes I have 3 now), the rose that Dave stopped and spontaneously bought from a street vendor (anybody that knows Dave knows that that is NOT Dave) the Tech pom-pom from the Sugar Bowl (Let's Go Hokie's) and of course the infamous pink fuzzy hat that I just had to buy because it was so me, and not have my thoughts dominated by those few days. Our New Orleans trip was one of the best times in my life and I'm so grateful that I got to see the city the way that it was meant to be seen!

OK, so now that I'm done with my emotional sappy blog, you want to know what happened over the weekend, don't you?

Friday I made a trip, along with my really cool new purple and green feather boa, to Fredericksburg to see TK-421. It was quite honestly one of their best shows that I had ever seen. It's a shame that I was one of the only ones to see it. The club had done zero promotional work for a band that would be playing the area for the very first time. They didn't even put their names on the marquee, choosing instead to draw throngs of people in with the all too enticing "Fri: Live Band" marketing strategy. Ugh, club owners. But as I've said before, these guys are nothing but pro and they put off the same electric show that they would have if they building had been packed. You can check out some video here and some awesome (if I do say so myself) pictures here.

Saturday, Trikki headed out to Awful Arthur's to see Drivn where it seemed like every friend we had had shown up as well. So as you can only imagine the hoo-haaing that commenced at AA's! The feather boa I believe was worn by nearly everyone in the room at some point even the bouncer, Bear. I guess that probably would have made the better story this week, huh?

Stay tuned for next week when you learn how to properly run from security after sneaking backstage at the 3 Doors Down concert.

My picks for shows of the week: Thursday night, The Pop Rivets are at Rancho Viejo near Tanglewood, Friday night will be INSANE and probably blog worthy with TK and the rest of the Wythevillers at Turn One in Wytheville (they'll be there Friday and Saturday.) You can also catch one of my favorites, Burning Bridges at Awful Arthurs Towers on Saturday (I swear Kenny we're coming back soon!!! We miss you guys!!)

Please note for anyone who is entirely TOO concerned about my PRIVATE life and what I do after 5:00 PM, it is 12:02 PM EST and I am in Roanoke right now not Harrisonburg. The blog said it's 9:10 PM EST....Figure it out for yourselves.

And then sometimes they aren't quite so easy...


I can't wait. I seriously can NOT wait.

It's a good thing I will be completely overwhelmed at work this week, otherwise I'd staring at the clock the whole time just waiting until I get to see my absolute favorite four men in the entire world play this Friday.

As wonderful as it's been the past few weeks getting to meet new friends and seeing new bands, I can not wait to see TK-421 again. I can not wait to go to a show and have my teeth kicked in by the music. I can not wait to see Steve flip his hair. I can not wait to see Troy climb on top of the speakers. I can not wait to not see Bill because of all the cymbals in front of his face. I can not wait to see Chuck jump all over the stage without getting twisted up in all the cords. I just can not effin' wait.

But what I can't wait the most for is hanging out with my friends, Chuck, Steve, Troy, Bill and Wayne. I hate drama. I seriously HATE drama. As much as I try to avoid it, it seems to follow me around like a rabid clown. As funny as it may appear to be at first, it really just bites me in the ass and causes lots of pain in the end. Aside from the amazingly incredible music they put out, I love being friends with these men because there is zero drama! The couple of times it appeared as if there might be something brewing, it was handled swiftly, quietly and professionally. True professionals, every last crazy one of them.

As for this past weekend, it was ok, nothing earth shattering. No seven hour road trips (although we tried liked mad to have a suprise Trikki summit in Galax for Burning Bridges but Nikki's mom just didn't like the idea of her driving in the family van from Pigeon Forge where they were on vaction) so, no Trikki (although I did have a great time with the Trikki fill-in "Trashhole,") and no swimming at 3 am, but at least there was some good music.

Thursday night I caught Charlie Hamill and Jason Hill's acoustic show at Corned Beef. It's always refreshing to see a laid back show like that where it's relaxed, fun and people are just having a good time during the show. It was also a welcome change to keep my shoes on for the entire time and not having my feet ache at the end of the night! I also had a great time hanging out with Ted and Brian from the Pop Rivets along with Denise, Callie and Katrina.

Friday night, I headed back down to Roanoke for the second time in two days to see the Rivets again. I wonder at what point this will be considered stalking? The Pop Rivets are so enjoyable to watch and listen to on stage. It's a shame the club wasn't really conducive to having a good time. Too many tables with too many people sitting down at them. No room to get up and dance. While the room was packed and the crowd was enjoying it, it just irritates me to see people sitting down all night. Although luckily, there apparently was enough room for a game or two of Twister and some metal-head moshing up front! But then again, the Rivets could play in a cave and still make it entertaining!

Saturday night I spent at home contemplating life, men bashing on the phone with Nikki (I hope the plan worked Nik although you probably shouldn't take me advice at this point) and wishing it was Friday. Is it any wonder I'm so Disengaged?


My picks for shows of the week-Friday, can you guess? Cancel all your plans, forget about all the other bands that are playing, pack your bags and take a trip with me to see TK-421 in Fredericksburg. There's nothing else going on in Roanoke anyway so it's the perfect time for a road trip! Saturday, THREE great shows in Roanoke. Start off with Charlie and Jason Hill at The Village Grill from 7-10pm. Then head over to see Drivn at Awful Arthurs Towers or Bad Dog is at the Coffee Pot.

Sometimes these things just seem to write themselves.

Gas-$90
Tickets for the best concert you never saw-$80
Sponge Bob birthday hats and party favors-$5
King size Snickers bar-$1.32
Putting a smile on the face of a friend-PRICELESS

Thursday, Friday and Saturday just felt like one really long, fun day but maybe that's because I only slept about 5 hours total all three days. I hopped in my car Thursday night headed to Salem to catch Chinese Fire Drill and I didn't seem to get out of the car until Sunday.

Chinese Fire Drill (CFD,) is one of those bands that even if you aren't familiar with their music you need to see at least once and it had been a very long time since the last time I had the pleasure to hear them. So when I found out they were playing a Thursday night at the new Awful Arthurs in Salem, I grabbed my Nikki and my Johnson, took Friday off from work and emailed everyone I knew to make sure that no one missed it.

These guys are nuts, but in the best way possible. I've never seen so many talented people in one band together. Each member of the band at some point during the night plays almost every instrument on stage as well as doing vocals. My only complaint about CFD is that they don't play out nearly enough. Although when you look at the lineup of this band, I'm surprised they find time to play at all considering the heavy show schedule of their other bands. Both Jason Hill and Brian Holt are in The Pop Rivets, Isaiah Osbourne plays for Burning Bridges and Sam Nash is the drummer for Brass Five. You can not, not have fun watching these guys! You won't find another band who has the confidence and silliness to sing a song called "I Hate Sports" in a sports bar all while Jason is dancing around the stage in the most hideous tacky red plaid polyester golf pants (who knew you could make a pair of pants like that hot) ever made. It's hilarious, rockin' and refreshing all at the same time.

After a long, overdue night of microwave lovin' with CFD, I headed back home to Harrisonburg to spend time doing my most important job, Mom. But as the soon as the sun started to go down, I slipped back into my alter ego "Band Girl," jumped back in the car and headed back to Roanoke to see Drivn at the Coffee Pot. I typically wouldn't have turned around and headed back until the Saturday show but I got advance warning that my favorite little singer might actually show up to see the Drivn guys and Saturday we were headed for a Motley Crue concert.

TK-421 has been on vacation for a month now and after spending nearly every weekend with those guys for the past 4 or 5 months, I was seriously beginning to have withdrawals. So when Chuck (TK singer) told me that there was a chance he would be coming out to see his friends in Drivn play, I knew I had to be there. There was no way those guys would let Chuck sit idly by enjoying his Jack without bringing him on stage for a few songs and good gosh did I need a TK fix!!

I love to watch Drivn play, as you may have read in an earlier blog, they just ooze rock! So to put the greatest singer I've ever seen perform on stage with these guys put me in absolute musical heaven. The energy from that show didn't end at the end of the night as the whole bar seemed to head back to the band hotel for a little post show celebration. It was just a crazy night filled full of drunken silliness, hot boy piles (yes, there were injuries and they probably won't enjoy me calling them "hot boy piles" either, it was much more heterosexual than it sounds) and flaming alcohol. Friday night was definitely one of the benefits of being friends with the band, it was unbelievable. ;)

After a brief couple of hours of sleep, I was up again Saturday morning driving home to Harrisonburg to do more Mom time and float around the pool for a couple of hours. It seem to go by entirely too fast because before I knew it, it was 4:00 and Nikki was pulling into my driveway. I had bought Nikki tickets to the Motley Crue concert for her birthday a few weeks earlier. Although we were both a little bummed that we were giving up a Saturday night with our friends, we had hoped we'd be able to run into Fred and Deb from Wytheville who knew the band Silvertide that was opening up for Motley. If we didn't run into them, my friends in JunkFood were playing about 10 miles down the road and I was excited to finally get a chance to catch them after the concert.

We drove the 90 minutes to Nissan (why is it that that drive is the same length as Harrisonburg to Roanoke but seems twice as long?) We had to park the car what seemed like 10 miles from the venue. It was the mid 90's at 7:00 pm but felt like 110. We were sweating, our clothes were sticking to us, it was nasty. We spent a few minutes looking around for Fred and Deb, couldn't find them and had some guys cigarette ash smack me right in the eye (don't ask me how it got behind my cool new yellow sunglasses.) So at this point we decide to at least head up to our seats and sit down, maybe it was cooler up there.

We get to row 302, seats D19 and 20. We looked at our seats, looked at the stage, looked at each other, looked at the stage, looked at each other..."We leaving?" I said to Nikki, "Yep" she responded almost not even needing to hear the question. So we make the 800 mile trek back to the car trying to figure out where we were going next. Since we were so close we decided to go ahead and see JunkFood. Remembering that the band didn't start their show until 10, we weren't sure what to do for the next 2 1/2 hours since we weren't familiar with the area.

As we sat in the car, trying to bring our body temperatures back to non-heat stroke levels, Nikki said "I forgot, tonight is Ted's birthday." She was speaking of Ted, the drummer of The Pop Rivets who have quickly become good friends of ours. "Oh yea," I said, "Nikki we can't miss Ted's birthday!" Nikki said "You're right, let's go back Roanoke."

So there I was driving to Roanoke for the third time in 3 days and this time was twice as far as the other trips. I laughed as I watched the odometer on my brand new car which I purchased two weeks ago, trip 2,000 miles. It had 9 miles on it when I left the dealership. I almost died to think about it until Nikki realized that we had put on her car just purchased 15 months ago around 45,000 miles. Yes, that's 45,000 band only miles. Nikki works 9 miles from her house and never goes anywhere unless it's to see a band...45,000 miles to see bands. Wow, we are not only dedicated but apparently nuts as well.

Knowing this was going to be an exceptionally long drive we managed to amuse ourselves by writing a stupid, hilarious song. The first verse came easily and left us in stitches for 10 or 15 minutes. But then feeling the need to actually finish the song, it started to become a little more like work and a lot less funny. But it did manage to help us pass the first 90 minutes of our impromptu road trip quickly.

We stopped in Harrisonburg for snacks and a bathroom break. Jumped back in the car and plotted the rest of the way on how to make Ted's birthday special. We also fielded calls from our friends trying to convince us to come back to Roanoke and see Drivn again after they found out about our concert abandonment. We decided it would be funny to tell everyone we weren't coming all the way back to Roanoke and then surprise them by walking through the door.

Our next stop was in Lexington at Walmart to buy birthday hats and party favors for Ted's birthday. It must have been a big birthday weekend in Lexington because our choices were limited to "Pretty Princess" and "Sponge Bob" so, Sponge Bob it was! We continued our drive laughing the whole way at how silly we would look walking into Awful Arthurs during the middle of the Pop Rivets show in Sponge Bob party hats and those little party favors that you blow in and the end pops out (what do you call those things??)

We knew the band would get a kick out of it but also realized on the way that we wanted to do something nice for Jason too, who was having a bit of a rough week. So we stopped and bought a Snickers bar for "Jay-Sun" since he had one swiped earlier in the week from some co-workers.

We reached the bar and walked in donning our Sponge Bob apparel and immediately Ted caught us out of the corner of his eye mid-song. He gave us this great "What are you all doing here?" look that was perfect!! As we walked around to the front of the stage, Jason saw us standing there and apparently shocked to see us said over the mic during the middle of the song "What happened to Motley Crue?" What a perfect reaction!!

We handed out our gifts to Ted and Jason (then feeling bad because we should have bought something for Brian and James, too.) Seeing the smile come over Jason's face as we handed him the candy bar and hearing probably the first ever verse of "I just got a Snickers" sung, I knew we had definitely made the right decision leaving the concert. I would have driven another 3 1/2 hours to make that happen again. It really does make me happy to make my friends smile. There's nothing better in the world!

We hung out at the Pop Rivets show for an hour or so and then needed to head over to see our second set of smiles (although Jason and Ted's smile were more than enough to make the drive worth it.) It couldn't have happened any more perfect. Johnson and Michelle had both called us several times during our trip trying to convince us to come back to the Coffee Pot for another round of Drivn. Each time one would call, we would seem more and more resigned to the fact that we weren't coming, eventually even concocting a story that we had stopped off near Nikki's place in Lexington and just gone to a local bar there.

Just as we were pulling into the Coffee Pot parking lot, Johnson called again asking us to come. "I wish!" I said. "Nikki's got me at this stupid redneck bar," I said trying not to laugh. "I hate this place! It sucks, I wish we would have come down there. I'm so annoyed with her!" I said and she was trying not to laugh. I kept telling him of my agitation as I walked into the bar with my phone in my hand still talking to him. I spotted him sitting at the bar and just stood there talking until he looked up and realized we were standing two feet from him! Second big, huge, night-making smile of the evening! I headed off into the bar to see everyone else and got more hugs, smiles and of course lots of "you did what?" reactions.

The rest of the night turned out much the same as the night before except for a great Trikki sandwich for Chad King, a great sandwich full of two sleeping girls who were dead to the world because they had just traveled 8 hours to see some really great smiles from some really great friends.


My picks for shows of the week: Thursday, Jason Hill and Charlie Hamil go acoustic at Corned Beef. Friday, Pop Rivets at Brambleton Deli or Fuzzy Logic at Shooters. Saturday, Pop Rivets at Smith Mountain Lake from 12-4, Drivn at the Best Western in Marion (they are there all weekend.) Burning Bridges, that other Isaiah band, will be at the Branding Iron in Galax all weekend as well.

Side Note: A big, fat CONGRATS to my friends in JunkFood for getting named "Best Local Band" by the Washington Post!!! Check them out when they hit the area in October.

I am guilty. I do it all the time. As much as I try to support the local music scene, I tend to go see the same few bands over and over again. I've made friends in these bands that I want to support as much as possible. I know all the words to their songs. I can go to the club alone and know that I'll always have friends there. Plus I'll admit there are certain perks to sitting at the band table like, no cover charges and if the band gets free alcohol for the night they tend to share (of course as many shots as I've bought for them I'm sure I've yet to come out ahead on that one.)

So I was not really looking forward to yet another weekend when all of my usuals weren't playing. I have however been looking forward to seeing some of my Burning Bridges buddies, Josh, Wes and Jeff play for the first time in their new band, Cobalt Media. So when I found out that The Pop Rivets were letting them play a few songs during their show at Awful Arthurs that's were Trikki headed for the night.

Not being familiar with their music I wasn't sure what to expect from the Rivets. Nikki is not a big Awful Arthur's fan so I knew she wasn't very excited about going which made me even more apprehensive about the night. Then add to the fact that we really didn't know the band, this night screamed, "YAWN!" But for the second time in two weeks, I was wrong (I apologize in advance to those of you who have just passed out because I said the words "I was wrong." It doesn't happen often, enjoy it.) I could not have been MORE wrong.

The night didn't start off too well as I was expecting. As usual Trikki (ok so it really was just the Tracy half of Trikki) was running way late so Johnson decided to head to First Friday's before we got there. Not knowing my way around the Noke very well, I called Johnson for explicit directions on where we needed to meet him. Apparently his party had started without Trikki. The conversation went as follows:

Me: Where are you?
DJ: I don't know.
Me: What? Where are we supposed to meet you goofball?
DJ: I don't know.
Me: How much have you had to drink?
DJ: I don't know.
Me: Just tell me how to get to Downtown!
DJ: What a shiny belt!

Ugh! Luckily I had somewhat of an idea of where to go and we were able to find it. But at this point I was a little annoyed so when we walked in and headed straight for the bar. As I waited on my liquid attitude change this guy in a cute little Gumby shirt approaches us. "You must be Tracy! I recognize your shirt from your MySpace page! " That had to be the funniest introduction to someone I have ever had. Although, I'll admit the shirt I was wearing was quite, uh, memorable (or mamoryable...I crack me up.) The guy in the Gumby shirt was Ted, the drummer from the Pop Rivets. We talked with Ted for a few minutes and then he headed on stage to start the show.

Ok, so now we've made friends with the band. The night is looking up. We see Jeff from Cobalt Media and head over to him. Jeff is the sweetest guy you'll ever meet and that always makes us feel better. The night was looking up, we knew someone from each of the bands, Johnson finally showed up and the drinks were starting to set in! Then the best part of the night started...The Pop Rivets began to play!

Any questions I had concerning their music were quickly dispelled. These guys were AWESOME! Seriously, just a great band! They weren't your typical band playing cover songs note for note, they'd take each song and make it their own. The best part as always though was when they would play their originals. If you've not listened to their original songs, go directly to their website right now and listen. I guarantee these songs will make you smile! It's apparent how much fun Jason, Brian, Ted and James are having on stage and that's so important when seeing a band perform. If they aren't having fun then how am I supposed to? The Pop Rivets enthusiasm was definitely contagious!

The night only got better from there. Jason was giving Trikki shout outs from the mic as soon as he recognized us! Random people I didn't know were coming up to me and asking me to come listen to their bands which was the coolest thing ever (no, I don't love any of the attention the Roanoke Times has brought me...Not!) I was getting free drinks and cd's from the band (I seriously love these guys!) I finally got to meet a few people that I had chatted with on Myspace and that is always fun! Jason played the last set with his shirt off..mmm...! What more could a girl ask for out of a night that could have been so easily lame?!

The night did get a little better though. We have been hearing about the new band Cobalt Media for a couple of months now from our friends Jeff, Josh and Wes. We had been invited to hear them practice but our schedules never quite worked out so we were anxious to hear them play. The Pop Rivets, being the sweet guys they are, let CM take over the stage for a few minutes to debut their band. It's always great to see local musicians support each other. Everyone at some point is starting from scratch and needs help of other established musicians and The Pop Rivets certainly stepped up to the plate for Cobalt Media. Cobalt Media played and the crowd dug it. I've not seen 5 happier people on stage in awhile!

Unfortunately the night came to a close all too soon. The band tore down, "D" went and got pizza for everyone (how sweet is that chick?) and eventually we said our goodbyes to everyone. The night I had thought was going to be a complete bust turned out to be an extraordinary night where we made lots of new friends and a new band!! I can not wait to see the Pop Rivets again and if they are any indication of what I've been missing out on, I promise to see as many new bands as possible!

Here are my picks for shows of the week: Thursday night catch Jason Hill and Brian Holt's other band, Chinese Fire Drill at Awful Arthur's in Salem. Friday and Saturday night Drivn will be at the Coffee Pot. You could also round out your Jason Hill week with his acoustic duo with Charlie Hamil at the 309 Market Street Grille and also The aforementioned Rivets will be at Awful Arthurs Towers on Saturday.

New York, LA, Detroit, Wytheville...What? Wytheville??

Wytheville, the tiny rural town in extreme Southwest Virginia with a whopping population of around 8,000 give or take a few people (mostly take.) But it is here in Wytheville that you will find the true spirit of rock. In a place where you'd expect to find not much more excitement on a Saturday night than a trip to Walmart, you'll catch people who care about music, support local musicians and certainly know how to throw one hell of a party!

I was in a unusually blah mood this past Saturday. Nikki was working late all weekend so there'd be no Trikki. TK-421 and Burning Bridges were both off. Although while I love to see the band Drivn play and I certainly don't get to see them nearly enough, I just really wasn't feeling the 3 hour drive Wytheville. I am so glad Johnson convinced me to go!

Johnson and I met up with Michelle, who had also been orphaned by Burning Bridges this week, and headed for the Clinic. Michelle had never seen Drivn before but has heard me say a thousand times, "you've really got to see these guys!!" Johnson, had seen them once before a couple of years ago at the old Howlers (I forgot about that one Tommy!) It was actually the first time that Johnson, Nikki and myself had hung out together (ahhhh, the memories.) I have seen Drivn a few times and spent one really great birthday night with them this year (yes, you can fit 3 musicians in an armoire but Troy gets mad if you lock him in there too long.)

Since I had only seen them a few times, I wasn't really sure if anyone from the band would remember me or not. I knew there would definitely be a few people there who I knew from TK shows. But I was relieved to hear them say, "HEY!! Glad you finally made another show!"

Once the band took the stage, Wytheville does what Wytheville does best...they rocked out!! I've seen probably 4 different bands in Wytheville. Every time, every show, every song, the people of Wytheville are up front screaming, singing and dancing. These people love their music.
It is the only town in this state (and outside of this state) that I've been to where the crowd knows every word of every song. Each time I hear them sing back the words to original songs, it truly makes me smile. It's really frustrating to me the lack of support original bands get around here. They'll be many extremely talented bands that will eventually cease to exist merely because people only seem to want to hear "Freebird" for the hundredth-million time. But for some unknown reason, Wytheville seems to "get it." Wytheville is indeed a phenomena.

Wytheville loves their Drivn!! Hometown boys, Chris, Trampus, Tommy, Cameron and Jody of Drivn put on another amazing show! What a talented group of guys! The music is amazing, the songs are catchy, the show is full of energy and they are just simply nice guys. If ever there was a band from this area that has what it takes to go to "the show," they are definitely one of them.

Aside from their great taste in music, the people I've met in Wytheville are among the nicest and most fun group of people you will ever meet. In "Wiffle", you'll meet people like Chad King, the Hoopers and the infamous Fred and Deb. Chad is an amazing person, always with a smile on his face and hug for me. He is crazy in the best kind of way and women just flock to him for those very reasons. I've seen the Hoopers at all the TK shows and hadn't ever really gotten to know them until one night their daughter Amanda saw me alone at a show and made a point of befriending me. What a sweet family! Finally the ultimate in "nice"...Fred and Deb!

I had always heard the stories of the parties at Fred and Deb's "Swamp." I had gotten the chance to finally meet them at this beautiful home a couple of months ago before a TK show. They had not a clue who I was but instantly it was like they had known me all of my life. They greeted me with hands full of Jello-shots (mine can't even compare) and whatever else I could possibly want to drink or eat.

After the Drivn show Saturday night, the party once again moved over to Fred and Deb's. It was an insanely fun night where 256 Jello shots, a liter and a fifth of Jager and 24 cans of Red Bull were consumed. Oh and I put away two big bad bottles of water. We got the sharpie, we gave the sharpie, we watched Chad try to remain upright, we heard great stories of calves and hacksaws ("But it's ok because he was young!" These are two different stories by the way. There were no animals harmed in the making of this blog.) and we made a lot of great new friends!

I finally gave into the fun induced exhaustion and curled up in Fred's big comfy chair. Next thing I know Deb is laying a blanket on me and Fred would walk by every few minutes to make sure the blanket was covering me so I wouldn't get cold. Amazing people indeed.

This is why I love Wytheville.

Side Notes: More band "musical chairs" this week. Tim Wilson (former Bananas At Large, Transcendent, Persona Non-Grata, Cradlejack) is taking over the lead vocals/bass for Monkey Bone. Tim replaces Dave Porter who I mentioned last week just joined Bad Dog. Tim is a good friend of mine so I wish Monkey Bone all the success in the world!! Can't wait to see them! (Tim please note the lower case "j" just for you honey!! :P) Be on the lookout also for one of Tim's solo projects, Mowing By Moonlight.

My picks for shows of the week: Friday is easy. The Pop Rivets are at Awful Arthurs Downtown and they are bringing with them a few special friends. Around midnight, the new band, Cobalt Media, will make their debut on stage. Come out and show some support for Jeff, Josh, Wes, Jessica and Megan!

Saturday?? Everyone has taken Saturday off apparently. Seriously, is there anything in this town happening on Saturday?? If you have ANY ideas please let me know. If not looks like we'll be making the road trip to Maryland to see JunkFood. By the way, JunkFood will make their Blacksburg and Harrisonburg debut in early October. Can't wait for those shows!

I can say that I have without a doubt THE best friends in the world. Who else will jump into a lake with you, crossdress for a friend and play doctor for you all in one silly little Burning Bridges night?

In the second half of the Nikki birthday throw-down, we headed for a double header at Mango's to see Burning Bridges. It was a typical Friday night show at Mango's with da Bridges. The music sounded great as always, well except for one really, uhm...interesting...version of that David Allan Coe song where I only know the one line about running my momma over in the rain. That's actually one line more than I need to know. Although I will say that is one of the great things about this band, they will give anyone the chance to jump on stage and do their thing. I remember many a night at Cheers where it was musical chairs with the mic. Sometimes the guest "Daniel" sounded good, sometimes not so much but, they always were having a good time up there and that's what made it fun!

Music blaring, drinks flowing, and a plethora of hot freshly tanned men all under the stars, Mango's is the perfect summertime nightspot. As perfect as it is, there was only one drawback to this weekend and that was the heat! Typically spending most of our night on the dance floor at a BB show, there is usually relief from the sweaty, hot bodies in the way of air conditioning or ceiling fans. But at Mango's all you get is all natural air conditioning. It was at this point, with lots of help from our new favorite drink the "Drunken Josh," Teri, Michelle and I decided that we were long overdue for a dive into the lake.

After the three of us had jumped in, we tried to persuade the rest of our group that had congregated on the dock to join us. We didn't have many takers, a couple of guys I still don't know who they were or where the came from. Another guy, Kevin, who knew the band but Nikki and I had just met a few hours earlier also took a dive. There was one person however who seemed like he really wanted to splash around with us but didn't know how he'd explain the wet clothes once he got home.

Isaiah, would walk up to the edge, look in as if he was about to jump in and then shake his head and walk back to the group on the dock. This indecision continued several times. The last time though, I look up to find Isaiah, "the tallest musician in the world", standing there in Nikki's clothes??!!

I must have spent a little too much time underwater because obviously I had missed something. It had to be seriously one of the oddest and funniest sites I have ever seen...The only thing covering all 6 foot 6 inches of Isaiah was a teeny tiny tank top proclaiming him a "Myrtle Beach Lifeguard" and a pair of jeans that now had a great 80's tightness to them. As if that site wasn't memorable enough, I then caught a glimpse of Nikki wearing really a baggy t-shirt and trying to hold up shorts that were designed to fall just below a man's knee but were now nearing her ankles. It was Freaky Friday, Burning Bridges style.

I think I was able manage a "What the ??" between laughs. But then as Nikki was just about to explain to me that she had offered Isaiah her clothes jokingly so that he could jump in and not get his clothes wet, I see Nikki still draped in Isaiah clothes, being pulled unwillingly into the lake with us. "Uh-oh someone's gonna die," was my first thought.

Nikki's not the type to be forced to do something she doesn't want to do. Seriously, that's just a bad idea. Nikki did not want to get into that lake. Isaiah also had not wanted to get his clothes, his check and his electronic car keys wet. Suddenly we were all sobered up and it was time to get out of the lake with the mood dimmed.

Nikki had smacked her foot hard against the dock when Kevin was pulling her in and was now limping back down towards the parking lot. I got out and went to see if she was ok passing by Michelle who had become the center of attention with her impromptu solo wet t-shirt contest thanks to a big blue bucket of water.

Eventually we all gathered in the parking lot to say our goodbyes. Nikki was trying her best not to kick Kevin with her good foot while Isaiah sat in his car in his boxers with his clothes hanging out the window in a feeble attempt at an air-dry. After Johnson thanked Michelle profusely for her earlier show he went and got the car for Nikki so she wouldn't have to walk.

Once we got "home" (Johnson's house has apparently become the permanent Trikki weekend retreat,) Doc Johnson picked Nikki up and carried her to bed so she wouldn't have to walk, prepared ice packs, got out the ibuprofen, fluffed pillows to put under Nikki's foot and then made Nachos (Nachos will cure any ailment) in bed for us all!! What a sweetheart!! You couldn't ask for a better guy!! He even gave up his middle spot in the usual weekend Trikki sandwich so that Nikki would have plenty of room to prop her foot up. He is truly an amazing friend (and single ladies!!)

We were able to end the night on an up note by laughing hysterically at a phone call from one of Nikki's many whacked out friends. Who knew you could leave a 26-minute voicemail??!! Poor Johnson though, left out of the Trikki sandwich because he was so nice, struggled to enjoy our hilarity from the other room. Saturday night however, we were able to return to the favor for him! :D

Side Notes: Saturday night we high tailed it from the last song at Mango's to Awful Arthur’s to catch Drivn's last set. Well we tried anyway. We were passed on the mountain by an obviously exceeding the speed limit, Wayne (Soundguy.) Maybe in fact though we were going just a little slow because our little Doc Johnson was hanging out of the passenger side of his car...uhm.."clearing" all the Beam and Jager shots from his system. After taking DJ home and tucking him into bed we did finally make it to catch the last few songs. If you have never seen Drivn before, you really are missing something great!! These guys are so talented and put on such a kick-butt-high energy show. Even the Crack Ho was having a great time!! ;)

My show picks this week: Check out the Pop Rivets at Awful Arthur’s Towers on Wednesday night. Drivn will be at the Clinic on Saturday so if you didn't catch them last weekend, here's another chance!

BIG Update from one of my previous blogs: A few weeks ago you may remember that I talked about Dave Porter (Monkey Bone) and Rusty Gwaltney (Bad Dog.) It turns out that Dave and Rusty have been best of friends since they were kids unbeknownst to me. Well I've just found out that Bad Dog has a new bass player, none other than Dave Porter! Band Girl bringing hot musicians together everywhere... :) (Ok yea so I know I had nothing to do with it but it's my fantasy let me live it :)) Good luck to the new Bad Dog!! Can't wait to catch your next show!

GET WELL SOON MIKE LINDSAY!! LOVE YA BUNCHES!!!

It started off like one of those crazy "Rockstar" stories you'd see on a really good episode of Behind the Music. The morning...errr, early afternoon...began with the drummer literally carrying in his extremely hungover guitar player into the "studio."

After a beer filled night of Cornnuts and broken briefcases, I had the distinct and rare pleasure of getting to sit in on a recording session for the new TK-421 cd, Disengaged. This is one of those really cool behind the scenes benefits to being friends with the band that not many people get a chance to experience unless they have an instrument to play or a mic in their hand. Luckily my talents lie in my happy, shiny personality (yea, right) because my zero musical ability gave me no right to be in that room.

Due to a Hungry Momma festival in Marion (I'm still trying to figure out why they were so hungry, there was an Arby's and Wendy's right up the road,) the band had to be spread out over a couple of different hotels. Bill got the "nice" room at the EconoLodge while Steve, Troy and Wayne were forced to set up the recording "studio" across the street in a hotel that was probably available by the hour if you needed such services.

It's amazing what technology has done for the recording industry. It used to be if you wanted to record your own music you had to pay a lot of money to sit in a recording studio for a little bit of time and pump out as much music as you could in your allotted time frame. When your 6 hours were over, like it or not, you had a cd. But now, with the help of a couple computer geeks (that's a compliment from me, a fellow geek) in your band you can have your very own recording studio in your very own flea bag hotel and make it sound a thousand times better than it would have in a professional studio.

While Bill carried a moaning Troy in and dropped him on an empty bed, Chuck was busy recording some guitar parts for Bed of Stone. Although I tried hard not to stare, it was difficult for me to take my eyes off of Chuck. The way musicians move and the energy they put behind playing has always fascinated me. I had never seen Chuck just play before without singing. I kept wanting to ask him if it was hard for him to not sing but decided to keep my goofy questions to myself so as not to disturbed the aoura of the moment.

Meanwhile at the helm, Steve, the "General," along with Wayne, the other "Grumpy Old Sound Guy," tuned and tweaked settings on the computer to make Chuck's singing-less guitar sound just right. It truly amazes me the level of talent in this band, not only musically but in all aspects. Steve and Troy designed the new cover art themselves as well as Steve doing all of the inside artwork too. I was so honored to get a sneak peek. Trust me, it looks amazing. The best thing about it though, I'm in it!! Steve, being the amazingly awesome guy that he is, made sure to give me prominent credit for a photograph featured on the inside of the cd that I took a few weeks ago.

Typically you'd also find Troy right up there in the middle of the mixing but at this point it was taking all his energy to muster up a bite of his Spicy Chicken. He was coming around though. Once he was finally able to get some food back on his stomach, he'd open an eye and manage a few smart-ass comments to lighten the intensity in the room. Eventually the blood started flowing again, must have been those magical spices in the chicken, both eyes opened albeit at a squint and Troy jumped up (that one must have hurt) when he heard some tones he didn't like.

A lot of people might have found a day of seeing Steve adjusting levels on a computer, watching Chuck play a few minutes of a guitar solo and then making Wendy's runs for hungry, hungover musicians boring but it really was a fabulously intriguing day for me. I need to say a HUGE "Thank you!" to Steve, Troy, Chuck and Bill for letting me into their private world for a few hours on a Saturday afternoon.

It will be an AMAZING cd when it comes out. Make sure you pick up a copy and check out that really cool photo inside...my camera is also available by the hour if you need such services.

Ho's, Phonebooks and Ihopping...

It was another "Trikki"less night which unfortunately seems to have been happening far too often recently (For those keeping score, "Trikki" is "Tracy" and "Nikki". To have a "Trikki," you must have both the Tracy and the Nikki otherwise you are "Trikki-less." Being Trikkiless is never a good thing.)

The original plan was to head down to Winston-Salem and catch Burning Bridges at Metal Rebel on Saturday night. But without a Trikki, I didn't really feel like driving all the way down there by myself. So this was the perfect opportunity for me to grab my best boy-FRIEND (For the person that keeps leaving malicious "anonymous" comments on these blogs, most of my friends are indeed "boys" try not to misconstrue it anymore) to catch a couple of bands that I don't normally get a chance to see too often.

I really wish I could clone myself so that I could get out and see the abundance of great bands in this area. But really, could the world stand two of me? Probably not, most of the world can barely comprehend my "me"-ness (I love making up new words.) Thankfully, there are a few who "get it" though. Maybe I just need to have a band summit and make everyone submit their schedules to me so I can coordinate according to my schedule. Think they'd do that for me? Probably not. As much fun as I am, I don't tend to pay nearly as well the clubs do.

Johnson (aforementioned friend) and I started the night at Don Ho's to see Monkey Bone. I had never been to Don Ho's before but was quite excited to see that half the sign was out and we would be spending the evening at the "Ho's Lounge." I felt right at home! :) (I thought I would make the joke before "anonymous" did.)

Although this was only my second time seeing Monkey Bone, it's apparent not long after the show starts why I'll see them as much as possible. Jody Ensor, Bill Foster and Dave Porter are so much fun on stage you can't help but enjoy yourself. They are always cracking jokes not only between themselves but with the crowd as well. It's so relaxed and fun. These guys are obviously just up there having a good time and it doesn't hurt that they sound great as well. And let's just be honest here, Dave Porter could sing the phone book and make it look good.

While there I also got my first "hey are you the girl that writes that stuff about bands?" person to come up to me. Let me just say, that was the coolest thing EVER! Joey, you rock sweetheart!! Thanks so much for the nice things you said!!

From the "Ho's" we headed over to Cheers to see another band I had only seen once before, Bad Dog. Cheers is my favorite local Roanoke bar but unfortunately I hadn't been in quite a while. I actually believe the last time I was there was to see Bad Dog around Mother's Day.

The Roanoke music scene is honestly just one big incestuous family. Everyone has played with everyone else at some point and don't even get me started on all the girlfriends they've shared. I've often thought about making a Roanoke music "family tree" but that would take one heck of a piece of paper and a whole lotta sharpies!!

Bad Dog is a newer group on the scene but is made of lots of those same familiar faces. Former members from Staxx and Bananas at Large just to name a couple. The first time I heard Bad Dog, they sounded good but I wasn't completely blown away (which is actually hard to do because I do know a little more about music than the typical "band girl.") But this time, I'm not sure if it was just the fact that I was somewhat sober, the last time I was uhm...not, to say the least. But these guys were AWESOME!! I only wished we had come earlier to hear more (this is where that cool clone chick would have come in handy.) We had only made it in time for the third set. A rockin' third set it was though! I will definitely be back to hear these guys again. I'm not sure if I've said it but, AWESOME! Again though, Rusty Gwaltney could sing the white pages to me and I would be enthralled. Let's not even talk about what he could do with the yellow pages. Ahhhh...

Of course after leaving Cheers, we had to make the obligatory 2 am Ihop stop. Anytime you get to make the drunken 2am Ihop stop with Dave Johnson, do NOT miss it. You really don't need to eat, just come for the show. Our past Ihop adventures have included: An exciting night of "licking the lingenberry, " The time he decided to help out the staff a little bit and started seating guests (I'm sure the staff appreciated it later...much later) and the Ihop employee dating service. This time we had many enjoyable minutes of making funny noises with the vinyl booth seats (isn't everything funny at 2am though.) "Ohhhhhh my belleeeeee....I really needed that...." Really, it was funny then.

So go see Monkey Bone, go see Bad Dog, take the phonebook, stop at Ihop on the way home.

My picks for shows of the week- Thursday, Fuzzy Logic (Dave Porter's other band, bring your phonebook) at the downtown Awful Arthur's (if you read this blog earlier I had the wrong AA's.) Friday, TK-421 at the Best Western in Marion (they'll be there Fri and Sat.) Saturday, Burning Bridges at Shooter's in Salem (they'll also be there both nights...again...clone...)

If there is anyone reading from my neck of the woods, Burning Bridges will be at Shaking at the Station in Staunton on Thursday and Drivn will be at the Pub in Harrisonburg, Friday and Saturday (ugh, clones, I need clones!!)

The long road.

People usually balk when they find out how far we drive every weekend. "You live where?" "Why do you come all the way down here?" I actually live in Harrisonburg but spend most every Friday, Saturday along with the occasional Wednesday and Thursday in Southwest Virginia. It's pretty much a pattern, drive the first leg to Nikki's near Lexington. Drop my car off there and then Nikki drives the second hour. It's an easy drive especially when you're chatting and laughing the whole way. How two people never run out of things to say to each other for hours on end I don't know but, there's rarely a quiet moment between us.

Occasionally though, I'll have to make the trek alone. This past Friday was one of those days. It was an especially long 3- hour, holiday traffic-ridden drive to Wytheville to see my favorite band, TK-421. But I had some great new tunes to listen to and I had been excited about this show for quite awhile so the drive wasn't too terribly lonely without my better half.

Friday night of two night gigs are the absolute best! It means no load out which in turn means the party starts a couple of hours early. A rare treat with TK since most of their shows seem to just be one nighters because of their crazy work schedules. Seriously Chuck, could you work any more hours? :)

Friday night as expected proved to be worth the drive. We played fun games like "Leave your drummer at the club and make him walk 2 miles back to the hotel," "Flying briefcases," "Throw your room key over the balcony," "Toss a cup of water on Troy then hide behind Chuck," "Who gets to play with Wayne's handcuffs this week," and the ever popular, "Let's all go mess with Bill while he's mad because he just had to walk 2 miles back from the club."

But, as much as I love hanging out with the guys after the show, there are really two reasons I'll spend six hours on the road for them. The first and most important is the obviously the music. I could watch/listen to these guys on stage for days on end. Even though a typical show is over 30 songs, I still leave wanting to hear twice as many. It would be impossible to squeeze anymore energy and enthusiasm out of these four men. Taking pictures of TK is so easy because there is so much hair flinging, airborne singers and speaker climbing that eventually your bound to get a cool shot of one of them. (Especially when Wayne teaches you how to use your brand new camera that has a whole lot of fancy buttons;) Thanks Wayne!!! )

The other reason I will drive to the ends of the earth for these five men is because each and every one of them are just incredibly wonderful, unique, kind, funny, sweet, big-hearted people. You will not meet a finer group of men than Bill Schlueter, Steve Layne, Troy Winemiller, Chuck Johnson and Soundguy extraordinairre, Wayne Sowder. I *heart* TK-421. Go see TK-421, you will not be disappointed by their music. Then go say "Hi" to them after the show, you will definitely not be disappointed by the people they are.


Side Note: Saturday with Burning Bridges was also full of fun party games including "Hang up Nikki in the armoire," "Who's the crazy toothless lady in our room,""Let's spit water all over Isaiah,""Smash Mike's face in the Nachos," "Watch Mike roll around in Nachos," "Matt are you in love?," and the also ever popular "Watch how fast Tracy can stand up and run down the hall when the crazy toothless lady offers to give her mouth to mouth."

My picks for this week's best band shows: Bad Dog at Cheer's on Friday, Monkey Bone at Don Ho's on Saturday. If you are a little farther south, go check out Drivn at the Best Western in Marion all weekend.

We had a strategy. Look hot, walk in like you own the place, get up front, look interested but not too interested.

We often joke about being "groupies" but typically we don't play the "groupie" game. Sure most of our friends are musicians and those related to the "scene" but we don't seek them out for purely sexual conquests. Tonight however, we were going to try to break new ground. We had the plan we were sure that would get us back stage to see Bret Michaels at a local fair. I even had a secret weapon, my Nikki.

Looking hot is never a problem with Nikki around. She is tall, model-beautiful and carries this great "I don't care if you are here or not" attitude that men are just drawn to like a magnet. Nikki without even trying will walk into a room and make every head turn. Bret would see her from the stage and be instantly mezmorized just like all the others, I was sure of it.

Almost ruining our plan before we ever got there, we had been running extremely late. How were we supposed to get up front when we weren't even going to get there until time for the show to start? No problem apparently. Brett, obviously a bit of a fallen star, was playing under a tent that wasn't even full. We were able to stroll right up front with out any problem.

In true rockstar fashion, the show started a little late. As the band rolled on the stage, I saw what could have been our golden ticket...Brett's guitar player was none other than Pete Evick! I have seen Pete's band, Evick play a couple of times and I know some people who are friends with Pete. Pete is one of those guys who always seems like he's having the time of his life on stage. He has, I guarantee you, the biggest smile of any musician ever!

My plan was to yell "Evick Rocks" during some point in the show to get Pete's attention since we were close enough for him to hear us. It was my theory then, that Pete would be so shocked and surprised that someone there knew who he was, instantly he would invite us back stage to hang out.

Rule #1 with any live musician, if you mess up, keep going, act like nothing happened and most of the time no one in the audience will ever notice a thing. Apparently hit records don't necessarily make good musicians. "No, no, no" Bret yelled as Pete began to play some tired ol' Poison song. He then turned to Happy Pete and said over the mic "Pete that was wrong, you can do better than that. THEY deserve better than that!" Poor Pete looked not only mortified but his cute, silly grin was gone. I felt sooooo bad for him and instantly hated Bret Michaels at that point.

But my hatred was soon pacified as I noticed that Bret kept looking and pointing at Nikki and I (I'm sure it was more Nikki than "I" but hey, I'll take that too!) Hmmm, our plan seemed to be falling into place quite nicely. To bad I kind of hated him now. But, I was beginning to think this might happen.

Later in the show after Bret had publicly accosted not only Pete again but his own guitar tech as well, the show was coming to an end and Bret was doing his last song. I saw one of the guys with a "backstage," or "back of tent" I guess is more appropriate, pass look at me. He pointed at me and then pointed to the right of the stage as if to say "You want to go back stage?"...OH MY GAWD!! No way!! There is no way this silly plan really worked!! I was so excited, my heart starting beating quickly, I was trying not to jump up and down with excitement...Some how I managed to compose myself enough to look at him with out cracking a smile and nodding my head with an affirmative yet subtle "yea, why not."

I grabbed Nikki's hand and started screaming in her ear "We are going backstage, we are going backstage!!" She said "What?" I said "WE ARE GOING BACKSTAGE"....uh maybe not...Apparently the guy was pointing at his 8 or 9 year old daughter who was standing directly in front of me and was telling her with his point to go stand in front of the stage instead of standing off to the side.

Then it was over. That was it. My plan had failed miserably, it was 9:30 on a Friday night and all I could think was "Man, Bret Michaels was such a jerk to Pete, I wish I had just gone to Mango's."

So this is what I learned from my night with Pete, Bret and Nikki:
-No matter how big you are or once were, don't be a jerk to those on stage with you.
-Never stop the song!
-Pete Evick does indeed ROCK!! Go see Evick!! Keep smiling Pete!!
-So far, so skank
-Musical careers are circular and sometimes eventually you'll have to play Sweet Home Alabama again.
-Someone tell me when they see pictures of my chest on the internet because the cameraman couldn't seem to get enough headless pictures of me. Perv.

On a side note, after the BM show (somewhat appopriate initials for the way he was acting I think) we went to see Point Blank at Chisholms. I'm not typically a big fan of chick singers but they were pretty good. They had a few few sound sound problems problems with with echoes echoes but overall not a bad cover band. They pulled out some really cool 80's tunes that I hadn't heard in a long time.

This weekends Band Girl gigs: TK-421 at the Clinic in Wytheville on Friday and Saturday. Come see Bill's new babies!! Burning Bridges is at The Pub in Harrisonburg on Saturday.