New York City

New York City was a major success. We played Sullivan Hall, an awesome venue on Sullivan and Bleeker, right by Washington Square Park. The show was part of the multi-venue, city-wide Green Apple Music Festival. The Hall has been renovated since last time we played there three months ago, and they added a sweet underground greenroom with a stocked bar. Unfortunately, the band that played before Calhoun, a jam band called Heavy Petters or something like that stole all the beer. Thanks guys! They also have created an uber-hip underground dance club (the kind that are cool because they don't have a sign) underneath the hall. The greenroom shared a back exit with the dance club, so I got to go stand in there for a little while, and get stared at, and feel really Texan and un-hip. However, I was wearing my spandex suit, so it's possible that I was just too hip for everyone there to handle.

Calhoun played an awesome show, to the crowd's dancing pleasure. There were some interesting conversations during the soundcheck, courtesy of the former Motorhead roadie sound guy, who later fondly reminisced about staying up for six days straight on speed. The levels eventually got somewhat figured out, and we put on a really tight, intense show. I had a really good time. Almost every song was at a pretty urgent tempo, but sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do, when the crowd needs to dance.

It was awesome to see a lot of our friends from high school at the show who are now living in NYC, making a place for themselves in the city. I got to see Steph, Kristin, Laura, Edward Landreth, James Gorski, as well as a lot of our NYC friends who I only get to see every few months like Emma, Sarah, Graham, and, most of all, the incredible Emily Skipper who always lets us wake her up at 530 in the morning to come downstairs, let us in, and give us a place to stay.

Lowpoint of NYC? Driving in with a trailor is INSANE. We also parked the van in a parking garage which was INSANE. Most frustrating experience ever, check! The parking garage also had a magically increasing price scale. The initial quote advertised on the outside sign said 12 dollars for 12 hours, plus 5 for oversize vehicles. However, the shift manager at 5:30 in the morning when we arrived in the city from the overnight drive from DC, informed us that our trailor qualified us for Extra-EXTRA Oversize status which meant that we had to pay 37 dollars for overnight. I thought this was kind of bs, but said I would pay in the morning when I could talk to the main manager, since we already had the van halfway in the garage, and I was about to pass out from exhaustion. In the morning the main manager couldn't understand how the night-time manager could have possibly quoted me such a low price, since the the trailor and the van together meant TWO extra-extra oversize charges, adding up to 67 dollars for the night. We ended up paying 48 dollars. I'm not really sure how we got to that number, but I'm pretty sure I got screwed.
We received our second parking ticket of the trip, although the sign appeared to say everything was totally legal, and the club managers encouraged us to park there. Calhoun also got a ticket.

Good news is, we are making way more money at the shows the past few days. At least half of it is going to parking tickets and towing companies, but we actually have a pretty nice stash of gas money going. Our success in not getting a single hotel room the whole trip, and frequently crashing in the car, has saved us a lot of cash. So despite the HUGE hassle of driving our own van and trailor around NYC, the show was awesome, there was a great crowd, and it was totally worth it.

Travis