Charles the Osprey

This past Thursday, we embarked on a small tour / vacation that brought us to the beautiful city of Minneapolis by way of Chicago. Since we’ve all been to Chicago a million times, and because we were only there for less than 36 hours, we’ll spend most of our storytelling here on the better half of the twin cities.

Thursday, August 19th – We met up around noon to figure out how to load the car and what equipment we could fit. After some jockeying, we managed to fit 3 out of Raf’s 4 cabs in, both the guitar and bass head, cord bag, guitar my drumset, the merch suitcase and our overnight bags, all in the back of my 2001 Isuzu Rodeo. We also had to leave room for my fan, which I left at The Strutt in Kalamazoo, and had to swing through on the way to Chicago.

We said goodbye to Becky & Bella and headed out on the first leg of our drive. After a quick stop in Kalamazoo (Me: “Hey, I left a fan here last week during the Russian Circles show…do you have it?” Bartender, in a booming, enunciated voice: “Is it a WIND MACHINE?” Me: “Why yes it is!” Bartender: “TAKE YOUR WIND MACHINE!”), we were off to Chicago.

When we arrived, we met up with our good friend Joe Dertien, who introduced us to a much-needed shot and a beer, and then a couple of microbrews at Piece (where we met up with the famous Evan Rosendahl), all of which resulted in us being slightly inebriated before the sun fell. After several horrifying stories of car break-ins, we became increasingly concerned about our equipment, vulnerable and blocks away at Joe’s place. We booked it back to the truck to find everything in its place and unharmed luckily, and piled in to get over to Quenchers. A couple Reubens, a sarcastic bartender, a few beers and several other GR-to-Chicago transplants later we played to a not-so-empty room, and pretty well considering Raf had just woken up from a nap in the corner. Sold a few records to Kristin, Pat & Ami and Pauly G. which was helpful considering the amount of gas we were about to consume!

After the show, we headed back to our friend (and drummer from The Midwestern and Students from Norway, the latter of which shared the stage with us) Ryan’s place to get some sleep before our semi-early rise for the 7 hour drive to Minneapolis.

Friday, August 20th – Up at 9am, we showered (separately, we’re not the McPolye Brothers) and drove over to the Cozy Corner diner, which is certainly that, being that there are 300 people trying to get a table in a place that seats 25 (exaggeration, of course). Since I failed to charge the iPod, and it was our only music delivery mechanism (I made Raf leave his big stupid CD folder at home, both because it takes up too much room and because then I wouldn’t have to endure Passion Pit or some such dance/hippie nonsense) I had to be that guy in a crowded diner with the Netbook on the counter with an iPod plugged into it. I looked like a total dick, but it didn’t matter. We NEED tunes.

Fast forward 7 hours, and several albums later (the full list is at the bottom of this post) we arrived at our host house, the beautiful second story apartment of GR-to-Mpls transplant Holly. Dinner plan? The Hard Times Cafe, a vegan-inspired, volunteer run co-op cafe and restaurant with some pretty incredible food. We then headed to the Dillinger-Four-Owned Triple Rock Social Club, where we discovered it was Thin Lizzy bassist Phil Lynott‘s birthday, and therefore featured two cover bands, Nato Coles and the Blue Diamond Band and Jailbreak. Raf was too tired, and napped in the car as me, Holly & Patrick whooped it up. Nato and his band put together the set for this show, and they were great. Jailbreak I’m pretty sure does this for a living. Nato was better. On our way out, we witnessed an Isuzu Rodeo sideswipe a Toyota station wagon, which I hoped was not an omen for future happenings. Nothing bad has happened since. Yet.

Saturday, August 21 – Slept in, had some vegan pancakes and sausage (did we mention Holly’s vegan? She also has a food blog HERE, which features said pancakes and fake sausage), which were delicious, and coffee that Holly had brought back for us (did we also mention Holly’s the best host ever?), and started scheming about the day. First up, Twin Town Guitars where I purchased a couple pair of sticks (unprepared!) and Raf drooled over a vintage Laney.

Next, Extreme Noise, a co-op record store (lots of co-ops, all very cool and fairly successful) where I carried around the Skeletonwitch 10″ demo for an hour before deciding to instead buy the newest Banner Pilot 12″ in their home town. Raf found a Fuck the Facts record, and Holly walked out with a slew of stuff, including the first Fifteen 7″.

Then we headed to Minnehaha Falls, a gorgeous park built around a giant waterfall. A much-needed relaxation session next to a bend in the river ensued, surrounded by wholesome scenes of fun from all the families also enjoying their day there.

The last stop before heading back to prepare for the show was a poorly lit bar called Palmers, who luckily had a patio, and was somewhat participating in the West Bank Music Festival, meaning that they probably had artists there, but not at that moment, but they were within earshot of one of the bigger stages. We think we heard Chooglin, a pretty sweet local band, but not positive that was who it was. We sat at a picnic table outside with Holly’s friend Ian, and after a couple beers it was apparent that the vegan pancakes were wearing off, and we needed to get food stat.

Grand Rapids has Yesterdog, and Minneapolis has Weinery. Both are shady looking establishments, not quite chain-restaurant-clean, with tattooed servers, independent owners, and a history that has earned them legendary status. However, for as charming as the simplicity of the Yesterdog menu is, Weinery wins for sheer creativity. You order your fries not with Small or Medium, but as how many potatoes you want…because they cut them right there. The ingredients are mostly, if not all, made on the premises, and the combinations are delicious. Go to there.

Turns out that smoked sausages make us sleepy, so before the show we got in a quick nap at Holly’s, while her cat (Dairy Queen) yelled in the background for no reason, and licked our hair as we slept (these are true facts, people).

Our final adventure for the night would be the show we came to play at the 501 Club, which also featured Buildings, a Young Widows / Jesus Lizard style band that rocked our doors off. Seriously, listen to that band. We played, and created somewhat of a buzz among the crowd, as some of Holly’s friends reported, which was a good feeling. Then there was Oriel, who was releasing a CD that night…they were alright. They seem like a band that spent a lot of time on adding crazy instrumentation and arrangement to their album, but forgot about translating that to a live show with 3 people. Then there was Zoo Animal, who, like Buildings, I’ve loved from the moment Holly told me they were on the show. Their singer’s name is also Holly, and she, Tim and Thom were all really great.

With the night coming to a close, we went back to Holly’s (our host, not the other Holly) apartment and had a few nightcaps with her friends Patrick & Rocky, whilst singing (well, judding really) along to Jud Jud.

Sunday, August 22nd – Got up, said our goodbyes to Holly, grabbed a microwave sandwich and some coffee at the Bob’s Java Hut, hopped on 94 and sailed home. 11 hours, a crapload of Chicago traffic, a few gas stops and a handful of cheese curds later, we were back in my driveway, saying hello to Becky & Bella. I had a half our till the encore of Mad Men, which was just enough time to get settled in.

All in all it was an amazing trip. Thanks to everyone who came out and helped us along the way, Especially Joe, Ryan and Holly for being our hosts.

Here is our tracklist from the trip, in alphabetical order, since I have no idea what the real time order is…

Alkaline Trio – Goddammit
American Football – Self Titled
Baroness – The Red Album
Cartel – Chroma
Converge – Jane Doe
Daniel Tosh – Completely Serious
Fall Out Boy – Take This To Your Grave
The Gaslight Anthem – American Slang
Garrison – The Bend Before the Break
Ghost Heart – (Not sure on the title – prerelease)
Girl Talk – Feed the Animals
Gojira – The Way of All Flesh
Helmet – Strap It On
Interpol – Turn On The Bright Lights
Lemuria – Get Better
The Mars Volta – De-Loused in the Comatorium
Motion City Soundtrack – Even If It Kills Me
Patton Oswalt – My Weakness is Strong
Paucity – Deer Bird Bear Ship
Pinback – Self Titled
The Postal Service – Give Up
Queens of the Stone Age – Rated R
Rilo Kiley – The Execution of All Things
The Roots – Things Fall Apart
The Shins – Oh Inverted World
Shores – Coup de Grace
Soundgarden – Superunknown
Strung Out – Exile in Oblivion
Taylor Swift – Fearless
Tool – Aenima
Zach Galifinakis – Live at the Purple Onion

Shuffled Artists – 50 Cent, Coheed & Cambria, Damien Jurado, Death Cab for Cutie, The Get Up Kids, The Haunted, Head Automatica, Iron Maiden, Mum, Owen, A Perfect Circle, The Queers, Rainer Maria, Screeching Weasel, Shellac, Sleater-Kinney, Torche, Training For Utopia, Wale.