I Heart NYC (as well as Wrightsville and Thomas)

I would love to be able to romanticize my situation by saying, “I arrived in New York City with nothing but the clothes on my back and a song in my heart,” but the truth is I had much more than that. I had my drums, cymbals, and percussion accessories. I had my back pack; complete with laptop, book, CD player, and Bruce Hornsby albums. And I did have the clothes on my back; just not the remaining garments I had packed for the six day trip we had just started.

Let me back up…. The previous evening we had had a rare gig in Knoxville. It was not a typical hometown performance at the Bijou or more recently the TN Theatre, however, but an extravagant tailgate party for what would end up being a heart breaking overtime loss to Georgia the following day. I had played many sweat soaked, beer drenched Saturday afternoon tailgates for various fraternities in my four years at UT, but this was a much more lavish, family friendly affair. The show was a blast and proved to be a good opportunity to shake the rust off after a rare two week break from the road. We played our last song, a new arrangement of an old cover (“T for Texas, T for Tennessee), packed our things, and began our overnight journey to the Big Apple.

There are not really shifts or guidelines for overnight drives in the Lillies, but the general rule of thumb is drive until you feel tired and then pass the wheel to the next person feeling alert. Tom was up for driving and volunteered first, so I settled into the seat and tried to get as much sleep as I could until I was inevitably awoken for my turn. Around 9 AM, we stopped in New Jersey for gas. Wrinkled and smelly from the previous night’s gig, I went around back to the trunk to grab my toothbrush and a fresh t-shirt. My heart sank. My bag was no where to be found. I did not panic, however. I had experienced this feeling many times before, only to discover that my bag had simply fallen into the back seat or been wedged behind the cooler. This time it was not. The bag was gone. Later, we pieced together that a member of the band (who will remain unnamed) had stopped at some point in the middle of the night to get something out of his/her own bag, placed mine on the wheel well of the trailer, and accidentally taken off, leaving the bag’s approximate location somewhere between northern Tennessee and New Jersey.

It was not such a bummer, though. As I am more than willing to admit, I have easily the worst fashion sense in the band. I probably get this sense (or lack thereof) from my father, who went to get clothes at the TN department store “Goody’s” sometime around the year I was born and decided that would probably be all the shopping he would ever need to do. In fact, of the three “gig appropriate” shirts I had packed for the trip, one was Cruz’s and the second was my roommate’s, who decided when I was asked to join the band that I needed it more than he did. There were three cherished items, however, that are now lost forever…. 1. My moisture-wicking West Virginia athletic shirt, given to me by Patrick Hall the day after my 23rd birthday. 2. My spit-caked, Texas flag emblazoned high school retainer (perhaps the least rock and roll item ever lost in a traveling musicians bag.) and 3. A never before worn t-shirt of one of my favorite new bands, Humming House (from Nashville), that featured a giant white llama on a green back-drop. The third loss was made even more heart breaking when days later I found out (from a reliable source in a Thomas, WV bar) that backpacking trips in Montana often keep several llamas in tow to ward off bears (apparently, the bears are frightened by the llamas’ unfamiliar, peculiar appearance). Not only had I lost a sweet new shirt, but also a stylish, comfortable bear repellant. Anywho, with the help of my folks (who had flown up from TX for the show) and shirt donations from the incredibly fine people of The Burning Bridge Tavern in Wrightsville, PA, I was able to piece together plenty of things to wear for the upcoming shows. Rock and Roll!

Speaking of which, the first show of the trip was a big old heaping pile of awesome that went down at, wait for it, Madison Square……….Park. The crowd was substantial and attentive and included (among many others) my mom, pop, sister, brother-in-law, childhood friend Clara, and dental wizard/band friend Kamand. We also found a new friend in an ornery, stuffed raccoon (pictured below) that had apparently made an appearance at every concert at MSP for the last two years. It was a pretty interesting experience pouring thick, juicy waves of Americana music over the sonic backdrop of bustling Manhattan, but Tom took full advantage of the ruckus; incorporating ambulance sirens and various other noises he heard into his pedal steel lines. The Madison Square Park Conservancy later called the show “one of the most rocking Studio sets the park has ever hosted”. (You can watch a high quality video of “Ramblin’ Boy” from the gig here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZTwVeM_96bE)

The following night we played at a great venue down the road called “Hill Country BBQ”. It was a pretty surreal experience; walking into to the club/restaurant off of the crowded New York streets I was immediately reminded of the feel/asthetic of many of the popular BBQ joints I use to frequent in and around Austin (I found out later that the owners are from Lockhart, a smoked meat mecca). The gig went well, and as an encore we debuted an acoustified version of the Zombies classic “Time of the Season”, with the whole audience singing along.

A gig-less Monday had us saying farewell to the Big Apple and hello to the historic city (definitely look it up) of Wrightsville, PA. The Burning Bridge Tavern is run by some of the kindest, most hospitable people you could ever hope to meet and not only did they clothe me, but they put us all up for two nights and fed us four hearty meals free of charge. Super kind folks, super cool bar. The final stop of the mini-tour was another one of the band’s favorite clubs, the Purple Fiddle in Thomas, WV. As usual, the place was packed to the gills with friendly, smiling faces ready to get up and get down. Afterwards, we repaired to a local bar where, to build team strength and unity, I instigated a series of “trust falls” among the band and bar patrons. The camaraderie flowed freely and everyone ended up having a few laughs; except for Cruz, who was way too trusting of an overly inebriated man and ended up with several bruised ribs.

Well there it is, as up to date as I am liable to get for the time being. Now I would like to briefly ask you, the blog reader/Black Lillies fan’s, for a little bit of assistance. You see, as a traveling musician chronicling my experiences, I end up from time to time finding myself feeling a bit like Guy Fieri. For those not in the know, Guy Fieri is a big, frosted-tipped goober who hosts a show my pop watches on Food Network called “Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives”. Every week Guy cruises around the country sampling various dishes from some of America’s best, as the title states, diners, drive-ins, and dives. It is actually a pretty entertaining show, and the best part is that 12 to 15 times an episode this spikey-haired little cheeseball has to come up with a new, trendy way to say, “That dish tastes really good”. Similarly, sometimes when I think about trying to write blog posts at various points in our journeys all that comes to mind are variations on “The gig in (insert city here) was really fun.” That’s why I would like to enlist your help in what will hopefully be an on and off Q&A section between ya’ll and the Lillies. Not only will it  provide you with little insights into what things are really like with the band, but it will also give me (the newest member) an opportunity to find out more about my band mates and the four years before I joined. Questions can either be directed towards specific band members (“Dear Bobby, You have a red beard. What is that like?”) or towards the band in general (“How does Bobby’s red beard affect the rest of the group?”). You can submit them underneath this blog’s post on the facebook page, or in the “comments” section of this blog. Lastly, I know with our friends/fans this probably goes without saying, but please only submit questions that you would feel comfortable having your grandmother answer (if your grandmother was in the Black Lillies). Hopefully these questions will provide more blog posts when nothing particularly bizarre is happening on the road. Yeah! America(na)!

Your friend,

Bowman