Day 7: We Cut Off Your Johnson City, Lebowski!

(Me plundering Gabe's sunglass collection and lookin' fiiiiiiine!)

Short drive to Johnson City, TN and then to the venue – The Acoustic Coffeehouse. From the name, Gabriel and I had been picturing a very different sorta joint – it turned out to be a combination bar/café/coffee-shop/hangout on a dusty street, with a super-eclectic mix of folks hanging out reading, drinking, talking and generally having a good time. After saying our hellos and buying a Dr. Enuf (the local soda, since 1949), we went off to meet Ari, our CouchSurfing host for the evening and a medical student at East Tennessee State. We hung around for a bit at his place and shot the breeze, practiced a little and then headed off to the gig.



(Ari's house)

The first act of the evening was Don and Karen McNatt, a husband-and-wife duo from Nashville. We grabbed some food and a beer and sat down to watch. They were very good, and it was sort of fascinating to see professional Nashville folks at work - they worked the crowd brilliantly, and were very well received by the audience, young and old, and seemingly from all walks of life.

We took the stage next and enjoyed ourselves very much. During my set, an older fellow wandered in from the laundromat next door and watched most of the performance, clapping and cheering loudly. Made me feel real good.

(We dun forgot to record MP3s... but won't fergit again!)

After our sets, we joined up with Ari and his roommate, Norman, who had very kindly come to see the show in spite of their having a major psychiatry exam the following morning. We went to a quiet part of the Coffeehouse and hung around for an hour or two, having a great time for ourselves, talking about this and that and nothing in particular. Turned out they knew the Two Man Gentlemen Band, who had performed a couple weeks before. Small little world.

Then we went back to the house and went to sleep.



(The dusty streets of Johnson City)

Day 6: Blue Ridge Mountain High

We headed off to Asheville full of home-shot venison. Around midway we stopped for lunch – our first real taste of barbecue this trip (which had better darn well not be our last). We went to a place recommended by a friend of Hunter’s, and were well rewarded. It was phenomenal. Even Gabriel (who was skeptical at first) loved it – not greasy at all, lightly sweet and nicely smoky, with a profound tang of vinegar and pepper – and balanced out by honest-to-goodness East Carolina slaw. A barbecue sandwich for the ages. Allen and Son was the name of the place, in case anyone is interested and in the area.



Once in Asheville, we took in the sights for a minute – gorgeous landscape, and what looked like more record stores, vintage clothing shops and art galleries per capita than any town I’ve ever been in. Drum circles on the corners. A hippie paradise nestled right in the Blue Ridge mountains.

We met up with the legendary Juan Holladay, ate some veggies (for which thank heaven) and went to the show. The show was a hell of a lot of fun – Juan played a great set (dude can SING) and then his friend Lucy came on and played. Her songs (and especially lyrics) were very cool, and she’s just starting out, which made it extra impressive. Then we played, and had a lot of fun doing so.

(Live MP3 - Gabriel doing "When I Was a Young Girl" - http://econo-graphics.com/superdupersecret/WhenIWasAYoungGirlAshe.mp3 )

After the show, we went out for a couple beers with Juan and his friends Mary and Kathy. We met up with a couple of New York musicians at the Bobo Gallery – Charles-Theodore Zerner and Chris Volpe – who were passing through Asheville in the opposite direction, towards Winston-Salem. We caught a little bit of their set – good stuff.



(Us looking like goofballs - blurry too!)



(With the awesome Asheville folks - Juan Holladay center, with blue shirt)

Went to sleep at Juan’s magnificent pad out in the country, woke up, ate an outstanding breakfast of Huevos Rancheros at the Sunny Point Café, then tooled around town for a bit, to a guitar shop, a cool record store, and a fantastic ice cream parlor.



(The house!)

We also got some bad news – our friend Alex was hit by a car riding his bike in New York on Monday night. He broke several bones but is expected to make a full recovery, and is still in the hospital. We’re thinking of him very much, and you should toss him a prayer if you’re that way inclined.

Til’ we meet again,

J

Day 5: Up the Coast to the Juggling Gypsy

Immediately after leaving Charleston we started to get hungry, and were very happy to realize that the seafood place recommended to us by multiple folks was only about 30 miles outside of town. We pulled up at the Seewee restaurant with empty bellies and bulging eyes – it looked exactly like the kind of place we wanted to feed.



And the bill of fare did not in any way disappoint. All of it was breathtakingly good. We started off with Charleston She-Crab Soup, which, for folks that don’t know, is similar to a crab chowder, served with a shot of sherry that the eater mixes in to his or her liking. Divine. On the side, we had fried pickles, which were perfectly crisp and not at all greasy – clearly the Seewee fryers are masters of their craft. The main event was a plate of some of the freshest seafood we’ve ever had (and after years of heading down the Cape in the summers, that’s saying something), including four perfect oysters, bone dry on the outside but bursting with oceanic juices at the slightest disturbance of the brittle crust.



We waddled out of the Seewee with what little dignity we had left and hit the road back to North Carolina. Drove past Myrtle Beach (kind of a pit) and briefly contemplated going into a shooting range and firing off a few rounds (I was the killjoy who nixed that idea).



We pulled off in Wilmington at about a quarter to five and went immediately to the Juggling Gypsy Café. What a joint – it felt like home the moment we walked in. Funky decorations all over the place and a laid-back atmosphere. The people there were super friendly, and we sat around and watched the end of “No Country for Old Men.”



We went to meet Hunter, our CouchSurfing host for the evening, and promptly got lost looking for his place (curses on you, Maria!), but when we found it we felt very welcome. Hunter was, true to his name, a hunter, and he offered us deer sausage for the next morning’s breakfast, about which more later. He also sacrificed watching the NCAA finals to come watch our show, which was super cool. He said he’d been meaning to check out the Juggling Gypsy for years, and now had a new reason to go. We hung out for a bit, then headed back to the Gypsy for the show.

At the Juggling Gypsy, we got fabulous sandwiches and local beers (Duck-Rabbit Porter! Hoohah!), and Gabriel discovered that he’d left the power adapter to his reverb pedal in South Carolina. Oops. And there was not a one to be found in Wilmington, at least not at that hour of night.

By the time we were ready to play, a little crowd had assembled. It was a great show – Gabe warmed the audience up (we’ve been switching off opening and designated driving duties) and got ‘em into it, and then I came on. For the first time this tour, I felt like I’d really found my footing. Felt very free up on stage. By the end of the night (near midnight on a Monday) the crowd had dwindled a bit, but those left were a fantastic audience nonetheless. After the show, we hung out with Hunter, Brian and Denny (who were running the Gypsy that night), drank a couple of beers (well, not me – I was driving) and headed back to Hunter’s place.



(Live MP3 - Jared doing "Butterfly" - http://econo-graphics.com/superdupersecret/ButterflyWilmington.mp3)

At Hunter’s, we sat up for a little while, shared some of the Kentucky Gentleman we’d procured a few stops back, and met his roommate, David, who played us a couple of songs on King Alfred, my elderly archtop electric guitar, including a great rendition of Townes’ “Mr. Gold and Mr. Mudd” and one of his own originals, which was very lovely indeed.

We took some shut-eye, and in the morning woke up to a breakfast of pancakes and the aforementioned deer sausage, which was spicy and delicious. With our bellies full, we packed up and headed west for Asheville.



(Deer sausage! And it was awesome!)

Day 4: Doin' the Charleston

So we woke up early in Chapel Hill, fended off the cats and hightailed it down to Charleston. In a stroke of incredible luck, our GPS unit (whom we’ve nicknamed “Maria”) decided (without our realizing it until we were well on our way) that it would be faster to take back roads from Chapel Hill to the South Carolina border than to go hook up with the interstate in Raleigh. As a result, we took winding two-lane blacktop all the way, through brown fields and tiny towns. We danced in our seats to “Rockin’ Pneumonia and the Boogie Woogie Flu” by Huey “Piano” Smith. I bought the worst cup of coffee I have ever sampled in my life (which, given previous hikes through Nebraska, Texas, Alabama, etc., is saying something).

We made the obligatory stop at South of the Border and happily resisted buying souvenirs for the most part –weren’t able to resist taking photos tho’…







We busted down I-95 to Charleston. And met up with Luca and Ladd, our CouchSurfing hosts for the evening, who were incredibly awesome. We got in touch with Luca more or less at the last minute, while we were in York, and he was kind enough to put us up with his friend Ladd, who has a much roomier apartment. Both are students at the College of Charleston in their last year of school.

Charleston was indescribable. We had a drink and some crab dip at a rather swanky bar at the end of a pier and looked out at a cruise ship loading up with tourists. We wandered through colonial-era alleys and saw ornate churches surrounded by palmettos.



But maybe the most interesting thing was what we saw when we went to meet Luca for dinner. Luca lives in a small apartment near the college, and when we got to his place, he was hanging out with his landlord, George, and their neighbor, Gerry. They offered to give us a tour of Gerry’s house, which George (an architect) had designed. It was spectacular, with a roof deck overlooking the city, a colonnaded patio (complete with fountain) overlooking the alleyway between the houses, and a working sundial hand-painted on the side of the house.



And then they gave us a tour of George’s house (that he had designed for himself), which was easily the most fascinating dwelling I’d ever been in. “Resplendent” would most assuredly be the word. As the immense front doors opened, we noticed that where most folks would have a den, a kitchen or a front room of some sort, George had a swimming pool built into the ground. The walls were lined with antique rugs that George had bought in Turkey. The ceilings were hugely high, and had a giant concrete chandelier hanging down. The floor was all mosaic. The living room had four ancient wooden columns, which they had found on the lot when they cleared it out to build the house. And it was rounded out by a giant poured-concrete fireplace that George had designed himself.



At any rate, Gabe and I both decided that we’re commissioning George to build us houses if we ever have any money. Done. Settled.

And for that matter, you should commission him too if you have the money – look him up at http://georgeholtdesign.com/.

So Luca and Ladd took us to a local joint called Papa ZuZu’s for dinner, which was exactly what the doctor ordered – fresh delicious veggies (and hey, the South Carolina tomatoes are already fantastic this time of year) to counteract the astonishingly unhealthy diet we’ve been rocking for the past few days.

Then we went to the show, at the Village Tavern in Mount Pleasant, just across the bridge from Charleston. Great bar, with a great beer selection and an impressive roster of local and touring bands of all genres – widely regarded as one of the best places to play in the area. Cameron, Steph and Ryan, who were running things when we got there, were really lovely to us, and we had a very nice little crowd by the time we got playing.

For myself, I will say it was the last time I ever play without a setlist, but Gabriel rocked the place. Folks gathered around as he played, and when he lit into Hank Williams’ “Lost Highway,” one dude grabbed a harmonica and started playing along; Gabe gestured him onstage, and he soloed at the mic. He was fantastic. Gabriel did a nice mix of originals and covers, and we sold a few CDs at evening’s end. A good time had by all.

(Live MP3s - Gabriel doing Dylan's "I Shall Be Released" - http://econo-graphics.com/superdupersecret/IShallBeReleasedCharleston.mp3)

We went back and crashed out at Ladd’s house, and in the morning she cooked us a lovely breakfast before she had to depart for school. We ducked into a music/pawn shop to buy a gig bag for me, and for Gabriel to add to his growing collection of sunglasses (this time, aviators with pink lenses – and I must say I look pretty good in ‘em too), got a couple spare keys cut at a hardware store, and lit out on 17 for Wilmington.

Day 3: Chapel Hill!

We woke early - early for me, anyway - and left York by 7:30 AM. Equipped with our first gas station coffee of the day, Jared and I high-tailed it down into Virginia. Our first destination: Wawa, a convenience store found in the mid-Atlantic states. Although I’d never heard of the chain, Jared knew and praised it even before leaving Brooklyn. The chain inspires great loyalty, apparently, and while in DC, Berg mentioned that on his next trip through NYC he planned to get the company’s logo tattooed into his flesh to cement his bond to the dispenser of donuts and egg ciabatta melts for all time. We saw a sign on 95, took the exit, and got ourselves some more coffee to wash down bagels and cream cheese. Back in the car, we listed to Car Talk until the channel fizzled into static.

We made Chapel Hill, NC in about eight hours and when we arrived we set up shop in Alina and Josh’s house (thanks, Alina!). That’s when we met their guard cats. Neither Jared nor I have ever encountered such ferocity from felines. From the moment we entered the house until the following morning, the cats bared their fangs, hissed, and swiped at our legs from around corners. I thought for sure that after feeding them, they would be our friends, but although the cats tempered themselves while I doled out their food, immediately after their Fancy Feast meal they started in again with the hissing. The cats aren’t allowed in any of the house’s rooms (they apparently like to pee indiscriminately), and so while we slept in the closed off living room we heard them prowling like little cougars outside our door, mewing, mewing, mewing. This morning as we left, both cats sat and watched us with cold, triumphant eyes. It was a frosty farewell.

In other news, Chapel Hill’s great. In addition to the government liquor store that carried the biggest Whiskey selection we’d ever seen, and a small but essential music store (CD Alley), the town boasts great food. We met up with the Western Civ folks for a damn fine Southern dinner at Mama Dip’s: fried green tomatoes, hushpuppies, bbq, sweet tea, and local Carolina beer. For me and Jared, equally as important as playing great shows is great eats, and Jared brought along two books – Roadfood, and Eccentric America – to assist our pursuits.

Time to finish up… we’re nearing our destination of Charleston, SC. I’m writing this entry from our passenger seat command center in the Jeep, which we’ve equipped with a GPS, iPod, radar detector, and a power splitter for the cigarette lighter. My bro and gadget guru should be proud. Until our next entry… G

Day 2: York PA

Day 2, and a lovely day it was. We rolled into York a little after 1 PM. Odd city – very beautiful buildings and a more-or-less deserted downtown. Reminded me of New Bedford in a lot of ways. We then hopped it for Amish country, a few miles east.



We started our Amish odyssey in Intercourse – home of the oft-stolen street sign (a fellow we met said his grandfather had personally lifted three of them over the last 80 years). Went pickle-and-jam shopping and ate a home-cooked lunch. Browsed the “Old Candle Barn.” Saw buggies. Way quaint:





(Whose smorgasbord? Gabriel's smorgasbord!)



(This goat was trying to climb this tree)

Then it was back to York, and our gig at Sparky & Clark’s coffeehouse.

First thing is we don’t have a mic stand – Gabe left his in Austin over his recent jaunt to SXSW. We’re going to pick it up when we get down there, but that obviously doesn’t do us any good now. And Sparky & Clark’s doesn’t have one either. What we did have was duct tape. And they had a stepstool and a broomhandle. So we MacGyvered this contraption:



The gig went down just fine. We played to about 10 people over the course of the night, most of whom we knew by name by the end of the sets (special thanks to Nick and Michelle, by the way). Not a big audience, but a great one nonetheless. We had a blast.

(Live MP3s from Sparky & Clark’s:

Gabriel's "Tough Love" - http://econo-graphics.com/superdupersecret/ToughLoveYork.mp3
Jared's "You Got Some Nerve" - http://econo-graphics.com/superdupersecret/YouGotSomeNerveYork.mp3)

And then we went and had our first CouchSurfing experience. For them what don’t know, CouchSurfing is an international program that uses the interwebs to connect travelers with people interested in hosting travelers. Everything is monitored, and hosts and surfers are reviewed by the people they stay with/host. It’s pretty awesome, actually.

Anyway, our first ‘Surf rocked. We stayed with Brian, Nick and Lindsay, college students in York who are about to graduate and move to Baltimore. Wicked cool people, and truly an experience we couldn’t conceivably have had through conventional means. We hung out, drank a couple beers and played a little music before heading to sleep. Brian played us a couple of his songs – he’s heading out on tour this summer, and if you are around you should seriously try to catch him – http://myspace.com/sirenisaband. Great stuff, with searing lyrics. Damn. Good people who want to host our bummy corpses, who also happen to be good musicians – what’re the friggin’ chances?



Then we crashed, woke up this morning and hauled out of York on the way to Chapel Hill, where we’re gonna rendezvous with Misty and the Western Civ crew. Huzzah!!!

Til tomorrow (but that’s just some other time),

J

Day 1: Our Nation’s Capital

(Gabriel is impaled on the Washington Monument. He did it all for art.)

Hooray! DC! Stop one on the tour! We started out the evening with a delightful repast at Ben’s Chili Bowl, perhaps the city’s finest eating establishment and a perennial Man in Gray favorite. Ben’s makes something called a chili half-smoke, which is a smoked sausage frizzled on the flattop until it takes on a wicked crust, then stuffed in a steamed bun and lathered with mustard, raw onions and a heaping of incredible chili. So very, very good. If you’ve ever been, I’d imagine you want one right now. With a side of cheese fries, naturally.

Then we got a beer with Gabriel’s friend Emily, who is doing awesome humanitarian work for the State Department. And then it was on to the Velvet Lounge, and our first gig this tour!

The show went really well – the small crowd grew as the set went on, and everyone seemed really into it. (Wanna hear a song from last night? This is Gabe doing a brand new one: http://econo-graphics.com/superdupersecret/KatieMaeDC.mp3)

Gaslight Society came on next and rocked – sort of a punky, groovy X-Ray Spex vibe. Very cool.

The night was closed out by DC force-to-be-reckoned-with Must Love Trash, who jammed out hard. I’ve seen them a couple-three times now, and they get radder every show. I highly recommend going to see them on Saturday at Kenny’s Castaways if you’re in NYC.

Berg of MLT and his lovely fiancee Tracy were kind enough to put us up, and we spent the rest of the evening eating “jumbo slice” (they’re way not kidding) pizza and playing with Parker, their adorable Labrador. And then we slept the sleep of reason that breeds monsters.

And now it’s off to York, PA. By way of Intercourse, PA. It’s a little off the beaten path, but how can one resist?

Much love,

J