USA

1998 March 18 - Los Angeles
Jenny took us to the airport. Long 13 hours. No sleep. LA - got car, took Andrew straight to Fatburger. Simon not at home. We went to Venice briefly and got a nice $2 Mexican shirt. Called Ashley. Got speaker box. Went out to Mexican restaurant with Simon and Lisa. Huge. Very good creamy pink colada!

March 20 - Lordsburg to Austin (13 hours)
Got firecrackers in North Mexico and let them off that night by the side of the road. Got lost in Austin trying to find Lynne's house - got there about 1am. I got a $180 speeding ticket in Ozona, Texas for going 97 miles per hour. Then Andrew got pulled over for almost ramming a country sheriff's car from the side as he passed him. "I pulled you over because you almost ran me off the road there!" "Sorry he is an Australian - we always drive on the wrong side of the road". He got off with a warning.

March 21 - Austin
Got a guitar strap and slide in a shop - took Andrew to the Magnolia for lunch. Went to get SXSW tags and saw Wayne W. Went to Soundcheck and met an Australian journalist based in new york. Played gig and it went well. Heather didn't turn up. Wandered around various gigs and met Lynne/Richard at French showcase in theatre. Saw Supermodel (UK) at Maggie May's. Met Scott and his sister and went to see Spacehog. Really sucked big time. **** keeps trying to kiss me and hugs me continually. She is nice but not my type. "Your lyrics mean so much to me" etc. Went to a really bad DJ rave thing. Got back home 3-4 am. Saw Jenny Garafolo in the street crying.

March 22 - Austin to Memphis
Meet Ashley in hotel lobby. Very cute blonde friend Vicki from MTV, New York (?) - has missed her flight. Lunch in Austin - leave 12.30 after buying Super-8 film. Go through Little Rock, Arkansas…through Ozarkes (beautiful hills, farms, forests). Finally found motel in Memphis after asking one black guy on the street…"I don't care man" and 2 cops in 7eleven. Go past Beale street - looks good even at 12.30 at night but Andrew is too tired to go out. Violent argument upstairs for ages.

March 23 - Memphis to St Louis via Colombia
Up early, go to dinner opposite Gracelands…"all you can eat breakfast" including grills etc. Go to Gracelands (very kitsch) but smaller than I expected. Upstairs not open. I went through it much quicker than Andrew. Checked out local music store but nothing there. Drove to Colombia - late, but got to ui radio station and did an interview plus 4 songs (badly) and then gave them the CD. Drove further on to just past St Louis and got good burgers (Andrew asked for beetroot) then retired to a rather expensive and flash Super 8 motel.

March 24 - St Louis to Chicago
Got going early (I woke by 6am). 3 hours drive to Chicago. Went to music store to try and get voltage converter. Found Empty Bottle venue. Took acoustic in to get fixed. Not time to do it properly. Found (after stressful run around) a converter. Went to a dodgy neighbourhood to pick it up - finally got it at 5 to 5. Fuckwit of a little guy behind the counter. Surrealistic bureacracy - very kafka. Turns out to be wrong one. Empty Bottle to load in and soundcheck. See Purple Ivy Shadow. Geeky Andrew Brough look (and sound) alikes. I meet Julie at the bar - cute blonde, druk, friendly. After talking for a while, she invites me/us back to her house to stay the night. After soundcheck we go back to her place, drink some more, smoke some dope, snort some cocaine, go back and do the show. She sings a little like Johnette Napolitano and plays bass badly. We stay at venue and drink, play pool, watch Purple Ivy Shadow. Geffen A + R there and other record company people. Guy from Flower booking agency (Sebadoh etc) wants to book us, maybe. We end up back at Julie's place - her ex is there, we drink and smoke some more. It is a bit awkward. We crash on the floor (sofa cushions) - very uncomfortable. I get 1 hours sleep at the most. Julie's flatmate is Michelle - very nice Chinese girl.

March 25
Woken up in the morning by a cat scratching at the door (all night) then phone ringing again and again. Julie finally answers then abuses the hell out of someone who turns out to be another obsessive ex-boyfriend. We pretend to be asleep - very embarrassing. "You keep saying I'm a slut and a whore - you are an asshole" etc. I'm exhausted with an extremely bad hangover. Stagger out and find greasy diner in the 'crotch' area. Feeling very seedy. Take back voltage converter and finally get $$$ back. Drive for miles to get another one. Right this time. Check out two more music stores. Nothing affordable - 4/5 Thinlines though. Get Chicago pizza and drive around downtown taking photos and film. Drive up to Milwaukie - 2 hours. Do show with no P.A. - I hate singing in front of small crowds. Our "biggest fan in Milwaukie" is a rather camp guy who asks for a song's meaning in between songs. It is intimidating. Cringe. 2 or 3 people there who know our stuff including a DJ (Melissa) at a local College radio station. We go back to Bill's for a curry with his best friend mark (a photographer) and katie. Good curry. Bill has the porno channel on cable. We go out later for a 'custard' (a local ice cream that tastes just like soft-serve ice cream. No different. Watch TV, talk a while, unfold the sofa bed as Bill stays up snoring and watching TV…waking up and switching channels…snoring again. He is extremely fat and snores and wheezes even when awake. Milwaukie is a pretty town.

March 26 - Milwaukie to Green Bay, Wisconsin
Mark very kindly comes around to take us where we need to go. We get rbeakfast then get Andrew's guitar set up. After a while we drove to a couple of other music stores and an antique clothing store. Said goodbye to Bill and left for Green bay. Gave us a Rushmore t-shirt each and one to give to Grant Hart but we forget to. 4 hours to Green bay and we get there late. Did instore at Exclusive Lo record store - pretty crap. No one there to see us. Get food then play gig in big beer barn with no beer to a bunch of young underage punk kids. 2 terrible bands before us and one more after us. Complete clash. They were polite though and we sold one CD. Went out afterwards to a very conservative sports bar where I got to talking to a very friendly and cute waitress called ****.

March 27 - Green bay to Minneapolis
I buy a brown Thinline Tele for $650 ($2500 in Australia - bargain!). This should have been a 4 or 5 hour trip but it ended up being about 8 or 9 hours because we took the wrong exit at Wansan and went North instead of West. Almost hit Lake Superior and Canada before stopping at a music store where I asked the old guy there "how much further to Minneapolis" and he said 4 hours…:but why are you so far North?". "Where am I?". Minoqana apparently. So after 5 hours already we have to do another 4 in driving rain and really heavy mist. Speeding hard to get to the gig on time. Finally we got there at about 9 o'clock. We didn't know when we were supposed to be playing, but luckily we are due on at 10. We meet Grant Hart. Very nice, very clever guy. Very fat also. His gig was a bit dull…just him and a guitar. Our gig went ok although I realised I lost/had stolen my tuner and lead. Got a good response. We were drinking in the groovy old bar downstairs and smoking some of the dope that Grant gave me when a girl invited us back to her place for the night. Another typical bloody Yank - friendly, trusting and generous. I know for a fact it wouldn't happen like this for an American band in Australia. We went back to her place via a dodgy burger bar (for me) and a small party with some of her friends…including 'Baby Johnson' - a white guy singing the blues who'd won some state version of an Aria. I went to bed. Andrew (prize asshle that he most undoubtedly is!) kept coming in every 20 minutes to shake me awake and drunkenly yell at me something like "where's the pot man…you've got the pot…where is it?" I told him politely that I wasn't aware of the location of the marijuana and asked him gently to leave the room. Or "fuck off, get out and leave me alone!" The girl whose house it was even staggered in and turned on the fucking light at 4am. I was in no mood to fend off the amorous advances of a four-eyed, gap-toothed ninny…but all she was after was my drugs. Sow! Turns out I found it all in my pocket a couple of days later. Andrew came in again and having nowhere to crash, leering drunkenly said…"move over, it's just you and me tonight, baby" Sarcastic bastard. Again I politely declined his kind offer. I forgot about Kiki. I met her at a bar in Minneapolis - she was sort of cute (Ithought in that Jewish-Italian style I like. Hair on upper lip etc (according to Andrew later on). Unfortunately Kiki turned out to be a little kooky. She wouldn't go away. Kept pulling pre-written poems and scripts out of her pockets and reading them out to me - saying she 'owed' me an apology. For what I never found out. She took an instant dislike to Andrew when he slinked up - maybe because he insisted on calling her kooky, and told her to 'cheer up'. She eventually stamped off. She was a bit pretentious, but strange women have always amused me (see Julie in Chicago and white witch in New york. But hey, whatever.

March 28 - Minneapolis to Fargo, North Dakota
Boring, flat 5 hour drive but before that I bought a beautiful '77 SG form a shop that grant hart told me about. Andrew had a magnificently potenet hangover. He ordered steak and eggs, and I oredered Eggs Benedict (nice and sloppy). I was in the lobby making some calls when my eggs came first. Andrew had already eaten half my breakfast without even realising it wasn't steak. Anyway, we got lost when we got into Fargo trying to find a Super 8 motel, then trying to find Ralph's. Terrible pork rib sandwich for dinner.

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