[Editor's note: Tommy Miller is guitarist and vocalist for Bless Me Ultima, a hardcore band out of Alliance, Neb. As they continue their first tour after an album release, Miller will be sending updates from the road.]
May 26 at 9:06 p.m.
First of all, I must apologize for the inconsistency of my updates, good 3G signals are rather hard to come by sometimes. Also, there are no pictures because the camera on my phone is absolutely terrible. But Dillon, our bassist, is working on some video updates right now that have some live footage of our sets.
We arrived in Christopher, Ill., after a rather unsuccessful attempt at hustling merch in St. Louis. I guess all the scene kids were all at home because it was nothing but bros and grandmothers. We did however get one CD sold and the guy added us on Facebook 20 minutes later. Every bit counts! We pulled into a Walmart in a township a little bit outside of Christopher to replenish our canned food supplies and eat some chicken. After giving up all hope in finding a place to crash and nearly settling for the Walmart parking lot, Clint from Yours Truly came to the rescue and hooked us up with some places to crash in Murphysboro, Ill.
After a 30-minute drive, we unloaded our dirty clothes and supplies from the van and shared show stories with some of the fellas from Yours Truly. Then we were treated with a solid band practice by the band. The best way I can describe this band is like a mixture of We Came as Romans and Asking Alexandria, minus the terrible attitudes. After a good ear massage by Yours Truly, we cracked some brews and did as musicians do after a long, boring day on the road. Just as a hint, most of us were up until at least four in the morning.
Tired, a little ill and extremely dirty, we all took turns in the showers and spent most of the afternoon with Yours Truly mobbing around town to get cigarettes and some sodas (a 44 oz fountain drink cost only a buck at the place we visited). I had a lunch of cold chili out of the can while my bandmates settled for canned chicken and tuna. I've eaten so much canned meat that I'd better be getting an endorsement from a certain meat processing company famous for its questionable salty ham cubes. After Yours Truly loaded their equipment into their vehicles, the two bands made like an old caravan and journeyed to Christopher.
Draw O' Coward played fourth in the lineup, with us following and Yours Truly taking the headlining spot. Another band, The Truth of Versailles, gave a very solid set of ambient hardcore, which took me by complete surprise. Draw O' Coward masterfully delivered their sonic booms of destruction as the crowd gave them a solid response. Yours Truly absolutely killed it, not surprisingly. I was particularly impressed with their vocalists; I have never seen two guys so in sync with each other on stage. Hell, the band as a whole was in sync! We're definitely keeping in touch with these fellas.
After saying our goodbyes and exchanging many high fives and bro-hugs, we made our grueling overnight journey to Merrill, Wisc. Dillon, being the manly man he is, drove most of the night. All I remember is putting on my headphones, jamming some Decoder, and passing out. I woke up at noon parked by a rest stop somewhere in Wisconsin. After driving most of the night, Dillon was passed out, so I took the wheel and drove the remaining two hours to Merrill. We arrived at Les and Jim's to find our buds Draw O' Coward at the venue (they beat us to all of the venues all tour long, so there's no surprises there). After taking some naps on the stage and charging our mobile devices, we set up our gear to open this night of brutality.
The PA was dialed in for rawk and we turned our amps loud. We ferociously stampeded through seven songs and had heads nodding and people getting totes brutes in the pit. Timmy got up and did guest vocals for Draw O' Coward's song "Edgar Allen Pwnage" and completely killed it with Noah, Phil, Zack, Dustin and Alex during their excellently executed set. This show definitely is up there with Alliance and Dubuque in terms of the sound quality. After packing up our gear and saying our goodbyes with Draw O' Coward, we set off for Dubuque to spend a couple days of our six days off to relax.
This may be the last update I do for a while before our first show of our second leg in Wichita, Kan. There, we'll meet up with our bros in North to Alaska and Nothing is Everything to take on Kansas, Colorado and Wyoming!
May 24 at 1:43 p.m.
After having a little R&R at the park in Freeburg, we set our GPS toward the American Legion Post #56. We were a little shocked that the GPS took us six miles out on county roads, but we were pleasantly surprised by the serenity of our surroundings once we arrived. The hall overlooks a nice little lake that Timmy, Dillon and Elliot found to be great for swimming. Mighty old oaks surround the whole area in a dense forest full of deer, raccoons and coyotes (we heard a whole pack of them howling last night before settling in, which was rather unnerving). This post is also the only one in the U.S. where veterans live on the property. Nestled in the woods, veterans of WWII, Korea and some from Vietnam live among the plentiful flora and fauna of the area.
The show last night was great! Not a whole lot of folks, but the music went on, and I'm sure as hell glad it did because the bands were awesome. Bless Me Ultima and Draw O' Coward both killed as usual, but I was particularly blown away by North to Alaska. Their wrenching breakdowns and aggressive guitar tones were intertwined with spellbinding harmonies that ebbed and flowed between tensions and releases. After the show, we chatted with Gino and Ryan from North to Alaska was well as Jim, a veteran of Vietnam, who runs the venue. Jim was kind enough to hook up both bands with a campground for only $10, as well as some pizza leftover from the VFW regional meeting the day before.
The bands lit a fire, gathered timber, cracked some brews and jammed some tunes from our local scenes and previous bands we have played with on our old endeavors across the state of Nebraska and their home state of Wisconsin. I don't think I've ever eaten so many roasted hotdogs and s'mores on any single camping trip in my entire life. Well, actually, I've only been camping once at Lake McConaughy, so I really haven't been out in the wilderness much. Noah and Zach from Draw O' Coward elected to sleep under the stars while the rest of us crammed into our vans and slept the night away.
This morning I woke up with my brother Timmy's feet in my face. I'm sure he didn't appreciate mine in his. In the van we have a certain way of getting everyone to sleep into reasonably comfortable positions, but often we're bums and elbows. Timmy, Elliot and Dillon took a nice swim in the lake and I washed off the ash, sweat and spilled beverage of the night before in the campground shower. Later on we're hitting up some local malls in the area to hustle our EP to make some extra money for gas. It's another off day today, so we're just going to see the sights and promote like there's no tomorrow. Our next stop is in Christopher, Ill., so I'll be on probably before the show to give another update.
May 22 at 2:06 p.m.
So we're still kind of in our down period before the show. It's a beautiful day outside, plenty of bird calls that I've never heard in Nebraska, a gentle breeze rolling over our tired shoulders, and not a single cloud in the sky. Off in the distance I can hear the church bells chime in one o'clock much like the Holy Rosary in Alliance.
I find myself thinking a lot about what's to come with a little apprehension. There are many details that need to be ironed out for our shows in June, but I'm sure we can figure something out. Tonight we're playing with our labelmates Draw O'Coward and North to Alaska, as well as some other bands from around the area. It should be pretty damn awesome; Bless Me O' Coward (as we've taken to calling to two bands collectively) have been playing stellar sets all tour and from what I heard from North to Alaska's recordings, they will definitely tear it up tonight as well.
For lunch we all had our cans of tuna, crackers and whatever else we could find in our van. We definitely need to hit up a grocery store very soon. Walter (our touring van) has been running like a champ ever since we had our issue with the bearings fixed, and I'm confident he'll continue to treat us well. Most of our hauls between shows have been over six hours, so we're all a little road-weary, but we're still in high spirits. I keep recollecting our shows in Alliance and Dubuque and remain hopeful that the rest of our shows will be as fun and awesome as those two.
May 21 at 3:03 p.m.
Exhausted after a six-hour drive across the lovely state of Iowa, we finally pulled into the back alley of Off Minor, our comrades Draw O' Coward there waiting for us. Draw O' Coward opened the show with a brutal set and we followed with a solid one of our own. Remember Last Fall followed us and gave a great set of pop-punk synthy goodness.
After being heckled for free gear by some inebriated ladies (we told them up and down that merch sales and any door money is our only source of funding for food and gas), the members of the band went upstairs to the bar area of Off Minor and enjoyed a few cold ones and listened to the rest of the brutally heavy lineup. Before last night, I did not believe it possible to tune a guitar to a drop F# (like, a whole sixth below our normal drop D tuning).
Merch sales were slim, but spirits were high. Jesse from Remember Last Fall and his roommates Andrea and Jenny were gracious enough to let us 10 smelly, sweaty dudes spend the night at their place and have some brews, conversation and dice games that no one can ever seem to win.
However, as with most things in rock 'n' roll, things rarely go off without a hitch. We noticed bearing grease leaking from our front left tire and had to have the bearing cap replaced because our old one was not sealed. Personally, I'm battling a rather annoying cold, so I'm drinking Airborne and sucking on Halls like it's my job, but thus far it has not affected my singing much.
Today, we have the day off to drive to Freeburg, Illinois, for our next stop. We're just going to take it easy and cruise along, enjoying the beautiful foliage and Mississippi River as we go along. Everyone has told me that Iowa is flat and boring (like much Western Nebraska), but that's not so. I do believe that I have found a home away from home in Dubuque.
May 20 at 10:29 a.m.
Day two on the road, I'm eating some awesome waffles courtesy of Chelsea Dart and Steve Ponec. They're both good friends of mine and the band from our previous excursions with Eastern Turkish. After a good night's sleep and some rad food, we're off to Dubuque, Iowa, today. I'm glad as hell they're putting us up so well today. Last night we had spam and canned beans for dinner, a typical fare for those who jam econo.
Grand Island was an interesting show. We played in the basement of a little red house on the prairie (not really, I just wanted to use the cliche). Not too many folks, but it was a very up close and intimate setup. The previous show in Alliance was absolutely amazing! At least 100 folks were in and out of the Legion listening to music, smoking cigs and getting McDonald's conveniently located across the street.
