PAULA KELLEY’S SOME SUCKER’S TOUR
In support of her new album, Some Sucker's Life, Part 1, out now on Stop, Pop, and Roll Records
Thursday, June 15: Twiggs: San Diego, CA
Saturday, June 17: Lava Lounge: Hollywood, CA
Friday, June 23: Radio Bean: Burlington, VT
Monday, June 26: Sin-e: New York, NY
Tuesday, June 27: Abbey Lounge: Boston, MA
Monday, July 3: The Red Door: Portsmouth, NH
Saturday, July 8: Lizard Lounge: Cambridge, MA (Boy Joys)
Friday, July 14: House of Shields: San Francisco, CA
Saturday, July 15: Walden’s Coffeehouse: Reno, NV
Sunday, July 16:d Infringement Records, Portland, OR
Tuesday, July 18: Sun Bean: Clarkston, WA
Wednesday, July 19: Coffeeville, Coeur d’Alene, ID
Thursday, July 20: Rock Coffee: Spokane, WA)
Friday, July 21: Hotwire Coffee: Seattle, WA
Friday, July 28: Knitting Factory: Hollywood, CA (IPO)
www.paulakelley.com
www.stoppopandroll.com
www.myspace.com/thepko
Thursday, June 15
Around 6pm we call the venue to find out what time we're on. "I dunno, just not first."
Great. The music was scheduled to begin at 8, so we figure that's a fine time to show up.
I see the chalkboard has all of the night's artists listed, not in a logical manner, but rather as clouds scattered across the board. I ask the doorguy, "Um, does the order go clockwise?" Not surprisingly, he answers, "Naw, I just kind of threw everyone up there. We'll play it by ear." Fabulous.
I promptly run to the liquor store to buy nips of cognac for my coffee. After enduring two painfully earnest singer-songwriter fellas, I drag out of the doorguy that we'll be on around 10:00-10:15. Now, if I had known that all along, I could have put together a much better clothing ensemble, hair, makeup, etc. Not that this cargo-shorted, flip-flopped lot would have noticed...
Aaron and I took the stage by storm (insofar as two well-dressed indie-snots can), SO ready to play after all the mind-numbing anticipation. We managed to pull together quite a good set, me switching from guitar to piano (the venue has a baby grand, which I fear is woefully underused. I gave it some lovin’) and Aaron from guitar to tambourine to melodica. We played a great set, it was my favorite part of the evening. I must have come upon that perfect cognac to coffee ratio...
PK
Saturday, June 17
Though I've lived in LA for a year and a half now, I had never been to The Lava Lounge before. The name sounded promising enough, but the fact that it lies in a strip mall on North La Brea Ave didn't bode well. To throw a fly in the ointment, the drummer who said we could borrow his kit about a month ago emailed us the night before the gig
to renege on his offer. Dontcha love that? So all Friday night and Saturday was spent trying to scrounge up a drum kit because it stressed this little fucker out too much to loan us his.
Fortunately, as soon as we set foot in the venue we knew the Tiki Gods had smiled upon us. It's a damn cool room. Small stage, but swanky decor to counteract it. Yes, I can be swayed by aesthetics. Leave me alone.
As we were loading in, so was Drum Douche. I stared at him but he wouldn't make eye contact with me. His band played before us and every so often during their set I'd go right up front and look directly at him. I'd give him the stink-eye. He never looked at me but, oh, he knew I was there.
One bright spot of our pre-show experience was when two friends of ours dragged us out of the club and shoved the most delicious ice cream sandwiches in our faces. Apparently this strip mall also boasts the home of the best ice cream in LA. I still can't stop thinking
about it. Lavender ice cream smooshed between two light crispy waffle cookies and dipped in pistachio nuts around the edges. I try not to eat dairy before I have to sing, but holy shit, this rendered me powerless.
Back inside, a Sterolabby half French band was making rather cool, atmospheric music. Drum Douche was still lurking. I was still glowering.
We were the final band of the evening, and difficult as it was to stay sober, we did just about manage. Lots of friends came out to see us and it was a nice feeling, you know, to have the crowd on our side. They laughed at my corny jokes. We played as raucous a set we're capable of, being an orch-pop band and all. But we finished with one of my new songs, "In Light of Your Less Complicated Life" from which we segued into "The Lap of the Gods" by Queen.
Drum Douche had the audacity to stay for our entire set, proving he had no good reason to screw us.
Fuck 'im, though, we rocked and I challenge any wussy pop band to rock as hard as we do! (Again, only the wussies, please!)
I spent the next morning deleting Drum Douche from my MySpace friends list and removing myself from all the goddamn groups he was so relentless about my joining.
PK
Saturday, June 24
Planes, trains and automobiles without the humor.
Missed my flight from LA to Boston. Drove six hours to San Jose with Aaron. Got red-eye from San Jose to Boston. Aaron played show with other band in San Jose. Aaron got redder-eye from San Jose to Chicago to Boston. Drove four hours to Burlington, VT. Played show. Venue had very tasty cocktails. Venue had very very tasty cocktails. Slept a few hours in Burlington. Aaron's flight to Cleveland is cancelled. The circle of shitting ourselves will not be unbroken.
To be continued...
PK
Monday, June 26
After having two days to slowly emerge from travel hell, we were ready to face the road again. The drive from Boston to New York is generally no problem until you get near the city, when it becomes a huge problem. Our drive was no exception. The good thing was that we had the Gnarls Barkley CD in the van and I played "Crazy" about 893 times. Seriously, it's the best pop single I've heard in a long, long time.
We arrive at Sin-é with time to spare and had a nice leisurely sound check. As we were reunited with our east coast PKO trumpet player, Chris Barrett, we got to run some new tunes with him.
Then we zipped around the corner to a cute bar with delightful cocktails and appetizers. I can't usually eat before I play, but upon sight of an actual plate of food my body went into cave-woman mode. Though my brain hadn't, my body remembered I hadn't had a real meal in about five days. So I ate and then I had to reapply my fucking makeup in the dark bathroom. I hope I didn't near clown-dom. Photos will tell all.
We got back to the club to watch the band before us, Mascot, fronted by my college buddy Kendall Meade, who now resides in the city. We saw each other and broke into maniacal laughter upon realizing we looked exactly the same. Same hair, same glasses, similar outfits. Dorks.
Mascot performed a very endearing set. Her songs are sweet and earnest, and just fucking good. Her voice is breezy and unique. I'm hoping to play with them back in LA.
When we got onstage we felt relaxed and prepared, what a nice change! The crowd was responsive, so much so that we felt it appropriate to use cue-cards and engage them in a sing-along during the choruses of "Talk Away." Believe it.
After some post-show mingling, we collected a group of friends and went to a Mexican place for, duh, margaritas. Our friend and some-time trumpet player Dennis, who doubles as a math teacher, presented us with this riddlish problem:
Add one line to this equation to make it true:
5 + 5 + 5 = 550
Note: the answer is not to make the equal sign a "does not equal" sign.
Nor is the answer to cross the whole thing out.
Can you solve it?
PK
Tuesday, June 27
After all the travel mishaps we'd endured, not to mention my brother giving me heaps of shit about missing my flight out of LA (such a dink!), we finally had a show that compensated for all of it.
There were six bands in all, and the room was already packed during the first set. People stayed all night. The crowd was continually abuzz with happy chatter, genuine laughter, and clinking glasses. I'm not one of those people to get all into cosmic shit, man, but there was a palpable good vibe.
Plus, I was having a fabulous hair night.
We went onstage as a trio: Aaron, Chris, and me. Our friend Lisa joined us later for some singing and keyboard playing. Finally, Jeff and Jim, the East Coast PKO rhythm section hopped onstage for a couple songs.
The audience made us feel adored, and you know, all us performers are suckers for that. We did the cue-carded-sing-along again on “Talk Away� and the crowd actually out-sang us. I truly didn't want our set to end.
And that, my friends, is what it's all about.
PK
Tuesday, July 4
What we didn't know before we left: Portsmouth has its Independence Day fireworks display on July 3 rather than the 4th. Though its downtown area is rather small, one lane streets and throngs of yankees trudging to the place where they may pour Bud Lite down their throats whilst engaging in the viewing of a wicked awesome light show made getting around difficult for us schleps trying to find a rawk club. Especially one that has no name. Just the, er, red door.
I, princess that I am, got to go into the club and "set up" while the boys parked out back in people hell. Setting up, happily, entailed the discovery that the bartender knew how to make delicious swanky cocktails. The venue itself was quite cozy- not in that ginham-curtained-rustic- New England way, but in the Gimmie-a-Moscow Mule-and-stick-me-on-the-black- vinyl-settee sort of way.
A gaggle of friends from Boston came up to the show which made things even cozier. Before the PKO Jr. played, two very nice fellas took the stage. The first, Witt, was something of a troubadour for the misplaced indie-kids. The second, Will Bangs, played atmospheric guitar music, and it was the perfect soundtrack to the fireworks we could see from one of the windows. Perfect in that eerie, surreal, mismatched kind of way. (Sorry, John Philip Sousa...)
We played as a trio - Aaron, Chris, and me. When we started the set, we had a good sized crowd, but a few songs in we got some of the rowdy firework overflow infiltrating the poor little room. Not a big deal, they had their own thing going on and we had ours...until Mr. Funny Guy Heckler started in on me. He was wearing a sport jacket and a tie - one of those douches - and he started yelling "Play Wish You Were Here!" (could have been a worse choice, but still). I said "no!" Then he said "Well play something I know!" because it is, after all, all about him. I said "This next song is called "The Girlfriend." After I play it, you will know it. "
Earlier in the evening I had made a comment about how the room reminded me of being in someone's swanky living-room, just with a better bar. After we played "The Girlfriend" I said "remember how I made that comment about this place being like my living room?" One guy up front answered "Yeah! Did your living room have a jackass in it?" Heh heh.
So the chaff left, we continued on with our merry set, and got a great response from the people who were actually there to see us. We drank stuff, sold stuff, ate stuff, and were pretty damn happy about it. And the club staff couldn't have been sweeter.
Yay The Red Door!
-PK
P.S. link to riddle answer:
http://blog.myspace.com/thepko
Friday, July 14th
The western leg of our tour began swimmingly. We got to the club on time, for one. We drove and therefore didn't have any possibility of missing flights.
The House of Shields is a neat little venue - the band plays in a balcony of sorts and there's a black and white video monitor that projects the show to the bar downstairs. Plus it's dark and has little white lights.
We were happy to see some friendly faces show up - former PKO Boston keyboard player Rich Goldman and Matt Nathanson drummer Jason Mackenzie even joined us for some guest percussion. Also joining us for a number was talented opener Steve Taylor. He hopped up and sang the third harmony on the Bee Gees "How Can You Mend a Broken Heart..." which I can't quite remember why we ended up playing in the first place. Perhaps just because it's awesome.
So yes, the show went well, but maybe even better was...THE BREAKFAST THE NEXT DAY! We found this place on the outskirts of Oakland called the Rudy's Can't Fail Cafe. I am going to bed without dinner tonight so it will cause me great pain to go into detail about how amazing the food was. I'm nearly crying just thinking about it. Just go there. I don't care if you have to fly across the country.
-PK
Saturday, July 15th
After having the BEST BREAKFAST IN THE WORLD, we set off to Reno. Our show was early, so we were ready to gamble afterwards. We got to the venue a bit before they were ready for us to set up, so we took a walk. This was a semi-crazy idea, because Reno is hotter than stereo equipment being sold from a white van. We met some horses in a paddock by the side of the road. One of them was intent on trying to eat my bright orange skirt. (What do horses like that's orange?)
Back at the club, after a pregnant rocker belted out a set (gotta hand it to her, especially in the heat), we were on. Aaron's melodica solo in "Burnin' for You" was particularly on. We were joined onstage by a 15 year old girl named Morgan who held up our cue cards for the "Talk Away" sing-along. Morgan was there with her million siblings who were all as supportive as you'd want an audience to be.
After out set, lamely, we were too tired to hit the casinos. Plus, we had an hour and a half drive to the hotel (getting a head start on a long drive to Portland the next day). Off we went, back into the dessert heat...
PK
Sunday, July 16th
After being spoiled with THE BEST BREAKFAST IN THE WORLD back in San Fran, we were cursed with THE WORST PIZZA PLACE IN THE WORLD on our drive to Portland. I believe the "restaurant" was in Ashland, Oregon. It dared call itself The Great American Pizza Company. Aaron's slice was like bad frozen school-caff pizza- it had those imprints on the bottom of the crust. My mistake was trying to get an eggplant parmesan sub out of them. It wasn't on the menu, yet as they had a chicken parm sub and also had eggplant as a pizza topping, I figured they could concoct what I wanted. I should have backed out when the waiter seemed taken aback at my request. Apparently he had never heard of fucking eggplant parmesan. My "sandwich" arrived with crappy slices of uncooked, un-breaded, chewy eggplant, tomato sauce, and cheese from a shaker! Ugh! A pox on them!
The nine hour drive finally passed, and we rolled out of the car and into the record store. The first thing I hear is "Do you want a glass of wine?" I couldn't think of anything I wanted more. I knew we were going to like these guys.
We arrived about a half hour late - the drive from Reno was loooong, and we were confronted with lots of back-ass roads that must be navigated slowly. The guys at the store weren't mad at us, though, obviously. They had wine and cookies and an assortment of cool instruments and records for us to amuse ourselves with. They let us wind down a bit before we played.
We did a sans-piano set, basically because we didn't feel like pulling the damn thing out of the car. We managed to get through "The Night," Over Your Head," and "The Light Under the Door" without having practiced them for ages, the latter for over a year! After sapping everything we knew without piano, we hopped offstage for more wine and cookies. I tried to figure out a guitaron for a while. HUGE instrument with the shortest neck! Who invented that?
Later that night, we went for sushi with the owner of the record portion of the store.
Super-nice guy. Terrific in-store experience.
PK
Tuesday, July 18th
I had never heard of Clarkston before. To get there, we had to drive through part of Idaho. In fact, Clarkston is right on the Idaho/Washington border, and it abuts a town called Lewiston. Cute, ain't it? The American Northwest is spectacularly beautiful. Beautiful in a bigger way than the Northeast is...those who have been to both parts of the country may know what I mean. The trees seem bigger, the cliffs are bigger, the mountains are bigger...I feel smaller, which is a good thing.
Anyway, we arrive at Sun Bean. It's hot as hell. I'll say it again, I had no idea the northern US got so friggin' HOT. The town is serene and surrounded by mountains. Very calming. Still, I go in and get about a hundred coffees. Feeling serene before playing a set isn't natural for me. I thrive on nerves.
We had no idea what to expect from this show, but the place was full for the entire (two hour!) set. We let it slip that we knew some (some- ha! about a hundred!) Bee Gees songs and took a couple requests. Folks were into my songs, too. We sold hella merch and got lots of nice compliments. The crowd was completely attutide-free. That's a boon for dorks like us!
We listen to Harry Potter books on CD during our long drives. We go online to "The Leaky Cauldron" when we get free internet. Please tell me there are other people over 25 who do this...
PK
Wednesday, July 19th
Our first show in Idaho! Woo hoo!
...
Possibly our last show in Idaho.
woo.
PK
Thursday, July 20th
The day started early for us. A limo came to pick us up at the hotel at 11:30 AM. We had agreed to do a video podcast while being driven about Spokane on a guided tour from a call-in radio show winner. Bizarre, but true. Ginormous coffees in hands, Aaron and I stumble down. The limo is Spokane's one and only "Racing Limo," all done up NASCAR style with flags and logos and stuff. People were taking pictures of our car out of their cars. The interviewer (and show setter-upper) Isamu Jordan did a great job of making us feel like rock stars. The contest winner, Clyde, was a retired fireman with penchants for partial disrobing and mail-order brides. At least we stopped at a spectacular cathedral so I could take in the view whilst repenting in advance for anything I may do or say to him on the remainder of the afternoon. Isamu's newspaper paid for AT's and my lunches at a fancy-schmancy vegetarian place in downtown Spokane.
We went back to the hotel and napped.
We woke up and went to the show.
The promoters did a swell job ensuring there would be people there. Plus it was one of those coffeehouses that has BOOZE so some people were feeling very festive. We got a very enthusiastic crowd response, especially for "In LIght of Your Less Complicated Life," in which I fooled some poor soul into thinking I was some sort of piano virtuoso. (his words). I do hit some right notes sometimes...
The "Talk Away" sing-along was the best ever, as I do believe the Incredible Hulk was somewhere in the chorus.
After the show, Isamu took us to an all night diner where we got a couple amazing bloody marys and a pesto grilled cheese sandwich.
A perfect ending to a lovely, surreal day.
PK
