Jeremiah Edmond
Manchester Orchestra
Kansas City»Chicago

March 22, 2008 at 2:44 am

Kansas city was fun, but I can't seem to remember too much about it. Jake from C&C drums was there, so I got to hang out with him a bit. We had another 8 hour drive today, so we had to wake up at 6:30 AM. I can't remember being more miserable waking up in recent history. I went straight for the back of the van and slept a couple of hours while Chris and Robert took the first driving shift. I was happy to wake up at a QT gas station. Frozen rooster booster, hot dog, taquito and BBQ chips for lunch. It was nice and warm about an hour outside of Chicago, but by the time we got to the venue, it was snowing. We played the House Of Blues tonight. Other than the 8 flights of stairs, I really like playing there. They had catering today which was a nice change from the usual fast food. Fried chicken, green beans, mashed potatoes and macaroni and cheese. The show was decent, but nothing special. Brett and Matt from Anathallo came and hung out for a while. It was really great seeing them. They are about to leave for a tour with Aloha. Go see them if they come close to you. They are amazing. After the show, we all went next door to 10 pins bowling alley and bowled a couple games. Turns out Biffy Clyro are amazing bowlers. I ended up bowling 100 and Jeff from Say Anything came back at the end with about 5 frames of strikes or spares including a spare and a strike in the last frame. We then both started the next game with strikes. It was all downhill after that. We are now in the van, heading a few minutes out of the city to get a cheaper hotel. Tomorrow we drive to Detroit and play at St. Andrews. Hopefully Papa Smurf will be there.

Jonathan Corley
Manchester Orchestra
Detroit

March 22, 2008

PAPA SMURF hasn't even shown up here yet, so we must be early. I'm in Detroit again, but this time we're playing upstairs at Saint Andrew's (with Say Anything). We've been to Detroit six times in the last year and a crazy old man who goes by "Papa Smurf" is always here waiting to greet us with big gray beard and Orlando Magic hat. I doubt Papa Smurf is actually homeless, but he certainly runs the homeless scene around here. Detroit knows him and everyone seems to respect him. It's a scary city, but if you tip Papa your van and trailer will be safe in the Parking Lot. Last time we were in town, Papa was all excited about a new myspace profile that someone was setting up for him. There may be T-Shirts coming soon with his face on them. I typed in the web address that he gave me ("www.papasmurf.com - myspace@aol.com") and for some reason I couldn't load the page. Maybe Papa is having Server issues... When we pulled into Chicago yesterday, it started snowing. This tour has been a lot colder than I anticipated, and I really just want warm weather again. Despite the cold, time has been going by so fast. Our good friends in Say Anything are great live, and each night I've been consistently blown away by [Weatherbox] (San Diego, CA) and [Biffy Clyro] (Glasgow, UK). At last night's Chicago show I wore a Harry Caray mask during the set(obviously). Maybe next time I'm in town we'll cover "Take Me Out to the Ball Game." That will probably never happen. We have a day off for Easter tomorrow. On Easter last year, we were on our way from Arizona to Texas. We stopped at an Arcade/Batting Cage/Lazer-Tag Emporium. I'm not sure where we'll end up on our day of tomorrow. I'd like to find a church service tomorrow morning, but it would be close to impossible to do that on the road. Maybe we'll get hit by 65 MPH fastballs again. »http://www.youtube.com/watch?v3DYv03Be4iayg
»http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3073/2358525141_803c6fdaa9.jpg?v3D0
»http://youtube.com/watch?v3DZ8ZsXDA-P4s

Jeremiah Edmond
Manchester Orchestra
Detroit»Easter»Pittsburgh»Philadelphia

March 26, 2008 at 2:30am

It is 3 AM and I am struggling to stay awake with Joe on the drive from Pittsburgh to Philadelphia, so I figured now is a good time to blog. We had two days off after Detroit. Easter and the day after. We checked into a hotel a little ways outside of Detroit. It advertised an indoor water park, but really just had one water slide and there were too many little kids to enjoy even just the pool. We ate a large Easter lunch at Ruby Tuesday's and spent the rest of the two days off just relaxing at the hotel and enjoying the first good reliable and speedy internet of the whole tour. I was finally able to finish updating the Gnome Records http://www.myspace.com/gnomerecords myspace as well as the Favorite Gentlemen myspace. It felt good to finally get some work done. I finally watched the latest episode of LOST in the van today. I have no idea who I think is good or bad or right or wrong anymore. I can't believe we have to wait so long for a new episode. Tonight's show was at a surprisingly small venue. It worked out well though and the crowd was nice and close and packed in. The stage was awkwardly tall though. A few of us went next door and got some good sushi and sake before hand. I can never remember which kind has rice and which is just fish and ended up with just fish. It was still really good though. The amount of people that knew who we were in Pittsburgh was surprising considering we had never played there. Thanks to all of you that cared to see us and bought merch or just said hey. It meant a lot to us! Philadelphia should be fun. We hear there are some great restaurants near the venue and we have some friends that we haven't seen in a while coming to the show. Our manager and label owner and booking agent will all be there as well so it will be nice. Am trying to think of more stuff to write so I will stay awake but I am drawing blanks. I guess I will have to find another way to stay awake.

Jeremiah Edmond
Manchester Orchestra
Philadelphia»New Haven»Worcester

March 28, 2008 at 5:37pm

Philadelphia was filled with friends and food. We got to hang out with our good friend and sometimes merch guy/TM Mike Almquist. Our manager, label owner and booking agent all came out as well. You can actually read a little bit about our agent Andrew Ellis in the latest AP I believe. We had some tasty cheesesteaks before hand and some pretty good pizza after the show. Robert and J bought some screen printing and stenciling supplies at a local art supply store and made a couple shirts. I think the three of us are going to try our hand at screen printing when we get back home. Toad's Place in New Haven was pretty cool. The crowd was great other than the crowd surfing. There was no barrier and the stage was really shallow so it was difficult for the security to get on stage and catch the crowd surfers. Everyone at the venue was awesome. Today we stopped at Cracker Barrel for lunch. I don't know why we don't go there more often. It felt like being home in the south for a minute. Robert is a genius according to their little game at the table. J had to ask the waitress how to beat it. We are now in Worcester at the venue all on our computers. The place is pretty huge. The stage is nice and roomy. Hopefully the sound is good. It should be a good night.