Dentist Canadian Tour Log II

Dentist and a coupla bears.

Part the Second

by Justin Bornemann

It was finally time to play our first show after three days of preparing and hanging out in Vancouver. The venue was called The Cobalt; and we were set to open the show, which, if you're familiar with being in a band, is not usually something that you want. There is always the danger of playing to an empty room, because people don't usually arrive exactly at 9. That wouldn't be cool! In this case, however, the prospect of playing to an empty room had its appeal. During sound check I remember being so nervous that I could barely play my guitar. Despite the fact that we had gotten things together in rehearsal, it seemed like we were totally unprepared to do this. Emily was playing bass (an instrument she doesn't play); we were playing as a three piece (we are usually four); and we were playing with a drummer we'd never played with before (no explanation needed). I think I probably played guitar as badly as I'm capable of, without doing it on purpose, during that sound check.
 
After we finished, we had about an hour to wait around and wonder if people would show up. I was torn between the strong desire to play to an empty room, and the desire for this tour to have a purpose, and we'd probably need to play in front of an audience from time to time for that to happen. I also didn't know if we'd have the opening slot for every show at that point. Would it be a whole tour of playing in front of only the other bands? Would they even bother watching, or would they go out front to smoke instead? Ten minutes before we went on, people finally started to drift in. When we stepped onstage, there were probably around twenty-five people. Definitely a respectable audience (I've played in front of fewer), but it was a big room; and the people were scattered; so it was going to feel like playing to an empty room.

A band feeds off the audience. I find that when the crowd is engaged, and they look like they are enjoying themselves, it's much easier to play well and to get lost in the moment.  However, when it seems like no one cares, I tend to overthink everything, and I'm more likely to play badly.

Mitch, the drummer from Windigo and also our drummer for this tour, counted us into our first song. At first there was no one up front; but, around a minute into it, Windigo and the other band, Illicuda, came up to the front of the stage. This behavior made it ok for other people in the bar to come towards the front of the room; and, by the end of the second song, it felt like we were playing to people. This relaxed us, and the sound guy had done a decent job too; so it felt full for a three piece.

I'm pretty sure it was far from the best we've sounded, but it was good enough. We sold a couple records, and it reinforced the idea that it was possible to make this a successful tour. Of course, the other bands were way tighter than we were since they weren't thrown together a few days before. That may have hurt our confidence a little; but, overall, we left the show feeling good.

"Uh... ...We have merch."

The next show was in a much smaller town, and the place we were playing was called The Dirty Jersey (What are the odds?). When we got there, it was clear that this place was an old man bar at least some of the time. We also arrived pretty early, so we experienced it as such for a long time. It filled out very nicely, however; and, even though it initially didn't seem like a good place for a show, they were probably the only game in town.

I remember the show as being very positive. There was a full room to play to. The other bands were good. People bought merch, and I believe we drank for free that night. That was two successful shows under our belt. Maybe every show would be good?

Our third show was definitely interesting. The town was called Kelowna, and I was told it was a college town. When we pulled up to the venue, there were about ten people who were clearly on drugs milling in front. We thought it best to park somewhere else until it was time to load in. When we went into the venue, we were told that the local band that was supposed to play canceled; and, at the last minute, a band called My Dudes was found.

Picture being at a college party with around 15 people. Maybe it's the beginning of the night or the end, and the three members of the frat who also play instruments decide to wow everyone with their extensive knowledge of riffs. This was how things started off.

My dude, Justin, repping CDM up north along with drummer, Mitch.

We sat there and couldn't tell if the show had started or if the band were too young to realize that it's not typical to be onstage before you play and run through every riff that you know. It turns out that that part wasn't the show, but it was a warm up of what was to come, because they were a cover band. Fifteen or so college kids were extremely stoked to see them play a standard top 40 bar band set. Those 15 or so people were also totally down to leave right after My Dudes played.
 
What was fun about the show was that Windigo just rolled with it and used the show as an excuse to have fun and be goofy while they played. I think the experience helped us to bond more. We all consumed a fair amount of beer that night, which was free as well; and I think the venue still paid us. It wasn't a total loss, and it helped us get towards our destination. After the first three shows, it was time to go to Calgary, Windigo's hometown. There were many more shows to come, but it was time for a few days off and more time to practice with our new drummer.  

Dentist Canadian Tour Log

Dentist and Windigo

Part the First

by Justin Bornemann

We knew we were going to Canada to play Canadian Music Week, but we initially thought that we would do a weeklong tour at most. Unexpectedly, a band from Canada called Windigo -- who are awesome, by the way -- asked us to join them on a month long tour from Vancouver to Toronto. Dentist had never done a month long tour; and there were many obstacles to overcome, like getting off work for a month, and not having a drummer and bass player who could do it, but we decided not to let those minor details stop us. Besides, booking a tour really sucks, and hopping onto one that was already booked was a very agreeable prospect.

On March 21st, we flew into Vancouver with our luggage, a few pedals, some merch, a bass, and a guitar. Despite the fact that Emily didn't play bass, aside from doing a Pixies cover set on Halloween one year, she rose to the challenge of being our low end. We sold my Fender Jazz Bass (I have two) to get a Fender Mustang that would suit her better.

We decided to take another risk and ask Windigo's drummer, Mitch, to play drums for us despite never having played with him before. Windigo sounded really good on recording, so we figured, why not? What's the worst that could happen besides his not bothering to learn any of the songs? We arranged our schedule so that we had two days in Vancouver to organize and rehearse before the start of our tour. On a side note, I should mention that we were in the process of moving the week before our tour; and it was probably one of the most stressful weeks ever with all we had to get done, organize, and lift.

Things got off to a rocky start when we overslept for our flight. After realizing we weren't going to make the train in time to get to Newark airport, we started to drive in that direction to possibly catch a different train. As we were driving, Emily asked to see the flight info; and she noticed that the flight was actually leaving from LaGuardia Airport not Newark. My bad.

It seemed we had no choice but to drive there. With not enough time to figure out anything, we ended up parking in a lot that was 60 dollars a day and only meant for temporary parking because it was the first lot we saw. Calculating how much this would cost us was very stressful to put it mildly, but we didn't want to miss our flight and it would have to be figured out later. I left the parking lot ticket in the glove compartment as I started thinking about who would be able and willing to pick up the car for us, and we rushed to make our flight just in time.    

The flight was long, had a layover, and we flew with the lovely people of United, who really know how to treat their passengers. Upon arrival, we found that they had thrown our merch case, as opposed to maybe placing it as they were loading it, and they smashed the shit out of it. We gathered our things and made our way toward our rental car, a Mazda 5, and headed toward our Airbnb. While we drove, we noticed that Vancouver is a beautiful city with great mountain views and a Seattle-type climate. One of the highlights about the west coast is looking at the mountains as you drive, but I'll discuss more later on.

Traffic light with mountains

Are you ready for out first culture shock? Upon arrival to our Airbnb, we were told to take off our shoes before entering! This place was not what I would call nice. Don't get me wrong it was fine, and it was only 40 dollars a night or something; but this was a very surprising request to us. Our initial reaction was, “Wow, really?  You think your house is so fucking fancy?” But, it turns out, our host was nice and that Americans are just slobs that never take their shoes off when they go to someone's house; while it's pretty much universally done in Canada. Someone later asked us when I told them that we don't usually take off our shoes in the States, “Do you guys just mop all the time or something?”  Fair enough.

Seattle-type climate

After dinner and a night's rest, we first had to figure out what to do about the car. I contacted my friend Santo to see if he could be persuaded to pick it up for me. We went to the post office and overnighted him the key, but this mistake would set us back 300 bucks when all was said and done. Better than leaving it there and a lesson learned. From now on, just pay for a ride to the airport.

After taking care of the car, we were ready to rehearse with Mitch, the drummer from Windigo. This tour, like any tour I'd imagine, was a series of ups and downs. It's one of the most fun things to do in my opinion, but you never know what to expect; and we left a lot of possibilities open for things to go wrong. I've laid out a lot of bad stuff already, but our first "victory" took place when we discovered that Mitch is an awesome drummer who put some serious effort into learning our songs. Emily did a great job playing the bass, and I did my best to fill up any empty space since we are usually a four piece. For better or worse, we had a band that sounded good and was ready to go across Canada.