DAY 1    01.26.03

Today is SuperBowl Sunday and like last year at this time, I've got Italy on my mind. Last SuperBowl, the first post-Sept 11 SuperBowl, may have been the SuperBowl with the most gaudy displays of American flags, fireworks, and popstars I have ever seen (that display by Bono left me with my mouth open trying to ask 'what has happened to us?'). Or at least seen since the previous year's spectacle, which was replete with Britney Spears and Aerosmith. Granted, most of what I saw was the halftime show and actually would have enjoyed watching a bit of the game. What the hell, the hometown team was in the game, and I think that since it was 2 AM there on the Italian-Slovenian border, having just played a show, and then having had a bit of the strange liqueur offered up by the host of the little soiree we were attending, the novelty of watching American football seemed enticing. Who knows why? But alas, it would not come to be that I could watch the SuperBowl in the middle of the night in Italy, as we left the party for our TV-less hotel rooms.

I've got no strong desire to see the game this year since I've nothing invested in either team. Nor do I fail to see the weird sports-as-war-metaphor things especially when there is a "No-Fly Zone" like the one imposed on Iraq around the stadium and the navy is actually moving their aircraft carriers to a spot in San Diego harbor that supposedly has better TV reception. I kid you not. Wait, those things have 'smart bombs' and radar and all kinds of technology and they still have to move for better TV reception? And yet, I can't help but wonder if the people in the sports media realize that the outcome of this year's match may have been predicted some 15 years ago by none other than Theo Huxtable. You may remember that he placed a sizable sum of money on the then terrible Tampa Bay Bucaneers to beat the very good Oakland Raiders. His prognostication was based on the emblems that the teams donned on their helmets, Tampa Bay having a more impressive one according to young Theo. This surely meant victory for underdogs Tampa. If I had to pick a winner on uniforms alone, I would pick Oakland, hands down. Tampa Bay has changed their look in the last 10 years or so and they look cheesy, if you ask me (though the new look may account for Tampa's recent winning record. Who knows?). Oakland has stayed with the classic silver and black scheme which has brought them years of success.

Instead of football, I watched a little RAI on cable this afternoon to get the sound of Italian in my ears. RAI is a big television network in Italy that must have an international station or something. I watched soccer highlights for about half an hour. The big news was (at least, I think it was the news. I don't speak Italian, really) that the president of Juventus, the most famous soccer team in Italy, died recently. They were showing the ceremony in which they placed a Juventus jersey on the deceased's now permanently empty box seat at the home stadium; an Italian take on pouring out some of your 40 oz. malt liquor beverage on the front lawn for your fallen homeboys.

I'm excited for this tour as usual. The audiences in Italy (and in Spain, where we'll do a few shows as well) are plentiful and gracious, the food is fantastic usually, and the drives are short. At least you'd think they would be short. Somehow, the drives in this small country take what seem like endless hours and that's not for any lack of fast driving, I assure you. (Think Ferrari, Lamborghini, Mario Andretti etc) I don't know why, but the drives are long and hard and it will be so again, no doubt. Thankfully, there is Autogrill. Cappucinos at every rest stop, need I say more? Yes. One word. Pocketcoffee. (click on 'Prodotti', then 'Praline')I don't think I could handle the hours with out my little helper. The sandwiches are good too. Il Rustico is good....Prosciutto...Capri....mmmm.

One of the countless drawbacks to spending 8 hours a day on the road for a month is that you rarely get to see much of the countries you visit. On the other hand, you get to meet people in way that the tourist usually does not. For one thing, if you're performing, the natives of the country will pay close attention to you, unlike the casual disregard given the tourist. Plus, the Italians have a way of adoring you, and it's nice to feel adored even if it is for only two hours or so a night. Though not having any time but to drive and play the show, one does over time, become familliar with the country that's in close proximity to the highways and the rock clubs. You become really familliar with certain aspects of a country's land or culture but remain completely ignorant of other aspects, having in essence, not spent anytime there doing anything but a few specific things: driving and playing music. That's half good, I guess. So I can tell you a bit about a rock club but can tell you less about why the kids there hate Berlusconi, for example. Often, exposure to current events and the general goings on of a country just come from TV late at night in a hotel room. And as it is with America or anywhere, TV won't really give you a feel for what's a place is all about. Though, TV certainly lets you know that European music videos are pretty hilarious.

Anyway, I guess I'd better start getting packed. I'm traveling relatively light this year. No 75 lbs drum case filled with a bass drum, smaller drum inside the bass drum, socks, and miscellanea, and no fretting about my drums being left on an airport tarmac somewhere or the fact that I need to check at least 3 over sized bags. Well, I guess I could worry about losing what I am checking: cymbals, one drum, clothes.....

DAY 2

I arrived in Bologna at around 10AM Central European Time with jet lag setting in quicker than it had in other trans-atlantic trips. My internal clock read 4AM Eastern Time which normally isn't a serious problem for me, but the previous night in Boston was a late one and this may have contributed to the early onset of a weighty fatigue. The flight itself was a smooth one and the lay- over in Frankfurt a short one. I sat and watched our idiot man-child president deliver the state of the union address in dubbed German and spotted what can only be the African American basketball player playing in a European league on his way to a game. 6' 7" inch black guys in contemporary American fashions really stand out in a German airport. Trust me on this one, I'm not just saying a tall black guy has to be a baller.

Anyway, I had a short layover and then another flight on Lufthansa to Italy. I booked my flight on Lufthansa because I imagined that this airline would be operating at the highest level of German efficiency with strict time schedules, skilled pilots and tall, gorgeous stewardesses who goose step down the aisles offering expertly engineered airline food.

I was picked up at the airport by Greet Vyvey, of Belgium. Her first name is pronounced as if the G was some other non-existent letter that comes between G and H. Its like a combination of both, as it's Dutch and the language of Flanders, north Belgium, you see. She's our tour manger, booking agent, sound engineer, equipment supplier, number cruncher, and ass kicker of wack promoters who don't make good on their deals. She is the perfect person for all those jobs and handles them all with a manic competence that leaves you wondering just how on earth she can do it. For instance, when she freaks out about losing her keys and they're on the rope around her neck, I wonder how she keeps track of every reciept, evey last Euro, and does evey mathmatical computation necessary for a tour, sometimes in her head. She does it all and eventually finds those keys. Greet is the fourth member of Karate (Eamonn Vitt still haunts our vans, so I guess they share that distinction) . She has our total trust to make all business and logistical decisions when in Europe. Honey gets the props.

She took me to our friend Tiziano's place an hour or so north of Bologna via winding country roads across the flat expanses of the Emilia-Romagna region of north-east Italy. Tiziano is a good friend of Karate and has been doing shows for us or acting on our behalf since we first toured in Italy in '98. We crash at his place, drink his wine, and enjoy the food cooked by his mother, who lives down the street. We eat pumpkin tortellini and other goodies. Let me tell you that the taste is not just good, its...mystical. Its good to see Titziano. He seems well, still strokes his beard and gestures with his hands more than any human I've ever met. Another old friend, Giovanna comes to lunch. She and 'Tizio' used to be an item, but they are just on the platonic tip these days. Its good to see that it's working out. We'll undoubtedly see a lot of friends again this year who we see each year when we come to their respective cities, towns, or villages. Its the same in the US, too. Tour means seeing 'tour friends', and there are a lot of them, thanks to nearly 10 years of touring a number of months out of every year. Seeing these folks is a lot of the allure of tour for me but its a bit strange because you always seem to be 'catching up' with them rather than moving through life with them. You drive and you drive, get off the road to see a friend, get back in the van and drive for 9 months or a year until you find yourself on their street and with them again. Its sometimes easy to tell whose been doing well and whose struggling; you can hear it in their speech, see it in their eyes, notice weight fluctuations, or notice how many cigarettes they're smoking or how much booze they're putting back. Or sometimes, these friends just disappear. You hear they've moved and you never see them again. I wonder to what extent our friends see the changes in Karate. Do they say to themselves, 'Karate seems even more burned out than last year' or 'Gee whiz, Gavin sure looks great this year' or 'Karate is here. Again. And they keep bugging me about using my internet connection'

DAY 3

After a struggling through a fitfull night of sleep thanks to jet lag, I wake up and get ready to head another hour or so north to Ferrara, where Jeff Goddard and I will meet Geoff Farina, who's been here in Italy for a few months already. There, we'd practice at the studio Natural Head Quarter, which is run by Manuele Fusaroli, who was instrumental in recording and mixing our new live record that Titziano put out on his label, Fooltribe. Practice was long and tiring. Karate hadn't played in two months and this practice was to simply play all the songs we currently know so that we can dust of the cob webs and get them ready to present. These kind of practices are simply for jogging the memory; shocking the muscles into remembering how to play the songs that you learned once before. Its like a musical defibrillator. Clear!! No response. Clear!! Ok, we've got a pulse and I hear Sever and There Are Ghosts.

Also on this day, we meet Ivan. He's from Pordenone and has graciously accepted the task of merchandiser ('merch-guy') for a few shows as a substitute for our friend Bernie, who was scheduled to be here from the beginning until realizing he needed to be in his home country of Belgium on the 3rd of February to collect one of the freely distributed unemployment checks that Belgium seems to give to anyone who asks. We'll meet Bernie in Spain.

DAY 4

I woke up today feeling as if I'd been beaten in my sleep. It's like someone came along with a pillow case full of unopened 12oz cans of Coke and beat me in my sleep--a la the movie Bad Boys. I feel its possible. I suspect Farina, as I know he's a big fan of the movie and its methods of violence. I feel like I slept for 10 minutes. On the drive down to Perugia for our first show, in addition to being tired, my stomach is complaining about the European style breakfast that I had. Unlike Americans, Europeans seem to be able to subsist on a breakfast of one croissant and a strong espresso. Italians seem to like a very sweet pastry in the morning. My american appetite does not simply want to break my fast, but to shatter it into little satiated pieces, preferably using a blunt proteinaceous instrument for the total annihilation of hunger. On the first day of driving, I'm tired and hungry. This is gonna be a long tour if this keeps up. I'm sure my stomach will adjust though. Ah hah! I see an Autogrill on the horizon.

Another preoccupation on the drive down was the impending tour itself. How will the shows be? How will Karate sound? Will people like us like they did last year? Did they like us last year? Will it seem like an adventure or something shockingly new like the tours of years ago? This last question is the one I think about most. I want it to be exciting, and for it to feel like anything but tedium. Sure, there will be much tedium in the discussions about merchandise pricing, shipping, drive times, VAT costs, equipment failures, lousy directions.....But I'm talking about are the dizzying highs, not the terrifiying lows; the beautiful landscapes, the intersting venues, the interesting people. I don't want to feel the dreaded 'routine' of home life. I want mystery! Intrigue! A nightly catharsis each night on stage! Einstein said: "The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and science". Word up!

The show goes really well for a first show. We went on at about midnight for about 200 rowdy yet attentive attendees. Somewhere in the middle of our set, as I realised that we were sounding pretty tight for not having played much recently and feeling the flood of endorphins that accompanies the experience of a show going well, and hearing the crowd respond in a way that, to me, confirmed it, I realize that this is routine for Karate. This is a beautiful routine: playing music for an audience, seeing foreign countries, meeting people. Christ, what the hell could possibly be mundane about that? Our routine is great. Had we become familliar with a routine that included lousy show after lousy show, personality conflicts, and auto accidents for example, (uh, wait, it has included auto accidents) Karate wouldn't even be a band and I wouldn't even have the opportunity to write this drivel. So we're playing the show and I'm feeling blessed. I don't want to be anywhere else. I feel emabarrased that I even felt just a little bored or apprehensive in the van today.

After the show, I hang around and talk to people at the merch table. Its mainly just me saying 'grazie' over and over to people for their graciousness. Its nice to be told 'you are great' even when you're just like 'yeah, wait till you get to know me, buddy, then see how you feel' (Speaking of unwarranted idolatry, as we ate our evening meal in the restaraunt adjacent to the club, surrounded by many of the same people you would be at the show later, a young woman approached me with the CD of her friends band (which turned out to be pretty good). She wanted to present it to me but first asked if she 'was permitted to speak with me' HA!! Of course, language was an issue and I was eating dinner so it really just sounded funny and was an (almost) reasonable question) And as I hovered around the merch table, I saw Greet approaching me with a look in her eyes and in the muscles of her face that I instantly recognized but had forgotten about since I last saw her. Its a look that, in the simultaneity of the memory of it and the implications of it, I found heartwarming and annoying at the same time. It was heartwarming because it was a familliar nonverbal communique from a friend whom I 'd not seen in many months. It was annoying because its a look that says that 'the time has come to cease socializing and get back to work. Put down that glass of wine! Get back up on stage and start packing up equipment!'

So the night concludes and I'm like 'damn, I'll take this routine every day of the week' Oh, and I should mention that I've not seen a greater concentration of beauriful women in one place at one time. Even Ivan, and Italian whom you'd think would be used to seeing many Italian girls congregating at a rock show, is also stunned by this 1:1 ratio. For every one beautiful person, there is only another beautiful. A trivial detail perhaps, but I have to report the events as I see them, right? And finally, a question that Greet, Geoff, and I ask ourselves at the end of many a night: 'Where's Goddard?' The answer is usually one of a few possibilities: 1. He's in deep conversation with someone he's just met. They've revealed their respective lives histories, hopes and dreams in around 30-45 minutes. 2. He's not feeling well and is in the bathroom or 3, which happens to be tonights correct answer, (which he himself answered best when asked to explain his extended absence) he's 'at the bar with the boys'.

DAY 5

Our second show is in Bologna. Tons of people show up and are very attentive, particularly during our quieter songs, which makes playing those songs much more enjoyable because I'd like to hear the music I'm trying to play and not raucous barroom banter. The show goes really well until the last part of our last song in the encore to our set. The song is called This Day Next Year and there is bridge that separates the bulk of the song-the verses, the guitar solos, lyrics-from the instrumental section that crecendos to the very end. When we get to the instrumental bridge, Farina simply forgets how to play it and just stops. I say to him, in complete shock, 'no, no, man, find it! find it! move the hands...' But that's it. He can't remember it and there will be no denouement in this concert. I'm totally shocked and angry for a few minutes after the show but manage to tell myself that it's cool. And it is. It happens to everyone. Its water under the bridge and there will be other shows. Farina explains that rather than fumble around trying to find the chords and risk making a tough situation worse, this is the way to bow out gracefully. I can dig that.

Someone told me that space shuttle has blown up. I get a little bummed out. It's one of those tragedies that is distinctly American, like a school shooting but less common. I have memories as an 8 year old watching this now destroyed shuttle land after its first flight. 1981, I think. I have distinct memories of the moment I was told that the space shuttle blew up the first time in 1986. I feel bad for these astronauts who are usaully these super smart physicists or scientists or test pilots whose only goal in life was to be an astronaut, some of whom apply for the job over and over until they are accepted. So here I am, at another space shuttle related milemarker. This time I'm in Italy and chances are, I'll have to get the information about the tragedy little by little, or until I find an English language newspaper. Plus its weird, because whenever something crashes or explodes in America these days, you can't help but ask, 'Terrorists?' For some reason, I feel glad to have been in the US on Sept 11. Being home gives you the chance to be with your friends and together ask 'what the hell has happened....'? In Italy, I'll only be able to wonder what everyone is saying at home; my friends, the talking heads on TV, the newspapers......

As I'm looking for a bottle of water during our loading-out process that evening, I'm struck by the seemingly more frequent need for water on tour. We all seem to be thirsty all the time on tour and thus water becomes a commodity whose value goes up when on the road. It must be that a day of driving in a van heated with dry air and then an evening in a smoky bar perpetuates thirst quite well. We're always hoarding bottles of water in our courier bags, our single strapped backpacks that store all our belongings that need to be on us at all times-books, pens, an article of clothing or two, passports and WATER. In the van, bottled water is stored in both the front and back seats, and someone is always looking for some. 'You guys got any water up there?' If I'm at show or have left my hotel room early in the morning for the van, or wait to meet the others at the van before hitting the road, there are certain locations in the van that bottles of water are stored. These oases in the body of the automobile are like the favored watering holes of ancient bi-peds as they wandered their part of the savannah looking for food, water, and shelter. It's as if the tour has helped us devolve. We've become simple primates who wander the urban expanses of 21st century earth, our needs going little further than food, water, and shelter. And of course, a venue with good acoustics and a new skin on my snare drum.

DAY 6

This morning, I slept until 2pm because we didn't get in until 4:30 am last night. I woke up, again at Tiziano's place, this time to find that breakfast/lunch was about to be put on the table. A meal cooked by his mother that was amazing not only because it was delicious, but because it appeared to be plain sauceless spaghetti. Somehow, using ingredients and sauces unbeknownst to me, (or magic, for all I know) there is a flavor explosion. The taste is a lot of stimulus for the brain first thing in the morning. Plus, Lambrusco, a light sparkling red wine is served. I don't usually include wine in my breakfast, but when in the village of San Martino Spino, do as they do.

The evenings show in Ferrara is good, though not a lot of people show up on this Sunday evening. We play with a good band from Sicily called Jasmine Shock. After the show, which ends relatively early, around midnight, I pack up my gear quickly. Since we will be staying at Tiziano's place once again, this night with the other band, I'm anticipating a little bit of socializing when we get back to the house. And indeed, that's what we do. It goes until 6 am, or until we'd had all the wine and laughter we could handle. We're drinking the wine made by a friend of Tiziano's (of which is in no short supply around the table) and just generally hamming it up about whatever. At one point in the evening, Tiziano is in animated discussion with one of the guys from the other band. I just sit and listen to the sound of Italian bouncing off my eardrums. Tiziano puts on a display of language that I've never heard in my life. Its as though he's saying one sentence that goes on for fifteen minutes. I'm telling you, it was the fastest, most verbose thing I have ever heard. There were no breaks! I don't think he even inhaled for fifteen minutes as all his air seemed to be exhaled, used to produce sound. I just sat there and marveled, trying not to smile too wide. I didn't want to seem like I was laughing at him......which I was sort of, I guess, but....you know what I'm getting at. It wasn't 'funny' it was just.....amazing. I mean, how many ideas must have been expressed? Yeah, and come to think of it, I really wonder what subject evoked such a display. God, and the gesturing! Beautiful. Che bello raggazo!

Day 7

Today there is no show. We spend night and day driving from Tiziano's place to Castellon, Spain. At the start, we drop Ivan off at the train station in Ferrara so he can catch a train north to Pordenone. It will be just the four of us until tomorrow, when we pick up Bernie at the Barcelona airport, our merchandiser for the remainder and bulk of the tour. Geoff was the only person who knew Ivan before he volunteered for the 'merch-guy' role. I trusted Geoff's suggestion of a month before that Ivan would be a great merch guy to fill in for Bernie's early absence, and I had reservations only because I'd never even met him But Geoff was right, of course, and it was a real pleasure to travel with him. Plus, that man can sell a CD!

DAY 8

Last night, after a long day of driving, we began the oft practiced ritual of pulling off the highway in the middle of the night, in the middle of nowhere, and searching for a hotel that has 1. vacancies 2. is cheap, but 3, is not a rat infested roach motel. This little episode always kind of sucks, and not only because we're tired and cranky but because it usually takes an hour of getting lost to find one. Last night, thankfully, it didn't take more than a few minutes to spy a vacancy sign from the road. The hotel turned out to be both cheap and relatively clean. That did little to change my status of tired and cranky, however.

The French, and maybe the rest of Europe I'm not sure, have taken the roadside motel and made it cheaper. That is, built it cheaper. From the outside, these motels look like the short, squat and strong concrete structures that are any Motel 6 or Econolodge-type motels back in the States. But when you enter the hallways of these European representations, you discover that much of the building is made out of plastic or other synthetic materials--little concrete it seems, and no wood. In the rooms, the bathrooms are like glorified portable toilets (Port-a -Johns, Port-a-Pots, Johnny-on-the-spot, Handy-house) with showers. The mattresses are thin. Last night, the only available rooms had only one mattress each, so two of us had to get various bedding stored in the van and build makeshift beds. What decided who slept in the real beds or the makeshift ones, were two 5 round, bare knuckled boxing matches in the parking lot. I beat Goddard on a TKO and Greet knocked out Farina early.

This mornings breakfast after a restless night in this plastic French motel was a groggy one, yet not one that wasn't tasty. They at least had some good croissants. France, don't you forget. And coffee. But the plastic-y, cold, cramped lobby, the lack of deep sleep, and the knowledge that tonight's show would come only after a penance paid by at least eight hours behind the wheel, made breakfast a little depressing. This scene has been run before. How many times? I can't remember and I really don't need to. Some French Pop pipes in from the ceiling. La Mix 92.3 FM? Who knows. The DJ comes on and I try to cull a weather report from the otherwise unrecognizable stream of French. Its going to rain.

The scenery starts to change as we come down the Pyrenees, into Spain. The sun comes out from behind the clouds that had covered southern France and the land turns toward brown, away from green and gray. Our destination is the Barcelona airport for a rendezvous with Bernie van Hecke, sergeant first class, special merch operations. We schedule to meet at 02:00. No later, because the drive is at least 4 hours further south to Castellon, Spain. Our window of time for this operation is a narrow one; little room for error. But after only two and a half trips around the various terminals at Barcelona's airport, we find Bernie and get back on the highway heading south. We need merch! Up front! NOW!

It's good to have Bernie From Belgium with us again. He's an experienced salesman and carries with him a reverence for the tradition of excellence that Karate roadies have adhered to over the years. A bit on the lanky side, Bernie's a tall 26 year old from Leuven, Belgium and also carries with him one or more movie cameras. That's just how he works. A student and connoisseur of the camera and the images that pass before the lens, he's usually thinking about 'the visuals, man', and always on the lookout for beautiful scenery or an interesting human face to capture on celluloid. He's got good eyes, and apparently good ears too, because he speaks Dutch, English, French, Spanish, and German. Fluently. Currently, behind closed doors, Bernie is working on editing hours of live Karate footage and various scenes from the road that he's filmed over the past couple of years.

Today the road is flat and straight which makes for good driving. When the road features long steady inclines, the van has to be eased up these hills in fourth, sometimes third gear. Rocking back and forth in the drivers seat, pushing on the steering wheel doesn't seem to speed up the van unfortunately. I've tried that. On the left is the Mediterranean Sea and on the right are big patches of land used for agriculture. The only recognizable crop is oranges. Behind these farms are towns that consist of a few brownish buildings with classic red, concave spanish roofing tile (I'm sure there's a name for these, but I don't know it) and small cathedrals at their centers. Behind the towns is a mountain range.

The show in Castellon is well attended but is a difficult one to perform. The bar is very small as is the stage. The stage itself, that is, the part if the flooring that is raised from the rest of the floor, is only large enough for the drums. Geoff is stuffed into a corner of the room, sandwiched in the little hall between the stage and the backstage room. He's right on top of his gear and consequently, will deafen himself if he turns up his amp too loud. The quieter than normal guitar sound made the bass sound louder than normal to me, but Geoff still couldn't hear it due to his precarious position in the room, and quite possibly could only hear himself because he was forced to play in a tiny, isolated spot. Basically, no one could hear anything clearly and we 'trainwrecked' in the song In Hundreds. We had to give up and start another song. Karate has these problems that cause premature endings of a song about 1 out of about every 50 gigs. I guess that's not bad. Is it? Its only rock n roll.

Before the show, I was quite hungry. We didn't have much time to stop and eat on the road so when we showed up at the club I dined on wine and tortilla chips that the nice folks had put out for us. By the end of the show, I was starving and tipsy from the wine and was eager to go out to eat. By around 11 PM (the show had been an early one), we found ourselves at one of Castellon's fine Chinese restaurants. The waiters there spoke Spanish with heavy Asian accents and asked us if we spoke Spanish like so many other Americans. Muy poco. After leaving the restaurant, (we were the evenings last customers) we went to stay at the promoters house. It was a clear, almost warm night. The air was incredibly fresh and almost completely still but for a light breeze that blew through a nearby palm tree causing the palms to slap against themselves, turning the tree into a living percussion instrument. That, and a distant dog barking were the only sounds as I pulled my bags from the van. I stared up into the sky for a bit before going inside to sleep.

DAY 9

Today was another day off. Another day spent driving; our destination Porto, Portugal. Today's drive was different than other long distance drives in Europe. Not different in the sense that it wasn't long, tiring, or at its core, mind numbingly boring, but because of the scenery and the sense that Spain is largely unpopulated. Unlike driving through Germany or other parts of northern Europe, where people and concrete are stacked nearly on top of each other, Spain has kilometer after kilometer of open space. We drove south for a half hour or so to Valencia, then headed west, up from the sea onto a plateau of rolling, greenish-brown hills. The day was crystal clear, and as the sun sank on our left, it cast different colors and shadows on the land and lit up the the small cumulus clouds that occasionally punctuated the sky orange and pink.

We hit the sprawling Madrid by nightfall, its throbbing neon a sudden contrast to the natural play of light and color we had enjoyed on the drive from the east. On that drive there had been little conversation; we kept to ourselves, attached to our books and headphones or just stared out the window. At one point, however, Bernie and I disagreed on the answer to a question regarding Spanish spelling. Does the word 'caliente', the adjective for 'hot', have one 'l' or two, was the debate. I contested it has only one, Bernie two. A wager of one Euro was made. After our dinner at the rest stop, we filled up on gas at the adjacent island of pumps. (60 liters of diesel; don't forget the receipt!) Bernie and I walked into the little convenient store where you can pay for your gas or can just browse through a selection of alcohol, pornography, sandwiches and candy, and found a middle aged, female cashier who would be able to settle our bet. Bernie did most of the talking as his Spanish, not to mention the other languages he speaks, and quite possibly including his English, is better than mine. (Damn polyglots!) He asked the woman for the spelling of 'caliente' and of course, it has one 'l'. I did a little victory dance around the store and Bernie conspicuously dropped a one Euro coin into my outstretched hand. The woman behind the counter smiled sheepishly. As we walked out, Bernie says, 'Man, I've heard it pronounced with that 'two l' sound. You know, like a 'y' sound. Cayente'. So Bernie turns around and asks her to say the word. She does in fact say it with a 'y' sound.

It was not until hours later that Bernie and I gave this episode any thought. We had pulled of the highway, again in the middle of nowhere west of Madrid, in the middle of the night, looking for lodging. Miraculously, we found a cheap but beautiful hotel with plenty of vacancies. It was like a giant ski chalet; a triangular shape with lots of nice exposed wood. The rooms where beautiful with ornate wood head boards on the beds. As we watched TV, I wondered what the women at the gas station had made of our queries. I wonder if she thought we were asking about 'caliente's ' other meaning: 'horny'. "Hi honey, I'm home. Work was fine, but these two freaks came into the station and started talking dirty to me. They wanted me to spell horny and then say it out loud to them." Who knows what she thought. I wonder what she made of Bernie dropping the coin in my hand. Probably thought we were a bunch of punk-ass kids. Which we are, of course. Imagine this possible analogy: a tourist comes into your place of employment and asks, for example, "Uh, hello. Could you please for me to spell 'erection'? Does it have one r or two? Please say it for me". You'd probably think something like, 'yeah, why don't you go take a long walk off a short pier, guy', as our friend at the gas station must have.

DAY 10

The morning light revealed that the hotel sits above a large lake. Beyond the lake are mountains, their tops dusted with snow. The hotel and the setting had 'The Shining' written all over it. We sat on the front steps and looked out across the empty parking lot to the lake and mountains, and sunned ourselves while drinking the morning's requisite cappuccinos. A local dog and trio of cats come sit at our feet. They seem attention starved. When we depart, around noon, we continue east and soon the terrain becomes more mountainous. All along the way, there are old, decaying castles atop the smaller hills. They look really old and seem to be eroding, eventually to be washed away by eons of wind and water like the hills themselves will be. I daydream about ancient landscapes, the imperceptible creep of geological time, and people long gone. I wonder what daydreams will be evoked in future travelers when they look upon our generations forgotten buildings, parking lots and garbage dumps. Spanish Castle Magic loops in my head. Duh duh duh duh. It's very far away. Duh duh duh duh, It takes about half a day: to get there, if we travel by my.... duh duh duh duh......dragonfly. Duh duh duh duh, and its not in Spain, baby. Duh duh duh duh. But it's groovy all the same.

We drive into late afternoon traffic in Porto, Portugal. The roads are stuffed with cars and jaywalkers. We park the van on the quay along the river which is undergoing major construction. We park here because the club where we'll play is nestled in one of the buildings that face the river. We park in a way that blocks most of the road, so while Greet runs to flush the promoter out of the club and give us some direction as to where to park so we can load our gear in for soundcheck, I direct traffic between our bumper and the fence which separates the river and the construction from the road. There is about an inch and a half on either side for the smaller cars to pass. I wonder when I'll get my first taste of Portuguese insults.

In the hour or so that we had to kill before starting soundcheck but after we had loaded in, I did a little walking around the neighborhood. The buildings are really old and had lots of tile work on their facades; tiles decorated with blue colored patterns or mosaics that wrapped around windows and doorways. I noticed in that hour, that I didn't see a single person that appeared to be under 60 years old. I later learned that most young people had moved out of the old town in recent years and are only now coming back to the part that has been held on to by the older, more traditional population.

Soundcheck, when we finally got to it, was a difficult one because of the acoustics. The stage was tiny and the walls were giant exposed stone for the sound to bounce right off of. We try playing some songs, including a new one we're working on. All in all we play for an hour and by the end of sound check, we're tired and hungry, our usual corporeal state on tour. Our hosts and promoters are Augusto and Sophia, lovely folks who've booked us rooms in a beautiful hotel in central Porto. Thanks guys! We drive there to check in on our way to dinner and then try and figure out what to do with our van for the remainder of the evening. We're concerned about its safety as it holds all of our merchandise- about 15 boxes and many dollars worth; many dollars that we don't yet have for the payment of the bill that accompanies these boxes. Greet finds a good spot to park while we wait for a table at a little restaurant nearby. Once seated, we enjoy some good conversation with our hosts, good food and sangria. Goddard has a meal whose main ingredient is chicken blood. Or was it sheep's blood? Either way, Goddard talks about its great taste for hours after its consumption. He keeps saying, in a matter-of-fact way, 'You should have had the blood'. I fear he may have become a vampire or something--a Portuguese vampire!

DAY 11

Today's drive north, back into Spain, is short and sweet. We are playing in Vigo, on the north west coast. Its Saturday night, and as you may know, they party late in Spain. We learn that we don't go on stage until 1:30 am.; dinner will be served at 11 PM. By the end of dinner, I'm ready for bed. During dinner, I listen to Augusto and Sophia, who've driven up for the show, speak Portuguese. I'm taken by the sound of Sophia's voice. I've really never listened to Portuguese, despite the hundreds of Brazilians in my own neighborhood, and the sound of the language coming from Sophia is mesmerizing; (its possible I was just mesmerized by the large meal I was trying to digest at midnight) lots of 'sh' sounds and gently formed consonants. She should consider hypnotism. Before I left for tour, Chris Brokaw said the sound of Portuguese reminded him of Russian. Farina also shared this sentiment saying the language sounded like a cross between French and Russian. It does, kinda.

The show goes well and wraps up at around 3AM, just in time for people to show up for the dance party. We load out just before it starts to get crazy as people stream into the club from all directions. As we pack the van, a few drunken Karate fans ask us if we've heard of Fugazi.

DAY 12

This morning, I ate breakfast in the hotel in Vigo. Thankfully, this was not one of the plastic hotels that we stay at on many overnight drives, but a nice hotel, with a lovely little cafe off the lobby where I can have a coffee and croissant, and lament having to get up at 9AM to drive to Madrid after having not been to sleep before 4 AM (which feels like minutes ago). I sit and recall the previous evenings late show and wonder why that guy off to 'stage-left' had to yell unintelligibly during many of our songs. It was particularly annoying when he would yell during a rest in a song. If it was a quarter note rest, we got a quarter note yell. A little section between verses with a little rhythmic phrase, we'd get a little rhythmic yell. It's cool that the guy knew the songs, but another way of expressing his familiarity and enjoyment would have been preferable.

I watched TV in the little cafe, had coffee, and waited for the others to emerge, tired, from their rooms. I felt great despite the fatigue. I'd just had an interaction with the waitress in respectable Spanish in which I was able to communicate a number of ideas, most about the food I desired and how I wanted it served. Caliente, of course. I also had a little quite time to write down some things I'd noticed in the past days.

Goddard shows up and heads straight for the pay phone. Goddard carries with him his Pocketmail device which allows him to get his email over the phone. The messages are transmitted from the receiver by a loud static sound that Pocketmail 'hears' and transforms to text. You know Goddard is close by when you hear this sound. The thing is, Goddard is always on the phone with that strange black box pressed against the receiver, listening for email from God(-dard) knows who. From girls? Friends? Lawyers? Hit men? His personal servants? I'd ask but its none of my business.

Farina, Greet and Bernie appear, relatively awake, in relatively good spirits. Soon, Greet is running around frantically, trying to find someone who knows Spain's telephone's international dialing code, or who simply understands what she's saying. Though Greet has formidable languages skills, (she speaks four languages, Spanish not being one of them) she has a hard time getting the information she needs. Meanwhile, I sit by watching terrible Spanish Pop music videos. These videos have a great power to annoy the living shit out of me. I imagine they'd be great tools for use in some form of psychological warfare: they would initially agitate the enemy to a point where they would not be able to concentrate without extreme effort. Soon, a numbing of the cerebral cortex and frontal lobe of the brain would occur, putting the enemy into a passive stupor. Then a final dose of steady quarter notes, repetitive melody, and high pitched, tuneless Spanish would cause in the enemy a terrifying psychosis that, after the smallest bit of Spanish 'alternative rock' (administered with acoustic guitars, of course) would likely cause the enemy to immolate themselves by whatever means available.

We retrace our steps back to Madrid and head for the club Sirocco. Its another great club with a challenging stage: too small, lousy on-stage sound, and I have to face at a 45 degree angle away from the crowd due to the strange shape of the stage and room. There is consolation in that the folks who work there are super cool and helpful. One guy kept telling me that whatever I asked for would be mine. He took us to dinner and kept asking if we needed more food, more wine, more dessert. How 'bout a beer? A cigarette? Back at the club he again stated that whatever I could imagine was mine for the having. I started to think he was actually hoping I would ask for something like prostitutes or cocaine. In all seriousness, he was just a sweet guy and he showed it.

The show itself is ok despite the only average sound and despite Farina's electronics freaking out and causing a delay half way through the show. Those effects pedals that Farina expertly controls can be a real pain in the ass for him on occasion. The crowd is large, and from what I understand, there were up to a few hundred people who could not get in. I'd love to have a two night stand in Madrid someday as it seems it may be warranted.

DAY 13

The drive to Saint Feliu de Guixols, north of Barcelona by about 100 kilometers, was smooth besides the 20 kilometer traffic back up that we sat in for an hour or so. We showed up at the club and had long since missed soundcheck. Its just as well 'cause soundcheck would have consisted of sitting around while Greet tried to fix the barely working PA system . The show itself is fun. I feel more relaxed on stage than any of the previous shows.

The evenings hotel is the same one as last year and it's more of a dormitory than a hotel. In fact, it reminds me of what they call 'worker hotels', which are basically dormitories for migrant construction workers. Karate has stayed in a few of these in Slovenia and the Czech Republic. They're not luxurious by any stretch of the imagination, and this one is not only unheated, but there is all kinds of noise: the maids are yelling as they clean, there is music from a radio, there is some strange pounding sound and the sound of children playing. Its impossible to walk across the freezing floors barefoot. There is no hot water. When I walk outside, some sources of the noise are revealed. The place is sandwiched between a school yard and a construction site.

DAY 14

Today we played in France. We were supposed to have a day off to drive back to Italy only because getting a gig in southern France was impossible this year. Greet came to the stage in Madrid during soundcheck and asked if we wanted to play in Aix-en-Provence and we said sure, its better than a day off in another plastic French motel. Apparently, some guys had heard about our troubles getting a gig and offered us a show in their rehearsal space.

Bernie sat next to me in the van reading the biography of John Casavettes. The van, a blue Fiat Ducato, does not appear aerodynamic. It looks like a giant square box on wheels with one corner of the box cut off at a 45 degree angle for the windshield. Inside, a good deal of trash has started to pile up; orange peels, plastic bags, flyers from previous shows, candy wrappers, stray articles of clothing. As we drive to the show, I wonder what the space will be like and if anyone will actually show up. We stop for lunch and are reminded by its price that France is expensive. We eat among other travelers. A mother and her two grown daughters sit and smoke and have coffee. They're accompanied by an androgenous teen. Why do many French teen agers seem to have this weird androgynous trait? Have you noticed this? I remember in grade school, we had this exchange program with some French school and all the boys looked so girly and the girls so boyish. Then something must happen at around age 18, when distinguishing a French person's sex suddenly becomes easy. Anyway, at the rest stop, I find an English language newspaper and buy it, as much interested in basketball scores as I am in war with Iraq or other important topics. I think this attraction to sports scores is just a distraction or defense mechanism I use against the usual assault of bad news from America . I'll take some innocuous professional sports scores, thanks, rather than the usual stuff that's just frightening, embarrassing and downright nauseating.

We show up in Aix, and wait in a parking lot for one of the guys to come get us and take us to the venue. The venue turns out to be in back of one of the guy's houses, and was formerly an aviary; birds that eventually ended up on plates in restaurants: pheasants, quail, who knows what else, used to be housed here. Thankfully, it had been cleaned up and would make a nice space for our performance. Greet was back in one of her 'zona linguas' and got on well with the folks there. She worked for an hour or so setting up the PA and positioning the speakers to her liking. We had a nice dinner, graciously prepared by our hosts, and huddled around one of two space heaters because, like too many of the clubs we play, this place isn't heated well. Meanwhile, I notice that we've returned to an area where the cheek kissing includes man to man. In Spain, I witnessed only hetero greetings. The bathroom facilites were in the kitchen of one of the guy's mother's houses so I'd try and give a hearty 'bon soir' every time I went into their house. From the house, you'd walk through the dark back yard to the performance space, which was one of what was actually a few connected buildings. Connected by a dark hall, exposed to the elements that smelled of moist earth and, by the time the show started, a lot of hashish. It was a bit of a surprise that 50 or so kids managed to show up. The show was booked only three days earlier and I would think that no one knew about it until at most two days before the show . That tells me there's not a lot to do in Aix on a Monday night or, more likely, these folks have a deep hunger for Rock. Voulez-vous Rock avec moi, ce soir?

After the show, we're split up. Bernie and I will stay with the girlfriend of the promoter. Greet, Goddard and Farina go to the home of the promoter. Their names elude me currently, forgive me. Our host lets us check our email, and provides us comfortable accommodations. It was a very nice evening and it seemed so pleasantly......French. Yes, that's possible.

DAY 15

The drive back into Italy takes longer than expected (as usual). In addition, we spent an hour driving around Torino, trying to find the club. We eventually gave up, pulled over and called the promoter, telling him where we were and asking him to come get us and lead us to the club. (We also promised to do him no harm when he arrived, despite our road-rage brought on by another day with bad directions) At soundcheck, on a stage we'd played before, I got the feeling that tonight's show, at least from my aural perspective on stage, was going to be a rough one. Something about the sound on the stage really sucked. My drums seemed to not resonate, the snare drum sounded like a cardboard box, and the bass and guitar sounded distant. Turn up that monitor! Yeah! I'm going deaf!

The show is indeed a downer. The crowd, while well behaved, seemed too well behaved. Perhaps they noticed that something on stage wasn't going as it should. I play angry. I hope it doesn't show, but since people often think I look angry when I'm feeling nothing but sunshine inside, I don't hold much hope for any demeanor deception. When its over, I'm embarrassed and depressed. Can people tell when we suck? Do we suck when I think we're good? I don't really feel like socializing or fielding 'complimenti' when I don't feel I deserve it, so I go and hover around the merch table yet again. Tonight, above the merch table, is a TV that is silently showing Italian news. I see images of tanks, American aircraft carriers, Saddam Hussein, and burning flags. There is a ticker tape that scrolls across the top and I can make out only a few words: la guerra, Bush, Saddam. The images alone are enough to keep me staring at the screen. The fact that I can only glean information about what's being reported from images and a printed word here or there makes me feel that the subject (impending war) is even more incomprehensible, more terrifying. Something important could've happened today and I would have to piece together the information bit by bit. Even at home, with all the news and information I can take, in a language I understand, I don't understand the nature of politicians and dictators. Here, simply because I don't understand the language, its like the dictators and politicians are free to go about their evil business and I'd never even know it. Not that I could stop them, though. The TV, with its glowing pixels illuminating the merch table, just confuses me more. There is trouble in the political world and tonight, there's trouble in my head. At least we end up selling a bunch of CD's. We've got to sell, sell, sell, people!! Ugh.

DAY 16

Italy has claimed its first victim. Last year, Farina, and merch girl Stacie Merrill, were stricken by some strange flu like virus which threatened the completion of the tour. This year, it's Bernie, who spent most of last night vomiting; vomit accompanied by bad diarrhea. Sometimes they occurred simultaneously, I'm sorry to report. I missed most of these episodes but was awakened by one early in the morning at which point I got up, got dressed, and went looking for a 'farmacia'. I had a hunch that one would be near by, as we stayed in this hotel here in Torino last year and remembered that outside were lots of cafes and shops, so why not a pharmacy. I found one and got some medicine; for diarrhea, for rehydration, for upset stomach. I implored Bernie to try and relax and get some sleep if possible. He was very sick and had only slept lightly as he kept having to make trips to the bathroom. I go downstairs and have cappuccino and wait for the others. I tell them the situation and we change our plans from leaving at 11am, to 2pm. The hotel as agreed to let Bernie sleep past the 12 pm check out, so at 2pm, we'll assess the situation

So I sit in the small dining room of the hotel for a few hours, casually flipping through the pages of the assortment of Italian newspapers that have been put out on one of the tables and reading a bit of one of the books that I have with me. I've brought two books with me, both collections of essays by Scott Russell Sanders called Secrets of the Universe and The Paradise of Bombs. Very good. The walls of the dining room that I sit in are covered by promotional photos of musicians and entertainers that have likely stayed in the rooms here. I don't recognize any of the faces that look out from these photos nor do I know the names printed on the them. They appear to be mostly blues and folk musicians, guitar and harmonica players, and a few rock bands I've never heard of. There are also a number of soft-core pornography stars or swimsuit models. Its hard to tell exactly what their gig is just by their scantily clad or nude bodies. One such photo features a naked woman wearing boxing gloves. I've seen this boxing glove/naked woman combination before and wonder if there's some connection I'm failing to make because it looks completely ridiculous to me. It neither evokes anything remotely sexy or anything remotely athletic. Is there some message here about the violence of boxing and the skin of women? Is this an intentional coupling of sex and violence? Perhaps this is the ultimate male fantasy? What am I missing here, I wonder. Who is the person who engineers these photos and thinks they are sexy or tasteful? News flash: Its completely tasteless.

2pm roles around and its clear that Bernie has to be left behind. He's not going to make it to Venezia tonight. In fact, he may die. Just kidding. We reserve the hotel room for an extra night and let him sleep. Tomorrow, he'll get up and get a train to Milano, where we'll meet him at the club there.

DAY 17

Our show outside Venezia felt like business as usual. We started by doing our usual routine of trying to interpret the directions to the club, realizing they make little sense, then getting lost and being forced to pull over and call the promoter of the show and have him come and pick us up and lead us to the club from our current location on the side of the road. The performance itself was average, I guess. Ivan does a cameo as merch guy as we left Bernie in Torino.

Back at the hotel, Geoff, Jeff, Greet, and I hang out in one of the hotel rooms and get to talking about various topics such as contrasting senses of humor between Europeans and Americans, but particularly the contrasts between Greet, a Belgian and Karate, Americans. Greet says she's pretty sure she knows by now when Karate is being sarcastic and when being we're serious. I still think we differ on our interpretations of 'literal' and 'figurative' meanings, however. When we tell her we'll 'just be a second', she wonders why it actually may take longer. Anyway, we shoot the breeze (so to speak, you see) about a bunch of stuff. I get a kick out of her response to Geoff's asking if she was ambidextrous. She replies, 'I've never had any problems with.....any problems'. So much for a clear, mutual understanding.

DAY 18

Today was Milan. On the way there, I witness the archetype of Italian driving habits on the crowded A4. What I like about the Italians is their use of lanes. The left lane is strictly for passing and rarely will someone pass you on the right, unlike in America where we don't follow these rules with nearly enough attention. In Italy, there is no cruising in the left lane unless you're doing about 100mph, which, believe me, many people are. I've found myself in the left lane traveling around 75mph with nothing behind me one second, the next second there's a Mercedes, BMW or other high performance vehicle literally inches off my back bumper, flashing its lights urging me to merge right. And when some car is only inches off your back bumper, you need little encouragement to quickly move right. This I'm not so fond of. I've watched this tailgating routine as it happens to others and it seems that a collision is always just barely averted. The Italians also seem to have only a vague idea about how to put their vehicles in the the center of a given lane. It's as if they can't make up their minds. Do I want the left lane or the right? They often just choose both. I think what they must be trying to do is to situate the drivers seat directly in the center of the lane, causing the right side of the car to drift into the lane to their right. Not to worry. 'When in Rome'.......or Milan, whichever the case may be.

We arrive in Milan, and though its my fourth time here, I've seen very little of the city beside what is on the sides of the road on the way from the highway to the clubs. Tonight's club is Leoncavallo, which is the largest leftist 'squat' (illegally occupied building) in Italy. We arrive a few hours early. Inside this giant complex of buildings it is cold and dreary. There is every form of leftist signage and slogan, a small library, a makeshift greenhouse growing nothing but marijuana, and of course, a huge concert space that could probably hold 5000. The space looks like what must have once been a factory floor, the machinery long gone. We sit on our butts for hours in this giant unheated place, wondering where, exactly, we're going to play, let alone if we'll have a sound check. I'm also hoping that I'll be able to find a toilet with a seat. So far I've only seen the Infamous Italian Toilet Holes here. These are simply porcelain lined depressions in the floor with a hole toward the back of the depressed area. On either side of the hole are raised areas, one for each foot, complete with traction so you don't slip as you, presumably, squat above. I prefer toilets. I really wonder what Italians think of the Infamous Italian Toilet Hole. Could they offer me some advice or techniques for successful use? Its seems potentially messy, not to mention incredibly awkward and uncomfortable on the thighs depending on how long you need to spend. There's probably little newspaper reading done here. I would suggest to European interior designers to increase the number of actual toilets. Please?!!. Oh, and maybe I'm naive, but I don't think the bidés are getting much use. One other thing. Could you please mount more of the shower heads on the wall? I'm tired of holding the shower head above me while I shower. Granted, I can get a better angle on my nether regions, (no more handstands in the shower!) but my right arm never gets clean.

We finally get a sound check on the stage they've erected at one side of the cavernous performance space. They've brought in a PA and cordoned off a section of the room. This small section of room can still easily fit 500 people. During soundcheck, it's painfully obvious that tonight's sound will be a joke. The amount of reverb in this massive concrete space takes all the sound produced on the stage and turns it into a slur of unrecognizable noise. After soundcheck, we eat in the kitchen/restaurant area of the squat. Upon entrance, you feel you've just walked into a soup kitchen. The air is thick with smoke and chatter from the many strange, and some grizzled people who sit at the tables or who've lined up at the kitchen window to receive various dollops of mass produced Italian food. Food that, due to my ravenous hunger, tastes pretty good.

Finally, its show time, and of course, the sound is terrible. This is really not an appropriate venue for Karate, but somehow, with the crowd packed up against the stage and the absurdity of the acoustics, its still pretty fun. For bad sound, it could've been worse. My impression of Leoncavallo itself, however, could not have been worse. This place seems a contradiction and a farce to me. Ostensibly, it appears no more a center for political activism and leftist idealism than it does a mall, selling every image and trinket of hip, flavor of the month causes. For instance, the importance of drug legalization is, to me, contradicted by the sheer numbers of people who, by nights end, are completely blasted out of their minds on who knows what. And isn't ETA basically a group of Basque killers who have little support in their own region of Spain? Why are they glorified here? Everything here is for sale, whether its books, videos, CD's, alcohol, drugs etc. I don't see how this place can reconcile its intended leftist ideals with its first-world capitalist banality. And all these drug addled psychos here! Fuck this place! I don't know, maybe its just an off night.

The evenings hotel is non-descript. In the morning, I get the feeling I've been here before. (note: by the time I copy this onto my computer, any memory of the place is completely gone).

DAY 19

What a difference a day makes. Last nights show in Tarzo, a little town in the northeast, was great. The whole package was great-the audience, our friends from that part of the country who showed up or helped out in one way or another, and the performance itself. The sound was great, especially on stage. After what feels like days and days of 'challenging' stages and acoustics, we finally get a sound that is audible but not too loud, no extreme room reverberation, a nice intrumental/vocal mix, nice monitor mix......Yes!

After the show, as I'm filling in at the merch table for Bernie who's run to the bathroom, I get the old unsolicited kiss on the cheek from an adoring Karate fan. Yeah, female fan. Anyway, Bernie comes back and asks if I've sold anything. I tell him that in addition to selling a few records, (I have to tell him specifically which ones. Every unit sold must be itemized in the merch book for bookkeeping purposes), and signing my name over and over on Karate CDs, I got kissed on the cheek by a cute girl who likes my band. Wheee! He then looks over my shoulder and asks 'Was it that girl right there?' I turn around to see this girl planting a smooch on Farina. Damn! For a second I thought she wanted to kiss me and not 'Karate'. I'm sure she eventually got to Goddard.

Part of last nights success was our accommodations for the evening: spacious hotel rooms with heat, hot water, and beds that are longer than 5'2". And this morning is beautiful-bright sun, deep blue sky, fresh air. Today we head for Firenze (Florence).

Day 20

It's morning in Firenze after our show here. Another bitch of a show, if you'll pardon my fucking French. Stage sound was a joke. The crowd, for the most part seemed completely detached from the performance. Most of them were talking through the show, louder than our instruments. Why must people come to a show, plant themselves in the front row, in full view of the band, and proceed to talk during the entire show? Short attention spans? Karate's not entertaining enough? Maybe its just what people do at rock shows, but it's really distracting and kind of depressing. In addition to that, some wise ass thought it a good idea to get on stage and strut across from one side to the other. I looked up from my drums to see him half way between Goddard and Farina, with a cocky stride and a smirk on his face. As he passed in front of me and headed off stage to my right, (the few stairs to the stage are 90 degrees right and left of the drums), I quickly envisioned and assessed the possibility of hitting the guy with a well thrown drumstick. That would have entailed me throwing the stick I held in my right hand, hitting him and causing him brief, yet sharp pain, grabbing another stick and continuing the song without any audible pauses or skipped beats. Man, it would've been some martial arts-ninja-kung fu type of shit had I done it successfully, but wisely, I didn't make the attempt. I probably would've hit an innocent bystander and ruined the song we were playing due to suddenly having one less drumstick. Plus I could've really hurt the guy. I know because I've had the unfortunate experience of hitting myself in the face with a drumstick with some energy behind it and it really hurts, I assure you. Don't come on stage when the band is playing! This not some 80's hardcore show. There will be no passing the mic so you can scream the lyrics. There will be no skanking on stage nor stage diving. Jesus, people! Pay attention and stay off the stage! (whine).

Soon after the performance, my frustration with the sound and the (real or imagined) apathy of the audience started to fade away as I hung around backstage with the opening band. They were having such a great time carrying on with each other and their friends that I couldn't help but catch a bit of their enthusiasm. Soon, food was being thrown and Farina was being hugged and draped in streamers and confetti. The party got a little too excited but it was the only place to be since the requisite post rock concert dance party had begun to rage out in the main room.

What a strange tour this has been so far. One minute I want to attack some guy that walks across the stage, the next minute, I feel in holy communion with a bunch of people I just met. The dizzying highs, the terrifying lows....Touring for me is such a wonderful opportunity to play music nightly, to travel, and to meet incredible and generous people. And to get paid for it should be a crime. But then there is the dark side, and I've noticed the disturbance in the Force a lot lately. Quite acutely, I might add. It's the paralyzing depression, sometimes anger, that accompanies an episode on stage when the sound is terrible, I can't hear one instrument or another or something else isn't happening the way it should. Or its a different, less tangible feeling of not being able to experience the show in an intuitive and visceral way; a night that we're simply not 'tapping in.'

I still have to ask myself how to deal with this two sided coin. I think the answer lies in the ability to realize that these perceived situations or emotions are just that: perceived, and I can easily choose to perceive them anyway I like. It's a lot easier said than done, but when I realize that 'it really doesn't matter', and 'its just a fucking rock band', I feel a lot better. Plus, on tour, there's always tomorrow to try and get that high that is playing a good show. Tomorrow, our roads lead to Rome.

DAY 21

Tonight, we play at INIT on its opening night. The club has been built from the ground up by some or our Roman friends. Giampaulo, Alberto, Christian and others have spent countless hours working on the venue which sits in the shadows of a giant aqueduct. Alberto tells me that a few pieces of ancient Roman terracotta were unearthed by the guys in the early stages of clearing the land before the foundations were laid.

When we arrive, they're still setting up the PA, taking down some last pieces of scaffolding and sweeping the floor. The last few days has been spent frantically working to take care of last minute details: stage lighting, connecting the soundboard to the speakers, stocking the bar.....They're getting the job done in an Italian style--at the last possible moment.

Tonight we share the stage with our good friends Zu and Blind Loving Power. We find that the stage has great sound and the 500 people that show up to watch the show are a great audience. Its a very comfortable environment for us and it feels really good to be with our friends here. It's nice to have what feels like a home base in Rome. Our friends there are nothing but helpful, supportive, and talented as all get-out, and have worked so hard to make these concerts happen. Speaking of helpful and supportive, we're going to need all the help and support we can get, because after the show, we find that our van has a problem and is not working properly. It seems like the clutch won't let the engine engage; the engine stalls as the clutch is let out. We're not going anywhere. As we realize the gravity of the problem, the joking and goofing around in the van (with Zu, and a few others who were riding with us to the suburb of Ostia) stops and a quiet concern takes the place of laughter. Immediately, the fragile nature of a tour is revealed. The realization that there is a problem with the van is to realize that we could also be facing an end to the tour. The van breaking down changes every thing. But no one wants to believe that the van actually has a problem. Everyone is under the impression that it's the fault of the person behind the wheel and consequently, nearly everyone wants a shot at starting and driving the vehicle. It's clear to me by the new timbre of the engine's idle, that the van is sick indeed, and there is nothing we can do for it here, at 4 AM, underneath this aqueduct. So I watch (a re-run) this tragic-comedy unfold. It stars a cast of backseat drivers all saying simultaneously, 'let me try'. I remain a relaxed observer, all the while taking solace in Karate's First Law of Mechanical Entropy. This law states that any mechanical breakdown of a vehicle that transports the band Karate must and will only cease operating at a time and place that ensures the continuation of a Karate tour. I don't know how to explain it, but it just happens. We break down in the best possible places, at the best possible times. We have friends and 'resources' here, and tomorrow we play the same club, so if need be, the day can be spent at the mechanic or on the phone trying to find a good Samaritan ( I mean, Roman) who owns a van. Greet, as hardcore a tour-manager as she is, states that instead of joining us in Zu's van (which we had avoided due to its own set of mechanical problems) and going 45 minutes east to Ostia to our hotel, she'll sleep for a few hours on the stage of the club so that in the morning she can get a jump on trying to diagnose and cure our van's sickness. Apparently, there's a Fiat garage close by.

Before we pile into Zu's van, an old Renault, Giampaulo, the only Italian in this ensemble that has a drivers license, gets behind the wheel while the rest of us push it down the hill. We push it because it needs some momentum so that the clutch can be popped and the engine 'jumped'. This is the only way to start the 'Zu-mobile'. I'm not exactly sure how this technique works, but as the van leaves our hands and silently gathers speed as it rolls down the hill, we hear it come to life as it passes under an arch of the aqueduct where it crosses the street. While playing in this farce, I'm imagining a Roman merchant or minstrel in this very location millennia ago. He's swearing at his lethargic horse, or his cart whose wooden wheel has been recently fractured. Since Giampaulo will stay at the club with Greet tonight, and help her with what will likely be a tough day tomorrow dealing with our broken down van, Goddard is behind the wheel for our drive to Ostia.

DAY 22

The first part of the day, a day which we woke up at around 1pm because of the exceptionally late night (in bed around 5 am, I think), is spent in Ostia. Ostia is a large beach town just west of Rome. In summer, I'm told the city is overrun by Romans trying to escape the city heat. Today, its not crowded as it's February. The main thoroughfare along the beach has only light traffic. At around 3pm, our friend Massimo comes from his apartment to the hotel to meet us for lunch. He also has information from Greet, who no doubt has been working hard on the problem with our van. We go to lunch and wait for her scheduled phone call. She'll let us know the status of our van--our whole tour, really--by about 4pm.

Its a really nice day in Ostia--bright sunshine reflecting off the Mediterranean and a fresh breeze as we walk down the street toward a cafe that Massimo knows and likes. Jacopo, another friend and drummer of Zu, joins us there. I'm feeling relaxed despite the imminent phone call to Massimo from Greet. When it comes, I can tell that the news is good by the tone of his voice, the 'bene, bene', and his laughter at what can only be the madness that Greet must be describing as her day spent dealing with the van. I'm partly amazed and partly not surprised at all, but I'm wholly relieved. Part of me wonders if Greet's force of will alone has caused the van to fix itself.

We drive the Zu-mobile back to Rome and the club INIT. We meet up with Greet and she gives a few details on how she's spent the last 12 hours or so and the van and its repairs . That she's slept for 3 hours on the stage in the unheated club is the detail she makes most clear. I feel sort of guilty that she took that responsibility upon herself while we slept in a hotel and had a generally stress-free day. Because Greet's very tired, because we don't need to do soundcheck as we'll presumably have the same sound tonight, and because Alberto, who can do sound for us is here, we send her back to the hotel for the night. During the show, which another 500 people have shown up for, the generator which is powering most of the club, including the stage, gives out twice. It throws a bit of damper on Zu's set and causes a bit of stress among the guys behind the bar and the soundboard. I stand there in the now darkened room and wonder how much time will pass before the crowd gets restless or starts leaving and asks for their money back. During even the longest of the forced intermissions, the crowd remains surprisingly fixed and relatively un agitated. I hope they do the same for us if this happens when we play.

During our set, the generators generate as they are supposed to. Like last night, the crowd is enthusiastic and well behaved. I must say, and I think I speak for Karate as a whole when I say its been an honor for us to play the opening of this club. Its also an honor for us to get to share the stage with Zu and Blind Loving Power, who are inspirational musicians as well as great regazzis. Its nice to have shows like these and be with friends. Especially, on the eve of a potentially debilitating 10 hour drive to Sicily.

DAY 23

The drive to Sicily is long and uneventful. It took about 9.5 hours but I'm sure would have been shorter had the highway not had so many detours and so many places where it changes to one lane. As you drive 40 Mph behind a truck that you can't pass, you're forced to look at the closed lane and wonder why its closed. It looks like the road crews came to work on it and started by closing the lane in preparation, but left it at that.

This year, there is a lot of snow in the mountains but thankfully not on the roads. Not until we get close to Calabria and the 'tip of the boot' does the snow disappear. We arrive at the ferry to Messina, Sicily as night falls. Its only about a 30 minute ride over the choppy waters but long enough to eat a greasy croquette and relax a bit and stare blankly at the other passengers. Last year on this ride, there was a Rastafarian playing guitar and singing loudly. I got the sense that he was north African and not West Indian. I also recall a group of drunk Americans who seemed to be enjoying the ride and the singing. They were dirty and shoeless. I avoided them. This year's passengers feature another Rastafarian, but this one has a drum and is sitting quietly.

As we pass the toll booths in Catania, we're stopped by the police for about 30 minutes as they send in the drug sniffing dogs. The dogs don't seem too...focused. They're jumping in the van, sniffing briefly, then jumping out. They don't seem to like their job. Perhaps the smell of a rock band's van is too much for their powerful olfactory senses. We don't have any drugs or stowaways so they let us go.

The show itself is great despite the lousy acoustics in the gymnasium style room. In fact, I think it is actually a gym as there are bleachers folded up against the wall. The crowd is big and seems very happy and excited--probably as a result of living in a beautiful seaside town that sits below Europe's most active volcano, Etna. When you live below a volcano, it makes sense to live every day happy, as if it's your last. I love playing Catania. The people there are so warm and friendly. Its too bad that we'll spend twice as much time getting there and back than we actually spend being there.

DAY 24

As we roll out of Catania, north to Messina then on to the mainland, a light rain falls from a patchy overcast. Despite the dreariness, the scenery is great. On the left, every shade of green appears. Cactus, palms and thousands of types of flora I could never name, grows from the black volcanic soil on the slopes of Mt. Etna. On the right is the Ionian Sea and the sun is shooting yellow spotlights through the clouds onto the surface. The road has countless tunnels along the mountainous coast and villages are often perched high atop these mountains. I can't imagine how these villages and their large stone buildings were built considering their location, nor can I imagine the acrophobia that must accompany living there.

Today's passengers on the ferry are mostly Italian. Dark haired men and heavily made up women mill about in the cafe where I eat breakfast--another greasy croquette. A bridge between the mainland and Sicily would make this much easier, but I assume the ferry business is entrenched here and a bridge would effectively shut it down.

We arrive in Napoli late. We're met at the train station by the promoter who will ride with us and navigate us to the club. We've been driving for hours and I feel sick and tired but know that a challenge is still ahead: driving in Napoli. Driving in this part of Italy gives new meaning to the term 'driving defensively' because you never now when a car or scooter or pedestrian will decide that the rules of the road, plain common sense, and the will to live aren't a priority. Your reflexes must be quick in order to avoid a senseless accident.

The first sign of trouble with the show is the venue's stage. The stage is a five sided, tiled box which makes us sound incredibly loud on stage and presumably horrendous to the audience who is separated from us by a flight of stairs. At soundcheck, I realize that getting a rug for the drums to sit on so they don't slide across the tiled floor is going to be difficult. The promoters can't seem to find one and I wonder why they can't just call a friend to bring one. Does no one have a throw-rug in this town? I try a thin blanket that they provide but that doesn't do the trick. Then I try a piece of foam that I've found in a back stairwell. No luck. I try to convey the fact that there won't be a show if I can't find something to anchor the drums. After some debating about what will work, I try to take matters into my own hands and head out onto the street in hopes of locating a rug in the many piles of garbage that I noticed when loading in. There's nothing but cinder blocks and garbage bags and pieces of splintered wood. As I walk back toward the club, Goddard comes out of the door with an excited look on his face and the brilliant idea of stealing the big brown fuzzy doormat from an adjacent McDonalds. Its the perfect solution. As he and I walk toward McDonalds and conspire to get the rug, we're chased by a girl who's waiting to get into the show. She wants to take our photo and get an autograph. We oblige her but I'm focused on the rug heist and not able to pay her much mind. I wonder how that photo looks. I imagine it features a smiling Italian girl flanked by two tired and frazzled guys who look like they're up to no good. Soon after, one of the promoters comes out when word of our theft has spread and importunes us not to do it. Allegedly, he's found something that will work. I'm dubious at first, but in the end he provided something that will work. Its not perfect, but I've grown tired of this quest for the perfect drum anchoring rug and resign myself to the possibility of sliding drums during the show.

After the show, the girl who asked Goddard and I for photos as we tried to find a drum rug is now asking Farina for marriage. She'd like to 'spousify'.

DAY 25

Today we head north to Massa, 100km south of Genoa. The drive is fairly relaxed thanks to good weather and flat terrain. We make good time despite a wrong turn, which sends us on a brief tour of Rome's international airport, and later, another stop by police. The cops want to see our drivers licenses and the contents of the van. I open up the back and reveal our instruments. One cop says to me, 'Oh, you are music group? You are like Deep Purple?' Yes, exactly like Deep Purple.

We arrive late, nonetheless, and quickly soundcheck. We played this club last year and were late last year too. Today there have been a number of debates stemming from our individual 'requirements'---who needs to soundcheck, who needs to eat at the club, who needs to hang out before the show, who needs to sleep, who needs to be awake, who wants to play in England next year, who doesn't, and on and on and on. Its frustrating at times, but that's how it goes.

Touring seems so ostensibly simple. Drive, eat , play, sleep, repeat; a 'tour template'. But every aspect is obfuscated by money, opinions, emotions, other people. The fact that the chips do fall in the right places is a statistical coup. The 'tour template' also provides the sub plots and characters that provide concern or comedy. It provides the situations that are better thought of in hindsight--the getting lost, the bad sound, ('Remember how bad that show was? Yeah, that was funny. I think I almost punched the promoter. Ha Ha' etc etc), the illnesses, the near death experiences-- it's all part of the template.

And what of the music that we play every night? To begin to expound on that would take many pages and an eloquence I don't have. I would like to convey what the music itself is like, not the environments in which it is played, but music can explain itself better than I can. A few thoughts on Karate and drumming, seen through my tour tired eyes: I need a practice period of a few months. I hope Karate has a practice period, too. I hope both continue to move forward as we have in the past. I hope we're not going to play these songs for the rest of our 'career'. I hope I can one day play a tight, pianissimo, 64th note single stroke roll at 60 beats per minute.......

The show itself is decent and there are some fun (if not slightly insane) people to hang out with afterwards. One guy uses his hands to explain the various levels to which certain musicians have risen. 'Karate is here', he says, holding his hand at about chest level, but 'Pat Metheny is here!' he says, as his hand shoots up above his head.

DAY 26

We drove from the Mediterranean coast, across Piemonte to the city of Verona. Our show there went well. The club, called Interzona, is situated in a sprawling expanse of concrete, warehouses and abandoned rail line. It is the site of the old market, or Mercati Generali. The club has saved many of the old signs that must have lined the old market walls. I presume this complex was built by Mussolini. It has a bland sense of fascism.

We play early, and we're asked to go on stage while people are still arriving. Interzona has been closed for a year and tonight is their re-opening. The employees are strict about time schedules as they assume various members of the city regulatory boards will be making appearances to see how the operation is run.

The show is fun thanks to great stage sound. I'm reminded that there is an incredible Roman amphitheather in Verona. I saw it down a side street as we drove to the hotel.

DAY 27

Our second to last show is in Senegalia, on the Adriatic coast. The club is huge and the turnout is relatively low. We're playing with Zu, which is always fun. During our set, I notice more and more silhouettes of people in the back. I realize that they are showing up for the inevitable post show dance party. When we finish playing, I hang out near the merch, just off to the right of stage. The dance party gets going on the floor and its hopping. The people number in the high hundreds and the music is bad--very treble oriented, un danceable rock music. Then the strobe lights and fog machines kick in. Then I remember that most of my belongings are on the other side of the club,-- 'backstage'.

I start to plan a route to the backstage area. From the higher vantage point of the stage I scope out the areas where the crowd is thin and I can pass through relatively un noticed--and un harmed. I make a break for it. It is psychologically more terrifying than I expected. I'm bombarded with loud music, strobe lights, smoke, scantily clad women and people who are clearly not happy about me trying to get through. I get a few sharp elbows thrown my way as I pass. As I get past the dancers, I think I've made it through, only to find that another separate throng of revelers stands in my way. I continue trying to throw my best head fakes, jukes and dodges in order to get by. I'm starting to think I may not make it. I'll end up beaten up by some thug or trampled by oblivious dancers.

I make it back stage, followed by Farina who has a panic stricken look on his face. He, too, is incredulous as to the severity of the gauntlet we've just run. Now we have to turn around and make our exit. We decide that rather than proceed with short sprints, we should just head into the storm, full power. I will act as human bulldozer, clearing the way for those behind me, like a lineman blocking for the running backs. It turns out to be an easier trip this time. By pure luck, we hit the seams of the crowd, where their numbers are few.

LAST SHOW AND GOING HOME

Our last show is in Forli, north of Senigallia and not far from Bologna. Most of the evening is spent discussing last minute book keeping details: money, travel plans, merch numbers etc. The show goes well and shortly afterward, we say goodbye to Farina, who will head to Pordenone with his girlfriend, Caterina. I begin readying my equipment and belongings for airline travel. I will need to be at the Bologna airport at 8 AM, which is an hour away from tonights hotel.

On arrival to the hotel, at around 4 AM, I'm confronted with one last driving challenge. I must back the van into a narrow arched driveway. Backing in is extremely difficult due to the narrow street lined with parked cars. Things are looking good until I start to feel that maybe this is one parking job I can't handle. No sooner than this doubt crosses my mind do I smash the side mirror against the wall. Shit! The mirror just popped right off and is now somewhere under the van. I give up and let Greet take over. As she backs up, we hear a cracking the sound. It's the yet unbroken and still usable mirror being cracked under the tires. That figures.

I get three hours of sleep before Greet and I wake to go to Bologna. I drive myself there, using the cracked mirror fixed with packing tape so that I can see what's behind me on the right side. Greet sleeps. She'll have to drive herself back to the the hotel. I hope she doesn't have much traffic. Today, she'll start her return to Belgium by van.

My flights are smooth. On my connection from Munich to Boston. There's a decidedly different look to the people than the people I've seen in the past weeks. It takes me but a second to recognize this look. They're Americans. It's difficult to describe--all I can say is that there is a pervasive blandness to this group--in sight and sound. I can't help but wonder if Europeans can pick me out a lineup, as easily identifiable as American as these Americans are to me. I'd like to think not. But I'm one of them!! And yet, I can't help but feel at home with my bland countrymen. That is, until the woman next to me asks me if I've seen The Bachelorette, a 'reality' show on TV, and adds an 'x' to 'espresso'.

Thanks for reading. See you here.