Emily Armond’s Tour Diary, Part 3
Dark Meat finds itself busless and penniless on the Great Plains
By Emily Armond
Published: May 16th, 2008 | 12:40pm
Piccolo player Emily Armond is traveling on a bus with 12 men as part of Dark Meat’s 2008 spring tour caravan. While touring, Armond has graciously agreed to document what happens “on the bus” and “off the bus,” and what it’s like to be a woman touring on the road with so very many boys. Check venuszine.com for weekly updates about Dark Meat’s road shenanigans in support of the band’s new album, Universal Indians (re-released April 8 on Vice).
I’d just finished talking to my dad on the phone — “I’m hoping the bus problems are over,” I’d said — when three violent lurches sent us to the side of the road, and I heard [Dark Meat vocalist, guitarist, bassist, keyboardist, lyricist, and positive mental attitude promoter] Bernard yell “Everybody Out!” I couldn’t get to my shoes in the tangle of bodies, so I grabbed my piccolo and scooted out the door with my socks on. The back of the bus was smoking, but there was no fire. It was dusk, we were just outside of Buffalo, New York, and our exit was in sight.
After yet another roadside hour, we learned that it was the transmission this time, so we called three cabs, lugged as many instruments as we could carry, and waited at a diner for our checkered caravan to the show. Soon after my cab’s arrival at the Mohawk Place, the bus, stuck in first gear, came lumbering around the corner. It took some ingenuity on [Dark Meat roadie, vocalist, and perpetual troubadour] Curtis’s part to make that happen, but it was no miracle. We played to a small but friendly crowd, and then drove 20 miles-per-hour to a house of friendly people. The next day we went at the same slow speed to a garage for diesel vehicles.
And that’s where the bus stayed for 10 days.
We slept one night at the garage, missing our Pittsburgh show, while the bad news was confirmed: our old transmission would have to be rebuilt. Estimate: $7000.
We borrowed money, held meetings, and ultimately concocted an expensive and implausible plan for continuing the tour. We would rent vans, book flights, and hope that the bus could make it from Buffalo to Denver in two days. It was all complicated by a lack of one-way vans; some of them would have to be returned to where they came from.
The day of our Cleveland show, we rented a cargo van and a 15-passenger van and took them to the show. Then we slept for a few hours in some dirty warehouse where a band was practicing loudly. Seven of us left at 7 a.m. to return a van to Buffalo, rent a one-way minivan, and drive all the way to Urbana, Illinois, for a show that night. The others took two benches out of another 15-passenger, loaded up the equipment, and drove to Urbana with two people up front, four on a bench, and one laying on top of the drums and guitars.
And so it went through Urbana, Peoria, Illinois, Chicago, Minneapolis, Fargo, Omaha, Lawrence, Kansas, and Denver. All the while, we didn’t know if the bus would survive the 1500 miles from Buffalo to Denver, or if it would make it on time, or how we would ever pay for the repairs, which were added to an already large debt.
Wasn’t I supposed to get to write about champagne and groupies?
Dear reader, please send money.
Issue #35
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