The Mutaytor - 8/7/06 - Boulder, CO - Fox Theatre

early morning in milwaukee… roo straddles the trailer, the van shakes. badass checks the engine, drums are laid aside for people flying to the next gig in colorado tomorrow. talk of the show last night, the one some of us missed due to flight goblins and circumstance. to hear of the fun makes my fingers spasm and i whisper consolation to my camera like a whimpering child to my bosom. apparently the beginning of the show was like ‘watching ants coming to the sugar’. milwaukee summaries included bratwurst and fresh root beer from a keg, exaggerated accents of ‘bangin a hyooo-eee’ and ‘dat deeeer’… last night we all met up at the crashpad at 2am. everyone hottubbed & settled in to sleep all together on futons and air mattresses in a basement, a celtic happy place where the banana bread is always warm. at 9am i got the green light for steamrolling… “gently!” crunchy warned… my initial attempts proved futile, a bunch of rootbeer-laden heavy socks all grumpy-like… a half hour later and duty called for more rigorous tactics… “ok 80%”, mama said… “90!” I negotiated. “85!” she replied. we settled on 82% of full throttle steamrolling and i basked in success in the form of bryan’s bloated morning face sniveling at me and kj’s one eye acknowledgment of consciousness, eric’s adorable, yet ineffective pout… breakfast and coffee and hugs goodbye… 10 of us now make the 15 hour drive to boulder… the rest fly with rayray heads and kick drums… 6pm - driving thru iowa, thru nebraska, been on the road for 12 hours… we took boobie photos at the ‘welcome to illinois’ sign, endured another flat tire and walked thru fields of chest-deep wildflowers and corn fields. the blue haze of dusk settles in and my eyes are heavy… 7 JULY - 11AM ~ morning faces, more driving to do… we pile into the van and hope another tire doesn’t blow… “who’d rather be working a desk job?!” kj says and we all pull to perspective. day 2 of driving from wisconsin to colorado. i return calls from NBC about some images they might use and set up another portland shoot from the road. notes on post-its and prayers for wireless at the next hotel. road madness has descended… buck blindfolds eric with a seatbelt, alphi kicks buck’s seat repeatedly. bowie plays on but does nothing much to tame the beasts… brady and i make mush faces at each other and then pretend to throw up, roo drives, staring through bug encrusted windows driving us closer to our venue for tonight. “has anyone been keeping track of our mileage since we left home?” silence answers that question… “does a SHIT-TON qualify?” buck says absorbed unblinking behind his iggy pop biography… we arrive in boulder… the fox theater creeps up… ‘THE MUTAYTOR’ big and huge on the marquee and a photo of mine of the band in the window… another temporary home of which to rock… we all jump out and make busy the toiling… i run to the front and snap away before the raindrops get any more funny ideas…