Laval, Toulose, Marseille, Ljubljana, Prague, Dresden

So there is often no easily accessible wifi over here or time in which to use it; hence the lack of frequent updates. Post-Ieper we drove to Laval in France where we met up with new friends, Birds in Row, a band you will no doubt be hearing about in the next six months or so. We played in a basement(!) on a floor(!) and it felt good. Stayed with Birds' front-dude Bart at his parents' pad. The next day was a hefty 8 hour drive through the toll-happy French countryside to Toulose. It was fairly brutal, but we were happy to be greeted at the venue with delicious food and friendly French folks out for a show. Shout-out to Pablo, who shares a mutual friend with me in Sergio del Grosso from the Bronx, NY. That night we slept in another parent-pad and enjoyed the company of some French tough-guy enthusiasts. Check out their band ARKAUS if you're into that kind of thing.

The next morning began an odyssey across southern Europe: we awoke in Toulose, drove to the French Riviera where we swam in the Mediterranean at Narbonne, then hopped in the van, drove to Marseilles where we played a basement once used by the French Resistance in WWII (there was still radio equipment mounted into the wall), then we got right in the van and drove straight through to Venezia where we got our tourist on pretty hard, then back into the van to Koper, Slovenia where we swam in the wonderful Adriatic, and then, finally, into the van for a final time for a drive to Ljubljana where we played a cool squat and finally, finally got to sleep. Shout outs to my boys Lukow and Rog (maybe Rok?) and Sanja for being super accomodating and making great dinner.

The next day we awoke feeling well rested and drove through absolutely stunning surroundings to Prague where we played a really cool show and hung out pretty hard. Prague is, in fact, as beautiful as everyone says it is. Despite the group getting separated in a peak tourist location, we did manage to find one another and return, once again, to the van.

Yesterday it was a quick drive from Prague to Dresden with a short interruption by the German Border Police, but we told them to fuck off and they did. Well, not exactly, but we did escape unscathed. We were supposed to play AZ Conni, another squat, but their summer construction is not yet finished and so our brave promoter, Born, moved the show to a practice studio across town. Luckily it effected the draw not one iota and we played perhaps my favorite show of tour.

Now I head to breakfast to eat something and prepare for Leipzig tonight, Hohenstein-Ernsthal tomorrow, and then home the day after that...