Week two on the road with The Dollyrots!
Tuesday, May 25th, 2010 by Dollyrots
Greetings from the road with The Dollyrots and their rad jeans, both progressively getting dirtier and traveling throughout North America with Buzzcocks! We left you last week at the very start of our French Canadian adventure. The past seven days were amazing and included the first leg of Canadian dates on the tour in both Montreal and Toronto. Got across the border and had the van searched but the only thing found of note was a creepy bunny head mask and some whisky. The whisky wasn’t a problem and was consumed that night in Montreal. Montreal’s a cool city with lots of French-speakers and after-show late night restaurants serving Poutine, which everyone should try at least once in their life and consists of french fries covered in whatever goodness you can imagine. After a moxie filled show, during which Kelly attempted to speak to the crowd in French, we drank some “rocket fuel” (what Buzzcocks call champagne) and headed out in search of a place that offered vegan poutine. We were so excited we forgot to take a photo so here’s someone else’s poutine. Artery clogging but absolutely delicious. Here’s the place to go!
Montreal Rock!
Followed by poutine!
After Montreal we hit Toronto, which felt like a pretty normal big city, maybe a little NYC style. The show was HUGE and we got to meet some long-time Dollyrots fans in person finally! After rocking Toronto we got up early in the morning, hit Tim Hortons (kind of like Canada’s version of Dunkin Donuts), and drove to Niagara Falls before the U.S. Border Crossing! It was huge, damp, beautiful and full of lots of international tourists. It’s common knowledge that the Canadian side of the Falls is more impressive, and from what we saw that totally seems like the case. Basically, the Canadian side gets an incredible view of misty, enormous cascades of water while the U.S. side gets a sideways view of the Falls and direct view of an eyesore-inducing Vegas-style Marriot. Our jeans absorbed some sweet Niagara mist and we continued on into the U.S., where Cleveland met us with open arms. Cleveland rocks, period. Although there’s a heat wave tearing through the Midwest right now and that definitely had it’s effects on things. I swear the Cleveland, Detroit, and Chicago shows ranked in Top 5 in terms of sweatiest Dollyrots shows ever.
Luis and Fuzzy our merch girl at Niagara Falls!
We’ve never played Detroit before and St. Andrew’s Hall is an amazing old venue that used to be a giant cathedral and retains a creepily awesome energy. We probably lost 10 pounds of water weight because St Andrew’s doesn’t have A/C. It was a warm one and so far, sorry Boston, it was the BEST crowd yet! Kelly filmed a lot of the Buzzcocks set from the pit which was a damp and happy mass of humanity. We had to load out across a busy street at the end of the night, and a cool older guy named Papa Smurf appeared out of nowhere, gave us magic beads, and stopped traffic to let us across with our amps. He mentioned some bands we knew and we’ve since confirmed they all have magic beads from him too.
Chris and Papa Smurf
Chicago was super intense, with a sold-out room at the Double Door resulting in stage temperatures that made us soak through our jeans. Literally felt like I had jumped into a lake (actually, jumping into a lake afterwards would’ve been pretty awesome, but I digress). Rocked the white pants only reserved for special shows and moved on to Minneapolis, the only city we name-drop on the new album and a place we love dearly. The city is home to the coolest, crusty, courier-style stinky punks and we really dig it. We were met with open arms by good friends and given leftover bottles of wine at the end of the night by Buzzcocks after they decided they were sticking with champagne. After a week like this I’m not sure how but we did it again. It was an amazing rock show. Sometimes I think I’m just going to be too tired to do it but one it’s time it always happens. That’s what makes rock n roll so addictive. I don’t think we can live without it.
On our way to Canada for the second leg now! Far enough north in North Dakota that at 10pm so sun still isn’t down. We have tonight off and will miss the rock but our bodies can really use a break. Until next week…. signing off with freshly washed jeans!
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kelly ogden
singing bass dollyrot
www.dollyrots.com
twitter.com/kellydollyrot
myspace.com/thedollyrots
or if you’re old fashioned or want to send me a postcard or treats…
The Dollyrots
636 Broadway, Ste. 1210
NY, NY 10012
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