K.C. Moan
Without question, one of the greatest things in life is the spontaneous road trip. Most of my leisure time is occupied by the same stuff that other guys my age like: beer, sports, girls, video games, junk food, and cult movies. However, I've never seen "The Fast and the Furious," never purchased an ENYCE or FUBU item of clothing, and never close-cropped my hair so that I could comb it forward in order to look like a Roman sex slave. The primary reason for my abhorrence for the cultural miasma relentlessly promoted by MTV is based on a simple factor, that being my taste in music.
I know what you're thinking: "Oh, no, here comes some sanctimonious crap about the glory of hippie music." I would never preach that you should or shouldn't like hippie music. In fact, I almost completely disagree with the political leanings and social aspects of the hippie scene. However, I have a deep appreciation for jamband music, and my love for it allows me to ignore the peripheral things I don't care for. My love of rock is deep-rooted. My parents dragged us to Beach Boys and Rolling Stones concerts when we were little. I asked for and received the Zeppelin box set for my eighth grade graduation. I know just about everything there is to know about the Dead. Rap, on the other hand, is all but lost on me. I don't like the inorganic process of making rap music, that being: Write some lyrics; produce a synthesized beat; get a bunch of friends to recite some of their own lyrics; and overlay a bunch of silly sound effects, such as guns ablazing and women screaming out in insincere sexual ecstacy. Because of the intensely produced foundation underlying rap, I've heard that live rap really blows, and I wouldn't be surprised if this were true, not that I have any desire to find out for myself. As far as I'm concerned, spontaneity on stage is magic, and for that reason I prefer live music above all else.
The biggest problem with loving live music is the fact that I often find myself traveling long distances to get my fill of my favorite jamband, Widespread Panic. Fortunately, being a true road warrior by virtue of my job, I am very easily goaded into joining the live muisc caravan, so long as I've got compatriots for the journey. The length of the ride is of little concern to me, though I have a standing cap of 300 miles round-trip. This year, however, I decided to break my distance rule.
Widespread released a new album just a couple weeks ago, and a little voice in my head urged me to go to the tour opener in Kansas City. I didn't tell anyone that I was thinking about making the trip, lest it appear that I was inventing new ways to fuck around. Thankfully, Seamus called me on Monday night and asked with a slightly insane chuckle if I wanted to go. I was sitting on a stool behind the counter in the clubhouse at the time, and I glanced out the window at the broad green expanse of golf course before me. I hesitated for a split second. A K.C. trip would entail driving all day Wednesday, arriving just a couple hours before the show, crashing briefly, and driving all day Thursday. I thought about it for about two seconds. What was I going to say? Game on.
Unlike some of my regular tour buddies, I never cut and run without a word. I always tell at least one member of my family as to my destination, in case a medical or business emergency should arise. Usually, I tell my brother about my plans unless he is with me, in which case we tell my mom. My brother is, however, currently still in Europe, and I couldn't very well tell my mom (who is also technically, if not really practically, my boss) that I was ditching work for two days to go to a concert. So, my littlest sister became the information-keeper in this instance. She was stunned when I told her about the trip; you would think that I had just told her, "I joined the Marines" or "I'm going to Vegas to get married." I don't know why she was so taken back by my plan, but then I realized something vitally important: It simply never dawned on her that I go on Panic road trips three or four times every year. She knows I see ten or twelve shows per year, but she'd never before thought about the necessity of travel in order to do so -- a sure sign of my effectiveness as the ultimate spontaneous road tripper.
On Wednesday afternoon Seamus called and said he was sleeping over so we could hit the road early the next morning. I made it back from Wisco pretty late, at around 10:30, and he was already passed out on the couch. My television set was tuned to the end of the NBA Finals, and Shaq and Wade were hugging Pat Riley. I threw two shirts and a few packs of cigaretes into my backpack, ate some chips and salsa, played around on the computer, and read for a while, finally turning off my bedside light at 1:30. I set my dual alarms for 7:00 and 7:30.
At 5:40, Seamus stormed out of the bathroom and began screaming at me to wake up. "Oh, man," I thought, "I never thought we'd leave this early." I stumbled out of bed and into my computer chair whereupon I had a smoke. I told Seamus I was sorry for being so late in getting home, that I'd hoped to get dinner and hang out, but he reassured me that it wasn't a problem. He rollerbladed to my place early in the evening, ordered a pizza for dinner, and met the Wej at Pippin's for a few drinks. I scratched my head and looked out the window. The sky was eerily purple, and sheets of light rain sprinkled the city. The drizzle made me feel somewhat less guilty about ditching the course for a couple days; the forecast was for rain most of the next two days, so I probably wouldn't have gone to work anyway. I stretched, showered, and finished packing. We went to Starbucks and hit the road at 6:40.
Seamus wanted to drive, which was fine by me. I drive about a hundred miles a day, so I was happy to play navigator. After all, when we're out on the road, it ceases to be my car and becomes the tour's car -- everyone is responsible. It should be said that we always take my car because I have a Jeep, and the large cabin space allows one to stretch out thereby diminishing clausterphobic sensations. Maybe it was because it was so early, or maybe it was due to pure instinct, but we headed north on the Kennedy away from the city. As we battled through traffic and approached the Kimball exit, I thought it might be a good time to look at the directions Seamus had printed up the day before. "Shit!" I exclaimed. "We were supposed to go south!" All the color drained from Seamus' face; he stammered nothing in particular. It had taken us nearly thirty minutes to get that far, and as the morning rush steadily increased into a solid jam, the fight back down to my house would consume at least an additional forty-five minutes. I sprang into action, diving into the backseat for my Rand-McNally road atlas. That thing is the best $20 I ever spent, by the way. If you don't have one, buy one now -- you'll definitely need it one day. I flipped to Illinois and quickly realized that our "mistake" actually turned out to be a godsend, for the MapQuest instructions would have dragged us into the thick of the Dan Ryan construction nightmare. Inadvertantly, we'd saved ourselves about 2 hours. Crisis averted. Traffic was pretty rough until we passed O'Hare, at which point it was mostly smooth sailing out of Chicagoland.
We cruise-controlled our way across the Great Plains at the steady pace of 85 mph. (For those of you who don't know, much of I-80, which stretches from San Francisco all the way to Jersey, has a speed limit of 75, which nearly everyone violates anyway.) Every time a car moved out of our way, Seamus pointed and remarked, "That guy must be a Nascar fan." There is not much to see in the exterior parts of Illinois but, then again, there's not much to see in the exterior parts of anywhere. As the city and suburbs fade away, one finds oneself surrounded on all sides by farmland as far as the eye can see, punctuated by an occasional farmhouse or truck stop. If you've ever driven between European cities, you'll know that there isn't such a thing as "the country" over there. I've heard stories about Europeans who come to America just to drive out into the vastness of it, to see what miles and miles of openness looks like. It is too easy to take it for granted, this thing we call "the country," because it seems so pervasive and bleak. But there is great beauty rusted metal barns, row after row of straight soy plants, and low feed corn swaying in the wind. Some might find these miles of flatness boring, but I am fascinated by them. If nothing else, it represents the reality that our country can keep growing ad infinitum. Unlike other large industrial nations, most of our land is arable. We are not burdened with rocky islands like Japan; treacherous mountain terrain like China; or a frozen desert like Russia. Our overall temperate flatness might, in fact, be our greatest natural resource. Is it so ridiculous to presume that in 200 years, Dubuque might be considered a suburb of Chicago? Socio-economic ponderings flooded my brain as we rode across the expanses of western Illinois.
After a few hours, at around 10, we crossed the bridge over the Mississippi. The most striking thing about the Mississippi is that, for all its fame, it is not really a big river. The Hudson, for example, seems about three times wider than the Mississippi. (Maybe not? This is just a personal observation.) The Mississippi is famous for, first, its muddy character and, mostly, its extreme length, which as a characteristic is impossible to grasp from a terrestrial vehicle. Seamus and I made a few jokes about Old Man River and recited lines from our favorite movies. I told him about State Department Boy's 30th birthday revelries. We stared out the window at the nothing that is something.
After passing through Davenport, we pulled up to the mightiest of road trip must-stops: The Iowa 80. Spanning several acres, the oasis is rumored to be the world's largest truck stop, and I wouldn't doubt it. I can't imagine anyone being crazy enough to build a truck stop bigger th
an three airplane hangars. We went in and wandered around a little. Most of the space was empty, though there was a large country store, a massive selection of tractor-trailer accessories, the Trucker's Hall of Fame, and a huge array of police, fire department, and military patches. Seamus went to one of the fast food places to get lunch. I found two (surprisingly, only two) beer koozies, each bearing a drawing of a motorcycle. The purple one read "Freedom Machine;" the green one read "Panhead Country." (I don't really know what a panhead is. Who cares? It sounded a bit like "Panichead," at any rate.) We jumped back in the car and continued to barrel across Iowa.
I hit a physical and mental wall at the five hour mark, as I suddenly discovered myself to be completely, crippingly sick of sitting in the car. This mood only lasted only an hour, though, after which point I felt like I keep on trucking forever. I told Seamus my five-one-infinity theory, and he agreed, adding that he couldn't wait to get to K.C. nonetheless. We stopped at the Iowa-Missouri border to gas up and buy beers for the pre-show tailgate. I asked Seamus, "Are we in Missouri yet?" Some local chimed in, "That dare road dare is da Missoura lahn." I took a picture of the desolate dirt road that is the border, because it was a funny, strange road trip moment.
It was impossible not to notice that as we crossed into Missouri, the highway became excessively bumpy and crappy. Without question, we were in the South. We bumped and sped along the interstate, evetually passing Terrible's Casino whose sign read, "RV Lots and Camping Available." We discussed the freaks that must drive their campers to the casino in the middle of nowhere Missouri, and debated whether or not people in the middle of nowhere know how bad the middle of nowhere truly sucks. I grabbed the atlas to check our progress. I spent a couple of hours looking through the atlas, because I'm a big fan of maps. I plotted out routes for, among other things, Logan Airport to my sister's school, and Father of Jackson's house to Manhattan.
At long last, after about eight hours or at about 3, we made our way through the northern environs of K.C., past the airport and theme parks, and toward downtown. We got lost on the interstate through the city, it being full of exits labeled 2a, 2b, 2c, and so on until about 2h, which were spread out over three miles. Annoying. We grew tired of waiting for our exit and turned off into downtown, figuring we could find our way through a numbered grid downtown with ease. Though it is a smallish city, we somehow managed to run headlong into the only major traffic snare they've probably had in years. Sprint is building an enormous call center and corporate office right in the middle of downtown, which involves the blocking off and dredging out of about six city blocks. It was a big take. We eventually got around the massive hole in the ground and continued heading south.
We drove past the hotel and decided to get some food before checking in. By chance, we passed Gates, which Bill said is the best fast-food barbeque in the midwest. We parked and went in, and though it smelled really good, we decided to get take out. I ordered a barbeque beef sandwich; Seamus got enough ribs to kill a t-rex, as well as some seasoning and sauce to take home. Seamus went to the bathroom, leaving me standing there with the three bags of food. A deranged-looking old man approached me. He was wearing a shirt that said "I (heart) KC." He asked me if I'd told him about his car's lights being left on; I told him I had no idea what he was talking about. He kept talking nonsense, and finally Seamus came out and we left. I said, "That old guy was freakin' nuts!" Seamus said, "You love K.C., but does K.C. love you?" It became our micro-tour mantra. We jumped back into the car and headed back toward the hotel.
We pulled up to a high-rise Marriott, gathered up our things -- including the food and beer -- and went into the lobby. Seamus said, "Hi, I'd like to check in." The lady behind the check-in counter asked, "Do you have a reservation?" Seamus paused, then replied, "No." I don't know why I didn't slam him the face with the bags of barbeque, but I definitely wanted to. The asshole had driven us 530 miles to no particular destination. Great. It's not like we were in Milwaukee or Indy or Madison, where we could just drive home after the show. We were stuck out there, way far away from home, and the news got worse. The woman made a couple of calls and had no luck. She said there was a big convention in town, apparently of ample enough size to fill every available hotel room. She suggested that we try another one of their locations in a different part of town, further from the convention center.
We dragged all of our shit back outside, and the valet looked at us like we were nuts. Once the doors were closed, I exploded. "Fucker! I NEVER would have driven all the way out here without a fucking hotel reservation! I mean, I would have gladly paid for it! Why didn't you make a fucking reservation Monday! Fuck!" He said, "I accept full responsibility for this," as though the predicament could possibly be the fault of anyone else. The way he figured it, on our last roadtrip to Minneapolis, we appeared at a hotel and got a room. I screamed, "That was November! ("October," he corrected me.) No one travels in the fall! When do people travel?! June, July, and August, motherfucker!" We drove around in silence for a long, long time, going in and out of hotels, invariably getting the gas face.
Eventually we pulled up to a nice hotel in the middle of the yuppie section of town, and Seamus walked into the lobby. He ran back out a couple seconds later and said, "They have a room for us. You go in and pay. I'll park the car." So I gathered all of my crap again and walked in. Sure enough, suddenly, somehow, the room had become unavailable. I exclaimed, " What?! How is that possible? ! Are you giving these rooms away for free? ! How did you lose it in thirty seconds?!" They looked around at each other sheepishly, and I resigned myself to the fact that I would never get the full story of what really happened. One of the women behind the counter had a sheet with a list of area hotels and their phone numbers and suggested that I start calling around. "Listen, we're here from Chicago, and this is our first time here. We're going to the Starlight Theatre in Swope Park. Could you just circle three or four places close to the venue?" It seemed like a pretty straightforward question, but apparently, the woman was totally confounded. Literally, she had no idea what I was talking about. I might as well have said, "Explain moral relativism in fifty words or less." This was my first, but hardly my last, experience of K.C. denizens' utter lack of knowledge of their city's geography.
I got back into the car, enraged. "Fuck!" I screamed, "Fuck fuck fuck!" For whatever reason, Seamus decided this would be a good time to call his brother, as though he could do anything to resolve the problem. Seamus handed me the phone, and I said, "Why the hell are you dragging him into this mess? Look, here's a list of hotels. Let's just start calling them." After several unsuccessful inquiries, Seamus finally got a bite at the Day's Inn on the south side of town. As an added bonus, we deduced from the map that it was located within 5 minutes of the Starlight. Seamus told me to find the address on the map, which I pointed out was a complete impossibility given my lack of familiarity with the town, but at least now my hostility waned and we were engaging in adult exchanges.
I called the hotel again and said to the manager, "We're at (the intersetction of two major streets, I can't remember which). How do we get to your hotel from here?" Silence. Then he repeated the address. "Sir," I said calmly, "I'm from out of town. The address isn't helpful. Can't you give me some better directions?" He said, and I'm not kidding, "We're right near the big Wal-Mart." I told him he was a fuckhead and hung up. We finally found the street and started driving. We suddenly found ourselves in K.C., Missouri. Amazingly, neither of us made any "We're not in Kansas anymore" or any other Wizard of Oz references, because we were too pissed off to joke around. After turning around and driving west for about twenty minutes, Seamus pulled into a gas station and asked the attendant for directions. The guy told him, "Keep going that way. There's stuff over there." Well, what the hell does that mean? I'm sure there's stuff over there -- there's stuff over EVERYWHERE. But where, you fucking urban hillbilly, is THIS FUCKING ADDRESS? No one seemed to know.
So we kept going in the general direction we thought we ought to be, and we approached a big-box shopping area. I made Seamus pull over and call the hotel again. Suddenly, the guy turned into Christopher Columbus. Two left turns and we'd be there. Nice. We finally pulled into the Day's Inn which was, not surprisingly, a total craphole alongside the highway. Seamus went inside to check in, and returned a couple of minutes later with our room key. We drove around to the back of the building and approached our room. We looked into the window and, to our horror, noticed that the room looked like a bomb had hit it -- one bed was missing, the other was uncovered, the air conditioning unit was on the floor, and cans of paint and canvases littered every flat surface. Seamus sprang into action, drove back to the front desk to sort things out, and came back to pick me up. I passed his sojourn by checking out the pool, abyss of activity that it was, thinking that a post-show dip might be in order, especially if we could lure some hot hippie girls to join us.
We passed through the lobby and went into our furnished room, whereupon we plopped down and tore into our dinner, which by that point was completely cold and nasty. Temperature issues aside, neither of us was overly impressed with the flavor. "Twin Anchors is much better," Seamus said between unsatisfactory bites. My beef sandwich was excessively fatty, and there's nothing that skeeves me out like fatty meat. I focused my attention on my fries, cole slaw, and barbeque beans. We finished eating in under five minutes and headed back through the lobby. When Seamus checked in, the guy at the reception desk promised to get him directions to the theater. Wrong-o. The guy was an Indian who had clearly just immigrated here a couple of weeks ago at most, which would explain his inability to give us proper directions. He didn't even have a clue as to which highway we were looking at through the glass doors. Fortunately, at that very moment, the maintenence man appeared. He was a strung-out-looking black guy, and he knew where to go, sort of. "Take a left up here, and then take a right on the twisty road. Then you take two lefts, and you'll be there." What? Seamus disengaged and made the Hindu print out Mapquest directions. I inquired of the black guy, "What's the street called?" The guy said, "I have no idea." No one in K.C. knows how to get around K.C. It's remarkably irritating.
We went back out to the car; I decided to drive. Seamus suggested we follow the Mapquest route; I complied. Unfortunately, we discovered that the road we were supposed to take was a completely dug up mess. Where once was a road was now a massive trail of dirt, which illicited me to comment, "Where's the General Lee when you need it?" We turned the car around and I opted to follow the crackhead's directions which, crack-headed and incomplete though they were, turned out to be correct. We followed the signs through a winding forest way, and followed a pack of fellow Panicheads into the parking lot.
Swope is pretty nice for an urban park. There are massive, twenty-foot-tall brick and iron entrances into the complex, which includes the city's zoo as well as the Starlight Theatre. The grounds are sparsely populated with trees with little undergrowth, not to mention verandas and other small structures. Mostly, it is an expanse of hilly, bare land. We noticed right away that we were in the smallest parking lot, practically right on top of the theater. We opened the doors and the back gate, and blasted one of my favorite Panic shows, 04/27/99 Jacksonville. Because of the hotel incident, we had merely an hour (rather than three or four) to pre-game for the show, and pre-game for the show we did. It was blazing hot, about 95 degrees, which fueled our drinking to an unnecessary degree. After a near-miss with security, in which I cannot belive Seamus did not get busted, we sailed into the venue, very buzzed and sweaty.
Upon entering the gates, we were struck by the sheer beauty of the Starlight. It is quite tall for a theater structure, in the range of eight or ten stories. There are square turrets to the sides wi
th boarded windows, and four levels of scaffolding and large boarded doors extending above the stage. We learned from one of the locals that it was modeled on Shakespeare's Globe in London, which I hadn't noticed until he mentioned it. The guy also said Panic is one of few rock bands to book the Starlight, as it is usually the staging grounds for orchestras, plays, and the like. We learned from a different guy in line that the Sandstone Amphitheater in Bonner Springs is such a terrible venue that the locals refer to it as "The Suckstone." Interesting. We soon discovered that the Starlight serves Miller Lite (yea!) and that this would likely spell the end of our hopes for going out after the show (boo!). Before the music began, we pounded many beers and drunk-dialed many people, including Page, Proehl, and others. We were pretty drunk, the sun was still ablaze, and the show hadn't even started yet. To say that our spirits peaked at that moment would be an understatement. I had a feeling that, in spite of everything else, this was going to be one finest shows I'd ever heard, and I was right.
The setlist was awesome. The sound was awesome. The setting was awesome. Everything was awesome. We ourselves were awesome. At some point though, I stopped being awesome and became shitfaced beyond description. My personal demise arose during the setbreak, when Seamus went to the bathroom and I pounded two beers while talking to a random girl in line. I knew it was a bad idea to drink so much on such a hot day, but I go along with bad ideas all the time. We had a couple more before the show resumed, and Seamus made me drink some water. There was a woman standing in front of us with a large gaggle of dirty hippie kids running all over the place. Seamus hates dirty little hippie kids, so he approached the woman to give her the business. "Do you really think it's a good idea to bring children here?" he asked. "Why not?" she said. He looked at her with disgust and pointed at a tall figure wearing pants and long dark hair, and said, "Well, can't you get your husband over there to corral them or something?" The woman looked at him with a look of horror on her face and said, "That isn't my husband; that's my teenage daughter!" Seamus exclaimed, "Well, then, you're all fucked!" and walked away. It's a miracle no one has ever punched him out.
As the second set started, I realized that I had achieved a state of utter, no-turning-back wasted. We were standing on a grassy lawn to the side of the seating area. I turned around and saw two plastic deck chairs sitting unoccupied behind us. I dragged them over and we sat down. No one said anything, and it was awesome. Then, as the skies grew dark, my thoughts grew dark, and I fought the battle to keep control over my innards. Seamus left me alone and, more importantly, kept other people far away from me. I was just floating along, lost in a swirl of booze and grooves, dreaming of the cartoons for the lyrics I was hearing, drifting in and out of consciousness, unable to form words or coherent thoughts, and not wanting to do anything but just be there, listening to Panic, enjoying the warmth of a clear summer night. Seamus bought me a beer at last call. I couldn't even look at it.
The second encore cued our departure. "Fishwater" can sometimes drag on forever, and though it is a crowd favorite, it is not an overly strong tune in my opinion. We ran out to the parking lot in a frantic search of food. There was lots of water and beer available, but no grub. Seamus and I somehow got split up, but we met back at the car a few minutes later. I found him talking to the people parked next to us, but I interrupted and told him to get me the fuck home. We made our way out of the park and quickly found a McDonald's. How we got home from there, I'll never know. That miracle served as further proof that the Force is real when it comes to figuring out directions. Next thing I knew, I was laying in bed, eating a Quarter Pounder, and watching SportsCenter. Fantastic. I passed out.
I awoke at 4:45 with an unshakable, splitting headache. I tossed and turned, slammed my head into the pillow, swore out loud, and grimaced. Nothing I did would ease the pain. I finally decided to go into the bathroom and pull the trigger. I pounded several cups of warm water and let 'er rip. Gallons of puke flowed forth, and I could not help myself from unleashing the wild puke scream. I heard rustling from within the room; my moaning stirred Seamus from his sleep, though he knew better than to interrupt me. After about fifteen minutes of heavy puking, during which I wondered if I would have the physical strength to endure the drive home, I took a deep breath of putrid vomit-scented air and dug in for one last big push. To my horror, the last batch consisted of ample amounts of a deep blood-red liquid. I leaned back against the bathtub and thought to myself, "Now you've done it -- you burst vessels in some vital organ, and now you're going to die of internal bleeding, you self-abusive dickhead." Then, through the searing pain in my forehead, I remembered the rancid red barbeque beans from Gates and breathed a small sigh of relief. I cleaned myself off and crawled back into bed, and immediately passed out.
Miraculously, I felt perfectly refreshed when the alarm sounded off at 10. Seamus got us out of town as quickly as possible while a light rain fell over K.C. We pulled over after 100 miles and got breakfast at a little diner in the middle of nowhere. We read the St. Joe's and K.C. dailies, and I was amused to learn that the K.C. Star's cover columnist hadn't bothered going to Kaufmann Stadium in over a year. Back in the car, we found the world's worst baseball game on the radio, that being the finale of the Pirates-Royals series. Not only was the start delayed due to rain, but it was also interminably bad baseball. We'd considered making an appearance at the game before heading back home but were ultimately happy to listen for as long as possible. Just as the game's broadcast signal f
aded, the big Chicago stations kicked in, and we listened to Jim Rome and the guys on the Score make fun of the pathetic effort by the U.S. team in the Global Supporter. The drive home was principally uneventful; we simply followed the signs back to Chicago. When we re-crossed the Mississippi, I was struck by the sad finality of the fact that our abbreviated trip was coming to an end. On our approach to the city, we took the northbound Tollroad to avoid rush hour, having arrived in the southwestern suburbs at around 7. I dropped Seamus off at his parents' house, grabbed a burger to-go at Steak 'n' Shake, briefly stopped back at Seamus' to give him his forgotten cell phone, and pulled up to my parents' house at 8:30. I decompressed in front of the flat screen for a couple hours, savoring the punch-drunk state of half-sleep, half-ecstasy that follows every successful road trip.
My mom walked into the den and asked how my week was going, and I replied, "Everything's been great except for the K.C. moan."
I know what you're thinking: "Oh, no, here comes some sanctimonious crap about the glory of hippie music." I would never preach that you should or shouldn't like hippie music. In fact, I almost completely disagree with the political leanings and social aspects of the hippie scene. However, I have a deep appreciation for jamband music, and my love for it allows me to ignore the peripheral things I don't care for. My love of rock is deep-rooted. My parents dragged us to Beach Boys and Rolling Stones concerts when we were little. I asked for and received the Zeppelin box set for my eighth grade graduation. I know just about everything there is to know about the Dead. Rap, on the other hand, is all but lost on me. I don't like the inorganic process of making rap music, that being: Write some lyrics; produce a synthesized beat; get a bunch of friends to recite some of their own lyrics; and overlay a bunch of silly sound effects, such as guns ablazing and women screaming out in insincere sexual ecstacy. Because of the intensely produced foundation underlying rap, I've heard that live rap really blows, and I wouldn't be surprised if this were true, not that I have any desire to find out for myself. As far as I'm concerned, spontaneity on stage is magic, and for that reason I prefer live music above all else.
The biggest problem with loving live music is the fact that I often find myself traveling long distances to get my fill of my favorite jamband, Widespread Panic. Fortunately, being a true road warrior by virtue of my job, I am very easily goaded into joining the live muisc caravan, so long as I've got compatriots for the journey. The length of the ride is of little concern to me, though I have a standing cap of 300 miles round-trip. This year, however, I decided to break my distance rule.
Widespread released a new album just a couple weeks ago, and a little voice in my head urged me to go to the tour opener in Kansas City. I didn't tell anyone that I was thinking about making the trip, lest it appear that I was inventing new ways to fuck around. Thankfully, Seamus called me on Monday night and asked with a slightly insane chuckle if I wanted to go. I was sitting on a stool behind the counter in the clubhouse at the time, and I glanced out the window at the broad green expanse of golf course before me. I hesitated for a split second. A K.C. trip would entail driving all day Wednesday, arriving just a couple hours before the show, crashing briefly, and driving all day Thursday. I thought about it for about two seconds. What was I going to say? Game on.
Unlike some of my regular tour buddies, I never cut and run without a word. I always tell at least one member of my family as to my destination, in case a medical or business emergency should arise. Usually, I tell my brother about my plans unless he is with me, in which case we tell my mom. My brother is, however, currently still in Europe, and I couldn't very well tell my mom (who is also technically, if not really practically, my boss) that I was ditching work for two days to go to a concert. So, my littlest sister became the information-keeper in this instance. She was stunned when I told her about the trip; you would think that I had just told her, "I joined the Marines" or "I'm going to Vegas to get married." I don't know why she was so taken back by my plan, but then I realized something vitally important: It simply never dawned on her that I go on Panic road trips three or four times every year. She knows I see ten or twelve shows per year, but she'd never before thought about the necessity of travel in order to do so -- a sure sign of my effectiveness as the ultimate spontaneous road tripper.
On Wednesday afternoon Seamus called and said he was sleeping over so we could hit the road early the next morning. I made it back from Wisco pretty late, at around 10:30, and he was already passed out on the couch. My television set was tuned to the end of the NBA Finals, and Shaq and Wade were hugging Pat Riley. I threw two shirts and a few packs of cigaretes into my backpack, ate some chips and salsa, played around on the computer, and read for a while, finally turning off my bedside light at 1:30. I set my dual alarms for 7:00 and 7:30.
At 5:40, Seamus stormed out of the bathroom and began screaming at me to wake up. "Oh, man," I thought, "I never thought we'd leave this early." I stumbled out of bed and into my computer chair whereupon I had a smoke. I told Seamus I was sorry for being so late in getting home, that I'd hoped to get dinner and hang out, but he reassured me that it wasn't a problem. He rollerbladed to my place early in the evening, ordered a pizza for dinner, and met the Wej at Pippin's for a few drinks. I scratched my head and looked out the window. The sky was eerily purple, and sheets of light rain sprinkled the city. The drizzle made me feel somewhat less guilty about ditching the course for a couple days; the forecast was for rain most of the next two days, so I probably wouldn't have gone to work anyway. I stretched, showered, and finished packing. We went to Starbucks and hit the road at 6:40.
Seamus wanted to drive, which was fine by me. I drive about a hundred miles a day, so I was happy to play navigator. After all, when we're out on the road, it ceases to be my car and becomes the tour's car -- everyone is responsible. It should be said that we always take my car because I have a Jeep, and the large cabin space allows one to stretch out thereby diminishing clausterphobic sensations. Maybe it was because it was so early, or maybe it was due to pure instinct, but we headed north on the Kennedy away from the city. As we battled through traffic and approached the Kimball exit, I thought it might be a good time to look at the directions Seamus had printed up the day before. "Shit!" I exclaimed. "We were supposed to go south!" All the color drained from Seamus' face; he stammered nothing in particular. It had taken us nearly thirty minutes to get that far, and as the morning rush steadily increased into a solid jam, the fight back down to my house would consume at least an additional forty-five minutes. I sprang into action, diving into the backseat for my Rand-McNally road atlas. That thing is the best $20 I ever spent, by the way. If you don't have one, buy one now -- you'll definitely need it one day. I flipped to Illinois and quickly realized that our "mistake" actually turned out to be a godsend, for the MapQuest instructions would have dragged us into the thick of the Dan Ryan construction nightmare. Inadvertantly, we'd saved ourselves about 2 hours. Crisis averted. Traffic was pretty rough until we passed O'Hare, at which point it was mostly smooth sailing out of Chicagoland.
We cruise-controlled our way across the Great Plains at the steady pace of 85 mph. (For those of you who don't know, much of I-80, which stretches from San Francisco all the way to Jersey, has a speed limit of 75, which nearly everyone violates anyway.) Every time a car moved out of our way, Seamus pointed and remarked, "That guy must be a Nascar fan." There is not much to see in the exterior parts of Illinois but, then again, there's not much to see in the exterior parts of anywhere. As the city and suburbs fade away, one finds oneself surrounded on all sides by farmland as far as the eye can see, punctuated by an occasional farmhouse or truck stop. If you've ever driven between European cities, you'll know that there isn't such a thing as "the country" over there. I've heard stories about Europeans who come to America just to drive out into the vastness of it, to see what miles and miles of openness looks like. It is too easy to take it for granted, this thing we call "the country," because it seems so pervasive and bleak. But there is great beauty rusted metal barns, row after row of straight soy plants, and low feed corn swaying in the wind. Some might find these miles of flatness boring, but I am fascinated by them. If nothing else, it represents the reality that our country can keep growing ad infinitum. Unlike other large industrial nations, most of our land is arable. We are not burdened with rocky islands like Japan; treacherous mountain terrain like China; or a frozen desert like Russia. Our overall temperate flatness might, in fact, be our greatest natural resource. Is it so ridiculous to presume that in 200 years, Dubuque might be considered a suburb of Chicago? Socio-economic ponderings flooded my brain as we rode across the expanses of western Illinois.
After a few hours, at around 10, we crossed the bridge over the Mississippi. The most striking thing about the Mississippi is that, for all its fame, it is not really a big river. The Hudson, for example, seems about three times wider than the Mississippi. (Maybe not? This is just a personal observation.) The Mississippi is famous for, first, its muddy character and, mostly, its extreme length, which as a characteristic is impossible to grasp from a terrestrial vehicle. Seamus and I made a few jokes about Old Man River and recited lines from our favorite movies. I told him about State Department Boy's 30th birthday revelries. We stared out the window at the nothing that is something.
After passing through Davenport, we pulled up to the mightiest of road trip must-stops: The Iowa 80. Spanning several acres, the oasis is rumored to be the world's largest truck stop, and I wouldn't doubt it. I can't imagine anyone being crazy enough to build a truck stop bigger th
an three airplane hangars. We went in and wandered around a little. Most of the space was empty, though there was a large country store, a massive selection of tractor-trailer accessories, the Trucker's Hall of Fame, and a huge array of police, fire department, and military patches. Seamus went to one of the fast food places to get lunch. I found two (surprisingly, only two) beer koozies, each bearing a drawing of a motorcycle. The purple one read "Freedom Machine;" the green one read "Panhead Country." (I don't really know what a panhead is. Who cares? It sounded a bit like "Panichead," at any rate.) We jumped back in the car and continued to barrel across Iowa.I hit a physical and mental wall at the five hour mark, as I suddenly discovered myself to be completely, crippingly sick of sitting in the car. This mood only lasted only an hour, though, after which point I felt like I keep on trucking forever. I told Seamus my five-one-infinity theory, and he agreed, adding that he couldn't wait to get to K.C. nonetheless. We stopped at the Iowa-Missouri border to gas up and buy beers for the pre-show tailgate. I asked Seamus, "Are we in Missouri yet?" Some local chimed in, "That dare road dare is da Missoura lahn." I took a picture of the desolate dirt road that is the border, because it was a funny, strange road trip moment.
It was impossible not to notice that as we crossed into Missouri, the highway became excessively bumpy and crappy. Without question, we were in the South. We bumped and sped along the interstate, evetually passing Terrible's Casino whose sign read, "RV Lots and Camping Available." We discussed the freaks that must drive their campers to the casino in the middle of nowhere Missouri, and debated whether or not people in the middle of nowhere know how bad the middle of nowhere truly sucks. I grabbed the atlas to check our progress. I spent a couple of hours looking through the atlas, because I'm a big fan of maps. I plotted out routes for, among other things, Logan Airport to my sister's school, and Father of Jackson's house to Manhattan.
At long last, after about eight hours or at about 3, we made our way through the northern environs of K.C., past the airport and theme parks, and toward downtown. We got lost on the interstate through the city, it being full of exits labeled 2a, 2b, 2c, and so on until about 2h, which were spread out over three miles. Annoying. We grew tired of waiting for our exit and turned off into downtown, figuring we could find our way through a numbered grid downtown with ease. Though it is a smallish city, we somehow managed to run headlong into the only major traffic snare they've probably had in years. Sprint is building an enormous call center and corporate office right in the middle of downtown, which involves the blocking off and dredging out of about six city blocks. It was a big take. We eventually got around the massive hole in the ground and continued heading south.
We drove past the hotel and decided to get some food before checking in. By chance, we passed Gates, which Bill said is the best fast-food barbeque in the midwest. We parked and went in, and though it smelled really good, we decided to get take out. I ordered a barbeque beef sandwich; Seamus got enough ribs to kill a t-rex, as well as some seasoning and sauce to take home. Seamus went to the bathroom, leaving me standing there with the three bags of food. A deranged-looking old man approached me. He was wearing a shirt that said "I (heart) KC." He asked me if I'd told him about his car's lights being left on; I told him I had no idea what he was talking about. He kept talking nonsense, and finally Seamus came out and we left. I said, "That old guy was freakin' nuts!" Seamus said, "You love K.C., but does K.C. love you?" It became our micro-tour mantra. We jumped back into the car and headed back toward the hotel.
We pulled up to a high-rise Marriott, gathered up our things -- including the food and beer -- and went into the lobby. Seamus said, "Hi, I'd like to check in." The lady behind the check-in counter asked, "Do you have a reservation?" Seamus paused, then replied, "No." I don't know why I didn't slam him the face with the bags of barbeque, but I definitely wanted to. The asshole had driven us 530 miles to no particular destination. Great. It's not like we were in Milwaukee or Indy or Madison, where we could just drive home after the show. We were stuck out there, way far away from home, and the news got worse. The woman made a couple of calls and had no luck. She said there was a big convention in town, apparently of ample enough size to fill every available hotel room. She suggested that we try another one of their locations in a different part of town, further from the convention center.
We dragged all of our shit back outside, and the valet looked at us like we were nuts. Once the doors were closed, I exploded. "Fucker! I NEVER would have driven all the way out here without a fucking hotel reservation! I mean, I would have gladly paid for it! Why didn't you make a fucking reservation Monday! Fuck!" He said, "I accept full responsibility for this," as though the predicament could possibly be the fault of anyone else. The way he figured it, on our last roadtrip to Minneapolis, we appeared at a hotel and got a room. I screamed, "That was November! ("October," he corrected me.) No one travels in the fall! When do people travel?! June, July, and August, motherfucker!" We drove around in silence for a long, long time, going in and out of hotels, invariably getting the gas face.
Eventually we pulled up to a nice hotel in the middle of the yuppie section of town, and Seamus walked into the lobby. He ran back out a couple seconds later and said, "They have a room for us. You go in and pay. I'll park the car." So I gathered all of my crap again and walked in. Sure enough, suddenly, somehow, the room had become unavailable. I exclaimed, " What?! How is that possible? ! Are you giving these rooms away for free? ! How did you lose it in thirty seconds?!" They looked around at each other sheepishly, and I resigned myself to the fact that I would never get the full story of what really happened. One of the women behind the counter had a sheet with a list of area hotels and their phone numbers and suggested that I start calling around. "Listen, we're here from Chicago, and this is our first time here. We're going to the Starlight Theatre in Swope Park. Could you just circle three or four places close to the venue?" It seemed like a pretty straightforward question, but apparently, the woman was totally confounded. Literally, she had no idea what I was talking about. I might as well have said, "Explain moral relativism in fifty words or less." This was my first, but hardly my last, experience of K.C. denizens' utter lack of knowledge of their city's geography.
I got back into the car, enraged. "Fuck!" I screamed, "Fuck fuck fuck!" For whatever reason, Seamus decided this would be a good time to call his brother, as though he could do anything to resolve the problem. Seamus handed me the phone, and I said, "Why the hell are you dragging him into this mess? Look, here's a list of hotels. Let's just start calling them." After several unsuccessful inquiries, Seamus finally got a bite at the Day's Inn on the south side of town. As an added bonus, we deduced from the map that it was located within 5 minutes of the Starlight. Seamus told me to find the address on the map, which I pointed out was a complete impossibility given my lack of familiarity with the town, but at least now my hostility waned and we were engaging in adult exchanges.
I called the hotel again and said to the manager, "We're at (the intersetction of two major streets, I can't remember which). How do we get to your hotel from here?" Silence. Then he repeated the address. "Sir," I said calmly, "I'm from out of town. The address isn't helpful. Can't you give me some better directions?" He said, and I'm not kidding, "We're right near the big Wal-Mart." I told him he was a fuckhead and hung up. We finally found the street and started driving. We suddenly found ourselves in K.C., Missouri. Amazingly, neither of us made any "We're not in Kansas anymore" or any other Wizard of Oz references, because we were too pissed off to joke around. After turning around and driving west for about twenty minutes, Seamus pulled into a gas station and asked the attendant for directions. The guy told him, "Keep going that way. There's stuff over there." Well, what the hell does that mean? I'm sure there's stuff over there -- there's stuff over EVERYWHERE. But where, you fucking urban hillbilly, is THIS FUCKING ADDRESS? No one seemed to know.
So we kept going in the general direction we thought we ought to be, and we approached a big-box shopping area. I made Seamus pull over and call the hotel again. Suddenly, the guy turned into Christopher Columbus. Two left turns and we'd be there. Nice. We finally pulled into the Day's Inn which was, not surprisingly, a total craphole alongside the highway. Seamus went inside to check in, and returned a couple of minutes later with our room key. We drove around to the back of the building and approached our room. We looked into the window and, to our horror, noticed that the room looked like a bomb had hit it -- one bed was missing, the other was uncovered, the air conditioning unit was on the floor, and cans of paint and canvases littered every flat surface. Seamus sprang into action, drove back to the front desk to sort things out, and came back to pick me up. I passed his sojourn by checking out the pool, abyss of activity that it was, thinking that a post-show dip might be in order, especially if we could lure some hot hippie girls to join us.
We passed through the lobby and went into our furnished room, whereupon we plopped down and tore into our dinner, which by that point was completely cold and nasty. Temperature issues aside, neither of us was overly impressed with the flavor. "Twin Anchors is much better," Seamus said between unsatisfactory bites. My beef sandwich was excessively fatty, and there's nothing that skeeves me out like fatty meat. I focused my attention on my fries, cole slaw, and barbeque beans. We finished eating in under five minutes and headed back through the lobby. When Seamus checked in, the guy at the reception desk promised to get him directions to the theater. Wrong-o. The guy was an Indian who had clearly just immigrated here a couple of weeks ago at most, which would explain his inability to give us proper directions. He didn't even have a clue as to which highway we were looking at through the glass doors. Fortunately, at that very moment, the maintenence man appeared. He was a strung-out-looking black guy, and he knew where to go, sort of. "Take a left up here, and then take a right on the twisty road. Then you take two lefts, and you'll be there." What? Seamus disengaged and made the Hindu print out Mapquest directions. I inquired of the black guy, "What's the street called?" The guy said, "I have no idea." No one in K.C. knows how to get around K.C. It's remarkably irritating.
We went back out to the car; I decided to drive. Seamus suggested we follow the Mapquest route; I complied. Unfortunately, we discovered that the road we were supposed to take was a completely dug up mess. Where once was a road was now a massive trail of dirt, which illicited me to comment, "Where's the General Lee when you need it?" We turned the car around and I opted to follow the crackhead's directions which, crack-headed and incomplete though they were, turned out to be correct. We followed the signs through a winding forest way, and followed a pack of fellow Panicheads into the parking lot.
Swope is pretty nice for an urban park. There are massive, twenty-foot-tall brick and iron entrances into the complex, which includes the city's zoo as well as the Starlight Theatre. The grounds are sparsely populated with trees with little undergrowth, not to mention verandas and other small structures. Mostly, it is an expanse of hilly, bare land. We noticed right away that we were in the smallest parking lot, practically right on top of the theater. We opened the doors and the back gate, and blasted one of my favorite Panic shows, 04/27/99 Jacksonville. Because of the hotel incident, we had merely an hour (rather than three or four) to pre-game for the show, and pre-game for the show we did. It was blazing hot, about 95 degrees, which fueled our drinking to an unnecessary degree. After a near-miss with security, in which I cannot belive Seamus did not get busted, we sailed into the venue, very buzzed and sweaty.
Upon entering the gates, we were struck by the sheer beauty of the Starlight. It is quite tall for a theater structure, in the range of eight or ten stories. There are square turrets to the sides wi
th boarded windows, and four levels of scaffolding and large boarded doors extending above the stage. We learned from one of the locals that it was modeled on Shakespeare's Globe in London, which I hadn't noticed until he mentioned it. The guy also said Panic is one of few rock bands to book the Starlight, as it is usually the staging grounds for orchestras, plays, and the like. We learned from a different guy in line that the Sandstone Amphitheater in Bonner Springs is such a terrible venue that the locals refer to it as "The Suckstone." Interesting. We soon discovered that the Starlight serves Miller Lite (yea!) and that this would likely spell the end of our hopes for going out after the show (boo!). Before the music began, we pounded many beers and drunk-dialed many people, including Page, Proehl, and others. We were pretty drunk, the sun was still ablaze, and the show hadn't even started yet. To say that our spirits peaked at that moment would be an understatement. I had a feeling that, in spite of everything else, this was going to be one finest shows I'd ever heard, and I was right.The setlist was awesome. The sound was awesome. The setting was awesome. Everything was awesome. We ourselves were awesome. At some point though, I stopped being awesome and became shitfaced beyond description. My personal demise arose during the setbreak, when Seamus went to the bathroom and I pounded two beers while talking to a random girl in line. I knew it was a bad idea to drink so much on such a hot day, but I go along with bad ideas all the time. We had a couple more before the show resumed, and Seamus made me drink some water. There was a woman standing in front of us with a large gaggle of dirty hippie kids running all over the place. Seamus hates dirty little hippie kids, so he approached the woman to give her the business. "Do you really think it's a good idea to bring children here?" he asked. "Why not?" she said. He looked at her with disgust and pointed at a tall figure wearing pants and long dark hair, and said, "Well, can't you get your husband over there to corral them or something?" The woman looked at him with a look of horror on her face and said, "That isn't my husband; that's my teenage daughter!" Seamus exclaimed, "Well, then, you're all fucked!" and walked away. It's a miracle no one has ever punched him out.
As the second set started, I realized that I had achieved a state of utter, no-turning-back wasted. We were standing on a grassy lawn to the side of the seating area. I turned around and saw two plastic deck chairs sitting unoccupied behind us. I dragged them over and we sat down. No one said anything, and it was awesome. Then, as the skies grew dark, my thoughts grew dark, and I fought the battle to keep control over my innards. Seamus left me alone and, more importantly, kept other people far away from me. I was just floating along, lost in a swirl of booze and grooves, dreaming of the cartoons for the lyrics I was hearing, drifting in and out of consciousness, unable to form words or coherent thoughts, and not wanting to do anything but just be there, listening to Panic, enjoying the warmth of a clear summer night. Seamus bought me a beer at last call. I couldn't even look at it.
The second encore cued our departure. "Fishwater" can sometimes drag on forever, and though it is a crowd favorite, it is not an overly strong tune in my opinion. We ran out to the parking lot in a frantic search of food. There was lots of water and beer available, but no grub. Seamus and I somehow got split up, but we met back at the car a few minutes later. I found him talking to the people parked next to us, but I interrupted and told him to get me the fuck home. We made our way out of the park and quickly found a McDonald's. How we got home from there, I'll never know. That miracle served as further proof that the Force is real when it comes to figuring out directions. Next thing I knew, I was laying in bed, eating a Quarter Pounder, and watching SportsCenter. Fantastic. I passed out.
I awoke at 4:45 with an unshakable, splitting headache. I tossed and turned, slammed my head into the pillow, swore out loud, and grimaced. Nothing I did would ease the pain. I finally decided to go into the bathroom and pull the trigger. I pounded several cups of warm water and let 'er rip. Gallons of puke flowed forth, and I could not help myself from unleashing the wild puke scream. I heard rustling from within the room; my moaning stirred Seamus from his sleep, though he knew better than to interrupt me. After about fifteen minutes of heavy puking, during which I wondered if I would have the physical strength to endure the drive home, I took a deep breath of putrid vomit-scented air and dug in for one last big push. To my horror, the last batch consisted of ample amounts of a deep blood-red liquid. I leaned back against the bathtub and thought to myself, "Now you've done it -- you burst vessels in some vital organ, and now you're going to die of internal bleeding, you self-abusive dickhead." Then, through the searing pain in my forehead, I remembered the rancid red barbeque beans from Gates and breathed a small sigh of relief. I cleaned myself off and crawled back into bed, and immediately passed out.
Miraculously, I felt perfectly refreshed when the alarm sounded off at 10. Seamus got us out of town as quickly as possible while a light rain fell over K.C. We pulled over after 100 miles and got breakfast at a little diner in the middle of nowhere. We read the St. Joe's and K.C. dailies, and I was amused to learn that the K.C. Star's cover columnist hadn't bothered going to Kaufmann Stadium in over a year. Back in the car, we found the world's worst baseball game on the radio, that being the finale of the Pirates-Royals series. Not only was the start delayed due to rain, but it was also interminably bad baseball. We'd considered making an appearance at the game before heading back home but were ultimately happy to listen for as long as possible. Just as the game's broadcast signal f
aded, the big Chicago stations kicked in, and we listened to Jim Rome and the guys on the Score make fun of the pathetic effort by the U.S. team in the Global Supporter. The drive home was principally uneventful; we simply followed the signs back to Chicago. When we re-crossed the Mississippi, I was struck by the sad finality of the fact that our abbreviated trip was coming to an end. On our approach to the city, we took the northbound Tollroad to avoid rush hour, having arrived in the southwestern suburbs at around 7. I dropped Seamus off at his parents' house, grabbed a burger to-go at Steak 'n' Shake, briefly stopped back at Seamus' to give him his forgotten cell phone, and pulled up to my parents' house at 8:30. I decompressed in front of the flat screen for a couple hours, savoring the punch-drunk state of half-sleep, half-ecstasy that follows every successful road trip.My mom walked into the den and asked how my week was going, and I replied, "Everything's been great except for the K.C. moan."
posted by Pat at 10:34 PM
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