Richmond, Philly & NYC

March 25th: DC:
I'm in the midst of a brief run of acoustic, solo shows this week. I played Richmond on Tuesday night at a venue I have been to now a handful of times called The Camel. Its a great venue and the staff is excellent there and treat the musicians real well. I ended up grabbing a bite there as well, their veggie-hummus wrap which was not so bad. They have a good menu and I may have choked with this order. I've been on a mild-vegetarian run of food the past few months, nearly a year I guess. By mild, I mean that I have an internal debate with myself about ordering a vegetarian meal about 50% of the time I eat. The full exceptions are if I am hungover, when its not even close to a debate. I want a burger, bacon, whatever. Steak-house, I don't consider it. But a steak-house visit is few and far between now that I no longer roll in my white collar world. So, basically if you are reading this you can chalk me up as being still in the "discovery" period of vegetarianism. I've been in that stage for a while though. I also caved and ordered a few PRB cans as well. I think the idea of the PBR can was pretty cool back in 2004. But basically, I see it everywhere now and its like beyond the point of hipster. Its basically now full blown mainstream yuppy. Its like drinking Rolling Rock in the 80s. Well, Im not positive of that as I didn't drink in the 80s. I was still just a prodigy child of course, concerned with my studies of nuclear fision and building blocks. But those people I saw drinking Rolling Rock in the 80's seemed to be the same people drinking PBR now . . .so, I guess this is what I mean.

As I was the only solo artist on the bill, I opened up the night for two other bands, Bay of Pigs and ROMA. I played 8 songs, 6 of which are real new and 5 of which I performed for the first time. The tunes aren't totally complete and I am still making edits to them, but I think they came across well and they fit within the framework of the new album I am working on. I ended up playing Underwater Stone and Dear James from Like A Lion and scraped my plan to play Headed For from the titled-track EP. Full set-list posted below. After I played my 8 song acoustic set, I was treated to Bay of Pigs which was full-blown Prog Metal. Yeah, you may be asking yourself . . how did that sound back-to-back? Well, I dont know. All I know, is the crowd there to see Bay of Pigs, before I knew what Bay of Pigs sound was, seemed to enjoy my set and was real responsive. Can't ask for more than that.

The drive down to Richmond was a total nightmare. For those who live in the DC area, you know all about the horror which is the "Mixing Bowl" . . . well it appears to me that the nightmare of traffic in DC extends essentially all the way to just inside Fredricksburg. As Rand at the Camel said, probably be better to fly to Richmond. All jokes aside, what a fucking mess it was. 2 hours, according to Google Maps, which as we all know is more like 1 hour 30 min to 1 hour 45 min, took 3 hours 15 minutes. Thank god I left early enough. I was planning on eating some food, chilling out . . yeah. Not so much.

Anyway, headed to Philly tonight to play The Fire in Fishtown (i think its in Fishtown . .at least that is what I heard . . I have no idea what Fishtown is) . . than up to NYC to play The Living Room again, a great acoustic place for a solo show. I've been to Philly twice in my life. I am in love with the idea of the city, but I really don't know it all too well. I'll keep you all posted. Its a crowded line-up tonight for sure.

The Camel: Tom McBride (solo)
March 23, 2010

Opulent Viewpoints (2nd performance)
Underwater Stone
A Brief Head Spin (1st performance)
Table for Two
Oh! The Wandering Troubadour (1st performance)
Dear James
Into the Arms of the Wild Eyed Young (1st performance)
Underneath the Sheltering Sky (1st performance)