Tour Diary Day 4, May 27, 2017 

Tour Diary Day 4, May 27, 2017 

It’s Saturday! 

I say that to remind myself, it doesn’t take long to lose track of what day it is - these Tour Diaries help. 

Today we have two gigs and before we go Pete tells me where getting a proper Pasty. I told him I had one the other day and he said “what was in it?” I said “butter chicken.” “That’s not a Pasty.” So today we’re getting a real one. 

I do really love regional food. It’s like when I go to Massachusetts and someone says “we have a great new Mexican restaurant” and you know it’s shite without even trying it. I was on the Baltic Sea last year for a gig and they said “We have the best nachos” and I accepted that challenge and it was a basket full of no. There were chips and there was salsa on top but it was the sweetest salsa I’d ever had - as if it was cherry flavored or something. I ate 3 chips and couldn’t eat no more. 

Wherever you are - eat what they eat and you’ll be fine. 

I get it though - I'm a bit of a burger snob. There's places that make great burgers, Golden Goose in Sedona, AZ, Park Bench Cafe in Huntington Beach, just about any 5 Guys Burgers - and nowhere in Europe. 

So when Pete said I had to have a proper Pasty I knew what he meant and so we went to Oggy Oggy, the Cornish Pasty Company and I learned more about them from Pete like it was a tradition for the miners who ate them to drop the crusts down the mine for the “Tommyknockers” who were, as far as I can tell, the elves of good fortune. If you didn’t give up your crust to the Tommyknockers it was bad luck for that mine shaft. Sounds to me like it was a way of keeping the rats happy. 

I had my traditional Cornish Pasty {pronounced Pă/stee} and it had beef and potatoes and some other stuff as well. I took a picture of the bag it came in but by the time I was eating it - I couldn’t get my phone out in time. Pasty = Tasty. {those words don’t rhyme well) 

Then we went over to the Ashtorre Rock Hall in Saltash which is a room in a community center where we played unplugged for about two hours. Two hours? Maybe. I lost track of time but it was wonderful, we would swap off songs and Pete, Phil and Jim (Jakku Dogs) would join me on songs and I joined in with them as well. 

It was an intimate show but I really dug it because everyone was really listening. You can’t beat listening rooms. 

Then we came back to Pete’s flat and he made sausage, salad and mushrooms and shallots.* Pete is a great cook, I’ve been spoiled here and apparently tomorrow we’re having a roast that is already cooking in the slow cooker. 

After late lunch/early dinner we headed over to the The Brook Inn in Plymouth - a right proper pub with a great stage and soundman. We tore it up good tonight and I even broke a few strings. I actually said before we started that I would be lucky to get through tonight’s gig without breaking any strings as this was the third day of shows and that’s about how long they last for me on tour. I’ve been working myself like a professional bicyclist with how fast I can change a string - or maybe a pit crew working Indy 500. I got string changes down to under one minute. The first string to go was a D and the second was a B. I’m going to have to change out the rest of them before our show tomorrow. 

I played a couple of songs that I hadn’t played yet this week and got my looping pedal going in a couple of tunes. I use it as a percussion thing in one song and as an instrumental part in another. I’m very aware of how using the looping pedal can become annoying to the audience and try to minimize the annoyance. There are some bands, like Whitehorse, that are a two person looping machine that is at a level of performance art of how they coordinate the pedal dance but when I see solo folks do it, I rarely enjoy it for more than a song or two. 

So I used it in two songs. 

I’ve been joining the Jakku Dogs on stage for a few numbers every night and it’s quite fun. They cover “When the night comes falling” which is a Bob Dylan song covered by The Jeff Healey Band in Roadhouse - which is a very convoluted way to get to a Bob Dylan song but we’ve really been giving it a good kicking and totally underrated Robert Zimmerman tune. 

And the Jakku Dogs have been joining me for “No Expectations” as well and we did a pretty sweet version of it tonight. 

After the show I find myself talking to a bloke sitting there who, between my having a hard time hearing him in a loud bar, his British accent and him being drunk - let’s just say I was getting about every third word but I can tell you: 

He watches “Big Brother”. 
Someone on that show recorded a song 
His actual brother was most likely involved with the recording of that song. 
I am a very good performer. 
You need a gimmick to make a million pounds. 
I need a gimmick. 
The girl on Big Brother was a git. (what is a ‘git’?) 

That is the extreme Reader’s Digest condensed version of our conversation. 

After the show it was toast and tea for Pete and I and that’s how we rock and roll in Cornwall. 

Cheers. 

*Only they pronounce shallots wrong. I don’t know how these Brits keep screwing up the English language.

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