NAMM Tour Diary
Day 1
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9:02 a.m. - Kirk arrives at Jack's house and is happy to find that he has recovered from the malaria he was suffering from the previous two days.
930 a.m. - We pick up Justin and quickly hit the road. Music Choice: Big Business - Here Come The Waterworks
10:13 a.m. - We stop for coffee at a drive-thru Starbucks. Justin says "fuck starbucks" and we promptly drive him to a drive-thru Dutch Bros. We talk about the tattoo artist who has the dick tattoo market locked down. Not tattooing on a dick...but tattooing dicks on other parts of the body.
11 a.m.-1 p.m. - Lose an hour in magical vortex that is I-5
1:17 p.m. - Make friends with the locals/yokels of Southern Oregon. We are getting homesick already.
2:00 p.m. - We see a Red-tailed Hawk and a gigantic Bald Eagle within a few minutes of each other. We talk about nature and Justin's former job scaring birds off the tarmac at PDX airport.
2:30 p.m. - Tortilla chip hits the iPod causing "heat 4 yo azz" by Celly Cel pop onto the stereo.
2:43 p.m. - Kirk tries to explain the plot of Death Race 2000 to Jack. Fails miserably.
3:02 p.m. - California border. How much do these guys that ask about fruits and vegetables make? Too much we presume.
3:30 p.m. - Kirk orders largest burrito any of us have ever seen.
3:50 p.m. - Kirk immediately regrets eating entire said burrito.
4:20 p.m. - You know the deal...
4:21 p.m. - Pulled over by the California State Highway Patrol (you can't make this stuff up)
4:30 p.m. - Change collective underpants. Music Choice: Dead Meadow - Feathers
5:30 p.m - 8:30 p.m. - Music Choices: High on Fire - Death Is This Communion, Polvo, Kylesa - Static Tensions
8:30 p.m. - Arrive in Oakland. Staying with our friends Brian and Amy at their beautiful loft. Red beans & rice. Beers. ChinatownX
Days 2-5
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We started our epic road-trip to sunny Anaheim with every intention of keeping up with daily accounts of our shenanigans. Unfortunately, beers, business and fun took over and the dull ringing in our ears and heads made it impossible to keep up with this "tour diary" on a daily basis. We're sorry. You can schpank us.
Day 2 started with an excellent breakfast cooked by our wonderful hosts Bryan and Amy. We set out in the Crown Victioria towards central California. Although we had complained about the vortex in Southern Oregon the previous day, nothing compared to the 6 hours between Oakland and the Grapevine. Pure. Unadulterated. Boring.
We managed to cut the monotony of the open road by listening to awesome tunes and running over as many tumbleweeds as we could...and dick and fart jokes...always the dick and fart jokes.
We arrived in sunny LA just in time for rush hour. Yay. We managed to make it to Anaheim relatively unscathed. Checked in and unpacked and headed up to the "Sheraton Club Level" (which is special apparently) for free cocktails.
Shortly thereafter we headed down to Earthquaker Devices bowl-o-rama after-party to check it out. We met up with our buddy Philippe from Caroline Guitar Co. and hung out with the ZVex, Earthquaker, Walrus Audio and Fairfield Electronics crews. It was a blast. We also met our new favorite person Kilyn from Walrus Audio. He's kinda like the little brother none of us ever had...lucky for him.
We woke up the next morning ready for the long trek through the monstrosity that is NAMM. We felt like champions from the night before. After walking approximately 22.3 miles collectively, we called it quits and prepared for another night of fun ahead by heading to dinner.
By the by, has anyone ever noticed how big Cheesecake Factory's menu is? There's 6 pages specifically devoted to chicken. Insane.
We headed over to Walrus Audio's hotel where they kidnapped us in their windowless van and drove us to this place. We only obliged because of the enormous bottle of Jim Beam they provided.
We ended the night with our friends Philippe, Kilyn, Chelsea and Patrick. Don't they look happy?
We woke up the next morning and headed back towards home. It was a quick trip but one that we will never forget. We made a lot of new friends and met a lot of our peers. We also had some seriously great fun and look forward to next year.
Until next time,
Mr. Black & Co.
