Back from Bend

Man, what a couple of days we chose to head north for a show.

Back Door Slam is a GREAT band! I would totally pay money to see them again. Nice guys, too. If you see them playing in your town, GO SEE THEM! They are in Portland tonight somewhere. Go to their website to see where. They're very organic sounding. I don't know how else to put it. There were effects on the singer's voice, but they didn't change how his voice sounded, really. Good sound guy... Anyway, all three of them are very, very good musicians and the oldest one is 20, I guess. They've chosen a great selection of songs to cover and they have some fine originals, too.

The opening band started with "Roadhouse Blues". If I was opening for these guys, I would have chosen a less shitty song to start with. I would have gone with a recognizable song that isn't so overplayed. Overplayed badly.

Got to Bend last night about 6:30 and headed to Grover's to have pizza and visit with a friend who was setting up the jam there. While waiting for the food, some of us headed over to the "Westward Ho" hotel to get a room. They actually had a room that all seven of us were able to sleep in... two bathrooms, three queen sized beds, 2 cots and a bunk bed. Awesome. It was starting to snow about then.

Headed to the Domino Room by about 7:15 to meet the band and all that. The show ended at 11, and we went back to Grover's to jam with the Bend contingent. It was blizzardy. Got back to the hotel, played some tunes on the acoustics and then we all crashed around 3:30 am or so.

On the road this morning at around 10. Heard from a trucker in LaPine that there were nine trucks off the road between LaPine and Klamath. Haw. I figured he was exaggerating. But no, we counted, and really, there were ten trucks off the road and we got to see someone in a little car slide into a snowbank just south of Modoc Point.

There were spots of the 97 where we were lucky to see 50 feet ahead of us.

So I had a pretty cool little birthday dealie.