Home sweet Lyndhurst.

So here we are, back from our continued international traveling and (as for me) awake at 5:15 a.m. due to serious jet lag. It's these late nights when I get to thinking how incredibly lucky I am and how thankful I am for the people who really have made these dreams come true (my family, my friends, and anyone who supports this muiscal endeavor). If you haven't been following us, or just need a recap of events for the year so far, allow me to help out. Well first off, I'm proud and happy to say we are now working alongside Vinnie and Kyle of Set a Fire Management to further our musical career, and well, to just have a great time doing it with the same philosophy towards the music industry. That last part really excites me because I'm a firm believer in being yourself and achieving goals without sacrficing morals and ethics. Secondly, we were blessed to tour in the United Kingdom at the beginning of the year. Our friends Hellogoodbye have really been behind us in helping out and taking us out on tours and we totally appreciate it. This time they really out did themselves by bringing us all over England and even making a stop in Scotland and in Wales for a completely sold out tour. It's always so surreal to play a show in another country, but to have people there singing along is so breathtaking that it's hard to even convery through words. I remember waking up on our bus (?!?!) in Birmingham and stepping out in the misty, light rain and just breathing in the smell of a city to which I had never been (and I got to do this pretty much everyday for 2 weeks). I wiped my eyes clear of a sleepy glaze and walked up to the venue. You can't even imagine how shocking it is to see a few kids in line already (mind you we've arrived at least 6 to 8 hours prior to doors opening), but to have a few of these kids come up to me WITH OUR CD BOOKLET was just out of this world. My jaw hit the ground in awe and sheer gratitude. It's a feeling unparalled and further fuels my deep desire to continue to create music and pursue my love of performing it. It's little things like that that really make everything worth it, and not just in the self satisfying sort of way but more in the "wow this music may really be having some effect on other people" way. Ok, enough of the serious emotional stuff. So yes, we got to visit and tour the fabulous Kindom that seems to be United, although Wales and England seem to be about as "united" as Texans and folks from New York City, heh. I'd have to say that I haven't come across many cities throughout our extensive touring that I think I could reside in, but Manchester ranks amongst Seattle, Melbourne, and San Francisco, and uh Lyndhurst to me. Sorry for the utter digression here but I'm simply spitting out whatever comes to mind and whatever I can recall of the trips without any design to it. The English are great people, they seem a little more intense as people than the Australians who are way more laid back and drink more than most Americans who speak much better English than the Japanese, but all in all I haven't really met anyone I didn't like. I've since picked up some phrases from the English that I'm very fond of: ["gutted" - bummed out, devastated] ["well good" - very good] and now I'm at a loss for words trying to remember others, but I'm sure they'll come to me once I click "add entry" to this journal. I think one of my favorite things about going on tour is making new friends. I don't just mean a friend for a night, but instead hanging out with people and actually keeping in touch or having meaningful conversation. I made loads of new friends on our UK trip and it only keeps me anxiously awaiting our return that much more. So in between the UK trip and the one I will get to next we were working on new songs. We've been going through writers blocks at points and then some weeks we'll nail out three or four songs with ease. It's funny how it all works, but so awesome to watch the music come to life. Hopefully if all goes well, we can record in April or May and get the cd released in July or August (I'll have my fingers crossed for sure). It's pretty exciting, I'd say a few of the songs, musically, are reminiscent of "a collection of short stories" while others are headed off in a newer direction for us. So post 3 week break we headed back off to the land of kangaroos and beautiful people, the land of Monopoly-looking money, Australia. It's always exciting revisiting a stop on tour, and even more so when it's going from 20 degree dead of winter to sunny, 80 degree Australian summer time. Based on our last trip I knew we were going to have a blast in Oz. I was definitely not let down. We had a crazy time playing three festival dates with the likes of Thrice, Plus 44, MxPx, Unwritten Law and more. Wow, I just realized it's 6:30 am and I am beat, I'll finish this thing tomorrow when I wake up....

Semi-midway-rundown.

Here I sit in the pitch black La Quinta hotel room in Mesa Arizona where it is currently 9:30a.m. pacific standard time. So far we have played about 14 or so show on this tour I believe and each one has had its own exciting story. It all begins in an incredibly large room named the Norva, located in Norfolk Virginia. The trip down sparked raging anticipation for our first national headlining tour. We honestly had no idea what to expect going out and headlining a tour being such a small band. We figured, what the hell, let's give it a go since the best way to get something you want done is to do it yourself (and by that I mean package a tour and get it going). The first night, sadly, was easily one of the weirder more awkward shows. By awkward I mean picture a giant room where, say, New Found Glory should be headlining, and then picture it being filled with 2 or 3 rows of kids, maybe 80 or 90 at best. But you know what, Virginia is one of the states we least commonly frequent so we all went into it expecting worse! The only problem was the huge room made it look harsh. Oh well. Over that. This night also marked the introduction to our comrades in Quietdrive, an amazing band out of Minneapolis. We had heard things from numerous people, since you always have to ask mutual friends about the band you're about to tour with for 6 weeks, and honestly we got mixed reviews. That's the best part about it all, because then we get to go into with less judgement and decide for ourselves. Fortunately, the first night kind of set the bar very high. They turned out to all be strapping young lads who are all incredibly nice people and insanely fun to hang out with. They also put on one flawless live show. Speaking of flawless live show, Dave Melillo was also a part of this great first night, and would be with us up until San Antonio, Texas. Now if you don't know Dave, he is a, most of the time haha, soft spoken individual with a great heart and even better voice. So enter day one - it seems like it's going to be a very very fun tour, overly successful? Who knows, the test of time will be the only answer for that one.

I wish I had the will to write an entry like that for every show but that's pretty unrealistic considering my slight A.D.D. problem. Let's just say, after that we went on to Charlotte where we finally got to meet The Mile After who were incredibly awesome guys and a very very good band. We got to stay with my parents for a few days around the Atlanta and Charlotte dates. We played some serious croquet, and by serious I mean very competitive, but with me that's pretty much all you get. We then started entering the heat wave of 2006, Florida. Florida, minus the heat, was a ton of fun. We made a bunch of snow cones in Orlando and West Palm Beach, we had the most technical difficulties in one show ever, saw a ton of old friends anddd a girlfriend and made a ton of new friends. I don't think I finally stopped sweating until we got in the van post show each night and even then it took a bit. Here we go, headed off to Texas where the weather could only get better right! Haha, ever hotter I'd say. We pull into Dallas the first day and I believe the thermometer read 108 degrees. Now if you know me at all, you know I haven't worn shorts in approximately 7 or so years. I started to now. I had to. The heat is vicious. We played A TON of shows in Texas; Garland, Houston, San Marcos, McAllen, Brownsville, San Antonio and Amarillo. Every show was fun, some had a lot of kids, some had not a lot of kids, some provided us with an open bar post show(Brownsville - BEST CITY IN TEXAS EVER...HEY MARK, LIZ, RAY AND ERIKA!), some provided us with a million bugs on the front of our van. We have finally made it out of Texas. On the way we lost our good friends Dave, Ryan, Trex and Clark who ventured back home...but make sure you go out and buy the new Dave cd entitled "Talk is Cheap." It's in stores NOWWWWW.

So here I sit in lovely Arizona about to go sit by the pool for a bit, clean up, and head out to yet another show, yet another day in the life of....

FULL HOUSE

Whoever has been keeping up with this show, hit me up at joeygladstone@full.house.net. We have MUCH to discuss. I can't believe Kimmy changed D.J.'s grade from an "F" to an "A"

tourrrr

go watch the movie "v for vendetta" it rules.

melbourne madness

Been in Melbourne for about 24 hours now and I can say with the utmost confidence that I'm staying forever, well if by utmost confidence I mean sarcasm. However, I would if I could. This city is incredibly welcoming and receptive to, well, just humans in general. Got a chance to walk around the city yesterday and it kind of reminds me of California, even the weather. Jarrett, Josh and I found a casino within a 1/2 mile of our hotel and had the pleasure of playing our first touch screen roulette - only there still exists an actual roulette wheel and spinner person.

If the first night of this tour is any indication of how the rest will pan out, let's just say it's going to be one hell of a ride....

phew

what a weekend/intro to a month. i really want to thank everyone ever who hung out for my birthday and for all these past amazing shows. valencia kills it, tokyo rose kills it. those guys made virginia beach out of control. it was the best time ever, and even nicole had a little too much fun. ha! all in all it was such an incredible time spending my birthday with my best friends and all these new friends. thank you to you all who sang me happy birthday in baltimore, it was awesome.

we flew over the cascades

so i flew over to seattle for a few days to visit the bro and sis in law. it's been awesome and relaxing in between a pretty relaxing month of january as well..hm that sounds like way too much relaxing. i'm anxious to get back on the road come february and incredibly excited to starting touring internationally come march. hopefully if all works out as planned we will be visiting three different continents in march alone. that would pretty much be the best month ever, obviously.

i've been living at chris barker's house since around the beginning of january and i can honestly say he's one of the best dudes ever. he's putting josh and i up and letting us take over his life. it's pretty awesome since we've been messing around with a side project tentatively named 'airplane,airplane' - yes very similar to action action, but the name was too funny/fun when we first heard it. plus after what seemed like an hour long discussion post-thanksgiving dinner/drinks it seemed like a sure fire winner. i think we're going to lay down a song or two in the studio chris works with so maybe some purevolume loveliness will arise.

thank you so much to everyone who came out to any of our shows in january - it has been a really really fun, easy going atmosphere to play (w/our old friends hipv) and thus in turn a very rewarding experience. xo

bmore, philly

The shows in Baltimore and Philadelphia were out of control. Both were incredible and everyone who came out was so nice and supportive. I saw a lot of my old friends in Baltimore so that was really awesome. Philadelphia was a sold out show and was completely out of control. Valencia owned the stage and Hidden in Plain View was nothing short of amazing. Go buy the Valencia cd if you don't have it. That's it

it's over.

so the tour is over. the two month epic, dramatic, warm to cold trek across the entire country has finally come to an end. i sit here at the end of this tour feeling more accomplished than ever. we played some of the best shows we have ever gotten the opportunity to play and i feel as though are live performance has gained so much over the past two months. it feels really good to come home and be really happy with what i just did for so much of my time. thanks to every single person who came out and sang along or hung out with me and talked to me or anything. i'd also like to give a huge thanks to allister for putting us on the tour and of course to day at the fair and fenix tx for being really awesome. and a special thanks for chris, todd and steve of DATF for allowing me to play with them for about 3 weeks when rob went home with mono. this was by far my favorite tour ever and i can only imagine what the future may hold for us - it really excites me. now for a quick rundown of my favorite shows of the tour -

Long Island - really really good people there.
Philadelphia(pre-cop-chaos) - the best time i've ever had in philly, the venue was amazing the crowd was amazing.
Charlotte - first time my parents got to see a halfway decent show. plus we got to eat great food with them in SC.
Anaheim - house of blues is such a treat to play, it makes you feel insanely special and the people there were so nice to us.
San Fran - the venue was amazing and so was the unexpected response we got. plus its my second favorite city next to....
Seattle - hung out with my brother and sis-in-law (haha) and i really love that city.
Salt Lake City - they always treat us so well there, plus we had an amazing thanksgiving with allister and day at the fair.
Denver - never played, but it was sooooo incredible, plus we got to hang out with cameron which is always fun.
Milwaukee, Minneapolis, Chicago, and Detroit - the last four shows on the tour were four of our best shows on the whole trip. those four cities were so supportive to us and helped close out the tour with such a great feeling.

ha ha seems like i just listed half of the shows. oh well. the tour was amazing. i'm ecstatic to play a show this friday in delaware and then of course saturday at hamilton st (with tons of surprises of course) then to take a well needed respite for x-mas down in south carolina.

nebraska. snow.

shacked up in holiday inn in nebraska. the snow took over the roads and we were pretty much forced to pull over and stay the night in the barren, snow-covered, nebraskan city of north platte. everyone is getting slightly irritable, understandably so as we have pretty much been out together since september 7.
the final stretch of shows has begun and the home/tour/lifestyle anxiety has set in. The days are getting shorter and the nights are getting longer and crazier. the drama never stops on this tour, i was thinking about writing a complete memoir of the entire tour because what goes on behind the scenes is really interesting and out of control sometimes.

in more specific news, salt lake city and denver were 2 of the best shows we've had on this tour. it's amazing how you can go into playing a show and expect little to no one to know your songs and by the time you're on stage you realize that a ton of people are into you. i'm having an awesome time playing 2 sets a night, and am finally very comfortable playing the datf songs. it's such a fun change of pace. a big thanks to cameron for letting us stay at his place in colorado. it was awesome, plus we watched the warriors. a huge thanks to parker and "stenie" for the food that we didn't get to eat haha. i really have met a ton of awesome people on this tour, it's a crazy thing.

tonight i'll sleep well in nebraska and head out to des moines tomorrow early morning. not sure what awaits me at home anymore but i guess all that will be sorted out when i actually get back.