Tour Wrapup

Well it’s been about a week since we all departed from Portland, with great fatigue and a sense of accomplishment, to go to our respective homes. Since then, we’ve been asleep, recovering from the excessive driving, but now having reawakened, here are some thoughts and pictures to wrap up the account of our tour here on the site.

After our much-needed day off in Seattle, which featured lots of salmon-eating and microbrew-drinking, and clouds (of course), we proceeded northward to Vancouver where, after a relatively simple border crossing, we met up with another Banffer, Meredith Bates, a violinist, who provided excellent hospitality. After a large afternoon sushi feast, we headed down to the Cellar, one of our favorite rooms on the tour, where we played a couple of high-energy sets for a really enthusiastic and raucous crowd, which was refreshing after a couple of subdued gigs in a row. We really enjoyed the city too, and were sad to leave quickly the next day to hit the road one last time to Portland.

Upon our (rain-filled) arrival in Portland, we were treated to a great meal by my friend Colin’s parents, who also graciously put up a couple members of the band. We then proceeded to hit the studio the following morning for what essentially amounted to a setup day, then headed over to the Old Church for a concert that night. Though we were all quite tired, the concert turned out to be really fun and we really loosened up a bit and started interacting in some new and fun ways that hadn’t necessarily happened throughout the tour.

The next day, which was the final day of the tour, was quite lengthy but really rewarding as we laid down studio versions of all the material we’d worked up over the course of the tour. We’ll be mixing and mastering soon, and we’ll be releasing the new album on Origin Records early next year. And, just as abruptly as it had begun, everyone flew off the next morning and it was over!

Thanks to everyone who came out to see us, put us up, contributed money to our toonie campaign, or anything else that I’m forgetting to make this tour a success, it was even better than we could have hoped and we’re really looking forward to one (or maybe even more) tours in 2011 in support of our new album! We’ll keep you posted on here and by email about happenings in the mean time, and once we finish sorting through all the gig recordings, we’ll post a few highlights too.

Meanwhile, here are a few photos from the last few days of the tour, enjoy: