Bloomington, IN is a lovely town. More importantly, if you're ever there, go to Rhino's - it's a real gem: an all-ages venue with a great stage, huge capacity, and awesome sound (4 monitor mixes - score!) Also, the people who work there are great. We kinda showed up, played, and drove on to Chicago (though not without embarrasingly returning to Rhino's to take a picture of the marquee), so we didn't exactly "see the town," but hey, we'll save that for next time.

Shondes vs. Tegan and Sara (Shondes came out pretty all right)

Staying with mishpocha (and/or surrogate mishpocha) in Ann Arbor might be the best thing ever. We arrived circa 6 am to brightly colored signs welcoming us, warm beds all set up, freshly baked peanut butter chocolate chip cookies on the counter (we just about died) and the espresso maker all set up to make "four teeny espressos" come morning. Thrill.

The next day, after sleeping off the insane Pittsburgh drive to an ungodly hour, we woke up to get to see Claire, Santiago, Adam and Eva. Antics ensued, OBVIOUSLY. We covered D&D, wolf sounds, latching, Rusted Root and accompanying shame, and secret enneagram handshakes. Also, there was pizza with olives (OLIVES!) and capers (CAPERS!) and garlic. GARLIC! And of course, more cookies were baked. A mac and cheese lesson was invaluable. Did I mention how nice they all are? Gevalt.

The next day (by this point, feels like we're 'wintering' in the 'narb. i could get used to that) The Shondes ran about town doing band errands, eating at slightly-too-quiet-organic-establishments where Rufus Wainwright wafted perpetually at slightly the wrong volume, and finally ended up getting sucked into a *mall vortex* (how this happened, I'm not sure. I think it began with Ian needing to go to Champ. bah?) and getting spat out by the beast somewhere by the H&M checkout counter. Also, I'm pretty sure Louisa and Ian purchased the tiniest amp in the world at a local guitar store.

And then the show. As per title, we found out that although we were playing the wonderful She-bang event, we were in competition with none other than Tegan and Sara, playing that night in Detroit. So TC's Speakeasy in Ypsilante was cozy, intimate, though people did begin to trickle in. By the time we played there was a veritable if - I'll say it again - cozy crowd, and everyone was dancing, singing and sweating together, all close to the stage. It was fabulous - I had a great time playing, and everyone was really into it. Which is always incredible as a show experience. It naturally lends itself to what Ian calls "the rock n' roll high." We'll get there later, though. And likely, repeatedly.

After the show, we got to talk to a bunch of people, and are FINALLY able to sell records at our shows. Gratifying is really an understatement on how nice that is. I also got to talk with our new friend Jack from Teruah, an awesome Jewish music blog. Tour is especially cool when you get to meet people you've only emailed or myspaced or facebooked or what-have-you-ed with for the longest time. He's incredibly passionate about, well, loving and giving exposure to all kinds of Jewish music, and it was great to meet him and talk politics and life and music with him.
Bethany and Erin, the She-Bang people, were incredibly sweet and according to Adam and Eva, had a pretty excellent between-sets-song-selection. In the evening's end, we and A & E stayed out waay too late eating Ypsi's version of Hippie Hash and (does my scorn and shame never end?) Greek salad with no feta cheese. I know. I'm a disgrace to the world and cheese lovers throughout history.

Today? Still wintering in the 'narb. We hope to scare up some Emergen-C from the co-oop, spend some more time with the mishpochaniks, and write eternal, semi-sensical blog entries. Hmph.

Shondes vs. Steelers (shondes lost...)

Tour began as a rainy, gray monday morning. We had neither our 3000 cds (originally expect to arrive on the previous friday) nor our van (to be picked up, circa 7:30am). All in all a good start. We scrambled through the cold november rain to get our shit together, pick up the van, get gas, go to our practice space and get our equipment. Ian went to his office to head off the UPS man, who kindly unloaded our cds (26 boxes) onto the sidewalk, where Ian waited for the rest of the band to pick him up.

Circa 1pm (late!) we were on the road to our first stop, pittsburgh. It rained in sheets and the drive was less than fun, but Eli managed the weather and got us there on time for our show at Garfield Artworks.

It should be said, we love Garfield Artworks, Manny Theiner has always been enthusiastic and worked hard to turn people it and the people in Pittsburgh have been pretty warm to us. This, however, was not the ideal night for a show. By the fault of the National Football League, a Steelers game was scheduled for this monday night in november, resulting in particularly low turnout (even for a monday night). But alas, the crowd that was there was enthusiastic and fun, and we had a very fun first night of tour, with plenty of rock and plenty of roll.

At the end of the show we sped away toward Ann Arbor, where warm beds, wonderful people and another show awaited us.