April 11 2002
Erick: Woke up at 7.00am after a nice three hour sleep. Paul drove the whole way to Chicago; I had some weird dreams about being buried alive. Got to The Metro at 2.00pm. and dropped our equipment off. The line-up: Apes, Milemarker, Les Savy Fav. We were scheduled to play first, at 7.00pm, which blows. Nothing is worse than playing an early set. Nobody is ready to rock at 7.00 -- that is the time when you get home from work and decompress. It’s not the time to run to a club to catch the first band. The Metro is a great club; everyone was really nice, fancy backstage. Went out, got some food, and my goal for the day was to see the Harry Carey statue at the stadium -- without a doubt the scariest sculpture ever, a must see.
Went on at 7.00pm. sharp to a decent-sized crowd. Stage was freezing, played well but not as fun as yesterday's show. Playing second is another world from opening. It is nice to be able to get pumped up by watching an opening act. I was hanging out with my cousins but supposedly Tim from the Fav pulled out a giant ladder from backstage and put it in the middle of the crowd. I think it freaked out the club. If he fell off, that would be a scene.
Stayed at my cousins' house and watched Fargo. Exciting stuff...
April 12 2002
Amanda: I woke up around 8.30am. at Erick's cousins' house in Evanston, a suburb of Chicago. The reason I woke up so early was that Erick's cousins are the proud parents of two -- a two year-old and a four year-old. They were upstairs shrieking at the top of their lungs. Eventually they left and the rest of the Apes woke up. The children returned with their mother around noon and we got to meet the li'l darlins. They were sure cute. Mitchell, the four year-old, looked like E.T. (according to Erick). Emma, the two year-old, had a load in her diapers.
While we were showering, Jeff made friends with the family dog, Stanley, who looked like she really needed some lovin'. Jeff was nice enough to take her outside and play for a good 45 minutes. When he came back in the house, he played checkers with Mitchell. It was the first time I'd seen Jeff interact with a child on any level and I don't know whether it was precious or totally disturbing.
Meanwhile, Paul was outside. Every morning as we get ourselves ready, Paul goes outside. Paul likes to organize the van. Paul doesn't like to impose on guests. Paul doesn't like Inside. So I think he was actually outside for at least one and a half hours that morning. I know he was on the phone part of the time, or maybe a lot of the time, but it's interesting to note the strange disappearance of Paul EVERY morning.
We left eventually and drove to Madison. The show was at a place called the Catacombs, a student-run "club" in the basement of the University's Catholic Student Services Center. I was the last person to go inside and Erick pointed out the promoter and said "Kleiny, go say hello. DO YOUR JOB!" The promoter was creepier in person than he was on the phone. He was this big long-haired fellow wearing a beret and sporting a nice goatee and a mafia-esque leather jacket. I didn't say hi. Not 'til hours later when I was ready to get paid.
Met some really nice kids who worked at the Catacombs. Johnny, Noah and Ryan hooked us up with coffee and cookies and snacks all night long. Met some of the Paris, Texas guys as well.
The show itself was okay. It was around 8.00pm, barely dark, and Paul started the set in a rocking chair reading from some book. I don't remember much else except that as soon as we finished, the room got really crowded.
Later, when Les Savy Fav was playing, I met Yishai, the nice fellow who was going to put us up for the evening. We heard that there was going to be a party at Yishai's that night after the show, but we were still welcome to crash there. One of us thought we'd heard mention of a separate basement apartment so we figured we'd be able to escape the party as necessary. When we arrived we quickly learned there was no basement apartment. So, the three nerdier Apes stood around the living room for a minute and sure enough, in under five minutes' time, the room cleared. So we spread ourselves out on the couch.
Several times people infiltrated our web of anti-social silk but most didn't stay long. A few guys over the course of several hours sat on the arm of the chair and practically in my lap but left once they got a whiff of my poisonous farts, stronger than any I'd ever let before. Yishai let Paul and I have the bedroom of one of his roommates at around 4.00am, when it became apparent that this party wasn't ending. People still walked through that room 'til after 5.00am.
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