oh yeah...

this about 24 hours over due, but forgot to mention,
home again.

:)

Frankfurt

About to leave for the airport! By far, my favorite tour ever. Ready for some Austin, though. see ya!

Utrect

indescribably sleepy. this will be a cave man post.
last night was fun. played a sort of private party in this crazy old machine room. All around us were huge gears and what looked to be parts of...well, giant, machines. Pictures are necessary.

Tonight was the last show of the tour. Felt more sad about it than i thought I would. We're gonna miss Nills. It's been awesome to get to hear him play every night. Had fun on stage. The crowd was pretty great. Had us back for a little encore. twas nice to be on familiar ground again.

I'm writing from the same hostel we stayed in last time. Sitting on a top bunk that is not against a wall and has no rails...here's to hoping I make it through the night without some sort of unfortunate dive to the ground. I've been exhausted all day. Quite ready for bed. Not ready for 9 hours in the van tomorrow, on the great marathon of dropping off Nills, returning the gear, returning the van, etc. oh geeze. It's been so fun though. Maybe my favorite tour yet of the 6 under my belt...

Alright. sleep time. see most of you soon!

Hamburg: Night 2

This will be a speed post. We have to be out of here and on the road in 8 hours. We've got another hefty drive ahead. BUT I have to say that today was my favorite day of the tour, hands down. We just played a house show at Nills' fathers' house, the place where they both grew up. It is amazing. There are probably over 20 rooms in here, no joke. Anyway, amazing house. Amazing walk in the woods. Great homemade dinner. Such friendly warm people. Really, really awesome, amazing acoustic show. agh. I wish I had more time to write. But I'll hate myself if I don't try and sleep now. Hopefully, I'll get some more words in tomorrow.

until then, gnight!
-aisha

Hamburg!

*tried to post this last night but Michael preemptively rushed me off the computer for no reason :)

Just finished our show in Hamburg.
went pretty alright. Encore was the most fun I think
Drove 7 hours from Poland today
Saw an awesome hedgehog last night in the grass!
so adorable.
beat Mario 3 with Andrew.
off to see a little of Hamburg!

Poland

oh man. so here we are, sittin around in the venue in Poland just waitin for dinner time. The past couple of days have been pretty good. Thought I was going to die in Prague. A tickle in my throat the previous day quickly turned into a cough, which then turned into a cold, which in Prague of all places turned into a fever. ugh. I had the worst migraine, sneezy, stuffy nose, chills crazy sick spell that I've had in a long, long time. Somehow, I played the show, then draped myself under my coat and laid down on a bed of chairs. Apparently the show was good. I don't really remember.

Sadly, I missed out on seeing the city. It's like Prague didn't really happen. oh wellllll. Another time. Last night we played in Dresden in a cool little theatre. Great hospitality there and a really fun show. I feel like we're getting to the point where I say the same things about every place. drive all day. unload. wait around a whole lot. sound check for an hour. wait around for dinner. eat some food. play the show. wait around. pack up. go to bed. :: repeat:: I'm having fun though. Just under a week left. Hope that volcano calms itself and we get to fly home on timeeee.

Well, well, that's all I've got today I think. Everyone is skype calling around me, but I hate being on the phone a) when everyone else is on the phone, b) without any privacy, and c) when the internet is fickle. lame.

I think I'm gonna go read and dream about dinner.
short and sweet today.
adios
-aisha

April 19

Made it to Prague. I'm feelin pretty lousy. Wish I'd gotten sick in a country I'd already seen. Can't get into the venue till 5. It's 3:45. We're all so hungry, but can't buy any food because we don't have any Crowns (they don't take Euro here). Ah. geeze. Hope we figure somethin out soooon.

April 18

Sittin in a hostel bed in Nuremberg, Germany. Today is our first day off and we've spent most of the daylight driving. Tomorrow we play in Prague. I've never been there before, so I'm not sure what to expect. But I'm pretty ready to find out!

I've finally gotten sick. Thought I was about to make it out of the tour unscathed. I slept for nearly 4 hours straight in the car today. ugh. I haven't exactly been eating enough throughout the day, which doesn't help. I just barely snack after a breakfast that's usually bread + more bread and then fill myself with dinner. But hopefully the food situation will be good this week. Actual nourishment + vitamins, emergen c, cold meds and echinacea will hopefully do the trick!

Anyhow. Weird show last night. My violin kept going out for no reason, so I unplugged and played at the very edge of the stage. A bunch of other strange things occured. I'm gonna blame it on a stage poltergeist of some kind. hah. ah. ok. The internet here keeps going out so i'm going to surrender while hoping that this actually posts.

adios,
-aisha

Still in Vinelz

photo by M.Muller.

My new favorite game.
(that I so lazily described earlier)

Been here since noon and have been taken care of so well. I watched a 9-year-old girl very confidently beat two grown men at Foosball. Later I had a semi-lengthy conversation with a Swiss man wearing an F--- Bush t-shirt (he says it was completely unplanned. he had no idea who we were or that we were from Texas) about health care. I wish that the people who are protesting any sort of reform could come talk to Europeans. The way it works here just makes so much more sense to me. You shouldn't be left with an unmanageable bill because you were ill or had an emergency or had to ride in an ambulance to the ER...That is absurd to me. It's absurd to people here. I just wish people at home could see things this way. Anyway, I won't get too political here...

This guy has joined the club of people who are shocked that we are from Texas because we "don't sound like it." haha. It's still funny to me, but not surprising. We are certainly lacking the drawl. I guess I don't spend too much time with people who sound like they should be from Texas. Oh gosh, if we all sounded like we walked out of Walker Texas Ranger or something I'm not sure I could handle it..

Still waitin' to play. Nills is playing my favorite song of his. ah. We need to play soon. We're all fallin asleeeep. First day off tomorrow(!)

Volcanoooo

You were probably wondering about this. We haven't seen any ash, really. We are scheduled to fly out of Frankfurt. But we've still got 10 days. I'm not too worried. In my mind I say I wouldn't mind being stuck in Europe. But in reality, being trapped in Frankfurt would become quite expensive very fast. Sorry for the pixelated image. It was a good map showing the ash and airport closures. I bet it'll be fine, but eh, keep those fingers crossed anyway, will ya?

April 17 - Vinelz

Hanging out now in an even tinier Swiss town, or village I guess I should say.
Oh man. It is so adorable. We parked our van and right across the street we saw two Shetland ponies in someone's backyard. Nicole, Trav, Kendall and I ran to the fence, grinning and taking pictures. Then the others waved us back. I think the sight of four gawking Americans was freaking out the family having a quiet Saturday afternoon.whoops.

This venue is cool. Half of us spent a good amount of the afternoon playing games: 3D checkers (awesome, by the way) chess, checkers with chess pieces, a simpler looking plinko-style contraption, and something that worked like the reverse of Hungry Hungry Hippos. I could explain it, but it would probably only further confuse you. Just know that it was extremely amusing and Kendall was the victor.

I'm looking forward to this show. Hopefully people will come out to this place, even further in the middle of nowhere (no one at the show last night had heard of this place). But the weather is perfect. It's sunny and cloudless outside. Tree covered hills and mountains surround, and now and again a rooster crows. Everywhere I go here I feel like I'm in some sort of idealized landscape painting. lovely.

April 16 - Dudingen, Switzerland

Twenty minutes until dinner and the loudest soundcheck I've ever heard in my entire life (I think they're shooting to disturb the Richter scale with this bass. If I'd had a meal in the last six hours, I'd definitely feel the way one does after eating a disgusting theme park dinner and immediately hopping on a roller coaster. sick). Anyway, lets see what I can do.

The second show in Paris was awesome. I won't say much, other than we got to play acoustic which made it one of my favorites. This will sound stupid, but in the middle of a song, don't remember which one, I re-realized that we were in Paris. We were in Paris! For the second time in a year. Playing to a room full of people who were there just to see us. And though I've been playing shows across Europe every single day for over 2 weeks now, for some reason I was struck by it in a way that I hadn't been. I'm pretty sure I grinned, and definitely felt so excited and lucky to be doing exactly what I'm doing.

Last night we played in Chur, Switzerland and things sounded great. Travis's parents made another appearance, and it was great to see them again. I hung out around the merch booth and spent an hour talking to people after the show. When I'm in the mood for it, that is one of my favorite parts about touring. We signed a lot of cds and records. took a group photo. and eventually walked to our hotel and slept in. Oh man, how I love sleeping in.


I spent a lot of time writing in the van today, which I'm happy about. I've strayed from fiction for a long time and it's been great to come back again. Maybe I'll share it with some of you someday... I'm writing now from Dudingen, Switzerland at a venue called Bad Bonn. It felt so good to walk into a familliar place. We played here in October. This place is exactly in the middle of nowhere. It sits in the Swiss countryside. Green fields all around, adorable houses with horses and the sound of bells jingling from the necks of cows. It is great. I went for a walk with nicole down to the water and felt like a kid, running down the trails, picking up rocks. Switzerland is amazingly beautiful. That's all I can say. I'm in awe of the world again.

Sadly, on a less poetic note, perhaps I'm nearly over the hill as far as my ears are concerned, but I'd rather brave the cold than the decibel level in this room right now.
Only 11 days left!

-aisha

april 14 - Paris

Hey hey.
This shall be a quick one I think! We played last night in Paris and are staying here another night, which has made today feel like a day off. Woke up without an alarm. Slept on in. Ate the best croissants in the world. Kendall scrambled some eggs and shared em with me. Had an orange, And a glass of the reddest orange juice I've ever seen. Sat at the table with Kendall and Marco, our host, and talked about French politics for a while. nice. Conquered the laundry beast afterward. It's gonna feel so nice to put on clean clothes tomorrow! Not a lot else goin' on. Just resting and being lazy...aka, my tour heaven.

performance tonight. long drive tomorrow. woo!
-aisha

Fraaaaaance!

Here we are, settin up in Paris, France. We had quite the driving adventure last night after a show that seemed to sort of underwhelm us a bit. It wasn't bad at all, but sometimes you just finish playing and all you can think of to say is, "well, that happened." And then you pack up and think about sleeping. Or in this case you pack up and get stuck in midnight traffic, get misled by confusing highways, and drive for nearly four hours. Weird. frustrating. But Andrew and I distracted ourselves quite nicely with at least a 2 hour Super Mario Bros. 3 adventure on my laptop. so so fun. I forgot how fun it is to just keep playing video games and laughing until you're completely exhausted and useless. haha. Twas great.

We finally pulled into a hotel at 3:30am (first out of three we tried outside of london that wasn't completely booked) and I had a bed to myself for the first time in a long time and I felt like a queen!

Well well, we are in the middle of soundcheck and I feel strange sitting up here typing, SO! I think I'll go now. more later!

-aisha

From Brussels

From Brussels.
Photo by http://kaldirimlar.com/
more here

Sounds

Albums I've been Listening to In that Van of Ours...

In urban spaces: some beats: http://vodpod.com/watch/542-four-tet-hands

Most mornings: a friend: http://myspace.com/kellieanngrubbs

Today:

Edinburgh, Scottland

Somehow, whenever I'm ready to write in this thing, my battery is quite near to death. oh well. I'll quickly say that last night was swell. We played in Edinburgh, Scotland for the closing of Peter Liversidge's gallery exhibit. He invited us to play this event and by some work of magic it happened to fit perfectly into our schedule. He was so excited to get to know us and make us comfortable. I can't remember the number of times he thanked us for playing. After the show, he took us, along with some friends, to this really awesome Indian restaurant. A girl who worked at the gallery told me that she vistited India before but still loved the Indian food in the UK better somehow. ?! Not sure how that's possible, and I've never been to India, but this food was pretty delicious. Ate way too much annd loved every minute of it.

We spent the afternoon with Peter's family, who made breakfast for us and joined us at the table. I've never had such service in a house! They were refilling drinks and bringing out more and more food. I feel like sometimes I don't know how to respond to strangers with such enthusiasm for getting to know me, because I can't imagine anyone being so excited to know a person they've never met and will probably never see again. That paired with a general sleepyness and thirst for a moment alone left me with a bit of a subdued reaction. BUT I hope they didn't think I wasn't appreciative or glad for it all. They were so nice! Peter, his wife and his father took us for a walk atop this till that provided for the most scenic view of the city. Castles, hills, the ocean and so much green grass. ah, beautiful. I would move there if I could.

I got to briefly know two of the most adorable kids I've seen in ages. Man, wish I could post some pictures. But they were so cute. I turned around and Nicole was holding hands with 4 year old boy George and walking. She asked him about the book he was holding and he replied "Shall I show you?" Shall I ?! See? cute.

I just ate a whole pizza (not huge, maybe a small). I've gotten quite cosy on this couch in a restaurant/bar/venue we've been in for the past four hours. I think Nils is about to start so I think I'll head downstairs soon. Tomorrow we're make our second 7 hour drive in 3 days, down to Oxford, England. Oh the glamor of touring :)

-aisha

April 8 - London

Guys, you have no idea how nice it is to have my facebook and blogger back in English again. The Flemish, and German and French was getting a little confusing.

Today has been pretty alright. I feel like touring makes me very aware of every slight mood change I experience. And I think that simply noticing each change makes me overreact a little to them. It's a strange thing, what happens to my mind on the road. I have spent and will spend a disgusting amount of time trying to figure it out.

I've been feeling pretty quiet today. I think I need a good deal of time alone to recharge or reset or something. And the lack of that is probably one of the hardest things for me to adapt to on every tour for some reason. In its absence, I've felt a bit zombie-like. Hopefully it'll subside soon. Its quite boring this way.

The highlight of my day might've been the great video game adventure Andrew and I had this morning in the van. We installed a Nintendo emulator, and Andrew has an actual Nes controller that connects through a usb port! haha. so fun! We played pac man and then Mario 3 (my favorite), where he out-played me repeatedly...until the power went out on my computer and it was game over for real.

Traveling through the chunnel wasn't as exciting as I'd imagined. It just looked like a dark train ride. boooring. i slept through most of it. Then we had a slightly tense drive through crowded London streets, filled with impatient, and honk-happy people. agh! Things look sort of crummy in this area. It's not at all what I'd imagined London would be like. But apparently, I heard from a local that lots of artists live in this neighborhood. I heard a few different languages out on the street. There's a huge immigrant population here as well. We ate dinner in an awesome Turkish restaurant, and for some unexplainable reason, the waiter kept giving us free things! Free drinks! Free Turkish delight ( a traditional dessert). So, so good.

---I wrote the first half of this before the show. Things went alright tonight. Unlike our last show in London where about 8 people came, this place was packed. They sold 150 pre-sale tickets. nuts! I think there were definitely some weird moments in the set..not sure what happened exactly, but regardless, people were into it! We played Truth as our encore and sang the end without mics. It was great! Easily the favorite part of my day. I'm ready for bed now, but Mike and Rob are still chit chatting away with important people.

Tomorrow, well...not sure where we're going tomorrow. :)

starting to miss all you guys from home,
-aisha

April 7 - Brussels show

I have exactly 6% battery power left on my laptop and a frightening looking outlet in my room. ack! I also need to be dressed and ready to go at 8am. Really, I should be sleeping. But I'm very wide awake.

I'm only writing to say that tonight was the most fun I've had playing music yet on this tour. I think I somehow got into an autopilot zone before. But tonight, we played nearly acoustic (just a small amount of strings and acoustic guitars coming through the speakers) and with a beautiful piano. It was lovely. It was incredibly refreshing to not worry about hearing myself, or the frustrating sound that is my violin running through a pick up. Maybe it was that. ...I don't know. For some reason that I clearly can't explain, my mind was in a different place, and definitely more connected to just making music in a way that it hasn't been in a while. And it made me really love doing what I'm doing.

I'm not sure I could be more vague.

All I'm trying to say in way too many words is that I had an awesome, memorable night. Favorite so far. That's all. Bed time now.

-aisha

Amsterdam. M.Muller.

The Balmorhea Tumblr is a'tumblin.

Go enjoy some pics. Michael sometimes makes things look better in photos than they do in real life.

Andrew also begged me to document and share with you all that he loves sparkling water. There it is. He also just dropped two barbecue chips on the floor and ate them. Thought you should know.

I think this whole time I've hardly written anything about our touring companion Nils Frahm. He is awesome. Annnnd wonderfully amazing at piano. Listen to his music here.

photo by M. Muller.

April 7 - Brussels, Belgium

I haven't the patience to recap the last couple of days, so you'll just have to use your imagination a bit. :)

Last night we played in Gent, Belgium, which turned out to be a really fun show. I was a little nervous about it after walking into the venue. It was small, and recalling the squished, sweaty, sardine-like nature of our show in Ghent in October, I wasn't convinced we'd fit without some sort of uncomfortable situation occurring. But it was fine. They pre-sold tickets, set out some chairs and we fit nicely. They also gave us all the Belgian beer we could want and more food than most of us could really eat. Twas great.

Someone made a comment about how each of my posts describes everything we eat and I hadn't realized until today how much I've had food on the brain this whole tour! I'm not sure what my deal is...But having a good stash of snacks and some sort of huge dinner has consumed me lately. I just found a grocery store a block away from our lunch spot at Snack Seven (I had this chicken wrap with french fries INSIDE of it. weird!). I bought a tiny jar of nutella to dress up all the bread we've been eating, and a little box of chocolate chip cookies. Anyway, that was a slight digression (this post apparently isn't going to be linear at all, my appologies). Last night the show was wonderful. Andrew did a great job of making a mediocre PA sound great, and I think we all played pretty well. A success, I'd say.

We split up by twos and stayed with people who organized/came to the show. It's nice sometimes to stay at someone's house instead of a hotel. When you're always together all the time, for me at least, it's fun to do something a little different and then feel excited when you see everyone again. The hospitality of people who've never met us will continually astound me. The people Nicole and I stayed with gave us dibs on this large box full of Easter chocolates. They also provided me with the most comfortable bed I've encountered in a week. We slept so well that we slept in. But downstairs was a table full of bread, croissants, juice and tea just waiting for the two of us. lovely.

(there I go with the food again...)

Ah gosh, I've written so much about nothing at all. As I'm writing, Nills is soundchecking and the venue is getting spruced up with all sorts of lights and chairs. Maybe someone will take a picture and I can post it. The place is sort of tucked away behind this old white brick wall that has ivy strands climbing over it. And this huge stretch of what looks like wooded roots is sprawled across the side of the building. Looks nice. We have a real piano tonight that's just been tuned. It's a sold out show. Should be good, I hope!

Tomorrow, we venture off to the UK on this.

-aisha

From Amsterdam April 5

Beautiful photos from our show in Amsterdam!
http://milov.nl/photos/5141/balmorhea-at-paradiso-amsterdam

Courtesy of Milo Vermeulen

April 4 - Ottersum, Netherlands

Well, we made it! Just 20 minutes after I dosed off to sleep, Kendall woke up me up with a few taps on the back, bright (well, dark) and early at 4:40am. We brushed our teeth, grabbed the box of food the venue left for us and piled into the van. It was fun to watch the world get light. From black to blue to a paler hue and so on through sunrise. I remember staring out through the window in that kind of stare that traps you and keeps you from turning away. I thought through a lot of things that have been running through my mind the past few weeks, months even (I love that touring gives me space for that). I thought then about writing them out. But then, in a careless mistake, I thought about sleeping and that was the end of it all.

There are few things I remember about that 6 hour drive. The sound of Michael laughing comes in pretty clear, however. He, Rob and Kendall stayed up the entire tiiiime. Insane! But someone had to keep the driver awake. Today definitely could've been some sort of commercial for the benefits of coffee drinking. I woke up to "Boy From School" by Hotchip commin through the speakers and Michael yelling that we were only 15 minutes away and almost in the Netherlands!

Our show was in what was once a monestary and is now a venue. This place is amazing. We played in what could've been the old chapel, huge stained glass windows, high white ceilings and a stage enclosed with blue curtains. Things went quite well. Andrew thinks its the best show yet. We drew an older crowd somehow, eighty-eight people total. Did another encore, yet again. This is crazy.

After the show, we went back to our greenroom and had dinner. And oh man, I'm not sure if you read my last post, but I've been ridiculously hungry. Annnnd I ate so, so much! There was chicken in some sort of curry sauce, kous kous with tomatoes, salad, and quiche! Quite the feast! I went back four times. Twas delicious.

I'm writing you now from the gals room in the B&B we're staying at in Germany. It's so awesome! We have the whole upstairs to ourselves, four bedrooms and a common room for us to roam. It's maybe one of the cutest places I've ever stayed. It's 8:40pm and all I want to do is go to bed. Sleeping for 5 hours in the van was lovely but definitely not enough. There was some sort of crazy bonfire/ party happening around the corner that I think the guys went to, but I'm in such an exhausted state that I don't realllly feel much like talking. I'm in a bit of a hiding mood and mostly unashamed of that. Think I'll take a shower, get into my pjs and curl up under the covers. :)

Amsterdam tomorrow!

Day 3 - April 3 - Rostock

There is probably a lot I could say, but all I want to say is that it's 2:30am and I'm laying on a top bunk while some terrible German version of a 90s grunge rock ballad is sadly creeping through the red, tagged walls around me. It's not alone though. It's keeping company with the voices of people who sound like they're conversing with their faces buried in pillows and the clanking of beer bottles being violently introduced to trash cans. silly. The backstage area of this venue has two rooms with bunk beds for the bands to stay in. As usual, Nicole and I are in what has become a gals room and the guys are across the hall. But just a few yards away is this troublesome bar, entertaining a drinking crowd. Not the best sleeping conditions.

Good thing I'm not planning on sleeping.

Somehow, in the wonders of booking, after headlining tonight's show, we are expected to be in the Netherlands by noon tomorrow, following what is no less than a 6 hour drive. This means that we have to leave here by 5am. The clock tells me it's 2:45am. My brain tells me I just might regret this, but I'm not sleepy in the slightest! We've been getting to bed so late, around 3 or 3:30 really. And I'm starving. We haven't really been eating lunch. I think we've been driving through lunch time, and arriving in town just in time for our load in and sound check. Our dinners have been pretty great but man, skipping that meal leaves my stomach screaming for something around midnight each night. So yeah, an empty stomach plus a bizarre internal clock is definitely keepin me from even attempting to sleep. Or even changing into my pajamas for that matter.

Anyway, enough griping. I'm not as uncomfortable as I sound, promise! The highlights of my day were as follows:

1) playing Nintendo on my computer (with a real controller!) today with Andrew and Travis.
2)a pretty filling breakfast served by a disgruntled indie looking German man
3)seeing a grown man walk down the street with a giant horse balloon floating in the air before him, tied to the zipper on his sweater.
4) oh yeah, and the show was pretty fun too :)

Day 2 - April 2 - Berlin

Berlin!

Only a 2 hour drive today, which made for a nice slow wake up. Aside from my cold shower (guess that's what happens when 5 people get their act together before you do), the morning was great. Ralph, the guy we stayed with, made coffee and tea, toasted a basket full of bread, made some hard boiled eggs, and laid out plates of cheeses and dips for us all. So, so nice.

In Berlin we had about a half hour to sight see. We took a walk along the east side of the Berlin wall, bordering the river. I'd never seen it up close and was momentarily astonished by how short it was. It seemed so easy to climb over, but then I remembered that the height of a wall so heavily and explosively guarded is irrelevant. It's a work of art now. Each panel is completely painted over and stylistically independent of the one before it. It's quite the mosaic now, and draws probably hundreds of people daily who stop by just in front to get their picture taken. It's nice when things like that get turned into something beautiful.

Later we took a stroll through a Turkish neighborhood and stopped at a Turkish bakery where I was hit by a German bird! Yes, a bird. Please, do me a favor and try to recall the last time a tiny little bird miscalculated and sailed straight into you. I remember looking down and thinking, oh hey, look at those little guys, they're cute. And then right in the middle of my stride, about 10 seconds later, I felt this semi-forceful thud right into my shin! And then the little guy flew off. what. the. heck.

Our green room was stocked with water and beer, a basket of bread, and plates of cheeses, vegetables and fruit. Oh and a Sega Genesis with a tower of games. Really there was absolutely no reason for me to write anything about the green room, I just liked that someone put a Sega in there...

Tonight was our first show with in-ear monitors for the strings. It's tricky to get used to, but I think things went well. We got another double encore. It's crazy out here in that way. People love their encores. We tip toed through the mess of chords and hopped off the stage into this teeny tiny stairwell that was definitely not large enough for the six of us. Awkwardly close, we paused with the door slightly open (funny), because if it closed it might've locked, and then returned. Our newest untitled song is coming together quite well. And where it used to completely terrify me (in that it is so energetic and there's so much quick movement, it seems as though it could almost explode), I keep catching myself grinning in the middle of it. It's one of my favorites now, without a doubt.

After the show, we took a walk with all of our bags to a hostel 10 minutes away. It's sure nice when housing is free but it's even nicer when its not full of blaring 80s music till 4am...

Next stop, Rostock.

Europe Tour III - Day 1

Day 1

(Sidenote: I wrote this days ago and just now realized I never posted it. whoops...enjoy)

We just finished the longest day ever. I first woke up Wednesday at 7:40am, central time. Got on a plane at 11:40am, flew to Dallas. Then sat down on a plane in Dallas, set to take us to Frankfurt Germany at 2:15pm. Then began the great sleeping fest. I woke up only to eat some lunch. Then slept again...for 6 hours (That's the kind of in-flight sleep that happens only after staying up till you're falling asleep while at a computer finishing your taxes at 6am). After a couple hours of flying and some mystery chicken in strange gravy amidst some sort of mashed potato substance, we landed in Germany. And suddenly I was forced to pretend that there really are only 9 hours from a Wednesday afternoon to 7:30am on a Thursday morning. awesome.

Lets skip all the driving and surprise mini snow falls to our arrival in Hannover, Germany. Finekost Lampe, was the venue. It's a small place, run by two of the friendliest people I've ever met. The inside feels like a cozy living room, couch seating, low ceilings and dim lighting by way of many many lamps. Here we met our new friend Greg, who opened for us and will catch a ride with us back to his home in Berlin. The owners made us dinner and shoved Club Matte into our hands. I think about half of us are obsessed with this bottled mystery caffeinated drink. It's some sort of tea-lemonade fusion that's pretty delicious. But it's only in Germany! so we're takin it while we can. Anyway, the show! So, so nice. Our set went pretty well--sold out crowd, double encore, a few questionable moments, but mostly really, really fun. Few times have I been a part of a room so crowded.

Afterward, we hung around and sold some merch, signed some things. Michael did one of his incredible van parking moves and somehow squeezed our 8 seater Sprinter through a path with only inches of breathing room. such skill! We spend the night with a man named Ralph, who we stayed with a year ago. He seemed to like us pretty well. He's had probably hundreds of bands stay in his home. I think we all got beds and pillows and some internet time, and awoke this morning to a mini breakfast buffet of breads, cheeses, eggs, fruit, coffee and teas. Now we're in the van, most of us in headphone land, leaving things quite silent and me on the verge of sleep again. Feels good to have the German countryside filling my windows. Next stop, Berlin!

-aisha