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—October 25th - 29th, 2001—
East Coast Tour

Rhode Island, Connecticut, and Massachusetts

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October 28th — the Smith College Noteables

It all started a few months ago when some random dude from Boston called us up and asked if we wanted to perform at the East Coast A Cappella Summit. Now, although we were all thinking "Heck yes!", we had to feign indifference for a while: "Well, if they really want us out there, it might be good to go and sing..." Kind of like dating, isn't it? "Do you want to go out?" (Heck yes) "I have to check my calendar." So eventually we said yes, and decided to try to book a few college shows around the event so we wouldn't feel quite so ridiculous. There's nothing like a college show to make you feel less ridiculous.

October 25th

We left on Thursday night. The plan was to take the redeye flight into Providence, RI, sleep on the plane, arrive on Friday morning refreshed, well rested, and ready to take on the world, rent some sound equipment and a van, and hit the road. George managed to find some nice travel cases for our mics and receivers and our mixing board. Challenge #1: We have a little drawer in our rack to store our mics, but we needed some foam to pad the mics with. Where would we get foam? Where else? We ventured to Palo Alto's House Of Foam, thinking that this might be the right place. As we entered, our confidence was boosted by the sign on the door: "We Got Foam." Perfect. We entered, and as we took in the vast quantities of foam, hanging from the walls, rolled up and leaning on the counters, shaped into doghouses or oddly shaped people or other freakish objects, a man stepped out from the back room: "Can I help you?"

"Yeah, we're looking for some foam," we said simultaneously. "Ah. Halloween costumes?" "No..." and we explained our situation. He showed us around the foam stockroom, and eventually we found the type of foam we wanted. But our enthusiasm was quickly dampened:

"It's not cheap..."

We're at the House of Foam. We want Foam. We have found the Foam we want. And..."It's not cheap"??? IT'S FOAM!!!

Well, we brought in the mic drawer, and after a few iterations we got the foam cuts we needed. As we puzzled about how to cut out sections to fit the mics, the man informed us that he could do it, but not that night (he was just swamped) and it would cost us $50/hour.

You, too, can make $50/hour cutting foam. And he's swamped. Imagine how luxurious a house you could have if you made $50/hour and were swamped. Especially if the house was made of foam. Not the stuff we bought, of course...it's not cheap, you know.

Anyway, after George and Julia did the foamcutting job in 20 minutes for free, we got to the San Jose International Airport ridiculously early, got through the ridiculously short security line (they made us remove our belts and some clothing, which was interesting; we figured that wouldn't start till later in the tour), and sat for a while until we got on the plane, which was to be our resting place for the evening.

We were put in the back row. For those of you who have never been in the back row of a plane, don't ever accept seats in the back row. Strap yourself to the wing, grab onto the tail and hang on for dear life, sit inside the serving cart -- anything is more comfortable than the back row. At some point in the middle of the night, we transferred to a different plane with the same flight number in Detroit, and by transfer, I mean sprint like mad. Whoever heard of having to sprint all the way across an airport to catch the continuation of the same flight?!? After getting totally winded, asthmatic, and insulted (by the gate attendant), we got into our seats, which were remarkably like the seats on the other plane with the same flight number in that they were ridiculously uncomfortable.

October 26th

Well. So, we finally landed in Providence, rented the van, rented the sound equipment, had a flashback to our Rubik's Cube 80's past as we tried to fit all the sound equipment into the van, decided Mayank's suitcase would be known as "Behemoth," and drove toward the capital of New England: New London, CT. They have a river called the Thames, but unlike the Thames in old London, in old England, this one is pronounced "Thames" to rhyme with "James." Go figure.

Our first impression of New London: Nice beds. After a lovely meal at Connecticut College, provided by Scott from their events committee, we slept until it was time to set up for the show. We met the ConnChords, a lovely group of individuals who fed us a really good pasta dinner. They were perfect hosts, and sounded really great! Our contact Lizzie not only made sure we were very well provided for, but also made a great Mustang Lizzie (which if you're into the history of Ford vehicles is kind of funny). If any of you out there are in women's groups, I think you should contact the ConnChords (http://www.connchords.net) and get some arranging advice from them -- they used their voices really well and sounded excellent. The interesting thing about this performance is that the room it was held in used to house a swimming pool. The acoustics, then, were so bouncy that hearing anything other than Mayank's overtones and Jon's snare drum was a bit challenging. But we had a great time!! And then we went to sleep.

October 27th

Saturday, we were feeling much better. After sleeping for 9 or 10 hours, our voices actually kind of returned, which was good, because we had to drive to Smithfield, RI, to sing at Bryant College. Here, we had the unique and wonderful opportunity to not only open for the amazing R&B vocal group Kai, but also sang a song (Gone) with them at the end of the show. What an amazing experience -- these guys are so good, so professional, such great performers, and such nice people. That night, we were to stay at the Susse Chalet hotel nearby - sounds really nice, doesn't it? Well, our contact at Bryant, Norrine (who did a fantastic job of making sure we knew where we were going and had everything we needed!) informed us that there had been a murder at that hotel only a couple of days back, so we were in no rush to get back. After a bit of driving around, we found a bar that was still open (though only for seven more minutes). The kindly bartender gave us two pieces of information we really wanted: (1) directions to a restaurant that was still open, and (2) news that the person who allegedly committed the alleged murder was allegedly caught. Well, we sure slept easy that night. Luckily we were all crammed into one room - made things nice and cozy, and by cozy I mean CROWDED!

October 28th

That left Sunday. Early Sunday morning we made our way to Boston to participate in the East Coast A Cappella Summit. We got there at 10:00am, and...they were closed. The building was closed, there was no way in, and we were stuck outside, sleepy, cold, destitute, without a penny to our name...well, OK, we were a little chilly and a little tired but decided we could afford a trip to Burger King. Eventually the schedule sorted itself out, and we ripped out five songs; unfortunately the sound system was a little underpowered so our actual singing was obscuring our "amplified" sound. Very strange. Then we had to dash off to Northampton, MA, for our show with Smith College's Noteables (http://sophia.smith.edu/noteables/). First we thought it was the "Notables," or possibly the "No Tables" (we were wondering where we'd put our stuff...).

I cannot say enough about the Noteables -- they were amazing!! First, they fed us, for which we are eternally grateful. Then, they sounded fantastic!! Very different style from the ConnChords, but equally compelling. It's SO great to not have to lie in this review! Anyway, so we set up our sound and ate, and eventually got a sizeable and almost completely female crowd. This was a fun show - the audience was fantastic; they even put up with some problems we had with the sound and the fact that the stage came apart and nearly destroyed us. Great crowd. And our contact from the Noteables, Michaela, made Hookslide history by being the first repeat Mustang name -- how exciting!

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On that high note, we began our voyage home. It was about 10:30 at night, and our flight was at 6:00am Monday morning. We decided that since we'd be so late getting back to Providence, we didn't need a hotel room. Note the progression: 2 hotel rooms the first night, 1 hotel room the second night, and a minivan the third night. Good thing we didn't stay a fourth night; we'd have had to cram ourselves into a Yugo. Or a HotWheel. (shudder) Anyway, we got to Providence, and drove around for a while hoping to find something relatively Denny's-like.

Instead, we found this joint..that served fried chicken and french fries, and that's it. They didn't speak much English, so you would order by pointing at the appropriate fried item (since all the fried items were in metal buckets at the counter). Good thing potatoes don't look anything like chickens. If this sounds surreal now, try it at 3 in the morning. There were a couple of down-and-out-looking characters in the place, eating chicken, or fries, so when we showed up (still in our gig clothes) and all sat at a table and got on our cell phones, it was a little strange. But nobody beat the crap out of us - eventually, the bar next door closed and a whole bunch of well-dressed and perfumed people came into the place and turned up the music REALLY loud, which drove us out (which was probably the point).

October 29th

We got back into the van, and found the airport and slept at a hotel nearby. I mean, the van was parked at the hotel; we slept for about an hour in the van. At about 4:15 in the morning, we drove to the airport and began the check-in process (from chicken to check-in - that's a great slogan for.someone.). It was about 20 degrees outside, and we were still in our gig clothes, which are largely very thin polyester. We were basically naked. Naked in a van. In Providence. Watch for that in our next song. So we decided to get our stuff, change, repack, check in, return the van, and get on the plane.

By the time we finished checking in, it was 5:10. By the time we got downstairs to the parking lot it was 5:12. By the time Mayank ran back inside to look for the parking stub for short term parking (where the van was) and discovered he'd left it in his thin polyester pants which were now safely contained in his suitcase on their way to an airplane, it was 5:16. By the time Paul and Mayank got back to the parking lot, it was 5:17. Talk to guy in booth, explain situation, call manager, fill out a paper, pay $4 (nice manager): 5:22. Drive off, make wrong turn, get to rental car return: 5:30. Return car, get in shuttle, hang on (Bud told the driver our situation, and he responded by flooring it), get out at the gate, get in line: 5:35.

Now, with 25 minutes before our departure, smelling like perfume and chicken fried chicken and fries and rental car and really old sweat and smoke, we were in a line with 700 other people for security. The line advanced - there was no chance of cutting (that wouldn't have been looked upon kindly by the armed security officers), there was no way to make the flight. We reached the front of the line (after hearing our final boarding call twice) at about 5:57, and they paged Paul. There was still hope.but Paul got stopped because his bag contained video equipment, so Mayank ran ahead. The encounter:

Mayank: Hey, I'm with Paul Anderson, you just paged him.
Dude: You're too late.
Mayank: We were in line, you just paged Paul, he's coming..
Dude: You're too late. You'll have to catch another flight. I don't think there is one today.
Mayank: But.
(George arrives)
Mayank: He says we're too late.
George: AERRRRGH!!!!
Dude: You're too late, you'll have to catch another flight.
George: But it's right there!!!
Mayank: Our party is right here..You just paged.
Dude: You're late. You'll have to catch.
(Paul arrives)
Paul: I'm Paul Anderson, you just paged me.
Dude: You've missed the flight.
Paul: You JUST paged me!
George: It's RIGHT THERE!!!! The plane is RIGHT THERE!!!
Mayank: Surely there must be.
Dude: You should learn to be on time. How many of there are you, three?
Mayank: Four.
Dude: Where's your fourth?
George: He's running, he's right there.
Dude (looking around the corner): I don't see anyone running. You've missed the flight.
George (motioning to Jon to run): He's RIGHT THERE!!!
Mayank and Paul: He's right there.
(Jon arrives)
Mayank: He says we're too late.
Jon: What?
George: *rrrrrrr*
Dude: OK, get on the plane.

So, as far as we can tell, this guy pretty much was being difficult for the sake of being difficult. We got on the plane, which pushed back at EXACTLY 6:00am, as scheduled (in spite of waiting for us).

The voyage home was smooth, and now we're back and eager to perform for the home crowd!