Date
  Title
  Another fine day...
  Thank you..
  Dream Weekend
  Opening Night
  Vegas Baby!
  REO ROCKS!
  Thank you, Survivor...
  On the road--OFFICIALLY!
  The Today Show Odyssey
  Another Day in the Life
  Last night at Pine Knob...
  The Day After Springfield, MO
  Morning in Minnesota...
  Land spreading out so far and wide...
  Pursuing perfection in the prairie...
  Thinkin' of Lincoln
  On the road...
  Smiles, Hemlock and Magic...
  Psyche Delicacies...
  Roll Them Bones...
  The road to 47...
  Helplessly Hopped...
  Laughing at land mines
  Happy, nappy people...
  Delawareness
  Jumpin' & Jivin' in Jersey Baby...
  Another day in STYX...
  Konocti to Canada...
  Benjamin Orr...
  North Bay newcomers...
  North Bay to Quebec City...
  A rite of passage...
  Train kept a'rollin'...
  That voodoo that we do...
  Day off in Munich...
  Last day in Germany
  London today, LA tomorrow ...
  Looking at you from Lowell
     

9/21/00 - Happy, nappy people...

Hello from Connecticut,

Last night we played here in Wallingford at the Oakdale Music Theater with REO.

It was nice to be indoors again, taking the weather out of the equation. Also this particular hall was very satisfying for us acoustically. It gave Gary, our sound engineer, a real opportunity to show off his mixing skills.

The crew was extremely happy because catering was what some claimed to be the best so far this tour. I didn't eat dinner because it was too close to showtime but it must have been good because it got really quiet in the dining room before the oohs and ahhs started. Always a sure sign that the chow is tasty. I can attest to the amazingness of the batch of fresh cookies we waited for before leaving last night. We were goofy from the sugar on the drive back to the hotel. MMMM. GOOD cookies!

Now, catering issues aside, the show was really good. Because we were indoors it was our first chance in a couple of weeks to rehearse a little in the afternoon so we spent some time working out the kinks in "Sing For The Day" as well as getting a leg up on "Love Is The Ritual." What a groovin' song THAT is gonna be. Hopefully we will get to rehearse again today and move it closer to putting into the show. Ever since I first heard "Ritual" in the back of the bus when I was playing with Damn Yankees in Houston in 1991, it has always been what I felt was a breakthrough song for STYX, and one that showed the undeniable talents of Glen Burtnik as the bad-ass singer/songwriter we all know him to be. Last night I think "Sing For The Day" was the best we've played it so far. I love the song and am thrilled to be giving it some stage time, but it as you might know, in order to put a new song in, a song has to come out. Age old dilemma, so the jury is out as to how long we keep SFTD in the show. I think the more die hard fans are really going to enjoy it because it has virtually no miles on it as a live song.

Jeanne and Suzie are back out with us this week and it is nice to have their female presence again. We are somewhat spoiled by their thumbs up/thumbs down critiques of our appearances before we go on stage and when they are not there it is kind of funny with these guys walking aroung backstage asking each other, "Does this look okay?" We are such dudes. We have no idea really. Fortunately there is a finite amount of stage clothes in the wardrobe cases so hopefully we don't look THAT bad out here when the girls stay home. Jeanne had her scissors and clippers and was kept busy trimming the heads of a half dozen of her shaggier subjects. Good food and a haircut made for some happy, nappy campers backstage

Tonight we will be in Uncasville, CT with REO. I hope some of you will join us!

9/19/00 - Laughing at land mines

 

Greetings from the air again,

After getting to Dallas' DFW from LAX and finding our way to the little jam-packed, scary, driverless train-like thing that takes you to the connecting gate in a galaxy far, far away from where you got off the first plane, we made it just in time to get seated for the 3.5 hour trip to Hartford. Aboard the first flight they ran down the connecting gate information just prior to landing and it was then that I realized I had no idea where we were connecting to. Fortunately Keith was traveling with us and I felt certain he was keeping up with things better than me. Lately I have been fine at knowing what region of the country we are headed to but the actual cities are getting a little fuzzy. ;-)

Can you believe this? If I were not experiencing it myself I would think it was preposterous not to know this information. It is not for lack of caring or preparation as it is just the comfort factor. We have traveled so much this year that it is darn near impossible to resist the coziness of familiarity. If we were going on vacation, I would know a lot more about our destination, but we are going to perform and so it will be our comfortable STYX World we are traveling to. Our people, our wardrobe cases, our stage, our dressing rooms. So, like going to where you work every day, you stop thinking about how you get there, where you turn, what the speed limit is, etc. It isn't that you don't care about these things, it's just that you don't need to concentrate on them in order to get to where you are going so they become second nature to you.

The thing that never falls prey to routine or complacency is the concert itself. Every night it is raw and in your face. It is strapped to you and it is plugged into your ears. It can all go horribly wrong. It can be a disaster. But that is the gig. You suit up and show up physically, but you sure as heck better show up mentally and emotionally or you will crash and burn. This may sound a bit dramatic, but take it from the guy who recently introduced Glen as Lawrence, all it takes is one moment of losing concentration to really step in it!

So, now I know where we are going, I have stopped perspiring from the anxiety of the crowded boxcar trip and food is coming. Life is good again...

-----------------

Hi, I'm back. Bubba is happy, having just shared in Jeanie's pasta and my chicken hajimadish or whatever the heck that thing was (In case you just tuned in, Bubba is our dog who travels with us). You must excuse my wackiness today. It is hard sometimes to transition from home life back to tour life, and at this moment I have one foot in the boat and one on the shore.

I tend to believe we are all very much alike. We have different things we do for a living, but we all have our strengths and shortcomings and we do the best to accent the former and underplay the latter. I have friends who are extremely well off financially and those who live from paycheck to paycheck and they all have daily issues that could be interchangeable, because they are not effected by income levels. We all have to get through our day and we get to decide if it will consist of lots of laughs or if it is dead serious from dusk till dawn. When I lived in New York, I used to have this garbage man, and he was always laughing, whistling, as if he was the happiest man on earth. Laughter for me please.

I made the mistake of living in the future a couple of days ago. Whenever I do that, I hardly ever project that things will be wonderful. I usually "But what if?" myself into a knot. Funny thing is, life has always been pretty dang sweet despite my grim predictions. Especially these days! I used to board this horse at my farm named Marco who was constantly getting injured. As soon as all his scrapes and bumps would heal up, he would trip, fall or run into something, dinging himself up again. We always joked that he "couldn't stand prosperity..." Sometimes I relate to Marco.

I learned a few years ago to live life one day at a time, that tomorrow would be here soon enough and there was not diddly squat I could do about it today. This is just plain true. I know it, I have experienced it and I believe it. But that never stops me from occasionally taking a mental trip to the future to look for land mines. The good thing about this type of anxiety is that it passes as soon as you let it, and I can say that I am a lot better letter now than I once was. Perhaps someone will perfect this kind of time travel someday, but don't look to sell me a ticket. Nope, none for me.

Jeanne just gave me some of the mind altering hot fudge caramel desert she ordered so I think I will sit back and think about THAT for a while. Interestingly enough, today's plane trip from Los Angeles to Hartford is going to take almost the same amount of time it will take us to fly from Los Angeles to Frankfurt, Germany in a couple of weeks. Go figure that one out!

See you in Connecticut...

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