Man or Astro-Man? Summer European Tour Diary 1995<br>
6/27-7/17  -1995<br>
<br><br>
Tuesday, June 27<br>
Venue:  Paradiso<br>
City:  Amsterdam, Netherlands<br>
<br>
 In traditional Astro-style, we arrived to play on the same exact day of
entery into this foreign land.  In traditional Birdstuff Fashion, I spent the
entire previous night doing the normal, useless, obsessed things like ironing
the money I was taking and covering my drum cases with stickers.  Customs was
as simple as CoCo's mind.  We all had stuffed "Destroy's" and "Is It's" in
all our bags and were kind of worried.  I guess the hypno-beam still worked.
 The show was probably a 4.89 out of 10.  The venue was way too large (we had
350 people in it, and it looked only a fourth full), plus we still felt like
naked Roswell aliens without our fourth bretheren, the Captain.<br>
<br>
Wednesday, June 28<br>
Venue:  LVC<br>
City:  Leiden, Netherlands<br>
<br>
 One great thing about touring Holland is the short drives. Well of course we
drive, using jet packs is just way too intimidating!  The club was long and
narrow with the proper size stage (small!).  We're getting treated way better
than our earth or space parents have ever allowed.  I think I'm going to have
groceries for the next 5 months just from what's been left over in our
dressing rooms.  The show was amazing!  The 3 piece brain collective read
through with crystal clarity.  Star Crunch is now mandating the club as a
ship and making the soundman and monitor man the captain and co-pilot.
 Tomorrow's show is with the mighty Doo Rag!<br>
<br>
Thursday, June 29<br>
Venue:  Effenar<br>
City:  Eindhoven, Netherlands<br>
<br>
 On the way out of the Hotel, I snagged a brochure for the Noordwijk Space
Expo.  So, we headed out to see what "Space" in Dutch actually meant.  The
facility was small but was layed out really spectacularly.  After buying a
gaggle-load of space paraphenalia, we took the 12 guilder tour in order to
receive our official(?) European Space Agency certificate.  Star Crunch
wanted to see if they would let us capture a few Kodak Space Moments.  They
actually let us shoot 5 roles of film around various rocket and lunar models.
 Note:  You'll probably be seeing these photos around for the rest of our
career on earth.  The show was really acceptable.  Doo Rag were uniquely
superb and I interviewed them for the Man or Astro-Man? fanzine which may or
may not ever come out.<br><br>
Friday, June 30<br>
Venue:  Basement (Nitetown)<br>
City:  Rotterdam, Netherlands<br>
<br>
 It was the morning after the show.  We had been staying in some large office
building/hotel (I think the club rents out one floor for the bands to stay
in.)  Anyway, I had been cursed with the earth disease you guys refer to as
Insomnia.  Technically, it's different because we Astro-men actually recharge
instead of sleep, but as always we've found that simplification has been the
best policy when dealing with the earth mind.  Okay, so it was 7:00 a.m., and
I went to get breakfast.  The problem: no one is around - at all.  I mean
it's like Vincent Price's "Last Man on Earth."  Curious.  So, being from
another planet, I persue every nook and cranny of the joint.  Starving (my
gastro-sensors were reading the big 'E'), I head for the kitchen.  But to no
avail.  Yet alas, finally Coke and Saltines...a breakfast fit for a - well,
fit for an absolutely morsel-drained space boy.  This was getting to be
rather fun, as my inhibition programming ebbed with each slurp of my 1 Liter
Euro-Coke.  However, the apron was to be the major flaw in my non-plan.  I
should never have put it on.  Busted!  I was caught red-handed in the act of
Coke and cracker thievery, and while wearing an orange chef's apron...No
wonder Europeans think Americans are so stupid.  I think it would ake only
about 17 episodes like this for the entire continent to think citizens of the
United States are complete stark raving morons.  Oh, well.  Yesterday's show
was really in sync.  It was a great maximum-energy-released,
40-minute-space-punk set.  The crowd was really into it, and everybody left
after we played, so the rave DJ's had no one to play Trip-Hop-Acid-Jungle
House for.  What a shamex<br>
<br>
Saturday, July 1<br>
Venue:  Atak<br>
City:  Enchede, Netherlands<br>
<br>
 To get in this place you had to state your business to this drive-thru-type
speaker system and then some unseen controller would cause the road spike to
go under the ground.  Once inside, this top secret area turned into a strange
circle of cafes, movie theatres, nite clubs, and bowling alleys.  Weird?
 Needless to say, the references to our being trapped inside The Village from
"The Prisoner" TV series abounded.  The show went well, but I think my space
comrads are getting frustrated without a 4th robojock in the mix.  We all
agreed that if Hayden (ex-Supernova guitar player) would join us, then we
would teach him the ways of the Astro-clan...<br>
<br>
Sunday, July 2<br>
Venue:  Mark Hall<br>
City:  Hamburg, Germany<br>
<br>
 Ah yes, Germany - a wonderful de-evolutionary step in American cultural ease
and acceptance from that of our European home-away-from-home, Holland.  Lots
of fucked up people trying to use their 2 years of required English on you.
 The Mark Hall is a huge venue with one large and one small room.  Tonight
Soul Asylum and Man or Astro-Man? were poised against each other in the two
halls.  Can you guess who was in which room?  The show was absolute space
sludge.  We sound checked for an hour only to have the sampler channel and
entire monitor system go.  Good punk rock effort by CoCo, but those kind of
shows are satisfying me less and less.  No posters - No promotion - Germany
sucks space dick.  I did call Hayden, though.  He's in.  I guess the
collective brain cell goes back to a four piece when we return home.  Hmm...I
kind of like the name Dexter X:  Man From Planet Q.  Whaddya think?<br>
<br>
Monday, July 3<br>
OFF DAY<br>
City:  Hamburg, Germany<br>
<br>
 Being my normal Space Calvanist self, I never like the thought of having
days off.  I mean we're away from home base and our earth loved ones - why
not work our Asstros off?  Truth is, we probably wouldn'tt survive foreign
atmospheres if not for the off day phenomenon.  I'll be brief:  Space Suit
gets washed.  Star Crunch and I buy rad rocket shaped lava lamps.  Band buys
matching solar glasses (even the fourth pair for Mr. Dexter X), we visit the
Hamburg TV Tower (cheap German copy of Seattle's beloved Space Needle).
 Ashley Atomica and I eat at its revolving restaurant.  I try to buy a
Residents CD, but find out the CD's at this shop are only to rent, I get 3
new books to read including "Is There Anyone Out There."  We go to the
Reeperbahn and I buy dirty postcards for Bookman and Estrus honcho, Dave
Crider.  Hey, where'd all my tour money go?<br>
<br>
Tuesday, July 4<br>
Venue:  Huxley's<br>
City:  Berlin, Germany<br>
<br>
 The Fourth of July in Berlin, can it get any more patriotic than this?  We
did a TV interview before the show and this drug crazed cocaine dealer came
up to us while we were recording and kept trying to take his shirt off.
 Dinner was amazing as most our earth consumption units have been so far.
 With any other crowd the show would have been out of control, but of course
we became Man or Astro-Fish? and everyone stared at us like we were in an
aquarium.  Still much smaller crowds in Germany than we expected - Hey, why
are those tour posters on your desk and not in the city?<br>
<br>
Wednesday, July 5<br>
Venue:  Kerosin<br>
City:  Augsburg, Germany<br>
<br>
 Small club, but propaganda visuals (posters!) in place!  Massive amounts of
Huevos Rancheros stickers were up, giving one a strange sense of Canadian
wallpaper.  We are currently battling Huevos for attendance, not that either
Huevos or us were getting calls from Guiness for our German show-going
attendance figures.  The man providing the stats was Steven "The Invisible
Tour Manager."  Steven always seems to be there just when you need him.  He's
probably the nicest, most humble tour guy in the history of music.  He's done
the likes of My Bloody Valentine and Dinosaur, Jr., and he still treats us
like a band instead of the bumbling space fools that we proved ourselves to
be by playing a pretty weak show.<br>
<br>
Thursday, July 6<br>
Venue:  LGB<br>
City:  Nurnberg, Germany<br>
<br>
 Nurmberg, the trials and tribulations of the 3rd Reicht...what an excellent
place for humor from outer space.  We showed up to this open-air,
post-apocolyptic beer garden with 2 strange art buildings to either side.
 This place looked like the brain child of Martin Denny and Goebbles.  First
off, Mr. Disorganization and Supreme Untogetherness (that's me, for those of
you keeping score in your astro-logs), locked our only set of keys in the
van.  Luckily, thanks to Star Crunch's wire fishing capabilities coupled with
the stroke of genius we had in leaving the sun hatch unlocked, we again had
escape possibilities.  Andrea from Semaphore, Germany picked us up for an
interview at Radio Z.  The station was above a belly dancing club, and the
interview was fun and short.  Maybe belly dancing and good radio interviews
are direct casualties.  Somehow we all got back to the club with promotional
copies of a CD where Henry Rollins interviews Wayne Kramer of the MC-5.    A
friend from Empty Records took us to the 3rd Reicht meeting area.  It was
dilapidated but still ominous.  The main field dwarfs Jordan-Haire Stadium
(which holds 80,000) in Auburn.  It was eerie standing where Hitler spoke.
 For half an hour none of us cracked any jokes.  The show was excitement
packed but we were by no means "tight."  The sound guy was a Rastafarian and
I kept thinking that we were playing in Jamaica.<br>
<br>
Friday, July 7<br>
Venue:  Perron 55<br>
City:  Venlo, Netherlands<br>
<br>
 The band apartment we were suposed to be staying at in Nurnberg wasn't all
that appealing, so we decided to tackle the 6 hour journey to Venlo as a
nocturnal task.  My first rememberance of the night was hearing whoops and
hollers to the ongoing mischief of a drunk driver.  We were all cheering this
guy on to smash into another car or to run off the road and over the guard
rail.  Sick?  Maybe, but you've never been on the road wearing a sweaty space
suit for a solid week, now have you earth squat?  You take entertainment when
and where you can get it.  The show in Venlo was both fun and technically
smooth.  Final Note:  if you ever ask for a free t-shirt you will be told to
suck Astro-Peter along with the 10 or so people at this club who asked for
theirs.<br>
<br>
Saturday, July 8<br>
Venue:  Tivoli<br>
City:  Utrecht, Netherlands<br>
<br>
 This ended up being a space extravaganza like no other.  The club had spent
a week decorating every inch of the place in aluminum foil and space scenery.
 There were even several stuffed astronauts hanging from the ceiling.  The
Tivoli is a large landing hangar for our tiny spacecraft and crew.  Last time
the place was full of Dutch denziens because we were the opening act for Mr.
John Spencer himself.  But this night the Astro-men rang the ears of over 600
suckeroonies all by our lonesome.  The live musical experiment went just
dandy and there is professional videotape to prove it.  <br>
To top the night off, the club made us blue space cake for a post-show treat.
 Umm, umm Good!<br>
<br>
<br>
Sunday, July 9<br>
Venue:  Vera<br>
City:  Groningen, Netherlands<br>
<br>
 The world famous Vera.  If you've ever played there or talked to a band
who's toured Holland, you know the history of this volunteer-run club.  I'm
now supposing that you've read another band's tour diary of their European
tour, so instead of spending this whole entry telling you how great the club
is, I will merely reaffirm that it is indeed one of the best, if not thee
actual thing.  After solving (or at least half-solving) one of the greatest
amp buzz mysteries of all time, we suited up and were ready to take "the club
that's seen it all" by meteorite crashing status.  The show was pretty
strong, but everyone wanted an encore.  Small problem:  we never play
encores.  In miniscule earth terms, they're just stupid.  I mean, unless
you're a Naked Gun/Police Academy/Airplane freak, you don't start stomping
your feet to get an extra tidbit after the credits.  I'm sure there's some
history to it.  Okay, we're ruining some age old traditions started by the
Greeks or something, but who cares.  We play our best songs, put on our
little space side show for 1 hour, and then we head back into the great
beyond.  Anything else is anti-climactic.  Anyway, the crowd at Vera was
going nuts.  We had no choice.  Sell outs.  Hypocrites.  So we did it.
 "Here's one more song that won't be as good as the last one because we
already played our best song last!"  "Never again," I vowed.  At least not on
the instruments we know how to play.<br>
<br>
<br>
Monday, July 10<br>
Travel Day to Sheffield, England<br>
<br>
Today's Equations<br>
*  Oriental Food From Previous Day = Puke in sink next morning<br>
*  Six Hour Daytime Drive Thru Belgium = Unbearable Venusian
planet-surface-type heat<br>
*  Near Absolute Boredom = 70 pages read and tour diary entries<br>
*  Ferry Ride to England = Reflections of "alternate universe" with an
Oxford-graduated Love Boat crew member<br>
*  Duty Free Shop Aboard Ferry = New socks and underwear, "Pet U.F.O." Game,
and cool space-age looking silver notebooks<br>
*  Female Dover Customs Official = Proof of British hatered for Americans
(squared!)<br>
<br>
<br>
Tuesday, July 11<br>
Venue:  Leadmill<br>
City:  Sheffield, England<br>
<br>
 Okay, so my one, day-off puke session turned into some kind of Alien
Intestinal Death Rot.  Also the combination of the off season and the
festivals have made for very poor ticket sales.  Finally, Star Crunch's amp
was sounding like the musical equivalent of Catherine Hepburn's voice.  I
felt like walking off the stage when the amp coughed in a White Flag way
during our opening song "Sferic Waves."  But, lo and behold,due to my good
Karma from making this my "recycling not littering" tour, everything suddenly
turned around.  CoCo did some excellent stalling antics, and the amp "fixed
itself" after a good flogging by Star Crunch's boot.  Weird, though entropy
is way more common than revitilization in Astro-land.  Don't call it a
comeback.<br>
<br>
<br>
Wednesday, July 12<br>
Venue:  The Brittania Rowing Club<br>
City:  Nottingham<br>
<br>
 What thexit really was a rowing club that this girl had rented out for the
show.  The inside, however, ended up being really cool.  The ceiling had a
cave-like texture with cool, white stalagtites protruding from every odd
angle.  But once again adversity comes quick.  I twisted my foot while trying
to keep kicking a shitty bass drum pedal, so the rest of the night I had to
hit it on the side of my bare foot.  You do not know agony until you have
experienced this bit of musical torture.  I felt like a character in Harlan
Ellison's "I Have No Mouth, and I Must Scream."  CoCo did a good job of
anchoring the craft into orbit, though.  This show, because of the trial by
kick pedal, was one of my least favorite shows of all time.<br>
<br>
<br>
Thursday, July 13<br>
Venue:  The Garage<br>
City:  London<br>
<br>
 Okay, this was the show that was being covered by the wonderful British
music press.  I could see the headlines now:  Shit or Bull-Shit? You Decide.
With a new pair of Converse Low Tops, a newly improved (due to added patches)
space suit, and a headlight (excuse me, torch) attachment for my space
helmet, I was set to shake some cosmic fabric.  Star Crunch had fun foot
sliding across monitors and CoCo played really well.  After the show, the
crowd went bo-zonkers and tried to steal our tubes and inflatable rockets.
 It was great!  Okay, maybe we're not Oasis, but as soon as we perfect our
pouty faces, who knows?<br>
<br>
<br>
Friday, July 14<br>
Venue:  The Roadhouse<br>
City:  Manchester<br>
<br>
 Mike Noon, the head cheeze grater at Moral Sense Fanzine, put on this show
for the band.  Proof is in the payoff.  Having someone who digs the band do
the promotion works out a lot better than having some crusty Dead Head staple
a few posters outside the club.  Thanks to Mike we had about 300 people in a
room that comfortably held 200.  Due partly in fact to this "squeezing humans
by the force of a crowbar phenomenon," Manchester was the hottest show of the
tour.  After a sweat-filled (we still haven't built adequate sweat retainers
for CoCo's armpits so we can later sell as cologne) set we headed to Mike's
Godzilla-filled domicile and watched "The Cake" a short film by the BBC that
used 3 of our songs as background music.  It was actually pretty cool -
surreal but with a rather warm, farcical edge.  Geeze, get me out of this
country, I'm starting to talk like them.<br>
<br>
<br>
Saturday, July 15<br>
Venue:  Phoenix Festival<br>
City:  Strattford-Upon-Avon<br>
<br>
 Alright, I know what questions are in the great interior of your mind's
shell, but no, Shakespeare didn't show up for this one.  Phoenix was the
reason this tour was planned.  A really big deal with lots of bands, music
press, and (of course) bull shit.  After nearly being strip-searched to get
to the Melody Maker Back Stage, we got a chance to take in the atmosphere.
 Lots of hippies, lots of people with Carter the Unstoppable Sex Machine
T-shirts, and a complete plethora of take-away food places just in case you
felt the need to dam up those fine arteries.  After relieving organ #1, I
almost bumped into Ice-T who provided a soon to be overly quoted
Astro-Phrase: "You wanna scream like Henry Rollins or Pantera?  That shit
comes from that place inbetween your dick and your asshole."  Our show ended
up being excellent.  No broken strings, a finely tuned sampler, and a
mega-blast of space energy.  The promoter said we were the highlight of the
weekend for the middle stage.  After we played I caught a band called the
Cardiacs - they were supremely nifty.  They sounded like Devo meets Wire and
had some of the thriftiest choreographed moves this side of synchronized
swimming.  Then we were off to do a live interview with none other than John
Peel.  The interview was hilarious, but I'm not sure how Mr. Peel took our
Dick Dale irreverance.  Public Enemy was on the main stage and they were
great.  Flavor Flav could show CoCo a move or two.  Chuck D said that this
was going to be one of their last shows; at least I was there.  After P.E., I
caught a second of the Verve.  They were booring wah-wah, slap your ass with
a tambourine Brit-Pop - not my thing.  Finally, I caught Robyn Hitchcock at
the acoustic tent.  He was in excellent form, running on with bizaar
inbetween song wonderings and also providing a decent bit of material that I
hadn't heard before.  All in all, Phoenix was a diverse experience personally
and a beneficial experiment for the band.  Gak!  How boorish of an ending can
I be allowed?<br>
<br>
<br>
Sunday, July 16<br>
Venue:  Schrikkel Pop Festival<br>
City:  Near Brussels<br>
<br>
 All night drive and breakfast on a ferry - I hoped that this wasn't routing
its way into my normal alien existence.  Belgium makes me think of archaic
historical events that I never did consider pertinent to take note of.  Like
the "Gallic Wars" for instance - they probably happened in Belgium.  Anyway,
we showed up to a baseball field-type outdoor event with a bunch of shitty
Belgium deathcore bands.  Daisy Chainsaw minus the chick singer, Cop Shoot
Cop and us.  Fucked?  Slightly.  The saving grace was that inside the main
building there was a "Space Station" pinball game that Star Crunch and CoCo
got to work on 2p in Brit moula.  Needless to say, infinite pinball play
could make almost any day survivable.  One of the bands ended up being late
so we opted to kick instead of receive and went on 2 hours early.  I was kind
of worried because everyone was exausted and indifferent being that this was
the last day of our official active European Duty, but the tour went out in
Big Bang style.  Even demure Belgian frowns can't resist that Astro-charm.
 Our claims of being the controllers of the weather were finally fulfilled as
it began to rain seconds after our last note.  Now, as in the end of any
overseas tour, the "unleashing and devulging of the sacrement of the Holy
Holding-togetherness in Air Cargo, the substance and ritual from which the
blood of Astro flows and the ceremony therein" (the Time of Taping the Shit
out of everying with all the duct tape you have or can steal) commences.
 Packed, strapped, and ready to jet we all went our separate ways, just like
in the Journey song.  CoCo hung out with Jim Rose; I headed for the Eiffel
Tower; and Star Crunch headed for Home Base Alabama.  We had the Future in
front of us like the lights of an oncoming spacecraft crashing, control plate
first, into our present.  Is Dexter X flying this mysterious vehicle?  Find
out if and when I take the time to do a U.S. Diary of the 1995 West Coast
Tour.<br>
<br>
   Congratulations on your Theory of Relativity Earth Saparoos,<br>
      B.Stuff, esq.<br><br>