i really fucked the dog on this one!!! part 1

so, the whole idea of starting this blogspot account was to document our tours day by day...the problem with doing that is, it just isnt any fun...so, i gave up on it after the Las Vegas show. this will be a re-cap of the rest of the tour...starting in Albuquerque, New Mexico

I was really siked about this show because Trapped Under Ice was the headliner. i have yet to see them up until this point, and i heard a lot of good things about their live shows. we got into albuquerque a few hours early, so we met up with grave makers friend Sammy, who's house we were designated to stay at....it was really cool to get to hang out and relax a little bit...at that point i hadnt showered or changed my clothes for about 5 days, so it was AWESOME to put on some fresh boxers, socks and clothes (no shower of course haha)

we got to the venue right on time, and the venue owner showed up shortly after...he definitely looked like a smaller version of someone who would play for suicidal tendencies. and he had a braided goatie! fuckin stoked!!! the inside of the venue was a huge suprise when we got in...it was this 4 ft tall stage with a cage barrier....this was just a straight up metal venue...aaaaaand of course the opening bands were total metal core. pretty good bands though.

our set time got cut short because, before we could even get started, matts bass rig started giving him a hard time. it wouldnt put out any sound....it took about 15 minutes to fix, so we had only about 10 minutes to play....no sweat for us! haha. we still got in about 8 songs i think. it was such a good sound system with pro moniters and everything...so cool. our set went over really well. all the kids were really nice and welcoming. got a few circle pits going...really fun set.

trapped under ice lived up to the hype...well, the singer did at least...he was jumping all over the place and going nuts....the rest of the band sort of just stood there...but still, it was a great show and they turned out to be really nice dudes

Lubbock, Texas

this was a VERY interesting night... we left albuquerque much later than we should have, so we ended up getting to Lubbock around 8:30 pm. normally, getting to a show at 8:30 isnt that big of a deal, but there were some major problems with this show. bailey kept in contact with the "promoter" and she instructed us to drive to her house...i thought this was really weird, considering how late we were. but whatever, we got to her house, she comes outside and say, "hey the venue got changed, we need to go pick up the PA speakers from the venue that the show was SUPPOSED to be at and bring them to the new venue...ok, weird, but no biggie....we got to the venue and it was such an awesome building...it was a church for punx type place....perfect size building, perfect stage, graffitti everywhere, it was awesome....unfortunately, the reason we couldnt do the show there is that there was a big storm the day before and crashed the electricity in the building. so we get the speakers and we are about to make our way to the new venue....the promoter says, "hey, the guy who is supposed to bring the PA head locked his keys in his car, so the pa is going to be late" its late, we are all getting a little aggravated, and almost ready to just call it off.....we finally got to the "venue" around 10:30 pm...turns out the show is in a 10X10 self storage unit....pretty awesome....me matt and sina were all pretty siked about it...i mean, yeah it was a lot of hassle, and yeah there were only 3 kids who came to the show, but who can say they played a show in a self storage untit??? not many bands. us a grave maker played really short sets...the guy who brought the PA wanted us to be finished by 11 pm so he could go to sleep haha . ...then we went to eat at this place called whataburger....this place DID NOT live up to the hype...totally unimpressed

san antonio, texas

this show was at a place called the White Rabbit. such a weird/cool venue. it had 2 stages...HUGE stages. they were separated by a patio area that was really big an also included a pizza place called, White Rabbit Pizza. we were told that the touring bands get free pizza...if you know me, you know how siked i was about that....the cool thing about there being 2 stages is, there was always a band playing. when one band was playing, the other band was setting up to play....really cool...its a good way to have lots of bands on a show without it being annoying. this was actually one of the more memorable shows of this tour....since the stage was so big, i had TONS of room to run around and act like an idiot...i loved it....but, again with the tall stage and barrier...thats weird to me....the kids were REALLY responsive....they showed us an awesome time....one kid even did a backflip off of the stage for a free shirt....after we played, i was dying for that pizza....turns out, they only made pepperoni pizzas, so icouldnt have any....then they said, "oh no we are making a vegetarian pizza as well" that definitely never panned out and i was extremely dissapointed. grave maker played exceptionally well that night. it was such a fun show and an amzing time...i cant wait to go back there

monterrey, Mexico

the nightmare begins! we left san antonia at 7 am to meet up with our friend Luis in laredo texas at 10 am.....we got there right on time...Luis is from monterrey mexico, and he met us in texas to make our entrance into mexico easier. we picked him up, and we decided that since we were heading into mexico, we should put all our cash into one band members bank account so that if we are stopped by the police, we have only a small amount of cash....so we collectively (abhf only, not grave maker) put 1000 dollars into our fill in drummers (sergio aka shit for brains) bank account....we headed into mexico,,,,,,as soon as we got to the border, we got hit with all kinds of fees to pay....25 bucks per person just to enter in the country, 35 bucks for a permit to drive the van into the country, and 120 bucks for taxes on all our merch...fuck.....it was a major ordeal, but we got through it....oh yeah, and luis was helping me flirt with the lady who was taking all our money....it didnt help, she didnt give us any discounts.....

we drove for about 1 1/2 hours and we got into monterrey.....literally, 5 minutes into the monterrey border, we got pulled over and robbed by the police!!! they said that i was the only person allowed to drive (bailey was driving) since the vehicle is registered under my name.... they wanted 400 bucks, luis talked them down to 120....ballz....we got to the show, and we were really hungry....there was this big group of vegan kids that had vegan tortas in a cooler....luis said "these are for you" hell yeah, so we got to eat for free right? turns out that luis bought all the tortas for us and those kids were just there selling food....they wouldnt pay to get into the show because they "only support vegan bands" arrogant fucks......i felt so bad that luis bought all that food for us from those pricks...

the show was awesome...all the bands that played were really good. and we met SO MANY awesome people.....Por La Verdad was AWESOME....Luis was the singer of that band....check them out on our top friends on myspace....

after the show......
we went back to Luis' house, and his mom made a FEAST for us!!! LITERALLY hundreds of tacos were made by her and devoured by us....she made vegan, vegetarian and meat tacos....SO AWESOME. and there was also a 3 gallon jug of horchata. i was in heaven. afterwe stuffed our faces, me, matt, sina and a bunch of our new friends took a little adventure to the local circus that just HAPPENED to be in the middle of luis' neighborhood! what the fuck? hahaha. there was this trailer...TOTALLY unprotected, (the tongue of the trailer wasnt even locked) that had 4 LIVE FUCKING TIGERS!!! these things were MASSIVE!!! this experience was really bittersweet for me because, i felt so bad for the tigers being in this trailer, in HORRIBLE conditions, and they were all drugged up...BUT i also felt very lucky to be able to come so close to such an amazing animal. we were feeling brave, so we started petting the tigers paws....could you imagine what would happen if the tigers werent drugged up, and they were just tired? one swipe from a tiger would brake the trailer open and another would destroy us...it was really awesome...around the corner from the tiger cage/trailer the was a petting zoo of sorts, that included horses, lamas, cows, camels, donkeys and zebras. soooooo cool. we said our goodbyes to our new friends and started heading towards queretaro, mexico.

30 MINUTES into our drive, i set the terminator to cruise control, and it went haywire....the transmission sped up to 90 mph, but the van was slowing down...i took cruise control off and it was not driving right....the transmission wouldnt shift right and we were traveling on the freeway at about 20 mph....we pulled over and transmission fluid was shooting out EVERYWHERE....some how it even got on the back doors! keep in mind, this is like 2 am...matt and eric walked a few miles to a gas station and bought shit tons of transmission fluid...they poured it all in, and we were able to drive it to a local transmission shop...we parked in front and we all slept until the shop opened...the dude told us that the only thing he could do is replace the transmission, but there was another shop who could probably fix the problem for a lot cheaper...so we went there, and they quoted us 400 bucks and we slipped them an extra 50 to put our van in 1st priority...we spent ALL GOD DAMN DAY in front of that auto shop...going out of our minds from the heat...at one point, a handful of us were sleeping on the black asphalt street next to the trailer. we decided to make the best of it, and we started telling funny stories about tours/relationships etc etc....sina and brian made a buffet out of the nacho and hot dog condiments at the local gas station. jon mcrae got a bad-ass haircut at the salon next to the auto shop and all the girls working there wanted a picture with him and an autograph...they finished our van 1 1/2 hours later than they quoted us....we were BARELY going to make it to the next show just in time to play...the van was running very rough and the check engine light was on....so we decided to go to a gas station, and figure out whether we should move on with the tour, or go back to the states to fix the van....on the way to the gas station, we got pulled over by the police...they were looking for drugs and weapons...when they found we didnt have any, they sent us on our way...we decided that we for sure had to cancel the queretaro show...we took our van back to the shop where they "fixed" it, and told them what was up....they said they couldnt do anything about it until monday...so, we decided it would be best if we drove back to the states to get the van fixed...that night, our friends in ill intent and horizons (awesome bands, check them out) were playing in monterrey, so we went to that show to hang out with them. luis got in contact with the promoter for the mexico city show, and he offered to help pay for gravemakers bus tickets if they continued the mexico tour while we got the van fixed...so, we graciously parted ways and drove back to the states that night. it was a 4 hour drive back to the US border....this was the longest 4 hour drive of my life! i was waiting for the van to explode any second....we made it to the border, and AS SOON as the broder agent asked us our citiizen ship, BOOM there goes the transmission! we were able to pull over into one of the parking spots, and the dickhead border agent STILL made us unload the whole trailer to inspect everything! asshole! matt and eric walked to a gas station again, bought shit tons of transmission fluid, found out where a transmission shop was, came back and basically poured fluid in, drove until it ran out, poured fluid in, drove until it ran out and so on and so on...until we made it to the transmission shop. it was about 6 am at this point...we were parked in a jack in the box parking lot until the shop opened. our buddies in ill intent and horizons found out where we were and they stopped by to wish us good luck.....such awesome guys. they hung out with us for a bit, lifted our spirits and they moved on to their next shows. after the shop opened and they took our van, we hung out at jack in the box, and i emailed the band, The Red Alert. a band from laredo texas that we were playing with a few days after this. Q, the bassist of the band, called me and came to hang out for a while. he also got a hold of their guitarist, alex...it was so cool that these dudes came to hang out and give us some moral support...from total strangers to great friends within a matter of minutes...alex drove us around, showed us the mall, and an all you can eat pizza buffet...when Q got off work, and alex went to work, Q picked us up and took us to his house so we could take showers.

after we showered, Q took us to a place that i like to call HEAVEN. its really called, Taco Palenque. this place RULES. you buy a huge bowl of beans and cheese for 2.75 and they give you all the free tortillas and chips you want for free...and the salsa bar was AMAZING. it had lettuce, hot carrots, onions, peppers, all kinds of different salsas and dressings, cliantro....it was huge. in a sense, its all you can eat for 2.75