THE SMUGGLERS EUROPEAN TOUR DIARY 1997! PART TWO
    

Tuesday February 11, Tapioca, Vitoria, Spain:
It was great to be back in Spain, the only country in Europe where we had been previously, and a place where we were pretty sure we had some guaranteed fans. Sure enough, the show in the grand northern Basque-region town of Vitoria was a lot of fun, with patented wild Spanish audience action and the singing of incoherent soccer songs at the show's end. We even had to tape microphones to broom handles to hang from the lighting chassis for lack of any mic stands.

Wednesday February 12, El Sol, Madrid Spain:
Ah, Madrid! A pleasure to be back in one of the world's most exciting cities to see our friends at Record Runner (who set up our Spanish shows). Or was it? Unfortunately, it is probably easier to drive the Millenium Falcon through an asteroid field (How timely/nerdy of me, eh?) than it is to try and find a parking "space" in Madrid. There I was, driving down cobblestone streets that were made for a fucking horse and buggy, let alone our huge German Mercedes van. Meanwhile, cars careen down these thin lanes at light speed, scraping, grinding, bumping and honking for pole-position. Rush hour is basically a demolition derby. While trying to park I literally smashed into three cars, and one Spaniard tried to even the score a little by running a red light and ramming the side of our van. The way we dealt with the accidents? In the words of our Spanish tour manager: "I theenk eet's time to git zee 'ell outta here, hefe!!!" With that, he'd stomp his cowboy boot onto my foot on the accelerator and we'd peel out, often dragging the bumper of the car we hit for a few "blocks."

Although we were thoroughly freaked out after two hours of the above, the show was excellent, with a capacity crowd and repeated encores. The night ended in a dance party at about 6:00am back at the best bar in the entire world, Temple De Gato. Ah, Madrid.

Thursday February 13, Artxaia Music Hall, Pamplona Spain:
The interesting thing about this northern town, chronicled by Ernest Hemingway among others, is this city's famous past-time of "The Running Of The Bulls." What these crazy fuckers do is round up the meanest, baddest, biggest, blackest bulls in Spain and corral them all into the city's stadium where they're harassed, starved and sun-baked for a couple of hot summer days. Then, at a given moment, the thousand or so raging bulls are unleashed INTO THE CITY STREETS where the drunken, celebrating public gleefully try to out-run them down narrow cobblestone streets, their only defense being rolled up newspaper!!! NO JOKE!!! Each year, many people, especially cock-sure tourists, get mauled by the tormented beasts. One of the highlighted casualties of last year's fest was an American women trying to out-run a herd of stampedeing muscle, hoofs and horns with high heels. She was gouged, trampled, and killed. Yeeouch.

Our show was nowhere near as thrilling, it being our smallest in Spain. But when the townsfolk are used to such life-and-death entertainment, five guys trying to impress with rumpled suits, rubber boots and a couple of dance moves lifted from "Annie" can't really match up, as the cold, dark stares of the audience hinted towards.

Friday February 14, Salle de Fetes, Valence, France:
It's Valentine's Day and we're in the lovers' countryside of central France. This one was of the rare shows where there was more than just us playing, and here in Europe, if there's more than one or two bands playing, it's automatically called a festival. So, a Valentine's Day festival! No problem, and we were all on the prowl for some lovin'. (Smugglers trivia: can anyone name the town we played Valentine's Day 1996??? If you shrieked "Boston, and I loved it!!!" you're right!). This show was at a community centre and was another lucky-large show for us. And then there was the kissing contest... as many of you know, we have a li'l trivia contest where we play a dumb cover song and whoever can guess the TV show where it comes from wins a kiss. After the contest bombed about four times straight in Europe, we had to made the question easier and played "Barbara Ann" and asked the crowd to name the original band that played it. No problem. On this particular, hot, steamy night (most likely our hottest show ever, rivalling Fort Smith, Arkansas in '92 and CBGB's in Sept '96 - at the end of the show, a dehydrated, delirious Bryce tried to get out of the venue seeking air and water but before he could make an escape, the crowd grabbed his wet, prune-like corspe and viciously threw him back on stage into his drum set, chanting for more) we proclaimed that tonight it was FRENCH kissing night, and voila, the contest winner, a young man, bounded on stage, grabbed me around the waist and shoved his wet, hot tongue down my virgin throat. Shocked and choking on foreign phlegm, I pulled the ol' "rubber legs" routine and fell to the ground, pulling the man's wet muscle from my raw pipes. My only consolation was much later, when Dave told me, "He was very handsome." Those nutty Frenchmen!

Saturday February 15, Monte Carlo Monaco/Genova Italy:
We woke in the freezing cold French interior, and drove all day towards our next show in the north of Italy. Luckily, our drive took us along the beee-ootiful south coast of France. Cannes... Nice... Monte Carlo! When we saw the signs for Monaco we knew we'd have to stop. After taking the exit, following a Magnum P.I.-red Ferarri, we wound our way down the incredible, sun-bleached hillside, dotted with palm trees and villas, to the grand royale city of Monte Carlo. This was Europe in February??? It was 28 degrees celcius with not a cloud in the sky!!! As we took the last turn into the city we gasped. Rolled out before us on the edge of the blue Mediterrean was the gorgeous Monte Carlo Casino, sparkling in the sunshine with its lavish fountains, emerald lawns and ornate architecture. We were suddenly very aware we were WAY outta place. Everywhere we looked, we saw money. Every man looked like Mr. Howell and every woman Ginger. Every single person looked tanned, rich, and tipsy. Us? We looked like utter shit, absolute utter shit. Hung-over, stinky, sweaty, dirty Canadians. We weren't allowed in the casino (dress code). We couldn't afford a postcard, let alone a cocktail, and everywhere we went we were being stared at. On one particular patio where every single beautiful person could have been a movie star, we saw one chap proudly reading "Millionaire Magazine." No joke! After about an hour of wandering around gawking at the babes and the cars, we humbly climbed back into our domestic, ugly Mercedes, climbed the majestic cliffs, left Monaco, and headed back into cold, hard France.

We continued to drive along the rugged coastline and soon crossed into Italy where the border guards smoke and wear cool leather jackets and look like the cast of "Goodfellas." Waiting for us at the border was a small car with a sign in the back window that said "Welcome Smugglers!" The promoter, Andrea, drove us up the winding, steep, seaside hills of Genova to a dark nook in a deserted valley, high on the cliffside. Deep down in the depths, to our raw horror, we found the polar opposite to Monte Carlo: an abandoned warehouse that had been transformed into a communist concert hall squat. But it was another Euro-shock: this turned out to be an incredible show, our largest of the tour, with over 500 Italians coming out of nowhere to pack a long hall the size of an airplane hangar (actually, the place probably WAS an airplane hangar). It was extra-special because Roberto Vallebona from Four Monsters Records ("Gotta Gotta Gotta" 7", 1993) also showed up and travelled with us down to Rome the next day. Thanks to Andrea the promoter for a wonderful time.

Sunday February 16 / Monday February 17, Forte Prenestino, Rome Italy:
This show has to be the strangest and most incredible venue we have ever played. Forget the miniature golf course in Pennsylvania; disregard the laundromat in Texas... in Rome we were playing none other than a massive, abandoned military fort, last occupied by the Nazis in World War Two, now occupied by communist punks who broke into the condemned space ten years ago and have squatted there ever since. They have created a complete, grass-roots, living community within the stone fort, and they love to have rock concerts, and tonight, we were it. We played in a stone tunnel/hangar-like area that held the 400 people who showed up to see the show. The attendance again amazed us. Not five minutes before we started the place was deserted and as spooky as a Scooby-Doo mystery. Out of nowhere, like Roman zombies from the night, punks, mods, crusties, commies and drunks filled the tunnel, all dancing around in this strange, damp, dark castle.

Alas, another recurring problem we were having throughout the tour was our famous international dance contest. Besides the obvious language barrier, it was becoming exceedingly difficult to give the trophies away! No one, show after show, would accept! They'd dance like crazy, and when the winner was pointed out, they'd often refuse to come up on stage in a gesture of some type of European humility. This particular Roman show was another first... not only did the winner finally climb on stage, she also did not accept the trophy, but grabbed it, broke it in two and threw it into the crowd with a defiant "we're all equal" pitch! Insulted but ever-professional, we carried on as if our feelings and pride were NOT spat upon and ridiculed. These foreigners, I tell ya!

After the show, we went with the extremely nice promoter Carmelo and the rest of the warm, friendly section of the crowd to the bar in the centre tunnel of the fort for beer, wine and dancing, and then later, a drunken Grant, Nick and SKA-T went deep into the tunnels beneath the fort to see what weird Nazi trinkets we could dig up (of course the place was supposed to be haunted). It was very, very scary. After ten minutes in the dark, we were basically crying, holding on to each others' hands. All we found was bizarre graffiti and artwork on the walls, and a sleeping bag with a lump in it that we were too afraid to inspect. We ending up sleeping at the fort for two nights (we had a day off for sight-seeing in Rome) in a very dank, cold, stone room on damp, saggy mattresses left over from who wants to know when. When they finally lifted the iron gate and we drove out of the hidden fort in the city of Rome, we were all sick as the mangy mutts that scoured the place for scraps, but it was worth it. Ah, Roma!

Tuesday February 18, The Tunnel, Milano, Italy:
Yes, the Smugglers finally made it to the fashion capital of the world, just about the only place we feel truly at home. The only difference between the suit-clad Italians and the suit-clad Smugglers is that their suits don't smell like old-man urine. It's a problem, we know. Another ridiculously huge show of 400 folks packed into the club, much to our never-ending surprise, as we were again the only band playing. Our promoters, Titty and Corrado, run a very cool record store called Riot Records. Unfortunately, these two take their store name seriously, as Corrado was facing a jail term for political anti-fascist rioting and assault charges and was planning to flee for Spain two days after our show. Hope he made it.

Wednesday February 19, day off, Milano, Italy:
Spent the day hanging out at Corrado's squat as he made preparations to vamoose. Foosball in the pub and soccer on TV was the order of the day. Oh, and when teams score goals on TV, nobody makes a peep! No cheers, nothing! It's that cool Italian machismo thing, I guess.

Thursday February 20, off:
We had a day off to make the long journey across the breath-taking Alps, through Switzerland and Austria, and into Germany. As we wound our way up the mountainside we passed the time by creating ficticious sit-coms and movies. IE: "Hey gang, have you heard the news? Don Knotts and Penny Marshall have gotten together to star in a new show! It's called `Laverne and Furley!'" Or, "Scott Baio stars in a new show. In the pilot episode, he falls into a meat grinder at his new job at the meat factory. It's called "Charles In Chunks"!" Guess you had to be there. Okay one more... "Glenn Close, Kathy Bates and Whoopi Goldberg star as problem-solving city engineers in a new movie about a huge dam that is about to burst. It's called "Reservoir Dogs"!"

Friday February 21, The Go-In, Isny, Germany:
Throughout our tour, we would always ask folks, German and otherwise, where the hell Isny, Germany was. NO ONE, anywhere, had ever heard of it, but there it was on the tour schedule. Turns out it's a small Bavarian skiing village just north of the Austrian border, an isolated location to say the least. The kids were NUTS. But before we get to that, gotta mention that we visited Isny's lone tourist trap, King Ludwig Of Bavaria's castle, the very fairy-tale structure that Walt Disney used as a proto-type for the Sleeping Beauty castles of Disneyland and Disneyworld.

Back at the Go-In, which was a classic Bavarian A-frame chalet, we played to a slightly smallish crowd of about 100, but lordy, were they an insane bunch of danger-punks. These desperately bored animals felt the inherent need to smash and destroy everything in their path. Finished their pint? Smash the mug! Getting up from the table? Throw the chair into a crowd and overturn the table! Had too much to drink? Puke on a friend! Don't like the look of someone's leiderhosen? Whack 'em with a pool cue! By midnight, the blood and vomit flowed as steadily as the Jaegermeister. At one point, a crazed punk stared Nick into a corner, tore a Smugglers poster off the wall and proceeded to angrily chew, eat and swallow the entire thing while growling like a mad dog. Another time, while I was trying to fend off two maniacs who wanted either my glasses or my money belt as a souvenir, Bryce flew by me like a bat out of hell with two mohawk-sporting punks hot on his heels, brandishing broken beer bottles and screaming for bloody murder. We all did manage to get out of there alive, thankfully, but the fact that SKA-T was caught tonguing the boss' girlfriend in the coat-check closet didn't help matters.

Europe - PART THREE

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