The four of us met this afternoon in Amsterdam. Mike discovered a 56 Euro parking ticket on the windshield of the van, signaling the official beginning of the tour and of our financial woes. Alan reunited with an old friend, Greg, who has been living off the grid for the last decade having adventures that most people don’t have the courage to attempt. We invited Greg to join us for more courageous endeavors like loading gear, unloading gear, and eating pasta. He was game.
Greg was staying in a squat downtown, where Alan and Reid had spent the previous night. Greg’s friend Corry joined us, too, and soon the garbage strike’ened streets of Amsterdam gave way to the traffic clogged highways of rural Holland.
At least it was pretty with all those cows and sheeps and shit all over the place. With six of us, it was quite cozy in the van. Especially considering that more than half of us had squatted in a defunct building and hadn’t showered. The van took on a kind of ripe, homelessy scent with an essence of stale, chimney flue.
After just seven months, The Bitter Tears returned to Deventer, a smaller Dutch town sort of near Germany. Our host, Laurens, was in great spirits and welcomed us back with smiles and beer.
Hots For Helga opened the night with genuine 80’s art rock. The singer sang with his eyes, adding humor to covers of Joy Division and Velvet Underground. During our soundcheck, he took notice of Reid playing around with a “No Quarter” patch on the Nord.
“Sounds like your keyboard has too much water in it.”
It became our turn to play music to Deventer. I must say, it was a great first show. Alan jumped around with yards of energy. Mike’s improv instincts were strong. Reid made his keyboard debut with The Bitter Tears in garb reminiscent of an extra on The Munsters. I got dangerously close to blackface. But hey, we were sort of near Germany.
Bitter Tears Behind The Scenes!
For years, Alan and Mike have taken a cue from vaudeville performers of yore, applying a lit match to the end of a wine cork and rubbing its ashes onto their sad or happy faces. It achieves an authentic coal miner’s ragamuffin look. Recently we were told that it also achieves toxic levels of carcinogens into the human body. So now The Bitter Tears have switched to a new, healthier liquid called Face Rot. But we will continue to endorse the use of asbestos for kleenex.
During the encore, someone handed Alan and Mike large plants and the Dutch took pictures like 80’s Asian stereotypes. This devolved into a loud angry rant by Alan translated simultaneously by Mike in Spanish, creating a cacophony that never quite crescendoed. It just sort of ended. Mike calls these shows “crumblers”.
We crumbled back to Laurens’ home, where the festivities were just beginning. Alan played trumpet while I pumped out Beach Boys and Arm Soup songs on an antique pump organ. Meanwhile, downstairs a huge air guitar party had ensued. It was Zeppelin. I came in just in time to add air drums to the first snare crack of “Achilles Last Stand.”
We played air instruments until dawn, man. We were awesome and always ferocious. Between bursts of Russian kick-dancing, Mike and I assisted Reid in breakdancing to Metallica’s Master of Puppets LP.
Pumped and frenzied, I put on a Heino record, which was answered almost immediately with Maiden. Reid responded with US Maple and everyone went home. James Brown’s Hell segued into Deventer’s morning birds. Lou Reed’s Metal Machine Music waited on an ottoman, frozen in eternal potential energy.
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