May 12 - Havenkwartier, Deventer Holland

Close all the windows and turn on the gas, because The Bitter Tears return to Europe! This tour’s lineup includes: Alan (guitar), Mike (bass), Reid (keyboard), and me (drum).

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.

April 10 - Peoria Theater, Peoria IL

The Peoria Theater sits inside a mall that has been on life support since 1982. Attached to the theater is a bowling center, a sauna, and a neglected arcade.

Two security guards dressed as California Highway Patrolmen oversee the property.

When we arrived Derrick Hart & The Fantastic Possibilities Of Life On This Planet were assembling their massive stage show. While Mike and Alan bowled, I made a beer run that involved a Schnuck's cashier who had never heard of Jim Beam or bourbon. He used a telephone. I was told the guy who runs the liquor department had gone home early.

Returning to the megaplex, I found John and his wife Christine hanging out in the parking lot. John drank coffee from a thermos and smoked a cigarette. Soon one of the mall ChiPs approached. We were told to move, proving that coffee and cigarettes doesn't play in Peoria movie theaters.

Derrick Hart and his crew had decorated the stage with plush toys, homemade Radio Shack lights, and a life-size robot that seemed in a decent mood.

They kept their music slow and easy on the ears. Derrick gently referenced boxing legends in a Grandaddy timber, using "smurf" as a verb, while his right hand man Eddie launched flatulent balloons upward and onto the songs. Then he added Fisher Price feedback with a Toys 'R Us guitar. Sometimes he narrated through a megaphone, and let his horsey-on-a-stick whinny for emphasis. During one song, Eddie slowly unravelled his body from a mummified cacoon, revealing a butterfly costume in the song's crescendo.

The sextet was dressed for success, a motley melding of gnomewear, Nehru, sombreros, baseball caps, tape moustaches, and robes. Several kids sitting on a couch wore gorilla masks or those novelty springy alien antennae things that were popular in 80's malls. All the while a film played behind them. For the final song, a barrage of streamers bounced off of the band, and supermarket fireworks popped, like a family version of Great White's live show.

Derrick Hart put on something special for Peoria.

Too bad Peoria doesn't know what special is.

We played next. We weren't very good. We closed with "Vanilla Bean."

Three times.

During the fourth "Vanilla Bean," someone shouted out "Laura Clark."

Laura Clark is a 17-piece band that takes a long time to set up. While they were still setting up, I retrieved some keys I had accidentally left near the stage. I apologized for walking through their set up, and said it would be the last and only time.

"Good," said the lead mandolinist flatly.

Laura Clark is also the name of the band's lead singer. She is an "attractive" girlwoman who plays original guitars and musics. I think it's really cute that such a beautiful girl can be a woman with a band of men to make her songs sound so professional and good-sounding. Her father played keyboards and favored major sevenths, the kind that contemporary adults go mad for.

"That's my Dad. It's past his bedtime."

The rest of the family laughed. It was a good family time atmosphere.

"Thank you for staying. I know it's late. We're going to play some nice songs."

Laura Clark the band did play nice songs. All 23 of the band members knew exactly how to play their instruments the right way. Every song sounded like it could have been on the shiny radio. They played so properly, it sounded like 47 people were playing. And there were only 34 of them on the stage! They were that good.

And gracious, too!

"Thanks to The Bitter Tears. That was an experience."

That's the thing about being an artist. You have to have life experience. And Laura Clark was born with it.

"Can someone get me a beer-JUST KIDDING!! I don't drink beer.

It tastes like pee."

Now even though Laura Clark has never had a beer in her life, she knows that it tastes like pee because it smells like pee. That makes sense to me! Besides, her husband would kill her if he caught her talented face drinking a beer.

The only reason I immediately left after that was because I had to go drink some pee, I mean, use the restroom. On the way there a gentlemen compared The Bitter Tears to Phish. He insisted that he meant no harm for several minutes.

At the concession stand they sold liquor and pee, I mean beer. The guy behind the counter switched to speaking in Ebonics when talking to black men. I ate a soft, warm pretzel and watched other conversations, until someone asked me how Jay Bennett had been portrayed in the Wilco movie. Meanwhile Alan sold a bunch of CD's and pee, I mean LP's.

Our records just sound like pee.

The original plan was to spend the night in Peoria and drive back the next day. But if we hit the road right away we would get home by as early as tomorrow. Mike took the wheel for the necessary trip directly back home right now.

As the morning birds chirped in Chicago we passed an establishment called Family Bar.

"The family that drinks together, stinks together."

A big thanks to Derrick Hart & The Fantastic Possibilities Of Life On This Planet for putting together a wonderfully odd bill in reverse order. Since The Bitter Tears didn't "play in Peoria" I wonder if we should remove it from our past shows list.

March 28 - Circle A, Milwaukee WI

Though we've seen it over 700 times in our lifetimes, none of us had never been to Mars Cheese Castle in Kenosha, Wisconsin. So Alan, Mike, my girlfriend Lauren (making her Bitter Tears road debut) and I used it as a pit stop.

It had a lot more to offer than I thought.

In addition to the obligatory cheeses, jerkies, and obnoxiously scatalogical, sexist hot sauces ("Ass In Space," "Fiery Fart," and "The Big Hot One" featuring a cartoon bikini girl with fake tits and collagen lips sucking off a porn-sized pepper), there's a deli, a bar, a long knight's table, maces, and suits of armor. And best of all, a gift shop!

The Circle A is a tiny bar owned by a pair of quirky adults who live upstairs. It's what a childless couple's child could look like if they had a good jukebox. And they do! 45's of James Brown, Strawberry Alarm Clock, and Kitty Wells played while friends (including Yale Delay and Mr. Alarm from ifihadahifi) filled the one-room bar to capacity.

Wereworm began the night with truly enjoyable instrumental rock of the Thinking Fellers variety. Tom Stack (painter, illustrator and creator of many gig posters) bashed many a flam on an early 60's jazz kit that resembled a delicious honeycomb. One of the guitarists had a Stu Sutcliffe stage presence, his back to the crowd the whole time. We were in for a good night.

This was a rare Bitter Tears show as a trio, just Alan on guitar, Mike on bass, on me on drums. The room was packed and tight. The neck of Mike's bass crashed into my ride, and the body of Alan's guitar rode my crash. We kept the tempo mostly up with "Fire Messiah," "Moline" and "Rough & Ready." The guys from hifi added a round of whiskey into the show and things got kooky. One of those fruit shakers (apple) found its way onto my floor tom, so I beat a hole into it. All of its beads leaked onto the drum, and when I pounded the drum they flew into the happy mass like confetti bullets. They returned the favor with flying beer cans, which pissed off the living ghost of Rollins. Too bad, Hank.

Yale Delay tried to tackle me during "The Companion," which ended with nasty cymbal washes, ringing everyone's ears into tomorrow. Reluctantly the 10pm DJ allowed us an encore, and we dusted off "Murdered" for the messy mass.

Afterward Yale thrust another 16oz Bitburger into my hand and bear hugged me into the ceiling and onto a blue collar regular. The guy told me to watch out, but he liked the show. It took a long time for me to get out of make up and figure this one out: You have to work in the morning and Lauren's driving your drunk ass home.

Circle A is tops!

March 20 - The Valley of the Vapors Independent Music Festival, Hot Springs, AR

At 6am I felt the urge to vomit. The bathroom upstairs was occupied. I didn’t know the location of the bathroom downstairs, but I went down there in my underwear anyway. I hovered above the kitchen sink and drank a glass of water in Alan’s parents' house. I drank another and lied down on the cool floor of the kitchen in my underwear. I woke up at 7:30 in my underwear and found a bathroom. TOURING!!!

In Blytheville, Arkansas we found The Dixie Pig, a barbeque spot in the middle of yet another dying small town in Main Street America. The service was nice (the waitress gave us each two glasses of water to drink from), and the meat spoke for itself without too much input from the sauce. In the Memphis area, meat is to man as sauce is to Stepford wife.

We returned to The Valley Of The Vapors Festival in Hot Springs, this time in the rain. A steady stream leaked from the hills down to the valley, muddying the dirt parking lot where a car echoed “Sympathy For The Devil” against the rocks.

A speedy bluegrass outfit named Cletus Got Shot growled Jim Crow songs with an upright bass made out of an industrial plastic tank.

Next was Projexorcism, a visual “Revolution #9” made up of old instructional film reels, their projectors manipulated by an entertaining man in bunny ears. It lasted forty minutes?

The kids in Hot Springs wanted loud and fast, some of them wanted it hateful. They yelled, they danced, they questioned, they hugged, they tossed out “we love you”s, they tattooed the word HATE on their inner lips. We played a loud set. We played a good set, too. The HATE-tattooed went bananas for "The Companion." It took three shows to get tight, just in time for the end of the tour. A-one, a-two, a-thrreee! Crunch! A-thrreee!

Closing the evening was Frown Pow’r, a quintet form the Little Rock area. They borrowed Alan’s guitar amp. They should have borrowed his tuner, too. They were a sloppy fun mess. The bass player looked like Brian Wilson with a Jonas Brothers haircut: a dumber angel. The singer looked like Rod Blagojevich, the perfect front man. The mandolin player had 5 pedals, adding a high-pitched drone to the clumsy party rock. After several false starts, they inexplicably closed with “Shout,” the Isley Brothers song, the one heard at weddings. They even left a gap for the crowd to sing “shout,” but no one did. “You know you make me wanna (silence)…” It sounded like the song was being edited for television. People danced and had fun, myself included. Except for the dancing part.

Zac and Cheryl from Itinerant Locals put us up once again. This summer they are going on tour by train, performing in spots like Tucson, Minneapolis, Klamath Falls, Minot, San Francisco, and more. It sounds pretty amazing. Look for an Itinerant Locals show with these Bitter Tears in Chicago this July.

March 19 - 2720 Cherokee Art Gallery, St. Louis MO

After pancakes, we hit the road. I decided to forget my cellphone in Champaign. This is the fourth time this year I have left my cellphone somewhere else. It means that I love having a cellphone and that I cannot imagine life without it. My cellphone is who I am. My cellphone is what I will always be.

Alan forgot his jacket there, too. Mike forgot his inflatable bed. To fit in, John left his social security card, birth certificate and voter registration in the Mississippi River.

The caravan arrived in Missouri, at the doorstep of Alan’s parents. Alan’s mom prepared a spread of feta and smoked gouda. While we each took a much needed shower, St. Louis white chili cooked and fresh corn muffins baked. It was all very delicious.

For some reason load in was at 6pm. At 6:30 we showed up to 2320 Cherokee, a huge art space decorated with out of tune pianos and out of time technology in the Historic Cherokee Shopping District of St. Louis. We were early. The soundman wouldn’t arrive for another hour. So we used the time to rehearse some new songs that we had played only once before at Coach House Sounds.

Thanks to Carlin, the wonderfully quaffed and chopped man who put this show together, our friends The Columbines were on the bill. This is the fourth show I’ve played with them in the last six months. Before I joined, The Bitter Tears were my favorite Chicago band. Now the title must go to The Columbines. John scratches out reverberated Bo Didley breaks on a JC Penney guitar, Kayte goofs off in shades and instigates Danzig impression contests (she sings nice, too), and Julia smirks like a minxy Alice Cramden as she pounds out some tom-heavy cave beats. They closed with “Bullet” but not the one by The Misfits. Fuck yes, please.

Speaking of fuck yes, the taco stand down the street fed us all to complete satisfaction for a fraction of the price. I wolfed down two lengua tacos for $3.

Before our set, John Leonard carted us to the bar where we ordered more drinks, and then wheeled us around the space and to the stage. I was a bit in the bag for this show. But I felt it went well, despite breaking two sticks, missing the big entrance in “Grieving” for the second night in a row, and having a few drum fills truncated by my new, big mink coat. Alan’s parents were in attendance, and several people from their careers showed up, too. Alan brought up abortion. We debuted one of his new songs, “Things The Boys Love,” a happy sing-along about a group of American cowboys who decide to ambush some Indians, only to have the tables turned. It’s told from the perspective of a rabid halfwit who enjoys watching his buddies getting slaughtered.

John and Eliza from Chicago traveled down just to see the show. Hardcore!

Afterward the upstairs art gallery was opened for all to see. It was a gallery filled with art. I noticed two guys exit a door that I thought led to the roof, so I followed. The door did not lead to the roof, but as soon as I opened it a man began yelling and barking and yelling at me. I put my hands in the air and left the art gallery.

With the entire downstairs space to myself I ordered another beer. I had another one while loading out, too. I was feeling good. I was talking a lot. And laughing. I was being an idiot or a rabid halfwit. On the ride home it took me twenty minutes to roll a borrowed cigarette while revealing my internet porn site of choice. I stumbled to a guest room in Alan’s parents’ house, theoretically ending a night of buffoonery.

March 18 - Independent Media Center, Urbana IL

We tried to fit five in the van sans U-Haul. The equipment was packed tight like Tetris or Jenga or "Truth Or Dare" Tetris and "Spin The Butthole" Jenga. When Mike and John squeezed in, a backpack popped out and onto the ground.

"Careful!" John exclaimed.

"John, is that a glass Pyrex measuring cup in your bag?"

"I like to make tea."

So Alan and Justyna would enjoy a second honeymoon in their car, while Mike, John and I followed in the van. Everyone got excited about doubling our gas expenses for this brief tour of the midwest.

The Urbana-Champaign Independent Media Center is a converted post office in the center of town. In its basement lurks an art gallery, a bike co-op, a Books For Prisoners facility, and a costume shop.

We arrived while a humble guitar picker and a fiddler tastefully soundchecked. Their pickup truck had Pennsylvania plates. The small gathering of aging NPR subscribers bobbed their heads and tapped their hands to their knees.

It was all very polite. I found myself crossing my legs and folding my hands. After their set, they vanished. I never got their names.

A drunk local trio followed with heavy, almost-math rockriffs to the growing and thinning crowd. The frontman got drunk because his hamster had died that day, and he was bummed out. He thanked “Jan and Dean” for playing before them. I was happy that he mentioned their names so I could give them credit on the blog. The bass player ended the set by throwing his bass on the ground while keeping his backwards baseball cap on. It was all very impolite. I never get their names.

The Bitter Tears’ wardrobe was provided by the costume shop. I found the most wonderful white mink pea coat. Alan found a blouse emblazoned with kisses. John scored some terrible tourist or golf wear. Mike looked like he had found some kind of Jesus in a cavern.

The set went alright considering…we hadn’t practiced in a while. Oh, and the sound man left before we even played because his sister had locked herself out of the house. He had to go rescue her. College!

We stretched out a little in the solo section of “Moline.” At one point in the set Alan began uttering. Just uttering. His words were all broken, spilling onto the floor like freshly loosened teeth. It was The Bitter Tears I remembered seeing from the audience years ago, where the show could and would fall apart at any moment for no reason.

Afterward we convened at a house owned by Art, a childhood friend of Alan, Mike and John. Art is quick and funny, and could do stand up if he wanted. He donated a trumpet and a trombone to the band! Some more folks from the area arrived to join in the popcorn, beer, and laughter. We signed an LP for a woman in jail. I didn’t know they had phonographs in prison.

November 13 - The Inferno, Madison WI

The Bitter Tears arrived in Madison LA-style, in three separate cars. We split into two pairs of spouses and one pair of “tour spouses”: Greg and Esther, Alan and Justyna, and Mike and I.

The Inferno sits on the outskirts of town in a house next to a set of railroad tracks. A small nylon poster with the words THE INFERNO hovered above the front door. It reeked of a DIY spot. Their locked door gave Mike and I time to find a barbeque restaurant and laugh at a bookstore called The Frugal Muse. It was like our second honeymoon.

Once The Inferno opened we were surprised by its actual club status. It had a stage, monitors, two bars, leathery furniture, clean bathrooms, and a roped-off VIP room housing a very important glitter ball. There was even a humorless doorman with a shitty attitude who listened to earbuds while playing Memory on his laptop. Pretty legit!

Mike Behrends began the evening with life-battered guitar tales and shanties. I inadvertently added percussion near the VIP ropes by clanging together giant 3-foot earrings that decoratively dangled from the walls.

Butte, a 2 and a half piece band, followed with the world’s best alternative to a drum machine: a DVD projector projecting a drummer playing the drum parts to their songs. So a man replaced himself directly with a machine. The projector also provided the between songs banter in a girly voice. So the cute girl who is learning the bass was also replaced by a machine.

Madison’s AV Club gave the show some lovely press, including an interview and a half-page picture of The Bitter Tears for their Agenda. It officially brought 11 people to the show.

Esther joined the boys in the men’s room for the dress-up ritual while Mike combed the parking lot for more costumes. He entered the bathroom with a handful of what he called brambles, and what Wisconsinites and most other people call branches.

Alan opened the set solo on stage with “Grieving.” His arm performed the strumming of his guitar, no small feat after he broke it wiping out on a bicycle in Berlin. The rest of us emerged from the bathroom one by one with brambles poking in all directions from our clothes. In the lights it looked like a scene found on the cutting room floor of Where The Wild Things Aren’t.

During the show we played songs, but mostly provoked the small crowd into heckling us about Illinois/Wisconsin rivalry nonsense. The word “fib” (fuckin’ Illinois bastard) was used at us. Greg retaliated by referring to the Wisconsin audience as "SIDS." Alan used the microphone to berate Mike’s new character Brambleman, who seemed more like Rambleman. Esther’s playing was offered up for scrutiny during “The Love Letter.” Greg ended "Vanilla Bean" and the night with a crying trumpet note from the hostile but friendly audience.

Big thanks to Reem from This Is How I Will Get Famous for putting us up, feeding us dates, and recommending breakfast at Mickey’s Tavern. As I get older I’m beginning to appreciate towns like Madison that contain less anger, violence, and stress than fucking bastard Chicago. You have a great state, ya SIDS!