Land of one thousand Waffle Houses. We stay at the Holiday Inn across the street from Centennial Olympic Park. Our second Holiday Inn with close proximity to a terrorist attack. Atlanta is all new, corporate, and alien. We can’t figure it out. We play at Smith’s Olde Bar. It’s a huge complex. Pool tables downstairs, several bars, a restaurant. Music is upstairs in a room with silver chairs and mirrors that make it seem like it was once a strip club. Pretty cool place but few folks are there. On the good side, the samll audience is wildly enthusiastic. We sell some CDs. Meet Jimbo who treats us to some local greenery. Back to the Holiday Inn where we unsuccessfully try to order pizza, then room service. We finally find a Chinese restaurant that delivers until six. We get Orange Chicken, Egg Foo Young, Egg Rolls. It’s seems to be delicious. That’s pretty much it for Atlanta. They say there’s six million people here. As far as I can tell, they’re all on the freeway. .

“Grapevine” hit Number #1 on the Freeform American Roots chart this week. FAR charts are compiled from reports sent in by actual DJs with freeform (i.e. no playlists) radio shows on public, college and community stations round the country (and world).  Each of them lists the six albums they took most pleasure in playing, one of which can be their Album of the Month.  Many thanks to all the DJs who are playing us.

Three gigs in Nashville. We start off at Billy Block’s Western Beat at the Exit Inn. Cool place. Big room. Good acts. Billy gives us a great introduction to Nashville, explains to the audience what California country music is and that it exists. Billy is a good friend to the Hawks (see FOOD IN USA). The room sounds good, there’s a nice crowd. Folks dig it. Nashville is surprisingly welcoming to this skeptical band. Everyone is very nice, the band gets lots of praise, people hand us their business cards and shake our hands. Maybe we were wrong about this place all along?

No. We were not wrong. As the week goes along the darkness starts to creep in. Nashville has shattered and terrified so many of the songwriters who have come here. It’s as if this town is the saddest casino on earth and the song writers just sit there at the Toby Keith/Tim McGraw/Faith Hill slot machine, putting years of their lives in the coin slot, waiting for some big artist to record one of their songs. The darkness rubs off on us and is hard to shake. Still, we manage to convert some of the natives. As we stand out in front of The Sutler, a car drives by cranking music. It’s only after several seconds that I recognize it as “Nicotine and Vitamin C.” They wave. Whoa. The gig at Douglas Corner’s with Richard Ferreira is a mixed bag. The room is great, Richard is great, but the crowd has gone somewhere else tonight. Perhaps to see the Hacienda Brothers, or Jim Lauderdale. There’s lots of competition in this town.

The Hawks rolled out of a secure, undisclosed location in Vermont sluggish and triumphant after the most potent blue moon bachanalia in their recent memory (a lot has happened in their minds, especially PL’s, since Saturday night).
GUEST-BLOGGER RECAP, COURTESY OF HAWKS’s VT GROUND TEAM:
Having hurtled north from NYC Friday morning, and following a solid set at the Marble Valley Correctional Facility in Rutland that afternooon, the Hawks hightailed it even further north to their preferred swimming hole: A brook running from the slopes of Hunger Mountain pools clear and cool below an old mill dam. Friday night the band was fast and loose (the tight kind) at the tiki-torch-laden Waterbury Wings. Vermont organic beer flowed while old and new friends kept the spirits round and full. Paul Lacques hovered roughly seven centimeters (goin’ metric so close to Canada) off the ground during his always memorable Humboldt-closer guitar blast-off. Local restaunteur Steve of the Mist Grill Cafe loved the band from L.A. and with coast-to-coast hospitality and joie de vivre generously regaled the band with top-shelf dining the following evening.

Saturday morning, under cloudy skies, children danced in the grassy courtyard beside the Farmer’s Market in Montpelier while the Hawks played serene renditions of Hope Against Hope, Beautiful Narcotic and a dozen others. It was a heroic morning effort following Friday’s two-show-plus travel day. The perfect temperature, Vermont summer breeze, promise of a fine evening meal, and about forty-three deciliters of locally roasted coffee made it all come together.Saturday evening, the evening in question. Well, the Hawks have requested that you fill in the blanks with your imagination. But safe to say that the band went temporarily off the grid in good hands and in fine company. Memorable deserts were eaten, and memorable late-night jams with old friends ensued.

Having touched the people and the elements in their furthest-from-home tour destination, one of the finest and kindest bands in the land has begun their homeward journey — with many great shows still to come. Be safe, be well, and be youtiful.

After our first good night’s sleep of the journey we got up and ate at the Cracker Barrel. We’re Crackers afterall. Or maybe that was the day before. It’s all blending together now.

We played with a fine band in Charlotte called the 2$ Pistols at The Evening Muse, a cool brick walled bar with a bartender who wore a bikini top under her overalls. Classic southern look. It was a full house and the crowd was enthusiastic. We sold a pile of CDs and pulled well at the door. Best dough yet and it was much needed to defray the costs of getting all the way across the damn country. Next day was Raleigh. We played at the Pour House. Friendliest crowd yet. Marianne at the Pour House put together a nice afternoon show. Great sound man and system. Two great sets of music. The band is gelling into a loose, tight country rock machine. And that’s not an oxymoron.

It was also our good friend Mona’s welcome to town party. Mona recently moved from LA back to Raleigh. She is a Cole’s regular and a fine, long time friend of the Hawks. It was fantastic to have her at our first shows on the the road. One special treat: her seven year old nephew, Tristan Mackie, got up and sang “Papa Stopped The Wagon.” No kidding. Every word. It was amazing. Look for video of this event up on the website soon. Afterwards, Mona cooked us a fine meal of vegetarian lasagna and garlic bread at her new home. She also served cantaloupe, grapes, cucumbers, green peppers, carrots. We needed the fruits and vegetables badly after so many meals at the Waffle House. North Carloina was good to us. Hope the rest of the tour goes half as well.

(must be visible from the Interstate, ranking doesn’t reflect any endorsement other than relative quality)

Paul Marshall:1. Subway
2. Taco Bell
3. Waffle House

Rob Waller:1. Waffle House’
2. Subway
3. McDonalds
4. Taco Bell
5. Arby’s
6. KFC
7. Burger King

Paul Lacques:1. Waffle House
2. Taco Bell

Paul L. foolishly volunteered to take the wheel
somewhere north of the Mason Dixon line, and the sky
proceeded to darken up, and the rain fell hard on the
Jersey Turnpike, the hardest rain people can
remember, we found out later. Got off I-95 in
Teaneck, and drove through flooded streets to WFDU,
where the gracious and sophisticated Lynn Crystal fed
us some great questions and we played some songs.
Lynn steered us to Veggie Heaven, an all vegan pan-
Asian restaurant in a funky Teaneck neighborhood. It
was delicious, an antidote to a few too many trips to
Waffle House. A BIG 4 THUMBS UP from the HAWKS NON
CORPORATE FOOD RATING SYSTEM. The Hawks wolfed down
the tofu as if their lives depended on it.
Then we walked across the street to Borschardt’s
(sp?) ice cream parlor, stepped across the threshold
into an air conditioned 50’s palace, not retro
because it hasn’t changed since the 50’s. Great home
made ice cream at an old formica counter, young soda
jerks in bow ties and white shirts, Jersey girls and
their dates a few seats away.
We drove through the steamy night to Fort Lee,
checked into the very Holiday Inn where four of the
9/11 hijackers stayed the night before their
cataclysmic deed. Not only that, but they had high
speed internet. The pool was closed. The Hawks
jammed on some Burrito Bros. tunes, which we’ve never
done before, Paul M. knows all the words and chords.
Next day we dined at Red’s Diner in outer Ft. Lee,
another NON CORPORATE RECOMMENDATION, good solid
breakfast in a Sopranos on location setting.
Then Rob allowed his New York taxi driver spirit to
take over his body, and we raced over the George
Washington Bridge and along the East River into
Manhattan. It’s Paul Marshall’s first visit to New
York. We passed stately Yankee Stadium across the
river in the Bronx, pointed it out to Paul, who
said, “Great! I hate the Yankees.” We pulled up at
the Rodeo Bar, at 28th and 3rd Avenue, found a
miraculous parking spot which we were to assuage with
quarters until 10 p.m. The Rodeo Bar has powerful
air conditioning and a very activist interior
designer, retro road signs and cowboy gear plucked
from Texas junk stores and a stuffed Bison that
appears to come crashing through a brick wall. We
hung out and rehearsed with Christina Ortega and Tom
Corbett, raised the spirit of east side L.A. and
Cole’s P.E. Buffet, 118 E. Sixth Street, Los Angeles,
California.
The Rodeo Bar serves what might be called a tribute
to Mexican food. Christina ordered a mole dish, and
the waiter asked her if she’d ever tried mole before,
it might be a little spicy. We leave to your
imagination Christina’s reaction. Good margaritas,
though.
The combined Christina Ortega/Hawks orchestra sounded
damn good. . Several
good friends from Coles P.E. Buffet, 6th & Main, Los Angeles,
showed up, called out requests, and one even passed out on a prominent table near the stage.
The Hawks banged out a well received set,
did a long and self-incriminating video interview
with Ritt Henn. Seven people piled into the Yukon,
Rob once again summoned the NY taxi spirit and raced
through Washington Heights and the Bronx, delivering
passengers to various apartment building destinations
on moody late night wet streets. Paul M. and Shawn
drove off into the Bronx night toward Ft. Lee, and
Rob and Paul L. stayed in the always kind Charles and
Gina’s elegant 4th floor pad.

The alarm, if there was one, came much too early. But the Hawks were on time and on schedule. PM and SN checked out of the Al Qaeda Holiday Inn, drove over the George Washington Bridge, picked up PL and RW and got us on the road headed for Marble Valley Regional Correctional Facility. Traffic was light and the Hawks made it to the prison nearly on time. And we would’ve made it to if it wasn’t for a blatant error in our Mapquest directions. DO NOT TRUST MAPQUEST. Their directions are often not the shortest route, rely too much on freeways, and, in rare cases, lead you in exactly the wrong direction.

The MVRCF experience offered much more than we expected. We had prepared ourselves for a romantic, classic country prison gig. Well, maybe romantic is the wrong word. But prison is just scary. Damn scary. We were lead through several heavy doors that locked behind us. The first thing to hit you is the smell. Prisons, like high school locker rooms, smell like sweaty men. They smell bad. The jacked up guards at the central console confiscated our cell phones, cigarettes, nail clippers, and made jokes about how they were not going to let us out now that they had us locked in. These jokes were not funny. These guys know how to intimidate people.We were soon to learn why intimidation skills are important. The marched us out onto the exercise yard right there with the general population. Some shirtless men playing volley ball. Some shirtless men playing basketball. One very heavily tattooed shirtless man and his small posse strutting around the perimeter bad-vibing everyone, looking for a fight.

But it’s not the prisoners that are scary. In fact, the prisoners who came to our show were quite nice. The listened closely, clapped and cheered. They particularly liked our tunes with overt drug references. “40 pounds in the back of my van,” got the loudest hoots. It is the prison culture which is scary. It strips away the dignity from both the prisoners and the guards. These kinds of hardened power imbalances diminish us all, I’m afraid. The folks in Attica had some solid demands. I don’t think things have improved too much since the early 70s.The show ended, we shook hands with many of the inmates, packed up, took some photos and headed for the warm home of Carter and Chani. Quite an experience.

This XM radio has a pretty good jazz station and a decent classic country station but most of the others totally suck. It’s just weird, the whole satellite radio thing. It’s cold, and global, and detached. I miss the regional flavor of good AM and FM radio. That feeling of good fortune you get when you find a great station on the dial in a town you don’t know well. That doesn’t happen on the space radio.