APRIL 5 – THE BISHOP BAR, BLOOMINGTON, IL [SHOW #193]

[JT]  Day 229.  50,100 miles.  We passed the 50,000th mile of this tour, which started on June 10, 2010, on the drive from Chicago to Bloomington.  This is our first Bloomington show ever as a band.  It is also the home of Mike Dixon, the primary engineer of our new record.  We invited him out to the show, and he brought his pedal steel guitar to play along with us on the few new songs he is featured on: Porcelain Brain, Church on Mars, and Born On Date.  Bloomington is also the current home of Frankenixon’s Evelyn Davis.  She has been living here the past few years studying music composition.  It was wonderful to see her again, and we spent a long time catching up with each other.

The first band that night was sort of a Bloomington mashup, the members only recently formed for a Bloomington music project.  They played a set of new songs that they had written, including a cover of the Silver Jews ‘Random Rules’ to our delight.  We played a quick set in the middle, and Brass Bed closed the show.  Keeping up the cover spirit, they tore through Neil Young’s ‘Words.’

The next day we, Shawn, and Mike picked up Evelyn and her boyfriend and met up with Brass Bed at a local Mexican restaurant for a big group lunch.  Afterwards Mike invited us over to the recording studio in town that he often works at, Red Russian.  When we arrived I recognized it as the former location of the Art Hospital, a former Bloomington art space that used to put on shows and events.  Mike gave us a tour and introduced us to the studio’s head engineer, also named Mike.  They play in a band together called Memory Map.  The studio was impressive, especially since Patrick and I saw the space just a few years ago, before any of it was constructed.  We dropped Mike off at his apartment and had some goodbye hugs.  He gave us some records and CDs of his recent musical work.  Before leaving town we went to a natural food store for some coffee and finished our band meeting with Shawn before he left back home to Grand Rapids, and we on to the next town.

The jam in the van:  Dungen  Skit I Allt / The Magnetic Fields 69 Love Songs Vol. 1 & 2 / Moby 18

The word we heard:  “Suck it, taco” –Christiaan, punching his leftover Mexican lunch

Dinner was a winner:  burritos from Laughing Planet

The pad was rad:  Mike

Our friends the Bartends:  Jay / Andy

Sound Tech we respect:  Tim

The fill of the bill:  The Great Great Great / Brass Bed

Monument / Some Ordinary Vision / Pacific Sunrise / Porcelain Brain / Church on Mars / Born On Date / Camille Claudel / Collage of impressions / Don’t Go / When the World Sleeps