Dispatches: Junior Battles: Episode 1

Toronto's Junior Battles recently embarked on a US tour with O Pioneers!!!. This first episode in a series of Dispathces sees the band starting to head South to Rad Fest.

Wed. May 5th aka Cinco de Mayo aka Day 1
Touring in America is like going to Disneyland. Our first experience with this land of splendour and plenty came last Fall with One Win Choice, trekking down to Fest 8. This time out, it's us and O Pioneers!!!, heading to the inaugural Rad Fest. After two really fun warm-up shows in Canada, we headed into the land of Natural Ice and Wawa sandwiches on Saturday morning. Our first stop was in Buffalo, where we played at Sugar City, a sweet all ages show / art space in a converted old house. The show was great, but our early morning load-in the next day in Boston meant making a quick escape at the end of the night, driving overnight through a totally bullshit early May snowstorm (what?) to arrive in time for an all ages matinee at Harper's Ferry. After some exploring and a spirited game of handball, we noticed this weird guy in the parking lot behind the venue, dressed in a SWAT uniform, continually leaping down from and then scaling the massive wall adjacent to the lot.
Boston! The show was tons of fun, and marked the first of three shows we were set to play with Bomb the Music Industry!, who absolutely demolished our brains by being so fucking awesome. After the show, we opted to head to Brooklyn, which meant getting a chance to try out Bomb main-dude Jeff Rosenstock's new pet project, programming songs in Rock Band. Playing Xbox drums to "493 Ruth" while an avatar of Jeff stage dives on screen is super fucking funny and very fucking weird. After grabbing a pint at a small local bar where everyone seemed to have adorably appropriate Brooklyn haircuts, we bid Jeff a good night (right after shotgunning a beer in the street? His idea.) and headed to Bomb/Laura Stevenson horn/key dude Matt Keegan's place to crash. We end up convincing him to come explore downtown with us (and a backpack full of beer) at 2am, but when the subway wasn't scheduled to come for another 20 minutes, we opted to crack a beer and walk around Queens. While standing innocently on a residential street corner in Ridgewood, we were shocked when a cop car came roaring past us with its cherries on. We casually placed our beers on the ground and began to walk away, when three more cop cars came rolling up, and we quickly realised we were not going to try running from the NYPD on this night. When an ambulance and a firetruck arrived, it became pretty clear that these cops hadn't shown up to bust a few nice young men enjoying a beer in the cool spring air, but had apparently been responding to a medical call in the building right beside us. At first, the cops seemed inclined to let us walk, but when The Boss showed up, they apologised that they kind of had to give us a ticket, but informed us we might as well finish our beers while they wrote them up. After receiving our $25 fines (best $25 spent on tour so far) and polishing off our Natty Ices, we spent a few minutes shooting the shit with the cops about the best ripper joints in New York before taking off to grab sandwiches and cracking another beer for the walk home.

The next morning we all woke up early (somehow!) and spent the day bombing around New York, seeing and being seen. The show was at the Knitting Factory, and also included Thousandaires, which we were all really excited about because, for one, they fucking rule, and for two, our first real tour ever was with Bridge and Tunnel and any chance to see any of those dudes / ladies is a great one. We also finally got to meet Dave, who plays drums in Thousandaires and runs If You Make It (who posted our 7" as a free download), so it was just stoked times all around.

After the show, we headed to Lou Lou's, a bar that somehow stays in business while offering a free pizza with every pint. New York! A casual night of catching up with some old friends quickly turned into a brutally executed round robin tournament on the bar's Big Game Buck Hunter arcade console. After a lot of practice looking cool while reloading a plastic infrared gun, Justin emerged victorious, claiming the many spoils he was now entitled to (one dollar, bragging). The next morning we woke up early to try to track down an extra acoustic guitar for our planned Pink Couch session, and ended up meeting our friend Tia from Fellow Project at her new store in Queens. Vaya Bags! Get into it! She loaned us an old beater and we headed to Dave's place, kicking some tunes and eating some bagels. After an attempt to beat traffic on our way to Eric's parents' place in New Jersey, we settled in to the luxury of a real Adult Home, eating a Real Meal and Washing Our Clothes. The show that night was at Asbury Lanes, which is as cool in execution as it sounds on paper: a old bowling alley with a stage built in the centre. Also playing that night was Franz Nicolay, who brought a nice moustachioed classiness to the preceedings. The show was a blast and all the kids seemed stoked, when Bomb's set started to take a turn for the weird; a cover of "My Own Worst Enemy" (sung by this guy) was followed by an even stranger and sloppier cover of "Self Esteem". It left the kids watching them either perplexed or insanely stoked, and was honestly really funny and highlighted the actual, no bullshit "don't-give-a-shit-at-all" attitude that makes Bomb so genuinely exciting and honest and fucking punk. Anyway, someone working at the Lanes didn't think so, and when their Offspring homage ended and they announced their actual last song, someone went to the soundboard, killed all the mics, and started blasting "Ace of Spades" over the PA. It led to a lot of anger onstage and in the crowd, and after a few minutes of tense stand-off action, Bomb was finally allowed to play one more song, but shit was seriously tense and everyone could feel it. Asbury Park! It was an exciting end to our shows together, and we celebrated by immediately receding to the comfort of Eric's parents' house to sit in the basement and watch "World's Most Talented Teens" on Oprah at 2am.

Coming next update: outlet malls! Philadelphia! A pimp tries to sell us a hooker at a gas station and then Joel sees her working in the van right beside us!