Day 15: Los Angeles, CA
Welcome
Yesterday we drove to Los Angeles and played the first of our three headline shows at the Lodge Room.
It was a beautiful drive down to LA. We left the hotel at 7:30 and cruised south on I-5 enjoying the wash of early morning light that on the undulating landscape, a terrain dressed with parched grass and the jagged forms of pylons alongside the highway.
Time passes quickly on these early morning drives and the first couple of hours in the van felt calm and pleasant. We made a breakfast stop at a Starbucks near Coalinga and I ordered myself an Impossible breakfast sandwich – an English Muffin with a plant-based patty, an egg, and a slice of processed cheese. The egg and the cheese may have also been plant based but I’m not in a position to confirm that fact.
It was just after 1pm when we parked outside the Lodge Room, a venue in northeast Los Angeles that as the name suggests is housed in the main hall of a Masonic Lodge dating back to 1922. While the activities of the Freemason guilds might still be shrouded in mystery what we do know is that they know how to construct a handsome building. Wooden panelling, ornate architraves, and fine chandeliers greeted us as we trundled our equipment out of the elevator and into the hall, pushing everything up the ramp and onto a stage that isn’t small but is a lot tighter than what we have gotten used to over the past couple of weeks.
We began setting up but were soon interrupted by another very special reunion, this one with our manager Apple Baggios who turned up with a car full of our packages that we had ordered to her apartment. It was embarrassing, the amount of cardboard packes that we had accumulated but it was also exciting to see our goodies, with clothes, guitar pedals, and even a brand new Pelican being unboxed on the floor of the venue.
It was a challenging room to soundcheck in; the wooden walls and floors aren’t the most forgiving for amplified sound, and Gabe had to work hard to get things sounding balanced at his end of the room. “It will be fine once you add the bodies” is the phrase that we usually take comfort in, and we did, trusting that things would sound great later on.
Rosie Tucker opened the show at 8pm. It was delightful and nostalgic hearing them again, and although they have put together a completely new band since our tour last year the magic of a Rosie Tucker set remains the same. We heard some familiar songs and were treated to some brand-new material, the highlight of which was the suite of four ‘tiny songs’ that were delivered in quick succession and created a pleasant diversion in the middle of the set.
Would we be fit enough to make it through eighty minutes of playing? That was the question on everyone’s lips as we walked out on stage to do our first full-length headline set in six weeks. I think it’s safe to say that we weren’t match fit, but we still retained enough muscle memory to get through all the songs and the energy from this fine LA crowd did the rest. We were back in our favourite format, the 500-person club; a perfect balance of intimacy and energy that left everyone in the room feeling satisfied.
A polaroid; my only photo from the show, left on stage by a mystery photographer. Thanks!
Afterwards we loaded everything back into the van, ready to take to our show at the Hollywood Bowl. We were about to drive off to our accommodation when we hit a snag – Jake and Apple’s car wouldn’t start. Tristan dived under the hood and began poking around while the rest of us stood back and let him work. The prognosis arrived swiftly and confidently; the vehicle was out of petrol.
We made a trip to a nearby gas station so Jake could purchase a jerry can and some fuel and then headed back to refill the tank; a simple solution that thankfully turned out to be the correct solution when the car sprung back into life a few minutes later. It was after 1am by this point and we said our goodbyes and drove to the accommodation, collapsing into our beds at the end of this long and tiring day.
