Attempting to bring the rock to Denver, CO. Bringing the rock to Bozeman, MT. Delivering more of the rock to Missoula, MT. Missoula looks a little like a View-Master slide. But in a good way.

9/9/02 -- Big V's, St. Paul, MN
We spend Sunday lounging in a hotel room, recuperating from the sensory excesses of Madison, and we all agree that Contest Searchlight is a pretty funny show. The show at Big V's begins after innumerable rounds of video deer hunting and Galaga. Jason from Irate Booking has put together a solid show and there is a healthy turnout, despite the ever-present Interpol performing that night in the twin cities. Good bands throughout the evening: Grickle Grass opened up with a great set, displaying qualities reminiscent of Jawbreaker and Garden Variety. Falcon Crest headlined and sounded like Rye Coalition on their best day. The drummer hit 'em like they talked shit about his momma. They do a Mission of Burma cover for us -- impeccably executed and sweet as all hell.

What's up with the porno? We Beatings begin to sense a theme to our little adventure. About three quarters of the way through their set, they whipped out a huge box of porn rags and started pelting the audience with 'em. Erin got hit in the face with what appeared to be a Hustler.

We stayed with Joe from Grickle Grass -- he had a hyper puppy that didn't want to give Erin any love. She told it to "go fuck Mike". A good night.

9/10/02 -- Farnum Street/the Junction, Omaha, NE
Felt like we were shot out of a cannon into a goddamn David Lynch film. We show up at Farnam Street and the show isn't listed; we're nervous but some very nice anarcho punks come over from next door and we chat for awhile. They're in the process of putting a collective together and they show us around the building. Eventually, they round up Tom, the promoter, for us. We are informed that Bright Eyes is playing in Lincoln, effectively depopulating the town of concert goers. Tom is an interesting character. We are blasted by tales of how he lost his keys, some guy hung himself in the park, I pulled a knife on some dude, etc. We load in and set up. Tom doesn't have the power cord to drive the PA. Things are definitely off to a great start.

After smashing some stuff, Tom is very accommodating, and manages to get us on the bill at the Junction up the street with the Reputation, whom with we had just played in Madison. The place is run by an older couple...well an older woman who bosses the shit out of her aloof husband. They have a certain bizarro charm that fits the energy of the evening. He also finagles it so that the underage kids who came to Farnam Street can hang out in the Junction, which is 21 plus. Of course by now we are all set up to play at Farnam Street, so we break everything down and load the van for a 300 foot hike up the street.

One would think that a sense of community might pervade in such a situation, given that there is literally no one in Omaha to see the concert except the other bands and ourselves, but a crying match begins over money between the owner of the bar and parties who shall remain nameless. We order beer and refused to get involved, trying to remove the enormous steel cock that was raping our collective mind. The kicker comes when someone forces the underage crowd to have to move out of the stage area because they want to drink onstage. In all the insanity, the show ends up being decent. We drive away.

9/12/02 -- 15th Street Tavern, Denver, CO
We hole up with (indie performance artist, vigilante extraordinaire and gifted athlete) El Vortex at an undisclosed location in Colorado. His western lair is well equipped with all the amenities. We launder, shower and eventually back up the sewer so that the basement is flooding. His hideout is apparently not built to withstand such activity. We shut off the water.

What the fuck happened in Denver? Not much other than a flash flood. Oh yeah, and they put us on at 7:00 p.m. and closed the bar while we were playing. No big deal. On the positive, we finally got to meet John Wenzel from Sponic, who for the better part of our existence has been an ardent fan and has been enthusiastically recommending us to anyone who will listen. To finally meet him was great. Back to the bar closing: In the middle of our third song, the bar stopped serving alcohol and closed the doors to new people coming in. Despite a no-frills, ass kicking set, the club slowly empties out. Fox gives us the lowdown. We're a bit stunned. What the fuck happened? Nothing much except that Jucifer has to sound check. Continuing a desperate exhibition of the bright side of things, Jucifer are very nice and dig our musical stylings. Also, each band member got his/her own full pitcher of beer, which is just great because we have to leave on a 12-hour drive to Montana, and we gotta leave toot-sweet. An hour and a half later, we still haven't left, and Jucifer still hasn't sound-checked. Thank you Denver and good afternoon.

9/13/02 -- Zebra Cocktail Lounge, Bozeman, MT
After a grueling overnight drive through Wyoming, we pull into Bozeman and the sun shines upon us. We check into Fox's favorite low-roller, poor man's paradise, the Lewis and Clark Hotel. For 65 bucks, tax included, there is gambling, a trout pond, a big pool, beer served in the lobby, a phone in the shitter and do I really have to go on? We drink, sleep, gamble, drink, gamble. Everytime you withdraw money from the ATM, you get a free beer.

We get to the club way too early as usual, but this works to our advantage as we get a pretty thorough sound check. The venue is nicely laid out with a huge stage area and other various "hang out"-type rooms. We lounge about in our usual fashion until showtime with a roundtable discussion of various topics: scumbag booking agents, liquid bowel syndrome, and why we haven't stopped sneezing since Columbus. All the while we are downing Fat Tires drafts, which are free to bands. Dwarftosser open the show and do a hilarious metally Ween/late Ozzy type theatrical rock extravaganza. The lead singer's stage presence is a literally a cross between present-day Ozzy and a fortune-telling-booth robot. It's supposed to be weird and the lighting is very effective. JC Auto follows with a straight-up punk rock set, the audience seems to dig them a lot, and they cover "Gigantic", which was cool and well received. After the Omaha/Denver Mindfuck Bifecta, the audience at the Zebra was a godsend: not only were there about a hundred or so people there, they were dancing, yelling, and one girl in particular feeling the "vibes" coming off the monitors. Whatever exactly it was that she was doing, she was into it.

The crowd was eating us up and we likewise fed off their energy. The set ends in a beer bath, during the grind part of "Heavy Metal". This is how it's supposed to be. Dennis was deaf and the audience was screaming for an encore. We plugged back in and pounded out "Twins". Big Rob Parker of Hard Corps Entertainment had put the show on with a great venue and it was a success on all fronts. After the show, we exchanged drunken pleasantries and vowed to always return to Bozeman.

9/14/02 -- Jay's Upstairs, Missoula, MT
We wake up -- or more accurately, come to -- on Saturday morning to sunny weather, a hearty breakfast and a three and a half-hour drive to Missoula. Aside from having wonderful rock fans, a generally attractive populace and video poker, Montana also takes the prize for most beautiful state to drive through. We pull up in Missoula, another big college town, and while away the time 'til load in with a short radio interview, some video game violence and a subpar Thai dinner. I guess Southern Asian cuisine would be the Achilles heel of this otherwise amazing state.

Jay's Upstairs Lounge is a cool venue, despite the upstairs load-in -- free Sierra Nevadas and still more friendly patrons. The local duo Bacon and Egg opened with some funny, innovative instrumental and electronic wizardry. They offered it loud and catchy and the audience responded and asked for more. We took the stage and roared through a set that is still reverberating through the canyons of Western Montana at press time. Each of us -- even Eldridge, who had been suffering from flu-like symptoms -- played with unrivaled ferocity. Then Dead Moon came up and blew the roof off with an hour-long set of pure, un-cut Oregon gold. When the dust settled, Rob (the egg of Bacon and Egg) and his wife Cindy offered their unused cabana for our exclusive use for the next 36 hours. Dennis is contemplating the ramifications of forgoing the rest of the tour and his life in favor of settling down in Montana.

We'll post a new installment of The Beatings' diary every week. Want to be mentioned in it? Get your sorry ass out to see the band on the remaining portion of their tour. Here are the dates:

09/18/02 | Stork Club | Oakland, CA
09/19/02 | Spaceland | Los Angeles, CA
09/20/02 | Xanth | San Diego, CA
09/21/02 | Nile Theatre | Mesa, AZ
09/23/02 | Taco Land | San Antonio, TX
09/24/02 | Rudyards | Houston, TX
09/25/02 | Emo's | Austin, TX
09/26/02 | Boiler Room | Birmingham, AL
09/27/02 | Orpheum | Tampa, FL
09/28/02 | Will's Pub | Orlando, FL
09/30/02 | Common Ground | Gainesville, FL
10/01/02 | Caledonia Lounge | Athens, GA
10/02/02 | The Basement | Durham, NC
10/03/02 | Pilot Light | Knoxville, TN
10/04/02 | Southgate House | Newport, KY
10/05/02 | YWCA (all ages) | Huntington, WV
10/06/02 | Black Cat | Washington, DC
10/07/02 | Talking Head | Baltimore, MD
10/08/02 | Fire | Philadelphia, PA
10/09/02 | Knitting Factory | New York, NY
10/10/02 | TT the Bears | Cambridge, MA