Tunnel Six

Well it’s been about a week since we all departed from Portland, with great fatigue and a sense of accomplishment, to go to our respective homes.  Since then, we’ve been asleep, recovering from the excessive driving, but now having reawakened, here are some thoughts and pictures to wrap up the account of our tour here on the site.

After our much-needed day off in Seattle, which featured lots of salmon-eating and microbrew-drinking, and clouds (of course), we proceeded northward to Vancouver where, after a relatively simple border crossing, we met up with another Banffer, Meredith Bates, a violinist, who provided excellent hospitality.  After a large afternoon sushi feast, we headed down to the Cellar, one of our favorite rooms on the tour, where we played a couple of high-energy sets for a really enthusiastic and raucous crowd, which was refreshing after a couple of subdued gigs in a row.  We really enjoyed the city too, and were sad to leave quickly the next day to hit the road one last time to Portland.

Upon our (rain-filled) arrival in Portland, we were treated to a great meal by my friend Colin’s parents, who also graciously put up a couple members of the band.  We then proceeded to hit the studio the following morning for what essentially amounted to a setup day, then headed over to the Old Church for a concert that night.  Though we were all quite tired, the concert turned out to be really fun and we really loosened up a bit and started interacting in some new and fun ways that hadn’t necessarily happened throughout the tour.

The next day, which was the final day of the tour, was quite lengthy but really rewarding as we laid down studio versions of all the material we’d worked up over the course of the tour.  We’ll be mixing and mastering soon, and we’ll be releasing the new album on Origin Records early next year.  And, just as abruptly as it had begun, everyone flew off the next morning and it was over!

Thanks to everyone who came out to see us, put us up, contributed money to our toonie campaign, or anything else that I’m forgetting to make this tour a success, it was even better than we could have hoped and we’re really looking forward to one (or maybe even more) tours in 2011 in support of our new album!  We’ll keep you posted on here and by email about happenings in the mean time, and once we finish sorting through all the gig recordings, we’ll post a few highlights too.

Meanwhile, here are a few photos from the last few days of the tour, enjoy:

at the Space Needle in Seattle

at Tula’s in Seattle

Meredith eats sushi and explains the universe

final border crossing

Bob Stark, engineer

See you next year!

We’ve arrived in Seattle, where we played a nice show last night at Tula’s Jazz Club, and now we have one of the only days off of the whole tour, which is MUCH needed as we gear up for Vancouver, Portland, and our album recording this weekend!

We’re really enjoying the Northwest, we visited Pike Place Market today and bought some great salmon, which we are about to eat!  Here are some recent photos now that the internet is of decent speed:

Waking up in Canmore

The return of Tunnel 6 to the Banff Centre!

Edmonton

Tyson in the Yardbird Suite Green Room

Ferries!

At Tula’s.  Photos by Jim Levitt

Gearing up for Vancouver tomorrow and Portland on Friday!  See you there!

Well we’re really blasting across North America here in MOOSE WARRIOR!  We’re in the van so internet is somewhat slow and pictures are not uploading properly.  I will update with pictures later today.  Meanwhile, a brief recap of the past few days:

We rolled into Calgary on Thursday after a lengthy drive across the plains.  We played a nice though poorly attended gig at the BeatNiq, mostly due to a freak snowstorm (which actually is still dumping snow on Calgary – more on that in a minute).  The room and people were nice and it was certainly a good stop which we hope to repeat next time, but without the horrendous weather!

The next morning we played our “homecoming” gig at the Banff Centre, during their lunch break.  It was awesome to be back there and see Dave Douglas and some other good friends of ours who were back from last year.  We then blasted north to Edmonton for an amazing gig at YardBird Suite, one of the finest jazz clubs any of us has ever played.  It’s all volunteer run, they have amazing gear, a great piano, a highly attentive audience, and they treated us amazingly.  It was certainly the best gig of our tour so far, and we really hope to have the chance to play there again!

Since then, we’ve been driving constantly and are about to arrive at the West Coast at last for what promises to be a really nice gig tonight at the Sunshine Coast Arts Center, the kickoff for the Gibson’s Landing Jazz Festival.  We’re very excited to have finished up our last super-long drive, now we just have some short drives and ferries for the rest of the tour!  Huzzah!

More pictures and audio from Edmonton coming very soon!  Cheers y’all…

Well we’re blasting across Saskatchewan here on our way to Calgary and the West Coast!  We’ve just posted some new press from Brandon, Seattle, and Ottawa on the “Press” page, so check it out when you have a chance.  We received an especially nice feature in the Brandon Sun for our concert last night.

Meanwhile, we’re looking forward to the Alberta and BC gigs in the next few days, especially our return to the Banff Centre tomorrow morning for a brief visit and performance at noon.  More soon!

Well we’ve had a splendid couple of days in Manitoba, full of really nice and generous people and a couple great gigs.  We started out with a nice dinner with Ben’s father in Winnipeg yesterday followed by a really fun gig at the Centre Culturel Franco-Manitobain, a cultural center for French speakers in Manitoba.  It was a fantastic room and a very attentive and full audience – we couldn’t have asked for more!

Today we drove to Ben’s college town of Brandon, MB and did a really nice clinic in the morning.  We discussed Brian’s tune “Not Yet” and different ways in which we conceptualize collective improvisation.  A good friend of Ben’s and a great patron of the arts here, Scott, took us out to a huge lunch of sushi (very far from the ocean), and then we took a righteous nap before playing a nice little gig over at The Music Studio, a nice small and intimate space.

Tomorrow we’re taking off on a rather lengthy (12-hour) trek over to Calgary for a gig at the BeatNiq!  Onward and upward!

We’ve arrived at Ben Dietschi’s mom’s house, near Selkirk, Manitoba, after MANY hours of driving both yesterday and today.  Some highlights were a great wade in Lake Superior yesterday, which was just what we needed after a day in the car:

Last night we spent the night in some sweet log cabins in WAWA, Ontario, run by some really nice Polish people who were very enthusiastic about hosting us.

Unfortunately we were unable to hang out and enjoy the nature, we had to hit the road to make it here.  We blasted through many hours of lakes and then 3 hours of miserable but stunning thunderstorms and pouring rain to arrive at last!

Tomorrow night: Le Foyer in Winnipeg!  And, for good measure, Chad’s photoshop skills take a turn for the better (or worse) to greet you from our fine tour van:

Well we’re on our way across Ontario to WAWA, halfway between Montreal and Winnipeg.  Today we got up at 5 AM and embarked, looking something like this:

However, before this somewhat unpleasent 2-fifteen-hour-day episode, we had some great times in Montreal.  We stayed in a bizarre hotel on an otherwise uninhabited island some distance from downtown, but it was cheap and nice enough.  We even had a lengthy and extremely productive rehearsal in a conference room, and have produced, for your viewing pleasure, a little taste of what we’re up to: the melody of Chad’s brand new tune “MOOSE WARRIOR”, named after our trusty tour van:

We had a day off in Montreal on Friday, after traveling from Ottawa, and had some great times in the city, and then played a fun gig last night with Julie Themens’ band.  Julie is a great pianist who was also at Banff last year, and we split the bill at a little place called Bistro in Vivo in Eastern Montreal, in a 100% Francophone neighborhood, which was cool and also another nice change of vibe.  The audience was extremely appreciative and attentive, and Julie’s band played a great set too.  We’re blasting through Ontario here, and looking forward to our busy week of shows in Central and Western Canada.  Here are some photos from our times in Motreal:

So, the tour is nicely underway here…yesterday we left Toronto and were plagued by ruthless traffic and construction and finally made it to Ottawa just in time to load in to Cafe Paradiso, a fine little venue in Ottawa’s pleasant and very relaxed downtown.  They served us a fantastic meal and we even had time to take a walk down the street to the Parlaiment buildings!

We had a nice gig, it was much more subdued than our raucous Rex set, and made for an interesting contrast.  One of the nice things about the scheduling on this tour is the wide variety of venue size and type, and the various ways we adapt to the circumstances.

The weather so far has been exemplary, perfectly warm and sunny, and Ottawa was especially beautiful.  Here’s a few pics (including some of the full band, for a change).  Today we’re moving along to Montreal for a nice day off and then a gig tomorrow night before we begin our epic trek westward!

So, after a year in the works, we got off to a smashing start last night at the Rex in Toronto!  It’s a fantastic room and it was completely full for almost the entire evening!  After learning an amazing amount of really hard music in a really short period of time, we were all reminded again how great of a band this is when we pulled it off with lots of energy and gusto.  We also met up with Mark and Heather Segger, both great musicians who were at Banff with us.  The connections never end!  A great start to the tour.

Today we’re heading up to Ottawa to play at Cafe Paradiso.  It will be a smaller room but we’ve heard great things about it and are looking forward to starting our voyage.  Time to pack up MOOSE WARRIOR (which, incidentally, now has a tune by Chad named after it) and hit the road.

Here are a few pictures from last night…

Well after not having played together for a year, we’ve more or less prepared 14 tunes, almost all of which are brand new, just for this band!  Everyone came through with great new compositions and we’re really excited to play them all month, especially tomorrow night at our kickoff show at the Rex!

Today we had 12 nearly straight hours of rehearsal, which was really intense.  It was really reminiscent of  Banff, in vibe and in quality of musicianship!  Here’s a few photos, we’ll keep you posted with gig details and more tomorrow!  Cheers from Toronto!

Ben and Chad awaken and immediately start taping charts together

Brian and Pinkie

Chad and Ben take a break after the 5th hour…

Yeah, rhythm section!

Tired band at the end of the day!