Day Seven - 6/18 Pleasure Island (Pittsburgh, PA)

Sean and I both got woken up by Dex in the morning, but Sean's early greeting was not quite as pleasant as mine. It turns out I left the back window to our 4 Runner open all night. This is the morning after we chilled on Dex's porch looking at the TORRENTIAL rain take over his backyard. Everything remained intact however and no equipment was ruined or stolen. With a new strange smell joining us, we hit the road and began our trek to Pittsburgh. I actually don't remember anything from that particular leg of our trip except that Sean drove first and I slept and then I drove and Sean wrote yesterday's blog entry. We arrived in Pittsburgh a lot earlier than expected and soon met up with our friend, cbend, at the Pleasure Island house and parked on the steepest incline the 4runner has ever parked on, i think. We were greeted with warm welcomes and a shirtless cook, Zach, who was whipping up what would be the most delicious and filling meal in recent memory (it gave Caitlin's delicious tofu feast the night before a run for its money). We grabbed some PBR, ate some sa-tan wings and vegan philly cheesesteaks, and pre-partied the night away until the show would start. Strugglefish arrived later and they started off the night in the even tinier basement than the night before in DC. The punked our faces off and after their set was over, cbend was scheduled to play, but Da Bears surprised everyone and stated that they will play their 15 set before cbend. No one was opposed, so they started setting up. Next, both members took off all of their clothes and played their emotional noisy math rock completely in the nude. Most people who came down (or was already there) stayed, but I saw a few duders walk down the stairs, and then immediately turn around once they caught sight of da bears' dongs. the fully clothed cbend then played her un-amplified set to what was probably the biggest crowd of the night. I missed her live show and the people at the show were way down with her stuff, many of them knowing the words to her songs. It's awesome to see someone so happy in such a new place. It's also great to see how quickly and fully people can accept others. We were in the presence of great group of people. After i fixed a momentary problem with my amp, we started playing and within 30 seconds of us starting, i broke a string. I ran upstairs and then downstairs outside and grabbed THE CONQUEROR out of the truck and proceeded to play the rest of the show on that shitty and noisy piece. I had some trouble seeing the frets on the conquerer, but we powered through our set and soon Who Goes There started their sludgy, powerful, "EPIC AS FUCK" set and we both (and many others) dug it very much. After a long and tiring load-out and after we said our good-byes to all the great people we met, we started walking over to cbend's crib. When we got there, we drank some super high quality whiskey on the roof and i soon hit the hay because i was more tired than i've been in a long long while. I was wonderfully offered the bed of a great hostess and i reluctantly accepted due to all of the great things she already did for us that day. I slept like a baby and the rest is tomorrow's story.
We just picked up a box full of "EPs" and we're now currently on the road to Jersey City to play at Automata Chino. We also lost track of expenses, so we're now financial mysteries.

i bet i'm still in the lead though.