On tour with Ursula Rucker:

Crazy street. James Rouse (drummer extraordinaire) and I shared a beautiful apartment here. We stayed near a food market, so after a nights rest after flying in, in the morning James bought tuna steaks, eggs, and cheese—that was breakfast.

Played Music Box (an old converted bordello). The street is crazy at night. Our first show was magical and the people wonderful (as always!). I have lost count, but i think this may be my 25th show (w UR)  in Portugal over the years. Sound was fantastic. Late night hang back stage til 5am.  Tonight's show we didn't know the material fully yet (as only one rehearsal), so lot's of improv was happening. it was truly amazing.

Travelled by train (which we almost missed due to taxi craziness) to Oporto the magic city...so beautiful here. Words cannot describe. Playing Hard Club venue tonite. Capacity 850. Great sound here. Pedro our engineer for the night killed it! Once again, a magical night. The music is really coming together. "Call to Axiom" becoming my favorite of the set.  Autographed CD's after show, talked to fans, tour guide by tatiana, 3 clubs, dance, djs. great ,music,  the river, no sleep, breakfast at 7am. astounding.

Flight is fine. exhausted. lol. Sleep for one hour. (it was totally worthwhile to lose sleep while in Oporto. very necessary.) Sit in square. Ice tea and tomatoes mozzarella. soundcheck. Great to be back at Turnhalle. This is one of my favorite venues to play. Good show tonight although i wasn't quite happy with my sound. The audience loves it. Nice to hang with Christian. I gave him D, GB, B3 cd's. Talked about Turnhalle workshops/gigs. Stayed at Bern hotel.  The slow motian dancer was at our gig tonite. Always such as pleasure to be here.

Travel day. Almost miss our train to Zurich due to a cab driver wasting time. crazy and creates anxiety for us. Swiss chocolate at airport. A nice flight into Heathrow. Upon arriving in UK, Ursula's hunch is right, we are held up at UK immigration. Our papers are not sufficient. The promoter did not provide work permit and as a result we are detained at 4:30pm. This turns into 7 hours. Our bags are searched, we are searched, finger printed, photographed, & interviewed. They went through all of our personal things, contents of wallet, luggage, etc. Finally we are held in a holding room until promoter gets it together.  Finally all is worked out and we leave at 11pm. Exhausted and mad as hell. This was a first. On to the hotel to sleep. Tomorrow we play in London.

Hotel breakfast. walkaround music row. amazing gear here and v expensive. enjoy a late lunch and pint at a local pub. bus to venue. upon arrival, nothing is set up. all drums are still in flight cases, nothing mic'd up. now i find out there is no power transformer either to power my pedal board. upon inquirying i find all the backline companies are closed. for the next 3 hours we run about (on foot) in east London trying to buy a transformer for the show. all stores are closed. every place closes early here. no luck. finally our friend calls a musician who has a transformer. this will be delivered 10 minutes before showtime. there in no soundcheck. a quick line check only to make sure everything is working. just insane. we go on just after 10pm, and ironically, it is absolutely awesome sound. We have an incredible show. Transcendental. bad food afterwards. back to hotel. sleep in preparation for our travel to Prague tomorrow. good night.

Slon hotel.  I love this hotel. very feng shui. Queen size bed next to window that opens wide—wonderful fresh air. Slept upon arrival up until soundcheck. catching up on sleep. hot. sound check is fine.
Ursula does interview for slovenija tv. apparently the show is broadcast on the slovenija radio here.
dinner. slovenian trout! quite amazing. salad, veg. feel good. folks here very nice. hip.
after really great festival show back to hotel. it took 3 songs to get the audience. 'fuck you' got their attention. from there on it was way on. afterwards, walk to bar for wind down. extremely drunk people here. observe kids dancing to slovenian pop music. then, sleep.

Akropolis.

Fantastic show tonight. with Phil Yaeger joining on trombone. He travelled 4 hours by bus from Vienna to Prague. On his bus in, they stopped and Phil left his horn behind by mistake, or perhpas the bus  left without him. (I can't remember) He took a second bus into Prague and when he arrived they had his horn. whew! Phil is an amazing musician and good friend. it was great he was here.
nice venue. good sound. after soundcheck, Crowd was really with us, a very cool concert vibe here. The venue reminded me of the Trocodero in Philly. very similar. Afterwards interviewed for radio, then to dinner. great! Leffe in the house. back to hotel. sleep.