On the Road

For this issue im going to go briefly into what i think are the top 20 tips for surviving a band trip or tour, some of the tips will work regardless of the length of the trip be it a day or a week or a month, some of the tips will also work for road trips and budget vacations.
Next issue i will go into each tip with more detail and explanations, so with out further ado here they are the top 20 tips for surviving the road

1. quality toilet paper....just cause you are on the road don’t mean you don’t go, and if you ever used rest area facilities you know what im talking about. buy one of those family packs from wally world....

2. toilet covers aka butt gaskets....those paper things you put on the stool before you sit, pretty self explanatory

3. wal-mart gift cards...you can buy anything with these anywhere in the country..

4.get insurance on your gear and personal property, and make sure its all covered no matter if its in the van, club or in between.

5.if possible rent a van, we rented a van for one tour got it for a month for a grand, was less than a year old and had around 12k miles, if it did break down a new one was just a call away

6.only eat from grocery stores not drive-ups, you can feed a band of 4 stoners with the munchies for $2-3 a meal minus drinks...

7. KEEP IT IN YOUR PANTS lol, an old drummer learned that the hard way, and now has to pay close attention to valtrex commercials...

8. don’t act like an immature idiot in towns you are not’t from, its a good quick way to get a free tour of the town jail, and if your lucky a face to face meeting with a nightstick lol....

9.make sure your van doesn’t look like its a band vehicle, no stickers, signs, naked mannequins etc etc, you want to look like a family taking a summer vacation, so don’t dress and look to wild while on the road, wait till you get to the club., if anyone important asks you at any of the major point of entry of entry stations along the interstate, you do admit to being a band when asked, but you are a Christian {insert music genre here} traveling to bring his word to the kids who need it most...etc etc. don’t say you are a stoner rock band, whose songs glorify drug abuse and cop killing....

10 the most important one BRING QUALITY TOLIET PAPER

11. if you stay in a hotel, pick a major economy chain like motel 6 or super 8, don’t stay at an independently owned motel, even if its cheaper.why? you will have probably 4-5 people and everyone of those people have to pay extra to stay. at the place where the owner is at 24/7 they are going to notice 5 people pilling into a single room since that is money straight from their pocket. at the major chain the desk is going to be ran by most likely a normal employee that only really cares what time the shift is over not how many people are in a room, chances are the clerk is in a band as well and will cut you some slack. i recommend telling the staff there’s half as many people as there really are, if an odd number go up, so for 4 people say 2, for 5 people say 3, don’t say 1 person then call the front desk for towels for 8 people. using the half rule you can request another round of towels in the morning for the half that didn’t shower(you should always bring a towel or 2 anyway) or gets to use a clean towel.....don’t act like rock stars or you will end up sleeping in the van, and getting no refund for the room, use the hotel to sleep and shower, stay away from the public areas like the pool hot tubs etc, if you all look like your in a band, 6 people swimming covered in tattoos surrounded by family's stick out like a sore thumb, esp. if there is only supposed to be 3, have your fun in the clubs, on stage, after hours etc., outside of that the more you look and act like a normal member of society the less hassles you will have.

12.dont over extend yourself, keep it simple at first do traveling weekends for a month or 2, to make sure everyone can actually stand being together for a long amount of time in confined spaces, then bump it up to a week, then 2 etc etc, don’t go from playing shows in just your town where everyone comes and leaves separately to planning a 2 month north american tour..

13.try and only book shows at legitimate businesses, or funded centers at towns, churches, schools and stay away from promoters who just rent venues or have them in their house, while these shows are often the best more often than not they get cancelled and shut down and you get no notice at all....

14.dont expect to make enough money at the shows to live on, even if its in contracts, as they say sh#t happens, and the club owner/promoters don’t have a shady rep for no reason, have enough cash to cover any and all expenses, look at it like you are going on one hell of a vacation and get to play music also, this way any money you do make is bonus, and you will never end up broke and running on fumes...

15.showering is not always an option, and while some places say use the showers at trucks stops, but that just grosses me out, i used to suggest buying a bottle of .89 rubbing alcohol and .99 bag of cotton balls for keeping your face and neck areas clean (look at your fave skin astringent number 1 ingredient is alcohol, the rubbing alcohol also works wonders cleaning your cord ends, pick-ups etc. after our band had members experience parenthood, baby wipes made an appearance and quickly shuttled the alcohol to cleaning electronics only. all the major chains sell big family sized boxes of luvs, huggies etc brand for less than 10 bucks...don’t try and save a buck or two here and go generic, buy quality you will thank yourself for it later.

16. an often overlooked section of financing a tour, is your bank itself, you need your bank to have nation-wide branches atms, so you can get cash in case of emergencies without paying an arm and a leg in fees, and every travel guide ever published has said to never carry large amounts of cash, so
in the event you have a really good nite money wise, you are still only a few miles from a place to safely deposit your cash with a teller, or for 69 cents most gas stations and convenience stores sell money orders, the money order can then be deposited via atm with no worries about loss...

17. buy travel sized toothbrushes, toothpaste and deodorants, they all fit inconspicuously into one pocket, add a handful of baby wipes in the other pocket
and you can walk into any nice clean private restaurant/gas station and give your self a decent cleaning without the staff knowing....places that have these nice facilities usually don’t like them to be used in this fashion, so don’t walk in and ask for the key/or where the bathroom is, carrying your towel, shaving kit and toiletries all in your hands and don’t spend hours primping, you have the same amount of time to clean up as someone with slight digestive troubles so don’t dawdle

18.make sure your van is equipped with a power inverters of at least 500w preferably 1000w....this will cost between $50-$100, but the inverters is a piece of equipment that changes 12v dc to 120v ac, or in laymen’s you plug it into your cigarette lighter, and then you can plug what ever normal appliance you want into the inverters and it will power it up. we used it to power a tv, vcr, playstation, and powered speakers, so we could watch movies, play games etc, before shows at nite, while driving etc, without having to go buy fancy 12v appliances.

19.switch your audio system over to mp3s, instead of tapes, and regular cds. for $20 bucks walmart sells a portable diskman that plays mp3 cds, an mp3 cd holds aprox. 300-400 songs or 30-40 cds worth, as you can see all those giant photo albums of cds, that take up so much space, are now condensed down to a single wallet sized holder, and by adding that adapter that goes from headphones to tape player, and the diskman plugged into the inverter, you are now rocking with a digital music system for less than 30 bucks, you can also use mp3 players such as ipods etc, in the same manner if you wish to bypass cds altogether, anything with a headphone jack can be ran thru a tape player so your imagination is the limit. if money is no object id suggest buying a satellite music system, as its definitely the best option for those long nights driving thru the prairie with nothing but a fuzzy fm station doing farm reports and a bunch of am stations preaching fire and brimstones, or thru the desert with nothing at all but static.

20.check the fluids on your van at every stop, no matter if they are 10 min. apart, every time that van gets off the road you are checking the oil, washer fluid,brake,transmission etc., when you get out look underneath to see what the space looks like as you pulled in (try parking in spots with no stains) and when you get back in look for puddles, or drops, often this will tell you of a leak before the dipsticks will, and will alert you to any problems that may be upcoming.