ROADBLOG_pyeng threadgill

July 23, 2008
July 30th (Driving to Rome) “A Tuscan Fairy”


We have a running joke (in addition to Yanni – you would have to be there for me to explain – he’s been following us everywhere we go) that this band is the most socially inappropriate group and that’s what makes us the most musically appropriate. I’ll spare you the social details but last night’s show was bangin’! We performed outdoors at a small square in Umbertide, Italy. The audience was medium in size but eventually grew to maybe a couple hundred. I even hear that LIAM NEESON was in the crowd with his family. Unfortunately, I didn’t get to meet him. Kevin decided to give the crowd a lesson during his solo on our encore of “Dead Shrimp”. Friends of friends from New York came, I found out that Enrico and I both have daughters named Luna and they are a year apart. So sometime in the next year we’ve determined that they will have to meet. And at the very end of “An Orbit of Skirts” just as Evan prepared his sticks for his final rhythmic touches, an unusual white insect leapt from his cymbal and flapped it’s wings fading into the night.

Ciao Italy. Hope to see you again in the fall!


July 30th (Driving to Rome) “All Kinds of Irrigation”
Enrico, one of the Italian promoters, mentioned a quote last night. Someone (he never mentioned the name) said “musicians get paid to travel, not make music”. On the one hand it seems like the scaffolding of the music industry is collapsing and we’re mostly glad for it. Because at the same time new music is flooding the dam, laying creeks, rivers and all kinds of new irrigation. Only I wonder how will we be able to continue in this profession when we are charged to pack a suitcase and fuel prices are rising much faster than our opportunities to make a living.


July 28th (late day en route to Umbria, Italy) “Sleeping Sitting Up”
I’m not homesick yet...but I am bedsick. Day after day on planes, cars, and trains one starts to crave being horizontal.








UMBRIAN TOUR BUS




















OUR HOTEL IN UMBRIA




















A TOWER NEAR UMBERTIDE, ITALY














YANNI















July 28th (Arbatax, Italy) “ Where The Grand Canyon Meets The Mediterranean Sea”
In the delirium of being on tour, it’s often hard to take a step back and remember the beauty you are experiencing. Winding on a road that looks like a line a kid drew during class, we swerve from side to side staring out over the sea in Sardinia. Where in the US would I get a chance like this? To play my music on a stage reminiscent of Woodstock, facing the rippling Mediterranean with seating available for hundreds of people. I can hardly take it all in now so I have to write it down. Even if audiences and the music industry in the US never tune their listening to Indie-Jazz-Pop-World-Folk-Funk-Classical, I hope I can continue working like this abroad.



July 27th (Cagliari, Italy) “Everybody’s Teaching!”











SARDINIA_Evan's Office














MY GOLDEN SHOES HELP ME GET BY















“Everybody’s teaching now, what’s up with that?” Larry Bowie exclaimed after a short hang after our show in Sardinia. I think it’s true everyboyd is teaching and I never know which way my career is going to go but if I wind up teaching music and no longer performing or going on the road, I would be proud to continue doing so if I could positively effect the way that students know how to use their instrument. Singing in a healthy way for the repertoire of one’s choosing still hasn’t quite caught up with academia.


July 26th (Cognac, France) “Four Days In A Row”









THE HENNESSY ESTATE















IN THE REMY MARTIN VIP TENT


















BAND PORTRAIT BY THIBAULT BALAHY











The best show
The most sweat
The hottest tent
The least wind

The best kept secret
The fewest cds
A Marc Ribot exchange
A departure mix up to keep things strange

The largest crowd
The most attention
The highest anxiety

A Joan Baez opening
A Brass band jam
In a tent of Hennessy

A revolving menu
“deets” for days
A Remy Martin exclusive

Washboard and tambourine
At the end of the night
Willie King is the real thing


July 25th (afternoon in Cognac) "Swimming Senegal"

I have two memories that stand out in my mind when I recall working on the documentary "Retour a Goree" with Youssou N'Dour in Senegal. The first memory was going to hear Youssou N'Dour perform at HIS club in Dakar with HIS band. I was jetlagged and probably hungry but the thickness of this band's groove and the commitment and love from his crowd were deliriously distracting. That groove permeated through everything, just enough to hold me through some days of some success, some humiliation, and some miscommunication. And so that leads me to my second favorite memory...my ritual swim at my hotel. I think I can call it a ritual because the staff and even some of the hotel guests got used to seeing me submerge myself in the chlorine waters each morning and sometimes evening. My head switching from viscous blue to airy blue would eventually become automatic and unlock the contents of my brain 'til they spilled out and left me some room to think again.

Today at a L'essachier in Cognac France I reluctantly yanked myself out of bed so that I could go swim before breakfast. And it brought to mind that same liberating experience coupled with an enormous gratitude towards my mother. The words in my head became a kind of prose/letter that ended something like this...
"...thank you mom for pushing me to do so many great things. Things that you never quite finished learning or learned late in life...like the feeling of my body soaring through water or the feeling of another language on my tongue. I have you to thank for my persistent writing. And sometimes I wonder if the music is just an avenue to lead me to experience these greater parts of living...love Pyeng"


July 25th (morning) "Give In To White flour"

I thought when I first got on our lfight (144) on Air India to Paris, that I would ease into the white flour indulgence that IS Europe. Since it really is all there is once you cross the ocean. At first glance at the croissant they offered on the plane, a withered science experiment which I turned down, I decided to wait until our arrival to "go gluten". But after a slammin performance at the Sun Side Jazz Club, it was time to fill my desire for crepes. So I said a quick "hello" to Ej Strickland who was also playin in town, found a little crepe stand and ordered two. But! To my dismay my french crepe fantasy was not as buttery as I had dreamed. I realized that I've grown quite accustomed to Nikolai's spelt flour "palatschinken" (the Austrain equivalent of crepes, white flour free). Nevertheless this morning I loaded up my plate with 3 miniature croissants, filled my pot with hot water, grabbed a nectarine and gave in to the deliciousness of refined goods.


July 24th "The Lack Of A Good Vice" (Notes From European Tour)










SPAIN_ San Sebastian.
















SPAIN_San Sebastian.











SPAIN_onstage in San Sebastian
There is something about a hotel room that opens out onto a balcony that makes me miss smoking. You would think the fresh air and flowers blooming fuscia and chattering grass would be enough, but once in a while stepping out onto a terrace like this, I feel the urge for a good cigarette and my feet up on the table.











SPAIN_VIEW FROM MY BALCONY












July 23 "To Biarritz, Car 15" (Notes From European Tour)

The train deities stood watch for us as we loaded onto the TGV high speed train from Paris to Biarritz (Basque country) today. We made it on just one car off from where we were supposed to be. Thank goodness! I had no idea which combination of numbers and letters would have a significant bearing on our trip. And it was worth the hustle (by internet and by foot) because traveling by train through Europe is better. Like viewing the scenes of your life without any anxiety but rather a sense of peace as you witness how fast it is going by. Again some time to quiet my mind.


July 22 "Any Music To Go With Paris" (Notes From European Tour)










CHLLIN' WITH EJ STRICKLAND

















POST GIG PARIS. KEITH WITTY JOINED US ON BASS.














What is not beautiful about Paris? Not late afternoon or early morning...and any song seems like it would sound good with the "seine". Every Rue and Boulevard looks familiar to me and I have only been here a handful of times. Though there was that period in junior high when my mother had a Parisian boyfriend. Mostly I remember long stints of time with my ears locked in headphones of Nat King Cole and Tribe Called Quest.

I haven’t mentioned this renewed love affair with Paris to my husband yet. He teases me each time I go somewhere because I always call or write home saying that I’ve found a new place for us to live. Even on the plane practicing my French I could feel the fluttering of my heart quicken as my mind starts to leap to dreams of wanderlust.


July 19 "All Over The World" (Notes From Halifax Tour)










THE WOODEN MONEY















RELAXING BEFORE THE FEAST













All over the world
I get my feet wet
you hold the rhythm in your hands
the pulse is different
I get my feet wet
how much longer do we have to fly?

I could reminisce about the beauty of Canada. The minimalist architecture and blissful skyline. The pools of water sprinkled everywhere like seasoning to make the land just right. But after a 6am start and planes to cars to soundchecks to food to dress to performances, it was of great relief and comfort to go to the local Halifax hang, “Stainers”, and hear a group of great musicians play. Suddenly I got that "zing" and at the same time quiet feeling that all over the world there..s a rumbling, pushing, questioning and the noun is not singular it is plural. We are doing it.