steven wilson tour 2013 (usa)

17th April. Atlanta, Georgia

So after the Florida gig, there is a telephone call and some bad news. There follows much discussion and some other calls and e mails. For family reasons, private reasons, Chad is going to have to leave the tour, at least for the time being. He will do the next night's gig in Atlanta, then there is a night off and he will fly back to L.A. He will be back, but we are not sure when. To accommodate this, Marco is contacted immediately to see if he can come back until his rehearsals with Joe Satriani start. Very fortunately it turns out that he can. This is of course a huge relief as of course Marco knows this music inside out, was in the band from the beginning and recorded the album etc. Marco and Chad are good friends, so Marco is able to help out and return and the immediate crisis is resolved. Wow! Life.

So we drive through the night from Florida to Atlanta, Georgia in the Deep South of the US of A. Not that I get to see much of Atlanta. As usual, I wake up in a small bunk on the tour bus in a parking lot. I look out of the bus window and see a brick wall. I put some shoes on and ask where the venue entrance is. So I go through a doorway in the brick wall into a theatre and down some stairs into a nondescript basement dressing room. Bit like Groundhog Day. At least when on tour in America I know what country I am in. When touring round mainland Europe and you do this, it is not uncommon to clamber off the bus and have no idea what country you are in.

The venue is nice, and backstage facilities pretty good. All decent venues have shower facilities backstage so I have a shower and breakfast and catch up on e mails etc. At 4.30 pm there is a good sound check, and then off to dinner with Guthrie for a rather tasty hot chicken sandwich with avocado and salad and fries. It is good to go for a brief wander. The area around the venue has a great record shop called Criminal Records and there are lots of cool vintage clothes shops too. The street has a kind of Haight Ashbury vibe and felt pretty hip.

Before the gig went to a nearby coffee house where there were some curious slogans posted on the wall - like 'Tampons for Jesus'. Eh...?! Also a local magazine called 'Ponce news', and a flyer for a 'Grow your own Marijuana' talk with a picture of a smiling scientist in a white lab coat. Yeah, man...

So the gig felt really good. I did have some monitoring problems as there was some loud interference in the radio frequency used for my in ear monitors. It was manageable though. Chad was superb and everyone played well. In my soprano sax solo on Raider 2, there is some cool rhythmic interaction with the keyboards and drums. After the solo, I look over at Chad and he looks up and gives me a smile. I think that meant he liked it, and that felt great. Sometimes the smallest looks, nods, eyebrow movements on stage between musicians can communicate so much. Approval from Chad Wackerman. Cool.
Steven was fantastic and as usual was great talking to the audience. He seems so natural doing it - Informative, funny, interacting with hecklers, being spontaneous. It sounds so natural and that is hard to do. I know from fronting my own band. Sometimes I spend half a song thinking what I am going to say, then I say something completely different to what I intended because something or someone in the audience diverts my attention. Then it comes out all wrong and I talk gibberish. So I have a lot of respect for people who can chat to the audience in a relaxed manner in between songs. And from being in an audience myself, I know this can add a lot to a gig. After all, you have heard the music on CD or record before, but you haven't necessarily heard the artist talk, and certainly not to you on that specific evening. I think it is a unique and special part of seeing a favourite artist live. So nice one, Steve. And as I say, he can be very funny.

Hung out a bit after the gig and nice to see and chat with Andre Cholmondeley from 'Project Object' again. He is friends with Adam and Marco and I had met him at various European festivals and gigs before. He is currently tour managing Greg Lake. Good guy and some interesting chat. He also informed me that the David Bowie exhibition at the Victoria and Albert museum in London, which I was planning on going to is sold out until August. Most annoying.

Then back on the bus for the long drive to Philadelphia. In fact we are driving through the night, then from 10am until tomorrow midnight we are in a hotel somewhere while the driver has a break, then back on the bus at midnight to complete the drive to Philly. Steven suggests if possible we could go and see the new Harmonie Korine film Spring Breakers which is on general release and is the director's first mainstream film. Sounds like a good plan to me. 'Harmonie Korine' is the name of one of Steven's songs that we play in the set. I believe the song is named after him just because it is a beautiful name, not because the lyrics have anything to do with him. I subsequently spend some time online checking out the weird world of Harmonie Korine.

Theo Travis