I brought a little portable recording studio on the road with me for the trip.  My friend Jami Weiderholt tipped me off to a songwriting challenge on NPR to write a song in a weekend so I wrote the song this weekend and recorded it at the Fairfield Inn in Ottumwa this morning before we left for Burlington.  They were trying to get us to get of the room because check out was at noon so we just took the second take.  We just did bass and vocal. Steve played bass and I sang it live.

The challenge was to write and record a song by 8pm on the 15th.  The song had to include at least one word from a random list of words.  The word I chose was “firecracker”.

My road ready recording studio. It takes about two minutes to set up. Notice the fold up piano!

Apologize for the spottiness of blogging.  The relentlessness of the traveling doesn’t leave much time for pontificating in my hotel room after the show.

We’ve been having a great time both on and off stage.  Driving a lot, eating a lot of fast food and having a great time in our two hours on stage.

I wrote a song today in response to a challenge from NPR to write and record a song in a weekend containing one a select bunch of words.  I’ll be posting it up on Facebook soon.

Finally a travel day with a night off! We drove six hours today from Grand Island, Nebraska to Johnson, KS.  It’s so different being in this part of the country.  I realize now what a city boy I’ve become being in NY for 12 years now.  It’s really been great driving every day through all of this farm country and then doing shows very night.  It really gives some needed perspective and a welcome break from the relentless momentum of city life.

We tried to go bowling with Steve Doyle because that’s what he wanted to do on his birthday (which is tomorrow).  We ended up at Prairie Lanes in the next town over (28 miles away!).  No luck on the bowling because it was a league night.  So we finally landed at the Windbreak, the local bar.

I’m posting this pic of the wall of my hotel room here in Johnson.  It’s a pretty nice and simple room and it even comes with a fly swatter hanging high on the wall next to the LCD TV!

Flyswatter comes standard

We’ve had a great time in Sioux City.  We went out on the town last night and ended up at the Firehouse, a local bar that once was a real firehouse.

Our soundman/road manager Ross is a great guy and we’re starting to get into the routine.  Had a great show tonight and now we have to get up early to start off to Pierre, SD for a matinee tomorrow.

Just got home from the first night of our string of Midwest performances.  Tonight we were in Brainerd, MN. Brainerd is the home of Paul Bunyan and Babe, the OX.

When we got into town, we decided to eat at the Bonanza next to the hotel.  A Bonanza is basically an all-you-can eat steakhouse.  Steve kept getting up to check the sign to make sure that we could get the sirloin tips AND the lunch buffet, too, for the one low price.  It seemed too good to be true.

We got off to a great start, though I think it will take a few days to get the routine down.  Basically we get up every morning, drive all day, do the soundcheck, go back to the hotel to change, do the show and then scramble to find a place to eat that stays open past 10pm.

I’m hoping part of the routine will be to actually use the tour blog feature on my website.  I’ll try to post pics and videos along our travels.  I didn’t take many pictures today as we had enough to do getting our levels and equipment set.  Here’s a picture of Steve Doyle embracing the stage at setup.

I figured this would as good a time as any to start my tour blog… thanks for tuning in.

I just finished my third night here in London at the newly resurrected Pizza on the Park thanks to Jeff Harnar and Keith Turnipseed. It’s been a few years since I’ve been here, but this is the first time I’ve been able to come here as a performer.  This is a beautiful city and I hope to actually get out and see it now that I’m getting over the throat infection I came down with the first day I was here.  I’ve never been good about being sick… but being sick while travelling… and working… and singing, is “quite dreadful,” as they would say here  in London town.

So far, the infection has stayed north of the vocal chords, and as long as I can sing, I can do a show.  In fact, I love doing the show, because that has been the only hour of the day where I make myself forget how much my throat hurts and how exhausted my body feels. 

So even though that being sick on the road is one of most stressful and uncomfortable things that can happen to a performer, it can also serve as a reminder of the healing power of music and the human interaction of a performance.  I’ve done some shows where I’ve wondered if I could even get through the whole thing without falling over, thinking I may have to awkwardly excuse myself, or worse yet, slump over the piano in a YouTube worthy train wreck.  Each time, though, I’ve found that I the show and the energy of an audience wanting to share in a common appreciation for music is energizing and I have a really good show. 

Well, now that I’m hopefully on the upswing, I’ll try to take some pictures of the club and the hotel and put them up before I leave.  

Until next time…

Welcome to Tony’s Tour blog. . .Tony will give you a sneak peek into his life on tour.  Be sure to check back often for a behind the scenes glimpse of what Tony’s doing now.

Don’t be surprised to see photos, hear unreleased clips, or meet unexpected guests here in the anything goes Tour Blog.

We’re working on syndicating his Facebook statuses, forthcoming Twitter stream, and even Flickr or Tumblr feeds.

Yeah, we’re those kind of geeks.