Buffalo and Pittsburgh

Our last show in upstate New York was a great way to bring that leg of the tour to an end. We saw dear old friends, had a wonderful dinner at Merge where we played, enjoyed the surprisingly good mango parsnip sorbet, and performed two long and fun sets. We had a request for “Not Guilty,” which we dusted off for its Buffalo debut, and David tested out a song for the first time, tentatively called “Look What You've Done to Me”.

Pittsburgh, PA

Our trip out of upstate New York was not as pleasant as our trip in. We pulled off a trifecta and were awarded three tickets in 12 hours by the New York police force (none of which involved speeding). It made a dent into our earnings but not our morale.

We played our first house concert of the tour at Erika May’s new series called Grandview Music (www.grandview music.blogspot.com). She has a lovely home and we were honored to be the first band in this new series. We got a chance to visit with old friends and family and left Pittsburgh with plans to return again soon.

Ithaca, NY

The next day as we were packing up to head to Ithaca, Suz realized she didn’t have her wallet. But we weren’t too worried as our car is so chocked full of gear that we assumed we’d find it after a thorough search. But the post office found it before we did as it ended up in a mail box on Westcott Street, depleted of its supply of cash, but fortunately, the credit cards and license were untouched.

We made our way quickly to Ithaca and after a great quick home-cooked meal with our friend Giffen, we played in the most unusual stop yet on our tour -- a tattoo parlor/coffeehouse called The Shop. It was our smallest audience yet, but we had a great time nonetheless and had an appreciative crowd. Although our earnings were meager that night, we got a great deal on new tattoos and now each have Alec Dempster's band portrait tattooed on our upper arms!

Syracuse, NY

2nd Story Coffeehouse has definitely been one of our favorite venues on the tour so far. Tucked away in the Westcott neighborhood, 2nd Story is a beautiful space with wonderful art on the walls and a cozy feel. Alexis runs the coffeeshop and Jeff books the music (and hosts the wayfaring bands).

We played one of our best sets of the tour, finishing with an acoustic version of “Give Your Love,” which gave our friends in Auld Lang Syne license to play their entire set acoustic. And what a set it was! They stepped out in front of the mics and played a truly breathtaking collection of some of the most tender and gutsy music we’ve ever heard. Their amazingly beautiful song “Tree on Fire” was our personal favorite. Jason Cimon joined again for a fantastic encore of one of his songs.

The crowd at 2nd Story poured over into a neighboring bar, and the conversations and the start of new friendships carried over late into the night.

Rochester, NY

Saturday morning ended up being a stressful morning, as we prepared to leave home for a month. We had the longest drive of the tour ahead of us -- 6 hours to Rochester, New York -- and cut it about as close as we could. But the drive and the packing rush were well worth it, as we found ourselves with old friends in upstate New York. Our friend Tom Combs coordinated his visit back home to Rochester with our tour stop, and having him in the audience helped us feel right at home.

We set up the Rochester show with Auld Lang Syne -- another band that has opened for The Avett Brothers -- and were fortunate enough to have two shows in a row with them. They’re a fantastic band that we highly recommend you check out.

Timing worked out the next day such that Suz was able to visit the newest member of her family -- a 13-day-old baby that she almost packed in her suitcase to take on our tour with us.

New England 9/19 - 9/25

Hogfarm Studios Annex, Biddeford, ME

Hogfarm Studios is a community arts space and bar created by a couple we’re lucky enough to call friends. Gil and Coco Corral are a fun, artistic couple who have created a happening arts scene out of thin air. It started as a house concert series in a barn attached to their home and has now blossomed to a beautiful venue in the heart of Biddeford.

After a late start, we arrived just in time at Hogfarm to catch a magical performance by our friends in Wooden Dinosaur (Michael Roberts & Katie Trautz) who played acoustically in the center of the room with the audience circled around them, listening with bated breath.

Staying with Gil and Coco after the show was a real treat unto itself, from the bottomless tequila bottle to the 2:00 a.m. quesadillas to the hours of laughter and good conversation. This joyous evening was followed by a morning of more wonderful food and Jiro’s first trampoline experience with six-year-old Chloe.

The Red Door

After a wonderful private party on Sunday for a dear friend of ours, we headed back north up the coast, this time to Portsmouth, New Hampshire. We did a fun interview and in-studio performance with Terry Blake at 106.1 FM, a great community radio station in Portsmouth. We were thrilled to have friends up from Boston and Durham for the show.

A year ago we met Andrew when we were opening for The Avett Brothers out on Martha’s Vineyard. He really pulled through and brought out a bunch of friends to fill up The Red Door. Suz learned a new “whoot-whoot” whistle and Dave got re-introduced to stick shift driving. All in all, it was a great stop on the tour.

The Starving Artist

We had been meaning to get out to The Starving Artist Collective for some time and were thrilled to finally make our way there as part of the Carpenter Bird Tour. We played the set unplugged, which is always a great way to connect with a new audience. Fortunately, The Starving Artist was the perfect type of intimate venue for an acoustic show.

The next day we found ourselves in Brattleboro, exploring the city, checking out a painting exhibit by the very talented David Brewster (who David knows from Deep Springs College), eating at the farmer’s market where we heard beautiful kora music and where we got a fresh poem written for us for $1 by M Hayden, a vagabond poet with a typewriter perched on a crate (poem reproduced in full below).

The Monkey House

The show at the Monkey House was a great success thanks in large part to the full attendance of the UVM Field Naturalist department. Our friends Zack and Corey had recently relocated to Burlington where Zack is studying at UVM, and it was a joy to see them, meet their friends, and spend the next day on their back porch, enjoying the last thralls of summer. The highlight of the performance for us was definitely stepping out from behind the mics for an acoustic encore of “Give Your Love.”

Langdon Street Café

We finally met The Accident That Led Me To The World at the Langdon Street Café, a band who has been playing lots of the same venues as us over the last two years, especially within the last couple of weeks on tour, where it felt like they were just at our heels and gaining at every venue.

Once we started tuning up for our performance, David realized he had lost a piece (a saddle block) for his guitar the night beforee. Jiro went looking for a replacement and after digging around outside luckily found a pebble that he carved to work as a makeshift saddle block for the G-string on David’s guitar.

Although sometimes our audiences are hesitant to get up and start dancing to the festive Mexican-infused songs of our repertoire, a little girl at Langdon had no such hesitations and performed a beautiful dance routine in front of the stage as we played through fast and slow songs.

We topped off a great evening by driving out to our friend Katie’s mountaintop cabin where we stargazed from her roof.

Firehouse 13

After a full afternoon back in Cambridge, complete with a radio interview, an oil change, a guitar drop-off to Yukon Stubblebine for a quick, professional fix to the saddle block problem, and several loads of laundry, we made our way down to Providence, Rhode Island for a performance at Firehouse 13 with Ben Pilgrim, Tallahassee, and Joe Fletcher. Firehouse 13 is an old fire station that has now been converted to an art gallery and performance space. We played to a packed room, which was a stark and amazing contrast to our last performance in Providence, where we played to an audience of five (one of whom was our bass player’s girlfriend). We hope to get back to Providence soon!

Club Passim 9/18/09

Although we already played five shows with the new album, the two shows at Club Passim on Friday, September 18 marked its official release. The display of support from our friends and fans overwhelmed us with a sense of profound gratitude. With all the support we’ve received the Passim community, it was the perfect send-off for the tour.

In order to redeem ourselves for a bad scheduling decision to have the CD Release on Rosh Hashanah, our bass player Mike Roberts picked up a crate of heirloom Vermont apples to pass around with honey for a lovely makeshift New Year's party. We performed an old chestnut “Shabbot Shalom” to help ring in the new year.

We had never before performed two shows back-to-back, and admittedly we didn’t quite know how it would feel to do a second show in terms of energy and stamina. But once Passim started filling up again for the second show we found ourselves completely reenergized and excited. We had decided to perform an almost entirely different set for the second show, which helped it feel fresh.

Thanks to the 200 of you that came out to Passim to support us! We can’t wait to see you all at the Lizard Lounge on October 24.

The Dream Away Lodge

From New Haven we headed northwest to the Berkshire mountains to a magical place called The Dream Away Lodge, a quaint and quirky destination very much off the beaten track in Becket, MA.

As we stepped out of the car we saw the most peculiar sight: coming out of the forest was about a dozen matrons decked out in purple outfits complete with bright red hats. After chatting with them in the restaurant later, we found out they were part of the Red Hat Ladies club and invited them to our show. The Dream Away Lodge wined and dined us and truly treated us with the utmost hospitality, even allowing us to stay in "The Shed". Except for the below 40-degree chill, The Shed was actually quite luxurious complete with clawfoot tub, outdoor shower and sauna.

So if you find yourself in Becket on a dark night, get out your GPS and track down The Dream Away Lodge. We can guarantee you won't regret it!