Our drive yesterday from Seattle to Olympia was short, so we spent a leisurely morning around the kitchen table with Sol.

We breakfasted on scrambled eggs and toast made from Dave’s Killer Bread, which Sol touted as the best packaged bread there is but which I had purchased simply because of its ridiculous package sporting a muscular man with a ponytail and mustache shredding on an electric guitar. I also learned that the hook for this bread is that the guy who founded the company or something is a reformed felon- It’s a little more complicated than that, and he didn’t kill anyone, but THE POINT IS that we were induced to brainstorm our own crime-themed baked goods including “Melissa’s Murder Muffins” and “Sam’s Sex Offender Scones.” Look for these in your local overpriced pseudo-whole-foods shop soon.

We blew the rest of our day in Seattle on a quick trip to REI (where I purchased a flashlight to replace the one that I left in Spokane and, since my toiletry kit had mysteriously vanished between Thursday morning and Thursday night, a toothbrush, which would remain in my possession for less than a full day, rendering it the world’s most cost ineffective dental implement at 75 cents per brush) and, like dumb tourists, a visit to what I thought was the Starbucks roastery but actually turned out to be some kind of tasting room or something. Nobody was mad though, because we got to try the whiskey barrel cold brew which, everyone agreed, was delicious.

We also spent a fair amount of time enjoying the beautiful which, I can’t stress enough, does not happen in Houston in October.

Taking funny pictures of Sam is also a perennial favorite

At the bottom of the hill in downtown I looked out over the sound to the mountains on the other side- what I guess is Olympic National Park, with Canada somewhere beyond- and felt the same awe that touched me seeing the Rockies in Denver.

With this distant view fresh in my mind on the drive to Olympia, it was almost shocking to see Mt. Rainier in the east, impossibly huge and ringed with clouds.

You know what else was daunting? The INSANE TRAFFIC between Seattle and Olympia.

Friday, October 6: Le Voyeur (Olympia, WA) with Main Force Patrol and UK Gold

This show was unusual on this tour in two respects. First, Omotai had played at Le Voyeur before, in 2010- it wasn’t a good show. But second, both of the local bands were founded by friends of ours from Houston. From UK Gold, we had Matt Murillo, formerly of Junior Varsity, the Jewws, White Whale, the Ka-nives, etc etc etc

(Matt also set up this show for us on short notice! Thank you Matt for saving our butts!)

And from Main Force Patrol, driving up from Portland, we had Eric Faucette, formerly of all of the bands with the best names: Dethro Skull, Inscrutable Vocabulary (with yours truly), and with Melissa’s husband Chris, the incredible God’s Temple of Family Deliverance, who were playing doom sludge about ten years before the advent of our current sludge bubble.

This was Eric’s first show with Main Force Patrol, and in fact, his first show at all in about seven years.

Aside from a false start at the beginning of the set, you never would have known. Just goes to show that once you have it, you never really lose it.

The other two guys were great too- Frosty, the drummer, was clearly not a metal drummer primarily- he admitted to me after the show he had never performed with a double kick pedal before- but he had things pretty well handled, and his drums balanced perfectly with Eric’s guitar.

As for vocalist Max, he ripped but mostly he reminded us so much of a young Beau Beasley it was a little weird!

 

We played second and had a BLAST. Setlist:

Spanish Constellation
A Ruined Oak
Green Vial
A Maiden Nerve
Blackjaw
Back Office
Tusk Aurora

Matt bought us whiskeys during our set! I had Sam’s!

For this reason I don’t remember a TON about what UK Gold’s set was like, but piecing it together in the van our collective impression was that it was a little like Fred Schneider from the B-52s singing for a No Wave band.

Does that sound like fun to you? Well may I present photographic evidence to the affirmatory

Oh wait did I mention that Trey and Katherine Lavigne drove from Spokane to party with us?!

An aside: note the guitarist’s distinctive buttercream Univox Mosrite clone, a notable guitar model once owned by our own Sam Waters as well as Stu Smith of the Jonx.

(UK Gold has a new 7″ out! Buy one!)

The rest of the night after UK Gold wrapped is a little jumbled but I think this picture does it justice:

 

With the show over early, we repaired to Eric’s house in Portland to hang out and get a head start on a long drive to Reno tomorrow.

Thanks to Matt, Eric, Le Voyeur, and all our friends old and new. Olympia has some pretty stiff competition from Spokane and Arlington but I think we have to dub this the best night of the tour so far.

Oh yeah one more thing, on the way to Portland, we passed the namesake of our buddies from Bryan- the town of Tenino, Washington! I got a picture: