artist The Shagbots

Last Wednesday The Shagbots (and Cameron) set off to destinations that would take us the farthest we have ever been away from Calgary as a band. We left with our suitcases packed, coolers chilled, and our Nintendo DS's in hand. To say that our adventure eastward into Saskatchewan and Manitoba went off without a hitch ...not exactly. Besides all of this we all had one of the busiest and most genuinely enjoyable 5 days we could have asked for.

Our tour included some bad luck, cold Chef Boyardee, a 15 cheeseburger night, a 5 am wake up and a 2 Live Crew song that was sung for possibly an hour in various different arrangements. The trip started by driving to our first destination en route to Winnipeg which was Swift Current. Our hotel was across from the Living Skies Casino which featured searchlights that made a tepee which touched the sky... very cool indeed. After waking up at 5 to make it to the show in Winnipeg we drove through Saskatchewan and into Manitoba. Along the way we stopped in the village of Elkhorn, Manitoba. We played football and ate food out of the back of our trailer in what ended up being one of the best rest stops we had all tour.

We arrived in Winnipeg where we were staying with some of Michael's semi-relatives (who treated us extremely nice). Our show that night was at the Pyramid with a local band from Winnipeg called The Paps . The Paps played an Arctic Monkeys and a Hives cover that we know and have played in the past which caused us to dance like 11 year olds when we heard them. We ate at a place called Mitzi's which is famous for it's chicken fingers and they definitely did not disappoint. The show went well and the venue was great, hopefully one day we can be back at the pyramid.

Our next show was in Saskatoon @ The Roxy. After playing football in the alley behind the venue and managing to lose a football in a yard, we explored Broadway in Saskatoon. Saskatoon was a cool city with a nice vibe and hopefully we can go back sometime soon as well. As for the concert, things did not go as swimmingly. We were so infatuated with the Pyramid in Winnipeg that we decided to leave them a token of our gratitude, our keyboard. We learned about this about 9 minutes before we were going on stage that night at the Roxy and were forced to compose a set of mostly covers and improvised arrangements of our originals on Davis' keyboard. We made due considering our circumstances but we wont be trying it again any time soon. After the concert, through some eleventh hour phone calling by Cameron and quick thinking a mother back in Calgary, we arranged to have our keyboard shipped to Calgary. All in all, lets just say we were happy to be done with our show at the Roxy and moving on to Regina the next night.

We stayed that night with a really nice guy named Clare who took 6 strangers into his house and introduced us to the bliss that is Wing World at 3:40 AM. After a breakfast of wings and ribs, we embarked on the last destination on our mini-tour, Regina. We drove into Regina (the temperature at 32 Degrees) and checked in to our Super 8. After renting a keyboard to play that night, we played at a venue called The Club with a band called This Machine Is A Fountain from Regina who played a kickass set and were really nice as well. The show went really well and was probably the best show of the weekend. Prior to the show however, we decided to lock our keys inside the trailer in keeping with the motif of the past few days. So after having to bolt-cut our way into our own trailer we decided to nurse our sadness by having a wild night of partying. This out-of-control rockstar extravaganza of a night included a trip to McDonalds (see 15 cheeseburger night), some poorly mixed hard liquor out of a sock, and one epidisode of Mythbusters before we all collectively fell asleep. We partied like no other.

We then started the drive back to Calgary which was scorchingly hot and featured an impromptu game of baseball played at a gas station on the side of the highway and some of the most bizzare discussions one could possible imagine. In total, we spent over 30 hours in the car which made realize how spread out cities are in Canada which creates the most frusterating climate for a band trying to tour. Nonetheless, we saw some cool stuff on this tour and we hope to do it again soon.

We returned home to Calgary and back to normal civilization only to discover that the world of touring with your best friends is infinitely more fun than the real world, and any one of us would live that life in a heartbeat.

-bots