Touring prepared me for fatherhood. Being in a situation that you have to constantly attend to and can’t turn off while trying to function on very little sleep is a skill that applies to both. For many years of traveling with Grandchildren, I did the majority of the driving, and sometimes we had to drive late into the night and even overnight after playing a show. One memorable night we played in New Orleans and then drove straight to Austin after the show for a 10 a.m. South by Southwest set.
We played our last show as a five-piece in 2019, and after not being able to experience live music throughout the pandemic, I was the most pent up for it that I’d ever been. Throughout my time in Rad Racket and Grandchildren, I rarely felt the desire to go out to see a live show. For some of that time, I saw pretty much every show at the Danger Danger House (where I lived) and the Danger Danger Gallery (where I did not live) and played so many shows that live music became something from which I needed respite. I still loved playing and watching live music, but I was so constantly exposed to it that my need for it felt overfulfilled.
As my feelings about playing and seeing shows lightened in the past year, I’ve been trying to go out to and play as many shows as I can muster the energy and money for. Which is still not many, with having a family and being stable but not affluent. But it’s more than I would have at any point before the pandemic, and it’s the first time in a long time that I resumed my high school habit of searching all the live music listings for shows I might want to see.
I also missed the long-distance driving, weirdly enough. Some of my favorite driving occurred while the rest of the band slept, and I always wondered what it would be like to tour by myself. In March and August 2023, I did a couple of practice rounds trying to book strings of shows out of town. Even though everything was on a very small scale, I had a blast going out both times. And after playing a piece that emphasized the difficulty of touring, I came back thinking, Parenting’s harder.
Check out the Weird Music album on Bandcamp, iTunes, Apple Music, Spotify, and all other places where you can find music. For transcripts to these episodes, visit my personal Substack.
