Back in February we got turned onto Austin's Megafauna via their single "Haunted Factory"—a track packed with gnarly riffs sugared by Dani's vocals and a 90s power-pop-cum-prog sensibility. Since then they've released a record, Maximalist, and they've been touring like crazy. Because the world is crazy big and there's not enough time to explore it, we often ask bands to take pics and tell us what they've seen. Like Cheatahs moment with the juggalos in Milwaukee, and that time Thumpers had a run in with Snoop, or Skaters spent most of their tour of England pretending to be Tom Cruise. As you do. Megafauna just completed a month long jaunt from Texas to the West. They had an amazing time communing with giant trees and melting faces and eating an awful lot of food. Here's what they saw.
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Stay here. We drove out to Fort Stockton the night before our first show. We got to the motel at two in the morning and the door was locked. We loitered outside the door, knocked and yelped for about a half hour until the night attendant let us in. Those breakfast sausages never tasted so good.
Tucson's one of our favorite cities to visit. We played with our buds Garboski, they're an awesome power trio we've played with three or four times over the years. Austin, the guy with the slacker shirt, owns a Deli down the street from the venue called 4th Avenue Deli. He invited us to an after-hours party with all the free beer we could dream of. The next morning he made us delicious sandwiches for the road. He's the man.
Arizona and New Mexico are gorgeous. See.
Here we are with Tristan Lewellyn, a psychedelic artist. He's friends with Bryan (our bassist) from high school in New Hampshire. There's a lot of New Englanders who relocate to San Diego (why the fuck not). He drew the lotus-owl-octopus design which is now on our t-shirt. We could have stayed at this San Diego hostel forever. It's indoor/outdoor and right on the beach. We spent the night partying with South American travelers on the beach and in the wee hours and Dani went into the ocean in her clothes and felt the dancing waves. The next morning, staring at the ocean in a trance, it occurred to us how impossible it would be to ever get anything done living in such a dream. We ate massive, delicious, and extremely cheap breakfast burritos. Tristan informed us that the shittier seeming the Mexican restaurant the better the food. We also went to Taco Surf, a surfer themed Mexican spot that is INCREDIBLE.
We spent five days in Arcata: where the Redwoods meet the Pacific Ocean. On all of our tours we try to get into nature as much as possible. We walked around the Arcata Community Forest, admiring how old the Redwoods are, contemplating existence and realizing we need not worry about stupid things. Dani hugged a tree, as she sometimes does. We also worked on new material at the house we were staying, in pajamas. Our friend who was on tour with us from Athens recorded some demos. We watched Austin Powers, cooked a lot of food—mostly in a crockpot—drank 1,000 beers, lost our minds then found them again.
We visited Dolores Park every day we were in San Francisco. It's been under construction forever but this park is still wonderful. It's the sunniest part of San Francisco. You can get anything you want without even standing up, just lay down on the healthy grass and feel the sun beat down on you. It's like a festival with no show. There were people walking a tightrope tied to trees, couples doing acro-yoga, a man playing hand drum along to a stereo, adorable dogs of all shapes and sizes. A woman walked around selling spring rolls, there was a dude selling beer, a man selling truffles out of copper bowls, and beautiful lady named Destiny who'd been selling tasty brownies for 20 years. We indulged in so many she cut us a deal.
There was a lot of this: Napping. Here's Zack showcasing the importance of sleep gear.
Five days total in the sexy grey Northwest. We're moving here. We played some great shows with awesome bands: Sad Horse, Ghost Frog, and Talkative. We ended up staying at Elizabeth from Sad Horse's house in Northwest Portland, drinking wine and listening to records. In Seattle we went to a punk show at The Summit Inn, a former halfway house in Capitol Hill. Health Problems put on an insane show where the frontman Ian was writhing on the floor, brandishing his mic stand at the crowd, screaming and freaking out. We were sure he was accessing the Devil. It was one of the most intense 18 minute sets EVER. There also happened to be a coffin in the hallway. The woman working the door was lighting Palo Santo to keep the dark spirits at bay. Oh bleak beauty!
Always the most insane, best nights. PAL's Clubhouse in Portland kicks ass and so does Albuquerque's Iron Haus. Here's Dani dressed as either a fox or kitten for Halloween at PAL's. The costume involved a lot of intricate planning, mainly the borrowing of Kristen's (Bryan's girlfriend, our merch girl and photographer) black eyeliner. PAL's has maps on the walls of its living room, string lights, and bands play on a sweet stage in the backyard. As always, it got rowdy. Iron Haus was in a house in a residential neighborhood in Albuquerque. It was a great night with awesome ABQ band, Leeches of Lore. The night ended with us sitting around the fire forever and petting three tiny dogs.
Recharging in the mountains. Here's Zack looking thoughtful. A great night off in CO with Dani's sister, Kelly, her boyfriend Jimmy and Zack's high school/college friend Nelson. Fires are a theme for us and this time we spent the night sitting around a fire and getting surreal under the milky way. Jimmy made us pork chops and mashed potatoes at 2 A.M. We did some off-kilter dancing to EDM (a rare occurrence), listened to My Bloody Valentine and generally ate everything possible. Coming here is highly recommended.
We hung out with some lovely friends from Burning Man. Zack and Dani saw them get married at the BM temple back in August. They made us pancakes, hash browns, and bacon at three in the morning. Some of their friends came back to the house at night decked out in creature gear, googly plastic eyes as far as the eye could see and fur everywhere. Two of them would not stop getting it on in creature hats. We had to eventually ask them if they could leave the bathroom so we could pee. One woman, as she was leaving, gave Dani this handmade creature mask. SLC is a hidden gem.
