check out this live performance of “far away” REBLOG omg!

Alright peoplez you know what time it is!

It’s time for some EXCLUSIVE TUMBLR CONTENT. The Mp3 right HERE is the original “Free at last” which was re-recorded for our album “Doorways, Vehicles, And Markets” (available at www.westwoodandwillow.bandcamp.com)

I like this version better. I had this evil scheme to rewrite and make free at last into a hit single but it was fine the way it was!!!… They both have their redeeming qualities but I’ve always been partial to this one.

Sean and I had this huge fight over this song… I was not feeling it one day and told him I didn’t want it on the album and he got all mad at me and was like “I spent 48 HOURS recording those bongos!” Recording albums is stressful :). 

Now you can listen to both of them! I’m going to try and post some unreleased stuff on here once a week so check back often and tell your friends to follow us!

<3 Kev 

We haven’t updated our tumblr in FOREVERZ. I was planning on doing the fourth and final tour update but I never did. Anyhow here’s what happened in quick successions:

we went to Tacoma and the show was cool, stayed with one of seans friends and watched that leonardo dicaprio movie about the psyche ward.

then

We opened up a show for a black metal band because Sean misheard what some booker said when they called him. It was weird. Everyone angerily smoked outside while we played. We then stayed across the street from a grave yard.

When we got home I showered like never before.

NOW THAT WE’VE BEEN BACK FOR HALF A YEAR. things have CHANGED!! Sean has blonde hair and I have long black hair and dress like a mutant at times. The rumor and myth is true that we’re playing bottom of the hill february 26th with MAX BEMIS of SAY ANYTHING and DAVE SMALLEN and THE TROPHY FIRE. You should come! Buy presalez please it’s going to sell out/be really fun. Buy presales here: http://2011.noisepop.com/event/23217/

Anyway as far as my personal life I bit off my first finger nail and my pinky nail but I can still play. Found out there’s all sorts of 2pac albums i don’t have which is great. I also saw a nice man offer some rude girl with a pit bull a cigarette on the bus today and she took three. then her friend took two. Don’t let people walk all over you and your newports friends!!!

xxxx

kevin

We last left you in the overcast streets of Portland Oregon. We drove off paper towel in ear and all to the dark streets of Seattle. I had a stomach ache and was sleepy but luckily I kept a steady eye on my “Happy Valentines Day” pin which kept me in high spirits. We got to Seattle with time to kill (WE MURDERED IT) so we went to this kewl sandgwarch bakery place near the venue. We met our main girl Jill C. who was running the show and then went to scope down town for a few moments. This was when I called the kaiser phone line and a nurse told me I need to get that thang out of my head. Unfortunately there is no Kaiser in Seattle… Blood started spilling out of my ear into this pair of boots I was looking at and I was arrested for beating Sean in public because we drank six quarts of Vodka each to ease the physical and mental stress. I tipped back the boot filled with ear blood, pretended to drink it to fake out the police officer but then spit it in his face (like Gangrel from WWF) and we ran to the gig.

We started playing and Sean and I both exploded to a room full of pizza and chirping birds. It was fun but also caused me to go into one of my first coffin rests (vampire) and brooding sessions of the tour. The girl playing after us was Sharaya Mikael and she was the trees knees. Check her out. She’s on a 5 month tour going to every U.S state. grl iz bonkerz (in a good way). We bounced out fresh (glock fully loaded) to the E.R to get my ear removed. The doctor that helped out out once got paper stuck in his ear too so it was funny. Everyone else coming to the e.R was bleeding or choking so the nurses and doctors really liked me. We all had a laugh and I was finally free from clogation. the quote of that night was the doctor saying “It’s a boy” as he pulled out the paper towel. That night we slept in the greatest guest room of all time. Also chilled with a poodle. So many canines…

The next morning we buhbuhBOUNCED to the tourist trap pikes place market. It was straight up ridic. The best part about it was meeting the pen and ink artist Patrick Kerr who had some great words of inspiration. “Just pick up a pen and draw, do what feels good.” he was cute/awesome. After doing all that hub bub we went up the street to the arcade “gamewerkz” and got hyphy on some videogames. Sean kilt a bunch of mofuckas in Tekken, I got enough tickets to get a shitty yo-yo and a mario gummy… It was good times. I think I was dehydrated at this point. (this is important info) On the way back to the car we dropped into this tobacco shop hopefully/hopelessly asking if they had snuff. No one ever has the right snuff. but O M G this shop had the presidents blend! The only blend I sniff… I was elated. I tucked it away in the breast pocket of my denim shirt. Now we started heading towards to most rindonk part of the trip… The border.

We cruised steady to the border, I snoozed and we listened to david gilmour. I was awoken by Sean as we pulled into this park where the border is. We waited in line for a while and then we pulled up the the booth. Reliving this is getting me really nervous and uncomfortable already. This really REALLY stern lady prodded us with questions and had really dark sunglasses on the whole time that made her eyes look permanently cartoon angry. quote of that moment: her-“any plants…animals… raw meat in the car?” sean-“No” kevin-“wait… we do have a bell pepper.”

Well i guess we look like shady characters so she made us pull into a parking lot and an officer told sean to take off his sunglasses. He was wearing leather gloves so every time he pointed his glove tightened and it made a scary noise. We went into this building and stood around anxiously. Some guy was denied getting into Canada because of “Negligent Homicide” :-o. Eventually an officer talked with us and made us empty our pockets. Sean had the camera in his pocket because he wears cargo shorts (because he’s a nerd) and when we were in Chico the girl who let us stay with her had a gun so obviously we took pictures holding it. The police man didn’t like that. He made me sniff my snuff in front of him; kevin-“it’s old timey” cop-“ok so what else do you do… other than old timey tobacco?” He thought we had narcotics in the car. I wasn’t allowed to keep my hands in my pockets. Sean was dehydrated now. (I think I got water somewhere in between.) After some sort of hubbaloo we made it through somehow. They cut off seans pinky because of all the trouble. (He’s out of the band)

We were really stressed until we got to the hostel, where there was no parking at we had to pay $15. Then we were stressed and unhappy until we got to the lobby and checked in and the guy said we had no reservation. then we were stressed, unhappy and hating canada. They had another room we took. There was a fight across the street. Sean was jamming to classic rock (Punching the steering wheel… it’s a bad thing) the room was really warm and we shared a double bed. We put down our bags and went to drink some beers legally. A really big beer and a veggie burger later we were feeling better.  We went to sleep while the pigeons shrieked wildly outside all morning and night.

We awoke the next morning to go splorin. We walked around and clowned a bit. Drank lunch beers, played larivee guitars, got free porn from the thrift store. It was then time to scope the show. We went to trees organic cafe and checked in. Ate some yuppy sandwhiches then played. It was a great crowd, great set and everyone was peakin off yola (metaphorically) when we finished. Then our boy Frank Patrick set it off with some songz n stompin. Unfortunately no one offered us a floor to sleep on so we dropped $80 on the cheapest hotel in lovely East Vancouver (the equivalent of san franciscos tenderloin). To our excitement however the Patricia inn was connected to pats pub. Pats pub was closing in 30 minutes and had $3.50 draft beers. Time to drink fast. It was also karaoke night. We drank fast and got to experience a little bit of Vancouvers hipster scene. Sean sang R.E.M’s “Losing my religion” like a rockstar (he had his lanyard on) and i sang Wham!’s “last christmas” it was neato. We retired to our room with one bed for the second night in a row. The only difference this night was that Sean kept  trying to dream cuddle with me. I wasn’t havin it though. We woke up and hit the streets again.

We met up with our friend from S.F Daria and went to granville island. They wanted us to buy stuff but we wouldn’t do it. Unless of course it was afternoon beer, which we HAD to buy. We had some mid day red ale. I fell asleep in public on a grassy hill. Sean tells me people were staring. It was a good nap. The kind where I drooled.

I’m not sure what else we did other than eat gelato until the show. I think i was feeling ill. All that afternoon beer was throwing me off. We got to the venue for that night with high hopes. It was the second story of a fancy pub, legit stage, bar, 4 bands. We knew we would have a great time. At least we thought we would.

This is where my southern thumb comes out. The bar wouldn’t give us free beer. So we bought two local brews in bottles… keep in mind this aint even draft. Bartender says: “that’ll be 12 dollars”. boingbox number 6, this bar fuckin blew it! The first two bands were kewl and we made sure to say what up to them. We were playing third. Apparently they were too cool to hang around and they literally left the minute they got their last piece of gear out of the venue. Folks… This is a big moment for us all, these two bands, in their entirety have recieved the most severe thumbs down of the entire tour. They blew it. We played the most awkward show ever but luckily our girl Daria came through. (not to mention all the phantoms) The band after us was pretty pretty brutal classic rock but sean and I were feeling defeated despite the brutality. Nobody was giving us a place to stay and there was no way we were going to buy another room. We put into effect the tactic of looking sad and hanging around the venue for as long as possible (it wasn’t that hard… we were emo and had no place to go.) Our main breh Alex the sound guy said we could crash on his hardwood floor because we looked real sad. We were yarmphed up and went to his place. We discussed the cutthroat nature of Canadian musicians and how being on the run from the law in BC would be intense because it’s so big. Also he has a fantastic collection of hats. quote of the night: “we would totally play with your band if you hadn’t broken up.” “AYYYYYYYE???” they really do say “aye” in Canada. All the time. It’s awesome.

We woke up and nervously approached the U.S border. We were hoping we’d get through no problem but of course we were wrong. Quote of that moment: “pop the trunk… oh a whole box full of cds.” boing -_-. We handed over our keys and got questioned (although in a much nicer manner than the Canadians.) long story short he found the tour flier and said he couldn’t believe Canada let us in with all our merch without a work permit. (we’re making a whole lot of money right) I guess Canada was too concerned with the narcotics they thought we had… boingbox. The officer was a very nice man and charged us $10.75 for some sort of reason and told us to scram. We celebrated with portabello mushroom burgers IN THE LAND OF FREEDOM ONCE AGAIN. Onwards to Tacoma…

TO BE CONTINUED.

Well we left Redding after me waiting around forever for Sean to find a police man to sign his fix it ticket before we left California. The drive to Oregon was beautiful in every way. Of course we stopped in Weed CA, of course I beat Sean in a game of bowling there. We rolled into Ashland Oregon around six and checked into our super cute hostel. Then we walked down the main strip and I got super zenned out in the most zen way. After eating a veggie sammurch from Grilla Bites we went to the train tracks and just relaxed. The weather was gorgeous and we were both thizzin (metaphorically). Most of that night was spent being excited and walking around. We slept like rocks in real beds for the first time in a while and woke up to do some more splorin’.

Throughout the day we popped in and out of shops on Main street and everyone we talked to knew about Tease (where we were playing) and said they’d try to stop by. Most notably was the owner and company of tree house books who did come to the show that evening. It was a super intimate; set we were unplugged but people were really listening and this guy drew this sexy picture while we played. I was amazed and excited by the concept of art inspiring art. At this point this was the best show yet. We hung around for a bit with the bartender and this other traveler discussing brutal music and the bare naked ladies. When we got back to the hostel we took an excited walk and ran into a deer. When we got back we was drawling in the living room of the hostel eating wheat thins and some girl came down stairs in her underwear (bOiNg!). The next morning we stripped our sheets and said good bye to wonderful ashland.

We had no show that day so we were going to try our luck in Eugene OR inbetween ashland and portland at an open mic. We went there and on the way stopped in canyonville to eat. On the way out from crunchin we went into an antique shop where some lady we met has 48 cats. She wuz real friendly though.

We arrived in Eugene twenty minutes before the open mic started. There were a couple of other youngsters at a table that I thought would be our Eugene local competition. Everybody else in there was clearly an OG and we were excited. As the second guy went up he introduced “Lions Hill” from Santa Rosa CA! They were the other youth I mentioned. We were actually following the same route, They had played in redding the day before us. We all giggled. They were awesome and their guitarist looks like and plays like johnny marr. Check them out at myspace.com/lionshill. We played and made the announcement that we were homeless. Right when we were done two people offered us a place followed by two more offers and free beers. Eugene had certainly won us over. After we played and hung around we went to “laughing planet” for a veggie burrito. My god sean and I dropped dead from eating that thing. It was great. We went back to the Cafe after that and I talked to this amazing blues slide guitarist about technique. Onwards to Rose’s house…

At Rose’s we all rejoiced with beerz, golden melodies and trampolines. We sat around a campfire. Real estate in Eugene is much cheaper than in the Bay area, the key phrase here is: “and over here is the orchard…” we played a super super emo version of “sweetest fruit” with our new pal Aya on the violin and then some bob dylan sing along’s. THEN WE SLEPT.

The next day we had some time to clown so Rose took us down to the river. I had not been in a river since guernville (yuck) it had been years and years for sean. (sean avoids water because apparently whenever he’s in a boat he falls out) It was pretty intense but overall a capital time. Little did we know that we were receiving some fucked up sun burns while we were jovially splashing through the river. We bid Rose farewell and she gifted us with a bell pepper and some almond milk for the road. To portland…

We arrived in Portland after some boingbox traffurk and rolled to Jess and Jimi’s house. We engaged in some knife throwing and male on male aloe vera back rubbing. It was then that we experienced the weird system of Cart food in Portland. It was strange and made my stomach hurt but you know what I always say… What chu gonna do put it inna shoe!!! We slept like lizards on heated rocks that night (sun burn) and awoke the next morning to go SPLORIN!!!!!!! Powells books was K3wl and I got some new Ted Kooser (my favorite poet) books I aint never seen no where before. Sean got a funk bass book… we took a silly picture. It all happened. I think at this point I was still thumbs downing portland partially because of the stomach ache and all the trouble it took navigating downtown. Powells made it go a little more west. Then we headed over to Hawthorne street to scope out aritchoke music where we would be playing that evening. Let me put it simply… artichoke music is the shit. The two owners Richard and Jim are some of the coolest music store guys/guys in general I have ever encountered. They stock shit tons of art & lutherie guitars AND i played a banjo for a solid twenty minutes without interruption. it was amazing. Then we trecked up Hawthorne into various vintage stores and all that stuff. Great thai food. blah blah blah yo-yo.

That evening the show opened up with an amazing harpist, followed by three great songwriters and an accordion playing story teller. We closed out the evening to a sold out crowd and that room was so respectful it was fantastic! This is where our girl Jasmine and her man Metro met up with us. We were to stay with them for the evening. We went to a 24 hour place called the Roxy and ate veggies. Hamms and sleep after that. The next morning Jasmine showed us around all the coolest spots. She is skamazing. we were supposed to have a show in Seattle that day but they fell off so we ended up in portland all day. There was a cool semi private show going on in a vintage shop that night and it was there that I got my first denim shirt, not to mention the best button ever (happy valentines day). This is also where things got kind of sketch. I put paper towels in my ears as ear plugs cause I’m all about my ability to hear. At the end of the show when I went to take em out the one in my left ear wouldn’t come out… It just got poked deeper with all my efforts. We went back to jasmines and ate burritos and fell asleep in chairs. The next day we bid Jasmine and Metro farewell and my ear was still clogged…My thumb was somewhere north west by the time we left.

WHAT’S GOING TO HAPPEN NEXT!?!?!? WHERE WILL WESTWOOD & WILLOW FIND THEIR NEXT ADVENTURE? WILL THEY BE DETAINED AT THE BORDER? WILL THEY SLEEP IN A BOX IN SEATTLE? IS THE RUMOR TRUE THAT SEAN GOT A BUZZ CUT??? FIND OUT IN TOUR PART 3!!!

These first few days have been very exciting, strange and awesome. We left on Thursday of last week headed towards $MACKRAMENT0 and immediately remembered why we live in San Francisco… BECAUSE THE VALLEY IS SO DAMN HOT. We were greeted by the lovely Anna Larina and proceeded to check out Sac’s version of thrift town. After a couple of  workers and other people in there told us we blew it and us them we continued on to the Coffee Garden to play our first sold out show of the tour. The support of ghosts was honestly overwhelming and the spirit world of sac really came through for us. We played for ten years and then went back to our grandmas house. We arrived to a note that said “There’s ice cream in the freezer and pepsi in the fridge, Help yourselves :)” There was also two bowls, two spoons and one scooper. Grandma never fails at being the cutest. We concluded that it was too late for ice cream so we ate a bunch of Eazy Cheeze and crackers. We also chilled with the loudest table ever. Grandma woke us up with skinnamon rolls, fresh strawlberries and peets coffee (she don’t brew no starbux!) quote of the morning: “I was having lunch with three ladies, I brought each of them a cucumber.”

We said our farewells and prepared for the journey to Chico California. This was going to be the first stop where we would be officially homeless. In between Sac and Chico Gma Holder (sean’s gf’s gma)  fed us some delicious grilled cheeze sammiches and we kicked it hard with her two saint bernards. They wuz droolin but we weren’t turpin!!!

We rolled up to “Has Beans” closely followed by the lovely Anna Larina who drove from sac to come see us again (aint she sweet???) We started playing sometime after that and did our fare amount of sweatin’ and wailin’. A couple named Turtle and Cindy came in and our boi turtle did a great sketch of Sean and I. They were our biggest fans in Chico. At the end of the night we were still homeless but luckily the Barista Laura let us sleep on her floor that night! She was awesome (also a red head… See the connection between red head and awesome?) The silly part about it all is that she is a hostess of a program called “Passion Parties” which is kind of like Avon (but with dildos) and she had had a passion party the evening before so we were greeted with a couple of good old fashioned floppy weiners. It was good times. She had three wonderful cats, even one with thumbs (EVOLUTION). We chatted through the evening and then slept. When we woke up she made us some Joebi-one-kanobi (coffee…) and waffles with strawlberries. We hung out for a while and she gave us a couple of places we should scope out in Redding when we get there… WHICH IS WHERE WE WERE HEADED NEXT!!!

We went to Redding and crossed the famous glass bridge. Apparently it used to be clear glass but they frosted it because people below the bridge were peepin up girls skirts (hehe). The frosting made it seem more like plastic than glass but nevertheless it was a monument that Sean and I have now CONQUERED. After crossing I was strumming my Ukulele and this fellow named Robert who drives a bicycle cab said he’d give us a free ride if I strummed and got him some customers. I asked what would happen if I didn’t get him any customers and he said death by hanging. (I’d later find out he was joking.) Sean and I took him up on his offer and raised him by singing to all the nice people exploring Redding on that sweltering day. It was great fun minus the mosquitos and the UUUV rays. UltraUltraUltraViolet. It was hot.

We left to Sues Java cafe to hang a little bit before the show. We were beat down a and sweaty. We lurked around the internet for a while and then we decided it was time to set up the Ouija board and call up our fans. It worked and the place was like the haunted mansion in the scene where they’re all dancing and feasting. Also on the mortal side of things my old friend Lary told her friends about the show and a couple awesome cats came through for the first set. It was during this awesomeness that we received another offer for a place to sleep. More on this later…

The first set was pleasent and then Lary and her other friends decided to show up fashionabley late so we played another set for them. It was neato kaspleato. After much talk of filddles and middle school theater productions we bid farewell to all our new and old friends and set out to the open air.

The generous soul who said we could stay at her house was named Maddie and ALSO has red hair (!!!). We went to go meet up with her and a couple other comrades at their apartment on Churnwell street. MUCH silliness ensued from this point of the night onward… Attempts at building a bong from lengths of fabric and a glue gun…  the legendary “Up Down” where I was nervous for a moment that i was going to watch a man die (he didn’t), kittens… sage…the works really. I slept like a lil calf on a very small couch. We woke up to some wonderful Eggs with tomato and cheese (thanks maddie!) and we played our new friends a little mini set. It was a capital time and much much better then sleeping in our car in a Wal-Mart parking lot.

Now we are powering down at Starbux using the internet and preparing for the long trek to Oregon. Sean and I have never been to OR so we are amped up. We will keep you updated and will be posting funny videos and pictures soon. We’d once again like to thank everyone that has helped us along the road literally and also just the road to getting on the literal road if you know what I mean… All your support is gold to us!

<3kev

I’m getting killed trying to record a song that I died writing and then was reborn by completing and playing. grr

“you ARE that guy that’s been in his robe all day…”

LIKE THE DOGZ SAY “RUFF” THAT’S WHERE I AM MENTALLY.

dogs bein dogs…

you know hOW IT GOES!!! Anyhow, do yall ever hit the snooze alarm for hours and hours before waking up? I do… It’s a good feeling. in and out in and out of sleep. hooRay especially when it’s raining a little. just sobbing skies. nothin too crazy.

mhmm

xoxoxoxoxo w&w