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----------------------- 03.27.03 - 04.02.03 This is the tour Diary of Vadim, Yarah Bravo, First Rate & Gez. Location: USA and Canada Welcome to the 7th installment of our weekly diary during our North American tour. We are starting to get very very tired and homesick. But we manage to meet up with some friends here and there. Thursday, March, 27th - Travel Day Dear Diary, wow great, a day off but not really. We start off by going to a florist in Saskatoon (it is mothers day on Sunday in the UK) and get caught in a horrendous hail storm. I think we have just about experienced every different type of weather possible (except tornadoes). This is followed by a brisk '0 hour drive from Saskatoon to Winnipeg. lovely day off eh! We arrive at our nice super 8 motel around midnight and decided to wash some clothes in the guest laundry till 5am. U get into a routine on tour - get up at 12, go to bed at 4am and its hard to break that cycle. Friday, March, 28th - Winnipeg Another new spot that none of us have ever been to. The venue was pretty large so we were a little worried but everything worked out in the end. The crowd was pretty big but quite subdued. It was pretty hard work to get them motivated and active and we kind off felt it didn't work - the turntable routines, the vocals, anything... but at the end of the show we sold loads of merchandise and a lot of people really raved about the show to us. A big plus point was that we found an amazing Indian restaurant. We all love Indian food (except Firstrate who only eats salad, once a day, he's a bit sick!) and this was one of the best food we have found anywhere.... There was a huge buffet and eat as much as u can policy which left us stuffed and needing carrying out virtually! ummmn sweet memories!!!! Saturday, March, 29th - Minneapolis We had to drive 9 hours southwards to get here via a Canada/US border crossing which went very smoothly. We have been here before back in 1999 when Atmosphere and Lateduster opened up for us. We had like 50 people that time, but i think just the mention of Atmosphere's name now will pack a room. Well after the soundcheck, a friend of ours (word up James Lateduster!) took us to a local community radio show where we chilled with the 'Groove Garden' posse (word up jenny!) and then after that we went to the 'Break of dawn' Radio show presented by The Rhymesayers posse. There was a nice open mic with Slug and Eyedea and some other local cats, it was really nice to catch up with them for a second cause we know they're always on the road also touring here and there. Back to the club via an anarchist cafe and the place was packed with a real rowdy up for it crowd. Wicked show. Intimate vibes, just great!!!!! After the show, Yarah and Firstrate went to an after party at someone's house. There was a big snake in the house that scared the shit out of them...well they had a great time, drank some 40's...and came back to the hotel a couple of hours later confused and cold.....kids hey... Sunday, March, 30th - Iowa city 5 hours of corn fields and a welcome return to Iowa city. Our man Tack fu who we rocked here last year hooked this show up so we were quite looking forward to this. Unfortunately not that many people showed up. Quite strange actually cos of all the shows we did this year, we had like 30/40% more people than last year but this show didn't work out. We were up against George Clinton who was playing across town and Bill Clinton who was in town to do some sort of lecture/seminar!!! oh well the Clinton's stole our crowd!! hahaha. Monday, March, 3'st - Iowa city (Day Off) Wow a 'REAL' day off, we could sleep all day and no show in the evening. We needed this day so much. We were feeling really run down. Vadim went record shopping of course. Gez paid a visit to a big American-Mall and bought yet another pair of Adidas shelltoes, ouch his lady is gonna kill him when he gets home. Firstrate and Yarah just chilled all day. In the evening we went to the cinema and saw 'The life of David Gale' with Kevin Spacey. What a great movie with a great twist at the end. Kevin Spacey always chooses great roles with mad twists like 'Usual suspects'. And First rate went to a 'thuggish hiphop party' looking for ladies. He got drunk and ended up swapping his nice Addict sweater for some old ladies hippie t-shirt. We were in shock when he came back to the hotel dressed in these bright pink colors and crazy patterns... We thought he was on drugs... but he was just happy... Tuesday, April, 'st - Milwaukee Another new spot for this tour. The only thing we knew about this spot is Coo Coo Cal and his song 'projects'. The club was some brewing joint like in 'cheers' but cozy. they had these funky barber seats which I have been searching for myself. Next door to the club there was a nice little record shop, we bought some records, even Firstrate bought some vinyl. He's the only DJ that I know that never buys any records... The show went good, we met some great people. And there was a lady called 'Melissa' who baked us a delicious apple pie. yummy. Wednesday, April, 2nd - Chicago (Day Off) After the show in Milwaukee we drove straight to Chicago to stay in the 'windy city'. We had a great hotel in the downtown (as opposed to our straight thuggin motel 6) So loads of movies - 'the pianist', 'catch me if u can'... and loads more. After a film marathon we went shopping on North Clark in the Lincoln park area - Hi fi records, Gramophone, 2nd hand tunes, reckless, Belmont. so many spots and so little time. This Wednesday night we didn't have a show, but we felt like going to a party anyway and just chill. So we went to a greeeat funk party that night in this tiny rugged bar - in Buck town (original gun clappers!!!) and met a few people from the previous night in Milwaukee. Great tunes and rammed to the hilt. We hooked up with some people from Galapagos 4 - Qwel, Quazar, Robust, Dj white lightening .. in fact most of the crew were there. We had a groove and had a drink and we had a great time. When the party finished Yarah and Firstrate obviously wanted to party some more.. Common and Talib Kweli had done a show earlier that day and they had an afterparty at another spot. So Yarah and Firstrate headed there, and they didn't come back to early in the morning. But me and Gez went to the hotel. Next week we'll let you know about our Chicago show. -- peace and love from the Russian Percussion Crew
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