Blogging Danny

Australia Face to Face to re-cap...

2009-03-15T08:32:00.000-07:00

Hi All...
Just got back from the face to face Australia tour. It was a great chance to see Australia and if I get the chance, I will certainly go back. We had a bit of a snag in that Scott became very ill right before we left so he was unable to do the trip. Luckily for us, Roger from Less Than Jake filled in he was great. Along with being a great bass player, Roger is a great human and was a blast to hang with. I hope I get to work with him in the future. I got a chance to see a few cool bands while there such as The Alkaline trio, Lamb of God, NIN, Less than Jake...There were about 40 bands on the bill and the major majority of them were sucky emo/screamo bands with stupid hair and cut off tight jean shorts ( Jorts) Whats with all the new music? Most of it just sucks!! The trio was great and were great guys to hang out with and although I am not a big fan of NFG, they were super cool dudes...The metal stage was the coolest area of the festival and it was HUGE!! Metal is alive and well world wide!!! Its a bummer but there is very little support for and new punk bands. Not these kid bands that get lumped into that category but any type of real punk or anything even close. And I'm talking to the punk rock community when I say this. Having a love for the Nostalgic bands is fine ( Bad Religion, Dickies, Ceircle Jerks, exploited etc etc..) but eventually all those bands will be gone and there will be no new punk bands. I don't believe that there just aren't any new bands that are good. I know there are good new punk bands out there. Let's support those bands and build the scene and community like it used to be. That is one reason metal is so huge. Don't get me wrong. I like metal and have huge respect for those bands but I'd sure like to se some movement in the punk scene..Now I must go because I need to take my super tight girl jeans and cut them into jorts, grow some facial hair, comb my bangs over my face and cry like a baby...
D

Back in full swing.....

2009-03-06T05:57:00.000-08:00

Man. It was great to play a headline club show after all those festival dates. It was nice to take our time sound checking and making sure everything is real comfortable. It makes such a difference . We did get used to playing the 40 minute festival set so it was a bit tough tonight to do double that. The longer headline set is where face really shines though. Trever is great at working the crowd and had Scott and Chad with us tonight so we were in full swing. Off to Iona on the morning. Stay tuned for more info. ~ Danny

Our last leg of the Tour brought us to Hawaii..

2009-03-04T22:48:00.000-08:00

So our run through Australia is finished. It was amazing to see so much of the country. The people in Australia were great. I will miss the land Down Under. That being said, it sure feels good to be back in the states. Free fast Internet at the hotel! Yes! We have the night off tonight and then a show at the pipeline tomorrow night. Should be fun. Stay tuned for more updates! ~ Danny

6 pairs of white socks

2009-03-01T07:15:00.000-08:00

We have made it too our final Australia destination of Perth. Beautiful city. This really is the other side of the world. Tomorrow is show day and then we have a full day to hit the beach before heading to Hawaii the following morning. I must say I am getting a bit homesick. As much as I love seeing the world and playing, I feel a bit isolated and lonely being this far away and somewhat out of touch. Keep in mind I am writing this at 8pm Sunday night. I need to get a new phone when I get home, one that I can use anywhere in the world. I hate feeling out of touch. The promoter invited us to dinner tonight but I think we are going to pass. We really only like the guys in a few of the bands. The Trio and BFG are super cool dudes I must say. I was looking over our rider with our TM (tour manager) Ryan and I was laughing at everything on the rider. A rider is your list of things you want backstage like water or towels etc. They get kind of ridiculous sometimes. For example we just added 6 pairs of white socks. Sounds weird but if you think about it, makes perfect sense. Who wants to take their sweaty socks around with them? The other thing you have to keep in mind is that as you travel and are in unfamiliar places, those little things make you feel more comfortable. Those things make you play a better show. Touring is very hard work. I think most people just see you on stage for an hour and think that is so easy and glamorous. The playing part is fun for sure but people never see the amount of time spent in airports and buses etc. There is a lot of waiting and trying to make yourself comfortable. OK, gotta go. Food. We found and good looking Korean BBQ. Stay tuned for more updates. ~ Danny

Dressing rooms, free stuff and bad catering.

2009-02-27T05:20:00.000-08:00

So at these big festivals there is supposed to be free catering but it almost always stinks so we rarely end up eating there. Today, the one day we try to go and we get there between lunch and dinner. Bummer. So to make up for it, we went back to our dressing room and jammed every possible thing we could fit into our backpacks. I have 2 six packs of Stella, two bottles of wine and at least a dozen bottles of water. My bag weighed about 50 pounds. Its all for us anyways so its not like were are stealing it but you still feel like you are getting something for free. Off to Adelaide in the morning. Two more shows before we head to Hawaii. Stay tuned for more updates. ~ Danny

Sightseeing on our day off.....

2009-02-26T06:01:00.000-08:00

Had a great day off on tour today. This has been a great tour so far in that we have had a good deal of time to see the country. Today we did a wine tasting tour in the Victoria region outside of Melbourne. This is also the area that was affected by the fires. Many of the wineries lost major portions of their grapes. They have something like 10 millimeters of rain in the last year! Can you imagine that? The wineries were still very nice and the landscape was quite lovely. This evening we went to an Ausi rules football game. Very cool! I am now a fan for sure. Its certainly not always like this on tour. In South America we would play, go eat and go to the hotel. By then it would be 2am and most mornings we left for the airport at 5am. So we slept whenever we could. After a few days of that we were beat. I'm happy this run has been better. Tomorrow it’s back to work. We play early at 3pm so it is predicted to be over 100 degrees at that point. Tomorrow we will be coming back here to the pool as soon as we finish. Adelaide is next stop. Stay tuned for more updates. ~ Danny

How we scared a bunch of those Emo Kids....

2009-02-25T07:54:00.000-08:00

So yesterday we played our sideshow. Part of our obligation to the festival promoters was to play a club date on our day off. We were not to happy about this because we were put on a horrible bill with Billy Talent and Emery. And we played right between them. Horrible. Not a good club and those band just suck. What is up with all these kid bands? They all sound exactly the same and dress the same, lame! We did have a decent turn out for us which made it worth while. We had a big group of raucous south Americans there, which scared a bunch of the little Emo kids. I thought that part was great. We rushed to get done with our set because the stray cats were playing down the street and we got invited to go to the show. We packed up and rushed down there and were ushered in the back door. It was so cool to see them. They sounded amazing! I also had forgotten that my good friend from King Doublebass was out with the cats so we hooked up with him after the show for a beer. Bizarre to travel around the world and then randomly see one if your friends from OC. Touring in a rock band.....its good work if you can get it. Stay tuned for more updates. ~ Danny

Richard Branson

2009-02-23T18:43:00.000-08:00

Ok. So my life is sometimes surreal. I watched Iconoclast the other night with Richard Branson and Desmond Tutu. Great episode. I later purchased his most recent book. So her I am, ordering a beer at the Hotel Bar and who walks up? Richard Branson.
Stay tuned for more updates. Danny

Sitting at Starbucks in Brisbane and updating my daily journal.

2009-02-21T14:51:00.000-08:00

02/21/09 Sat Brisbane, AUS Soundwave Festival

Played our first show of the tour last night. Was solid, considering we had a fill in bass player due to Scott being I'll. Roger from the band “Less than Jake” is stepping up and doing all the shows with us. Hopefully Scott will be better by the time we get to Hawaii. The festival was huge with 5 stages. I could look from my drum riser to the left and see “Lamb of God” doing there set off in the distance. They were hugely popular down here. Its funny how your mind can wander in the middle of the songs. Here I am rocking out to a crowd that's singing along to us and I'm thinking "Man, I think my deodorant is wearing off", “Where are we going to eat later?" or "I hope there is beer left in the dressing room” etc. Off to Sydney in a few hours. Stay tuned for more updates.

Face to Face arrived at Brisbane Feb 20th

2009-02-19T20:52:00.000-08:00

Hi all, Danny here. Face to face has arrived in Brisbane for the Soundwave festival.The festival travels around Australia playing all the major cities . The plane ride was funny from LA since half the passengers were other bands. Alkaline Trio got to ride in business class which I'm sure made the initial 13 hour flight to Auckland more tolerable. New Found Glory and Valencia were a few of the other bands on our flight. We are all at the same hotel as well which I'm sure isn't fun for the hotel staff. The key now is to stay awake until tonight so I can get on schedule. Its 1pm here on Friday which makes it about 6pm Thursday back home. That will mess with you. Sorry for the bad typing. Sent from iPhone. Until next time. Stay tuned!

Newsletter Archive

2009-02-19T20:27:00.000-08:00

Click on link to access previously sent Music Factory Newsletters.

Archived Newsletter here:

MusicFactoryTV

2009-02-19T12:51:00.000-08:00

Watch lesson tips, concert videos and more on our YouTube channel.

En route to Australia

2009-02-18T23:38:00.000-08:00

Face to Face left LAX at 5pm this afternoon.
Stay tuned for the first updates and pictures!

Danny's Drum lesson flyer

2009-02-18T22:54:00.000-08:00

Face to Face Down Under Tour Schedule

2009-02-18T22:42:00.000-08:00

After more than a decade since our last trip, Face to Face is heading back down to Australia as part of SOUNDWAVE. The tour itself includes official festival dates in 5 major cities, plus a couple of potential side shows in smaller clubs. There are a ton of cool bands out on this tour, check the link above for more info. Keep checking back for more word on our potential side shows. The official dates look like this:

02/21/09 Sat Brisbane, AUS Soundwave
02/22/09 Sun Sydney, AUS Soundwave
02/27/09 Fri Melbourne, AUS Soundwave
02/28/09 Sat Adelaide, AUS Soundwave
03/02/09 Mon Perth, AUS Soundwave
03/05/09 Thu Honolulu, HI Pipeline Cafe
03/06/09 Fri Kailua Kona, HI Rockstarz