By Tim Trouble Maker/Shrugg

Back at last!!....Near 2 weeks of roadtrip.....Sacto to Chattanooga in 4 days--tally one dead rental car. Sleep, as it were, in parking lots and campsites along the way. The other Trouble Makers arrive fresh via airmail at IBP (Instant Beer Pleasure) on Brainerd Road in Chattanooga. Brian's driving from the airport, so, natch, they're late. Played first of 3 to a very few folk who were enthusiastic, nonetheless. Tim White reports that the version of "That's Funny, All Right" was the best ever. Outside the IBP. Bad food, sorry service, warm beer. Gun demonstration on Lookout Mountain. Night of no sleep in the backyard at new friend Dan's COOL house on the outskirts. Stop off at Lookout Mountain and Rev Howard FInster's...ditch Mark and Tim W, and band heads for gig #2 at the Chukker, Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Five hour drive. Arrive to find a mexican food joint and a big place reminiscent of the 3B Tavern in Bellingham. We find we're slotted for 2 sets and that the Boss Martians played the night before. I come down with the spaghetti-flu and sleep(suit and all) in the parking lot across the street til 5 minutes to show time. At the Chukker in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. We bonded with the locals. This was the same night that Princess Diana had her fatal car accident. Notice "The Woggles" inscribed on the wall. A big hall sure looks empty with 15 people in it, and this one was no exception. Hit the stage and felt like a million; we played maybe the third best set of our career to KP and Brian's friend Nathan. Oh yeah. ..the bartender loved us...she bought 2 shirts. Take a break and are mobbed by the 15 folk there who have all successfully ignored us so far. They're all front/center and going nuts for all 6 or 7 songs of set #2. (?) Played maybe 4th encore of the Trouble Makers career. Nathan is bombed beyond comprehension and douses me with a pitcher of water; he'll spend most of the next 24 hours vomiting in anything he can find. Try to find a hotel in Tuscaloosa at 2 AM on Labor Day weekend, go ahead. So, at 4 AM, we sleep....breakfast at the Waffle House....Stan still has the napkin....'Nother 5 hour drive (we stop for fireworks) to "Hot-lanta" ( says so right on the shirts.) Did I mention the Humidity? Jesus Christ, I see why they're all movin' out here. The Star Bar is in a hipster section of town. We show up at 5 and find it goin' like a record convention- filled with pegged pants, beatle boots and op-art mini skirts. Stan's in heaven, and Brian heads for the nearest sports bar. Roughly this time we discover that we left all 50 t-shirts in Tuscaloosa, so there goes the gas money. First up, Royal Pendletons... OK schtick-rock in gaudy matching suits (like we should talk!) The Trouble Makers take the stage at the Fuzzfest. Plenty of red faces from the humidity. We go 2nd....Brian barely makes it back on time, saving me from an immenent embolism. We gear up (we're one of the only bands that brought our own gear...but hey, I wanted to do this right) and play a decent set...worst one of the tour, natch, but the crowd seemed to dig it. I run out at the end of the set and 3 of the Mysterians flag me down to say, "Great set!...you guys really had 'em goin'!" Ritchie from Screaming Apple Records and the Bad Trip gang seem truly buzzed. Les Incapables...French canucks play next; kinda dry' but the guitarist looks DEAD on like Matt O Shrugg. Hee Hee. The Woggles rocked like the righteous, and Stan and I jump on stage for some impromptu go-go dancing. Fortune and Maltese got Rod's goat for some reason, but I thought they were OK. Bass player was a-stonishing. Next up; ? and the Mysterians. ? in his PINK satin shirt didn't "measure up" to The Woggles who rocked the place! The Mysterians have been have been hanging out all night...4 mid-50's Mexican guys in black t-shirts and jeans, nice as can be. No sign of the ?, til they're on stage , grooving an instrumental. On he comes, in a yellow satin blouse open to the waist and skin-tight nylon pants. Circumsized. Keyboard player insisted on using his new synth instead of Fortune and Maltese' farfisa...sounded just like you'd think. The new songs were amazingly bad, but the old stuff sounded purty close to the way it musta sounded back when. And, you could look at the bad-ass bass player, that smooth happy smile poppin' out under the cowboy hat, and you just love him for it. The crowd is lost, but goes along, trying not to focus on ?'s penis. We clear out at 4 AM, kudos and $400 collected. I sleep like a rock in an empty house we're lent...no one else shuts an eye. 4 AM I swear to god Rod wrestles a live possum out of a local dog's mouth. Only in the south. Bleary-eyed and burnt ('cept me!) we hook up with the rest of the gang for breakfast, where we run into Johnny Saturn V and Lynne Mystery Date from SF. Mark, Tim, and I load the car and say goodbye, headed for home via New Orleans, Austin, Tuscon and LA. The rest of the guys and KP fly home; home that day and are home in bed before we pull over for the night.... Addendum... we get a fax from Ritchie Screaming Apple th other day; he loves the tape of the new recordings, and green lights the album. ...And, we picked up the shirts in Tuscaloosa, so the blue light special is on if anybody needs one....

Reprinted from "th' Swingin' Creeper" Vol.1 #1 1997(without Matt K Shruggs' permission. Hee Hee.)