A LETTER FROM DAVE TO THE HOODOO GURUS GLEE CLUB

Hey Guruvers!

It's Dave here. Jimmy twisted my arm and "persuaded" me to write a report on the band's U.S. tour. Right now we're half way through, but by the time you read this we'll be done. So maybe I write an update later.

We did a warm-up show in Bellingham, Washington on August 29 under the pseudonym "Chocolate Tiki" before playing our first official date in Victoria, British Columbia (on beautiful Vancouver Island - birthplace of our esteemed manager Michael McMartin). Canadian Immigration gave us a hard time issuing our work visas - mostly due to their industrial dispute("go-slow") and it took us five hours to get them processed where it normally takes one (yawn!). What a way to start our tour (not much of a welcome, eh?)! Things improved from there starting with the ferry out to Vancouver Island, though we didn't see any whales (killer or otherwise). However, we did see a lot of floating logs - not to be confused with the infamous chocolate tiki! The gigs cam and wen in their usual high-velocity fashion: slammers, moshers, and guruvers in Vancouver, Edmonton. (With the obligatory ride on the roller coaster-of-doom in the mall), Calgary, Saskatoon. Winnipeg was notable for the fact that the club was attached to a German-style meat market, which also served as our dressing room. That was fine until the show finished, when a drunken idiot decided to smash the plate glass windows - with his head! Security found him crying just up the street, not knowing why he did it (and probably sorry for his bank balance which was going to be $1000 lighter). He was lucky he didn't kill himself doing it - and that security didn't either! Hey, I know the beer is stronger in Canada, but really! (Must be a Yale ma, as Thurston Howell III would say).

Major at this point, our tour bus developed problems with its generator (and there were minor complaints too - one TV didn't work, things like that) so the hire company sent a new one to Winnipeg and off we drove to Minneapolis. We thought that fist Canadian border crossing was bad, but re-entering the U. S. was Murder! The inspector got down on his hands and knees and sniffed, poked and almost tasted every nook and cranny of the vehicle (and believe me, a luxury appointed bus has plenty of those). The bus had just been completely cleaned inside and out before being delivered to us 8 hours before, but the customs agent opened up a fold-out couch in the rear lounge (none of us even knew it could be made into a bed, as all our bunks were in the center section) and he proceeded to scrape on the carpet underneath and magically produced a marijuana seed which he triumphantly held up. "A Ha!;" he ejaculated. Meanwhile, all of us (except Mitchell, our tour manager, who was in the bus with the agent) were waiting in the customs lounge to receive our visas and depart on our merry (tired, bored) way. NO way! Now the investigation began in earnest. Each of us was strop searched (kinky!) and "interviewed" (or - more accurately - harassed, yelled at, accuse, lied to). They used every trick in the book to coerce a "confession" of gilt (or better, accuse each other!). Of course the whole thing was a joke. No one in our party had any drugs, and that seed could have been lying there undisturbed for years (if they hadn't planted it there themselves to justify a more thorough search of "those suspicious-looking rock musicians"). Gee, thanks! That makes us feel a whole lot better, pal!!! The irony is while they were wasting hours with us there were probably truckloads of drugs rolling through that same border, labelled as "perfume", or whatever else). When will these people get real and stop bothering musicians in an effort to get a newspaper headline. When they should be trying to stop drug traffickers (who, by the way, don't wear jeans and long hair, but look more like a conservative businessman or a nice little old lady). Musicians play music, they don't sell drugs. At worst, they are drug victims, like too many people in any and every profession around the world.

Let's go back to music. It was a gas to be back in Minneapolis finally! We hadn't played there since our first U.S. tour for Stoneage Romeos in 1984 - that's a long time between drinks. We had the added pressure of a live-to-air broadcast of the show, but it all went off (as we did, too) without a hitch.

Omaha was fun, especially the free ten pin bowling after the gig (the club was just one part of a bowling/entertainment complex).

After this our long drives began, starting with a doozy to Phoenix. We were excited about finally playing in Arizona - we had been booked for Tucson on our first tour but when we arrived the venue was undergoing renovations ("like sands through the hourglass, these are the gigs of our lives"). Not only was Phoenix a first, but the next night we debuted in New Mexico - Caramba! Both these states have a particular fascination for Brad who is passionately interested in Navajo Indian culture. Needless to say, he went shopping.

Hello Texas, or should I say, in the mortal words of Hrundi V. Bakshi, "Howdy Partinah!" (Peter Sellers in "The Party" 1968). Dallas (Big D.), Austin and Houston. Thanks for the great barbecue! Baton rouge welcomed us to Louisiana, and New Orleans played the genial southern host to the hilt. What's more, we had a day off to get up to whatever mischief our hears desired. I caught up with some good friends, and went to see the might New Orleans Saints (my tem) destroy the Minnesota Vikings at the Superdome - that was the high point of the tour form me (sports nut that I am). We will discreetly pull the shades over the rest of our New Orleans stay, except to say I didn't feel well for quite a few days afterwards.