Notes from the Boneyard: Tour Diary #7292

by Mark McCausland

It’s been a hectic few weeks. Now is the first moment I’ve sat still long enough to look back and register the parts I can remember… It began in Edinburgh, for a tour, playing guitar with my dear friend Jolie Holland. We embarked on a three week long road journey together, playing gigs almost every night.

I met friends from my distant past in every town. Gill Landry showed up in London for a pre-gig walk ‘n’ talk around Soho, putting the world to rights. We made an album together in Nashville many moons ago, and I haven’t seen him in ten years, but we picked up right wher we left off. Like no time had passed..

Howe Gelb appeared like a phantom in Brighton, for a walk along the pier, and again during the gig when he emerged from the shadows to twinkle the grand piano on a few songs. Then he set off on his own tour across Europe, and I’ll see him again at the tail end of it when he comes to Ireland to recuperate.

There were many ghosts on this journey. We stayed in a haunted house in Hebden Bridge, and a haunted hotel in Liverpool, where we had two solitary days off. I drove the city at night, making pilgrimages to The Beatles’ childhood homes, and taking the time to visit the grave of Stuart Sutcliffe. I even had time to watch my friend’s film about ‘The Coral’ in the cinema, which sent me 25 years back in time.

Our trusty companion for most of the road was The Blindboy Podcast, essential for long drives in the rain. We got the boat back to Dublin where we stayed in the grand home of a Hollywood actor, who was there but remained invisible. My room for the night was behind the secret bookcase in the library. I formed another new band over a pint of Guinness with some pals before the gig that night. We will never play together, but we are a band all the same.

After the soundcheck in Cork, I got a tap on the shoulder and turned around to see Willy Vlautin, not only an old amigo of mine, but also one of my all-time literary heros. Haven’t seen him in at least a decade when we toured together, and there he was now standing there with a smile, arriving with impeccable timing, like an angel sent from another realm.

We walked for an hour and he told me everything I needed to hear at that moment, unknotting my knotted brain with his pearls of wisdom. He cured whatever was ailing me without realising it. Then he vanished into thin air, and with a puff of smoke, Dave Murphy magically took his place. We walked back to the venue, making plans for a new recording with a tape machine in a church.

The tour ended in Belfast with a couple of cocktails with friends, old and new. I met Noah, the producer of Colin Broderick’s new movie, ‘Once Upon A Time In Hell’s Kitchen’.

We had pizza and traded war stories before realising we were both born just days apart, making us practically twins… There were many other encounters like this along the way, too many to remember. Going on tour has become like one big long reunion party where you get to see everyone who you would never get to see in normal life. It reminds you who you are.

Somehow in the middle of all this I released an album. The Geckøs LP with M Ward and Howe Gelb now exists in the universe, and that’s why I’m on this plane right now, for a few days of promotion with at least one of my fellow Geckøs.

But before that, I’ll meet Sebastian, the cinematographer who filmed ‘The Spin’, and we’ll attend the Oasis gig at Wembley Stadium tonight, my second time seeing them after Chicago last month.

And just as I’m writing this, an invite has come to play two shows in Spain this weekend with M Ward and a guy called Fernando, who I never met but we are destined to cross paths one of these days.

As fun as Spain sounds, I have to say no… home is calling. A deep hibernation is in order.

First thing I need to do when I get there is cancel a gig or two I let people talk me into. And then… A retreat, and a surrender in the hills, where I’ll remain, looking out, ready to take on whatever the universe hurls at me next.