paris trebendo. hotel la tour d’auvergne room 104

a wonderful flight over through a degualle under construction, met by our driver patrick. off to the hotel, this our first day of our tour. we play tonite at trebendo…it’s early. check in, deal with 18 pieces of luggage in a tiny lobby, elevator, and hallways. a so-so breakfast then off to trebendo for soundcheck. trebendo is seemingly very difficult to find and to get to. once outside, we find it is gated with security. at one point our driver actually is stuck between two gates – one in front and one immediately behind our van. it is an insane comedy of what it is like sometimes on the road.
check is good, the engineers and crew are on their game. it sounds great in here. biggest worry: the gig has had no support or promotion…hoping folks will come. afterwards off to shopping district where we drop cd’s to colette (213 rue saint-honore) an amazing place full of collectible one-offs where we also encounter karl lagerfeld lounging with a photographer. racing through parisian streets back to our hotel off to an amazing french meal at carte blanche (6 rue lamartine) then to show. gig was great, but very lightly attended. king laid into naive, the distributor that didn’t do any promotion, or even try to help promoter jonathan miltat with promo materials. steve from music and arts is here, and is blown away…a fine show, and recorded for a live broadcast of two songs on bonnaroo radio.
tomorrow to brussels by train and a day off.
we decide, against better judgement, to go out to seek food and, perhaps, a beer in pigalle (morlon rouge) after show. alls good. we find what we are looking for, and afterwards try to get a taxi back to our hotel, to no avail. finally! we find one, but he will only take 3 of us, not 4. i decide to be the odd man out, and mark boyce joins me. it was cold and we could not find a cab anywhere. we decide to walk towards the direction of our hotel (we think). bad decision. we are know walking down deserted streets except for small cozy places! called hot lips, or something like that. strange guys coming out and asking if we want to get laid…no, we are trying to get to the hotel. crazy. finally, we go back to pigalle, and after a long time get a cab back to our hotel. not really too much fun. sleep now.