TSO - Week 4
(By David Z)

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11/17/06: Show #16 Wachovia Arena – Wilkes-Barre, PA

This day had disaster written all over it. While traveling the night before we were told that the bad weather had taken down the water supply in Wilkes-Barre but not to worry because it would be fixed by the time we got there. Yeah right. When we arrived we were told that there was still no running water. About half way through my sleep I woke up to use the bathroom. Completely forgetting that there was no running water I dropped a deuce in the bucket and wasn’t able to kick it. I stared at my little friend in the bowl shaking my head in disbelief because I knew we would be roommates for a while. That’s not the half of it. While walking over to the venue, more shit happened to me,,,literally. I looked down at the grass and mud I was walking in only to find out that it was dog shit I was stepping in. Mind you now, it wasn’t only the hotel that didn’t have water, it was the entire town including the venue. I had to pour about 12 bottles of water across the bottom of my boots before any of it even started to come off.

On a good note, there were more ZO2 fanz in the audience tonight. One of them actually had a shirt with a picture of me ironed on to it that that I saw during the signing line. I’m sure if she knew what my boots have been through she would have kept a little more distance when meeting me though.

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11/18/06: Show #17 & #18 Wachovia Arena – Wilkes-Barre, PA

Double show day today, which meant that we played to over 16,000 people today. That’s pretty fucking cool. It’s great to hear the complete silence overcome the arena before a song like “Ornament” starts, especially when you know there are over 8,000 people doing it all at the same time per show. The only scary thing about having that many people, is realizing that there will be a signing line after the show. We must have signed over 300 autographs tonight. That leaves me with only one question: “where are the other 15,700 people?”

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11/19/06: Show #19 & #20 Giant Center – Hershey, PA

While on the road I’ve had people comment to me and ask me questions about my journalz. One of the questions I’ve received is what are “in-ears?” For those of you who don’t know, in-ear packs are wireless packs with molded headphones that go directly in the artist’s ears and allow them to get an individual mix of whatever instruments and voices they want. Need less to say a vocalist would have more of their vocals in their mix while me as a bass player would have more bass in my mix. But what happens when you plug you headphones into someone else’s pack? Unfortunately I had the displeasure of finding out today. I got on stage and had no bass guitar in my headphones. I started to panic thinking there was something wrong with the bass but it was coming out of the house PA just fine. I started to tell my monitor engineer (who adjusts our mixes) to keep raising the bass in my mix till the point that he had no more headroom. Once I realized I had on a singer’s in-ear pack, I switched back to mine to find that the bass was so cranked it almost took my head right off. Once I got it all back to normal I was able to hear everything nice and pristine again including the guy in front of the stage mic’s yelling “TSO are the GODS of Christmas.”

Another two shows in one day but I must say the driving force that kept me going today was the amount of ZO2 shirts I saw in both shows. There was a woman in the center section who kept standing up and flashing (no not them) her ZO2 sweater. There were pink and black girlie ZO2 T’s everywhere but the most impressive was the three Z-Teamers who ZO2 shirts, headbands and each had signs made out of rhinestones so that you could pretty much see them from anywhere in the arena. In addition, they handed out over 1,200 ZO2 flyers before and after the show. Now that’s what I call Z-Spirit. Way to go girls.

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11/20/06: DAY OFF

When I got to my room today for the day off I saw that they had put me in a handicapped room. Call it an amazing coincidence but sadly, it was very suiting for the way I felt. I was sick with a super high fever, a soar throat, aches and pains and everything else that makes one want to curl up and die. And that’s pretty much what I did on my day off. I curled up underneath the covers and slept the entire day away. What really sucked is that I wanted to sweat it out but my stupid heater wasn’t working. I later found out that it was motion censored and turned off when there wasn’t any movement in the room. Just great. The one good thing that happened was when one of the singers kindly brought back some food for me from a place that we all eat at every year, “the Dinosaur BBQ”. After eating it though, I realized that a pulled pork sandwich and fried green tomatoes probably was not the greatest things to feed my sickened body.

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11/21/06: Show #21 Oncenter Complex – Syracuse, NY

Unfortunately, vitamin C pills, emergency packs, Echinacea, tea, sleep and all other home remedies didn’t work for me. I was still sick as a dog. So much so that they had a doctor come to my room to give me a check up. She gave me seven days worth of antibiotics, some pills for the congestion and then said that she’d see me at the show tonight. I asked if she’d be working again tonight and she said, “no, I’ll see from my seats where I see you every year.” That would be funny if she asked me to sign the prescription pad instead of the other way around.

Playing a show when you’re sick is about as much fun as having pins put through your testicles (not that I’ve ever tried that). The whole time I kept trying to get my body to do what it normally does but to no avail. I wanted so badly to perform well for the crowd but it was a physical impossibility. My body was too fever ridden to move even a step without feeling like I would collapse. It was so bad that for the first time in seven years of touring with the TSO, I had to miss the signing line. I heard that there was a girl wearing a ZO2 shirt who’s birthday it was so to you I say “HAPPY BIRTHDAY and sorry I couldn’t be there.”

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11/22/06: Show #22 Cumberland County – Portland, ME

Another show to do and I still feel terrible. After the first song during the first narration I was told that there was a doctor in our dressing room giving B12 shots, which is supposed to give you a rush of vitamins and energy. Of course I immediately ran over there to try yet another thing to help me out of this hellhole I was feeling. When dealing with sharp pointed needles you don’t want to be rushing but time was definitely of the essence. The narrator was nearing the end of his speech which is my cue to walk on stage and play the next song but instead I was in my dressing room with my jacket and shirt completely off getting stuck with this hard sharp object…wait a second, is that what it feels like to be a groupie? I had to run back while trying to get my clothes back on and I could hear the next song starting. I hurried getting back on stage and wound up with only one “in-ear” in, one sleeve out longer than the other and only one button secured on my shirt revealing some of my stomach underneath. And believe me it wasn’t in the “ooohh he’s got his sexy stomach showing” way, it was more in the “ill, who let this homeless guy on stage” way. It would have been worth it if the B12 kicked in during the show but sadly it did not. When on the lift at the end of the show I felt as if I were literally going to fall over and off. And when your 50 feet in the air that’s the last thing you want to feel. I was so bad that I yet again had to miss the signing line. This time I had a runner bring me right back to my hotel room where I fell asleep and stayed asleep for a total of 13 hours. It was definitely something my body was craving.

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11/23/06: DAY OFF

Happy Thanksgiving everyone. I have so much to be thankful for this year: people I have met, things I have done, progress that ZO2 has made but today I am thankful for the fact that I’ve finally started to feel better. Better enough to be able to go to the Thanksgiving dinner that TSO prepared for all of us and not feel that I would be getting anyone else sick. So needless to say I packed in all the added food that my body was missing these past few days I’ve been sick.

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Stayed tuned for next week’s journal.

SAME Z TIME…SAME Z CHANNEL…OR LINK FOR THAT MATTER!!!