July 19, 2002

      After a rushed start today, we finally got on the road heading down to Dracut, MA to compete in a "real" battle of the bands. Everything went well for the bulk of the trip... which was unsettling, considering our past track record. Thankfully, less than 10 minutes from our destination, we finally managed to break something (in the name of a 1992 Old Cutlass) on the rainy streets of Lowell MA. After the little rear-end incident (which is still kind of sketchy - ask us about it sometime), we got to Deb's Lakeview Lounge just in time for the start of the competition. Just our luck, but we drew to go on first, so we loaded in and set up.
      By 8:45 we were smashing through our 30 minute set, which didn't come out so hot(t) in my opinion. I think it was probably the lack of practice during the week, combined with the fatigue of the trip and the weather. Needless to say, we didn't reach much of the 21+ crowd, and we assumed we were done for the rest of the competition. We were really impressed with some of the other bands that played, including Hope For The Best, a local pop punk band, and Nimbus 9, an Incubus-ish band from Manchester (several members of which seemed to like our stuff). There were a few bar bands that played, The Ben Shipper Band and The Jesse Terry Band, neither of which struck my fancy, but the crowd seemed to like (and probably Deprez). Anyway, we got out of there around 12:30 to head to our floor for the night, in Methuen, to get a good rest for the rest of the weekend's shows.
      No pictures of this show, because we had no merch-person/helper. But we do have some video of Nimbus 9, featuring excellent camerawork by yours truly. Maybe when we get free unlimited server space, we'll serve up some live video....

click to read the tour diary for July 20th @ Cafe Eclipse


SETLIST
Prelude
Action, Reaction
Jesus Sunrise
Waitforever
Boys Will Be Boys
Lie Down With Dogs