It's catl's last stop, before sweet home Canada!
And don't forget, they'll be touring the U.S this year!
"We
drove an hour with all our gear, our host Aleks, the driver Zoran, and Iggy the
harp player, to the charmer of a town called, Novi Sad. The car was a small Ford
‘something or other,’ and you couldn’t squeeze a piece of rice into the cramped
cabin if you wanted to."
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| catl-radio Novi Sad is on the air! |
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| Our first stop in Novi Sad was a local radio station to promote the show that night. We had no idea what was being said. |
"Got
put up at a nice hotel, that was walking distance from the venue. It was a
Tuesday, and the promoter Miro, didn’t expect a very good turnout. We don’t know,
if they know, what a bad turnout is here in Eastern Europe; but we were pretty pleased."
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| Strolling down the streets of Novi Sad towards our lunch destination. |
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| Lunch at Astal Saren was like
a ceremony. It started with drinks, then cheese, then large plates,
mostly meat, more drinks, lots of chain-smoking, and lasted about 4
hours. All in what looked like someone's grandmother's living room. Lots
of Rakija was consumed. | |
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| Lots of beautiful architecture in Novi Sad. Really cute town. |
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| More beautiful buildings. |
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| Jamie, at Kriva Marta, with some cool blues cats. |
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| Gospel Song 1930 & Negro Gospel |
"When they un-crated the amp we were gonna use for the night,
lo and behold, it was a 70’s fender twin! The same one Jamie uses at home. What a
great way to end off the tour!"
"Sarah found a music store where she bought some
new drum heads, after last night’s snare blow-out, so at least we were gonna
sound good."
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| Finally! A chance to change our drums heads! We tried many times on this trip to grab some extra
heads, but it was hard to find a music store (apparently most people buy
online now,) let alone one that had the right sizes. Drummer buddies
beware! Not a lot of 16' skins around! |
"The
show was moving along nicely, and we got about 7 songs deep before the cops
strolled in. We got shut down halfway through our set. Apparently, there was a
noise complaint. They took our drivers licenses, and really had no sense of humor at all. No surprise there. The crowd took it well, and were all very
apologetic about the cops. We thought it was kinda cool, at least it makes for
a good story. How many times in your life does your show get shut down by the
Serbian Police? There’s some videos of the show floating around out there."
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| Annnnnnnnnd... here come the
cops! Don't worry, we stayed and drank our faces off with the lovely
people of Novi Sad. Sure, I'll have one more Rakija! It is a Tuesday after all. The bar tender actually said, "In Serbia, we drink til dawn!" |
"We
had the next day off before we had to travel again (thank god!), so went out for
dinner with our new Serbian friends Aleks, and his lovely girlfriend, Milica. A scant 3 hours of
sleep, and now we're sitting in a Paris airport waiting to hurtle back to Toronto."
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| Aleksander posing in his #TijuanaBibles shirt! Represent Toronto Rock n' Roll! #badmusicforbadpeople #classycraigdaniels |
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| Sarah and Iggy - the one-man Harp Explosion! |
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| Jamie and Iggy... |
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| Dinner with Aleksander and Milica on our last night back in Belgrade was so wonderful! We miss them already. |
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| After dinner we had drinks at
the bar where Aleks and Milica met. Lo and behold, we find yet another
bar-dog. That's 3 we've documented on this trip, and there were
many more undocumented bar-dogs. I guess that's a "thing" here in
Europe? |
"Good
times, good hangs, lots of miles on the train, and some giant beers. European
audiences sure do love their rock and roll!"
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| Headed home, finally. It was a
whirlwind two weeks, with next to no sleep, while humping tons of shit on
and off trains, and blasting through large amounts of rock n' roll.
Maybe next time will be easier. Happy to be heading home, but already
missing new friends. And giant beers. And rakija! |
"Thanks
for reading!"
