So it's been awhile since the first blog..... I'm sitting in a hotel in Edmonton (Canada) right now on our day off. It's been a crazy few days and time is short, so instead of a day-by-day account I'm gonna lump this update into one big thing. Here goes....

We had a great gig in Montreal (sold out!!). After the show, Jim and I got together with our buddy Mike from Hardtimes for a video interview.....we joked around a lot, and I'm sure most people who see it will think we are complete morons, but we had fun and that's all that matters to us.....pretty much our same philosophy with the "Forced to Rock" video as a matter of fact. After the interview, Mike and I proceeded to talk for hours about 90's New York hardcore and our love for bands like Stigmata, Dying Breed, etc. Got a decent night sleep at a hotel right behind the venue and SURPRISE!! the next morning we discovered our van had been broken into. Luckily nothing got stolen, but we proceeded to spend the next 2 days driving around with duct tape all over what used to be our window.

Quebec City and Toronto were both great as well (some killer pit action during our set, always makes me happy) and once we got back to the states we got our window fixed in Michigan. Had an off-date with Exodus and Mutiny Within in Flint, MI that was fun. Small crowd, but the kids who did know us seemed to enjoy the show and we had a good time jamming out Skid Row and Ratt songs before our set began. After that, we hit up the House of Blues in Chicago for a KILLER show. Grabbed a quick shower after our set, then met up with my cousin and went out for an awesome dinner with her and her boyfriend. Minneapolis was pretty amazing the following night....the usual chaos ensued while we were on stage and the turnout ended up being fantastic despite relatively low pre-sale numbers. Fuck yeah!

Back into Canada, the show in Winnipeg was sold out from what I heard, and we had a very enthusiastic crowd response as usual. Some pretty nutty fans too (some guy kept coming up to Nat and me telling us how all he does is train to kill people.....ummm ok) In good spirits, we headed out to the van at the end of the night to find that GUESS WHAT?! 2 more windows in our van had been smashed out, and Jim and Nick's suitcases had been ripped off. Not good, especially since it was about 20 below zero that night. Completely pissed, we headed to the nearest decent hotel and brought in as much gear as we could with us. Luckily we had the next day off, and were able to get both windows replaced by a top-notch repair joint about 3 blocks down from our hotel. Thanks!

The next two nights in Calgary and Edmonton were amazing....Canadians love metal and we had a great time on stage. The place we played in Edmonton was in some huge mall that had a pirate ship, water park, and hockey arena in it - crazy!! I was also able to get Indian food for dinner which was a pleasant surprise. We head out in a little while to Vancouver, and are looking forward to the last 4 gigs of this tour. Hard to believe it's almost over already, this has definitely been the best lineup we have ever had the pleasure of touring with. Every show has just been incredible. Until next blog...