BOBNOXIOUS - featuring RAZOR frontman Bob Reid - recently wrapped up their Canadian tour in support of their new album, Rockaholics. Reid has issued the following update:

Day 18 - Winnipeg:

"It's cold, but it's sunny. We pull up in front of the bar, it's a one way and there's nowhere to park. We just leave the RV as close to the parked cars as we can. Gavin - and I'm thinking he wasn't - opens the door and steps out onto a busy one way and could have easily been smoked by a car, or a car gets smoked by a Giant. Either way, no harm… our fairy godrocker still watching over us."

1st Problem:

The look on everyone's face sums it up. Stairs! And many of them… and the gear is getting heavier every day, and there's stairs…many stairs... down to the first floor, stairs again to the second floor, then stairs to the entrance of the bar!! For fuck sakes…

I meet the owners Girard and Louise. They seem cool.

2nd Problem:

While unloading the gear, Gavin says to me, 'There's not much of a PA here.'

Great. What's that mean???

Gavin and I have a talk with Girard. He says he has no bass bins, no microphone stands, 1 monitor, 1 power amp to power everything, and 3 cheap microphones and one 6ft mic cable, and no lights…

3rd Problem:

Girard then produces a copy of an email he had sent to Chris, a guy on our managers team who is supposed to inform me of things I need to know before a show. In this email, it says that there is not much of a PA. I remember Chris telling me that the club didn't have a big PA but would be adequate for the size of room it was. What he should have said was.. There is NO PA there… for fuck sakes...

So guess fuckin' what? Gavin has to make a list of PA shit we need to make this gig happen and the store will be closing soon. Girard calls the store and begins reading from a list Gavin made, what we need. Nope - don't have any bass bins or bottoms, sorry. DOH!

I then realize this is not gonna be fun. Seeing as there was a mix up in the PA, I ask about meals and beer.

'Yeah, we'll make ya meals, but not sure about beers...'

'Dude, we gotta have beers... at least 24 of them...'

He agrees, I think that's the end of that and we set up the gear while Girard goes to get the rented gear. We order food, Dee grabs around of beers, we eat.

4th Problem:

The rented gear arrives. Girard then comes up to me and says...'So, we got a problem, who's gonna pay for this?'

as he holds his email thing in his hand and a receipt for $45 in his other.

I am not in any mood to petty over $$ right now, we needed the PA, and he pays me at the end of the night and could just take it off the top if he wants, so I reach into my pocket, pull out $45 and say, "Tell ya what, I'll pay the $45 if you start smiling again.. deal?'

The smile returns…

'I want that receipt,' I insist.

We set up, and soundcheck takes for ever, obviously Gavin has a lot to do. Girard has asked for three sets….three sets. I thought Chris was gonna take care of that .. so I tell Girard that we don't do three sets, or two sets, we just blast thru everything we got, which is about 1 hour 45 mins. So Jeffy volunteers to play a solo set for 45, then we'll play for the last set.. Girard agrees...

Jeffy plays, and we are about to go on but Tommy's getting hassles over beer. He tells me the bar only wants to give us 8. Eight? So I go back into the kitchen to find Girard.

'Hey man, I thought we agreed on 24 beers, we usually get 48, and we gotta have beers...'

'OK, no worries,' he says…

No worries... it's been nothing but.

We rock out on stage, and after we tear down the gear, I ask Girard who is telling me how we have to come back, to ask his big door guys to assist in carrying our gear up these bullshit stairs. He says OK... and thank God. The load out is painful, but under the influence, the pain is somewhat forgotten.

I am finishing my beer while rounding up what is left of our un-opened beer, when Wylie comes yelling into the bar about something going on outside. We all rush up the stairs to catch the end of the ordeal. Some guy, who at first was trying to help carry gear up the stairs, while on mushrooms, was told that his services weren't required because he was wasted and banging gear around, didn't like being dismissed, and hopped in the RV and tried to drive off with the whole motherload. Tom grabs the loser and pulls him out onto the pavement where they begun to wrestle while Tom's boot happily stomps the back of the mushroom king's head. The losers buddies grab him while our guys help separate the crap, all while I was downstairs being introduced to bar tabs that have mysteriously appeared. I thought we had a 24 beers. Anyway, I paid the three tabs 'cause I'm not a cheap bastard, Tom dusts off the reminisce of mushroom wrestling, and we are more than ready to get the fuck outta dodge!!

The gear is packed and we're heading home. Winnipeg is about 26 hours from London. We decide to drive straight.

So it is written, so it shall be done.

We drive for seven hours and Dee takes over for Wylie. Tom takes over for Dee, then Tom gets pulled over for speeding. And lucky for us, something must of come up, 'cause when we couldn't find the registration for the RV he gave us a warning and him and another cruiser pulled a u turn and took off.

Well what do you know… one for the good guys.

And home.. 5:45 am Monday morning. $4,000.00 in gas...that's a lot of beer money!"

Cheers Fuckers!"

Go to this location to read the entire Bobnoxious tour diary.