Upcoming shows  |  2008  |  2007  |  2006  |  2005  |  2004  |  2003  |   2002  |  2001  |  1999-2000

DATE	VENUE	BANDS	COMMENTS
Jan 31 2002	Black Cat DC	Liars	A good show, if a bit rusty on our part. We were gratified by the turn-out, which was much bigger than the last time we'd played here.
Feb 16 2002	Terrace Club Princeton NJ	Les Savy Fav Rye Coalition	This place was really cool -- basically a giant house with dozens of rooms, each with three or four sofas, lots of free food and drink, and all shows there are all ages and free. Not a bad deal, and right on campus. We played pretty sloppily.
Feb 21 2002	Northsix Brooklyn NY	Liars Touchdown	The sound was much better than the other time we played here. We put on a good show, but Liars were out of control: a chaotic, destructive -- but still highly danceable -- blowout of a performance.
Mar 3 2002	Melkweg Amsterdam Netherlands	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	The first show of our month-long European tour. The highlight was Tim from the Fav going through the crowd with a tray like a waiter, collecting their empty glasses, then going back to the front of the stage and hurling them all at the ground.
Mar 4 2002	Vera Groningen Netherlands	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	Possibly the coolest club we've ever played at. Great sound, nice stage, super-nice people (all volunteers), and bedrooms and showers so the bands can stay there after the show. The performances were on fire tonight.
Mar 5 2002	Schlacthoff Hamburg Germany	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	The sound at this place was loud and huge, but the crowd was embarassingly lifeless.
Mar 6 2002	SO36 Berlin Germany	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	Another big club, much better crowd than in Hamburg. The Fav ended their set with an all-star super-group jam that the crowd ate up.
Mar 7 2002	Rock Cafe Prague Czech Republic	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	Cool little club, not the coolest people running it. One of them tried to convince Jeff that he'd broken one of the overhead mics by hitting it and would have to pay for it, despite the fact that the mic had already not been working during soundcheck. The same guy later said he might have to stop the show because the bands were "too out of control". Both the Fav and the Volta ended up paying for things they'd supposedly broken.
Mar 8 2002	Metropolis Munich Germany	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	Huge, somewhat cheesy dance-type club. We played badly. At 10.30 they rushed all the bands out the door so they could start the dance party. Tim had to pay $150 for a disco ball he'd "broken" when he used it as a prop.
Mar 9 2002	MKNZ Ilirska Bistrica Slovenia	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	Small, very cool rock club with an enthusiastic rock crowd. Very fun show, which we needed after the previous night's weak performance. Leon and Anna, who were putting on the show, were ultra-cool.
Mar 10 2002	KSET Zagreb Croatia	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	Big, nice club with big sound. Good performances all around.
Mar 13 2002	Fort Prenestino Rome Italy	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	Rivals Fort Thunder in Providence for weird venue kingship, but Prenestino is an actual 200-year old fort, complete with moat and towers. The show was great, despite the temperature having dropped into the 40s by the time it got started (the stage was set up at the end of a long stone tunnel open at both ends).
Mar 14 2002	Il Covo Bologna Italy	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	Another good show from all three bands. Plus, you could watch the performances projected on a 15-foot screen from the bar.
Mar 15 2002	Babylonia Biella Italy	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	A very cool club, with a nice comfortable feel and good sound; unfortunately, this was the deadest (and almost the smallest) crowd of the whole tour -- these kids only perked up after the bands were finished and the DJ started playing records (including Les Savy Fav and At the Drive-In).
Mar 16 2002	CCO Lyon France	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	This was some kind of community center, with adult education classes going on in other rooms in the building. Show went well.
Mar 17 2002	Mephisto Barcelona Spain	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	This was a full-on metal club, complete with gigantic banner sporting the gothic "Mephisto" logo behind the stage. Poor turn-out and fairly dead crowd.
Mar 19 2002	El Sol Madrid Spain	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	This show got right off to a bad start. At soundcheck, the soundman refused to let Joachem (our driver and soundman for all three bands) touch the board. He refused to put a mic on Erick's bass amp. He had a rule about the mics not going past the monitors. Tim made it his mission to make him smile, and he finally succeeded: During their set, he came out covered only in a towel, which was soon whisked away, leaving his modesty protected only by a strategically held rose.
Mar 20 2002	The Cat Bordeaux France	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	Another cool show with lots of cool people. For the most part, European clubs seem to be staffed by much nicer people than American ones. They cooked us a great meal.
Mar 21 2002	Le Trabendo Paris France	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	This club had a great design and layout that made it easy to see the bands from wherever you were standing. Sound was good, too.
Mar 22 2002	Lintfabriek Kontich Belgium	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	We went over better here than at any other show on the tour. Crowd was very enthusiastic. This was another club which had sleeping/showering facilities for the bands; if only American clubs had that -- it's really great to be able to step upstairs and shower after a show, then watch the other bands, then go upstairs and go to sleep without having to load out or any of that.
Mar 24 2002	ULU London UK	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	Sold-out show at the University of London. Great performances, good crowd, and the Fav had probably fifty of them up on stage to sing and play along on their last song.
Mar 25 2002	The Cockpit Leeds UK	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	Good show, kind of weird sound (at least from the stage).
Mar 26 2002	King Tut Glasgow Scotland	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	Another good-sized (read: smaller) rock club, which we've definitely come to prefer over the bigger venues. They served us excellent food.
Mar 27 2002	Hop & Grape Manchester UK	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	Another show at a university; the crowd didn't seem too into us.
Mar 28 2002	Zero One Three Tilburg Netherlands	Les Savy Fav The Mars Volta	The last show of the tour, and we sucked. Technical problems and weak performances made us go out with a whimper. Luckily the Fav and Volta were there to give the crowd their money's worth. Golden Earring ("Radar Love") were playing in the sold-out downstairs room.
Apr 9 2002	Mohawk Place Buffalo NY	Les Savy Fav Maceo Ruez Elad Love Affair	Our 100th show; we commemorated by counting off "Black Tears" with a 100-count instead of a 4-count, do the delight of all.
Apr 10 2002	Carnegie Mellon Univ. Pittsburgh PA	Les Savy Fav Modey Lemon	Cool show in a giant cylinder of a room. Someone set off a fire alarm during the Fav's set; Tim made the best of it by leading a massive game of Duck-Duck-Goose on the soccer field.
Apr 11 2002	The Metro Chicago IL	Les Savy Fav Milemarker	Pretty dead response from what was a pretty good-sized crowd.
Apr 12 2002	The Catacombs Madison WI	Les Savy Fav Paris, Texas	Good show in the basement of a chapel or something. The guys running it made us excellent food.
Apr 13 2002	The Whole Music Club St Paul MN	Les Savy Fav Lucky Jeremy	Good show somewhat wasted on a mostly empty large room.
Apr 15 2002	15th St Tavern Denver CO	Les Savy Fav Sparkles	Decent show to a very cool crowd.
Apr 17 2002	Jay's Upstairs Missoula MT	Les Savy Fav The Pleasure	Another show where we were fed great food. Cool town, cool crowd, good show.
Apr 19 2002	The Factory Bellingham WA	Number 226 The Gary Projekt	Odd show in a bar that had just started having live music. Headliners Resin never showed up. Of the 20-30 people in the bar when we started our set, only 5 or 6 were left by the time we finished. One of the deserters was the local music critic.
Apr 20 2002	Graceland Seattle WA	Les Savy Fav Pleasure Forever	Packed house, great sound, great performances -- one of the best Fav performances we'd seen.
Apr 21 2002	Graceland Seattle WA	Les Savy Fav Pleasure Forever	This was an all-ages matinee to complement the previous night's 21+ show. Shawn, whom we'd met the night before, joined us onstage for some freestyling during Apessounds.
Apr 22 2002	The Blackbird Portland OR	Les Savy Fav Stateside	Fun show at a very cool little bar that apparently has suprisingly big acts play there (J Mascis, etc).
Apr 24 2002	Bottom of the Hill San Francisco CA	Les Savy Fav The Quails	Very cool club with excellent sound and nice staff.
Apr 26 2002	Troubadour Los Angeles CA	Les Savy Fav	Packed, sold-out show at a big club. Pretty exciting.
Apr 27 2002	KSDT UC San Diego CA		Fun radio show appearance for the university. Plus, Rishi treated us all to lunch courtesy of his mealcard.
Apr 27 2002	Casbah San Diego CA	Les Savy Fav Pleasure Forever	Cool little club; the only problem is it's 21 and over, which seems to be the way of it in San Diego.
Apr 28 2002	The Cooler Lounge Las Vegas NV	Les Savy Fav Pleasure Forever	Kind of a weird show to a very small crowd. The best Fav show we've ever seen, though, and after 56 shows together, the end of our touring brotherhood.
Apr 30 2002	MonkeyMania Denver CO	Littleheads Nightshark	Luke from Sparkles set up this fun show in his house/show space with very little notice; sound was surprisingly good, due to the classic warehouse acoustics, and a great time was had by all.
May 1 2002	Replay Lawrence KS	Nigel Peppercock Slurry	A show that could have been much better if the vocal PA hadn't died on the second song. Brett from Slurry established himself as the coolest guy ever by giving Jeff a cymbal stand to replace his ridiculously trashed, constantly-falling-over one.
May 2 2002	Mojo's Columbia MO	Sofa Kit XL One Inch Punch 13 Stars	Gratifyingly positive response from the crowd here.
May 3 2002	The Lemmons St Louis MO	Good Griefs Ouija	Fun show in a club that looks just like someone's basement: carpeted floor, wood-paneled walls; a heavy 70s vibe in general. Low ceiling, too. Great deep-dish pizza.
May 4 2002	The Red Rose Murfreesboro TN	Detachment Kit The Gold Room The Joshua Falken Trio	Satisfying show with three great bands. Jeff cut his knuckles pretty good, always the sign of a good set.
May 5 2002	The Musiquarium Jackson MS	Party of Helicopters The John Black Attack	Very fun show. The club is in a little shopping mall. Promoter Wes made us a great dinner, and pancakes and veggie sausage in the morning.
May 6 2002	The Earl Atlanta GA	Party of Helicopters The Blame Game	Good show. The Earl is always cool. Party of Helicopters were great.
May 7 2002	Go Rehearsal Studios Chapel Hill NC		The final show on our tour was a big blow-out with about 8 people in the audience, at least one of whom was from the other band.
June 2002	DCAC Washington DC	The Snuff Project	Good show, from what I remember.
July 9 2002	Winchester's Baltimore MD	GoGoGo Airheart Motio El Guapo Death of Marat	We start our NE Minitour, and our association with GGGAH, with an inauspicious gig at a comedy club. Pretty much no one was there.
July 10 2002	Black Cat Washington DC	GoGoGo Airheart	Much better than the first night of the tour; good, responsive crowd (rare in DC).
July 12 2002	Northsix Brooklyn NY	GoGoGo Airheart Semiautomatic The Peppermints	Our first time back in NY in awhile and it went pretty well. Lots of friends from other bands came out, which is always cool.
July 13 2002	AS220 Providence RI	Liars GoGoGo Airheart Moray	Kind of a weird show in a little coffeehouse-type place. The vocals kept going out for all the bands, except Moray, who didn't have any to begin with. Hash's (from GGGAH) family came; we stayed at their place and were fed like kings.
July 14 2002	T.T. The Bear's Boston MA	Neptune Liars GoGoGo Airheart The Faux	This show ruled. Great line-up from start to finish. Great crowd. Pat from Liars split his eyebrow open on a mic stand and kept rocking, ignoring the blood that was literally pouring from the cut all over his face and onto the stage.
July 17 2002	Tritone Philly PA	GoGoGo Airheart	This show was supposed to be at another club, but the owners never showed up to open the doors in a depressing repeat of our Mobile AL show. Luckily, the promoter and GGGAH were kind enough to add us to a second show they were doing at the Tritone bar; saving the final date of the tour from being a complete disaster. Turnout and sound were suprisingly good.
Aug 5 2002	Fort Reno Park Washington DC	Pines of Nowhere Field Machine	Rained out, despite the absence of rain. Apes and Field Machine arrived to an empty, sunny field. Played catch for a bit, then went home and saw the email message saying the show was cancelled.
August 8 2002	Knitting Factory New York	The Dishes The Witnesses The Newborn Naturals	No vocals for most of the first song, and the usual technical problems with the bass cab, but we got a good response from the people there. Paul fell into Jeff's drum set and knocked most of it over, leaving just hi-hat and snare to finish out the song.
Sept 8 2002	Luxx Brooklyn NY	Udet	This show was supposed to be with the Panthers and Bad Wizard. By the time the show rolled around, everyone on the original line-up had cancelled and been replaced, except for us. What with that and the lack of promotion, it was a pretty small crowd, but the show went pretty well. We did an unheard-of-for-us total of 11 songs. The sound was great, at least for the other bands.
Sept 19 2002	Talking Head Baltimore MD	Party of Helicopters Brachianation	Great show. The club is very small and narrow, with mirrored walls, and a weird stage with beams in the way, so we set up on the floor. PoH were awesome, as their crazy fans who whooped and hollered through the set would agree.
Sept 23 2002	Empty Bottle Chicago IL	GoGoGoAirheart The Watchers	Another excellent show. GGGAH were awesome, and the Watchers had a great, vaguely Talking Heads-ish thing going on. Rob of 90 Day Men hosted us for the night in his house full of strange DVDs, comics, and videogames.
Sept 24 2002	Howard's Club H Bowling Green OH	GoGoGo Airheart Stylex	Kind of a strange show. The first band didn't go on until almost 11pm on Tuesday night, but there was a pretty sizable crowd anyway. Stylex played a weird, noisy set supplemented by sequencers and all that crazy electronic stuff. After the show we crashed on the floor of promoter Brock's record store in the shopping mall.
Sept 25 2002	Lime Spider Akron OH	GoGoGo Airheart The Magnificent Tallboys Coffinberry	Great show. Great sound, too. GGGAH were on fire. The Tallboys played really catchy rock with vocals reminiscent of Mark E Smith from the Fall. Good stuff.
Sept 26 2002	Warsaw Brooklyn NY	GoGoGo Airheart An Albatross	Frustrating but fun show. We played in the Oak Room, which is exactly what it sounds like: A small room with hardwood floors. The stage, made of two pieces, drifted apart during our set, forcing Jeff to move his kit to the floor a few songs in and get up close and personal with the audience. The echoey nature of the room suited our sound pretty well.
Sept 27 2002	The Khyber Philadelphia PA	GoGoGo Airheart Canine The Capitol Years	Paul split his nose and eyebrow on the monitor, and Jeff's hi-hat turned inside-out.
Sept 28 2002	The Berwick Institute Boston MA	GoGoGo Airheart The Panthers The Faux Kent	Very D.I.Y. show put together at the last minute when the scheduled venue lost its liquor license. Decent turn-out, considering. Another concrete room that muddied up the sound, but also made it sound big and tough, always a plus. The Panthers were deafening.
Oct 19 2002	9.30 Club Washington DC	The Reverend Horton Heat	After three years, our triumphant return to DC's premier club, again with the Reverend. Great treatment and great sound, but not one of our best performances by most accounts. We made a few new fans, though, which is good considering the crowd probably wasn't in the mood for our ponderous dirges.
Nov 9 2002	Artomatic Washington DC	Echo Mutt Moodroom	We were a little worried at first by the fact that the show was in a strip-mall, and the room we were playing in was very big and very empty (aside from the artwork). Turned out to be a fun show with surprisingly good sound.
Nov 23 2002	Wesleyan University Middletown CT	Party of Helicopters Tunnel of Love Hearts of Darknesses Gregor Samsa Parts and Labor Styrofoam	Seven bands packed into a freezing basement "cafe" in the middle of campus (freezing because many of the windows were broken out). Crowd was small but, thankfully, enthusiastic and lively. PoH and Tunnel of Love rocked.
Nov 24 2002	Luxx Brooklyn NY	Party of Helicopters Tunnel of Love The Tallboys	Decent show. Decent turn-out for a Sunday night. Tunnel of Love ruled.
Nov 28 2002	Grandrokk Reykjavik Iceland	Fidel	Nice, small club. Plagued by our usual technical difficulties, we played to a small but enthusiastic crowd.
Nov 29 2002	Grandrokk Reykjavik Iceland	Minus	A much better show than the previous night. Still had some problems, but there were twice as many people, including some who had been there the previous night. At both Iceland shows, several in the crowd showed their appreciation by hurling their empty glasses at our feet, sending shards spraying everywhere.
Dec 3 2002	Freebutt Brighton UK	Alta May The Star Spangles	Fun show to start our UK tour off. The soundman, Steve, cranked the sound to obscene (and satisfying) levels -- it was the loudest we'd ever been, and it felt great. The Star Spangles were some weird group of youngsters with a complete entourage in tow: soundman, manager, roadie, driver, guitar tech, etc. When presented with the pasta and bread the promoter had prepared for us, the one kid in the band said "Is this it?" and another one said "We have to feed ourselves?"
Dec 4 2002	Arts Cafe London UK	Alta May Lomax	Lomax played some cool angular rock, and Alta May ripped it up. We played a good set, but Jeff was in a living hell of drum problems. The snare head was ripped, the stool couldn't be raised past its minimum height (making the drums at about the level of his collarbone), and the stage came apart, causing every piece of the kit to tilt and sway into the pit opening beneath it.
Dec 5 2002	Moles Bath UK	Alta May Ivory Springer	Great show in a beautiful city, with super-cool promoters and people at the club. Ivory Springer were a tight Shellac-y band. Alta May rocked hard. The crowd was totally into everything. The only downside was that we had to load out before the last chords had finished ringing: we had to make it to the ferry 154 miles away before it sailed for Ireland. With Paul Drake keeping the needle pinned at 95mph, we made it with literally not one minute to spare.
Dec 6 2002	Pine Lodge Myrtleville Ireland	Alta May	Definitely the coolest place we've ever played: a quaint bed and breakfast right on the beach. After a good nap in our room, we were fed by Mick, the proprietor, before coming downstairs to the bar to play the show. Hot showers were only a few steps away after the rock.
Dec 7 2002	High Stool Limerick Ireland	Alta May Rest	While Pine Lodge was the coolest venue, this was the best show of the tour. A good-sized bar, a packed crowd, and a high-energy set from all three bands. Possibly the biggest Apes crowd to date (at least when we weren't opening for some big band).
Dec 8 2002	Whelan's Dublin Ireland	Alta May	Terrific sound and an absolutely beautiful venue run by awesome people; unfortunately, a small turn-out kept the show from being as good as it could have been. Next time should be better.
Dec 9 2002	West 13th Bar Glasgow Scotland	Alta May The Grease Monkeys	I think there were 12 people at this show. Luckily, the food nearly made up for the lack of an audience.
Dec 10 2002	The Masque Theater Liverpool UK	Alta May Purple Gekko	Alta May delivered an awesome set on guitarist Erik's birthday. The venue and sound were great, but attendance was disappointing, much like Whelan's. Liverpool was a cool city, though.
Dec 11 2002	The Social Nottingham UK	Alta May Designer Babies	Great show in a cool little bar/club. Designer Babies played a cool if weird set of quiet passages and Creole vocals punctuated by blisteringly fast bursts.
Dec 12 2002	Sheffield University Sheffield UK	Alta May St Rose	Phenomenal sound in a venue that seemed way too big for us. Luckily, being in the Student Union meant a couple hundred or more students filled up the room after seeing Primal Scream upstairs. St Rose played some catchy rock/pop, Alta May sounded amazing, and apparently we were absolutely deafening. Yes!
Dec 13 2002	The Garage London UK	Alta May Mclusky	The last show of the tour was a great one. Big crowd (presumably there for excellent Welsh rockers Mclusky), more loud and clear sound. UK soundmen definitely seem to crank the PAs more than Americans.
Dec 28 2002	Black Cat Washington DC	The Dismemberment Plan Ms Spice & the Malenium Band	Really cool show to end our year on. The Plan sold the club out for the second night in a row. Ms Spice & co. played a great set of infectious go-go, the Plan got everyone dancing, and in between we had a fun set of our own.

Back to Top   |  Back Home

2008  |  2007  |  2006  |  2005  |  2004  |  2003  |   2002  |  2001  |  1999-2000