Circus Maximus with Imminent Sonic Destruction 2016 

September 2, 2016 – Reggies, Chicago
September 3, 2016 – Hard Luck Bar, Toronto
September 4, 2016 – Cafe Campus, Montreal
September 5, 2016 – Studio @ Webster Hall, New York


Fates Warning with Imminent Sonic Destruction North American Tour 2015

Fri, Oct 9 • Hartford, CT • Webster Theater
Sat, Oct 10 • Worcester, MA • Palladium
Sun, Oct 11 • Poughkeepsie, NY • The Chance
Tues, Oct 13 • Brooklyn, NY • St. Vitus
Wed, Oct 14 • Amityville, NY • Club Revolution
Fri, Oct 16 • Detroit, MI • Token Lounge
Sat, Oct 17 • Chicago, IL • Reggie’s
Sun, Oct 18 • Cleveland, OH • Agora Theater
Tues, Oct 20 • Altoona, PA • McGarveys
Wed, Oct 21 • Dayton, OH • Oddbody’s

ISD’s  Fates Warning Tour Diary at National Rock Review


Pain of Salvation North American Tour 2013

ISD with KINGCROW:

4/28/2013 The 120 Tavern – Marietta, GA w/ Halcyon Way
ISD with PAIN OF SALVATION and KINGCROW:

5/01/2013 Empire – West Springfield, VA
5/02/2013 House Of Rock – White Marsh, MD
5/05/2013 The Marlin Room @ Webster Hall – New York, NY
5/07/2013 Le Cercle – Quebec City, QC (cancelled due to illness)
5/08/2013 Caberet Du Mile End – Montreal, QC
5/09/2013 The Mod Club – Toronto, ON
5/10/2013 Reggie’s – Chicago, IL
5/11/2013 Station 4 – Minneapolis, MN (cancelled due to illness)

 

ISD Tour Blog #1: Pain of Salvation 2013 Tour
You’ve been clamoring for this, even if you don’t realize it. Trust me. So here you go!
This will be the longest one, being the inaugural post. We have a few things to cover, class, so I’m going to get right to it. Grab a beer (or a beer, we’re not giving you options here) and get comfy. First show, Atlanta GA at the Masquerade. VERY cool place. Used to be an old mill, more character in that place than a Tolkien novel.

So anyway, Scott (guitars, prescriptions) had to fly down and meet us in Atlanta for the first show. He had a work commitment that he couldn’t get out of, and he’s a fucking diva, so we were happy to meet up with him and get this tour going OFFICIALLY.

Maybe you didn’t know this, but apparently April 28th is monsoon season in Atlanta. Look it up. The crew at the Masquerade was great, helped us load in and we all got completely soaked. It was hard to be upset about that, however. The reason? WE ARE ON TOUR. You may have missed that part. Oh yeah, one of the crew guys (Nick) was from Flint, so that was cool. Super helpful, great guys at the Masquerade.

So, on to the good stuff. Finally got to meet our Italian tourmates Kingcrow, holy SHIT what a good band. Check them out NOW. Do it. Well, do it after reading this. Great guys, brought us a bottle of chianti from Tuscany! Come on! How can you not love these guys? Also played with two really talented local bands, Halcyon Way and Void of Reason. Good dudes. Met Lane Miller, official ISD Superfan, Southeast Division. Nothing like having someone up front belting out the lyrics to your songs! I think it helped Tony, so that’s a plus as well. We had some technical issues, scheduling snafus, etc. but that’s life on the road, Cage. Life on the road…

With all the things that went wrong, we still had a good show. Made some new fans, sold some merch. Which reminds me, our merch guy for the tour, Clay, is possibly the coolest MF in the lower 48. We’re giving him a ride to the next show where he’s supposed to hook up with Pain of Salvation, but we may try to keep him. He doesn’t eat much, and he hardly sheds at all.

So, we packed up the trailer, headed out of town to find a truck stop to park for the night. That’s when we noticed that we had a SHREDDED tire on the trailer. Yeah. I don’t think the Star Wars action figures necessarily were behind it, but it’s hard to say. They’re too quiet, I don’t trust them. This is really shaping up to be an eventful start to the tour, wouldn’t you say? Well, wouldn’t you? Answer me! Oh, sorry. Well, I think you’re up to date now. Tire fixed, back on the road. Today is a travel day, so we’re going to make some progress, stop and grill some food, and probably get superdrunk (Riley Sheahan style, minus the Teletubby costume, or not, TBD) and crash for the night. You can be jealous, we don’t mind. I’m going to close this first INSANELY long post by thanking Milton and Intromental for giving us this shot, because we would not be on tour (ON TOUR!!!) without him offering us this opportunity. Thanks man! Ok, that’s it for now. We’ll have more, far more brief posts in the coming days. Feel free to ask questions about life on the F’ING ROAD and we’ll answer the ones that we feel like answering. The rest will be cataloged and filed appropriately. So long for now, from somewhere on I-85 in South Carolina!

 

Tour blog #2: Pain of Salvation 2013 Tour

Well well well… Here we are, in Virginia. We had a couple days before we had to play, so it’s all about relaxing and driving, while we had the chance. Both of which are very nice. Beautiful scenery, and being able to stop for a band cookout was great. I have to say, the people we’ve run into at these truck stops so far have been very nice. Southern hospitality is alive and well, I’m happy to report. Dental hygiene, however, is apparently on life support. But I digress.

When we stopped to fix our flat tire, a truck stop employee (Timothy, who sounded EXACTLY like Gomer Pyle) treated us very well, and creeped us out at the same time. Once we got up, had an authentic down home breakfast at Waffle House (had to do it once… Seriously. ONCE), and got back on the road, we were feeling much better. The sun was back out, and the drive was beautiful. We headed for a rest stop to set up and enjoy the aforementioned cookout, and it was then that I realized we are having a pretty damn awesome time. This isn’t bad. The sleeping arrangements and showers are sketchy, but still… TOUR.

So, night off. That means a Team America viewing and a large amount of alcohol. Lets see, what else… We stopped at a Guitar Center for a drum head, took video of a crazy meth head bird lady dancing to music that no one else could hear, killed a homeless guy, officially accepted Clay as a member of the ISD family with an elaborate blood ritual, listened to some Joe Jackson, watched some Tenacious D, you know, the standard road trip checklist.

Tonight we get on with the serious part of the tour. Meet up with Pain of Salvation and Brian, the tour manager, get in the groove and start disassembling the world with our music, a little bit at a time. More tomorrow after the first show!

 

Tour Blog #3: Pain of Salvation 2013 tour

Ok, so where was I the last time we spoke? I think we were on our way to meet up with Pain of Salvation. So you need some updating. Here you go. In Springfield, VA, we met up with BK, (tour manager), Jimmy (tour bus driver and vocalist for Demonseed) and Pain of Salvation. Every one of these guys is cooler than the one next to him. Think about that for a minute.

Time’s up, bitches! So the show. Springfield was awesome. Seriously. Such a supportive crowd, gave so much energy. That made the show arguably the best one we’ve ever had. If any of you ever wonder if it makes a difference whether or not you yell or scream or jump around, I guarantee you it does. Sometimes people stand there and watch stoically like they’re watching a movie. Being at a show, you’re a part of the moment. Live that moment, contribute. You are feeding the band energy, it’s like red meat and all bands eat it up. Unless they’re vegetarians, in which case it’s like… what? Cucumber slices or some shit? That doesn’t really sound as good. ANYWAY. If you like the band you’re watching, SCREAM, YELL, GO CRAZY. You will witness a better show. I promise. And my word is my bond. Ask anyone. Well… ask Scott Thompson. On second thought, just blindly trust me.

This just in! Kingcrow is a really, really good band. Just wanted to mention that. And they enjoy the occasional Jaegermeister, which is fine by me. And Pain of Salvation? Sweet baby Jesus. All I have to say is if you are ANYWHERE near any of these shows, do yourself a favor and get a ticket. If I may be so bold, all three bands on this tour will rock your fucking socks off. Seriously. Bring extra socks. Preferably clean ones, because damn, you nasty. You will not be disappointed.

We’ve been having the time of our lives, and if you’re reading this and are one of the people who contributed to our fundraiser, know that we think about that contribution every single day of this tour, and we love each and every one of you in the manner of your choosing.

Last night was White Marsh, which is outside of Baltimore. Interesting venue, smaller crowd, but there are a few reasons for that. One of which is that it’s very close to the previous night’s venue and a lot of people chose one over the other. Some came to both, which was awesome. We also did an interview after our set, so once that’s online we’ll post a link.

Today is a travel day to Gettysburg, so we stocked up a little at Walmart and the liquor store with Leo (ridiculously awesome drummer for Pain of Salvation and Super Diva) and plan on getting to RosFest and setting up camp for a few days, cooking some burgers and enjoying a long set from Kingcrow tonight. Tomorrow PoS plays there, so we’ll enjoy that and then move on to NYC to continue our brutal, vicious slaughter of North America. By the way, we love you all. More later! We’re heading off to get our spines pierced.

 

Tour blog #4: Pain of Salvation 2013

Well kiddies, it’s that time again. Update time! We’re heading out from RosFest now, and even though we didn’t play, this was maybe the best stop so far. Gettysburg is an amazing town, and having a full-blown festival going really takes the pressure off the bands. Shuttle service, full crew, backline equipment, all of that means that we could relax and pretend we’re important. And pretend we did! RosFest is a really awesome festival, smoothly run, and it’s a perfect location. The Majestic Theater downtown is the venue for bands, and the nearby hotel that most people stay at has an after party each night. So there’s that. And that is good.

So we set up our two RVs (ours and Pain of Salvation’s) in the parking lot of the hotel, had a cookout and threw the baseball around. The perfect weather and beautiful setting couldn’t be passed up. Hung out with Brian (tour manager) and Jamie (bus driver) until he had to leave and get his truck repaired. Turns out one of the air bladders gave out, which is a huge deal. Luckily, this was the best possible time to have this problem, since we had a couple days in one place. So he got that taken care of in a couple hours and we were good to go.

After dinner, we watched Beerfest. If you haven’t seen it, you need to. I’m super serial you guys. Later on, Kingcrow played the after party, tore that place up and then hung out in our RV and had a bit of an after-after party. What a fun bunch of guys.

Saturday, Pain of Salvation was playing at 2pm, so we helped them out and sold their merch, as well as our own even though we weren’t playing. Now, this is part of the coolness we’ve been dealing with – We sold a bunch of our own CDs, even signed some, took pictures with fans and generally had a great time. Didn’t really expect this since nobody could hear us play, we just liked the opportunity to hawk our wares. Nice surprise at the warm reception! The Majestic is an absolutely beautiful theater. Oh! And, to top it all off, Clay (you may remember him from past blogs, I know you’ve been keeping up) got to live out a dream. Check this shit out: Roger, PoS’s rhythm guitarist had to bail on the tour at the last second because his wife had an emergency C section. She was 6 months pregnant, scary scary stuff. Everything seems to be fine now, but the band is doing their tour minus one guitar. Which brings me to Clay. Clay has his own band, Vangough, and is a huge Pain of Salvation fan. So, Daniel (PoS main man) asked him to learn their set and fill in on rhythm guitar. Can you even imagine?! We were almost as excited for him as he was. He did a great job and concealed his boner quite successfully.

A nice side bonus of the early show time was that we had the evening free. So the guys in PoS said they wanted to go into town and check out the sights and have some dinner, and invited us along. Daniel was feeling under the weather, so he went back early, but the rest of us had a great time hanging out and recharging for this upcoming last stretch of shows. Which starts tonight in New York City! More coming in blog #5!

 

Tour Blog #5: Pain of Salvation 2013
ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK: The Quickening

See, I told you blog #5 was coming soon! You lucky little monkeys, you get two in one day. I suppose you’ve earned it.

Well then. How do I start on this one? Extreme highs and lows, all wrapped up pretty-like and placed in a road case full of rabid squirrels. Interested yet? Well, put your shoes and socks on, people, and take a little journey with me to the land of smaller than usual slurpees.

Driving in Manhattan in an RV is sort of like trying to run full speed through a full kindergarten class wearing football gear. You’re worried about destroying everything in your path, but at the same time, the excitement you feel doesn’t escape your notice.

Arriving at the venue, we realized how cool this night could be. Narrow street, historic venue, it was VERY New York. Even though it’s incredibly hectic, it’s an amazing city. There’s really nowhere like it. The biggest issue was parking our buses, since there’s no parking available at the venue. Bacong (our manager) and I had to follow the other bus driver to find a place to park. Big RVs with trailers. In Manhattan. Yeah. We ended up on a bridge along the side of the road (along with several other truckers) and Bacong and I left the RV with PoS’s driver and caught a cab back to Webster Hall. Crazy, but it seemed to be normal here. New York is a topsy turvy wonderland of insane people and widely varying smells.

So the people start to queue up outside, and once Pain of Salvation starts their sound check, Scott and I are free to wander out and across the street to grab a shot of fireball and a quick beer. The stress of driving the RV is magically whisked away by the cinnamony goodness and it’s time to start getting fired up.

We had a minute to have a band moment of focus before going out, and then we proceeded to have our best show of the tour. The place was packed, the energy was STAGGERING and NYC lived up to the hype.

Now, at this point, because you’re so astute, (and honestly, that’s what we love about you. Well, that and your impeccable dental hygiene and love of proper grammar), you’re probably thinking, “I thought you said highs and lows! Make with the drama, bitches!” Here you go. So the PoS bus driver apparently had some kind of breakdown between driving into NYC and leaving the venue to get us to New Jersey for the night. So… He left. While everyone was either running errands or eating breakfast, he called a cab and left. Oh, don’t worry. He left a note. Wished us good luck finding a new driver and said not to call him. It was really quite touching.

So NOW, our bass player Bryan is driving PoS’s bus and our two bands are going all “wonder twins” and figuring out how to make this tour keep rolling without further Spinal Tap jackassery. “Form of, a bus driver!” “Form of, a glass of fucking WATER!” Seriously, why was that one wonder twin always something water related? How stupid. One twin gets to be a fighter jet made out of boobs and money, and the other one gets to be a damn ice cube. But I digress.

To sum it up, the show: great.
The surrounding circumstances: less than great.

At this point, we’re all laughing and making the best of it. The show must go on, and I think both bands are embracing the challenge admirably. And, getting drunk to numb the terror and fear. But rest assured, Canada, we’re coming to give you guys the best shows we can, and seriously, this is a kickass show. Kingcrow has been KILLING it, and Pain of Salvation has been nothing short of inspiring. Get ready!!

 

Tour blog #6: Pain of Salvation 2013 – Take off, eh!

Last we spoke, NYC was in our rear view mirror and the alluring moose call of Canada was beckoning. If you’ve been following along, you might think we’re making some of this up, but seriously you guys, there has been craziness every single day of this tour. And we wouldn’t change any of it. Well, maybe one or two things.

Crossing the border was expected to be an issue for 3 bands from 3 different countries with 2 buses and 2 trailers full of gear. Oh, and due to our loss of a driver in NYC, we didn’t cross until 3:30am. However, we only ended up waiting about 30 minutes before being sent on our way to the land where everyone lives in igloos and eats only what they can kill with their bare hands. At least, that’s what we thought. Turns out we had a lot to learn.

First up was Quebec City. Right about the time we were crossing into the city, we got a call that the show was cancelled due to Daniel from PoS being very ill. While this was bad news, we knew he needed rest so that a string of shows wouldn’t be cancelled. So now, what to do? We’re already in Quebec City… With a night to kill. One word answered our questions and put us on the one way road to unmitigated joy and intestinal distress: POUTINE! A local pointed us to the best place to get it, so we had a great first sample. really good, you guys. We strolled around the beautiful downtown area, ended up in a little local bar to watch Montreal and Ottawa for a period, then headed towards Montreal for the next night’s show.

Montreal. Holy shitballs. I can’t figure out how to describe it in a way that will convey it’s pure awesomenessitude. So I’ll just say, it’s kinda like if all the good things in the world were stuffed into a rocket ship and blasted directly at your face while an Eddie Van Halen guitar solo blared from 10-story speakers.

The show itself was easily the best of the tour so far. Great people with incredible energy, which fed the bands and made everyone step up their game to make it an amazing night. Also, Poutine. I’m just throwing that out there. Maybe it’s unrelated, but maybe YOU’RE unrelated.

Also, we had some time to spend sightseeing in Montreal, and recommend the hell out of it. We took a cab to the Old Port area and our cab driver found out we were musicians, so he spent the entire time singing us selections from his Calypso cd and laughing (ha-HA!!) at every other thing he said. Hilarious. CALYPSO!! Ha-HA!!!

Next up was Toronto. I have to say, we all decided in the least few days that Canada might be our favorite place to play. Such great cities, appreciative crowds, it’s been incredibly cool. After setup we wandered through Little Italy looking for a place to grab a quick beer.

Side note: Canadian beer? Yeah. They know what they’re doing. I recommend St. Ambroise.

We found a place called the Hogtown Pub and sat at a table on the sidewalk. Met Darryl the owner and chatted with him for a while, great guy. Also Christine, our waitress, was super cool. Metal head and huge Rush fan, bummed she had to work and couldn’t come to the show. Darryl, it turns out, plays golf with Alex Lifeson on occasion. All in all, it was a pretty pleasant way to spend an evening. After our show, we went back there to grab a bite and he bought us all shots. Are you starting to see why we love Canada so much? I’ll give you a hint in case you’re really slow. THE PEOPLE.

And beer.

So now we’re on our way to Chicago, and we’re hoping that the US crowd brings it’s “A” Game, because while we were floored by the reception in Canada, we have pride in our country. So if you come to the show tonight, get there early and scream until you lose your voice. Show these bands how we can bring it in America! By the way, I recommend doing your screaming after songs played by the bands. If you just show up at like 5:00 and start screaming nonstop, you’ll most likely be escorted out.

 

Tour Blog #7: Pain of Salvation 2013: The end? Beginning?

Hello darkness, my old friend… By the time you read this, I’ll be dead. Wait. Not dead. Home and recovering. Typo.

The tour is now over, so this is the final installment, and we’re grateful for all of you who followed our progress along the way. Here’s the scoop:

CHICAGO. Holy shitballs. Chicago brought it. We were figuring that any other shows would be a tiny bit of a letdown after our experiences in Canada, but we just kept getting surprised along the way. First of all, ISD had a LOT of friends show up at Reggie’s, along with some wives and girlfriends, which was a huge boost to our morale. So nice to see so many familiar faces. And Reggie’s! What a cool venue and what a great crowd! Most of them hung around until the very end of the night. Like after curfew, when the PA was off and the lights were on. Which could have something to do with the fact that Pain of Salvation played an extra song during this time, letting the crowd sing since the PA was off. Pretty magical moment, one of those “I was there when…” moments, and a great way to end the tour, even if we didn’t realize it at the time.

Which brings me to my next point. Chicago was supposed to be the second-to-last show. Daniel’s condition kept deteriorating as the tour went on, and the last trip to Minneapolis started to be in doubt immediately after the Chicago show. The decision was made early in the morning to cancel, and as much as everyone hated it, there really was no option. Pneumonia isn’t something to mess with. So we ended up crashing for a few hours, then meeting on Saturday with PoS and Kingcrow to say our goodbyes and have one last “end of tour” get together. We all spent a lot of time together and worked our asses off to keep the tour rolling, so we wanted to reminisce, take a lot of pictures and have some more laughs before scattering to the four corners of the earth. I can’t imagine having a better group of guys to be on this tour with. Both of the other bands were just tremendous, and there were some great friendships forged over these few weeks. Thanks guys!

We all really wish we could have made it to Minneapolis and kick the last show in the ass, there were a lot of people waiting for it. I know all the bands are very sorry about letting them down, we all talked about it. Everyone seems to be very understanding, however, and we all appreciate that.

This experience has been one of the best any of us has ever had. So many things packed into these two weeks that we’ll never forget. Even with the insane amount of things that didn’t go according to plan, we made great new friends in PoS and Kingcrow, and pretty much laughed our dicks off every day of the tour. Figuratively speaking, of course. Although, I have to say, we never did a “head count” if you know what I mean. So you never know…

I know this post hasn’t been as funny, but it just seems more like a time to be grateful for the experience, and especially grateful to all the people who showed up to rock out at these shows! You guys all exceeded our expectations, and we made new fans and friends at every stop. There’s absolutely nothing better than that. It sounds like a cliché, but there would have been no tour without people caring about the music and looking for new bands to experience and tell their friends about. Live music is such an amazing thing, there’s nothing like the relationship between the musicians and the audience. Magic.

Can’t wait to do it all again!

 

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