Jeremy Porter Road Blog

Road Blog: Tuesday October 15, 2019 - Dallas, TX

Road Blog
October 15, 2019
Dallas, Texas

Bob took the drive from Wichita to Dallas yesterday, south through Oklahoma then into Texas, through his old stomping grounds when he was a student in Norman. It was rainy when we left but cleared out as we drove through Oklahoma City. We hit the Texas border around noon and worked our way south towards Dallas then veered East towards Mckinney to check out The Guitar Sanctuary – a shop we’ve been hearing about. McKinney is a newer city with an older motif. The store was basically in a castle. We polished off our credit cards and went inside, visions of our worried wives in our heads. We each messed around with a few things – Gabriel and I guitars, Bob a Mesa Boogie bass rig, but alas, we left empty handed. We had a nice chat with Brian Meader about amps, guitars, and Eddie Trunk, who had recently done his radio show from their adjacent venue. From there we zig-zagged back west to our hotel in Arlington, where we checked in, took a few minutes to freshen up, and jumped back into the van to drive into the city.

We played Adair's Saloon two years ago to the day, and it was a crazy, late night with a decent crowd and my friends Jeff and Amy, two of my favorite humans, in attendance. It’s a cool honky-tonk in Deep Ellum, the old entertainment district of Dallas that started as a free-man’s town after the Civil War. We loaded in, ordered burgers (thanks for the tip Mike – they were KILLER!) and a round of Lone Star Beers, set up and ate. Jeff and Amy showed up with big smiles and big hugs, and it was great to see them again, even though a bird may or may not have pooped on my head as I was climbing out of the van when they arrived (I’m honestly not sure, but I thought I felt a little something, and there was bird poop all over the van from the small flock on the telephone line above). Yup, living the life, friends. It was a slow night, the crowd was thin, but fluctuating a little. We played our three sets, had a few drinks with the Whites, loaded out, watched the open-mic hosts do some Jason Isbell and Tyler Childers songs, bonded with the manager, Leslie, about her pet opossum Sneaky Pete, said our goodbyes, and headed back to Arlington for a nightcap and lights out around 1am. The show was a bummer but we had a good time hanging with our friends and playing a bunch of new songs for the second or third time.

This morning hit hard as I climbed out of the tomb, feeling a little worse for the wear, but nowhere near how I felt after our last show in Dallas. I sobered up, we got some hotel breakfast buffet, and we hit the road east, through the city towards the Arkansas line, which we hit at noon sharp. Gabe was in back getting caught up on some podcasts so Bob and I had our own little Alt-Country fest up front for a few hours. We drove through Texarkana (“Twice the Fun!”), Arkadelphia (“A Great Place to Call Home!”) and Little Rock (“Find your Experience With a Southern Accent!”) before turning east on I40 towards Tennessee. The drive was uneventful, the weather was beautiful, Bob tried to make small talk with a woman at a rest area who was wearing a Detroit Tigers shirt, but she had little interest in playing along. We hit Tennessee around 4PM and crossed into Mississippi and landed at our hotel at 4:30, where we are now. They’ve got a little happy hour set up with pulled pork and chicken and a keg of local craft beer that we got into a little bit.

We’ve got a couple hours of needed downtime before we head into Memphis, where we play tonight with Ben Ricketts and Mars Hall Music at The P&H Cafe. Gabe’s wearing his bright green pants which means shit's about to get weird. Last time we played Memphis it was a disaster, so let’s do it right this time and make it a good one!