Local quartet The Fluoride Program has been out east this month, supporting their latest album, Roadside Flowers. And people are really responding to their smart pop. Aren't new fans great? Well, yeah, except for when they hijack your tour van for an unauthorized joyride through lower Manhattan. Here, Fluoride's trapsman Steve Bekkala gives us his monomanias from the road.
5. Indiana? Terrific shows in South Bend and Bloomington, an all-night dance party, and an evening spent sleeping inside a slaughterhouse — yes, Indiana definitely ranks as a new favorite state to play. Something's in the water down there.
4. Add alcohol and stir: One night on tour, a seemingly normal fan morphed into Mr. Hyde as the evening and alcohol wore on. We napped uneasily as he commandeered our van as his personal hansom cab.
3. Tour van/clown car: In New York City our navigator — the sudden psycho from No. 4 above — decided to lead us down to Battery Park, then haphazardly across lower Manhattan, turning a 20-minute drive to Queens into an arduous misadventure. We had also crammed seven people inside the van. Plus gear, plus luggage.
2. Muqueca's Restaurante: This Cambridge, Mass., gem has some of the best Brazilian food we've ever had. The feijoada completa is particularly fantástico.
1. The Pitts: Best Monday gig ever. With the help of honorary FP booster Jerome Bettis, we helped unite two proud Rust Belt cities. It was like our own Super Bowl.
CD release party, Saturday, Feb. 25, at Lager House, 1254 Michigan Ave, Detroit, 313-961-4668.
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