KAYE – CRAZY TOUR STORIES

In this Crazy Tour Stories segment, the pop artist, KAYE, talks about some of her crazy moments from touring. You can check out the feature, after the break.

Last fall, we had the pleasure of opening for alt-J on their North American tour. We couldn’t have asked for a more welcoming, generous or fun band/crew to tour with, and it was an unforgettable experience to play with them every night. However, traveling in our 10-passenger clown car (read: Sprinter) meant five weeks of chasing their tour bus all over the continent, often sacrificing sleep to drive long hours during the day to arrive on time in the city of our next show. One upside, however, was that there was a delicious catered dinner waiting for us at every venue. Since sleep was such a precious commodity, we at least tried to keep up a modicum of health awareness by eating our vegetables, taking advantage of the juicing machine (oh, the juicing machine!), and trying to maintain a balanced diet on tour.

One time, we found ourselves in the position of not having the luxury to sleep at all between shows, because we needed every waking hour to drive from Southaven, MS, to our show the next afternoon at Austin City Limits. The drive between those two cities was around 11 hours, so we would have to head out immediately after playing and drive through the night to Austin for our 1PM set. We had a great dinner—burgers, green beans, freshly squeezed juice—played the show, and booked it.

When we got to the ACL festival site around 11AM, not only were we running on fumes from a night of no sleep, but it was also punishingly hot in Austin. The afternoon sun was positioned directly overhead, burning up the black floor beneath us and making me feel increasingly like I was going to pass out with every word I sang. San Fermin’s live set is an intensely physical show—everyone is high-energy and jumping around constantly—and it’s a testament to the power of adrenaline that the energy of the crowd, and of each other, pulled us through.

We were all desperate for a good night’s sleep after driving all night and feeling like we’d just played our set on the surface of Hell itself…but shortly after passing out cold at the house we were staying in, I jolted awake with the distinct, horrible feeling that I had to puke. I sprinted to the bathroom, only to encounter my bandmates Stephen (saxophonist in San Fermin) and Aki (guitar player in San Fermin) also sprinting down the hallway with the same horrified look on their faces. We subsequently spent the rest of the night brutalizing that poor toilet by taking turns vomiting into it, revolving-door style.

As luck would have it, what awaited us next was a full TWO-DAY DRIVE from Austin to Tuscon, AZ—but instead of enjoying the breathtaking scenery, Stephen, Aki and I spent the whole drive carsick out of our minds, prostrate on the van benches with plastic bags in hand. Upon arrival the rest of the band had a nice meal at a Mexican restaurant; I took a cab straight to the hotel and projectile-vomited into the first available receptacle. Afterward, freezing and sweating and not having slept in two days, I crashed on top of the covers and fell asleep with all my clothes on.

When we’d gotten our legs back and reunited with alt-J in California, we found out that 13 out of the 24 people in alt-J’s touring entourage had also fallen victim to food poisoning! Through process of elimination, we all deduced that it had been the green beans at the catering in Southaven. So much for trying to eat your vegetables. Maybe Soylent is worth looking into for the next tour…

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