"Thank you Cleveland, we love you, goodnight," as thousands of adouring fans scream at the top of their lungs begging for music. Girls and guys throwing personal garments up on stage, people passing out from excitement, legions of people just going crazy to get one more glimpse of Riot-A-Go-Go......well, that's how it went in my dreams in the van, on the way to Cleveland. Cleveland has the distinct honor of being the poorest city in the country, as was pointed out by several people at the show, which was suprising coming from Detroit. Pretty much Cleveland is like Detroit, but with more people, less abandoned buildings and store fronts.
For the evening we played at The Hi-Fi club, a mid-size club in a suburb of Cleveland called Lakewood. We got to the show and did the usual hurry up and wait routine that we're used to by now, chatted with the other bands and Jennifer, who set up the show. After hearing from someone how LA was the hotbed of punk rock and that he was going there to pass out CD's of his band in Hollywood, I wanted to puke. First don't talk about a city like it's the greatest thing in the world when you haven't been there, you need to live there first, not visit, but live because it's a different ballgame when you live somewhere. Second, LA blow's in my opinion and has a derth of pop-punk bands already and doesn't need/want anymore and furthermore, Hollywood hasn't been a hotbed of punk rock since The Weirdos, The Dickies, X, The Screamers, The Runaways, and a coked out, slutty version of the Go-Go's in fucking 1977!!!!
Anyways, I digress....................
So, The Lockhearts went on first and were a cool, local indie/mellow rock band and played very well. They didn't have a bass, just two guitars and a drummer which was interesting. We went on third and played awesome, we totally kicked ass that night. Nova did a phenomenal job of being the upfront rockstar and was always going into the crowd and doing some cool moves and was so fun to watch. Casey's rocked out with some moves of his own and as always was a rock on bass. We had a total blast and was a great fucking night, people dug it and were very cool. The last band were another really cool local band called Kill Shawns Head. We really enjoyed them and they were super cool.
It was a great night for us in Cleveland, the funny thing about the whole night is that we drew more people than the local bands. Which is amazing to me that people in fucking Cleveland a) know who we are b)did the research to find out about us c)and came out to the show to support us. I mean, that blows me away and we're so grateful for that. Thanks so much to Jennifer at Starloft, she rocked, a super cool person/promoter, who actually promotes the shows she sets up, goes to the shows she sets up, and talks to the bands she booked, she definatly gets the gold star promoter award this tour so far. Thanks to everyone who came to the show and helped us out, have a rad day, on to Philly.

Matt