Is This La Guardia?

13/3/2007 - Travel Day


The alarm rings at 5.30am, which means I must have had a good three hours sleep. I had every intention of being in bed by midnight, but the excitement was simply too much - and my socks were taking ages to dry. Ian Hunter perfectly encapsulates "the buzz" most blighty's experience on the eve of a trip to the States in "Diary Of A Rock Star." In it he talks of feeding his cats and doing laundry on the eve of a Mott The Hoople US tour and the overwhelming anticipation of what lay ahead. He took mandrax to summon the land of nod, I only had a Tesco brand sleep aid. Oh America, here we come! You bought Dido several houses, you put the drummer of Coldplay in The Times rich list and now we have our sights on you.

Arriving at Heathrow, we realise that we are in actually a bit late. We get fined £60 for having an overweight keyboard flightcase at check in and end up sprinting to the gate. Still, at least we shall be traveling with Virgin Atlantic, surely the best economy cabin service known to man. It is an early morning flight, so a decent adaptation of a full english breakfast is served, although the drinks trolley is slow to materialise. Still, Garo befriends an air steward who upon hearing we are flying onwards to SXSW in Austin, gives us a carrier bag full of beers so we don't have to pay for drinks from the tight fisted American Airlines. On behalf of us all - thank you.

Mr Joe Bennett, Brooklyn resident and the man with the plan, greets us at JFK offering Burrito's and sporting a rather fetching haircut. We await news of the connecting flight to Dallas, as it keeps getting more and more delayed. Memories of SXSW 2006 come flooding back, when we got stranded in Atlanta. Bloody airports...Once finally onboard the American Airlines crew offer us free headphones to watch the latest Ben Stiller movie, by way of compensation for the delay. They usually charge $5 for the privilege. I decline, although think I got the general jist from watching with the sound off and can say with almost certainty it is "whack."

We get as far as Dallas, safe in the knowledge we're at least in the right section of America - the bit in the middle. Just a short hop to Austin, and Goldrush will be home and dry. More delays...we're stuck in airport purgatory - cold departure lounges, tired faces, water fountains...finally the call comes and we board our third aircraft today. One of the funny things about SXSW is that if you're getting a flight to Austin around these dates, the person on the plane next to you is almost certainly in the "biz." I get talking to a nice chap called Dave, a radio DJ and plugger from Boston (MA, not Lincolnshire). His knowledge of British Indie is astounding - he has two Goldrush tracks on his ipod, and knows all about the tiny label imprint my first ever band signed to. Crazy! Before we know it we are touching down in Austin, trying to locate our instruments amongst hundreds of others at baggage claim, and in a cab to our amazing host Greg's. I look my watch and realise i left my flat well over 24 hrs ago. No. Sleep. Til Austin.