The Shirks at The Odditorium in Asheville, NC. Photo courtesy of the band.

It’s baaaack! Our first tour diarists of 2013 are local garage rock standouts. The former Three Stars subjects don’t even play enough for our liking in D.C., but they always provide a raucous beer-soaked time, so we greatly anticipated their jaunt through the rest of the country. They’ll be sending us entries and photos every couple of days from the road.

The Shirks’ merch table. Photo by Ned Moffitt.

Ned Moffitt writes:

4/6 Bristol, VA/TN

We kicked off the first night of our spring 2013 tour on the Virginia side of State St. in historic-and-happening Bristol, where Jimmie Rodgers and the Carter family cut the first modern country discs for RCA 86 years ago. The austerity and relative isolation of the town remain in aging mannequins staring out of dusty storefront windows flanking the main strip.

An out-of-business coffee shop hosted the show, and attendance was sparse. A few enthusiastic skinheads participated in a small mosh pit, and the promoter handed us three Coors Banquet Beers and left for our pay, never to return.

That said, the donations to the band were generous and a beautiful and hospitable esthetician and her soon-to-be ex-husband put us up for evening on their couches. We briefly drank at O’Mally’s, an Irish sports bar patronized by Eminem look-alikes and juggalos rather than Gaelic athletes.

4/7 Asheville, NC

Asheville, NC is a beautiful college town nestled in the Smoky Mountains, and is home to a handful of colleges I’ve never heard of. It attracts hemp enthusiasts and middle class retirees from all over the East Coast.

Ned Moffitt from the Shirks in front of the Ryman in Nashville, TN. Photo courtesy of the band.

We killed three hours walking around a downtown packed with an exclusive combination of antique stores and coffee shops; it was nearly impossible to find a store that sold a pen with which I could write this entry. Luckily our show was in West Asheville.

We found good bookstores, reasonably priced record stores, and cheap good food. The audience seemed to enjoy watching us play and we found an accommodating host for the evening.

The highlight: an intoxicated gentleman with a ping pong paddle in the elastic of his pants approached two band members in front of the venue, under the impression we were already acquaintances. Aside from Rage Against The Machine, he confessed a general dislike for rock ‘n’ roll because of the “victim” role most bands assume. In no time his cab arrived, and he expressed his love for us before disappearing.

4/8 Nashville, TN

The beauty of touring the south lies in the lower cost of living: cigarettes cost half the price, gas prices fall, and young music enthusiasts can afford to rent large houses. These affordable conditions attract many interesting refugees from all over the country.

Right now we are staying in a large group house watching “Toddlers and Tiaras” on cable after playing our show at Nashville’s Stone Fox. The show was a pleasure, and we ran into Red Onion’s Josh Harkavay and his wife Allyssa who happened to be in town on vacation.