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Happy St. Patrick's Day - 2008 SXSW Report - A MUST READ!!

"Kiss Me, I'm Akbar... I'm The Rockin' Camel" ;)
Posted: March 17, 2008

Rockin' Camel Music Wishes you a Happy St. Patty's Day!

Our owner, Carl Weaver and Manager of Artist Relations, Maegan Garrard, just arrived back to Gadsden, Alabama, after a week on the road. They took the Rockin' Camel Bus out to Austin, Texas to support Bonnie Bramlett during South By Southwest.

Click Here to read a "Rockin' Camel Road Report" from Carl Weaver.











Hey Folks,

We made it to Austin for the South by Southwest Music Extravaganza.

What a trip, when I get back I'll have to tell you about this town in Texas where we stopped to eat. We thought we had entered the twilight zone. Hell, we had!

I wanted to buy Mondays newspaper but I had to buy a Sunday newspaper because they said the newspaper delivery man would not put any other days newspaper in the newspaper box until all of Sundays papers were sold. This turned out to be the least crazy of what lie ahead. In the Sunday newspaper I read how this town had passed a law making it illegal to French kiss a child under 13. That police had arrested a woman for child abuse at a car wash ( she was quoted as saying " I didn't have it on turbo spray!"). That the police department had fired 120 shots at a car in a low speed pursuit. Only 66 of those bullets had hit the car of which only 9 hit the driver and he was not even critically wounded, The paper didn't quote police chief Barney Fife or officer Gump and nowhere in the article had anybody suggested that this might be excessive force or that target practice and gun safety training might be a method to reduce the high cost of ammunition for the police department.

We spent an hour and 30 min. in this screwed up town, most of that time in Penny's Diner at 3 am on Tuesday morning having breakfast with a pimp,his 3 Ho's (2 females and 1 possible Transvestite), an angry bald white supremacist, a white girl who worked at Pizza Hut and who thought she was a black original gangster, her gay friend, a redneck wanna be cowboy, a goth chick and her wanna be lover, 1 angry black woman (the cook) and a waitress whose IQ fell somewhere between her shoe size and her chest measurement. Poor little Maegan is still in shock. The redneck wanna be cowboy got the impression that she was a dirty little whore trying to convince me she was clean enough for me to sleep with. Maegan started to explain to him that what he had overheard was misinterpreted, but she correctly decided to not even bother. He wouldn't have believed her anyway.

Well, that's just the high points. The story gets uglier with the details and stranger as we get lost trying to escape this insane asylum but instead take an unplanned tour of "downtown" as we try to get back to the main road.

It is amazing the things I go through to promote our artists and our label.

Regards,

Carl

SOUTH BY SOUTHWEST NUMBERS

7 -

Days in Trip.
175 - Hours in Trip.
2,152 -

Total Miles Driven.
36 -

Hours Driving The Rockin' Camel Tour Bus.
6 -

Hours Spent Trying To Find A Place To Park The Bus.
4 -

Hours Spent Trying To Find A Place To Turn Bus Around.
0 -

Hours My Trusty Co-Pilot, Maegan, Drove.
26 - Hours I Slept All Week.
12 -

Hours Mark Pucci Slept All Week.
146 -

Hours Maegan Slept All Week.
1,673,147 -

Number of Cars & Trucks in Austin, TX.
1,272 -

Number of Parking Places in Austin, TX.
3 -

Parking Places for Busses in Austin, TX.
6 -

Places I Found to Park the Bus in Austin, TX.
1 -

Places I Parked the Bus That Were Legal (according to the Austin City Police Dept.)
1,700 -

Number of Bands at South By Southwest.
65 - Venues Participation in South By Southwest.
183 -

Number of People I Met.
6 -

Names I Remember.
- Number of People Mark Pucci (our Publicist) Knows.

MISSIONARY WORK
 (who knew my driving a bus would cause so many to pray & repent!)
93 -

Confirmed Number of Drivers (not including passengers) that I Scared the Hell Out Of.
26 -

Confirmed Number of Drivers (not including passengers) Who Found the Lord.
12 -

Confirmed Number of Drivers Who Rededicated Their Lives.
48 -

Drivers Suggested We Go to Hell (we were already in Texas, how close do we gotta get??)
32 -

People Who Felt Necessary to Express Their Opinion of My Bus Driving with an Obscene Gesture.
4,372 -

Times Maegan Thought We Were Gonna Die!