Florida - Tampa & Miami

So now I have introduced to you the basics of organising a US tour, I will start telling you about my numerous adventures! I initially set up a list of places that I wanted to visit (generally made up of cities that I have been told were the best places to play music in the US) and the Initial planned route consisted of:

Florida – Tampa & Miami

California – Los Angeles

Arizona – Phoenix

Texas – Austin

Tennessee – Nashville

New York – New York City (who would have thought?!)

As you will learn in subsequent blogs, plans sometimes change!

I arrived in Florida for the first leg of my tour on the 20th of July (yes I do know it is the worst time of year to go to Florida). One thing you learn if you are used to long haul flights is that you generally need a week to really get over the jet lag, so I originally planned myself a week to recuperate. However, as I’ve previously said, things don’t always go to plan, and guess what? It’s a good thing I got that insurance I talked about in my first blog, because by the end of the first week I was sick as a dog and had to take a jolly old trip down to the doctors! (Resulting in another week needed to recover.)

For the benefit of all those who plan to travel in America in the future I will give you a few tips.

NEVER go to the ER unless it is ABSOLUTELY necessary. Hospitals will treat you and give you lots of pills and then send you bills for the next 6 months/year (a little nugget of info I found out from my friend in California who broke his foot last year!)

You will usually be able to find a drop in clinic in the area in which you are staying, they do take British citizens but be sure to take down the American address at which you are staying and your American phone number if you have it, because they don’t like English addresses!

BE PREPARED – a doctors visit is likely to cost you at least $100 per visit so take your credit card with you, and if you have a non/low excess insurance (£50 or less) it may be worth calling up your insurance company before you visit and inform them that you will be making a claim. CHECK YOUR POLICY BEFORE YOU GO! A lot of insurance companies will not honour a claim unless they are informed of expenditure BEFORE it goes out of your account.

If the doctor gives you a prescription, DON’T buy your prescription at the clinic! It is 3 times the price it would be elsewhere. Another good tip – FIND A ‘PUBLIX’ supermarket. If they have one in the area in which you are staying, you can get your prescription FREE! (Always handy)

If you do have to pay for your prescription, go to any supermarket with a pharmacy. (CVS is cheap and generally have a good stock) the doctors will give you a specific drug name but you can often get a generic drug that will do the same job but be A LOT CHEAPER so don’t be afraid to ask the pharmacy attendant for a generic alternative. It could save you a lot of $

SO, now you know, be prepared for every eventuality because its sods law, if you don’t, trouble will be coming to a town near you very shortly!

Now, lets get down to the music shall we? My first tour area was Tampa Bay (no surprises there seeing as it’s where my boyfriend lives) I ended up playing 3 times in the area: 1 private party & 2 Acoustic nights at a little place called ‘The Dunedin Brewery’ a very cool and happening little venue in downtown Dunedin (A small suburb of Tampa). As a musician there aren’t many venues that:

Have a decent sound system
Have a crowd that isn’t made up of all musicians waiting to play or the posses they bring with them

Despite the fact that the Tampa Bay area isn’t particularly famous for its music scenes, I’ve generally experienced that the atmosphere and crowd in many of the venues far surpasses what you would find in most English music venues. I think this is because there is less quality live music available, so when there is an event everyone turns up, unlike the larger city areas (and most places in England) that are full of quality music venues, which spreads their audience thin.

You can watch a video of one of my performances at the Dunedin brewery below.

I also played at a few private events, one of which was a beach session.

MIAMI

I travelled down to Miami on the Greyhound bus, a 7-hour journey on the EXPRESS bus! American public transport has generally been given a bad name in the past. Their train system ‘Amtrak’ leaves something to be desired; (Its expensive, slow and has a very limited range of routes). However, in my opinion, American bus services can be more efficient and at a cheaper rate than English bus transport. I bought my ticket to Miami a week before my travel online and it cost me in total $11 for a one way ticket (approximately £8) which is exponentially cheaper than any transport you would find for the same travelling distance in the UK.

Taking a guitar on the greyhound:

Okay, this was the part that I was worried about, after looking online I was concerned that I would be forced to pay $15 dollars (fee for 2nd checked luggage bag) to store my guitar in the hold underneath the bus. I would have gladly paid this price if I had not been worried about the welfare of my guitar. If I was in England, this would not have been an issue as the hold of the bus never gets above about 15 degrees Celsius; (for my American readers that is around 59 degrees Fahrenheit) this temperature would not risk damaging the wood of the guitar (although you wouldn’t want to leave your guitar at that temperature for more than 24 hours) However, in Florida where the outside temperature gets up to 40 degrees Celsius (104 Fahrenheit) in the summer months, the inside of the bus hold would be likely to get up to about 30 degrees Celsius or above, which risks warping of the neck of the guitar and damage to the wood work (Wood expands in the heat).

Thankfully, when I arrived at the station, rules about luggage size were a lot more relaxed, with the general attitude being: ‘as long as it fits in the over head locker you can take it on board’. Luckily, my guitar did (with much pushing and shoving on my part) fit in the overhead lockers. For those musicians out there I have a very large case (with extensive padding) made to fit a dread-o-naught full-length guitar so most guitars & cases would fit in there easily (especially if you have a soft case).

Acoustic-Dreadnought-Guitar-Gig-bag-Premium_4_1024x1024.jpg

If you want to take your guitar on board just ask the bus driver before you board and on most occasions they are accommodating. Anything bigger than a guitar though (such as a cello) will have to go in the hold. So that is something to consider for any classical musicians out there.

Now I’d like to introduce you all to my tour buddy Louise Parker!

Louise and I met at university and were on the same Commercial Music degree for three years. We have previously worked in a band together named ‘Sweet Escape’ and have also worked on each others solo music in the last year so we are very familiar with each other’s music. When I told her that I was planning a UK tour, she asked if she could join me. For obvious safety purposes, having a tour buddy is a good idea for solo female touring artists, especially when working in a foreign country. However it also provides welcome company when you are travelling on long journeys and breaks up the monotony of being on your own for 6 months!

Louise met me in Miami a couple of days after I arrived at our first hostel: the Miami Freehand Hostel.

The Hostel

Before coming to America, I was somewhat concerned about the quality of the hostels. I have previously stayed in hostels around Europe, some good, some bad, but all decidedly basic and unfriendly places. Upon arrival at The Freehand Hostel I was pleasantly surprised that this wasn’t the case. It was better than some hotels I have stayed in which is a not what I had expected at all. It was clean, bright, trendy and the staff were friendly and accommodating along with the added advantage of a good location - right next to a bus stop to take us in to the centre, South Beach & Downtown Miami priced at $1.25(less than a pound) for a single journey! (SO CHEAP!)

It also featured a large (and CLEAN) pool area, a kitchen for guests to use and a BRILLIANT bar that serves food and drinks most of the day until late. The bar is so popular that it draws in a large local crowd as well as the people staying at the hostel and often features well-known DJs and musicians at special events run at the bar. ALSO a little tip, ask the bar man to make you a custom cocktail, I guarantee it will be entertaining and delicious. (It sounds like I spent a lot of time at the bar now but honestly, I didn’t! XD)

The Gigs

Before going to each city, I researched locations for us to play (open mic’s/acoustic nights or full length gigs). Turns out research proved to be fairly un-effective when if came to Miami. The plan was to maximise our time in each location and play as many nights as we could. Prior to leaving, I attempted to call the venues to confirm that the events were still running. (I bought my self a pre-paid American phone, which I highly recommend) Unfortunately, 9 times out of 10 the bars did not answer their phones, so we headed to the venues anyway, only to find that the events no longer ran or that they just weren’t doing it that particular week. This happened a couple of nights in a row, which is of course very frustrating, and a huge waste of our time and money.

One particular venue turned out to be very reliable and a huge success for us. The name of the venue was ‘Will Call’ and had full raised stage and backline available for musicians. The crowd was friendly and responsive, and the owners (Who happened to be in that night) were refreshingly enthusiastic about music and willing to help us get in touch with various useful contacts they had in other states/cities. On top of this we also sold a bunch of CD’s, which paid for our food for the next week! As a touring musician you rely heavily on CD sales to take the heat off tight budgets, especially if you are playing for free. As is the norm unless you are a well known local artist with an extended following, capable of filling up the venue

This event led to various other opportunities such as working/co-writing with some Miami producers and an offer of an interview with a YouTube blogger. The interview took place before my gig the next day for #Universal Miami which as it happened was also at Will Call. You can watch that interview with Bottles ‘give thanks’ Belafonte on the YouTube video below. You can also watch the video that was broadcasted live via Universal Miami’s website (Again, Link posted below)

Sight Seeing

Everglades – most Americans will say its ‘just a swamp’ but its actually very beautiful and full of interesting wild life. The most famous of which is.…drum roll please…. The ALIGATOR also known as ‘Gators’ (Insert southern American accent) Thoroughly enjoyed this trip and would reccomend it to anyone who visits Miami.

Lincoln road - Packed with shops and people, there are some interesting places to pop in to and A LOT of fancy hotels to Gawp at but not a whole lot else unless you are heavily enthusiatic about the local night scene and/or have a very large budget to waste. A WORD OF WARNING: taking out cash in Miami can be VERY EXPENSIVE - with some machines charging $5 for you to take out cash. so if you find a machine that costs less than $3 dollars, USE IT and I advise that you take out large amounts at a time so you do not need to keep going to the atm and getting charged again. (obviously, try not to carry all of the cash you have around with you if you can help it.)

South Beach - I thoroughly enjoyed South Beach especially going down to the pier point where you can see all the way up the beach. the cloudless skys, crystalline water and white sandy beach backed up with the Miami city scape it all its high rise glory makes for a pretty impressive photo and the sea temeperature is perfect for the sweltering hot miami summer! A WORD OF WARNING: if you are going to go swimming, be aware that there are jelly fish in the water *OUCH!* so just keep an eye out for big purple jelly like things. Nobody wants to be stung on their first day of their holiday!

South beach board walk - Its also fun to cycle the miami beach - South Beach board walk which spans about 4 miles. You can rent Deco-Bikes at many small stations up and down collins, lincoln road and the promenade for:
$4 for half an hour
$6 for 1hr
$10 for 2hrs
$18 for 4hrs
$24 for the day