Chris Arena, drummer for the New York punk band Sister Kisser, recently compiled several years’ worth of essays into a ‘zine entitled We Live In A Van. Volume one is nine different essays. While all are connected by the theme “The road is life, life is the road,” they’re not neccesarily from the same tour or even the same year.
Arena’s musings bring home the fact that, for touring bands, the show is the smallest part of the whole thing. MOst of the stories in here have mor to do with the life of a traveler, meeting new people, running into familiar faces in strange places, and the whole need to travel. As Arena puts it:
“The back alleys of my mind have been paved and are burning for some traffic. They’re waiting, all fresh and smooth, for new journeys, new experiences.”