Sky Pilots

Friday night came on like a worn out t-shirt. Having peeled themselves off their beds for yet another day of work, it was good to know that rock was on the rise. Sky Pilots got the call officially at 12:15 a.m. Friday morning about the possibility of playing a show that night. What was known was that it was in celebration of the Conspiracy of Beards who were having a CD release party at Amnesia at 7 p.m. and this was the after-party. The show was confirmed at 9 a.m. over e-mail and all Pilots eagerly answered the call. Work ended and each Pilot fueled for the fight. Pat and Brendan ordered Indian. Bill ate Metate and Mike ate boring refrigerator born leftovers. 6:30 p.m., show is confirmed with a cryptic message to show up at 10 and ask for Dan or Dave. The Pilots quickly tightened a couple loose screws, formally agreed to play a Black Sabbath cover, and rolled to the show in style, riding in vanny and sitting on chrome.

And then there was the Cyclone Warehouse. Proudly facing the Bay and a visible affront to the creeping progress of San Francisco’s revitalizing shipyards, initially it felt more like breaking into someone’s urban barn after hours and taking advantage of their absence to party in their sweet city space. The rumor was that this place was “legendary” but even that does not fully describe the excitable mood in the air, nor the giant growing crowd of people, nor the feeling of absolute freedom that circulated this evening throughout Cyclone. There was something too DIY about the whole evening already and believing that all of this was to good to be true, no one wanted to get too out of control or spoil this perfect secret. Soon though, this mindset was outrightly abandoned as first came shouts to move vehicles for the buidling of a giant bonfire, quickly followed by a torching rock fueled opening performance by Ghost Mansion’s very own Sky Pilots.

Tonight was a rather aggressive performance for these boys as they blazed the stage with furiously tight riffs and rode the snake when it was necessary to let the dedicated crowd breathe. Sabbath appeared followed by a punishing version of “Time Gunner,” much to the delight of our Thread productions’ super bros Low Red Land. Overall Bill, Pat, Brendan, and Mike were collectively victorious in their rock campaign and not too overwhelmed by how incredible this space was to simply play a tight rock show.

The Conspiracy of Beards, having fueled up on cold beer and awesome snacks, then regaled the crowd with a few choice Leonard Cohen tracks. Touched By A Janitor then took the stage, completely punishing every inch of Cyclone Warehouse with their spitfire guitar riffs and spastic shifts in rhythm. The crowd was enthusiastic and returned to the bonfire ready to celebrate rock freedom.

And celebratory we would remain for the rest of the evening, stuck between illegally parked cars on a newly constructed railroad bridge and a warm fire. There, in the shadows of giant overhead Gantry cranes and illuminated shipping docks, cell phones were tossed into the fire symbolizing a momentary separation from the reality that is the rest of San Francisco on this cool Spring evening. Something felt right about the entire evening, and this righteousness was solely capitulated with a late night order of 6 Tender Crisp sandwich meals from our very own BK on Bayshore. Oh and the TCs had pickles on them, making the late night food run nothing less than a total jam.

Photos from the evening’s performance.

Oh my, we should be ashamed, and we are. The site looked like total shit for awhile because Bill ignored warnings from the hosting company. Oh well, we’re back. Be on the lookout for a big update soon.

The biggest news is that we recorded a new record in February and March at Louder with Tim Green. He’s a great guy to work with, and an amazing engineer. The mixes sound hot. It’s being mastered right now down at Golden in Ventura. We’re looking at a release date of sometime in June or July.

In other news, our buddy Brendan Sheehan, of Everlasting Arms and Dame Satan fame, has signed on as the newest member. He’s playing second guitar and making space noises. Welcome aboard.

Stay tuned, big things are about to happen.

Apologies for our dormant web site. I keep trying to convince our throngs of fans that “less is more” when it comes to site updates, but no takers. This same line of thinking was sadly lost on my last few girlfriends, too.

Down to business: Three-day stint with Book of Maps next weekend. December holiday show TBA, somewhere in the city. Recording in February. Touring in the spring. After that, who knows?

Be sure to come out next Friday to the Hotel Utah. We’ll be playing with these aforementioned nutjobs, this bunch of crazies, and this marauding pack of sociopaths.

-POW

Sky Pilots will be in Davis tonight at the Turtle House with friends from our nation’s capitol, Cataract Camp, and Elders. If you can’t make the Davis show, all is not lost. Cataract Camp will play tomorow at Jack’s Club, at 24th & Utah, one block east of Potrero. On top of the rock, there will be karaoke, a DJ or two, and Pilot Pat will grill hot dogs and force feed them to anyone, willing or not.

It doesn’t stop there.

On Friday night, it’s going to go off at The Hotel Utah Saloon. First up is Minneapolis band Shotgun Monday, featuring ex-members of Kill Sadie and Calvin Krime. Pilots take the stage next, followed by Turn Me On Dead Man, a stony, heavy, psych-y rock band that plays songs about space. They’re about to put out a new album on Alternative Tentacles.

so, BE THERE!!!!!!!!!!

Summer is officially here, and like always, Sky Pilots will be hitting the outdoor festival circuit pretty hard. Shows in the woods, tunes on the beach, and late-night desert jams, complete with bonfires, stupid costumes, and peyote.

Of course these are utter lies. We don’t have a single festival date lined up, and we’re not that into the outdoors in the first place. For Christ’s sake, Pat doesn’t even recycle. But we do have a full summer of shows at your favorite San Francisco bars and clubs (all safely indoors), plus some out-of-towners (equally well guarded against the elements, we hope).

First up is the Hemlock Tavern with The Drogues and Painted Bird. The week following, we’ll blaze through Sacramento to play with Swims, and destroy the boardwalk in Santa Cruz the very next night. The next week will find us on stage with Shotgun Monday, from Minneapolis, and Turn Me On Dead Man, from right here in San Francisco. Finally, on August 26, this whole “summer” thing will begin drawing to a close with a night of rock at Balazo Gallery with friends Birds and Batteries, Low Red Land, and Tartufi. Show details.

If you looked back at your years on this planet and tried to pinpoint some of your worst decisions of all time, I’m sure that skipping out on Sky Pilots shows would be somewhere at the top of the list. Up there with experimenting with pipe bombs, getting grounded from The Prom with your foreign exchange student date, and playing chicken with locomotives. Thankfully you didn’t blow yourself up or get yourself flattened. Sadly, the foreign exchange student is back in Latvia. Or Hamburg. Or Caracas. Or wherever.

Now you can finally set your life back on course with some summertime Sky Pilots action. Start on July 20 at the Hemlock with local killers The Drogues. Follow up two weeks later across town at the Hotel Utah Saloon with Minneapolis’s own Shotgun Monday, featuring ex-members of Kill Sadie and Calvin Krime. Complete your journey on a hot Saturday night in the Mission on August 26, when we will play with our pals Low Red Land. All the dates and locations are right here.

We’ll be tanned and ready. BE THERE!!!

Welcome back to our trusty Web site. I know there haven’t been too many posts lately, but please don’t think we’re all ill or slaving away at work or caught up in some miserable relationship with a soulless woman. You couldn’t be further from the truth. In fact life is pretty good here at Sky Pilots HQ. We’ve been watching our health and welcoming the sun back into our lives, slowly crafting some new songs that will hopefully be worth the wait. Most of them are about crime.

We’ll most likely return to the Northwest in August for another week, but, as it stands now, there are no plans for a wider national tour for 2006. Although just typing those words gets me excited, so maybe we should do it. Either way, we’ll keep you posted.

But what about a Wednesday night show to help you get over this week’s hump? That we can do.

So get up off your couch, forget about this week’s “Lost,” and head down to the Elbo Room with a crisp fiver. Sky Pilots are up first, so get there early. Lay down your money and move all your different parts to our loud songs and chants. Yell out for your favorites songs. Scream along with us. Drink. Bring a fucking sword to the show if you please. Nothing would make us happier.

Wake up, ready to bomb it to Portland. Long drive ahead of us. Big thanks to Geoff for handling almost all the driving, not just today, but on the whole trip.

Wrong turn in Washington takes us to lonely road through wildlife preserve, then Indian reservation. Speeding ticket. Big time.

Fast-forward to Chris’s house in Portland, where we were to play later that night in the basement. Local two-piece The Ax started out the show with guitar-and-drums fury. Heavy, stoney riffs. Painful drum blasts. Repeat. I feel bad because throughout the rest of the night we would just run up them (Adam and Chris) and yell “The Ax!” right in their faces. Even the next day in the van, I would find myself blurting it out for no reason. That is how good they are.

Next up Sky Pilots. By now you know how that goes. But the Portland crew had never seen, and they kept cheering us on.

The Maps then took over rock duties. Everybody loved it. They are total warriors. We stayed up well into the night drinking keg beer and clowning around. But eventually our bodies got the best of us and we crawled in bed.

The next day Geoff drove us back to San Francisco. Nothing too eventful. The whole trip was way too short, and we’re already itching for another Northwest tour, which will probably go down this summer.

Slept in late and hit the road for Missoula. Pretty drive, with lots of farms, gorges, mountains, and old mining towns along the way.

The club in Missoula, The Raven, was a big cafe that turned into a BYOB rock venue at night. We took the stage at 10:00 or so and played our best show of the tour. Plus the kids were all charged up and happy to hear us.

Next up was Belt of Vapor from Spokane. Holy god these guys are one of the best bands we’ve ever seen. Completely mad, tortured psych freakout. Hard and spooky and riffs for miles. I don’t know what goes on in Spokane that makes people play music like this, but the thought of it is frightening.

Book of Maps, two of whom hail from Missoula, played last. I can’t say enough good things about these guys and their music. Once again they sunk eveyone into their world of extremely technical and punishing rock. It’s a weird but thrilling place, trust us.

After the show things didn’t slow down. There are pictures of things that we would rather nobody see. Ever. Not sure how these things happened.

An early morning departure got us into Portland by midday for lunch, and we headed straight to Chris’s (guitar hero, Book of Maps) pizza joint. He gave us free food and free pitchers of beer, which is better than sex for a band on the road.

Made it to Seattle by the evening. Leslie, the wonderful lady who set up the show for us, was crazy and wonderful the whole night. She must have bought the Maps and us three shots over thirty minutes.

Her husband played bass in the first band, Brother Wane. They were not like us or the Book of Maps, but their twang-rock got the show off to a good start. Congratulations to you, sirs, on the release of your new CD.

The Maps were second, and basically they gunned the entire bar down with their insanely tight and crushing prog assault. How they hell do these guys do it? Night after night of perfect rock crimes?

We played last and it went well, including our new song, Shoot the Pass. It’s long, weird, and fast at times, much like our post-show drive to Ellensburg, Washington. There we ate footlongs from Subway and the seven of us (Maps, Pilots, plus our friend Geoff) piled into a little motel room for the night.