Whoops.

We were all just laughing so hard!! That was so funny.

We walked into the hotel a back way. We had come in the front earlier. So I guess we were a little turned around. Once we got up to third floor, we all looked at each other to see who remembered what room we were in. I thought it was 316. Miguel thought it was 317. It's 2:30am... Hootie and I both very quietly tried our keys in 317. No go. Red light.
So we then very quietly tried our keys in 316. Nope. Another red light. Then we all burst into laughter. :) Where the heck is our room???

Hootie said, "Wait! I know I put the 'Do Not Disturb sign up" and then someone said, I think it was 307??? So we walked all the way down the hall, around the corner.... and THEN things started looking familiar. There was a 'Do Not Disturb: sign on 307, and Hallelujah! Our key worked! :) Whew. Sooooo funny.

I'm surprised that hasn't happened more! I mean, we stay in a different room every night. But usually one of us remembers where we are!

Tonight we played at Wild Wing Cafe in Asheville, NC. It was another REALLY good show. (other than Halloween, which was INSANELY PACKED) It was the most packed show we've ever had there before. There were quite a few repeats, but a whole lot of newbies at this show. It's fun at a sports bar during March Madness :) Everyone is SO hyped up for the games, and then we just get to be the afterparty :)

We had a few mishaps, though. As James was setting up his drum throne - he noticed it was busted. So he ended up having to play in a folding chair with the rug I normally use folded to give him a little more height.

Miguel had a rough night, too. His guitar amp kept shorting out. I modified the set a little bit to try to cover. We ended up playing all of "Never Call Me By My Name" without guitar. But at least I can play fiddle on the whole thing since Hoot sings it!

He checked all the electrical hook-ups, they were all fine. So he figured it was the amp itself - he even switched some tubes inside the amp... but it kept happening the whole night.

At the end of the night, he plugged his guitar into my amp, and YUP!!! It's his guitar. At least he knows the problem. We're about to go on a band "spring break" so he'll have time back in Nashville to get it fixed!

But other than the technical difficulties, it was a great night!

At the very beginning of the night - before the show had even started, this little boy named Tyler came up to me and handed me a crayon and piece of paper (that he had already drawn all over). He asked for my autograph :) I autographed the paper, and then I asked him if he wanted a poster. He was really shy, but when I asked that, he nodded so big that he shook his entire body!!! :) So sweet.


Fred is one of my favorite bouncers. He always takes such good care of us. And he definitely did his job tonight. One guy had to be taken out of the bar for taking a swing at another customer (scary). And another poor guy passed out sitting up at his table during "Devil Went Down To Georgia". I had a hard time concentrating on the song because people were slapping him in the face trying to get him to wake up. It took them a good 20 minutes to get him back to a point where he was coherent. I had NEVER seen that before. I thought Fred was gonna have to carry him out of the bar!


These guys got SOOOOO excited when we sang David Allan Coe. He was playing next door at the Orange Peel tonight, so I sent it out to everyone who couldn't go to the concert, but came to see us instead :) I don't even think they noticed there was no guitar on the song - they were singing too loud!!! One of the guys even stole one of my posters off the wall and had me sign it :)


I LOVED this couple!! They were so complimentary of my originals, and they said they liked them more than the covers we were playing (and they knew EVERY WORD to the covers we played tonight). So yeah, these 2 rule. :)


The guy to the right of me asked me when I was playing Ft. Bragg. :) Ummmm... can you say coincidence!?!?! Ft. Bragg booked us 2 days ago for next year!!!


Hootie sang "Free Falling" tonight. A bunch of people wanted to buy cds and t-shirts, and we had already done all of Hoot's songs in the set. I called "Free Falling", cause I figured they could vamp on the intro. But Hootie started singing, which I had never heard him sing that one before!!! And it was a good thing, cause it took me the whole song to take care of everyone!!! :)

And in other news, my agent kept texting me today. We had 63 forms today (basically bookings) - 34 schools and 29 military bases, and it is only day 2 of the conference. Ya'll, that is NUTS! He said it was more than double of any other act so far. That blows my mind!!! I don't know what was so different about this conference. But everything just came together. And the military is being so great to us. They are already talking about shows that I am bursting to talk about. But I'll wait until everything is official. It's so great to know we'll have work for another year. We were nervous going into this conference because we know that everyone is suffering budget cuts, and you just never know.... But we have shows on the books now until July 4, 2010. And I know Ari - this is only the beginning! He'll get on the horn. In our experience with past conferences - most of the booking happen later anyway. So yeah. Life is WONDERFUL right now. But now I need to go finish all these new songs so we can get a new project recorded. :)

Peace. Love. Fiddle. And the right hotel room.
~natalie