I’ve been touring a lot, and I don’t always know how to get around. Google Maps on the iPhone is pretty helpful with that.
I wish records got made faster and looser with less thought in them, but since touring is so much more profitable than records, you spend so much time on the road that it’s hard to work on them. And the records get further and further apart.
Over a year’s time, I felt like I squeezed in five years of touring experience, which was a really huge help moving forward.
For me, the exhausting thing about touring is the sitting around, which is why working on my concert music is really great – and also seeing concerts and seeing friends and, whenever possible, getting out to see a museum.
I’ve never done stand-up; I came via small-scale touring theatre, through the Royal Shakespeare Company, the National Theatre, then I got employed on that as an actor who had a humorous sensibility.
What I really care about is writing… Some people feel about touring the way I feel about writing, which is, ‘Whoa, I can’t believe I get to do this as a job.’
Mental health is personal for our whole band. As touring musicians, self-care can quickly become make it or break it on the road.
When I’m not touring, I really don’t leave the house.
Hopefully after a year or two of touring around eventually we’ll just be The Blanks. We do pretty much everything we do on ‘Scrubs’ in our show, but it’s not presented as Ted’s Band.
I didn’t know what to expect when we first started touring behind ‘Southeastern’ because you don’t want to lull anybody to sleep or lose their attention. But it’s really been incredible how the crowds seem to be just as excited for the slow, sad songs as they are for the old rockers.
