You get the idea. Basically, it's more of an impossible game of continental hopscotch than a tour.

But, both types have their charms.

Over the course of the first three years Moist were together we spent far more time on the road than anywhere else. We didn't always tour in the most intelligent way and rarely could our early tours be described in terms of the first tour scenario mentioned, but we had an enormous amount of fun and any mistakes made (there were plenty) were eventually treated as part of the learning curve. By the time we were starting to think about recording our second album, the road had become such a comfortable place to be that it was hard, and by "hard" I mean really painfully difficult to decide just when enough was enough; to put Silver away and come home for an extended period of time to write and record.

From the beginning of our first tour to the initial writing sessions for Creature everything we wanted to do, or had to do as individuals and as a band — recording, videos, family and personal commitments, and our ability to commit to a firm time period in which to do them — were conditional to our touring schedule. It got to the point where if a friend asked, "Hey, free for dinner on Friday?" they'd get the answer "I'll let you know Friday afternoon, we might be out of town." Our bags were always packed and by the door. Offered even the slimmest incentive, Moist would go anywhere, at any time, to flog our music. Once even rearranging a perfectly sensible and uncharacteristically seamless string of bookings in southern Ontario and northern New York State to do a show in Britain over the weekend. Suddenly, what was essentially a quiet weekend in cottage country became Friday in London, Ontario, Saturday in London, England, and Monday in NYC. It might sound a bit insane, but that sort of situation came up fairly regularly, and if opportunity knocked, we practically fell over one another in a rush to get the door.

Of course, eventually we decided to head home. Though Silver had been recorded in bits 'n' pieces between tours, we knew that we had to take a different approach to the next record. Still, even after packing it in and spending a few months writing at home in Vancouver, we still couldn't quite manage to stay in one place so we headed for Montreal; lock stock and tour manager.

Our first tour was done with typically limited support. We basically approached our agent, told him that we felt the only way to improve musically was to get on the road and asked nicely if he could help us out. Our problem was this: We knew that the band needed to perform all the time to get tighter and stay that way, but while we had a fair-sized following in Vancouver, if we played as much as we could in town, eventually they'd get tired of us, and burning out your crowd is not the smartest way to create excitement around a band. Even without that problem, there simply weren't enough venues for us to play as often as we felt was necessary.

We were extremely lucky. First, to get enough gigs to make crossing the country even remotely viable. Secondly, that our friends (the ones we hadn't hired... yet) were willing to loan us the money to buy a van. And finally, because we managed to spend the next month-and-a-half stuffed into the back of a Ford Econoline with very little money, not a speck of road experience between the lot of us and at times no clear idea where our next gig would be, without tearing each other into tiny bleeding pieces. Now all we needed was some way to convince people they should come to see us play.

Our strategy was simple: arrive in town the night before the show, if possible, and travel around to as many bars as we could, befriending everyone we could, handing out stickers and begging people to come to our show. Surprisingly, it worked pretty well. We had one variety of shirt, our independent tape, enough shows to get us as far as Toronto and more good luck than we probably deserved.