Dan Abbott (Bobby Joe Ebola)
SPB: What is the furthest you've traveled to play a single show (vs setting up a corresponding tour)?
Abbott: Driving or flying? Somewhere around 1997 or so, we were contacted by a private college in Ohio. They offered us $900 to come play in their student events hall. Our tech-bubble housemate had the weekend off and, like a madman, offered to drive us the 4,000 miles round trip in his sports car. Even after paying for gas and a couple of speeding tickets, we came back with enough money to put out a 7".
A couple of years ago we were approached by an English fellow about putting on a free festival in London. We thought it was a practical joke at first, but he was dead serious. He had zero experience with show organization, but he was throwing a ton of money around. And hey, London for free! So he flew us and a bunch of other East Bay bands to London for a single show. Imagine 40 or so drunken weirdos on the same fancy airplane and the same fancy London hotel. It was surreal. I think we were in the UK all of 72 hours.
