Their venue burned down in Boone, N.C., They played to a crowd of more than 100. They played to a crowd of less than 10. They were greeted by a shotgun-wielding man in the mountains while attempting to find another venue, a house party thrown by people on house arrest.
Still reeling from their summer experiences, members of local Afro-Latin band Umoja Orchestra recounted just a few memorable moments in their first-ever three-week summer tour throughout the East Coast.
"I mean, it was our first tour. We mainly went on tour just for the fun of traveling," said Evan Garfield, Umoja drummer.
Garfield, a UF senior, said he volunteered to book most of the 12-member band's nine shows, and bass player Michael Pedron, a UF senior, recorded the revenue from the concerts and merchandise sales.
"Next time around, I would probably just be a little more selective about booking shows," Garfield said.
For transportation, the band used a seven-passenger "soccer mom" mini-van, a five-passenger green Volkswagen Passat belonging to Pedron, and a rented U-Haul trailer to hold instruments.
The band lodged with friends, relatives, godparents, friends of family ¾ anyone who would lend floor space. It financed the trip through profits made from its past local shows.
Umoja singer and UF senior Natalia Perez said through the entire cramped adventure, the band got along fine, even when five members sat through a 20-hour trip in Pedron's car to make it home from Boston without stopping overnight.
Despite the tribulations and mountain-like bumps along the way, Garfield said he and his bandmates thought the tour went well.
He said Umoja played a sold-out show at the Knitting Factory in New York City, which more than made up for the money spent on the tour.
Yet Perez and Garfield agreed that the best show for the band had to be Boone, N.C.
"I think the Boone show was most like a Gainesville show because everybody was really dancing, and that's kind of what happens here," he said. "So I think that felt the most at home to us, which is unexpected because it's the most small, little, remote town."
Though, Perez said no matter the size of the crowd or the atmosphere, it was important for them to play their best show every time.
"Most of these people had never seen us or never heard of us, but we were used to the Gainesville crowd," Perez said. "We don't even have to talk to them. They get excited even before we start playing."
And as for the low points, Garfield and Perez joked as they elaborated on the band's so-called horror stories. Both described Umoja's experience in Asheville, N.C., and why the band ended up playing a show to fewer people than there are members in the band.
Garfield said Umoja advertised on craigslist.org to find venues in Asheville. He said the band offered its services for free in exchange for a place to stay.
"So I get this call from this restaurant called The Calypso II, and this lady's like, 'We're not normally opened on Wednesdays, but we want you guys to play here it's an African-Caribbean restaurant,' which seemed right up our alley," Garfield said. "Little did we know, it was really weird."
Perez said the woman described an "incident" that occurred a year ago and caused a decrease in the restaurant's once steady business flow.
"So I Googled it, and somebody was shot and murdered there like a year prior to this," Garfield said.
Saxophonist and UF senior David Borenstein said the owner of the Calypso also almost refused to let Umoja's friends in because of the venue's 30-and-over age restriction.
"In an effort to curb violence in their club, they made it a 30-and-up club!" Borenstein laughed.
Despite the slaying, Garfield said the band decided to play at the Calypso.
The three also explained Umoja's encounter with a nearly trigger-happy "mountain man" and a lackluster jam session for random people living in a trailer on house arrest in Asheville.
Perez said the members got lost on their way to a house party they were invited to play at, barely escaping a crazed man defending his land against trespassing.
"Most of the good stuff happened in between shows," he said. "That's just hanging out, you know, in other states. That's just what's fun."
Most of the band members were present at all the concerts, with Sebastian Lopez on vocals and guitar, Natalia Perez on vocals, Michael Pedron on bass guitar, Evan Hegarty on keyboard, David Borenstein on saxophone, Adam Finkelman, Michael Claytor, Scott Bihorel and Evan Garfield on percussion and Micah Shalom, Jason Prover, Keegan Jerabek on trumpets. Former band member Doug Fischer joined the band on trombone for its New York City show.
After the tour, the band members split for the summer and reunited within the past week.
"Going on tour is very humbling because you learn to enjoy yourself, even without the audience there," he said. "Even if there's five people there because those five people haven't heard you, so it's still important for us to make a good impression on those people because that's the only time they'll hear our band, at least for a really long time."
Soon, Umoja will start composing new music for a new album and play in the Real Big Deal Festival on Sept. 13. But Garfield said the memories and lessons from this first tour, such as making a good impression, even if you're just playing for yourselves, will stick with the members.
"Nobody is banking on this band for a career or anything, but I think a lot of people in the band have the mentality that if something arises because it's a good opportunity, people are kind of willing to maybe enjoy this while it lasts and try to like just go with the flow of it," he said. "We're not trying to get signed or anything like that: We're just trying to move with it."
