The landscape changed for us on July 24 when we drove from Oregon to California.
En route, we had an unexpected encounter at a rest area. We were getting into our car when 
we saw a van that was painted up and had “Plaid Nation” written on it. There were six or so guys in jeans and t-shirts hanging out around the van, filming and taking pictures of each other. They looked like an indie rock band on tour to us. Always glad to meet other musicians on the road, we went over to introduce ourselves. Turns out they were not a band at all, but dudes who work at a small fancy-pants PR/Branding firm in Connecticut called Plaid. Their recent clients include Janet Jackson and Joss Stone. They were on an annual trip to see the country, meet with others in their field, and generate buzz about their work.
We gave them a copy of Found a Reason and they did an on-the-spot interview of us. They 
used our song “Blues Slip In” and clips from the interview in one of the videos from their tour. You can watch it here. How nice. Browsing their tour website, it is clear that they are excited to be briefly experiencing life on the road. We have toured so much that day after day of diners and motels and rest stops has lost its novelty. So it was neat for me to look at our lifestyle through fresh eyes. I’m glad to say we still enjoy being in motion and seeing new places and randomly meeting people all of the time – all year round. Life on the road has become familiar to us in some ways, though by design it is always delightfully unpredictable.
The Plaid guys are giving free t-shirts to bloggers that mention their tour. Since we already got a free t-shirt in person, perhaps they’ll kick us down some pro bono branding/emerging media help. It could be a great feather in their cap to take a virtually unknown uke-abilly/rock ‘n’ roll duo and build our brand up as big as Janet Jackson’s. Clients would be knocking down their doors after that for sure. Just putting it out there.
