​Rogue Valley's tour diaries are written by frontman Chris Koza and edited by bandmate Peter Sieve. You can read their first, second, third, and fourth installments.

1/20/2012
Butte: 37 degrees. Bearmouth: 38 degrees. Missoula: 40 degrees.
Since the beginning of the week, before leaving Minneapolis, we had received warnings from people who knew of our travels. Everyone we met told us "ridiculous snowfall" awaited us in Missoula and beyond. When we finally rolled in, the knee-high mountains of snow plowed into piles around the downtown was impressive, but the worst of the storm had passed, and the city seemed to be functioning normally. More »

​Rogue Valley's tour diaries are written by frontman Chris Koza and edited by bandmate Peter Sieve. You can read their first installment here and second here, and third here.

1/18-1/19 Rogue Valley Tour Journal: "New Year Resolution"
Minneapolis: 21 degrees.
St. Cloud: 17 degrees.
Fergus Falls: 15 degrees.
Fargo: -6 degrees.
Our intention of beginning a tour immediately following the new year was to escape Winter and discover a milder reprieve, but thus far, this is not the case. No newsflash here, but Fargo is not a tropical January destination.
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​The game is won on the field. Some bits of advice are impossible to follow to fruition. "The game is won on the field, Mallman." This is the kind of hodge-podge rhetoric that makes so much sense, you end up feeling like shit about yourself because you can never live up to it. Life is not won. If anything, death wins.

I first heard the saying when I was editing sports at the TV station nine years earlier. Mr. B came into my office. "Mark, I'm having troubles. I want to meet women, you seem to do well for yourself. Can you help me? I'm lonely." He was a stout man, and the stars were not kind to him. "I can't help you with loneliness, Mr B.," I said, and just that minute hit play on my tape machine. It was a sound byte from then Green Bay Packers quarterback, Brett Favre. "Well, you know, the game is won on the field," he said. I stopped the deck, turned my chair towards Mr. B, and just looked at him. "I guess Brett is telling you to start going to some nightclubs." But I couldn't help him with the loneliness.

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​Days of no consequence. Minneapolis edged November. My turmoil was a batholith hidden deep within. The new record was closer to "The Red Bedroom" than anything I'd written in 10 years. Brad was forced to cancel our mix session in Kentucky, so tracking it round Minneapolis would be a new change. I would need to find a grand piano. I began making calls. On Saturday night, I spun top 40 and guilty pleasures at Club Jager. I missed her, and without ground to stand on, did the irony of "Jenny from the Block" have any bearing on real life? 
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Most of us in the van slept on our two-our northbound drive from Cottage Grove to Portland, OR, where we would be spending the night. I powered us through, since it's my home state and I felt responsible. It was nearly 2:30 a.m. by the time we made the u-turn around the grassy tree-studded median strip bisecting east and west traffic, and backed the van into the narrow driveway at the residence of my parents; the same and only house I've ever known.

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​Paul Schrader wrote the script to Taxi Driver while living in a station wagon. Such is the myth of the suffering artist. But beautiful crazy Van Gogh bastard established the archetype. We might stumble onto a kick-ass something in the morning, but by bedtime, the artist suffers by choice.
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​​Rogue Valley is a Minneapolis-based theatrical folk-pop band who are currently on tour. On the road are drummer Luke Anderson, bassist Paul Engles, keyboardist Joey Kantor, guitar/vocalist Chris Koza and guitarist Peter Sieve. Their tour diaries are written by Koza and edited by Sieve. Read the first installment here.
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​Rogue Valley is a Minneapolis-based theatrical folk-pop band who are currently on tour. On the road are drummer Luke Anderson, bassist Paul Engles, keyboardist Joey Kantor, guitar/vocalist Chris Koza and guitarist Peter Sieve. Their tour diaries are written by Koza and edited by Sieve.

The road is neither glitz nor glamour, it is however plenty of grit, or if you're in the south, grits. But we are starting this West Coast tour in the vast Midwest, affectionally referred to by those in the van as "the crease" of the country. We eat oats here.

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​A millionaire friend once told me, "Mallman, you have two options in this world: crazy busy or dead poor." I corrected him: "Try the music business, you'll be both." 
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