We survived!!!

Good morning friends,
The last couple of days have been extremely hectic and our tour almost came to a complete stop. After our Thursday show at the El Torreon Ballroom in Kansas City, Missouri we decided to make our way towards Wisconsin when something unexpected happened. It all went down at 3:30 am, I was at the wheel with Matty F navigating when our van started to struggle up a hill, I continued to press the gas pedal down but it wasn't accelerating a few seconds later Matt yells "pull over dude, pull over". I didn't realize what was going on until I looked out my right hand side mirror, the whole van was smoking and the inside began to fill with smoke as well. After pulling the van over we all jumped out and black smoke poured from underneath the van and from the inside. Non of us are mechanics and we don't really have much knowledge when it comes to cars but we knew this probably was going to be the end of our tour. We called the tow truck to pick us up and since we had triple A they towed the van for free but we had to pay for the trailer since that's not covered. We got to a random body shop at 6 in the morning and slept for an hour until they opened, as we waited in the lobby to hear what was wrong we all tried to figure out how to get home. Being an independent touring band is hard because everything is done on our own and the van breaking down is the last thing we need. After a few hours one of the mechanics came out and told us our transmission blew and it would cost us $2,100 to fix. We did not have that kind of money, we looked to our left and right and there was absolutely nothing, empty fields. We told the mechanic our situation and that we absolutely had no way of paying for a new transmission. After about an hour the guy came out and told us they feel extremely bad for us and what we've been through and they would fix our transmission for much cheaper. This was music to our ears, we decided to pay from our band account as well some of our own money we saved up prior to tour to cover food expenses. The mechanics we're so kind to us they even bought us pizza, these people we're just beautiful and had so much heart, we couldn't believe it. Safe to say we made it to Wisconsin in 35 hours and no sleep, we're okay and we decided to continue the tour. Last night we played a last minute show for a charity that supports Invisible Children and we met so many great people! Thank you guys for reading and if you're coming to any of our upcoming shows and could spare any change we would greatly appreciate it! That transmission shocked our band account but we're out here doing this 'cuz our hearts are still in it despite the great financial loss. Thanks for everything guys!!!
Alex
PS! our EP is back in stock at www.smartpunk.com
broken down



van being repaired

Roswell, OKC, St. Louis!!!

What's good St Louis? This is the first time we've had good internet connection since our last post so don't be hatin'!! So, let's recap...Roswell, New Mexico, we got to the city really early to search for some aliens, didn't find any. We found a really cool looking Macdonals though, it was shaped like a space ship. For the record, every single person who lives in Roswell hates being asked about aliens..so, don't do it!! Since this was our first time in the area we had a blast, everyone we met was super rad to us! After Roswell came Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, we played a really gnarly venue called the Factory and we were so excited to see a lot of you that we missed, thank you for coming out! A huge thanks to Bailey and her mom, we love you very much and Sara for housing us, we appreciate that so much. Having Doug on tour was just phenominal, he wipped us into shape and it was sad to see him go, we dropped him off at the airport really early and headed to St. Louis. We've never been here either and I've always wanted to play the Creepy Crawl because I've heard so many great things about this venue. We met a ton of cool people and this city is amazing. I was hoping to meet Nelly but that didn't happen. It's all good, we'll be back here in October so hopefully I get to meet him. We stayed at Matty F's aunt and uncle's house and they took us to this sweet place called the "Sky Zone" check it, everything was like a giant trampoline, walls and everything!! According to Bobby my knees don't work, how lame? Well, that's all, Kansas City tomorrow...come hang out!!!!!
Love, Love, and more Love,
Alex

Don't Mess With Texas

Holla!!! Alex here...again! I'm updating our journal from my sidekick as we drive to our next show at The Rocksteady in Plano, Tx. It's raining really, really hard, we have our hazard lights on and Bobbys driving about 35mph. The "service" roads that run parallel to the highways are completely flooded, some cars are on the side of the road just because the water is too high. So, remember how we mentioned six guys in a seven passanger van? Well, now, there's seven guys in this van, its a real tight squeeze. Our manager Doug flew in from California last night to spend a few days on the road with us, we love him so we don't mind the space he's taking up. If we have to spend a night in this van it would suck, there's absolutely no room to move haha!!! If you're coming to our next few shows and have a place for us to crash please hit us up!!!! That's the update on what's up in our world!
One more thing, unfortunately bad things just keep happening to our merch guy Dave, his camera was stolen last week in Florida and now someone has taken his laptop. He's really upset so leave him some love on myspace or on here. If you're coming out to a show, bring him something to make his day better. Thank you for everything!!!
Lots of love from the van!
Alex

Oh Florida!

Yooo!! what up? Alex here, we finally have solid Internet connection at this random hotel in Houston, Texas. We can't apologize enough for slacking off, things have been good and bad since we last updated. Florida was extremely humid but pleasant, it was so good to meet a lot of you, thanks for coming out and being a part of our show. We want to send huge shout outs to the boys of GBox (www.myspace.com/gboxfl), our new friends in Brandon, Todd and Lucky (thanks for giving us a place to crash), Mel at Heartfelt Entertainment, and Ryan at Carraway Clothing for giving us some sweet new gear to rock (www.myspace.com/carrawayclothing). For the past week we've been promising you some videos and photos from the road, unfortunately we have some bad news, Dave's video/photo camera has been stolen. It contained all of our media and we are so bummed this happened. We don't have the funds to replace the camera at the moment but, give us a little time to get things in order and we should be able to get something up. Thank you for being so patient with us, keep leaving us comments and messages on here or myspace (cheer Dave up, he's pretty upset), we're doing our best to stay in touch! Much love!!!
Aim: WeAreRacingKites
<3
Alex

PS: Here's a lesson learned. NEVER TELL ANYONE WHAT YOU FEAR!!!! I made that mistake when I told the guys in Gbox I'm terrified of cockroaches and let's just say while we were performing in Brandon they threw a roach on stage, I think I set the world record in high jump!
Also, twenty hour van rides to Texas are not fun but we made it!! "Don't mess with Texas"

hey guys whats up its dave again...we havent posted any blogs in the past 2 days because we have been busy with ricks family who is housing us for 3 days!! what an awesome aunt and uncle....anyway the drive from south carolina was fun we stopped at south of the border and we have some pics to show u. Anyway we went to the beach today and it was soo nice. the water was hot and the sun was soo stong. I had fun and i know they did....so tomorrow im gonna post 3 videos we have so far and u better like them...so un till them u should enjoy these pics!!!

ps. big shout out to eli!! the dude who put us on the show at sector 7g....thanks for letting us crash!!!

untill next post



wendys opens its drive thru to racing kites to walk tru



eli let us crash!!!



matt H loves monkey love



bobbys a S.O.B



south of the border



Bobby at South of the Border

yo yo holler its mattF. so where are we here.. 4th of july in maryland first we drove all night after our show in va to stay with our friends from musicbox productions *thank you so much for everything patty and cindy!* we played a outdoor 4th of july festival which was really awesome until the unexpected hurricane started, and tornados started touching down and hell broke loose well kinda.. i felt like i was 20,000 leagues under the sea. but it ended up clearing up while we played and everything turned out good for the show thanks to everyone who stopped to watch in the rain! the next day we left for Virginia and it continued to rain out of control during daves first time driving the van and trailer. he did fine though! we did manage to turn a 3 hour drive into a 6 hour drive with all the rain and construction going on. so we finally made it to newport news, va and met up with our friends mile high school and had a fun night. we had some technical difficulties strings break, wireless batteries die but these things happen! not much you can do about it. so after the show we went on our way to georgia. on the way we stumbled upon "south of the border" it was a crazy rest stop you can see pics below. so after about 10 hours of driving we finally got to augusta georgia where we are now sitting and waiting at a tobacco shop to go play... wellll thats about all i have to say check out the pics below!

ps holla to www.myspace.com/unlessyourwilling

captain matt.f. of the ss racing kites



matt scoots!!



why are ricks drums soo damn biggg



MATT TALKS TO FAKE MEN WEARIN BOBBYS HATT



daves 1st drive



bobby says happy fourth of july



she gave us a place to sleep for 2 days!!

Hey guys its dave here......so its 2:45 in the morning and were at a
truck stop in virginia tryin to figure out a way to sleep six guys in a
van!!! Awesome...Anyway everything is going well, except for the fact
that the workers at mapquest.com all need to sign up for the special
olympics this year....they had alex and I looking for route 7 for almost
2 hrs and guess what?!? There is no route 7...so the cool dude at sheets
(its like a wawa) said to take route 9 and we should be fine. Tomorrow
we are playing the Hope City Cafe in Pulaski Virginia, and its gonna be
a fun time.


Hey guys dave again and its now 10 am...i waited to post this blog so i can show u pics from last night and today!!! so we are in Pulaski Va, at the hope city cafe... and i have to say its pretty fun out herrre!!! sike!! hahah anyway i have a favor to ask you kiddsss...i put in ps2 in the van last night and forgot games!! =( so if u guys have anyold dvdsss and playstation games pleaseee hook us upp!!!

here are some pics


tour start!!



alex Drive!!!



Matty F SLEEPPSS some times!



RICK HIDES IN THE TRUNK SPACE!



Dave Is Loving Life With The Boys



Matty H Smokes rods!!



Chillin in Virginia



alex's knight in shiiiinnninggg arrrmmoorrrr



MFeds Mspace Face

seee yaalll sooon (southern accceeenntt kidddsss)

Aston, Pennsylvania (first stop on tour)

Last night was the first stop on our tour and it couldn't be better. Aston, Pennsylvania is pretty much our home away from home. Over the past year we have made so many great friends in this town and it gets better and better with every visit. Thanks to everyone who came out. sang along, and said goodbye, we had a blast. All of you that couldn't make it, you missed one good show, the lineup was filled with great bands like One Week Today, In All The Same Houses, Hear Me Roar, More Like The Moon, Team Goldie, Capitol Risk, and Four Year Strong. We had a chance to sit down and answer a few questions for Becky, our street team leader; you should definitely read it, pretty interesting. Head over to www.myspace.com/racingkitesstreetteam to read the whole article. Below are some pictures from last night, once again thank you all so much for making our going away show so phenomenal. Love you as always!!
<3Alex and RK
Below are some pictures from the show!!





We love ASTON!!



Rick's new kit (Shine drums)!



Alex and Matt from Team Goldie doing an interview



The crew




Our friend Pat sent this to our myspace, it's pretty rad! if have anything similar message us!!



Yeah, this is our boy Preston, go watch!
http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v232/ispyali/?action=view¤t=MOV01112.flv