On The Road Again: Before You Exit, Part One

[The Orlando, FL pop-rock quartet Before You Exit are currently on their first cross-country tour in a bus. As they travel, the band will be filling AP in on how the tour is going. This is part one of the series! Photos by Chris Martin.]

Leaving For Tour
After a long 12-hour drive in a car packed with 7 hyped and excited dudes, we arrived in Nashville, where we would pick up our bus and driver to depart for tour! We can only thank our awesome fans for all of the continuous support to help us work our way up to our very first tour bus for this six-week journey. I don’t think anyone could have been more ready to get into the bus, on the road and onto the first show in Minneapolis! It is quite a mission to put our excitement into words, but hopefully, over the course of these journal entries, you all will get a better feel.

After our departure out of Nashville, the first immediate stop was Walmart. How could any band possibly live without food? Joining us on this tour are two of our good friends from home (that would be Orlando, Florida): tour manager Cody Tapoler and merch man Sam Clark. The six of us wandered our way around the Walmart and came across the struggle of picking food. Half the group wanted to try and stay healthy but the other half continued to throw in Oreos, candy bars and cases upon cases of soda into a cart.

The whole rest of Wednesday night simply consisted of lying around, watching movies, hangin, and enjoying the ride to the first show. Nashville to Minneapolis was a 14-hour drive but it feels like two when you’re with your best friends. Here’s a picture of us just chillin on the bus:

–Connor McDonough

January 13: First Show of Tour
Tonight we played the very first show of the “All The Way” tour in Minneapolis, Minnesota, at an old-fashioned “Varsity Theater”! It was so good to be reunited with our friends in the other bands. The feel of the venue was very modern, with old theatre parts as if they had never been touched, a balcony, unique tile designs [and] a co-ed bathroom that looked very Italian and artsy. I loved the atmosphere, and the stage was wide and tall. As we arrived, we loaded in and said hello to all the guys we would be spending the next month and a half with!

From the second we got there, there were already fans lined up at the door in freezing cold weather. We got to talk to them and hang out before the show a little bit to get to know them, which hopefully made their cold wait somewhat worth it. In total, around 400 people came out and the crowd was crazy! They loved our “Tonight, Tonight” [Hot Chelle Rae] cover and they were super energetic throughout our set. We couldn’t have asked for a better night to start the tour.
–Braiden Wood

January 14: Kansas City, Missouri 
Kansas City showed us some serious love tonight at the show! We played at the Beaumont for the first time ever for around 350 people and had an absolute blast. We pulled up to the venue at about 12:45 p.m. and right as we stepped outside, a bunch of really awesome fans greeted us. We talked to them for a bit and played a couple acoustic songs! We instantly felt the love coming from the people in this city. We met a lot of people that had come to our St. Louis show with All Time Low over a year ago, so it was really invigorating being able to reunite with old friends and have them see an “updated us” play!  The night was pretty chill for the most part.

After this we watched our friends in the other bands play, soundchecked, and played a pretty sick show. As the night rolled on, our stomachs started to growl, so the guys in Hollywood Ending and us decided to get something to eat. Found a Chipotle on our phones and figured we’d walk there since it was only a mile away. Bad idea. The wind chill dropped the temperatures pretty drastically, so we started to become walking icicles—and on top of that we only had about 25 minutes until the end of the show to walk a mile there and back, so we had to run. That stunk. Half of us, including myself, turned around and went back to the venue, while the other half got the Chipotle for everyone, how nice of them! Everything worked out all right, though, especially the fact that we all found out we’re incredibly out of shape. 
Cheers,
–Thomas Silvers