London Blog

Triibe: On the south bank overlooking the River Thames, across from Parliament is Gyle, Adam, Ron, Daniel, Robert and Mark.


I've been back for over a week from my "Triibe Goes to the UK" trip, and though the jet-lag has worn off, the impact hasn't. The 24-7 Prayer ILG (International Leadership Gathering) was a great conference that included 24-7 leaders from around the world. Real movers and shakers here.

Triibe was happy to be part of the program, but we were equally humbled by the company we were in. (I liberated the above performance photo from Carla Harding's blog, Amazed and Confused)

We stayed at a hotel about 30 minutes away from the venue, so we were using the buses constantly. Gyle, our awesome den-mother, kept us on budget and on the same bus.

Next to our hotel was a regional cricket field called the Rose Bowl, where we took our morning walks and prayer-times before each day began. It was a great time to get out with just a bunch of guys who love God, who were there for the same purpose - to serve. We have more international invites to play, so hopefully we'll be able to take advantage of those soon.

Set up at Central Hall in Southampton


Triibe in front of the coffee chain that put Britain on the map, Starbucks. Pictured with us in the middle is Doug Ross, a great DJ with a greater heart.


With Pete Greig, the man behind the beginning of the 24-7 prayer movement, author of Red Moon Rising, God on Mute and The Vision.


More shots from London town.


Mark taking Ron's photo. (Taken by Adam)


Is that a government office building or Buckingham Palace?


Big Ben at night.

Bound for the UK

I'm leaving tomorrow for the UK. The Triibe is playing in Southampton this weekend for three nights. I've never been there, so I'm looking forward to it. We built in a little extra time to look around, but not enough.

Some of my favorite people on the planet are going on this trip, so that's a huge plus as well. I'll give you a report on the events when I get back.

Travel Log

I traveled to Tulsa-town this weekend to rehearse with the Triibe. We are going to England next month for an international leadership conference, and we have been wanting to prepare some new material.

During my trip here, I had a little fun making notes about odd things I noticed. Here's some of my miscellaneous thoughts:

Generosity Stolen

Location: Las Vegas Airport

Situation: In between flights, at the cashier, buying my personal pan pizza, m&m’s and water. (hey, at least I got water)

Total: $10.96 USD

Cashier: “That’s eleven hundred”, with a slight chuckle at her own ability to break down dollar amounts into the hundreds.

Me: “Oookay, here ya go”, giving her eleven bucks.

Cashier: “Thank you.” She closes the drawer and looks to the next sap.

I say “sure”, or something and walk away.

At first I thought, no biggie, it’s four cents. Then I thought deeper into it.

I would normally say, “please keep the change”, not wanting to deal with the pennies, etc. You see those change cups by registers all the time, and I frequently throw coinage in them. My beef was that I wasn’t given the option to give the money away. I was robbed of that “to give is better than to receive” feeling.

As I ponder my shallowness while waiting at my gate, an m&m bounces off my front tooth as I try to toss it in my mouth, then I realize that I have never thought it odd when a cashier forgives a few cents owed to them, like if a total is $11.04. I pick up the m&m and move on with my life.

On airport bathrooms:

I love going to the bathroom at airports these days. Everything is automated. You don’t have to touch anything that doesn’t belong to you. There is no main door, the toilets & urinals flush automatically, the sink is automatic, now even the soap is automated. The towel dispensers are automatic, but I guess I don’t wave nice enough for them to spit out towels for me. Wave wave wave. Stop, look, wait. Wave wa- there's a towel. Repeat.

On airplane windows:

I’m 6’1”. (and a half – I have to say that as I vainly try to keep up with my oldest son who is about 6’3”) Anyhoo, I’m 6’1”. Tall, but not super tall. Not freakishly Yao-tall. So, why are all airplane windows designed for people 5’4” and below? It’s a neck breaker to take a peep through them.

On airplane comforts:

I have a new invention idea. I know I’ll never market this idea, so you can have it. (just send me a nice gift card if it does well for you) It’s a travel aid called “No Splay”. It would be a simple Velcro strap you wrap around your legs, to keep them together as you nod off in your undersized seat on the plane. This cuts down on the awkward involuntary leg bumping with your neighbors. (thanks Martin for the name)

On window gazing:

While flying, where does that barrier exist between the houses, cars, roads looking like a clean, beautiful and elaborate train set, to just some regular, full-size houses, cars and roads? I think about 50 feet up, there is a magical line where everything transforms to the coolest toy collection ever, and I have always wanted to play with it.

Held Hostage

PHOTO: Stock shot of jet taking off from tarmac...

I arrived in Dallas Tuesday to help celebrate my Dad's retirement. Nice party, good food, etc. We have had a good time hanging out (my sister and brother are here too, so it's a strange-but-nice family dynamic again.

For some reason (okay, it's some wiring deal on a ton of their planes), American keeps canceling my flight out of Dallas. It's like Hotel California; I've entered, but I can never leave. Yesterday morning, I got a call at 6:45 am (mind you that's 4:45 am pacific time, which I'm still on btw) from the AA flight info computer, giving me the news of my first cancellation. Nice.

I'm not complaining. Yesterday afternoon, my Dad gave me one of his old sets of golf clubs... that's cool. I haven't been on the links in 10 years, but I'll probably venture out to embarrass myself soon with my new weapons.

This morning, while checking my gate info online, I noticed that the flight was again canceled. No rude early morning call this time. Man, am I glad I didn't head to DFW and fight through it there.

The hard part is being away from the family. My wife is holding down the fort (and is perfectly capable of doing so, make no mistake) but I wasn't mentally prepared to be away from home this long - or work for that matter, but that's another thread.

Right now, I'm on the phone (er, on ever-hold) with American to see about getting a lottery seat on the next flight out. Holding breath... okay I breathed... holding... okay forget it, I'm just going to be over here waiting... tapping foot... mmm, easier.

Okay, the real person from the airline finally picked up and put me on another plane headed out this evening. Can I assume that the wiring on this plane is a-ok? Another day of work missed. I wonder if this flight is going to really go out, or is this just another tease?

For now I'm just blogging on my Dad's PC, which means I am not sure how to use it for the picture I wanted for this entry. That's okay, I don't care. Soon enough I'll be home to the Macs in the studio.

You can use whatever mental imagery you want for the implied photo above. (though, I do prefer you to conjure a working plane coming in for a perfect landing... on time... you get the picture)

Rockin' Spain

The Triibe had a great trip to Spain. The conference was a success, and God changed many lives. We played a total of four times (3 times on Sunday!), and the response seemed really positive. Some people don't know what to do with us - since we're a percussion heavy / spoken-word heavy band, but most others get it and open themselves up to us and our message.

Unfortunately I only have this one picture of us playing. Maybe I'll add more if I receive more. I do have other interesting info from the conference though.

There were many bands at Contra Corriente, one being the UK band Superhero. They are a group of great guys with great hearts, and VERY cool music. Check them out. I believe you can get their music on iTunes.

Keith Wheeler (www.kw.org) is an amazing individual. To promote the gospel, he has carried the cross over 17,000 miles, through more than 160 countries on all seven continents. He was one of the key-note speakers, and he has an incredible story. We had the pleasure of hanging out with him and his wife Cherie a couple of late nights in the town of Huesca. (s.l. weska)


Backing up to the beginning... After flying into Madrid on Friday morning, we proceeded to drive to Huesca, a 3.5 hour drive northeast. We turned the drive into eight hours by stopping for a couple of us to visit as many bathrooms as we could find - sometimes visiting them more than once per stop. Crazy times.

We stopped in a small town called Huerta to visit a Monastery (Monasterio de Santa Maria de Huerta) about half way there. The monks were still living there, though their numbers have decreased by about 500 since the monastery's opening in 1100 AD. Here's some pics from there:


The front gate:



The main sanctuary:



A small portion of the ornate ceiling:


The pipe organ:


One of the court yards:


This is one of the monks. He invited us to a 30 minute prayer-time with all of the monks of the monastery. We didn't know what to do once we got there, but it was really interesting. (L-R: Gyle, Daniel, Mr Monk, and Bob)


This is just a really great self-portrait. Notice how my hat is a tad crooked. Very street.


Spain has a pace all it's own. We gladly adapted to that flow during our drive from Madrid to the conference. It was a nice relaxing time before the non-stop marathon that was the conference. I took this picture in a pub. I just thought these guys would be the perfect extras in a movie.


Triibe plays again in Kansas City in a couple of weeks. I will be joining them for that one too. I'm looking forward to it!

Traveling With The Triibe

I'm going to Spain on Thursday with a percussion troupe I've played with on-and-off for about 5 years now. It's called The Triibe. It formed in a prayer room at our church in Tulsa just before my family moved to Cali.

It's kind of 'stomp' meets 'blue man' meets God. My chops are feeling rusty, so I've gotten out the pad. I have been playing on a semi-regular basis, but this gig is very intense. I hope I'm ready.

The Triibe usually consists of a guy on a normal drum kit, then 2-3 other guys on percussion set-ups with instrumentation varying from conventional hand percussion to stuff we find in the trash. (usually the trash sounds better, don't ask me why!!) Then there's a guy or two on mics for spoken word (one whom was raised in Spain, so we're good on the language barrier), a guy with a sampler rolling loops (who doubles on perc), and if we're lucky enough to snag one, a DJ.

I don't get to play with them often, 'cause my schedule is crazy, and they don't usually have the budget to fly me in anyway. But the bigger gigs usually pay them enough to fly me in.

About a year and a half ago, I produced their "Raw" CD from recordings they made at local gigs without me. It IS raw sounding, but it's cool. They've talked to me about producing a studio album in the future. We'll see. The thing is, it's usually such a spontaneous vibe with this group, it would probably be hard to pull it off in the studio. Maybe we'll just make some concerted effort to record a few upcoming gigs REALLY well. That might capture the spirit better I think.

In Spain we're playing at the Contra Corriente conference. It's the largest youth conference in Spain and is celebrating it's 10th anniversary. They deal with the same teen issues our American teens deal with. The point of the conference is to empower them to overcome today's obstacles by relying on the help and power of Jesus to make better choices.

I'll be back in a week to report details and stuff. If I get a chance to step into an internet cafe, maybe then. Adios!