Go, Greased Lightning! F Yeah Fest Tours U.S. on Veg-Fueled Bus

Another time, about 30 miles outside of Pensacola, we ran out of diesel in a town that, we soon found out, had no diesel fuel. We called AAA, but they told us our best bet was to call 911. They said, “We don’t deliver diesel fuel, and we don’t tow buses.” That was the second time the tour “was over.” But I approached this really nice old man in this very small Christian town we were stuck in, and he made a phone call to another gas station 30 miles outside of town, and they actually brought us diesel fuel.

Anyone who gets on this bus realizes that it’s a lot of work. It’s free fuel, but it’s a hard time. When you go prowling for veggie oil, you just have to act like you know what you’re doing, so you don’t attract attention. We’re all definitely prepared to have “the talk” with police if they ever stop us — there are some issues because we’re not paying gas taxes when we run on vegetable oil. But, hopefully, the police will just be cool about it and let us go.

Tod Seelie/Sucka Pants Photography

It makes delicious French fries too: This vehicle, though unreliable, made it across the country and back.

Tod Seelie/Sucka Pants Photography

The dreaded ass mike: Ami Shalev on vocals

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More About

• Phil Hoelting
• Sean Carlson
• Merry Pranksters
• Totally Michael
• Josh Fadem

Describe the scariest experience involving bus nudity.

SC: Man, I’m sober 14 days on the tour, and then one time I get photographed naked and that photo gets on the Sucka Pants Web site and everyone thinks I’m naked all the time.

I didn’t ask about you personally, I just asked about general bus nudity.

SC: Sometimes we get naked on the bus. We got naked in Birmingham after a couple bottles of whiskey. I have a girlfriend, so I don’t really care. The sexual frustration is through the roof on the bus, though. It doesn’t even matter if you’re a boy or a girl anymore. We end up spending a lot of time spooning and holding one another.

PH: Sean’s the only one who gets to answer that.

Do any of the people at the shows already know what the F Yeah Fest is?

SC: Yeah, absolutely. Every city has a lot of press, and it’s going over really well. They know what I do and what Keith does, so it’s nice. Right now, F Yeah Fest is just a show to them, but, hopefully, in a couple years it’ll grow into something that they recognize. Next, we’re planning to go to Japan and Australia with the band Fucked Up in December. We’re also starting the West Coast tour.

Ken Kesey’s bus trip with his Merry Pranksters in The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test is now symbolic of the psychedelic movement and the beginnings of New Journalism. What will the F Yeah Fest and Greased Lightning come to represent?

PH: Finding a way to give smaller bands opportunities to tour during these unstable [times of] insane gas prices. We can tour the country for very little money by running on vegetable oil. The venues can’t even give bands guarantees to cover gas money right now. With Sean, I want to package tours for bands that maybe couldn’t do it otherwise.

SC: Being young. Being dumb. Having fun. Enjoying your youth for as long as possible. No one helped me when I was 18 and started F Yeah Fest. Everyone thought this tour would be a bust. But we’ve done it.