Camper Van Beethoven have lined up a ten-date U.S. tour, their first in over a decade. The group -- singer/guitarist David Lowery, bassist Victor Krummenacher, multi-instrumentalist Jonathan Segel, guitarists Greg Lisher and Kenny Margolis, and drummer Frank Funaro -- played a handful of reunion shows in New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco in June, after the release of Tusk, their note-for-note take on the 1977 Fleetwood Mac album of the same name.

More recently, SpinArt Records released Cigarettes and Carrot Juice: The Santa Cruz Years, a five-CD box set consisting of the group's first three albums Telephone Free Landslide Victory, II and III and CVB, along with their odds and ends collection Camper Vanquities, and a previously unreleased live album.

"When we first started out, we ended up playing for these hardcore punk rock kids," Lowery said in June. "And we'd basically make fun of them for thirty-five minutes. Generally, by the end, people really got into it, because we played all these punk covers and eventually we were sort of embraced by that community."

"It's funny, the songs have very sound foundations and it still sound good to me," Krummenacher said. "In this day and age, I think we have more in common with the jam bands than the alt/uber mafia."

On February 2nd, Camper will begin a thirteen-date European tour.

Camper Van Beethoven tour dates:

1/9: Charlottesville, VA, Starr Music Hall
1/10: New York, Irving Plaza
1/11: Boston, Middle East
1/17-18: Chicago, The Abbey
1/19: Madison, WI, Luther's Blues
1/21: Minneapolis, 1st Avenue Club
1/23 Pittsburgh, Rosebud
1/24: Philadelphia, Theater of the Living Arts
1/25: Washington, DC, 9:30 Club

ANDREW DANSBY
(December 13, 2002)