Ask an indie rock veteran: What are the best cities to play, and why are hamsters better than rats?

Do you ever find yourself wondering about why some rodents are accepted (hamsters, gerbils) while others are vilified (rats and mice)? I mean, what’s the difference?
—Ashley

I’d say it’s mostly tail and a little bit shape of the face? Hamsters are adorable. Gerbils are in the middle. Then comes mice and, finally, rats. The tails get bigger as you go down the list, you see, while the noses get more weaselly.

I can’t believe the timing of this question, because I am surrounded by rodents as I write this. We have trash-loving rats in the back, rats around our neighbors’ basement steps, rats in the front yard. It’s like that Coasters song “Girls, Girls, Girls”—rats playing tennis, riding horses, in tight sweaters. My kids have a beloved hamster named Venny. Mice visit our kitchen. A gerbil named Buttercup lives at my daughter’s kindergarten. And I just found out that my downstairs neighbor, a researcher at Johns Hopkins, has lab rats in his apartment. Geez.

The power went out at our house recently, and it turns out a rat had chewed through the electrical main. The guy who repaired it suggested we get an exterminator. Oh yeah? Does the exterminator have something at his disposal stronger than an animal that can bite through a fucking electrical main? Seems to me what we really need is a realtor. Maybe we can find a rat that is a realtor. Anyway, I was talking to my sister about this, and apparently, Toyota has started using soy-based wire shielding for its hybrids. It’s cheaper and better for the environment. Home builders caught on, and now there’s a lot of new wiring that’s coated with the stuff. The only problem is it’s delicious. So there’s this battle raging between electricians and exterminators, because the rodents are eating all of this wiring. My sister says she knew someone who came home after being away for a month, and mice were living in the hood of her Prius. (I don’t know if any of this is true.)

So, let’s recap. Hamsters: adorable, no tail, flat and trusting faces. Guinea pigs: no tail, spaced-out facial expression, half-eaten lettuce dangling from paws, also cute. Gerbils: I’m conflicted. Mice, rats: big tails, long evil faces, out to get us, thinking only of themselves. That’s the difference.

I saw The Walkmen in Phoenix maybe 10 years ago. I actually asked you if you were playing “French Vacation,” and you responded that you didn’t know it. You had your setlist written on a banana. I’m not trying to get you to badmouth places, but what have been the worst and best cities to play? I could see Phoenix, Vegas and L.A. being the former, while I think some of the best crowds I’ve seen have been in San Francisco. What about small cities? For instance, if you play in Peoria, Illinois, is it typically a waste of time, or is there a big showing from people who just want to see live music? Or is it all totally random?
—Colin

Sorry about not playing that song. We were very strict about our set. If it’s not on the banana…

It’s funny you should mention San Francisco. My experience is that they are some of the quietest crowds during the show, then they become appreciative at the end. New York is similar, but it’s wilder on the weekends than during the week. Maybe because people work a lot there? And after pot was legalized in California, you could actually feel the difference when you played.

Cleveland was a tough place to play, I thought. Kind of an angry vibe—sort of the same as Philly, before Philly became a hipster town. One place where you never knew what to expect was Morgantown, West Virginia. That’s a strange part of the country —West Virginia through Kentucky, down to, like, Alabama—where everyone stays out super late. In Morgantown, people wouldn’t show up until 1 a.m.; I have no idea why. Anyway, they sure liked to have a good time there. You could still smoke cigarettes indoors in West Virginia and Kentucky until very recently, long after it was illegal anywhere else. As you know, people who smoke are fun and like to get down. Just look at Obama and, I don’t have to remind you, John Boehner.