After I put the girls to bed at the hotel in Erbusco (Franciacorta) last night, Giovanni (above) took me to the coolest pub in Franciacorta, Andata e Ritorno Stazione di Provaglio d’Iseo, a functioning regionale train station (see video below, shot right outside the pub). Great selection of local, artisanal beers, super cool crowd, and awesome metal and classic rock playlist.

The place has the feel of train station circa 1965 (andata e ritorno means round trip in Italian).

Piadina with prosciutto, mozzarella, and salsa rosa.

I really dug owner Claudio Bertazzoli’s playlist of virtuoso metal: Satriani, Steve Vai, Pantera… This dude knows his shit and digs the shredding!

From the department of “it was twenty years ago today”…

My old friend and bandmate Shawn Amos (left) and I will be fronting our band “the Americani” Friday and Saturday April 5 and 6 at the Villa Marcello Marinelli in the heart of Proseccoland.

Both shows will take place at the Villa and showtime is 10 p.m. both nights.

We’ve got a wonderful set of americana lined up (think Howlin’ Wolf and Neil Young).

If you’re attending Vinitaly this year, come up and rock out with us before the fair (a ton of my winemaker friends are planning to come as are wine folks from the U.S.).

Tomorrow night (March 14) I’ll be working the floor at Sotto in Los Angeles, where we’re launching our new spring wine list (Tintilia del Molise, anyone?).

And Friday night (March 15), I’ll be pouring wine all evening and then, on the later side, appearing with my San Diego-based band, the Grapes (think Doug Sahm and Gram Parsons), at Jaynes Gastropub in San Diego.

Honestly, I don’t get the joke or paronomasia behind the label of the Veau qu’a bu l’r (the calf who drank the r). Maybe it has something to do with the Israelites’ golden calf?

What I can tell you is that — at least according to the internets — is a carbonic maceration old-vine Marsanne from some folks in southern France who have a groovy winemaking operation called Domaine de l’Ancestra

Photo by my buddy Michael Housewright. Thanks, dude, for coming out to the show!

I can also tell you with certainty that it’s delicious: we drank it before the Nous Non Plus show on Friday in San Francisco at Terroir (not where we played but where we drank).

I gladly paid a mere $40 for it basing my selection solely on my trust of the wine merchants at Selection Massale, Cory Cartwright and Guilhaume Gerard, and their superlative palates and mission to bring Natural “sincere” wines to the U.S. from France (“sincere” is my new term for what used to be called “Natural” wine).

Great wine, great value.

If you get to the party early enough, they’ll do your hair up go-go stye.

Our tour was so much freakin’ fun and the last night in SF at the Bardot a Go Go party was over the top.

So much fun to play with Joachim Cooder on drums (right). He is so amazing, with such nuance and grooviness in his playing and personality.

I’m super glad to be back at home with my girls but, man, there is something to be said for gettin’ yer ya-yas out.

Thanks to all who came out to rock out with us!

Buona domenica, yall! Happy Sunday…

My Nous Non Plus bandmates Céline Dijon and Jean-Luc Retard landed in Austin last night and we made our way over to Vino Vino for some pork belly and Lapierre Beaujolais (as you can imagine, we are not a rock band that lives by fish tacos alone!).

Our 9 p.m. show at the Parish Underground tomorrow night (Sat. Feb. 9) is FREE.

So please come out and see how my other half lives (and my bleached blond hair).