BREAKING

Lifestyle

Killin’ Time- On Tour With X

Article By: Xavier Muriel

Originally Published In The December 2014 Issue Of Cycle Source

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Hello my fellow road warriors. Well, I guess someone out there dug my first attempt at writing a column so I’m back again! Since we last spoke the band has finished up a major summer tour that took us across the country with some other great bands. Lots of good times and great hangs, one being an opportunity to test drive some Yamaha motorcycles that I normally never would have even considered riding. The powers that be asked some of us in various bands to take them out for spin and I, always being the curious one, accepted the offer. Now, I’ve never ridden I guess what you would call a sport bike in my life as it’s kinda not my thing, but hey a chance to ride while on tour rarely happens. About six of us jumped on these bikes and hit the road. Our ride took us through some Southern California mountains and highways to let us get a feel for the bikes and I must say as much as I am a rigid Panhead dude these things were fast, agile and somewhat comfortable. Now with that being said you’ll be hard pressed to find one in my garage but the experience is H Article By: Xavier Muriel what really matters to me.

Being able to break away from the road life for just a little while and get some seat time is always welcomed and doing it with some friends makes it that much better. I mean let’s face it as riders we don’t always agree with the same bikes but we do always agree on the feeling it gives us when we finish and that’s what it really is all about! There is something really special about sitting around a table with a bunch of other gear heads talking about this and that and different ways to approach a typical problem that many of us would never think of. Some of the best stuff I’ve ever learned was from some ol’ timer who said “no son you’re doing it all wrong, this is how ya do it”. Because when you think of it they never had the tools or technology we have today it truly was “ol’ school” There’s a certain organic beauty in that way of thinking.

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They couldn’t just open their computer and order it online, they had to fab something to make it work. I find myself getting lost for hours listening to these masters talk about “the good ol’ days” and how it’s so different today, and although that may be true it’s up to us to keep that process going to pass down knowledge and the passion for this art so that one day we can sit around and say “yeah I remember back when” I always look forward to hitting the next town as I have no idea who I will meet and what shop I may run across that will inspire my next words or perhaps my next build.

Case and point, I recently had the pleasure of spending a few hours with Will Ramsey at Faith Forgotten Choppers in Louisville Kentucky the same day we played Louder than Life Festival which by the way what a great turn out and show it was, nicely done Louisville! Will showed me some projects he’s been working on and let me try my hand at some tig welding. A few hours in the shop taught me a lot about the process of welding from preparation to completion. It’s always looked so simple to me and man was I wrong! So once again I gained knowledge about something that I thought was simple but takes many, many hours of practice to accomplish. A whole other art form within an art form that I took for granted. So my point is when you see a bike don’t just look at the outside and love it for the normal beauty, go beyond that to really see what kind of passion and time was used to create such a piece of art. As always Happy and Safe Riding…. X.

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