Jake Paleschic doesn't go anywhere without his bike. He rides it to and from work, to band practice, and even, on occasion, to shows. So when it came time to release his new EP, Cowboys Songs, last month, he had a crazy idea that didn't seem so crazy at the time: hand-delivering every single copy to his fans in Fort Worth.
“It was a very spur of the moment decision,” Paleschic, who's a barista as Avoca Coffee in Fort Worth, explains. “It was an idea that jumped into my head after getting home from an early morning shift at Avoca.” And so he did just that: On August 19, in a trek that lasted roughly nine hours and 50 miles in the stifling Texas August heat, Paleschic delivered the CDs to 26 different locations around Cowtown.
This wasn’t an overly hyped promo gig, or some crowd-funding reward. The day before his Homeric two-wheeled odyssey, Paleschic — who has previously recorded music under the moniker Patriot — posted a simple note on his Instragam page. He instructed interested parties to message him their orders and then, “Leave $5 and a cup of water in the mailbox for me.”
Spending an entire day peddling under the unforgiving Texas sun seems like an undertaking that would require a great deal of planning. He wasn’t racing the Tour de France, exactly, but he was damn sure expelling more electrolytes in one day than most of us will in a year. But painstaking prep wasn’t anywhere in this adventurous equation for Paleschic: He made the whole trip in his street clothes.
"I do about 50 miles a week on average, so that was an exceptional day for me," he says. "But I was back at riding the next day."