Twenty-six states; four provinces; one piano; thirty feet of a chool bus named Pearl: this is the simple, oft-awkward story of a most extraordinary escape from the mundane. Here, three old friends telegraph a bleak, prescribed economic present into a reckless, hand-built future; as if by kismet, a dream in yellow-and-black rolls into the picture. Soon, the friends find themselves soot-smeared on a Californian ranch, bolting a junkyard piano to the bus' inner wall, discussing hopes and fears with limited concern for what the future might portend. Steered by a revolving pack of as many as...