Pretrip listening to Hawkwind seems to be the right thing. Everything else sounds horrible... The city, the city-- back to the old shitty city! "We all find our way to Hawkwind" finds me at The Listing Loon less than 24 hours later with thanks to Brendan B.
I must be getting old but the fall feels like winter has already set in.
I seem to have forgotten how much fun it is watching bands and being a fan. I'm not worried about moving my own equipment... Watching it from thieves... Not worried about end of the night pay... This is relaxing. Must do it more.
Brief talk with John Lorenz about the THWART Top 25 and who could hold the number one position. He did not provide any guess as to his choice but suspected Pere Ubu. Smart guy.
At the Mayday when you buy a hotdog you can get a deal--almost 35% off! Available so long as you choose to sit in the 'viewing room'-- A room adorned with two-way mirrors and private booths featuring ample stocks of Kleenex tissues strategically placed.... For, 'you know'... Hot dog eating fetish-eers... Simply enough, you watch, or let someone watch another person, eating a hot dog, and others get off on it! Oddly enough, The Spits found this interesting and somewhat let down when they found out I was making it up.
"Sound and Vision" (David Bowie) plays on the Mayday sound system. Incidently, is also one my favorite Bowie songs. Blue... blue...
The show begins with SUBSETS kicking everything off. A flawless, powerful set. I overheard someone say "There was blood everywhere" during a quiet moment following an abrupt stop to a Subsets song. Like how people scream to be overheard atop the band and as the song ends there is a split second of silence (if the band is tight enough-- and the Subsets are) you clearly hear them yelling. No, the sentence wasn't meant for my ears and has nothing to do with any Subsets song (I think/hope) but I gotta exercise my one and a half ears of hearing while I still can. The sentence hit the surreal button.
Someone asked me for a 'weed' hook up. I consider it a compliment because now I must look like a subversive drug user. I embrace this.
Please note also 'awesome-natti'. A combination of awesome and Cincinnati. Corny but kinda funny too.
USELESS EATERS kick off with the lights turned way down. Adds dama... They start off free-jamming... Setting levels... Getting a feel for the venue. The room fills up with neer-do-wells hungry for rebellion. Was the Useless Eaters vocalist, Seth Sutton just saying something about 'chili chili chili everywhere' and even though this band has that kind of 'new punk' feel that is exlimpified by recent Dead Beat Records... I can't help but wonder if their LP is in fact on Dead Beat. Well, as it turns out it was not. None the less, a rager of a wax-slab as well as their live sound ended up being.
People began filling up the room from the outside. Where they were eating their hotdogs and talking about their fucking gardens and cats... The Useless Eaters were tight. They had a real psyched punk jammer rock 'n roll feel. It was rather beautiful thing... Reminded me of a John Wilkes Booze which was errie cause they were headed to Bloomington, Indiana the following night... Where JWB were from.
I guessed those JWB fellers-or at least some of them- ended up in an outfit called APACHE DROPOUT; another good band.
Useless Eaters reminded me of the Dirt Bombs... but I actually like the Useless Eaters so fuck the Dirt Bombs right? Fuck The Detroit Cobras too. Useless Eaters could blow both them off the stage any day just like I once seen The Clone Defects beautifully do before... AND The Spits haven't played yet. Wowzers. What a night.
With help from DH I 'drop-in' with THE SPITS unknowingly. I never seen a legitimate picture of the band not without some sort of get up. Truthfully, I'm reluctant to really meet bands when they play live that I tend to have a lot of records from. Touring isn't easy. There's a good chance you have being on tour or just plain music in general, that your gonna have a bad day every now and then. Because of someones bad day in band, and you just so happening to to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, the smallest negative encounter can mean you won't listen to anymore their records... You associate that bad memory when you hear those records. However, I didn't have the bad memory this time. Whew... I just so happen to have a great memory and I could've left right there maybe even fell down the steps and died or choked on a fucking hot dog in the eating booth but it was great meeting THE SPITS! Sharing a left-hander-cigarette. A cigarette that I eventually extinguished onto the top of my left hand, at the base of my thumb. Thanks to neuropathy I didn't feel it and probably look pretty cool when I did it (or I'd think it was cool) but the thing is I didn't feel it so there!
Honorable mention too local word spitter LAZY ASS DESTROYER also known as Ryan Schwass. He was really really obliterated. A 'bath salts' kinda high needing surgery to reopen his eyelids. Talking to walls. But hey, no slack from me, I was cruising with a mind-opening multi-dimensional moment myself (more later). Lazy D and I had the masterful idea to start a business doing alternative commentary to National Geographic movies/shows about animals. We both admitted to each other that we watch National Geographic shows until we learn the goofy-ass names that all the scientist give to the animals to humanize and identify with them to study in a social environment. Good idea or bad idea is really doesn't matter... The fact is that the idea had a place. That place had been recognized, and it had a chance of life-- if even for a moment, that place existed and we laughed. Like, soooo f-ing hard dude.
Maybe it was the good pink eye ridden smoke or maybe I actually seen actor Jake "Brokeback Mountain" Gyllenhaal, famed movie star actor arrive at Mayday but then again I was also seeing people (more than one) wearing bear mask for some odd reason. More observations revealed Jon Lorenz imitating airplane flight behind the crowd (later I would ask him and he said he didn't do it) that was otherwise captivated by The Spits. Jake Gyllenhaal was there... and I think I seen more hallucinations... It looked like Johnny "Outlaw" Sex was there too. According to my sources, Johnny had some ethical problems with The Spits as a band name and was nowhere near the event. I was ensured of this.
All in all I'm just really glad that I have finally got some glasses where I can see things from a distance. Thanks Eyemart Express. It took more than an hour, so your sorta liars about your pricing, but thanks anyway.
As THE SPITS started out they had some sort of police siren sound that they used. NOT the best sound to people in Cincinnati. Here, the police kill our friends. We got the memorials to prove it. A siren goes off and everyone turns from the stage and looks outside to see if they are the CPDs next victim... If the man is coming for them.
Some guy: "Man, to understand my life you have to understand the band Suicidal Tendencies..." and then he rambled off some song and said " that song is the story of my life man..." So naturally I had to say something to out-crazy this kid. I took a deep breath, leaned into the feller and said "Hey man have you ever seen the movie Apocalypse Now?" He said no. Leaning closer, lowering my vocal tone nearly whispering I said "That story is my life" I think that he didn't know what I was talking about.
THE SPITS hit hard, hit fast and stayed that way their whole set. Pure majesty! Each song was better than the next. I totally vindicated the mistake of me missing The Spits play The Comet before.
I think I seen someone, mid-Spits set, come back and change out of street clothes into a police officer's outfit and leave... Shits creeping... shit gets weird. Shit stays weird.
I approach the stage to take a picture of the band early but THE SPITS were rocking a small fog machine that, coupled with their flashing strobe light skull display, made it almost impossible for me to take a decent picture so despite the fact that after I take one picture the battery dies in the camera. So all you get is one picture... One terrible picture that isn't even worth showing (so I won't)
The only downside to THE SPITS it's really just me being near to the pit and checking to see if my wallet was stolen by a raucous spike and studded leather-punk. The type of punk you would see on a Punk & Disorderly compilation. Yeah, I guess Im old and getting in the way of kids good times now. Good, I doubt their enthusiasm anyway. Fuck the kids is the new For the Kids.
Mark Zero walks to the back and sez "Smoooooke Mu-sheen" then takes his hand a knocks over part of the merch table for SUBSETS that I was monitoring. I didn't respond the way I initially wanted to, so I just smiled. I smiled because I'm me, he is Mark Zero and I'm glad I'm not Mark Zero. But ultimately that guy is always going to be around. Sometimes you watch that guy, other times you are that guy... Where-as your interpretations of 'punk-rock' doesn't necessarily fit with other peoples perceptions of punk-rock it ultimately surfaces as some sort of violence. Nothing is really safe... Nothing anywhere. There has to be an element of danger to every punk show that ever exist but once again the police sirens fueled the tension. The beautiful tension.
"I'm a big fan AND I like your music too." My big line that sounded better way-high than not-way-high.
I find A Cincinnati native post-show arguing about how a Spits 7 inch cost... $15--an import from Germany. The beauty of that lost on him and I. Me? I listen to records. I don't care if something is being sold for $15 that you can get for $70 on eBay. That doesn't mean anything to me, nor my sudden ally. "I just wanna hear the fucking songs!" he proclaims. I love you Cincinnati, Ohio. Your the fucking best.
Read the Thwart Top 25
http://shawnabnoxious.blogspot.com/p/t.html
Mayday
http://www.maydaynorthside.com
