Sunday, March 28, 2010

3.26-27.2010, ftw

this is all kind of a blur in my memory because my sleep cycle is still screwy from opening yesterday on three hours' sleep.

my sweetie _nailed_ her presentation on thursday, got a lot of positive feedback, has been asked to present again, and is starting to think about this as an ongoing project rather than a one-shot deal. (kind of like the li'l stoogeband when we started -- we were only going to play one gig, then five, then it just kind of took on a life of its own.) celebrated with our second tokyo cafe dinner in a week (yuzu yellowtail roll -- hooray!).

i was going to nap after work but detoured to ops check my gear, which wound up waking me up. the switch on the marshall bluesbreaker i got from sir steffin has been sticking; when i trigger it with my hand it works fine, but my foot must be heavier. changed from running shoes to flat-soled leather ones in case the soles were catching. ray very kindly went out to the prac pad to get his big muff to bring to the gig so i'd have a backup. i see a trip to competition music in my near future.

there was already a decent crowd at lola's 6th when we rolled up to load in. ray and hembree were already there, and richard showed up soon after. a lot of friends were present. 'twas good to see jamie shipman, the conscientious projector, who's screening dfw punk at 1919 hemphill next saturday. (view the trailer here.) speaking of texas punk history, ex-nervebreaker bob childress was in the house with his wife vicky, and danced up a storm during our set. made my night, like mike haskins showing up at the grotto in january. someday, maybe we'll get t. tex and barry, too. (and carl.)

also saw j.j. (who's pinstriping clay's drums), cody, rat, calvin, and brady from the h.c./riverside crew (who were amazed when i told them my big sis, whom they met at stooge prac, is 18 months older than me, although she still gets carded buying wine in new joisey); the magical ash; graham (tending bar), billy (not playing with HIO sunday because his best friend passed away tragically in houston this week), and fluff from the wreck room; #1 stoogeaphilia fan amy (who, with my sweetie, made us play "i'm 18" for an "encore" at the end of our set) and teague's squeeze kara; dan and sarah but not kerrie (who was under the weather); and christina, the daughter of one of the jo kelly teachers, who it turns out went to high school with clay stinnett (playing with the black dotz) and justin robertson. uncle walt was right.

the new bastardos de sancho lineup is missing some of the "messkin mad max: beyond thunderdome" vibe that the original duo used to have, substituting a gal (baby becca blood) who shakes a tambourine the way homer henderson's g-f used to with his one-man band. ray noted and commented on the fact that the new guitarist (hose si) sings through a telephone receiver. their stage trip has evolved a little bit, too, with christmas lights around their mic stands and marty robbins' "el paso" as intro music.

the black dotz made us work our asses off to follow them, the same way the dangits did when we played with them at lola's stockyards last year. i'd heard them at the tommy atkins benefit at the kessler theater, which mwanza dover said was a bad performance (going through gutterth productions' p.a., which isn't optimized for a room the size of the kessler). later on, clay told me, "wanz was crying that day while we were playing," to which i responded, "we all were, through our instruments."

my initial take on the black dotz was "they're like les rallizes denudes or the gunslingers" (mainliner was another association i made later), but that doesn't really get it. there's a lot more dynamic variation, light and shade in what they do than any of those other bands i mentioned. wanz calls it "punk rock," but it's a lot more ethereal than that, with his guitar going through an arsenal of effects (half of what michio kurihara had with boris at rgrs).

what grounds their sound and makes it visceral is clay's aggressive attack on drums. i've heard clay in different contexts, but i've never heard him play like this, sounding like john bonham on a stripped-down jazz kit (three drums, two cymbals). the bonham comparison doesn't really cut it, either; what clay's up to is a lot more musical and detailed than what bonzo did. ross boyd rounds out the trio on bass and splits voxxx with wanz for even more variety. the stoogeband will definitely be doing more shows with 'em. if you get a chance to check 'em out, you owe it to yourself. my sweetie took pics, which in the fullness of time will be uploaded to her photo blog.

teague made me promise that we wouldn't play "as long as they'll let us," so we planned an abbreviated set (eleven songs) and opted to hold off on the blue cheer one we've been working on until we've given it a few more run-throughs in the shed. opened with the first three songs from funhouse, then broke the seal on the dead boys "ain't nothing to do" (the black dotz had already played "sonic reducer"), played "future now" for fraf like we always do, segueing into "30 seconds over tokyo," "new rose," "not right," and "final solution" before our aforementioned "encore."

we must have been louder than fuck. ray said he couldn't hear shit in his monitor and had to listen for himself through the mains. i noticed that my guitar fed back any time i took my hands off it, and when i saw andre at the market the next day, he told me that while he used to have to work to get me up in the mix, now he was having to work _around_ me, which he said was not a bad thing. (thanks to cody yates, also in the house, for the twin -- best eight bills i've spent in a long time.) afterward wanz asked me how loud i ran it; he had his on five and turned down to three at dre's request. i told him, "the volume knob's missing, so i just roll it up until i feel it going R-R-R-R-R-R-R in my chest." for someone that doesn't gig often, i lose/destroy an awful lot of equipment. my epiphone's now missing three knobs, and i had to borrow a patch cord from hembree because i crushed the 1/4-inch on the newest one i had.

woke up the next morning feelling like i'd inhaled the entahr state of north carolina, with my voice sounding like louis armstrong. (thank goodness for neti pots.) opened on three hours' sleep. by the end of my shift, i was crosseyed with sleep deprivation. napped a couple of hours before falling by jesse the painter's for gallery night festivities. this year, gallery 5 had an "erotica" theme for their show. nice to see new works by pussyhouse and phil hemsley. my fave was almost-new-dad greg bahr's multi-media wet dream catcher. monday morning quarterbacked the gig with clay, ray, and hembree. 'twas good to see jesse and his sweetie becky; need to get together with them soon.

my sleep cycle is still fucked. gotta recuperate today before heading for oak cliff to play the "raided x+" art event at the kessler theater with HIO. yeah!

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