Mental Housecleaning, Part 2

Read part one first, or else this won't make sense.

13. The Ex: A band that never disappoints, but the first time will always be remembered as the best time—at the Knitting Factory with Mecca Normal opening (1994, maybe?) My WPRB pals and I had all discovered the "Joggers & Smoggers" double album at around the same time, so a chance to check out the band who'd made this wild and freaky record was nothing to sneeze at. The Ex used to play two sets a night in those days (early and late) with different openers—we caught the late one, and were immediately pissed that we hadn't attended both. Instead, we'd chosen to dine at a local Vietnamese restaurant where I bitched and moaned loudly about how unexcited I was to see Mecca Normal because Mecca Normal sucks, and why would anyone book Mecca Normal to play with the Ex, and so on. 90 seconds into my diatribe, I was kicked (hard, in the shin, under the table) by a fellow DJ who quietly informed me that Mecca Normal were, in fact, sitting right next to us and had clearly heard everything I'd said. Whoops. [Ex photo by Nick Helderman, licensed via Creative Commons. Listen to the Ex perform "Frenzy"]

14. Ff: For an audience of 7 people at Under Acme. In celebration of their fantastic performance, the soundman was beaten up by someone in the band's entourage immediately following their set. I ate mediocre Tex-Mex with friends, band members, and local fanzine glitterati in the restaurant upstairs. Someone insisted we take a cab home, and then announced mid-trip that she had no money to contribute to the rather hefty fare. In hindsight, I feel as though we should have left her in the middle of the bridge.

15. Flipper: At Northsix, a couple of years ago. Flipper was one of the first bands I liked that I knew was really cool, and would more than likely alienate me from anyone who thought music should be catchy, have a tune, or be something one might try dancing to. "Sex Bomb" and "Way of the World" were anthems of my C-90 era, which is to say, they were perennial favorites on WPRB and WTSR when I was a kid who treated college radio like a daily religious service. I was too young to see them before bassist Will Shatter died, but against all odds, they put out a really good reunion record on Rick Rubin's label in the early 90s called "American Grafishy", so I figured another 15 years of mileage couldn't hurt. The show was poorly promoted, poorly attended, and that band the Pissed Jeans opened, whom I find rather pedestrian. Flipper played, and they sounded good, but the experience was rather like what I imagine watching a Flipper cover band would be like. I'd raised myself on the lore of Flipper being a defiant middle finger to the hardcore scene -- playing impossibly slow and dirgey songs to a generation of adrenalized idiots who'd elevated the phrase "play faster!" to battlecry status. But what happens when everyone's in on the scheme? In 2006, there were no skinheads to piss off, no punk rock establishment to rail against, and no countercultural art scene to define. Instead, it was a handful of Brooklyn hipsters, me, Chad, Liz, and Brian who watched politely but (I think) all left feeling pretty underwhelmed by the whole thing. After the show, I suddenly realized that it was 2 AM, a worknight, and I was at least an hour away from my bed by subway. In a spectacular act of frivolity, I took a cab all the way home, woke up my sleeping wife, and instructed her to talk me out of any future interest I might express in seeing reunited punk bands perform. [Listen to Flipper perform "Way of the World"]

16: Monsula: At ABC no RIO, heat of high summer, 1990 or 91. Me and my suburban pals hopped NJ Transit into the city especially for this show. In between bands, the crowd emptied into ABC's courtyard where the Food Not Bombs people were preparing some of the most sickening food ever to hit my tastebuds. I struck up a conversation with some art school ladies, one of whom I was crushin' hard on within 15 minutes. Suddenly, the heavily-pierced Monsula singer guy appeared like an artpunk Fonzie, and whisked this lovely lady away from me, summarily ending any potential for Skate Betty hookups. I spent the rest of the day brooding behind my hair.

17. Econochrist: With the dreaded Monsula (see above) at a Pittsburgh elementary school gymnasium at, like, 11 in the morning on a weekday. Maybe it wasn't Pittsburgh, but it was FAR. Much farther than Jon Solomon (who drove), myself, or our pal Liz imagined. There only seemed to be about 15 paying customers, but the bands played anyway and sounded reasonably good in spite of the horrible acoustics. Monsula's guitar player had been kicked out of the band the previous day, but they soldiered on as a drum-n-bass combo for the duration of their tour, which even I had to admit was pretty admirable. In between sets, basketballs, hula hoops, and other phys-ed paraphernalia were produced by the gym teacher for the funny-haired kids to amuse themselves with.

18. Blur: 1991, City Gardens, with the Senseless Things opening. I was driving to work in Trenton, listening to a pair of WTSR DJs trying to give away tickets to see these bands (whom I'd never heard of), only no one was calling in for them. In predictably arrogant college DJ style, they announced that "no more music would be played" until the tickets were gone. Troubled by the notion of more ceaseless yabbering on their part, I pulled over somewhere on Olden Avenue, found a payphone, dialed in, won the tickets, and continued on to my destination. I took my friend Amanda to the show, and was surprised to find an audience that had until then been non-existent at the club: Preppy kids. Hundreds of them. We stuck out like sore thumbs, as I was donned in my usual combat boots/army shorts getup, and Amanda wore some kind of pre-Courtney Love babydoll dress. We stood way in the back and heard, for the first time, the sound of BritPop. Neither of us were particularly impressed by it, but we were mildly intrigued by the Senseless Things' rousing cover of a Dag Nasty song. We left early and hit the Crystal Diner for bottomless coffees and discussion. [Listen to Blur perform "Sing"]

19. The Ohio Players: Mid 90s, Terrace front lawn, during sign-ins. You haven't really lived until you've seen a bunch of Princeton undergrads dancing outdoors to music being played by guys who all look like Rick James. [Listen to the Ohio Players perform "Trespassin'"]

20. The Trans Megetti: These guys held the curious distinction of being a bona fide punkity rock band based in the very un-punkity rock Jersey shore town of Beach Haven, NJ. (That's on LBI for you Bennys...) They played in some asshole fratboy hangout called The Ketch, but instantly brought the asshole fratboy audience to life with their manic surfcore. It is also worth pointing out that I was the ONLY person at the bar, for the entire night, yet it took herculean effort on my part to earn the bartender's attention every time I needed another Maker's Mark. Such are the pitfalls of being 35, but still harboring a fading interest in the music of 19-year-olds.

21. Nuisance: At WFMU, back when it was in East Orange, in the middle of the night on Pat Duncan's show. Fantastic band... now greatly revered by the guys in Comets on Fire, although you'd never know it from listening to their records. (Nuisance sounded like punk guys getting stoned and playing old Neil Young songs.) The tape of this set is the source of that "We were asked not to play because of our controversial subject matter" audio clip that I still play on FMU sometimes. It also pops up randomly on the station's homepage as a "soundbyte of the day". Pat used to record all of his live bands on a stationary, black & white camera, with the audio sourced through the mixing board. Somewhere in my closet is a VHS copy of this set filmed as such, and it very much creates the sensation of watching a rock show by means of a 7-11 security camera.

22. Libido Boyz: Also at WFMU's old studios, also in the middle of the night. This was on April 29th of 1992, and the only reason I know that is because it was the same night the L.A. riots erupted in the wake of the Rodney King police acquittals. As such, driving through a really nasty neighborhood at 3 AM with hundreds of angry people massing out on the street was not an experience which I'd recommend to many people today, even those who owe me money. I eventually just started blowing red lights in an effort to get out as quickly as possible. My departure from the East Orange city limits was accompanied by a shower of bottles and other debris, yet my car suffered only minimal scarring.

23. Cheap Trick: A couple of summers ago, in Liberty State Park. A poorly organized Outdoor Rock Fest in Jersey City. Patti Smith, Los Lobos, P-Funk, and a bunch of other bands also played. High ticket prices and a lack of promotion snarled the success of what could have been a packed event, but I blundered into free tix being given away by the promoters—a failed effort on their part to have some bodies on hand. (Some hippie guy who'd once accosted me in a local coffee shop demanding to know if I was a fan of The Gypsy Kings appeared at WFMU bearing complementary tickets "for the jocks". Later on that day, I saw him distributing more free tickets at a pizza parlor.) I missed Patti Smith and Los Lobos, P-Funk was shockingly uninteresting (really just George Clinton wandering around the stage in a tracksuit and saying "yeah!" or "that's right!" once in a while, while his pickup band and female backup singers did most of the work. Cheap Trick blew doors, however, even with only about 200 people watching by their set's conclusion. Several revelations were had by me by evening's end: 1) Robin Zander may be the singer, but Rick Neilsen is totally the frontman. 2) A lifetime of hard drinking leaves its mark most evidently in the neck/throat area. 3) "The Flame" is not as bad a song as I remembered it being. After the show, we followed a very intoxicated local resident through a muddy, wooded "trail" in almost complete darkness. I was seized by a brief and silent terror, but felt relief when the parking lot appeared through the mist, as per his prophecy. I went home and listened to In Color... on repeat for the next week. [Listen to Cheap Trick perform "Come On, Come On"]

24. The Wedding Present: Maxwell's, Sea Monsters tour, early 90s. They were loud as bombs and they didn't play "Dalliance". Not surprisingly, I have mixed feelings about this. [Listen to the Wedding Present perform "Dalliance"]

Go here for part 3.

Comments

[twitter.com/hakujins]

This is the most nostalgia'd nostalgia I've ever nostalgia'd! Congrats on the kid. -- rj

[Jon Solomon]

Believe it or not, the Econochrist/Monsula/Nuisance show was in Carlisle, PA - just west of Harrisburg and still a few hours from Pittsburgh.

15 paying customers is a generous over-estimate.

[r:m:b]

Thanks, Jim. And you're right -- for all my railing against nostalgia, I am totally pitching myself into its gooey center headfirst with these posts. But in my defense, I'm doing so in order to prevent becoming one of those hateful morons who hangs around the local bookstore, record shop, bar, or college radio station, babbling incessantly about "the glory days". I hate people like that, and would never want to become one of them. As I explained in the intro to part one of this series, the reason I'm typing all this stuff out now is to rid my brain of such cumbersome baggage. So why these stories inparticular? Well, some people find such chatter interesting, as evidenced by my Google traffic reports. If I'm guilty of anything, it's for making a cheap grab at earning more blog-traffic. As such, you may now officially hate the playa. -Mike

[r:m:b]

HARRISBURG! That's right -- thank you, Jon. I will always defer to you on Pennsylvania geography, as mine is sketchy at best. -Mike