this is some shit that my work goes to every year. it is in St. Louis. my girlfriend is still watching Desperate Housewives. all of the women on this show look like puppies and all the men on this show look like dudes with goatees.
last we left off, it was morning in Appleton, a place where even the Mexican restaurants sell gyros. down this entire strip was places that sold gyros. within a few minutes of exiting the van in the “downtown” area, we managed to find a farmer’s market where i bought some shit i probably lost in the van. we also met a dude named Hippie Wayne. he sold us some…uh…what are those fucking pickled beans called? they have some name like HAPPY BEANS or something stupid. well whatever, we ate them and he was cool. and we ate at a place called The Green Gecko where wisconsin wives were drinking red wine at 10am while wearing packers jerseys and the food was local fair trade organic whatever whatever. good joint. nice people. but no vegan shit.
“aw, that’s so sad,” i hear my girlfriend in the background say while some dumb shit happens on Desperate Housewives
i was eating vegan at the time so i ventured out to find some fucking muffins or something with the guiding words of the counterperson from The Green Gecko, telling me to go down an alley into some yoga studio/vegan bakery. i had to stop to take a shit at a coffeeshop. because i was on tour and thats what you do every single day. when i found the vegan bakery, it was like a closet with cookies in it. i left, awkwardly. i think i may have taken a shit there, too.
but all of these events were overshadowed by one rough thing. our road-dude, Mike, was missing and not answering his phone. we called, we texted, we called, we texted. it was confusing. eventually i posted on facebook and tagged him and he must’ve realized we were truly worried about him. so he called.
“hey man. just wanted to let you know that im okay.”
“uhhh…what happened to you?”
“well, i didnt feel good for one reason or another so i had to keep moving. so i left. i fell asleep in a chair.”
“in someone’s house?”
“what? no! that’d be rude. show up somewhere and just take a nap?”
“okay. so, where can we get you?”
“oh, dont worry about me, man. i’m in another place.”
“where?”
“milwaukee.”
he rejected any attempts we made to meet up with him in milwaukee and keep him on the tour with us. we were forced to party across the country while mike partied in a more confined region of the world that was luckily, not jail.
that thought of jail just reminded me to send this image to someone i know who is in an abusive relationship.
so we lost mike to the punk rock abyss and carried on to Milwaukee, Wisconsin. we left while debating on whether or not Ratsak played a Minor Threat cover.
so we drove and saw signs for “Cat Toys For People – Cat Dancer Products” and observed dudes whipping donuts on Lake Winnebego. for the uninitiated (people who dont live in miserable arctic climates), whipping donuts or “shitties” is when you pull your emergency brake and crank your steering wheel, sending you spinning around in circles. one time i was with my friend and we did a hit and run to a subaru that was backing out of a driveway. his ability to navigate due to whipping shitties was the only thing that allowed us to escape from a large truck that was pursuing us, presumably to write down the license plate.
before we got to Milwaukee, dan revealed to us that he is descended from Alfred the Great. he also told us that according to an inside source, Mike Portnoy (from Dream Theater, a band actually worse than Avenged Sevenfold) got kicked out of Avenged Sevenfold for stealing signed guitars for charities and sending them to his family members. also, Avenged Sevenfold are evidently all nice guys and not politically conservative, although they play one on Mountain Dew Presents Rockstar Energy Monster Stage.
we got to Milwaukee and headed towards Quarters Rock N’ Roll Palace. but ended up Riverwest co-op eating some awesome vegan philly cheesesteaks and stuff. outside was a girl on the phone asking her partner how to use her bike rack. then we went to Fuel Cafe and met up with the nice youngsters in Total Trash.
note the dudes in the back playing MAGIC: THE GATHERING
“dont write about poop hand,” my notes say, referring to a nameless member of the band having to wipe their own ass with their hand WHO THEN FORGOT TO WASH IT BEFORE EATING.
we sat around, people ate burritos, and eventually we organized records for the Havoc Distro we were entrusted to carry and sell. i talked to Amanda from Enabler, which is the first band Brain Tumors ever played a show with (as Teenage Impotents, this is actually our first show ever). one time I told Greg from Southern Lord Records that Jeff Lohrber was our manager and insisted we talk to him about our future with the label. sorry, jeff. sort of. but not really. at all. we also found out that we had a write up in THE ONION in Milwaukee.
brilliantly, they used our facebook picture. which is a picture of one of our favorite bands, Leather, from Philadelphia. “they’re really trying to help – I swear,” remarked Aaron.
we went to Quarters and saw Aaron Skufca, who is such a great dude. and we saw Brian and his girlfriend, Lindsey, who are such great dudes. and Bubba, who is such a great dudes.
i went to this tiki bar near Quarters and tried to get a drink but waited ten minutes and had pre-buyers remorse, so i left. it was just some fucking tiki bar.
the rest of my notes look like this:
“SOUP MOAT – GREAT”
“BUBBA + BRIAN”
“TALKED ABOUT DEADBEAT RECORDS RIPPING PEOPLE OFF”
“FUZZED GUITAR, GOOD SHIT”
“ERIC FROM HOLY SHIT”
Soup Moat had a song about riding tall bikes. Bubba told me a story about hanging out with Origin of M (ex-Gudon) and them being offered some poppers. the singer responded by opening up his fanny pack to reveal that he had his own supply of poppers.
Total Trash played a great set despite their guitarist Dustin being sick as fuck. and Strange Matter absolutely killed it in about a thousand ways, eliciting the quote of “this band is proof that Tony can do whatever the fuck he wants” from Aaron Skufca, referring to Tony from Holy Shit/Strange Matter.
Strange Matter sounded like Rich Kids on LSD meets The Melvins. so fuck yeah. he also yelled “Vote Subway, Vote Arby’s” at some point during their set. so i felt a strong kinship. here is an article about the show:
http://expressmilwaukee.com/article-permalink-20770.html
even during their set, some girl played The Simpsons Iphone Bullshit Assface Game while pretending to enjoy them, which is a proof of it’s dark power as warned to us by our gear fixer, Dusty Miller (thanked on the back of Fuck You Forever)
afterward, Bubba and I took shots with the bartender. i think of this bartender often because he is the only bartender to ever ask me to wait before serving me because he was too busy playing Mortal Kombat on the TV above the bar to grab my drink. i also met the best homeless dude ever outside. his name was John and he quoted only the nice parts of the bible that everyone agrees with.
i dont remember our set but i remembered it was fun. i think i tried to throw some girl’s cell phone and her name was carol. i met a dude who looked like Billy Zane from a band called Quitters who came to our show just to see if we were better than his band. he reluctantly stated that we were.
after drinking free beer all night, us and Total Trash went back to Aaron’s about a block away. some dude almost hit us but then stopped his car to ask for Grey Poupon and redeemed himself.
Bubba stole (bought?) us a bottle of shitty tequila because he is the best dude ever and we partied until way late. two of the bartenders from the tiki bar came over with pre-made mixed drinks, so i got my bullshit tiki drink after all. rory and i colored our mustaches (and my eyebrows) with mascara in a tribute to john waters. i talked to a guy and his girlfriend with facial tattoos about our show in New Orleans which they stated would be doomed (it wasnt). they also said theyd talk to their friends to put it in a better spot (they didnt). but whatever, nice people.
and all the while, Aaron blasted Nasa Space Universe and Venom and insisted that we take showers or do laundry.
i also met a guy i wrote down as “hank with the one stud”, as he had one stud on his jacket – just like me. we ain’t punk enough to have all the studs just yet.
we went to sleep on the floor with the madness a Don Hertzfeld dvd playing all through the night. he is amazing.
Instead of looking like John Waters he looks like Hunx from Hunx and His Punx. I doubt he’s as sassy as either Waters or Hunx, though.
this was one of my favorite shows…EVER. i had just re-integrated myself into the Mke scene after a prolonged “substance”-related hiatus and had been going to a couple shows a week if possible. Every show I had been to was ho-hum, maybe a good band, maybe two, but with the absolute shit bands that theyd play with the shows just werent cutting it. Then I came to this show…Soup Moat was on stage when I got there, just about ready to play. I had been told that they were a “joke” band, but were good, though I have to admit I was expecting something different, something worse. But I was pleasantly suprised, they were awesome. One down, three to go. Then Total Trash played, and while they may not have gotten the crowd reaction they deserved (hell, let’s be honest, nobody got the crowd reaction they deserved, most of Mke will sit there and bob their head in half-time for thrash beats, showing their deep knowledge of punk rhythms.) they were pretty sick. The guitar feedback was thick, the singer had a unique voice, something between a shout and early-hardcore “singing”, the drums were pretty tight, the bass seemed good (though i have to be honest it was hard to pay attention to the bass and not the vocalist/guitarist), buteverything sounded great. I liked this band because they had their own sound ( for those who are experienced in discerning differences amongst the punk/hardcore “noise” ) and also because they seemed to have an ironic love for ICP. The singer weaved her way through the audience, the guitarist would get bursts of groove through his bones, while his feet worked magic like Elvis. Occasionally he’d squat, as though he were sitting, for certain parts he’d play. The first time I thought maybe his guitar strap had fallen off. It didnt. He also had pointy-shoes on. I later talked to the vocalist when I checked out their merch. She was very nice. I bought their most recent cassette and had wanted to buy a shirt but they only had white shirts, and im prejudice when it comes to clothes. Next up was the almighty Brain Tumors, who I had never even heard of before this show (SHAMEful!!!). ( i will continue my little anecdote in a continued reply, aka part II, which i will write later this afternoon/evening…)
yo, dawgger. you better finish this. this was great. and for the record, Dustin from Total Trash seems to play like that UNCONTROLLABLY. we’ve been playing some music with him in another project and its interesting to see him shuffle around for an audience of two of his friends.