i seem to get a lot of bulletins and mass texts that start off with "Hello, friends" or "Hey, friends" or just simply "FRIENDS"-and then it goes on to tell me about some totally rad Dj night or alcohol funded "party" or mud wrestling/pumpkin carving contest. now i know we all get these--fuck, we all SEND these-and i have no problem with this. it's called "networking", right? and even though i hate that meaningless word as much as i hate "multitasking" or "millenials" (and puh-leeze! can you alt-rag music writers stop with "earworms"?)--i get it. i mean i'm writing this on myspace for chrissakes. and, hey-i wanna be kept in the loop, too. i mean, who wants to miss out on free black/grey swan/goose from 9 pm to 9:13 pm at lumen's, huh? certainly not me. BUT-what i do have a problem with is this irresponsible use of the word 'friend'. it's smarmy. if i'm such a friend why do i only ''hear'' from you in mass texts? i have more respect for mass texts that read, 'hey, all you fuckers!' at least with that i know where i stand. the respect level feels pretty consistent. no mixed signals there. but 'friends'? i'm not sure if i'm even comfortable with 'acquaintance'--chances are that i was pretty drunk when we met and i'd have trouble picking you out of anyone's top 8. not your fault--some people are good with names-some are good with faces. i suck at both.

i'd like to think this gross misuse of the word ''friends'' may have started with the lcd soundsystem track 'all my friends'. makes sense-this seems to be a fairly hipsterish problem/delusion--and the alt-rags tell me that mr. murphy is the clown king of hipsters (love that picture of you with espresso cup, jim). add to that equation the overall general excellence of that song and i think we're on to something. but i doubt very much that john mcCain has 'the sound of silver' in his i-tunes. and this guy uses the word "friends" like paris hilton uses ACTUAL friends (although, i suppose her friends deserve quotation marks, too). but what makes his use of the word that much more disingenuous is the inclusion of "my"---"my friends". "my FRIENDS'. so fucking galling. i'd rather listen to a million of palin's ''you betcha''s than endure just one more of mcCain's "my friends". dude, i'm not your friend-in fact i'm probably one of those americans that you call un-american (sound logic, sir. the fundamentals of that logic are SO strong). so stop smiling that creepy grin at me and stop prefacing everything with that condescending "my friends'' spoken in that pinched, aggravated voice of yours. it's a stinking, belching lie. and while we're on the subject : who the fuck are your friends? who will you be sending out the e-vites to? who will be coming out to your slammin' Dj night? i know you used to be friends with bush-but you guys don't appear to be so tight anymore. and besides, didn't he used to talk shit about you back in the day? like in 2000? biden says he's your friend-but i KNOW he talks shit about you----i'd watch my back with that one. and palin's your soul mate--sooo i'd rule that one out-sex always ruins the friendship. trust me, dude. so who's that leave? joe the plumber? yeah, you guys are obvious homies-there's no way that he's just using you to get his 15 minutes of soul sucking fame. and you obviously aren't using him to demonize obama and pretend that you AREN'T a rich fuck with 13 cars, 8 houses, and a family with a net worth of 136 million. so, you go on with your bad self, mickey-C. you and joe the plunger can go ahead and party down. make sure you bring plenty of nickleback. and if the plumber dude turns out to be a total tool (did i really?)-don't worry you've still got cheney in your corner.....but i'm pretty sure that-just like the entire republican party-he's just using you to get to palin. and hopefully, the last time i'll ever have to hear you call me your "friend" is this wednesday-during your fucking concession speech. now THAT's gonna be a party worthy of a mass text. holla!



scott

so, i was in salt lake city when i heard that paul newman had died-and i was fucking bummed. i get an endless kick out of the comedic genius that al pacino has turned into ever since 'scarface'/i think it's damn near impossible to beat the kinetic DANGER of early deniro/and nobody can do righteous indignation like jimmy stewart--but i gotta say->my favorite actor has to be paul newman. i've never once seen him turn in a performance that didn't feel 100% true. he just couldn't be false. and i'm not even talking about 'cool hand luke'. or 'slapshot'-although we could-but i love him in 'mr. and mrs. bridge'. and i love love LOVE him in 'nobody's fool'. he was just so fucking great-how could anyone dispute it? so it was with that in mind that i kind of got righteously indignant myself when i was talking about his death to the girl who shuttled me from the hotel to the show--and she goes, 'you mean the salad dressing guy?' and i was like, what the fuck? (and to answer your question:she was 29-so it's no excuse) but the next day i started to think about it. what she said is totally valid:maybe 'newman's own' really is his true legacy. i mean, you can't put a price tag on the joy and inspiration his movies have brought to people--but when it comes down to it->all that spaghetti sauce (sockarooni!) is what has made the real-concrete-ACTUAL difference. the kind of difference that you CAN put a price tag on-what? something like 200 fucking million dollars? all for charity....kind of amazing. and this in the face of all those lying, venal wall street fucks that have sold us down the river-not to mention those lying, venal fucks in washington who not only let this happen but facilitated it. see-i want to live in paul newman's america. the one where people give a shit. and i'm starting to feel like other people want to as well. lately, i've been hearing a lot of people talking about how they're gonna move to europe if mccain wins-and i'm not necessarily down with that-but i really don't think they're gonna have to. people are fucking fed up-and not just the liberal pinkos that live in my city-i'm starting to see it everywhere. the guy who drove me back to my hotel after the show in salt lake-he had just gotten back from iraq about a year ago. he was in the first wave AND he's re-enlisting because he got bad grades and now has to pay his loan BACK to the army (jesus-what is he? playing football?)-even this guy is gonna vote for obama. this is the kind of guy that mccain's always talking about; the kind of guy who he's running for->white kid, iraq war vet, lives in salt lake city--should be a slam dunk. nu-uh, motherfucker. he knows the war is fucked-and he's not even afraid of it (he's fucking re-enLISTING!) but he still knows it's over-he knows it's gotta stop. or take my dad-he was in the army, he's about 5 years younger than mccain, he lives up in the middle of deerhunter/from/my/cold/dead/hands/middle/of/fucking/nowhere upper wisconsin--his words? 'things have gotta change'. apparently not all white males are afraid to vote for a black man (oh-and by the way-my mom? not so enamored with ms. palin). these are the middle american, salt of the earth types that the republican party is always pretending to speak for. the non-elitists. but that shit just doesn't seem to be flying anymore-and it makes me so proud that i could fucking cry. so, put away your passports all you leftys-you ain't going anywhere--i don't think EVERYone in middle america is on board the straight talk express. and when i'm cracking a cold one on thursday and sitting down to watch biden rip palin to shreds-i'm gonna be thinking one thing->godDAMN! i wish paul newman had made beer.



scott

[note: as this is being posted local h is getting ready to go on stage in columbus while radiohead is readying to go on in chicago.]




i went into reckless yesterday to finally buy a physical copy of 'in rainbows'. i had downloaded it-like everybody else-last year (my price? 0. and that was in pounds.)-but i have recently become obsessed with this record and i had heard that the sound quality of the download wasn't quite up to snuff AND i wanted to give these guys my money. boy, did i. i walked over to the Rs-looked through the rocket from the crypts, hoping for that remastered 'circa:now' reissue that no one ever fucking has-then turned my head to the left and begin flipping through the radioheads. grabbed 'in rainbows' then thought 'hey, my ex-girlfriend absconded with my 'o.k. computer'. i really should have that. and i've always loved 'kid a' so why don't i have 'amnesiac'? have i even heard anything off that record? what the fuck. i might as well get 'hail to the thief', too. hey, what's this? are these live recordings?.......'. i was not happy to have to walk up to the smirking, judgemental counter of reckless records with 5 radiohead cds-but, shit. these wrongs had to be made right. i have ALWAYS resisted radiohead. why? when 'pablo honey' came out-i was like, 'who the fuck are these posers with a record named after a jerky boys bit?' even though 'creep' secretly tore me to bits every time i heard the start-stutter of that lawnmower guitar and yorkey got all angelic to pieces on your ass. when they proved to everybody that they didn't suck with 'the bends' i was like 'it's okay'. but, come on-'my iron lung' said otherwise. when they took EVERYTHING to the next level with 'o.k. computer' i pulled the old 'emperor has no clothes' bit-and i kept on with that shit right through 'kid A' and 'amnesiac'. then i found a copy of 'kid A' in a cd player at the gym and i started listening to it. REALLY listening. the hype had died down so it was safe. and i loved it. i absolutely loved it. i was convinced it was their best record and would get into arguments with people who still preferred the 'songs' of 'the bends'. i was so into this version and idea of radiohead that i completely ignored 'hail to the thief' because i had heard it was 'a return to form' (what a tired and lazy phrase that is). and then they did something so fucking completely off-the-rails-no-debate awesome--they said, 'um-screw you, record companies. screw you, RIAA. screw you, radio. just download the fucking thing and pay what you want. i mean we ARE radiohead, after all.' sure-you could say it was just a clever marketing ploy. but it MEANS something. it was a goddamn statement. it was daring to be great---and i STILL didn't listen to it. i downloaded it and that was about it. kept meaning to listen but-really-who has the time? i was BUSY. then i listened to it a couple of times in europe. and i liked it. LIKED it. then i listened to it in the van on a trip from vegas to san diego. and i REALLY liked it. it goes without saying that radiohead is a band born for headphones-and riding through the desert at night with the beautiful tones and expert knobbing of nigel godrich booming into your ears through honest-to-god-cradle-the balls headphones and NOT frequency reducing oh-so-convenient earbuds is pretty mind blowing. still-i was convinced that my current obsessions lied with the national (that new e.p. IS pretty great, though). and then i came home. i was getting ready to go out and i felt like listening to 'in rainbows'. so i burned it onto cd-popped it into the cd player-and started shaving. it was the greatest shave of my life. two weeks later-i can barely bring myself to listen to anything else-i listen to it at least twice a day. it's sick. it's an obsession and it's gotten out of hand. and i fucking love it. there are so many records that i will just call great-as in, 'yeah-that's a great record'. but they're not great. you listen a couple of times and that's usually it. not so with this. it's easy to forget what it feels like to totally immerse yourself in a group of songs and totally obsess about every detail and let the layers unfold and wash over you. to keep going back and hearing more and getting deeper and TRULY UNDERSTANDING the music in ways that no one else could POSSIBLY do in the way that you are RIGHT NOW. it's fucking great. it's why i love music. it's why music isn't my job-but rather it's inseparable from who i am. it's why i would give up everything at anytime to just get up PLAY for any room-no matter how empty. records like this are what has made me a hopeless fool for music. lying in bed last night, listening to 'house of cards' and realizing the difference between beautiful and gorgeous. i was 13 again. how can i go to pitchfork this weekend and pretend that vampire weekend actually matters when radiohead can crank out a song like 'reckoner' seven records into their career? why the fuck do i have to be playing a show on august 1 when all i really want for summer is to be able to listen to these guys play 'all i need' while i stare at the chicago skyline? and finally-why? why have i resisted radiohead for SO long? failed to see their greatness and just give in already. well, partly because i hate to be told what to do. doubt should be anybody's natural inclination when they're being bombarded with how great something is--and that's one reason why i hesitate to even write this now-but i think there's a deeper reason-and that reason is jealousy. plain and simple. i was always jealous of radiohead. and that statement is ridiculous because there is NO way that i could ever even be close to their level-and i'm really not fishing here because-fuck. who could be? but listening to a track like 'nude' or 'weird fishes' makes you realize that shutting your goddamn mouth and just listening and not giving a fuck is all that should matter. in ANYthing. we get so bogged down by bullshit that it's easy to forget the things that make you YOU. and loving a shitty little piece of plastic is one of the things that makes me ME. so thanks, radiohead. i'm glad you exist and i'm sorry i was such a shit to you all these years. i'll see you in cleveland. and thank you SO much for this record. i needed it in ways that you'll never know. of course, to be fair-you probably DID know how much i needed it.....you ARE radiohead, after all.





scott

check out 3 videos from Thursday nights Beat Kitchen show:

we’d just like to say that local h does not support the word ’DROP’. as in: ’local h’s new record DROPS may 13’. sure we have a new record COMING OUT on may 13th---but it is definitely not ’DROPPING’. maybe it’s just where we come from--but when it comes to records and record labels-the word ’DROP’ just makes us queasy. not cool at all.

finally got the new cd in my hot little hands yesterday. now it feels real. it comes out may 13th and it’s called ’12 angry months’ and-you guessed it-it IS a concept album. but aren’t they all? there should be a 7 inch for ’24 hour break-up session’ floating around somewhere-so look for it. we’ve been beating our own brains out rehearsing for the beat kitchen shows (did i really used to sing that high? fuck.) and the tour. we should be announcing the opening bands for the residency soon. i’m psyched.


scott

sitting in this holiday inn in des moine-hiding from all the raging assholes on st. patrick’s day-my mind, naturally, goes back to ireland. could this fucked-up worst of the worst day really be derived from the country that seemed so great just a mere week ago? it’s time to ask: what did i learn from that european trip? well, i learned that i’m a shit bass player-my hand still feels like a nosferatu claw. and my index finger is so stiff and stoney that it could be used by romans looking to purge in the ancient vomitoriums. on tour with my real band, playing a regular old six-string guitar feels more like playing a ukulele. i feel like a giant-or, maybe it’s just all that heavy beer i drank like it was coors light. i learned how to become a connoisseur of snores-picking them out like fine wines. for instance: bones has a deep oaky snore with undertones of berries, while mike’s is dry with a light finish (not to mention his uncanny ability to pee the theme to ’halloween’). but it doesn’t stop there-aaron can snore in time to hip-hop beats, t. snores like all 3 of the stooges, and rebecca doesn’t snore. and robert? well, he doesn’t sleep. i’ve learned that yes, i can survive for three weeks without hearing english-but it is a three weeks that one may never fully recover from. i feel like i don’t understand ANYBODY now. i watch lips-i study hand gestures--i don’t seem to trust words anymore. i’ve become painfully aware of my own speech impediments and am convinced that i am growing a david letterman-sized gap between my teeth which forces me to keep my trap shut. i have finally become a listener-but i don’t understand what i’m hearing so i may as well start babbling again. i’ve learned that a healthy and ready catalogue of quotes from ’glenngarry glenn ross’ may be the fastest way to make friends and influence people. i’ve learned the last few days of a tour are just as important as the first few days-probably more so. i’ve learned whiskey is no longer enough-a fact that became horrifyingly clear the other night when me and mcintyre’s ’quiet’ night out required far more than maker’s, power’s, OR jameson’s could ever give us. we needed-nay, DEMANDED-a fortification to our bourbon bedrock that included poteen, absinthe (thank you, delilah’s), and vicodin (thank you, DOCTOR!). and i’d like to say that i learned that we’re all the same-but we’re not. we’re all different-and i think that’s much, much better. we talk different. look different. smell different. and why not? what’s wrong with that? it seems to me that we’re run by people who have a fundamental problem with people being different in any way. that’s why we’re in such a shit-storm. that’s why our dollar is getting crushed like nuts going down a slide. and that’s why we’re so apprehensive about traveling. we’ve let ourselves be misrepresented to the rest of the world in the worst possible way. that’s why that ’rambo’ shit is doing so well in every country but ours. they see it as some kind of post-modern unpacking of our own national identity. it’s an absurdist joke that they are LOVING and one we seem to be sick of-or maybe it’s one that we just don’t get since we’re actually IN the fucking forest. they see george bush as a first-class criminal and probably can’t understand why we haven’t put his entire administration’s heads on spikes-and i really can’t see any reasonable answer to that question. our reasonable acceptance of the hi-jacking of our country can only be read as complete and utter section-8 insanity. or just plain cowardice-take your pick. and i realize that in the end none of this matters. i know that life really IS wonderful and the most important thing is the people you love and surround yourself with. i am so very aware that beyond that simple fact-i really don’t know anything. and i really am glad to be back home and i have no desire to move to another country (although, paris-you got my mark)-but i also have no desire to live in a country run by 4th grade-level morons and cynics that cater to 4th grade-level morons. something has to change. it’s GOT to, right? of course, i’ve seen europe’s tv shows, too. i’ve seen their sitcoms. i’ve heard their pop stars. i’ve tasted their junk food. total shit. certainly, no better than ours. but maybe that’s what binds us-makes us the same-levels us out and truly brings us together as brothers and sisters. well, if that’s true then beam me up, motherfuckers. but consider this (’what? movies, again?’)-number one at england’s box office was ’no country for old men’-the same week over here? the number one spot was ’meet the spartans’. now that doesn’t mean that england doesn’t suck and isn’t filled with a bunch of idiots--it just means that maybe we’ve got more of those idiots here. and as for you, st. patrick’s day-i don’t care where you came from and i don’t care how you got here--fuck you and fuck your stupid green beer.



scott

shit...last night was our last show. it was the last time i would stand on an over-crowded stage with those tossers. the last time i would play so many songs in the key of G. the last time my hand would contort itself into a nosferatu claw from playing tom’s bass. sad. i had high hopes for that last show--playing with the tossers in dublin. it conjured up images so glorious and profane that mere mortal men dare not imagine them-that is, of course, unless they WANTED pasolini to rise from the grave and demand that shit back. last night was supposed to be the money shot. so, how was it? .......hmmm. what could i write that would possibly satisfy you? what? that we killed babies and drank their blood? that i fear i’ve painted myself into a liver-soaked corner? that whiskey will never be enough again? that i have looked into the abyss and the abyss has looked back into me? nah. i feel great. better than when i started. MORE whole. i will say this, though-i never imagined i’d be sitting with an irish punk band in an apartment above a club in dublin drinking champagne bought for us by bono. for some reason THAT is weirder than drinking the blood of babies. maybe not. we’re staying in ireland today-we’re gonna visit phil lynnot’s grave, spend all our euro’s on booze and chips, and then we are going the fuck home.


scott

mike woke up this morning and croaked out a 'what the hell happened?' i wish i knew what to tell him. that poteen shit really works. or maybe it was all the 'bishop's finger's i drank. or the '1698' i chugged while stephen rea sweetly sang 'goodnight, irene' into my ear. yesterday, i took a ride on 'the belfast wheel'. i got into one it's glass cars and up it went-higher and (holy fuck!) higher above the city until i thought i was going to slingshot into some fucking church. real 'eyes of laura mars' shit. i could see everything-and i wasn't sure i wanted to. the wind screamed and shook that stupid creaking compartment like some invisible giant retarded child-while i bargained with any celestial being that would listen. 'omigod' i shrieked. 'i am going to die alone on a ferris wheel in belfast...and it is totally and completely awesome.' it was a shitty tourist attraction-and it was one of the best moments of my life. tonight is the last show of the tour. i can't wait to come home to you and find out how different i really am.


scott

we pulled into the port of belfast with a mixture of excitement and total unrelenting dread. the tossers in ireland-this is the place where we would be getting fitted for our body bags like high-school boys with their tuxes on the eve of the most horrifying prom ever. and speaking of coffin nails-i just purchased one: a bottle of poteen. we've decided to move on from the absinthe of europe and plunge into the hoary, celtic netherworld of irish moonshine. weighing in at 140 proof-it leaves me quaking in my boxing shorts-so very, very afraid. the lass i bought it from simply said, 'my hat's off to you' and handed me the change with a sinister smile. just looking at the bottle makes me wanna throw up. it's got turtleneck wearing sea monkeys floating in it. the show here tonight has the lowest pre-sale of the tour-a fact aaron likes to attribute to the notion that no one in belfast wants to commit to buying a ticket to a show that they're not sure they'll be alive to see. it's a bit of a walk-up town.


scott

OMIGOD! i have stared at a lot of people in various fogs of total incomprehension this month-but i have NEVER known a confusion like the confusion i’ve found in glascow. what the fuck? what the fuck? what the FUCK? i cannot understand a word--na’ uh facking werd. these guys have assaulted the english language with a prejudice so extreme that its very utterance causes babies to cry, women to wail, and grown men to piss their pants. irvine welsh wasn’t kidding. it would almost be kinda awesome if i wasn’t so dumbfounded. sometimes i can almost swear that i hear these sneaky pricks trying to slip some chinese by me. they know they’re doing it. i see those shitty grins out of the corner of my eye-don’t think i don’t. by the time i got to the club-i had given up. let them play they’re pidgen games-i spent my time swimming in a cocktail of equal parts stella, tennents, and coffee. we decided to go down the street and watch a real football game in a real pub-in other words: soccer in a bar-which, i am happy to report, is just as boring as american football. jesus, does anybody score in these things? we walked in with the score at 1-0 and that’s the way it stayed until the not so bitter end. nevertheless-these scotties were on the edge of their feet. amazing. don’t laugh, america. you think televised poker is riveting. i suppose, the EU’s insistence that this child’s game is actually exciting could be seen as a bit charming---charming in that ’are you fucking shitting me?’ way that the southern states’ constant insistence that the confederate flag is not a symbol of racism is charming. of course, it didn’t really matter to me-i primarily came for the profanity. i was not disappointed-the ’cunts’ and ’twats’ were flying like an air show of witches. glorious. we went back to the club and raged and seethed and demanded clapping from the philistines while our equipment huffed and puffed and held on for their lives. we put that shit away wet and headed out into the night with some translators-bound for a bar full of irish whiskey and scottish mud-wrestling.


scott

i'm hallucinating again-but this time it's not from absinthe. i just had my ass handed to me by an indian restaurant in birmingham. i am paralyzed by fear and massive amounts of madras. we've been in england for the past three days which means that we can finally understand the language. or i should say, we're SUPPOSED to understand. to be honest, i had an easier time in sweden. some hooligan here will be giving me the why and what for-and i just cannot make head or tail about what the fuck he's on about. cheeri-O. this also means that the steady stream of scandinavian beauty has dried up once and for all. in it's place is a calvacade of pubs with names that are heavy as fuck-each one trying to outdo the other with doom and gloom and total dungeon-ry. in oxford we downed pints at the hobgoblin-where (according to the sign on the door) even despair dies. goddamn! in london we jumped from 'the king's head' to 'the old queen's head' and over to 'the tiny little fetus head'. why? and every bar i walk into is cranking 'charmer' by kings of leon. this will do. evidently they're huge here-which, i guess, is good for them--now will you guys PLEASE starting getting ugly and fat? come on-do you have to have everything? it's not even fair. last night i sat talking to the owner of 'the dragon's other testicle' about the klaxons. i was talking to a 60-year-old about a bunch of 18-year-olds. hmmmm. he got me fucking LOADED. we went back to the hotel and took turns break dancing and mystifying robert. a word about robert-or as he is more commonly known: The Dread Pirate Robert. he is our vegan/straight edge tour manager from prague and i'm sure his idea of a good time is to drive a van full of chicago drunks all over europe. it's gotta suck to be him. oh, well-he's handled it with a quiet nordic grace and seems to understand that we all have our vices-his just happens to be protien powder. which brings us to birmingham. 'birmingham'-now THAT's a heavy name. we've put geezer butler on the guest list and have our fingers crossed SO hard. we fully intend to take a ride through birmingham cranking 'black sabbath' by black sabbath off the album 'black sabbath' after the show and it would be nice if he came along. my insides are fire.


scott

what a surprise! our show in paris last night was cancelled. but i thought the french loved american rock bands SO much that they would sooner hang than cancel a show. fuck 'em. we went to paris anyway-if for no other reason than pure spite. they think they can stop us from coming there and eating their croissants? drinking their wine? spitting on their sidewalks? NO! farting in someone's general direction is all very well and good-but situations like this deserve decisive action and direct confrontation. we snuck into the city limits sometime around noon and hunkered down in our hotel rooms to plan our assault. we were going to turn out this particular city's lights. we sauntered downstairs lobby-ways to pick a fight with the concierge-who turned out....to be a friendly elderly woman who was being extremely nice and helpful. what was this shit? how were we supposed to flex our jeremy piven with that? later, grandma. ciao, she called out after us. we thought that maybe we could hit a church and say, 'cunt'-but we ended up in the most incredible cemetery we'd ever seen. it slowly dawned on us that we were in per lachaise and were very close to the final resting place of jim morrison. okay, we'll take the bait. a light drizzle turned to a full downpour just as we reached the lizard king's headstone. it was surrounded by wet parisians butchering the words to 'riders on the storm'-as if that were ever possible. come on-let's go visit the grave of someone who actually COULD write poetry. we tip toed through the tulips over to the undisputed queen of gay tombs-here lies oscar wilde. fuck, yeah. ever seen a crypt covered in kisses? we were just starting to let our guard down when we became aware that we were being hunted by hundreds of black cats. stay calm-do NOT make any sudden moves. we packed ourselves into an outward huddle and slowly made our way out through the gate. i see. those smug sonsofbitches had tried to feed us to the felines. well, well, well. we could play dirty, too--we would storm their wine shops and buy cheap vinegar. surely this sort of buffoonery would not-could not-be tolerated. we hit a fine wine boutique ready for war-but the owner of this stupid fucking charming shop spoke to us in perfect english and complimented us on our purchases. was he kidding? did he not recognize us? we were assholes hoping to get stewed on we don't care what. be indignant, sir! demand satisfaction. dejected-we said, 'fuck it-might as well eat some crepes.' we went to a creperie that was NOT across from some shitty mall and consumed completely satisfying french food and wine that was NOT a rip off-served to us by awesome lesbians that did NOT seem to totally hate men. sitting there with our reasonable bill and pleasant french buzz-it seemed to me that we didn't feel like fighting anymore. o.k.-o.k.--we will go to the eiffel tower. by this time we had hooked up with charles and paul-the only two frenchmen to ever want to admit to liking any shitty band that i've ever been in-we took the metro over and sat outside the tower drinking wine, smoking pot, and watching it have an epileptic fit. my back began to hurt from looking up so we went to the top and looked down. i don't want to get into it-but you can probably imagine how that goddamn-fucking city looked twinkling away in that cold, black, holy-shit-this-is-high!-night. fuck you, france. i want YOUR paris. we'll trade you yours for ours-ours sucks. we all went back to the hotel and added whiskey to our wine as if we were def leppard and laughed at the french episode of 'flight of the conchords'. when all the liquids were gone and all the moss had been smoked-charles left for work, paul left for skiing, and we left for dead. i woke up in a pile of empty bottles and went back to the wine shop for a farewell kiss. despite the fact that my feet had grown two sizes and my shoes would never fit again-i felt pretty great. i didn't even know where my hangover was. hell, i petted a kitty. i'm sorry, france. it's all been a misunderstanding hasn't it? we cool? cool. evian had never tasted so sweet.



scott

i didn't think we were going to make it out that club alive-much less with our shirts still on. those people in vienna turned out to be lunatics. the supposed opening band-a certain mr. irish bastard-cancelled last night-AGAIN-so we had to go in there and warm those fuckers up ourselves. it did not look promising in the beginning. the crowd stood against the back wall like teenage boys at a school dance-eyeing us suspiciously. we steeled ourselves for an uphill battle of sysiphian proportions and jumped into the breach with eyes closed. by 'good mornin', da'' i could feel something start to give and crumble but i didn't want to jump to any conclusions. when we cleared 'the holy ground' they clacked their jaws and yelped like hounds possessed. at 'far away' i distinctly heard the sound of a crowd collectively shitting their pants. i began to feel the fear. we tried to beat it out of there but t. was singing a cappella jams-which made these psychos slathering mad. we pounded out 'the pub' and said, 'that's it. let's get out of here before we're drawn and quartered.' we were standing around backstage trying to figure out what the fuck just happened-when we felt the walls shaking. the mob was lighting torches and deciding on its rules. i thought of marie antoinette. we went back out there and played the only song that we had left; praying that it would satiate these savage beasts....it did not. i guess the chorus of 'fuck the police' is no way to calm an angry l.a. riot. rebecca and t. stayed out on the bloody field while we cruelly abandoned them-hoping against hope that the soothing strains of 'the parting glass' would FINALLY do the trick. nope. panicked-we crawled out of the bathroom window (the beer! save the beer!) and fled--refusing to look over our shoulder for fear that the wild eyed gomorrah of lip licking and eyeball whites would turn us all to salty pillars. we went back to our hotel and locked ourselves in our rooms-hiding under the beds and hissing at each other to 'shut up, goddammit! they'll hear you.'



scott