My neighborhood used to be different. Before the cute little shops selling Le Creuset to yuppies, before the hipsters took over the working class bar with the turret, before the thousand-square foot houses with leaky roofs (and Viking Ranges) sold for three hundred large, my neighborhood was a place for the lower middle class to buy a house and raise a family.  By now, this story is clichéd: neighborhood is affordable so fringy artist types move in, which makes it "eclectic" and "interesting" and (shudder) "cute", which slowly attracts development until one day you wake up and realize that you can't remember a time when you didn't dodge assholes in BMWs on your way to the hardware store.

My neighbor Mr. Braxton was old-school Williamson Street. He moved here in the fifties from the Greenbush neighborhood, and he bought a house, raised a family and lived there until he died last week.

I met him like most folks on my end of the street do. Between April and October, he'd sit on a folding chair in his front lawn and chat with the folks walking by. He was a fixture, and everyone loved him because he was infinitely lovable. When he said he was having a good day, he meant every single letter. Every day, as I walked to get my coffee in the morning, we'd chat for a bit- and it was neighborly in the best, most affirming sense of the word. He'd tell me about how he used to drink with Mickey and Pearl, and what life in the neighborhood was like. I'd tell him how the bar was doing, and how hung-over I was from the night before.

Every once in a while he'd come into the bar and order a glass of beer, and he'd try to pay for it, despite the fact that we both knew that I wasn't going to let it happen. He laughed when I told him it was on Mickey.

I knew his health was failing last summer when I saw him and asked how he was doing, and instead of the usual "Oh, pretty good", he said "Oh not so good, I'm in a lot of pain". Turns out the pain was cancer, and the doctors didn't give him long to live.

As summer cooled into autumn, I saw less and less of Mr. Braxton, and feared the worst until one day he came in for a beer with his sister. I was opening the bar, and they came around and knocked on the door. I set them up with a couple of Spotted Cows and the three of us talked for an hour in the empty bar.. It's one of my most cherished memories as a bartender. It was also the last time I saw him.

So goodbye Mr. Braxton, wherever you are. The neighborhood's not the same now as it was when you moved in, and it's certainly not the same now that you're gone.

Do yourself a favor, go here and listen to "Star Witness", a track off of Neko Case's forthcoming album. You're going to hear it a lot this spring, maybe even while making out with me, if youre lucky.

No updates until now, because nothing's new. Still battling insomnia, still obsessing over Jeff Tweedy's songwriting. I did bowl a 162 the other day though- that was fucking awesome. Speaking of awesome, last week's three gig  pile-on produced three really good shows.

Tuesday's gig with Doc was like something out of a David Lynch film. We both were in weird moods- him because he had a bad day at work, and me because I didn't sleep at all Monday night. That's not exactly true- I went to bed at 2, finished the first season of Lost, called my mom at 8 A.M., then finally fell asleep at 10:30- only to be awoken at 1 P.M. by the beer delivery guys. All attempts to nap during the day were met with a giant "fuck you, asshole" by my brain. Needless to say, by the time load-in rolled around I was a zombie. Exhaustion does weird things to my brain; it was like I saw myself in third person. Plus, Doc got into a yelling match with a woman who wanted us to "be peppier". If you've never seen him dig into a heckler, you're missing out. It really is a thing of beauty. Don't know how or why, but it was by far the best gig I've ever played with Doc. We're actually at a point now where we're worth checking out. (If you're interested, I'm playing with him again next Tuesday.)

Thursday, me and the boys played our first show ever at the King Club, with the .357 String Band. I normally only like bluegrass played by bluehairs in suits, mainly because most younger folks playing it now are fucking hippies and they generally come off like barefoot, overalls-clad  minstrel shows. But these boys are gutterpunk looking dudes who can pick the everlovin' shit out of their instruments. And they're nice guys to boot. As far as our portion of the show went, all I remember is getting something like six shots sent up to me and at falling backwards into my amp (and almost through the front window) at the end of the second set. The bar seemed to like it, though. They want us back post-haste.

By far, the best show of the week was Saturday. After a photo shoot with the exceedingly talented Kat, we played in Milwaukee on a three-band bill with our good friends the Superchiefs. and I think we sounded the best we ever have. This came in spite (or maybe because) of one of the other bands' decision to pull every single possible inconsiderate and self-important move a local band could pull. I'd go into details, but let's just say that it started with them blowing off sound check, continued with them playing almost twenty minutes over their allotted time, then asking us to play a song we'd already played so that they could come up and sit in. (I couldn't believe that anyone would expect to be invited on stage after giving us  beaucoup rockstar attitude)

At any rate, our anger translated into a really awesome two hour set, without any breaks. It was one of those moments when the music came effortlessly, and the instruments seemed to play themselves. Highlights include:
  cutting  my finger open on my Tele during "I've Been Everywhere" and getting blood everywhere, taking Pupy's belt off before the encore and being able to smoke onstage. The crowd was rowdy and, despite never seeing most of them before, they seemed to take a shine to us.  I think we're going to be invited back, which is nice since we can't seem to get a foothold in the 414.

When I got back into town on Sunday, my Mom (Hi Mom!) was already at my apartment, making good on her Christmas present to me. You see, my mother thinks I "live like a pig" and to celebrate Jebus' birthday, she offered to help me deep clean my sty. For the record, the apartment was in ragged shape. (Lack of sleep lots of afterbars = nastyass house.) She stayed for a couple of days, and we went to town on this dump. More than the clean apartment, I enjoyed spending time with Mom. I know a lot of folks who dread visits from their parents, and while I can sympathize, I can't empathize. I love it when they come and see me, and frankly, I think my Mom and I are hilarious when we hang out.

Bottom line? I've got a clean apartment, I'm feeling good about the bands I play in, and I've managed to keep the insomnia at bay for a week. I'll take it.

The Whatever Day In Numbers:

9:00 - Time that I woke up this morning

$13.78 - Amount of money it took to top off the gas tank in Captain Adequate. (I generally shy away from naming inanimate objects, but the name just fits my car so well.)

1900 - Approximate number of words I used to describe various aspects of Elvis Costello's lyrics, production value, and live shows to Angela as I drove her to her parents' house.

67 - Number of Minutes it took me to get from Madison to Angela's parents' house.

1:54 - Time in the afternoon that I arrived at my parents' apartment.

Eighty Bazillion - Approximate number of calories I've consumed over the course of the 10 hours that I've been here.

50 - Approximate percentage of the above calories that came from butter.

24 - Number of times that the phrase "You've ruined Christmas, fucker" was said to and by various family members today.

.75 - Amount (in litres) of Maker's Mark consumed by yours truly since arriving.

1 - Number of drunk women from the bar down the block (Muggle's) that came up to my brother, sister-in-law and myself as we were smoking outside to explain psychological makeup of our grandmother.

11 - Number of minutes of It's A Wonderful Life that I managed to see this year.

30 - Duration (in minutes) of my crying jag as a result of seeing the end of It's A Wonderful Life.

24.5 - Number of hours until we can finally forget about this holiday until next year.

Mom:

I know you’d never say it, but I’m convinced that you only accept my pathetically juvenile life choices as long as I make the paper. In the interest of having a relatively stress-free whatever eve celebration tomorrow, I’d like to show you this.

Just keep in mind that “bound[ing] around the stage in stark contrast to Costello's face-forward determination, pounds each bass line into submission” is newspaper speak for “He can barely play his instrument, and acts like an ass on stage.”

See you tomorrow.

Love,
Your Eldest Manchild

(Seriously, thanks to Charles for writing such a glowing article. Part of me thinks he was writing about another band he saw, but sure as shit, there’s ol’ Pupy’s picture. And because I know they’ll take the above seriously, I’d like to state for the record that both of my parents are extremely supportive and cool. You’d have to be to watch your college-graduate son give up a stable, lucrative job to become a full-time bartender.)

And I’ve been up for an hour.  On Purpose.

If this is what being a “responsible adult” feels like, y’all can keep it.

That is all. Good day.

"Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor"
"The Raven", Edgar Allen Poe

December fucks with me. It's a hard time to be sans significant other, with nights growing long and cold. Plus, everyone seems to be crazy- whether it be with buying stuff, throwing parties or fighting the angst and ennui that's inherent in a season so rife with expectation that disappointment is almost certainly guaranteed. December makes me want to retreat, to disappear, to reminisce.

Apparently, for me, that means listening to Bob Dylan again. You want nostalgia? I lost my virginity with Disc Two of Biograph playing the background. Looking back at the tracklist, it's a fucking hilarious CD to have playing at that moment. Imagine "Can You Please Crawl Out Your Window?" playing when you popped your cherry- that's some funny shit. (Oy, I hope I made it that long. Frankly, I hope I made it 'til "You Angel You".)

But, given my tastes at the time, that's not surprising. If you saw me between the ages of 18 and 21, and asked me what was in my CD changer at the time, I guarantee you that my answer would've included the words "Bob" and  "Dylan". Relentlessly, I poured over every note of any recording- studio or live, legit or bootleg- I could get my hands on. To say that I was obsessed would be very charitable; the last time I counted, there were more than seventy Bob Dylan albums in my collection.  In those formative years, Dylan, and Dylan alone, was the soundtrack to most (if not all) of the events of my awkward transition between adolescence and adulthood.

It was in the fall of 1997- my Sophomore year-  when I had the first of several moments that would cement me to Bob Dylan's records forever. I was a fat kid growing up. By the time I reached college age, I weighed over three hundred pounds. (How much over three bills I'll never know, because I consciously stopped weighing myself when I reached the three-hundred mark)  I was depressed, lonely and convinced that I would die alone. My roommate and best friend was on a date with a woman who, at the time, I longed for more than anything. I spent that evening in our 10'x12' cell/dorm room smoking pot alone with headphones on listening to Blonde on Blonde. As I laid on the top bunk alone, "Visions of Johanna" on repeat, Dylan was the only one who could express the aching loneliness that I felt.

During those years, my sophomore and junior years of college, my relationship with the ol' MJ grew increasingly more intimate. And as ridiculous as it might be, weed changed me. Unfortunately, the roommate/best friend that I had during those two years didn't share my enthusiasm for THC. His attitude about marijuana shifted from intrigued to amused to annoyed to enraged over the course of the two years that we were roommates. I still don't understand why we decided to get our first apartment together;  even at his most tolerant, he didn't like me smoking while he was in the room if he wasn't going to get high- which was most of the time.

Thank God, because one of my fondest college memories stemmed from his puritanical (C'mon, we were in college.) rules about smoking in our room. It was December '97, and I had a little time in between my exams. After studying for a while, I decided it was time for me to chill the fuck out and smoke a joint. I carefully rolled a pathetic pinner of Mexican brickweed and set out for a convenient place to smoke it. I ended up at the little terrace area on top of the Hoofers boathouse by Memorial Union. It was freezing cold, and the joint wouldn't stay lit- partly because of the relentless wind, and partly because I couldn't roll for shit then- but I managed to get high nonetheless. And my Walkman (That's with a cassette tape, hoss) was dimed out playing the Supper Club bootleg version of "Tight Connection To My Heart". I looked out on Lake Mendota and saw the frozen waves, blinking lights on the opposite shore, and felt like things made sense for the first time in my life. Naïve? Probably. Clichéd? Almost certainly. But for good or ill, it's one of my cherished Madison moments, and  I'm sure it's the first experience that has led me to make Madison (unless I'm presented with a major and compelling reason to leave) the place where I'm going to spend my life.

So here I am in Madison, Wisconsin. It's a bleak December. I feel lonesome and I'm listening to Bob Dylan. But every cherished dying ember reminds me of every cherished ghost wrought upon my floor. And that's not a horrible thing.  So fuck a bleak December, it'll  melt  into a warm and wonderful April and I'll still have "Tight Connection To My Heart". 

(Continuning the theme of "Not Providing Actual Content", I'm posting the text of my speech at Martin's birthday roast at the Slipper Club earlier this year. It's funnier if you do the rimshots in your head as you read along.)

Welcome to the Roast, bitches. My name’s Bob Hemauer, and I’ve had the misfortune to know Martin for several years. That reminds me, I need a drink. Before we get started, I wanted to let y’all know that we tried to get Joy Dragland here, but she couldn’t make it, unfortunately. Even more unfortunately, Joe Mingle could

We’re here, of course to pay tribute to Martin Price, our favorite d-list local celebrity. Which, of course, makes him better-known than me; but, looking around the room, if this is the company I have to keep to be “famous” in Madison, I’ll stay anonymous, thanks. 

You know what? I’m glad we got a chance to give Martin his just desserts before he leaves to go to law school. At Marquette. In Milwaukee.  I don’t even need to make a joke. Jesus H. LinesnortingChrist. Fucking Milwaukee. That’s funny enough.

As if that poor city doesn’t have enough problems. Urban blight, rampant segregation, widespread poverty, now they have to deal with ol’ faggo here screaming for another chocotini while he unsuccessfully hits on some nineteen year old down at the Manhole.

People are going to say a lot  mean things about Martin tonight, that he’s arrogant, vain, egotistical, rude, vain, self-centered, vain, conceited, completely oblivious to the feelings and needs of others, vain…wait where was I going with this?

Oh yeah, I look up to Martin. I look up to him and I see a broke-ass Paris Hilton. I look up to him second-rate Ethel Merman.  I look up to him and I see Bea Arthur without the stunning good looks.

I want to talk about how Martin and I met. It was up the street at Genna’s. I was a 22-year old unemployed college graduate, and Martin… was drunk. He was dressed in flip-flops, a feather boa, and a Wham crop-top. Wish you could still pull that off, huh sister? Yeah, well you’re the only one. That shit was not pretty.

He was in the sociology graduate program at the time. Incidentally, a lot of folks like to give him grief for quitting after one semester. Not me though. His stint in the grad program was way longer than my stint as a “gay man”.

Grad school or not, he’s a smart guy. Growing up in North Carolina he was in all of the gifted classes. Of course, being the smart kid in the rural south is like being the most talented one in the cabaret, but still.

Our relationship quickly developed into the love-hate relationship we have today- he’d love to fuck me and I hate the thought of it.

Despite that, we’ve grown to be close friends. We go to brunch, we go shopping, we play cards, we drink. If you didn’t know better, you’d think we’re fucking married. I never thought I’d say this, but thank GOD the Republicans in congress have dedicated themselves to protecting the sanctity of marriage. 

There’s one area that I’ve put off limits for myself tonight. I promised Martin that I wouldn’t rip into his love life- my mother told me never to speak ill of the dead. Besides, what can you really say about a cucumber, a bottle of Astroglide and a mirror?

Of course the Cabaret is how a lot of folks in this room know Martin. I love the Cabaret. I’m here every week. Where else besides Karaoke night at the Shamrock can you see someone caterwaul their way through classics like “Hungry Like the Fucking Wolf”? Where else besides the circus can you see trained monkeys and freaks get so much adulation? Where else besides alone in his bedroom can Martin wear a see-thru negligee and actually get applause?  (Goddamn, this stuff just writes itself, doesn’t it?)

The cabaret is a huge success, thanks in large part to Martin’s talent.  In fact, the cabaret has managed to help the Slipper Club transform itself from a shitty and lame gay club to a lame and shitty gay-friendly club. That’s progress, folks and that’s the power of Martin’s personality.

I’ll tell you what, though. Everything I’ve said tonight, especially the stuff about you being vain, arrogant, egotistical, loud, annoying and vain…did I mention vain? Well, that’s all true; but I love you like a brother. I’d do anything for you…no not that. Happy birthday, you rat fucking bastard.