"How Did the Show Go?" The Girl Pants – 1

Venue: Swayzes
Date: 7.25.2008
Marietta, GA
Support: Awkward Romance; Looks To Make History; The Wonder Years; Veira

This was our first time back at Swayze's in like 3 years. It's the longest running all-ages venue in the Southeast and they do a good job with consistently bringing out crowds. They're located deep in Marietta – up 75N- and its perfect for teenagers that can't make that trek into Atlanta to see dope live shows. Swayze's succeeds because it caters to an underserviced area. This is also a spot that doesn't think to highly of hip hop and I don't think its that they don't like it...i just think they think hip hop audiences are too fickle. I completely agree. For this reason, they don't really book rap/hiphop artists at all…it's a club that most relies on hardcore, emo, deathmetal, indie, or scene music. Therefore you can be sure of one thing above all else: girl pants galore.

So Awkward Romance are our homies and put us on this bill as they'll be heading out on tour for a week with one of the other bands. Last time we were here, we melted the audience faces off and so we wanted to maintain that standard this go around. I should have known things were gonna be different...

I got there around 7:50 as all the info I had received said that the show itself started at 8pm. apparently, they started the show earlier at 7:30. Well the first band was midway through their set when I pulled up and I found out that we would be going on next. This would be cool except that Niles and I hadn't figured out our set yet and our dj, Squashy, had yet to show up. After speaking to a few of the people outside, Niles and I step away and lay out a couple things that we want to see happen in the set. I'll admit…we're getting a little better at reading one another and settling on what to do in performances. We laid out a couple new ideas in addition to some new songs from PB&J to include and we had a pretty healthy 30 minute set. It was at this point that the stage manager (who'd I'd later find out is named JJ) ran out and asked if we were ready. I mentioned that our DJ was in route and he stated that he needed to be here in 3 minutes and set up in 7…so as you can imagine, he's a charming cat leaving a great first impression on me. Just as I give him the gtfoh face, I see Squashy pull up in his red pickup. Squash has the bald head of a Titleist golf ball and he's always cool as a fan - mild mannered in all situations. So as we're frantically directing him to back up to the venue entrance like Delta airport taxi men, he calmly does and gets out like – "hey guys" almost Eeyore-style. We tell him the situation and we quickly work for the next 10 minutes getting him set up on stage and checking his lines.

After everything's set up, we're then informed that we have 20 minutes. So we cut off a couple songs from the set…go over with Squashy quickly what we'll need. The only problem now is that the entire crowd is outside (save for a few TAR guys who are gluttons for our musical punishment). So Niles tries to bring as many as he can into the place from the stage and we just start with the set as planned. They begin to trickle in as we start the show. Niles wanted to try a new song that he wrote for the show on the guitar…except he forgot the chords to the song…so we tried to sing it anyway and have the audience clap. For a first time run through, it actually wasn't that bad. The audience laughed. The next song was "I Told You" which we tried over a new beat…which was turned out pretty good, although it was just extremely loud. I couldn't hear myself through the monitors and I can only suspect that the crowd heard nothing of me either. The next song we did was perhaps the weirdest experience of the night and probably the lowest. I don't know if we were rushed and never built the repoire with the audience or maybe it was just loud and distorted, but in recent memory, I cannot recall ever standing in front of such an audience statues. Me and Niles could have been rocking in front of Stonehedge for all I know. Anytime you can take note of the different ways people position their feet to stand, you are officially rocking for Stonewall Jacksons. And then it becomes a cascade of issues – dry mouth, intense sweat from the lights beaming down, erratic gesticulations to get any action out of the audience, noticing with your periphial that the soundman JJ has returned to the side of the stage and finally locating that center point in the audience that makes it seem like your making eye contact with someone, but in actuality your wondering HOW DID THIS %$@$%% SONG GET SO LONG ALL OF SUDDEN!?!?!?!?

To add insult to injury, Niles ends it with a Howard Dean yodel/scream/interjection/man-squeal that not only frightened the audience into applauding, but I'm sure also cured someone of the hiccups.

I figure the best thing we can do at this point is check in with the audience to see if they're still with us and if not (…can we get them back??)- plus Niles is checking in with JJ on the side. So I open up the stage for Q&A…and although their mostly hesitant, one brave kid shouts "HOW DID YOUR GET YOUR HAIR LIKE THAT????" Gotta love it…or not. I appreciated him asking anything though, so I began my answer but while talking Niles informs me that this needs to be our last song…

Wtf???

Apparently, JJ had informed him that we were on the clock as soon as Squash backed his truck up and that's where our 30 minutes went. So Niles and I quickly agree to end it with our new song "Yes My Dear" and it went over like a charm. Everyone loves John's verse and it's a shame that he's not there to see it (more on this later). It's a lighthearted song that has pretty silly verses that coaxes giggles out of the audience and if nothing else, at the end of the song I think I publicly questioned Niles' sexuality…all in a days work if you ask me.

It was only after the show was over that I took note of the many people who mentioned they'd try to make it out but didn't for some reason or another. What can you do? I hope they make it to the RedLight show. After it was all said and done and I got to speak with people after the show, I realized that it wasn't half as bad as it felt on stage. A lot of people said they enjoyed it and appreciated the variety for the night. A few members from other bands said they liked what they heard as well as one of the guys who worked at Swayze's mentioned that we reminded him of Jurassic 5 (which I'm gonna make the assumption that he's only familiar with them, because lyrically, they're horrific – despite all around positive dudes) A couple people even bought some merch at the table. Later on in the night, we got to perform a new song for the first time with The Awkward Romance for their upcoming album and it felt really good. All in all, it won't go down in history as one of the best shows ever…but for what people were able to see of our set, they seemed to enjoy it.

Hopefully, we can get back there and melt their faces off…but until then, we'll just NOT wear girl pants. aaaAANNNDDD SCENE!

On a scale of 1-10

Technically: 7
Response: 7.5
Feeling: 8

Overall: 7.5