TOUR FWENTY epic version7 wrap up
I'm in the car right now typing with one hand while holding an fm transmitter so we can listen to the new Cave album from my macbook. When we left off it was 420 morning I guess. Our Sonmi bros design t-shirts for Threadless, a company who exclusively screenprints wicked designs onto American Apparel tshirts for sale online. They also are one of the two sponsors of version 07 (the other one is PBR). So we went with Sonmi to the threadless warehouse to see the finished product of one of Julia's new
designs. We walked in and were immediately saddened by how crummy our jobs are in comparison to the Threadless hq. it was like something out of a Disney teen movie. There was a place for people to work on designs but most of the space was filled with ping pong tables, bigscreens, arcade hunting games, a photo booth, a camper to record podcasts, skateboards, gocarts, etc. None of this is imbellished. We met Joe who greeted us with something like "Hey nice to meet you, stranger dudes from another state. Go ahead and pick out any shirt from the wharehouse for free if you want." Thanks, Joe. Channing picked a blue shirt with unicorns humping for his girlfriend and Alex and I picked out a black shirt with a multitude of psychedelic gang signs. It was hard to pass on the shirt with a knight giving David Hasslehoff a piggy back ride. We went to lunch with 10 of the threadless people and ate outside at some Chicago eatery. Channing got the mini corndog platter and I got hummus which came with some vegetables which my body greatly appreciated. Julia had a nap attack so me and channing and alex walked over to Permanent Records to say hi.
On the way we realized that it was about to be 4:20 on 420 but we didn't have any wacky tobacky so channing ate a leaf and I ate a flower. Alex passed. Liz gave me a mad free red and gold Permanent shirt. Thanks, Liz. We stopped at a shop for some beverage. I got something called Brainergize with dandelions and stuff in it. Channing got Ginseng Rush cause it had a picture of a dude's cyber-butt on the bottle. Having farted around all day, we missed going to the museum of Holography for the 17th time. We all went to the version space to scope it and get wristbands for the show that night. Its too hard to describe how
awesome The Co-Prosperity Sphere is with words. The space was a little smaller than last year but still packed to the gills with weird trippy art and possibly interactive situational installations. It was a three story affair, the main space was mostly open with a partially walled off area in the middle for bands. Murals of monsters and knights were abundant as the theme of the space/party series was We're Rollin'/They're Hatin' (dungeons and dragons dice that is). I got a third free t-shirt to commemorate. Thanks, Version. Then there was a loft overlooking the performance space that had a couch and the sound booth and a "bar" that just served PBR. The basement was covered wall to wall in trippy painted plywood sections, curtains, foil, trash, toys, and pointy things. It was highly interactive and seemed basically set up just to have the maximum number of nooks for people to make out in.
Channing and I set out to find the location of our 420 performance, "20 is the New 10 Fashion Show". On the way there we honed our delivery by coming up with some gross freestyles over whatever reggaeton was playing on the radio.
Here are some highlights:
I dream of your cooter when it's dripping lots
then I'll scream in the future when I dip my dots (MC CAT)
I'll poke your hontas like it ain't no thang
then I'll paint you with all the cumors of my wang (MC CAT)
drinking all that surge gave me a boner
i'll get you wetter than not arizoner (OBECAT)
let me put my worm in your baby bird's mouth
then I'll flip you round and let my tongue fly south (OBELISK)
you're riding your bike in the street
i put a spike in your feet
you said ow when you stepped on the pedal
so i shot you in the headle with some metal
now you're deadle
i got a medal for combat
i put it in my pouch cause i'm a wombat
i only drink milk thats nonfat
cause if i got fat nobody would wanna gat on that (MC CAT)
you wanna get high y'all? you can come along
i can smoke 12 joints from my dodeca-bong
i did all the laker girls with my dodeca-schlong
i flipped a dozen patties with my dodeca-tongs (OBELISK)
take me out to the ballpark, I'll reach third base
cause you'll soon let me park my balls on your face (OBELISK)
girl take off your cummerbund
so it doesn't get soiled when I cum on your buns (ALEX DG)
We parked in the vicinity of the venue. I used the Chicago bumper rule when I parallel parked while chanting "why you got a bumper if you ain't gonna bunp?!" We snooped around till we thought we found it. Having just come from the Version space we didn't think twice about walking through an open door leading to a large room strewn with early 1990's children's toys and detailed graffiti murals on the walls. But then we began to realize that the only people in the room were an old Mexican man and two Mexican babies. We mumbled something about a fashion and one of the babies said to try across the street. We looked and saw that across the street was a bunch of rainbow rave lights and hipsters smoking outside and realized we had actually wandered into somebody's living room. Oops. As we scuttled out I saw that there were signs in the window about recruitment for strawberry picking and greencards or something. No joke. Even less of a joke when Channing accidentally referenced it later in front of the nice fashion people we had just met and sort of sounded like a dickwadd. Since we were the only band, we did our own sound but it was alright cause all the necessary components were there. We stood around for a while drinking free Bush and watching some practicing breakdancers. The fashion show itself was pretty intense. I sort of didn't see it coming so I got stuck in the corner right by the start of the runway and was assaulted with model butts. A hottie designer started talking to me so I handed her the mailing/nailing list and she immediately lost all interest. Rightly so. Channing and Sonmi went to get adult beverages so they didn't even see the fashion part. They returned right as it was time for us to take over. It looked like it was going to be a pretty sweet performance. Packed house of young fashionistas on 420 in Chicago. As soon as we cut the house music to start our set, drunk guys started to demanding that we play 1980s music. I got on a box and warmed up the crowd with a joke about flipping over your drivers' liscence and marking yourself down as an orgasm donor. It didn't go over very well. There was probably five seconds of silence followed by a unified "BOOOO!" by every person in the entire house. And then our music started. Sadly, things got progressively worse for the anthropomorphic man-cat and his friend. In our first song there is a line about "knock out your gold teeth, cold break your jaw" during which Channing whipped around and accidentally knocked my microphone right into my mouth and gave me a sweet fat lip. A girl who was sitting down pulled MC Cat Genius over by the tail and then yanked his mask off, maybe because she thought she knew the person behind it? Channing said "Yeah, it's a dude. What did you expect, asshole?" And nobody was dancing at all. Which we are used to but did not expect for that particular setting. Maybe we were still spoiled from our wicked show the previous night. Anyways, we were delighted when the cops showed up and our power strip got pulled before our set got to the audience participation part. I'm really glad that Sonmi and Coyote DG were there to see us get hated by the most amount of people we have simultaneously been hated by. It was legendary. Channing still got a sweet free windbreaker out of the night though. Thanks, Ashley.
With the fashion show abruptly over, we were free to go to the first night of party at the Version space. We got there and I immediately started double-fisting PBRs in true OBELISK at Version tradition. We found the girls who I had sat on for a long time the night before. Turns out they are supercool film babes from LA who make a D&D fantasy tv show/zine called Dungeon Mastery. I gave the blond one a piggyback ride and we got rejected from a fourthmeal offer. We finally ended up in the same circle as a tiny slobbery joint but at that point it was like a half hour past 420. Channing helped me coordinate a visit to the kissing booth that was set up downstairs I hear. Decision making is my specialty. We made it back to Sarah's apartment and I made drunk phonecalls on speaker phone inches away from Sarah's head until we all fell asleep.
We waked up remarkably early and baked with Sarah. 421 is better than nothing I guess. I ripped all the movies she took onto my computer and youtubed some of them. We we went to a Jewish deli that Sarah recommended. They were slow and my eggs were stiff but I didn't mention it. I liked the latka a lotka. We called our Sonmi bros who agreed to meet us later at the Holography museum and Sarah led us thrifting. We went to an enormous super thrift outlet place that was chock full of amazing awful clothes. I wasn't really feeling high until we stepped into that magical store and I found a Shaq Lakers jersey which I immediately put on, some American flag swim trunks, a shirt that says "If you don't like the Redbirds, you ain't shit", a Denise Austin pregnancy work out video, and a Dalmatian print unitard with dogs wearing sunglasses and smoking pipes. After that I felt like I was absolutely blazin. We bid Sarah goodbye and got a lift from Sunmi to the
Holography museum. It was about what you would expect. A whole lot of holograms. It was worth five dollars I think. After that we drove around and tried to find a Target so Channing could buy a Wii. We got lost but did find Chicago's largest party store. As we pulled in, me and channing were jamming an impromptu performance of "what the hook gonna be" using the snare and the tambourine that were in the back seat. Some African Americans looked at us oddly. Inside I farted a lot. They had brown balloons. I bought a slide whistle and it was the best purchase I have made this year. With enough practice, you can play any song on the radio on a slide whistle, I found. Found a Best Buy but they didn't have a Wii but me and Alex got to play "heart shaped box" on Guitar Hero II. Defeated, we went back to Coyote DG's and sat on the couch.
Eventually we mustered up enough motivation to go to the Zaireeka listening party at Permanent Records. Zaireeka is the Flaming Lips quad album that you have to listen to through 4 stereos at once. There was a DVD with animals getting chopped up and stuff. I cut the bottom off the Dalmatian unitard and wore it under my jersey. Then I got hot and took it off again. Alex and Julia and me felt like fourth meal so we went to 'Donalds for nuggs and frzz. There was a homeless guy who stood around and told us he was "just jammin". Channing joined us after a while. We all went to Dillon's to get BYObeverags for the last night of Rollin'/Hatin'. Channing and Alex opted for Tilt (they were out of Sparks), I got a shiny bottle of cheap champagne to go with my Lakers jersey, and Julia got two warm bottles of TGIFriday's pre-mixed drinks (long island & white Russian). The party was already hoppin when we got there. We talked to the Telefantasy team some more and continued to learn surprising awesome things about them. We got mad props by introducing ourselves as a "shaq-o-lantern" since I had on a shaq jersery and channing had on a pumpkin face tee. Dungeon Master Riley was really exited to see me. I wisht I could have remembered to talk to him more. Mystika gave me a Dungeon Magesty DVD so I gave her my slide whistle. Damn I miss my slide whistle. All the bands that night were interesting.
I really liked Mayor Daley who I had been referring to as Major Delay unknowingly. They are from Chicago. I stood behind the singer while I finished my bottle of champagne. She has a nice neck.
A really beardy guy sang and sort of rapped over some live digital drumming.
Juiceboxx did his set and while I hung out in the basement. I heard he climbed a lot. I helped Sean fasten his keyboard to a newspaper stand that has been decorated like a scary monster
Then I peed on a fence. Then back in the space, I was talking to Sonmi when I heard "da na na da na na da na na" the signiture Cave riff and I yelled "Cave is playingggg!!!" and ran downstairs. They were the only band playing in a basement that night which is the perfect setting for Cave. They played amidst all the silver foil streamers and playhouses and pointy toys. I was really digging the set to begin with and I thought it got even better when the power started going out. Cave is intensely jammy, so when all the powered instruments turned off, Cooper just kept ripping on a sick drum solo and band members reached for tambourines and cowbells. But the power shortages happened to be timed so well that I didn't even know till later that that's what happened. Julia and Alex watched from a playhouse right beside the band and made out. Which may or may not mean that they just laid their heads on each other's shoulders. I moved to the middle as the dance pit heated up. I had to stick my arms out "mom in a car" style to keep people from impaling themselves on cymbal stands. Everyone was busting moves and rubbing butts and Channing shook up a Tilt and sprayed it everywhere and then slammed the rest. He wanted me to mention that. When the set appeared to be over we started chanting "one more song" and then they started playing another song and we started chanting that techo song "One more time! We're gonna celebraaate! Aw yeah, all right gonna celebrate!". I tried to keep the yarn and foil streamers from falling on Cooper but then gave up and just started wrapping myself up in it. At some point I totally damaged my shoulder in a badass looking way. I said it was the best Cave set I've seen. Channing said it was good, but not his favorite.
After bands, I spent my last two of the $100 I took on tour on one last Pabst. The organizers started yelling that you had to sign a waver for the after event or leave. They would not say what the after event was and you had to sign a waver with comically small font and agree to possibly getting arrested so we were all like "fuck that, lets go get fifth meal at White Castle instead". Sarah did the after event and said that it was basically a poorly planned fake kidnapping where you ride in the back of a van with a bag on your head. Our loss.
The
Telefantasy crew took a rain check of fifth meal but promised that they would get around to it before we all die. We're holding you to that! At White Castle we got some sweet stickers and tiny bacon burgers. Channing got a flaming mudflab babe and I ironically got a sticker that says "I can't drive 65" which is how fast I was supposed to be going (instead of 100) when I got pulled over. While at White Castle high on Tilt, Alex invented the Shock Lock, a variation on the Rock Lock, where one person puts up the shocker and one person sticks up their ring finger and then you lock. Possibly the greatest invention of the 20th century.
We went back to Coyote DG's and documented all the band names we had thought of and I tried to start blogging out but ended up falling asleep standing up. I slept on the zuton with Sonmi, but unfortunately Alex was in the middle. Then in the morning I moved over to the couch with Channing. We left after getting superbagels and managed to make it home without getting pulled over again. I wanted to stop for another slide whistle but I couldn't find the party store or the mural of the lepreclown.
In conclusion, Version is a way better music festival than CMJ because you don't have to ride the subway 12 times a day and instead of being sponsored by Dave's CDR Labeling Service and Gothrock.com, its only sponsored by PBR. And if you say "hey is that Chris Mathis?" there is a really good chance that he will materialize and ride past you on a bicycle.
HAGS, Chicago!