Bucket List... fuck off! ha ha ha

Don't forget about this Deadhand gig happening tonight. I'm not sure why they're playing the Griffin, but I'd like to think it's because they're trying to pay off some drug fueled, hooker filled, 3 day long drinking binge, but I'm sure the real reason they're playing there is not as cool as what I imagined, but you never know. Anyways, go check out Deadhand tonight, and if I can get out of the studio tonight on time I just might venture downtown to check this out. It's an intimate setting that gives me the opportunity to see at least 1 good band before the Punk Rock Bowling snore fest oozes it's way into town. Sorry folks, but I'm just not feeling it this year. Who's playing this year that's worth getting worked up about? Rancid? NOFX? The Belltones? LOL Fuck all that ghey shit. If I wasn't playing the 2 gigs I'm playing with Guilty By Association I wouldn't even be anywhere in the vicinity of any gig happening this weekend. Le sigh. I'm always hanging out during the actual bowling aspect of it though, and this year I'm on the Vegascendents bowling team! Aaaaargh!! ha ha ha  Oh, BTW, Lane 1 @ Noon on Sat. - Roll Out and Support! :-)

And now it's the Calm before the Storm, the Punk Rock Bowling storm. I finally caught up on all the Flyers for the Gig Calendar page, and I've been nerding out big time on applying all the changes that Weebly have made to the software that makes this website possible. Did you see the new layout for the Videos page? I love it. It's all categorized and alphabetized and you can click on any bands name and it takes you to a page that contains all the stuff I have from that band on one page. You can comment on everything individually now, which is awesome too, and I found an old Thirteen34 video on my old Myspace page that I threw on there that I don't even have a hard copy of myself anymore. I lost it on a computer I used to have a long ass time ago. Click here to check that video out. I did the same with the Music Reviews page. I just added the review for the new Ministry CD, and you can click here to check that out too. I got a lot more but I've been busy adding all of this years photos I took to the Pictures page, which also has the new layout applied to it. I feel energized. I feel alive. Everything with all 5 bands I'm in is going great, almost... heh. I'm loving the physical drain of practicing and playing drums every day, and I got a bunch of new website merch on the way that I'm pretty hyped on. Stickers, badges, tee shirts, y todo! Things are going good with me, and I hope they are with you too. Most of you anyways. ;-)

I am soooooooooo in Love with Squeeze right now - even more than I ever was, if that's possible. They were incredible last night, basically playing everything from the Singles - 45's And Under release, with a few obscure songs that were definitely treats for us fans, stuff like In Quintessence, If I Didn't Love You, Heaven and Bang Bang from their very first album. My fucking jaw dropped as I haven't heard them play that song in like 30 years. Fucking Wow!!! In the early days, sure, but now, not really, as the band pretty much sticks to a give-the-people-what-they-want aspect of playing the Hits, although the band gets to stretch it's musical muscle on some newer, latter day material that's almost jam band, Rolling Stones like shit, but I forgave them for that little hippy-ish indiscretion. The crowd was tame, but the waitress service was fun, with the old folks in the crowd standing in nicely organized rows, allowing the waitresses to keep bringing me those splendid 32oz. drafts without any trouble. The more I drank, the better the band sounded. Go figure, right? ha ha ha There I was, a big dude in a Sharks jersey, jumping around and rocking out to Squeeze, singing along to almost every gawd damn song they played and just having the time of my Life in a crowd where there was seriously no one under the age of 30 in the place. Ha Ha Ha Ha I did not give a FUCK because sometimes it's good to be an old dude because you can appreciate the songwriting Genius of Mr's Difford and Tilbrook and the Music that they have created. The band was incredible. It was the same line up of players that I saw when Squeeze played the Crown Theater inside the Rio a few years ago (click here to see the photos I took that night) and like a fine wine, they've only gotten better with age. <3 Gawd damn do I love me some Squeeze. I bought all kinds of swag as I left the place. It was gaudy and all over-priced and I didn't care. :-)

Right before the gig I was watching the live feed on YouTube of Coachella 2012, and I gotta say, it was pretty sweet. I watched Jimmy Cliff's set, which was fantastic, despite the presence of that dooshbag Tim Armstrong in Mr. Cliff's backing band. It took me a while to recognize that Jimmy Cliff was doing a Rancid cover, but once I did... BARF!! ha ha ha I Can See Clearly Now was great, with the storm clouds off in the distance over the mountains, and, of course, The Harder They Fall, which is a Spiritual fucking classic. The set ended too quickly for me. The crowd seemed to dig it though, so that was good. And then came Madness. They sounded a bit ruff during the opener One Step Beyond, and they were missing Bedders on bass, but I gotta say, they sounded GREAT!! Suggs voice was in fine form, Woody is always on the beat, Chrissy Boy was playing Johnny Thunders riffs in between songs, Mike was pounding the keyboards in the back and Lee is just a madman, coming out dressed like some Chinese citizen from 1792 and just acting like the lunatic that he is, jumping around and up on the monitors, and mugging for the camera whenever possible. Best line of the night came from Chas, who said "I'm too old for this shit." LOL Second best was Lee asking the crowd "Does anyone have any drugs?" ;-) The highlight of the set was when they did Night Boat To Cairo, with the dual horn intro that sounded SICK, and that fucking crazy kid in the audience who was dressed up like the band were in the video for the song, crowd surfing with the biggest smile on his face while Madness played. That's what going to gigs is all about - having FUN!!! Oh my gawd I cannot wait to see Madness tonight. <3

If you're not going to the Madness gig tonight (I can't imagine why you're not though) there's other stuff going on. I had the date wrong about the Seriouslys gig @ the Motor City Cafe. It's tonight, not yesterday. If you're not going to that you should go to the Ignite / Guilty By Association / The Happy Campers / N.E. Last Words gig at the Aruba. Deadhand dropped off the gig because they don't do Pay to Play. Good for them. I couldn't be prouder. :-) And oh, I lost that video I shot of them doing Singing For You @ the Double Clown on Thurs. My iPhone took a shit, and when I took it down to the Apple store for them to fix it, they said they didn't know what was wrong with it, because it didn't show any signs of abuse/damage. It just couldn't be accessed, so I lost everything on it. Oh well. I got a brand new iPhone out of it, which will be majorly used tonight at Madness. I got Pigasus practice beforehand, so I'm gonna go try and get some sleep. These past few days have been AMAZING, and tonight is just going to be the capper of it all. It's always good seeing your old Friends. :-) Have a great weekend everyone. I know I am! Oh, and go see The People's Whiskey and the Hard Pipe Hitters tomorrow night @ the Bunkhouse!

I live for gigs like that one last night. I really do.

Small, intimate things with a handful of Friends in attendance, glorified practices really, and the vibe is just so relaxed, stress free, I dunno, something. The Bands are basically playing for each other and the 2 or 3 other idiots in attendance who have nothing better to do than to come out and check out some bands they've never heard of, on the slim chance that one of them might be worth remembering and maybe worth scrounging some change together to buy some merch off of the band to help their gas funds to get them to the next gig. Yeah, that's what last nights gig @ Yayo Taco was all about, and I loved every minute of it. I only made the effort to see Deadhand, who I am currently obsessed with, but seeing a band like Razorhoof just throw down the sickness with their Neurosis / Eyehategod Noise not Music was worth the $5 admission donation price alone. Click here to check out the bands Facebook page. And what's up with the new changes to the layout of Facebook? Can you say, LAME!! hahahaha  Smooth Sailing were pretty good too, in a Refused / At The Drive In kind of way, shaking the walls of Yayo Taco loose with their double bass playing musical onslaught. Click here to check their Facebook page out and become their Friend. And I finally got to see G.P.B., who are just the cutest bunch of Punk kids ever! They're like a cross between Rancid and the Casualties, and every one of their songs is, uhhhmmm, how should I put this, "inspired", by bands like the Dead Boys, Sham 69 and the 4-Skins. They played a NOFX cover that never changed tempo once, even though it was supposed to... heh heh heh. Deadhand played a NOFX cover too, Linoleum, and had some random Punk kid sing it and lose his shit while doing so. His buddy helped out on backup vocals too... rad. It was cute and awesome at the same time. Totally laid back night @ Yayo Taco. You should of been there. You missed out. :-)

Tomorrow night Pigasus is playing at the Beauty Bar for some reason, but I couldn't find shit on Facebook about it. I thought it was for something about tattoos or some shit, but who knows. Friday night Danny, The Prince of Drummers, is putting on a show at the place he works at, the Bikini Bar, that he's calling The Clash Of The Scenes, and it's featuring the Tinglerz, Six Shooters To The Sky and Babilos, and you can click here to check out all the info about it on the Facebook event page for it. Isn't Facebook wonderful? Takes all the effort out of promoting a gig! LOL And everybody is complaining about the new Facebook layout but I dunno, I like it. It works for me and simplifies everything. Whatever. And don't forget about this gig happening @ the Hypnotic Lounge this Saturday. It should be a night of Local Music Sexiness!!!! Deadhand, Aluminum Falcon and Holding Onto Sound. I was told that Dead Neon dropped off... Booooooooooooo. See ya there! XOXOXOXOXO