I don't know if the Darkness have ever played Vegas before. If they did, I didn't see them. There was no way I was missing this, because it was just too perfect. A great chance to talk shit on a Friday night. ;-) The band has recently reformed with all original members, and they just released a new MP3 single / video for the song Nothing's Gonna Stop Us, which you can check out and download for free at the bands website www.theactualdarkness.com. The song was better live is all I'm gonna say. :-) But yeah, I hate going to 'concerts', and I hate the House of Boooooo's with a passion, but for the Darkness, I made the effort. And it was sooooo worth it. :-) They opened up with Black Shuck, and then they all changed guitars and basses, and went into Growing On Me, and I was done. They were soooooo fucking good! They had an annoying habit of changing all their guitars and basses in between every song, and only Givin' Up / Stuck In A Rut were played back to back without a guitar  and bass change. Whatever. When you're total Rockstars like the Darkness I guess you can do that. They played everything I wanted to hear, like Street Spirit (Fade Out), the Radiohead cover, and stuff from the 2nd album One Way Ticket To Hell... And Back, like the title song and Is It Just Me, and every great song off of Permission To Land. Beautiful. Justin's voice sounded incredible live and the band sounded fantastic. A Rock N Roll Machine. The best sounding early era AC/DC band crawling around the trenches today they are, and I had a great time. Except for the crowd. I wanted to kill every Tool and Dooshbag in the audience, including the big 6' 4" gay guy sporting a Ride The Lightning era Metallica shirt that I was standing behind who I kept spitting on, because he kept blocking my view. Every time he did I spit on him, and he didn't even notice. Whatever. The capper to all that is when he french kissed his little bearded boyfriend when the band played I Believe In A Thing Called Love. It was their song, and they totally waited all night to hear it. You could totally tell. They took Facebook arm extended pictures of themselves too. I was touched, and immediately headed for the exit... LOL I'm just kidding, but still, it was pretty ghey. I'm glad the Darkness have that appeal. We all need some Pomp, Bombast, and Theatrics in our Music, and the Darkness do all that and more for me. Yup. To commemorate the event I bought a tour shirt with a giant prawn on the front. Why a prawn? I have no idea. It looked cool, is all I can say... heh heh heh

I heard nothing but great things about all the gigs this past weekend - the Pixies tribute show, and the T.S.O.L. / Guilty By Association / Civilians gig. Civilians - you guys made a bunch of new fans - Congratulations! Fuck, it's such a cool time here in the Las Vegas Music Scene right now. Watching your Friends play gigs is fun, playing gigs is better, and playing gigs with your Friends is always the Best. Everything's updated. I gotta get back to the front room. :-)

Man, it seems like forever since I've sat down at my desk and pecked away at this keyboard, and today I'm trying to put some words together to remind myself of just how truly beautiful things are. The laughter of a child, the shared moment with that special someone, or even just having a beer and a smoke with your Friends while telling war stories about playing gigs and being on the road, these are just a few things that make me appreciative of what I have and what's going on around me. It's truly fucking amazing. :-)

OK, now that the hippy dippy sappy moment has passed, what the fuck is going on with the Occupy Vegas movement and the Double Down? LOL Apparently some cars belonging to patrons of that piece of shit establishment got towed on Saturday night because the Occupy Vegas movement, which consists of Hobos, Derelicts and Idealistic, Naive Youth, takes up all the Double Down excess parking spots in the car lot adjacent to that notoriously smelly and thriving human petri dish. Now sabres are being rattled on both sides, with the Occupy Vegas people threatening to report any and all suspicious activity they witness, including what people do in their cars in the parking lot and how drunk they drive once they pull away from there. Personally I support any attempts at being a bee in the Double Down's bonnet, because I can't stand the place but since I know the Occupy Vegas movement is a total joke and incapable of getting anything done, I can't help but feel that nothing will become of the groups idle threats. Sure would be nice though... heh

Raiders... UGH!! ha ha ha ha Not only is it bad enough that the Fudge Packers beat our asses like we were a high school team, but then to have the Refs still cheat for them and make those obviously biased calls against the Raiders was just pathetic. How is this allowed to still go on?? I'm willing to bet that the Raiders are the ONLY team in the NFL this year who made a red flag challenge on a play that every replay on TV showed the runner stepping waaaayyy out of bounds on a 50 yard run back, but yet the Refs replay machine was supposedly broken and they were unable to review the play, so they just let the call stand and still charged the Raiders a time out for calling the challenge. Oh football, how I love you! XOXO

I missed out on the Christmas benefit show @ the Beauty Bar on Saturday, with Deadhand and the Quitters and Battle Born (I think). I heard it was good though. I don't know why Jane's Addiction cancelled their gig at the Joint last week, but I'm sooooo glad I didn't go, because I would of been pissed off if I bought tickets to that concert. Oh, and speaking of concerts, the Darkness are playing the House of Boooooo's in February - HYPED!!

Somebody just chipped in a few days ago with an update on the Mark Hornsby / Cheyenne Saloon thing, which you can read by clicking here, and while it totally sounds like a dooshbag move I could see him pulling, at this point I think it's pretty apparent to his Friends and people who know the Truth about what happened with all that shit with the Cheyenne Saloon that dooshbag moves like this are to be expected from him. Sad but True. Regardless, someone, I forgot who, reached out to me a while ago from there, telling me that I was welcome back to the Cheyenne Saloon anytime, and to please reconsider my stance about not supporting the place, which I did, by starting to list the Gigs they were having there again. It's a small gesture but the least I can do. I don't have a problem with the Cheyenne Saloon, per se. I had a problem with that dooshbag that worked there. Now that he's gone, I got no problem going there or playing there or anything. There just wasn't a gig worth going to playing there, so I've stayed away. 

Which leads me to this. :-) Guttermouth is playing at the Cheyenne Saloon this Saturday night, and I'm planning on being there and so should you. Yeah, the whole 'Mark & Co.' schtick is wearing thin, but you can't deny that Guttermouth has some really good songs, and depending on how coked out the band is when they play, it's either going to be an absolutely brilliant performance, or a magnificent train wreck. In either case you're compelled to watch it - you can't help it. Local support is provided by Guilty By Association, F.S.U. and Lambs To Lions, whoever they are. There's another Local band opening this gig, but they have a bass player who is a piece of shit loser and so I don't support or promote them, even going as far as to take their name off of the flyer for the gig. Yeah, I'm petty like that. ;-) God may Forgive, and even I do occasionally, but what I never do no matter what is Forget. Never. Fuck you Sector 7-G. Fuck you.

Well, since I'm hyping up Gigs, why not mention this little piece of amazement going down right here: The Naked City Romeos and The People's Whiskey @ Motor City Cafe this Friday night. I will definitely be attending this one, because I have to pick up a copy of that new CD The People's Whiskey just released - I'm dying to hear it! :-) Man, I bet it's just phenomenal. Reverend Lord's Unholy Saints are opening, but I don't know a thing about them. I heard there might be a Drama connection with them, but you know how rumors are, so until I verify it for myself, I believe nothing! LOL Regardless, this is going to be a great gig and if you're not too burned out from Christmas shopping and all that crap than stop on by and have some fun and maybe a drink or 2 or 3. There's no snitches hanging out in the parking lot @ the Motor City Cafe... heh heh

So yeah, I think I've written enough. It's breakfast time and I gotta get some sleep. :-) Everything's updated, a bunch of new stuff was added to the website but damn if I can remember what any of it was, nor do I care. Browse around and find it for yourself. Think of it like an Easter egg hunt or something... hee hee hee See you at the gigs! 

Wowsers ! We sure do have a lot of shows and stuff going on with the band. After a quick update from Miss Roxie I can tell you the following things.

1. A guy from Thrasher Magazine e-mailed the Club House to tell us that they're doing a CD Review on us and that they're printing a Review on a show we played there with Deadbolt a few months back. And if that wasn't awesome enough, they also want to interview us before our show on April 15 @ Ziggy's in Tempe. What a deal. I for one am HYPED !!!

2. We're gonna be playing a show with Curl Up And Die and Terror on April 23 @ The Crystal Palace Skate Rink that I guarantee won't get broken up by The Man, so everyone please come out and check out these 2 great bands and then us...heh heh heh.

3. I think we're gonna be playing @ Rumor's in North Hollywood on April 24 (Roxie's B-Day) and then on the 25th we're going to the opening of the Twilight Zone ride @ California Theme Park ! Special thanks to Caveman for hooking that up.

4. All of the above is on top of our other shows coming up, like the 3 pending shows with some legendary U.K. bands, and the Tour we're going on with The Half Empties, plus the show on June 24 with Defiance. And in the midst of all this gigging we're supposed to finish up the 7" and print up a shitload of merch and keep our wits about us. Yeah right. Like that will ever happen.

5. I don't think we're going to be playing @ Smoothie King anytime soon. They were busting our nuts over our guarantee. It seems their policy is that they don't pay bands to play there, but yet the bands themselves have to pay to play. We told them if they don't pay us that we don't play. They had Brendan from Absent Minded call Roxie to try to get us to play for free, and when that didn't work they had SOMEONE in N.Y.C. call the Club House claiming to be the "Smoothie King's Business Partner" try to talk us into playing for free. We asked them to send us some paperwork on this great charity that all the proceeds go to, and of course they never sent a thing, so phooey.

We're working on a totally gay new song, and we're gonna try to have it ready for the upcoming AZ. shows, and even though Jesse The Super Roadie didn't get us those Darkness tickets he was supposed to, we're still gonna have fun when we get there. My liver hurts at the thought. See ya at the shows on Sat.