Last nights gig was pretty fun. The only people in attendance were pretty much the Bands playing and drunken Locals with nothing better to do. No one was banned for tailgating in the parking lot, because everyone was doing it, as usual. The smell inside that place is nauseating. How do you people put up with it? The bathroom that was inside C.B.G.B.'s smelled better than the Double Clown does. When will the dooshbag that owns that place invest a few bucks to get proper ventilation in there? He spends enough on trendy art pieces and publishing books no one buys or reads to have that place renovated 3 times over. Whatever. We played first, pretty much for AJ and Heather's enjoyment only, but we sold some CD's after the gig, so I guess people liked us and that we did OK. We played a Descendents cover for some reason, (yeah right), and Homeless Mike seemed to really, really like it... LOL Yeah, Homeless Mike, he of the Legendary shit talking escapades on the Interwebz and the pilfering of musical equipment that doesn't belong to him, plays in No One Listens, a new band gigging around town as of late, and at first I was pissed off about sharing a stage with that slime ball, but then I just said fuck it - play the gig, so we did, and I had fun, so yeah. It was a cool way to spend a Friday night, standing around with your Friends in a parking lot, pounding energy drinks and bro-ing down, waiting to play some music. :-)

Tonight's the big shindig for the Huntridge Theater. I'm actually against the cause of saving the building, but I'm going to support my Friends who are playing the gig, and to be trendy and eat from a food truck while standing around in a parking lot. I hear it's the thing to do when you're Downtown. Why sit down at a table and be comfortable? Eat off a paper plate and be uncomfortable! It's sooooo cutting edge and unconventional! No wonder everyone's becoming a Hipster. What's next? Llama tattoos for all? LOL

The Anti-League Bowling event @ the Gold Coast last night was fun! Dark, but fun! They had some midnight bowling thing going on at the same time, so the turnout was pretty good, and the lone bartender was working his ass off trying to sate everyone's thirsty asses and demands, and it was pretty sweet walking into a darkened bowling alley to the strains of Black Flag blaring through the P.A., courtesy of the Bargain DJ Collective, of course.  :-) Great job guys. The music was kick ass. According to Facebook, a lot of my Friends were in attendance, but I only saw a few of them, but I wasn't there very long, and I spent the time I was there at the bar drinking. Oh, and I got pulled over on my way over there after band practice. I left MDV to head to the Gold Coast, cruising down Valley View until it hit a dead end. I made a u-turn and got pulled over by a cop with, apparently, nothing better to do, who asked me why I made a u-turn. Uhhhhhmm... because the street was a dead end? I told him, and he then informed me that I was in a well known, high traffic prostitution area. I thanked him for the free information, he ran a warrant check on me, and one he found nothing on me, he sent me on my merry way. Yeah, pretty interesting Thursday night. Don't make u-turns near the Tropicana / Valley View intersection, that's all I'm saying... :-)

Is there some reason why photographers today make their pictures look so craptacularly Photoshopped? LOL I saw some photos from that Punk Rock BBQ gig recently on Facebook, and everyone looked like a bad corpse, complete with unnatural coloring and the look of too much makeup on everyone's face. I think I'm gonna start making all my pictures look like they were colored by crayons. Why bother capturing how things looked exactly, when you can just colorize it like Ted Turner and make it better! Or, you could make them black & white and make them look artistic! ;-)

I got this stupid gig tonight @ the Double Clown, and I'm soooooooo not looking forward to it. It would be nice to see some friendly faces in attendance, but if you can't make it, I understand. I'm gonna be tailgating in the parking lot, because apparently, that's how you get banned from the place, and if I was lucky enough to be banned from the place, then I couldn't play there, and for once, the minority vote would win! hahaha See you there! :-)

Free time? What's that? :-)

It's Summertime, which means there are plenty of more things much more fun to do than to sit inside the house, parked in front of the computer, doing mundane things like working on the website or parsing through the porno girl meltdowns on efukt.com. (don't click here. You'll regret it). Nope! Even though it's a zillion degrees out there, and I have no air conditioning in my car, and now my transmission is slipping in it too (I think), and I'm still out and about and doing fun summer things like lounging and scrounging, maxing and relaxing, and generally just having the time of my Life. Everyone in my circle is with someone who makes them happy (even Bob, if you can believe that), there's no Drama forthcoming (maybe some in the near foreseeable future, but that's it), old Friends who were once Enemies are now my Friends again, and Life is extremely, extremely good right now. May change next week, but for right now, I'm loving it.

When I do work on the website, it's only to post up shit from months ago - Gig Reviews, Music Reviews, Pictures of Bands that nobody cares about, whatever. I'd post Links to everything I've thrown up on here but I don't really care if you read it or check any of it out. I really don't. If I wanted to be vapid and popular, I'd be a shill for the House of Boooooo's and give out free tickets to every show they do there like other websites do. Nope. That's not me. Everything I do on here is cathartic for me, and not for public consumption. Never was. There's been lots of people liking the onethirtyeight.org Facebook page as of late, and it concerns me a bit. No, this isn't the curmudgeon rant about how Popularity isn't Punk, no, it's more like my public assertion that I just really don't care. Your little "Xtreme" or "Alternative" or "Punk" musings, musical choices and style of dress may fade with time, but not mine. I'm here for the duration. When you're older and married and squirting out siblings, I'll still be here, checking out bands, going to the gigs, having fun. It's not a matter of not growing up. It's just knowing where your priorities are. It's knowing what's important. It's knowing what makes you happy. Life's too short, ya know? Facebook is stupid. Where's the next big thing at anyways? I'm ready for it.

I don't know where that came from. I was gonna erase all of it, but what would be the point of that? Apparently I've been perceived as being a bit 'negative' lately, but I think my passiveness is being misinterpreted as negativity, which is far from the truth but whatever. I got stuff to do, like the Anti-League Bowling event going down tonight at the Gold Coast (click here for more info about that), and then Fri. I got an Aluminum Falcon gig @ the Double Clown with The Psyatics, who have nothing to do with anyone from the Mapes, sorry for the mix up, and some other bands who will be vying for that impressive headlining spot at 2 am. Whatever. Saturday everything is happening Downtown, permeated with the stench of self-righteousness, vapid musical sensibilities, and poor math skills, what with that 'Save The Huntridge' benefit going on, (click here to check that out) and that 'Last Call' gig @ the Bunkhouse with all the Hipster bands (click here to check that out), and then, of course, there's that big 'Reunion' gig going down @ the Double Clown, which I want nothing to do with. It's not a 'Reunion' gig without ALL the original members, even the bass player, and I'm pretty sure it wasn't 10 years they were around as a viable, working band, but what do I know? I was only around back then, so my memory is pretty much not to be believed.. heh heh heh. ;-) Oh Nostalgia... how I fucking hate you.

While I was recovering from my debauchery this weekend, I caught up on some much needed video viewing. 2 minutes later, after I was done watching Porn, I checked out this video that my friend Jimmy from Razorcake told me about. It's a documentary about Chi Pig from S.N.F.U. and all he went through and how he's coming back from it all. Who's Chi Pig? I can hear you asking yourself. Who or what is a S.N.F.U.? you're saying? Well, they were this Legendary band from Canada who would just tear shit up anywhere and everywhere they played, releasing a few seminal, crucial albums on BYO Records (boooooooo), and eventually ending up on Epitaph, where, even with their musical clout and muscle pushing them, the band still couldn't break through and ended up in a mess of Hatred and Legal problems that pretty much put an end to their brilliant musical career. It's a sad story that brought tears to my eyes, as I'm a HUGE fan of these guys, so if you're either curious about the Legendary entity that is known as Chi Pig, or a fan of the band, you owe it to yourself to check this video out. It's pretty powerful stuff.

I could of sworn that that Voodoo Organist gig was tonight, and not yesterday. I saw the photos being posted on Facebook last night and was like Damn! I missed out. Oh well. I, like many people here in Vegas I'm sure, saw the Voodoo Organist hold court @ the Cooler Lounge back in the days, and I was definitely leaning towards checking him out again and shooting some photos for the website, that is, of course, if my better half was feeling up to getting into some mischief on a weekday night. ;-)

Speaking of which, I never posted anything about the D.I. gig that went down last Fri. It was too fun of a gig not to, and plus it was Anne's first time ever seeing D.I.,which is odd, considering she's an O.C. Punk girl tried and true... so yeah...

After dealing with the shitty Tourists that permeate Downtown like the cockroaches that they are, and paying for parking (UGH!) and hooking up with Mike to get our tickets, we walk into the LVCS, and the first thing that hits me is the atrocious sound in the place. Is it really that hard to find a competent sound man here in town? I mean seriously... this shit is embarrassing. The band Sick Sense was on stage tearing it up, and I recognized the dude from Luicidal on vocals. They were ultra 80's hardcore band that just wasn't doing it for me. They played a Fear cover. I yawned. The drummer was playing a sick looking, blue Vistalite drum set though, but just barely tapping on it, like a newborn babes bottom. I thought it was cute. American Made came on next and I pretty much slept through them, because they sucked, and then Guilty By Association came on (finally) and played an energetic, loud, fast, and obnoxious set of Punk Rock tuneage that everyone in the crowd was dying to hear and very appreciative of. They sounded good. They even played a few new tunes, which was majorly surprising to me. Could there be a new record in the future? We shall see! Peligro, featuring D.H. Peligro from the Dead Kennedys, played after GBA and lost all the momentum GBA had just built up, and sucking all the energy out of the room as well. The fact that they set up their gear, sound checked it, and then left it up there unattended for what seemed like hours had quite a few people heading for the door. I would of left too if I would of been by myself. Then, after that long ass wait, Peligro played a set that was much too long and much too full of mediocrity to even comment on further. D.I. was definitely worth the wait though, as they played a set chock full of the classic tunes they've released over the course of their storied career, and they even included a few new songs from their just released United We Slam EP, which is only available on iTunes, and you can click here to check that out. D.I. sounded great. They played an uptempo, energetic show, and the pit action was fast and heavy throughout their set. Surprise of the night was them playing Reagan Der Fuhrer, which I don't think I've heard them play in a long, long time, and the sad part was listening to Casey try to talk the crowd out of wanting to hear Chiva, saying how the song brought up bad memories and wasn't that good of a song to begin with, but he played it anyways, and the crowd went crazy for it, myself included. Yeah, it was a great night of Fun and Music at the LVCS, but they gotta do something about the sound there. It's atrocious. And bring back smoking inside the place. Going outside to smoke in Vegas is soooooooooo fucking lame!

Everything's updated. I posted some Pictures of The Swamp Gospel I took at the Beauty Bar a while back, and you can click here to check those out. It's a pretty quiet weekend, as far as I can remember. I mean, 3D6 and Tiger Sex are @ Artifice for that lame ass David Bowie vs. Iggy Pop mash-up thing they sometimes do there, and tomorrow night the Dirty Panties and IDFI are playing at the Double Clown, but I doubt I'll make it to that gig. Last time the Dirty Panties played there I got a message on Facebook from a Friend of theirs asking me to stop being mean to the band about that fundraiser thing they were trying to do to get to Japan to tour with the Bloodcocks, for whatever reason they wanted to do that for. I never replied to the guy from Squidhat Records about it, because, frankly, I didn't really care and couldn't be bothered. I was just making an observation, not a recommendation... heh

Never mix whiskey, tequila, vodka, rum, and weed all in one night. Just saying... 


Thankfully Pulsar bought me some Jack In The Crack for giving him a ride Home after the gig @ the Bunkhouse on Sat. I got about halfway through it before I puked it all back up. I haven't eaten Jack In The Crack in a while, and while it tasted good at the time, in my defense I was drunk and starving, and I shouldn't be eating that crap anyways, so good riddance, says I. I passed out in the front seat of my car, parked a few houses down from the Lonnie Hammargren estate, listening to Venom on my iPhone. :-) How I got there? I have no idea... lol

Yeah, that Punk Rock BBQ thing was pretty cool, except for the fact that A), there was no fucking BBQ to be found there, and B), it started at 8 pm. Who the fuck starts a gig at a bar here in Las Vegas at 8 pm? Jeesh! I thought I was getting there early to do some tailgating' in the parking lot at 9:30, but the gig had already been going on for a little bit, and I had already missed The People's Whiskey, who were one of the bands I was hyped on seeing! FUCK!! Why the Hell were they playing first and some crappy band nobody knows or gives a fuck about like Ambush Americana given the primo later slot on the bill? Ahhhhhh, whatever. There were more than enough fantastic bands on the bill to keep my mind off that minor, annoying complaint. Mersa was raging full on inside the joint when I got there, and both Jeremy and Dean came up to me while I was checking out Mersa and taking pix of the band, and after a bit we all headed to the bar, which was the recurring theme of the night after a bit. Everyone and their Mom was out and about the place. Either they were playing the gig or they were just there like me, hanging out and having fun. Like I said earlier, every band killed it, but man, the fucking dude running the sound for the outer stage just sucked balls big time. I almost thought that Bob was running the sound there for a second, it was that bad. And that annoying ring coming off the snare... UGH!! But despite all that, the bands were all bringing their A-Game, some better than others, and some succeeding, and some just sucking. Surrounded By Thieves fucking slayed it though, getting a rowdy pit going in the process, and I'm really digging the 2nd guitar player for Unfair Fight. He fattens the sound up and gives Chris more time to noodle away. I dig it. They were easily the best band of the evening, hands down. I dunno why people didn't like the Happy Campers. I mean, that click track stuff the drummer was doing was lame, but I thought they were pretty good. And after finally seeing in person the band Lambs To Lions, I'm glad I've missed out on seeing them as long as I have. In their defense they seemed to be nervous, drunk, whatever, and they had some technical difficulties killing their momentum, so, whatever. Maybe they'll do better next time.

I spent most of the evening bellied up to the bar, drinking my ass off and just hanging out with a gaggle of Friends both old and new, and I even made up with a couple of people I had some Drama with for years, which was interesting, to say the least. I think that's the secret, to catch me when I'm drunk, and I'll pretty much forgive you for anything... hahaha I did stop chatting and drinking long enough to check out the bands playing inside though, and I saw War Called Home play an impressive set of Fat Wreck Chords sounding material that's a welcome addition to the scene stew we got going on here. Their material is catchy as fuck, and the singer's dorkiness is cute. ;-) Burning Agrestic played a great set too, but I was too busy at the bar carrying on with everyone to get up front and take pictures, sorry guys. I didn't think too much of that Ambush Americana band. What I heard I didn't like, and neither did some other people. For the quality of the performances, from the bands that were good, it was worth sitting through a few moments of mediocrity to watch the diamonds of the Las Vegas Music Scene shine in the summer night. It was a very cool gig. If you weren't there, well, you should've been. Dummies. 

Everything's updated. New Pictures of the Bass Line Bums were just added. Click here to check those out. The Bass Line Bums were a band from Texas that played the Bunkhouse on a Tues. evening to nobody except us guys in Aluminum Falcon and Bob and Billy. It was embarrassing but they were good sports about it. We bought merch from them and sent them on their way. And with that I'm on my way back to bed. I'm sleepy. I need rest. I'll tell you about the D.I. gig mañana. :-)

As soon as I saw him standing there at the bar, I turned around and left the Bunkhouse.
I didn't need this guy in my Life at this particular time. It's only gonna be Trouble, and I knew it but didn't care. FUCK!, I said to myself once I saw that he saw me walking in.
What the fuck am I going to do now? I thought. I didn't wanna believe it, but there he was, large as a Tyrannosaurus Rex, and looking just as imposing.
My true Friend. My heterosexual Life partner. My ex band mate extraordinaire...

George.
The ex-Hardest Working Man In The Business World.

Standing there with that crooked grin of his and that mischievous look in his eyes. I couldn't recall the last time I saw him. 2 years ago? 3 years ago maybe? No idea. Seeing him made my liver hurt and my jaw ache from laughter. I had already suspected that this evening was going to be something Epic, what with it being the last Punk Rock gig to ever happen at this particular venue and all that, but this was just the icing on the cake. It's important to note the 'Punk Rock' aspect of that last statement, because there is a truly 'last gig ever' happening days later at the Bunkhouse, but it's being played by a shitload of dooshbag Hipster bands that I wouldn't walk across the street to spit on, but I digress. This Tale is one with a Reunification theme. It's the story of what happens when you run into a near and dear friend who you haven't seen in a long ass time, and how things just seem to go right back to where they once were, like no amount of time had passed between you. True Friendship.

He extended his hand to me, and I told him that wasn't going to be good enough, and I gave him a big ol' bear hug. It felt good. I did my Jackie The Jokeman impersonation for him. We both laughed like Idiots. He asked me what I wanted to drink, and I scolded him for forgetting. "Jameson's on the rocks?" he said, and I said of course.

We bellied up to the bar. It was going to be a long night...

And it was. :-)