I really don't feel like writing much of anything anymore.

I'm content to do what it is I'm doing; watching Raiders games, drinking Halloween themed drinks at bars here in town, playing video games (gawd damn Simpsons game), not practicing with any bands (S.F.T.! ha ha ha ha), hanging out with my girlfriend, going to gigs in real venues with bathrooms and booze, becoming even more of a Foodie than I already am, planning trips out of state and then not going through with them (The Mummies gig in CA. - FUCK!!), put-putting around my house, or just sleeping my Life away. Everything going on Locally in the music scene bores me to tears, and I'm almost to the point of embarrassment with everyone fawning over these Beardcore gigs going down at living rooms and houses all across the valley. Is this what it has come down to? A bunch of 40 something men mingling with teenage 20-something boys at houses and backyards full of underage kids and booze? Lame. Oh, and you guys with your "super secret" warehouse gigs - blow me. Did we not learn anything from The Artistic Armory debacle? Has that place opened up yet? Is it opening anytime soon? Anyone know what happened with that place? ha ha ha Yeah, your elitist attitudes just keeps things fragmented and cliquey. I hope you choke on it. I think the reason why you bands play these house gigs and warehouse gigs is because you can't get anyone over the age of 21 to come to see your shitty band play anywhere else, much less pay to see your band play at a real venue with real established bands, because that would mean your core audience of 'Fans' wouldn't be able to drink their Steel Reserve and smoke their blunts like real gangsters do before they check out the bands, and we all know it's no fun playing to a bunch of 'lame old men' who don't slam. News flash: there's nothing easier than making a bunch of drunken kids slam and jump around. Seriously. It's cool and all but nothing to get hyped about, or to alienate you core of fans over - just ask Three Rounds about that shit... LOL Yeah, the SquidHat Records Curse continues unabated, and I for one couldn't care less. Those bands deserve everything that's coming to them. Meh. I'm going back to work on the website. Rant over.

Hmmmmmmm... have I talked up any of this stuff before?

Music Review by Karl Bakla of the self-titled debut/demo release from Local Punks Radio Silence. Click here to read it.
Music Review of the latest Armored Saint album called Win Hands Down. Click here to read it.
Music Review on the new album from Hardcore CA. Punks Walk Proud called Too Much Is Never Enough. Click here to read it.
Music Review by Karl Bakla of a 12" piece of vinyl from Local Punks Agent 86 called 25 Years Of English For The Hearing Impaired. Click here to read it.

Pictures of Dangerboner playing @ the Dive for the Life Is Shit festival. Click here to check them out. I had my camera on a weird setting that night (D.A.F. setting) and the photos I took that night all came out... odd.
Pictures of Illicitor playing @ the Dive for the Life Is Shit festival. Click here to check them out.
Pictures of Blood Dumpster, a Dangerboner offshoot band of some sorts, playing @ the Dive for the Life Is Shit festival. Click here to check them out.
Pictures of Headwinds playing @ the Dive for the Life Is Shit festival. Click here to check them out.

Gig Review from the FNG in The Civilians, Matt, on the It's Not Dead Fest that went on in CA a few days ago. Click here to read it. Apparently he felt compelled to give it a write up, and you all should know I'm all about being compelled to do things... heh heh heh
Gig Review on the Psychedelic Furs / The Church show @ the Brooklyn Bowl last month. Click here to read it.
And in case you missed me talking about it before, from the Wayback Machine, a Gig Review from 4 years ago on the Tinglerz / The People's Whiskey / The Civilians / The Seriouslys gig at the Motor City Cafe. Click here to read it.

See? I post a lot of stuff on here to check out. The secret is to check in periodically to see if anything has been added. Or you can just wait until my stupid ass remembers to chat it up on here. :-)

The other day on Facebook I was given the gentle reminder that I have known Trueland Morrison for 4 years now. It reminded me of this by pointing out that it was 4 years ago to the day that we became friends on Facebook. We had become friends because I had just checked out his band The Civilians, a band my friends Tony and N.J. Pete were involved with, as they played their first ever gig on Oct. 7th, 2011 at the Motor City Cafe, a place that I think still does the occasional gig. The Seriouslys, Tinglerz, and The People's Whiskey also played. We were all there for Christy Larson's birthday party at her place of work at the time. I gave it a write up as well, and was almost 100% positive that I posted it on the website before, but apparently I didn't. I mean, if I did, I couldn't find evidence of it anywhere - not on a back up disc, not on the Internet Archive: Wayback Machine, nothing. I've sat on the write up for years now, always meaning to format it and get it posted up, but just never did. I'm lazy, whatta ya want? Now with the anniversary reminder thing, I figured now was as good a time as any to get it up on the website, so click here if you're interested to see what I'm babbling on about with this 4 year old write up of a mostly forgotten gig. In the long run, it's just a review of a rare night at a Local gig where some band didn't suck, and I didn't feel compelled to call them out on it, and everyone was chill and we all had a great time. I must of been drunk and high on drugs for such an apparent yet temporary lapse in pontificating my disparaging judgmental viewpoints. ;-)

Another thing that reminded me of that night at the Motor City Cafe, was a picture that appears in the latest Civilians video for the song Solidarity, from our upcoming split on Crowd Control Media Records with The Defenders. If you look closely you can see a picture of me checking out the band at I think the inaugural Civilians Motor City Cafe gig some 4 years ago. I went from being a fan, to being in the band... ha ha ha ha. It's been a great run so far, and I can't wait to see where we're heading in the next 4 years together. Mòran taing!

Everything is updated. Why I don't know... ;-)

Well, when I woke up tonight, I thought for sure I was going to be reading about a huge Denver blowout over the Raiders, but lo and behold that wasn't the case at all. I actually missed a pretty damn good football game! LOL I'll chalk this loss up to growing pains, because we easily could of won it. Sea Bass misses 2 FG's? Wow...

In any event, I'm having a fun weekend. Fri. night's Civilians gig with Sham 69 was great. That band Revolt was pretty pissed at us for taking their direct support spot playing right before Sham 69, but it wasn't really our fault. Right when I got to the Dive, Kirby rushed up to me and asked if Sham could use my drum kit, which I never have a problem with. Everyone's played my drum kit. Hell, even Miguel from Total Gheyass has used my kit! hahaha People love it, and I figure, if I can't break it, then neither can you, and no one's proven me wrong so far - knock on wood. Kirby said that Revolt were terrible, and that he didn't want people leaving before Sham got a chance to play - his words, not mine, although after seeing Revolt play, I can see why he said that. They're a typical UK 82 leopard print bondage belt high school Punx type of band, and compared to the sonic onslaught presented by The Psyatics and The Civilians, they just seemed underwhelming and boring. Kudos to the guitar player from Revolt for playing with 17 stitches in his head though, which he got from busting it open somehow the night before. Oh, to be young and seemingly made of rubber again. LOL It was a fun gig. The Psyatics are a great band, but could someone tell them to keep that annoying dancing girl outside the venue when they play? Seriously. She turns the band into background noise for the attention starved girl gyrating her way around the room. Wasn't just me thinking that either - I'm just the asshole stupid enough to say it publicly. We already have joke bands here in Vegas that do that, we don't need any more. The Civilians did good, and we finally got the FNG Matt up on stage to stutter/stop his way through Heroes Of Our Past and some other song I can't remember the title of. I could tell he was nervous, but he did a good job. I think that was the best crowd response we ever got from the Dive crowd, so again, Thanx! :-) Sham 69 were definitely having an off night. Technical difficulties and a rhythm section that looked like they learned the songs in the van on the ride over didn't really help their cause. Stop/starts galore were just killing the vibe in the room. Other than that though, they were OK I guess... LOL

I didn't even make it to the Riverboat Gamblers gig @ the Beauty Bar yesterday. The same ol' Local bands that seem to play every gig and store opening and Jewish brit milah were on the bill, and it had me thinking I didn't have to show up until after 11 at least, but at that time I figure, what's the point? The thought of going Downtown and dealing with that BS and paying for parking and the dooshiness of the Beauty Bar had me thinking I should just stay Home and play Red Dead Redemption: Undead Nightmare, my current obsession.

Matt is passed out on the tiles. Erika is slumbering in our bed. I'm wide awake and wired, with a belly full of tacos and booze. Today is the World Championship Taco And Salsa Festival, but I'm not going, because I got a gig later @ the Dive with Sham 69, and I know if I go to that taco festival, I ain't leaving. Or if I do leave, then I'm going to be even fatter and even more bloated than I usually am, and I don't feel like playing drums while puking all over myself again at the Dive. Nope! :-)

I've been so busy lately that I totally spaced on hyping up the fact that The Civilians were interviewed last night on another Internet radio show, this one being the ZRock'R Magazine Live show on LV Rocks Radio, which was mad crazy fun. Mother/Daughter co-hosts Sylvia and Stephy pretty much just let Trueland, myself, and Matt run amok on the airwaves, cracking wise and trying hard not to talk shit about Local bands like we did the last time we were on the radio... ha ha ha We debuted a couple of new songs from our upcoming split with The Defenders, told some stories, took some selfies, made lots of weird noises/voices, and like I said, just had a really great fucking time. Thanks again to Stephy and Sylvia for being the gracious hostesses that they are, and thanks to ZRock'R Magazine Live for giving us the airtime. We'll be back when the new album comes out... IF you'll have us back! LOL

Yeah, it's like 10 in the morning, and I got a gig in 10 hours. What am I doing up? LOL Tonight's gig with Sham 69 is gonna be fun. We got a bunch of new merch, we're gonna be playing a bunch of new songs on the brand new, now complete with drum riser stage @ the Dive, so come on out and have some fun. See ya there!

I knew the house of cards was going to crumble soon enough. You can't give up over 300 yards on Defense and expect to win games. You just can't. All my fellow Raider fans thought we had it, but I didn't think so. Sure, Carr is having a good run, but a lot of that is Amari Cooper's doing. I think anybody who can get the ball to Cooper would put up good numbers. Our defense does suck though. I was telling everybody all this last night at that Choppercon festival going on at Triple B's. Yeah, that's where I got wasted and things got weird (in a good way) in Downtown Vegas. Ugh. Was I ever feeling it this morning though... man.

Yeah, The Civilians were a last minute addition to the Choppercon festival gig, and I think we did a lot better than expected. Hearing the band members who had to play after us say "How the Hell are we supposed to follow that?" makes everything worth it. I went there knowing 3 people - Jesse, Roxie, and Kevin, and I left knowing a whole lot more, including the terribly rad chick who kept giving me Jack & Cokes for no apparent reason whatsoever. ;-) There was all sorts of stuff going on outside - food trucks, stands and stalls selling everything and anything biker related, and loads and loads of bearded bikers and the half naked, tattooed girls that love them. Everybody and everything was happening outside, which made it a bit rough for opening act Fuzz SoLow. He played his raucous, foot stomping one man band Rock 'N Roll aural assault to a sparse crowd of people who were interested enough in music to come in from outside and check out what was happening on stage. He got the night going right with his set, I dig him. Go to fuzzsolow.bandcamp.com to check some of his music out. The Civilians played next. Too many generous accolades were lauded upon us after our set. Whether any of them were deserved is anyone's guess. I was told that we had some circle pit action going on while we played. That's got to be worth something, right? Right?

The rest of the night after playing the set is a huge blur. I missed Big Daddy Carlos' band Chickenhawk, but seeing Big Daddy Carlos give little ol' Trueland a huge hug right after our set was definitely a highlight of the evening. The band Motochrist just seemed content with massacring AC/DC songs. If Sean And Zander played, I totally missed them, and by the time Rumble King started playing their 50's doo wop Rock 'N Roll, everyone outside was packing their gear up and making plans to continue the party elsewhere, with the majority of us deciding to hit the El Cortez for more drunken shenanigans. Yeah. Fun night. Definitely paying the price for it.