Follow The Leader

The panic text messages went out early on Saturday night. The Brother of the Promoter was letting everybody know that the Promoter took all the money made from the appropriately named Las Vegas Shakedown and left town with it, heading off to hide in Los Angeles with his tail firmly ensconced between his cowardly legs. The Brother of the Promoter was spreading the word that nobody was getting paid - not the Bands, not the Stage Hands, not Security, not the Staff - Nobody - and that he was officially washing his hands of all responsibility associated with the shady Shakedown festival. Like rats fleeing a sinking ship, it was every man for themselves. Bands played for free, and most of the workers simply walked off the job, and I don't blame them. I would too if I knew I wasn't going to get paid! LOL And with that chickenshit move, the Shakedown came to an anti-climactic end, and I say good riddance to bad rubbish. The lineup was terrible, but that was because quite a few bands didn't even wanna work with the Promoter, because of past experiences and stuff they had heard about him. The promotion for the festival was terrible too. Nobody knew anything about what was going on, and the gigs all definitely had a Poseur slant to them. All I saw when I was down there on Fremont Street was Rockasilly faggots walking around with their Chubby Page girlfriends. If it wasn't for Zeke, Custom Made Scare, Flexx Bronco and a few others, there wasn't a Punk band to be found anywhere. Phooey. I hope that the words 'Las Vegas' and 'Shakedown' never come together ever again, and if they do, I hope people aren't stupid enough to support it, and that bands aren't stupid enough to play it.

And what was I doing down on Fremont Street on Saturday? Why, attending the Occupy Las Vegas protest, of course! LOL I got there @ 4 pm, right when it was supposed to start, and there was nobody there. I checked the website and it said to meet in front of the big pint glass at Hennessey's, and so I grabbed a pint, ordered some grub and took a seat at a table outside of Hennessey's to watch the festivities. There were NHP bikes all lined up along the streets, film crews from Local TV stations were standing around looking stupid, and undercover police officers walked around talking into their lapels, but there was no crowd whatsoever. A few stragglers showed up, some idiot kids were walking around with anonymous Vendetta type face masks on the top of their heads, leaving their faces fully exposed, and a VW van kept driving around the area, with a poster board full of Anti-Big Business slogans and rhetoric scrawled on it, prominently affixed to the side of the van for all the world to see.

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Yes, the driver of this van was wearing a Tye-dyed Grateful Dead shirt. :-)

After 15 minutes the Cops started clearing out, the TV crews started breaking their gear down, and the 4 or 5 people who bothered to show up for the Protest just kind of congregated around looking foolish while the Tourists just milled about doing whatever it is they do. I paid up my tab and took a stroll up and down Neonopolis, thinking that maybe I had missed out on it, or maybe the gathering had moved, but I found nothing. I heard someone speaking on a megaphone, but when I followed it to the source all I found was a guy selling and demonstrating toys. After about an hour I gave up and called it a day. As I was crossing the street to leave I turned around and snapped a picture of the Protestors, just for documentations sake. I don't know why nobody showed up, but after this piss poor example of how everybody talks a good game on Facebook, but nobody ever follows through with what they say, I think I'm officially done with all this silliness. This whole Occupy thing might be working in other places but here in Vegas, it's a fucking joke.

The striped pants are a nice touch, don't ya think? ;-)

Jason Campbell... broken collar bone... fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck... Is this the end of our Season? Gawd I hope not. With the Sharks craptacular start this year, Football is the only thing I got going to cheer for! LOL Bring in Pryor! hahaha

I started the 2 a day practice sessions early last week. I'm building up my endurance as well as familiarizing myself with the material... the new material that is. Songs like Ode To Darby and Oki Dog I know like the back of my hand from playing them so much back in the day. If Ena shows up it will be an almost full classic line up reunion, but if not, it's still gonna be an amazingly fun time. Youth Gone Mad @ Rookie's in La Mirada (of course) this Sat. It's a benefit for the Wolf, one of the guys responsible for turning me onto the whole Punk Rock thing when I was a wee lad, and there's no way in Hell that I would miss out on this. No way. Lots of old Friends will show up, and lots of Pictures will be taken. I can't wait. :-)

Everything is updated. New stuff added, old stuff being worked on. Shellac on Weds. @ the Beauty Bar is gonna be AMAZING! See ya there!