Yesterday's post was entitled "A Day of Firsts" . . . here's the second "first":
I got into my first car accident last night.
It wasn't serious. And I wasn't shaken by it. But I was in one nontheless.
I find it ironic that whenever there seems to be a first day of live activity for Patch, I find myself in strange scenarios involving my car. Back in May, the day Greg and I started putting samples and electronics down in preparation for the whole band experience, I got pulled over in my own driveway for running a red light. The cop had witnessed someone getting their face blown off just prior and was in a complete tiff, disregarding any of my claims of dumbfoundness pertaining to the backslap of the red light. I got off, having persisted in my asking of "which light did I run through?" We made peace.
Yesterday, after a post-practice Spring Street Tavern celebration, I was giving Adri a ride home to Uptown. On 8th St. and University Ave. in Northeast, the light had just turned green for me. I started to slowly go through, a good five seconds after the light had turned. Some weirdo who was stopped perpendicular on the other street, who had a red light, started going slowly through the intersection. I had gone too far out into the middle of the street, so that even if I had stopped, he would have barreled into me. So I sped up to get out of this asshole's way, since he wasn't stopping. A good ten cars were idling on his street, and it seemed like such a buffoon move. I remember yelling and picturing a dunce cap covering the roof of the car.
He clipped my rear right door.
I pulled over immediately, and he turned and parked behind me. I got out, so did the person in the other car. The man who got out was an older man, perhaps in his late 30's/early 40's. He had a five o' clock shadow, and I couldn't help but think "failure". He said, "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I was distracted, I'm sorry."
The damage done to my car was a couple of ripples in the siding of the door, nothing serious. I have scrapes on the rear bumper that are worse. I sighed and looked at his car. His front bumper was scraped up and his license plate was hanging askew. He got it worse than I did. I nodded to myself and said internally, "He got it worse. Everything's fine." I shook his hand, no harm done, really. Adri and I got back in the car and drove off.
We talked about it for another two minutes, then went back to talking Patch. Another thing to add to the list of adventures experienced.
Today marked the first day that Patch had a live rehearsal. Greg was away for a wedding, so I played the parts of both me and him.
The item for the day: get a feel for how each person interacts with eachother and my direction. See what they each come up with on their own. See how the different musical styles and schemas mesh with one another. How to do this? Practice a song entirely of the Patch sound: Typosgraphy. Strip away any sort of basic 4/4 beat and see how different time changes go over with each individual.
It went over very well. I'm shaking with excitement. Seriously, we're making a huge sound. A professional sound. A scary sound.
Welcome to the family: Dustin, Adri, and Tim. King Crimson -- "Moonchild"
Patch's rehearsal space is situated in the back of the Monroe house. It is nestled in a garage turned storage area, not connected to the main house. Electricity flows in and out, but that's it. There is no heat. It is a space.
The first intent of Louie buying a house some two and a half years ago was to have a creative space where a band lived, breathed, and created together. Even before we moved in, item #1 was to have the back space all set up and ready to go as a practice area. It was big enough to house five guys and all their equipment. That summer (2007) and the proceeding fall we were in that room constantly, practicing for a handful of shows. November 2007 we started losing gusto and oomph. Dave left the band, the rest of us were kind of sick of how things were going. We had some drum auditions, but they proved to be lacking. WE proved to be lacking.
The last official Citizens Banned show was December 12, 2007. I was both lead singer and drummer. It was a fizzling moment, an epilogue to the end of CB. It was also when the practice space suffered in activity and upkeep.
It became a place of random storage. If someone didn't want to have something in the house it was placed in the back room. Creativity does not flow amongst clutter. No one went back into the room, save for Adri, who sometimes held impromptu practice sessions with Nikki Schultz's band. It became a pit of limbo, sometimes inviting us in for music jamming (and there were some projects happening back there, including a Smiths cover band, a birthday party show with everyone from Citizens Banned). Even recently, with The Lizard People pet project, it was still a mess. At this point, people were starting to move out of the house, using it as a prep point to keep piles and piles of shit until the big move. Lizard People held its practice sessions in the living room of the Monroe House, which for both the house and the neighbors was not ideal. The entire time we lamented about not being able to use the back room.
I got really fed up about it. I vowed that once everyone moved out and the new roommates moved in, I would turn that space into an even better practice area than what it was in the Citizens Banned days. It would be fully decorated, have a great PA system (CB's PA system was crap, nobody could hear vocals except for me since I put my voice into headphones in addition to the muffled speakers), refrigerator, television, a writing space, a nice storage area for cables and spare instruments, etc. This week we finally got the space cleaned out of all "storage" related material, and I set about making a fully workable music space.
Everything has been great so far . . . except the neighbors . . .
The price of having a free space to perform music, a preferred place untouched by anyone else where you can come and go as you please, is to have to compromise with neighbors on noise issues. Patch is loud. Louder than Citizens Banned. Everytime I've plugged an amp in or tuned the drums, the front door was pounded on by my neighbor yelling to "shut the music off".
One piece of back space construction: make peace with the neighbors.
So, after I got off work tonight, I ventured next door to my neighbor's front yard. The gate is hard to open, I had a little trouble getting the latch undone. On the other side, I shut the rusty gate, closed 'er down tight. I went up to the front door and knocked. Immediately a large dog named Bear started howling and barking furiously. Wasn't out of the ordinary, since he basically barks all of the goddamn time outside. He's part of the normal ambience.
Nobody came to the door. I knocked again. Strangely, the dog didn't bark on the other side. I was about to leave the yard, hoping the neighbor wouldn't call the cops on me the next night when drums would be wailed on at 8:00pm, when Bear came running along the side of the house into the front yard barking angrily. I froze. I saw it and immediately panicked. Do I bolt over the fence, risking my testicles in certain smashing, run for the hard to open gate, or stay where I am? I stayed put.
Bear started to bark in the other direction, looking for passing walkers. He turned, unsatisfied, and saw me standing on the front doorstep. I gulped. He ran at me, barking furiously. My voice started up in a rising scream. I turned into the doorway, and he grabbed my right leg in his jaws on the back of my upper thigh. He then proceeded to pull back. He took with him a chunk of my pants (ruined) and some skin. I didn't know I was bleeding quite yet. It just hurt like a motherfucker.
I turned to the neighbors shouting "BEAR!! STOP!!!" Bear ran away quickly, I turned, hiding my exposed underwear and most likely my nearly eaten man fruits.
Being the forgiving type, I left them without any ounce of the word "lawsuit". We also settled on noise being done at 9:00pm every night. I almost opted to say "Well, 10:00pm now that your dog destroyed my pants and gave me possible infection of God knows what!" But beggars can't be choosers.
I got the karma I deserved for making noise unannounced to the world around me, the way I see it. We're all square. But that dog, if it ever comes near me again, will have the police on him. Two little kids reside in the house neighboring on the other side of my own. I'm not fucking around next time, for their sake.
Had my first one on one with Dustin: lead guitarist.
We figured out his main distorted tone, and it was the beginning of a series of practice sessions geared to feel out how much direction I would be giving each member. How much they'll bring to the table. Up until next week, Patch Live 1.0 will be in this limbo stage of auditions and pre-pool showering.
It felt good to be in that space again. It's not completely set up yet, but at least it's already getting some action within its four dusty walls.
There's a fine line between art and awful. I saw a band tonight named Blacki (part of an every-other-weekly gig at The Art of This gallery showcasing three bands/soloists. Schuyler's Shield Your Eyes was the second band on the bill tonight. The first soloist was Pelzwik. They were both amazing.). While the other bands sported interesting ways to make ambient/noise/electronic/avant garde music, Blacki just made me think of those viral videos circulating the internet called "Shredding", which have terribly performed overdubs of famous band performances. Eric Clapton doesn't sound like Eric Clapton should, yet the overdubs logically follow what is happening on screen. A ton of bands have been "shredded".
Alas, I was put in a funk, much like the post-Walker Art Center funk. I was really trying to see the artistic merits of Blacki, but I couldn't stop thinking that if I closed my eyes after someone said "Listen to these guys and tell me who you think is playing it" I'd say a bunch of four year olds picked up some instruments in a basement and just played random notes.
I'm sorry Blacki, I tried.
Pelzwik -- "Track 2 (Of Untitled Demo Disc I Received at Show)"
The Mall of America carries a strange stigma for me. Growing up, obsessed with all things amusement parks, rides, and themes, Camp Snoopy was always on my travel wishlist. The first time I visited the Mall was in seventh grade, if I'm not mistaken. I loved it. The log ride was my favorite, being that it was heavily themed, it was creative, it utilized the space it resided in beautifully. I went back the next year after that, again I loved it.
Flash forward to college, particularly the University of Minnesota Twin Cities. Freshman year, right when you started school, if you were an out of towner, the MOA was one of the only things to do outside of campus, other than going to the Metrodome to check out Gophers football and downtown to Block E to catch a movie or play video games at Gameworks before 9:00pm (when they turn into a full out bar). So, the MOA was visted often, a companion to the trepidation I held for being out of the nest and away from my parents for the first time. I go back to that place in my head still whenever I visit the MOA. Especially when I frequent the amusement park in the middle.
As time wore on, the Mall was naturally seen as a sore in the Twin Cities. The natives were done with it, we grew older and wiser . . . we worked there. I never did, but a lot of my friends have or do. Whenever I venture to suggest a MOA trip to the clan, I tend to get a lot of groans as an answer. The Mall does magnify the generation below my own in an unfavorable light. I was hissed at on two separate occasions recently by passersby teenagers. The women there are of the fake Stepford Wife hopefuls, the men the American Eagle/Abercrombie/Hollister consumers. Within Nickelodeon Universe (what the former Camp Snoopy is called now) these dour personalities dissipate, leaving happy families, couples, and goofy braces laden teenagers in their stead. I like the amusement park. It tends to separate the pretentious from the happy souls. And I find it to still be a good date spot.
You can tell a lot about a person, especially if they have or currently work at the Mall, when they are within the confines of the nucleus of the largest shopping center in America. It's like a psychological screening. People who shun the park will most likely never be called upon for many out of the house romps by my person. The pro-park peeps: I've become best friends with people at this place. It makes me realize the intricacies within the personalities of the company I keep. I'm asking them to journey into a courtyard of a compound surrounded by asshole, shallow minded consumers. The very nature of our impending demise as a society is unmasked without remorse at the MOA, and I'm asking artists/intellectuals/level headed people to go there with me to have fun in an unironic way. It makes me realize there are people willing to goof off with me, wearing immaturity on their sleeve. My kind of people.
To my companion in tonight's Universe jaunt: it was beautiful. All pure, all good. Another found soul mate revealed as we were laughing at the bottom of the Log Chute's last drop.
We are in the midst of a plague. Them damn pig lickin' toddlers done got us in a fix, and now we're payin' for the sins we hath committed. The gluttonous wine and dine are now inflicted with the flu of the Swine.
Here's something interesting: I get the notion that, while we are taking pains to prevent H1N1 from spreading within our walls, it doesn't matter much to anybody. A couple of kids have been "treated" for H1N1, there hasn't been any word on whether or not they actually had it. There's also the notion that H1N1 is the only flu strain going around right now, so it's always a good idea to be treated for Swine Flu no matter what.
We sent more kids home this week than any other time I can remember. I think we were half-capacity today. Still, there's no panic, there's no "Go get yer flu shot!" It's "Feel better, give me a hug, I care that you're sick." Guess what? I've probably got Swine Flu all over my clothes right now. Am I worried? Am I ignorant? Am I careless? Why do I feel so . . . calm about this.
It may have to do with hand sanitizers.
I'm not the biggest clean freak in the world. My room is testament to that. I always wash my hands after I use the bathroom but I don't wash my hands enough in general, pertaining to when I've worked outside, or touched lots of dust, or finished cleaning with poisonous cleaning products, taken out the garbage, etc. Germs are OKAY. Here's a little hint: if you clean them all off how is your body going to know how to fight them off? Just like flu shots, giving your body a little bit of germs to munch on will teach it to eradicate the threat of them. We freak out about getting shots yet we clean ourselves silly with HAND SANITIZERS. Alcoholic germicides that wipe out everything, from the serious badass intestine munchers to the not-so-cool bad breath hounds.
While at college, we were taught in the Child Psych department to keep hand sanitizing products AWAY from kids. 1) Alcohol is in it. Kind of poisonous to little people. But not that big of a deal, really. 2) Allergies will develop because the body won't know how to fight off minor germ threats. It will just go into a default panic, creating hives, shortness of breath, etc. 3) YOU'LL GET SICK MORE BECAUSE YOUR BODY WON'T KNOW THE GERMS IT NEEDS TO FIGHT OFF THROUGHOUT YOUR LIFETIME!!!!
Parents have requested that we keep hand sanitizing solution in our school. They actually demanded "Why don't you have hand sanitizer in your classrooms?!" You fucking imbeciles, HAND SANITIZER IS THE EXACT OPPOSITE TO WHAT YOUR CHILD NEEDS!!! There are notices posted in the school saying "We don't use hand sanitizer because it has alcohol in it. It is your choice (the parent) to use this product." No mention of my second and third reasons for not using hand sanitizers. There is one bottle of hand sanitizer in the school. I see a lot of people using it, as it is in the entryway.
This is why we're all going to die in a massive plague apocalypse. Because we don't listen, we think it makes sense to use the germicide all purpose killer.
Again: don't use hand sanitizers, people. This isn't a conspiracy. Your body needs germs to fight constantly, creating a large database of things it doesn't like.
Use regular hand soap. NOT anti-bacterial soap. It's the same concept as hand sanitizers.
The more your body is introduced to small amounts of germs, the more it will be immune to all sorts of foreign contaminants. Seriously, you won't get sick. The more you kill those germs before they are introduced to customs, the more your customs bodyguards will fail in noticing an imminent threat to their vessel.
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