Tuesday, September 30, 2003
ROCK AND ROLL THIS WEEKEND!
DESPERATION SQUAD W/THIRD GRADE TEACHER AT THE PRESS - FRIDAY OCT. 3 - 9:30 PM - 129 HARVARD, CLAREMONT - (909) 625-5808 - NO COVER - ALL AGES (UNDER 21 MUST BE BUYING FOOD OR SOME SUCH THING LIKE THAT)
SHOULDA BEEN THERE
Well, the first of our heralded "fourth Saturday of the month" shows in Pomona was one of the most bizarre Squad shows ever, and I'm not trying to be like a fired-up college football coach here, one who has watched Joe Montana play and yet still says the walk-on QB "is the best prospect I've ever seen." In close to 20 years there has never been a show quite like this one.
The trouble started around 8:00, when I got a phone call from Ian, who was letting me know he had one foot out the door - to go to the airport and take the first plane out of town. It was one of those dreaded family emergency situations that trump all other plans, even those of a rock and roll nature. (Fortunately, in the end, it remained an emergency and not anything worse) Still, two hours before the show, it presented a thorny scenario - the Squad has no back up drummer. By all rights, we could have packed it in right there, said "Can't do it!" But after a couple of quick calls we secured a sub, our buddy Brian B, who was ready to give it the old college try.
This was appropriate, insamuch as we were sharing the bill with the Durty Bombs, the scourge of a new forming trend in performance art - retro cheerleading.
However, there were other problems. 10:00 arrived and there was no 10:00 band anywhere to be found. A band had pulled up in a truck, the guys from She's Dead, who had just come back from a canceled gig in East LA (is there any other kind of gig in that town?), and they were ready to jam at a moments notice. The irony is that the scheduled band, ADHD, was on the same Rosemary's Billygoat show as us and She's Dead, but they didn't show up for that one either. So at least they are consistent.
I was all for She's Dead as a replacement, but Joe Black apparently knew where to find this ADHD - down the block at a bar, getting tanked. He talked them into playing but honestly, they came in with this rock star attitude, driven mostly by alcohol and an empty venue.
(Interlude: It's an old party maxim. Band shows up at party - nobody is there. Band doesn't want to play until people show up. People won't show up until they hear music playing. Solution - band has to suck it in and play, that's why they are there. The people will come.)
So the band very slowly set up and got their shit together and once they started jamming, everything was fine. I mean, I still didn't like their attitude - tiny crowd, sub drummer - hmm, who had a better reason to pack it in? Nonetheless they rocked, the crowd was fired up, what could happen?
Plenty. When the Durty Bombs appeared - two women in cheerleading outfits and one man in a dress and wearing a Hello Kitty mask - at first the crowd was fascinated and aroused. Unfortunately, a man wearing a dress is still threatening to many drunk yahoos, and about half way through the cheer session it got ugly, really ugly. First someone came up and ripped the mask off and then someone threw a bottle and all throughout came a torrent of some of the meanest heckling I've heard in many a year - because of a cheerleading act. (I would like to stress that as far as I know, none of these assholes were there to see the Squad, but there was someone in the middle of it who yelled "D-Squad" so I hope the Bombs didn't get the wrong impression)
"Fag!" "Whore!" "Fuck you!" And that's just the printable stuff. The Ramones getting booed off the stage in San Bernadino when opening for Black Sabbath in 1977 couldn't have been any worse than this. So there's just this bad vibe hanging down in the place now, and people are getting tossed out and so forth and so on. Then it's our turn.
And remember - we're just winging it with a sub drummer that we've never practiced with, playing songs so old we had to dust the cobwebs off them before we started - talk about a hard act to follow. When I saw the three kids who had stuck around all night finally get up and leave after "Reenies A Tease" I knew we had to high tail it into "Rockin In The Free World" by Neil Young and it worked. It bought us enough time to get to the messy songs, our bread and butter, and by the time it was over we still elicted the now standard someone-in-the-audience-thinks-we're-the-greatest-band-ever-comment, Brian B pulled it off (as did Hayes and Bob and Laura, rock solid as usual) and, and, the really hot chick in the front row (I think it was the singer's girlfriend) came up afterward to lick chocolate syrup off the Panda Man - twice!
Just another night at the office. Shoulda been there.
YEAH BUT WHAT IS THIS ABOUT THE PRESS?
Um, yeah, well, this is the deal. The Press Restaurant is one of those places that "gets it" and I mean that. A band comes in there and is always made to feel welcome. The Press always feeds you and gets you drunk and pays you, the staff is friendly, the clientele are mostly drunks, but of a non-threatening variety. Really, it's almost too good to be true.
However . . .
I hate to say "I told you so" (and I mean it this time, because usually I love to say it) but years ago, when approached by the restaurant to play, I had extreme reservations about bringing the Squad there. These reservations were fueled by the fact that the Press is such a class establishment, it is really too good to accomodate the type of band that the Squad was then, and certainly is now. I mean, I had reservations well before we became a tortilla-throwing, syrup-spewing mess of a band. I was just thinking we'd break a wine glass or something and then everyone would get pissed off. I concluded that it wasn't necessarily in our best interest to play at a place that would put restrictions on our act. Period.
But we were compelled to play, and we did all the crazy shit, and they seemed to like it or encourage it or whatever, at least for a little while. Apparently, there have been continual problems concerning the carpet. We "ruined" a section of the carpet a year or so ago, according to them, and they replaced it and we were told under no uncertain terms that if it happened again it would come out of our own pockets. So we fixed that problem - we started to bring a tarp.
Problem solved, right?
Wrong. Apparently, and this is the first I've heard about it, our tortilla throwing - frankly, I never realized that would ever come back to bite us in the butt - precipitated another, more costly replacement of the carpet, although it could be that it's just the normal wear and tear that comes when thousands of people a year are trodding all over your floor. Whatever the reason, I got another warning for this show - leave the tortillas at home.
So there. I told you so! I knew that eventually the Squad charm would wear off, and the hatchet people would be after us. And I'm of the mind that, hey, fuck that shit, just fuck it all to hell. The band does not need to play any place that welcomes us with a threat. I knew this would happen, but when was the last time anyone listened to me?
Yeah but Panda Man, couldn't you just not play the messy songs and go on about business as usual?
Well, yeah, we could. That is if everyone who came to see us had seen us before and were willing to sit through a sort of "B" set of songs, instead of the usual "A" set. I'm sure every band in the world is amenable to that: "Let's see, we have probably the most outrageous show anyone has ever seen, the kind that just drops jaws, but we will be more than willing to set that aside for this venue, even though the folks here who have never seen us will judge us on a set that is not our best material. It's possible they will get the same thrill and rush as if we were playing our "A" set - possible, but not very likely."
So underneath the cynical veneer the Panda Man is throwing down here is a very real dilemma. Another band maxim: you generally don't a second chance to make a great first impression. And, yeah, if I thought that people appreciated subtlety over spectacle I might be willing to come down and do something acoustically, something retro, something different than the same seven songs, as I've hinted we might do at the Vault. But I didn't just fall off the turnip truck here. I can't remember one time at the Press when we've done a subtle song like "Cute College Girl", probably the most beautiful, least cynical and musically sound tune that we do - and not have half the audience march out to the patio, like they do, to smoke, because after all, we are a SPECTACLE band. Who really wants to watch us be songcrafters? Yeah, we used to do stuff like that, but when enough people walked out I realized that you don't keep the best stuff in the closet for a rainy day - you play it every single time, because there is always someone who has never experienced it, and that person deserves the best. It's only fair.
So unless someone can make a compelling case against this line of reasoning and believe me, I'm willing to listen, sadly this will be our last show at the Press, because we simply can't afford to not play our best stuff.
CHOW
DESPERATION SQUAD W/THIRD GRADE TEACHER AT THE PRESS - FRIDAY OCT. 3 - 9:30 PM - 129 HARVARD, CLAREMONT - (909) 625-5808 - NO COVER - ALL AGES (UNDER 21 MUST BE BUYING FOOD OR SOME SUCH THING LIKE THAT)
SHOULDA BEEN THERE
Well, the first of our heralded "fourth Saturday of the month" shows in Pomona was one of the most bizarre Squad shows ever, and I'm not trying to be like a fired-up college football coach here, one who has watched Joe Montana play and yet still says the walk-on QB "is the best prospect I've ever seen." In close to 20 years there has never been a show quite like this one.
The trouble started around 8:00, when I got a phone call from Ian, who was letting me know he had one foot out the door - to go to the airport and take the first plane out of town. It was one of those dreaded family emergency situations that trump all other plans, even those of a rock and roll nature. (Fortunately, in the end, it remained an emergency and not anything worse) Still, two hours before the show, it presented a thorny scenario - the Squad has no back up drummer. By all rights, we could have packed it in right there, said "Can't do it!" But after a couple of quick calls we secured a sub, our buddy Brian B, who was ready to give it the old college try.
This was appropriate, insamuch as we were sharing the bill with the Durty Bombs, the scourge of a new forming trend in performance art - retro cheerleading.
However, there were other problems. 10:00 arrived and there was no 10:00 band anywhere to be found. A band had pulled up in a truck, the guys from She's Dead, who had just come back from a canceled gig in East LA (is there any other kind of gig in that town?), and they were ready to jam at a moments notice. The irony is that the scheduled band, ADHD, was on the same Rosemary's Billygoat show as us and She's Dead, but they didn't show up for that one either. So at least they are consistent.
I was all for She's Dead as a replacement, but Joe Black apparently knew where to find this ADHD - down the block at a bar, getting tanked. He talked them into playing but honestly, they came in with this rock star attitude, driven mostly by alcohol and an empty venue.
(Interlude: It's an old party maxim. Band shows up at party - nobody is there. Band doesn't want to play until people show up. People won't show up until they hear music playing. Solution - band has to suck it in and play, that's why they are there. The people will come.)
So the band very slowly set up and got their shit together and once they started jamming, everything was fine. I mean, I still didn't like their attitude - tiny crowd, sub drummer - hmm, who had a better reason to pack it in? Nonetheless they rocked, the crowd was fired up, what could happen?
Plenty. When the Durty Bombs appeared - two women in cheerleading outfits and one man in a dress and wearing a Hello Kitty mask - at first the crowd was fascinated and aroused. Unfortunately, a man wearing a dress is still threatening to many drunk yahoos, and about half way through the cheer session it got ugly, really ugly. First someone came up and ripped the mask off and then someone threw a bottle and all throughout came a torrent of some of the meanest heckling I've heard in many a year - because of a cheerleading act. (I would like to stress that as far as I know, none of these assholes were there to see the Squad, but there was someone in the middle of it who yelled "D-Squad" so I hope the Bombs didn't get the wrong impression)
"Fag!" "Whore!" "Fuck you!" And that's just the printable stuff. The Ramones getting booed off the stage in San Bernadino when opening for Black Sabbath in 1977 couldn't have been any worse than this. So there's just this bad vibe hanging down in the place now, and people are getting tossed out and so forth and so on. Then it's our turn.
And remember - we're just winging it with a sub drummer that we've never practiced with, playing songs so old we had to dust the cobwebs off them before we started - talk about a hard act to follow. When I saw the three kids who had stuck around all night finally get up and leave after "Reenies A Tease" I knew we had to high tail it into "Rockin In The Free World" by Neil Young and it worked. It bought us enough time to get to the messy songs, our bread and butter, and by the time it was over we still elicted the now standard someone-in-the-audience-thinks-we're-the-greatest-band-ever-comment, Brian B pulled it off (as did Hayes and Bob and Laura, rock solid as usual) and, and, the really hot chick in the front row (I think it was the singer's girlfriend) came up afterward to lick chocolate syrup off the Panda Man - twice!
Just another night at the office. Shoulda been there.
YEAH BUT WHAT IS THIS ABOUT THE PRESS?
Um, yeah, well, this is the deal. The Press Restaurant is one of those places that "gets it" and I mean that. A band comes in there and is always made to feel welcome. The Press always feeds you and gets you drunk and pays you, the staff is friendly, the clientele are mostly drunks, but of a non-threatening variety. Really, it's almost too good to be true.
However . . .
I hate to say "I told you so" (and I mean it this time, because usually I love to say it) but years ago, when approached by the restaurant to play, I had extreme reservations about bringing the Squad there. These reservations were fueled by the fact that the Press is such a class establishment, it is really too good to accomodate the type of band that the Squad was then, and certainly is now. I mean, I had reservations well before we became a tortilla-throwing, syrup-spewing mess of a band. I was just thinking we'd break a wine glass or something and then everyone would get pissed off. I concluded that it wasn't necessarily in our best interest to play at a place that would put restrictions on our act. Period.
But we were compelled to play, and we did all the crazy shit, and they seemed to like it or encourage it or whatever, at least for a little while. Apparently, there have been continual problems concerning the carpet. We "ruined" a section of the carpet a year or so ago, according to them, and they replaced it and we were told under no uncertain terms that if it happened again it would come out of our own pockets. So we fixed that problem - we started to bring a tarp.
Problem solved, right?
Wrong. Apparently, and this is the first I've heard about it, our tortilla throwing - frankly, I never realized that would ever come back to bite us in the butt - precipitated another, more costly replacement of the carpet, although it could be that it's just the normal wear and tear that comes when thousands of people a year are trodding all over your floor. Whatever the reason, I got another warning for this show - leave the tortillas at home.
So there. I told you so! I knew that eventually the Squad charm would wear off, and the hatchet people would be after us. And I'm of the mind that, hey, fuck that shit, just fuck it all to hell. The band does not need to play any place that welcomes us with a threat. I knew this would happen, but when was the last time anyone listened to me?
Yeah but Panda Man, couldn't you just not play the messy songs and go on about business as usual?
Well, yeah, we could. That is if everyone who came to see us had seen us before and were willing to sit through a sort of "B" set of songs, instead of the usual "A" set. I'm sure every band in the world is amenable to that: "Let's see, we have probably the most outrageous show anyone has ever seen, the kind that just drops jaws, but we will be more than willing to set that aside for this venue, even though the folks here who have never seen us will judge us on a set that is not our best material. It's possible they will get the same thrill and rush as if we were playing our "A" set - possible, but not very likely."
So underneath the cynical veneer the Panda Man is throwing down here is a very real dilemma. Another band maxim: you generally don't a second chance to make a great first impression. And, yeah, if I thought that people appreciated subtlety over spectacle I might be willing to come down and do something acoustically, something retro, something different than the same seven songs, as I've hinted we might do at the Vault. But I didn't just fall off the turnip truck here. I can't remember one time at the Press when we've done a subtle song like "Cute College Girl", probably the most beautiful, least cynical and musically sound tune that we do - and not have half the audience march out to the patio, like they do, to smoke, because after all, we are a SPECTACLE band. Who really wants to watch us be songcrafters? Yeah, we used to do stuff like that, but when enough people walked out I realized that you don't keep the best stuff in the closet for a rainy day - you play it every single time, because there is always someone who has never experienced it, and that person deserves the best. It's only fair.
So unless someone can make a compelling case against this line of reasoning and believe me, I'm willing to listen, sadly this will be our last show at the Press, because we simply can't afford to not play our best stuff.
CHOW
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