Laudanum, Kylesa, Highstone Son of a Bitch, I Love a Parade at the Curve Bar in SF. Feb. 4th.
I went to a show last Tuesday and didn't recover from it until Friday, and I was taking it easy. However, the Curve does have $2 Pabst on tap. It's located across the street from Pac Bell Park. I guess they needed to start doing something to attract people in the off-season. I Love a Parade started playing as soon as I walked in. Jen (former Reina Aveja) is the most powerful vocalist on the planet so I wanted to see the new band she's in. Her band mates aren't rookies, they are punk rock veterans. Still, she seemed to be the band's feature attraction, or maybe that's just how I saw it. It's good to see she hasn't lost it. She fucking rocks. I noticed Ron (from Grinch) was in the next band, which is funny because I told my wife "and Ron from Grinch's new band" when she asked me who was playing this night. It was just a good guess. I didn't even know he had a new band. The only reason I said it was because I didn't remember the names of all the bands that were playing and I was trying to make it sound like a good show. My wife doesn't mind if I go out to have a good time while she stays home with the baby, but not if I'm out wasting time with crappy bands she never heard of. Having "Ron from Grinch" just lends any band an aura of authenticity. She said "Oh" and nodded her head approvingly when I mentioned it. It's rare that even a small lie gets past her, but as it turns out, I wasn't actually lieing to her at all. That's probably why I got away with it. Anyway, they are called Highstone Son of a Bitch and they have one of those tough looking bald headed dudes as a singer. The shocking thing about this guy is that he was more than a growling stage prop, he could actually sing. The band sounded good, but I did miss most of their set because I bought an old friend, Matt, a beer. Then he told me he didn't drink. When we were roommates like 8 years ago he loved drinking beer. Matt was always an intriguing guy. When we were roommates he was a magnet for all the girls that had previously settled for me. He was a sharp looking Berkeley grad, wrote for MRR, and played guitar. He used to be very particular about his punk rock. He liked Billy Childish and the Purple Onion type bands. He tried to teach me to play bass so we could form a band. I learned one song. Matt moved away and became a schoolteacher in Vegas. This night was the first time I'd seen him in seven or eight years. He still has the leather jacket, but now he has long hair. I told him he was the last person I expected to find at a metal show, "People change, you can't listen to the same music your entire life. I started taking Jazz lessons and it helped me appreciate different music. Plus, these bands actually practice." He said he was now a regular at the Lucifer's Hammer shows, but he only recently started going to shows again after he stopped drinking. I asked him what he was up to and he said he was weight lifting competitively. Maybe I was drunk but I think he actually said that he could clean and jerk 395 lbs., which is nuts. If this were the '70s he'd be in the Olympics. While we were there the girl who runs the place gave him a job working the door so maybe you'll see him. Kylesa played next and they did NOT rock my world. I was disappointed. They just sounded typical of the genre. Laudanum played after them and I thought they were the best band of the night. I remember when Becky was in Reina Aveja she told me what a great guitarist Judd was and this night I could really hear it. When they first moved to the Bay Area from Florida they formed Brainbloodvolume with Jen on vocals and Robert (Artimus Pyle) on bass. This is the same band, but without Jen on vocals. It was also the last show with Robert. I used to complain to Becky that Jen's vocals were lost in the mix with BBV and she explained that the band wanted her to sing differently than she did with Reina Aveja. I thought they just weren't utilizing her talent. Now that I hear Laudanum I understand the sound they were shooting for before. It's still extremely heavy but closer in style to the early Melvins than Eyehategod. They really fucking rocked. It's too bad half the punks had gone home by then. I think it was after 1am. I did see Carl Elvers from New Orleans at this show. He thought they rocked too and was heading over to buy a CD from them as I left. Anyway, I got home and, according to Keri, started snoring loudly. I only snore after I've been drinking. Keri woke me up and I unconsciously said, "Yeah, I'm good" and went back to sleep. I finally rolled on my side, got three hours sleep, and the next morning I had a sub assignment where the teacher was busy working in the next room and she asked me to lead a mid-class discussion about "marketing cool" to teenagers. She gave me some lame notes from the Frontline video. I bombed pretty hard. Normally as a sub I just sit and read all day, but it's not an easy job when they put you to work. I talked about the marketing of punk rock, but there were times when I'd stop in mid sentence and there would be a five-second pause of total silence as I tried to remember what I was talking about.

Yeah…, today, Feb 14th is the first school day of the month that I didn't get a sub assignment. That's good because last month it looked like work was drying up. I thought I might need a different job. I slept in 'til 11:30am this morning. That happens every time now that I don't work. I never used to do that. I'm just getting old or I'm worn out from chasing Lydia around. Tonight I'm driving Keri to Twin Peaks for a pizza and wine. We have a fold down table in our mini-van so it should be cool. After that, if Lydia is doing well with my mom we'll go to the Hunches, Mystery Girls show. Okay, time to post this…