By Rev. John Wheeler
A mere nine days shy of an entire year had passed since our last foray into the unpredictable horror that is being an unknown metal band traveling the back roads of America, driving from shithole to shithole essentially getting paid in beer. Twelve months free from barfights, drunken hags, angry rednecks, boring scenery, broken equipment, flat tires, sore backs, and the confused stares of offended and frightened music fans from every walk of life. For as long as it had been since we kissed it goodnight by exposing ourselves and throwing pies onstage at the First Avenue mainroom, everything came rushing back like an avalanche of beer cans and cigarette butts as we pulled our motorized garbage can on wheels into the desolate vacant lot behind The Wicked Moose in Rochester, MN.
Gabriel and The Apocalypse had asked us to be on this show, and we were kinda itchy to get back out there to try out all of the new songs we had written as well as the new members and equipment we had. All that in mind, I have to admit that I was rather excited when we finally found our way to the main room and it was quite large with a pro PA, a lot of lights and the whole shebang. Turff informed me that before being a rock bar, this place was the number one booty shakin dance club destination for orange skinned skanks and the douche-bags that wanted to impregnate them for miles and miles around. There was plenty of space to set up all of our shit and make sure it worked. There would be plenty of space to run around and everything promised to be louder than what is reasonable. We were pleased.
The hours wore on and I proceeded to get loaded with the other bands behind the club. It's simply how things are done. It felt like a million times past and the feeling was alright. As it got dark it was time to get serious and get into our make up and satanic neon gay pride outfits. My tight red pants and golden skull belt buckle had me lookin fly and ready to kick ass. The club was actually starting to fill and I could tell I was making everyone I got near pretty uncomfortable, which only added to my smug sense of accomplishment.
Our number came up and it was time to get on stage. After a quick sound check we were ready to explode. Wild animals poised to tear into virgin flesh. Soon after it was a blur of strobe lights, foul language and overly complex electro metal. Between songs I expertly wove a fine tapestry of grotesquely vivid profanity the likes of which it seemed the audience had not heard before in all of their lives combined. Yes all was going fairly well and I'll be damned if some of the audience wasn't actually diggin it. Sweet. We were doing our job. Filled with girlish glee I noticed a crumpled up beer can on the stage and decided to pick it up and fling it back hand style in the general direction of the dance floor. And the band played on.
Not a moment after our last note, large men came up onto the stage and told us in a fashion that was much more nervous than firm that we had to pack up our shit and leave. Apparently, that empty can of bud light that I so violently threw from the stage trans-mutated in mid air like an alchemist's wet dream into a full glass bottle and struck a cocktail waitress in the skull hard enough to send her to the hospital. Or at least home from work. When I calmly explained that not only did this not happen, but was also impossible, they insisted that we leave anyways. In addition to this, I guess someone had spit on Turff during our set, and being a punk rocker Tuff decided to spit back. Being a drunken towny hick, the original spitter decided to actually throw a beer bottle at Turff's magic space guitar and then go bitch to the club security. Turff's guitar was perfectly fine because our shit is blessed by the devil and baptized in hooker blood, but it was enough to stir up more trouble in this fine upscale establishment.
After I informed the hired goons that it would not be particularly quick for us to "take our shit and leave" because we had all of our complicated lighting to tear down, and if they tried to make us go without it, I would personally burn the place to the ground and take a dump on the ashes (or sue them, whichever) they relented a bit and told me to hurry up. As I went about this some broad came up to me with the can I threw and asked me to sign it. I did and asked her if she saw what happened, and she told me that she saw the can bounce harmlessly off of said waitress's shoulder who then decided to pitch a complete hissy fit because it was her first day or some shit and probably expected the bar to be more like the booty shakin club of yore. She had gone straight to the owner who in a coke fueled rage sent the decree for us to be banished for all eternity for our misdeeds.
Speaking of which, while I was taking stuff apart Turff took it upon himself to go upstairs and personally karate kick the coke mirror directly into the face of the club owner. During the ensuing ninja fight, this bozo said that throwing beer cans around at a rock concert was unacceptable because it could have completely destroyed their lighting system somehow. When Turff told him that his guitar could also have been ruined, the big dog snidely asked him if he would like to trade. A $3,000 guitar for $50,000 worth of lighting? Turff said it sounded like a hell of a deal as he round house kicked that motherfucker straight through the plate glass window behind him, causing him to fall screaming to his death.
About the time the rest of us got everything outside, I noticed the cops had shown up. At this point I assumed they were there to take us away to some backwards Nazi internment facility for all of the egregious mayhem we'd been causing, so like every red blooded American, I decided to hide. From my vantage point in the shadows clinging upside-down to the rafters in a narrow hallway a few feet above the confrontation, I learned that the police were actually yelling at the sound team (who did a great job) because we were so loud they got complaints. This place could easily hold 900 people, Seven Dust has played there, it's surrounded by an infinite expanse of vacant lot and the only neighbors on the horizon were business's on the other side of the freeway that closed hours ago-and some how we were too loud for this situation. So loud that people miles away were calling the cops. The cops seemed confused. So they left, and I snuck back outside.
After a while, i decided to put normal clothes back on, wash off my make up and throw on a baseball cap. I needed a disguise so I could watch GATA's set, grab our merch and possibly drink more. It totally worked, and I waltzed back in there with no static whatsoever. The other guys pulled the same shit and no one noticed. To the point where some of the staff were talking shit about us as if we were still outside. It spoke to the brilliance of our disguises, but I still had to quietly slip neurotoxins into their drinks as we passed by. No loose ends. After we had gotten our merch safely outside, one of Dave's buddies who had come out to the show peed on the floor behind the table. Seriously.
Just as we were all packed up and ready to drive off into the night, Jake from GATA ran outside and stopped us. He said he had smoothed things over, and we were still getting paid. He handed us an envelope, and to our excitement we saw that we still got the 50 bucks we were promised. Just so long as we agreed to take it and never return. We did, and headed towards Iowa...but that's a story for another time.
Salt the Earth (Official Video)
Salt the Earth (teaser video)
Turff Gets A Fancy New Toy!
Turff's custom Mira guitar built by James Zimmers @ PRS Guitar
Wundershowzen
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If you're looking for a bunch of pseudo meaningful, sentimental drivel that looks good in cursive tattooed on your chest, you're in the wrong fucking place. I hear a lot of talk about what's "real" and "true" from people who would starve to death if they got left alone in the woods for half a day. It seems like everyone's real good at arguing but no one can make a valid point. The basis for everything seems to be in the flawed notion that anyone gives a fuck about you. Trust me, bro, they dont, nor should they. Yeah, it sucks when some people are getting oppressed, and it sucks that we will scratch and claw and kill each other for scraps of colored paper, but what else were you going to do anyways? What makes you so fucking special? You clicked a button that says "let's stop homelessness" and then went back to looking at pictures of yourself? Well, bravo. Oh, I get it: you're special because you have faith. Even if the world is a hopeless black snake pit, you will some day move on to greener pastures because God loves you. Well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but that song you're swaying to with your eyes closed and your arms in the air was written by those same goddamn snakes. Everything you believe is a load of horseshit. History is nothing but a set of lies agreed upon by the same rich minority that invented religion to keep us from figuring out whats going on and murdering them in their sleep. By buying into the constant and irrational fears of eternal damnation and foreign invasion you are enabling every great atrocity that is committed by the same over privileged war criminals that sold you those two concepts in the first place. You're not Innocent. You're complacency makes you an accessory to a galaxy of lies, murder and suffering the likes of which you will never be able to imagine. I know what you're thinking, "who the fuck am I? How am I any different?". I am well aware that I am part of the problem. I have my place in the cycle of despair, but at least I KNOW it. I take notice and I cry foul. I do whatever I can to fight the imaginary bullshit machine. I have written entire records screaming into the void, trying to wake up anyone that will listen. If once you've read the venomous, accusatory bile I have spewed you are still willing to listen, then perhaps you are in the right place after all.
