Tales of rock professionalism

On Saturday night HOWLING FANTODS played a show out in Roxborough. Here's the short version: it was and we were awesome.

The longer version: another night of husband-core was to be had! First up was Matt Kelley's other band, LATE NIGHT TELEVISION. Matt grew a mustache for the show and he looked creepy. Or at least creepy up close. From a distance you couldn't really tell he had one. They played great---it was actually the first time I'd ever seen them, since they don't play too much these days.

I joined them for their last song, a cover of "Throwing Things". Immediately after that Fantods played. Kelley not only doing double duty but back to back double duty. I think he was pretty wiped out at the end of it all! But we really pulled it off...I did do the P&W but I didn't unplug anything. Not even one time! I know the fans like to see the Disconnection Notice, but at this show I was happy to disappoint them. (Seriously, how low are my expectations for myself that *not* disconnecting my guitar is cause for joy?!?!?)

We had no set list this time, but it was actually pretty cool not having one. There are like 3-4 people in the world who know our songs and I think they were all there. So they picked out songs and we'd play them. How neat! At the end we played LOVE Song and Happy Whaler and for some reason in Love Song I screwed up all the words. Nice job old man! There's video here. You know, I really thought I was singing well that night, but this video gives the lie to that!

After us were the mighty METROPLEX. They were fabulous---loud, shouty, catchy, energetic. And also old. And after that were our pals GHOSTS IN THE VALLEY. They too were loud, shouty, catchy and energetic! And old! LOVE IT! They did a cover of "Wicked Game" which was totally totally weird and rad.

One thing I should point out about the show was that all the bands were loud, but the only band that got complaints from the neighbors was the Fantods. I guess not everyone appreciates my low-quality "Sonic Youth if Sonic Youth weren't any good" squealy feedback guitar parts! WHY NOT!?!?!?!

And then on Monday my other band, ANIMALS AND INSECTS played at the Tritone. It was a sort of weird show in that we played after these two older gents played the blues. (Rock music is forever, but the blues are eternal!) And that was it. The blues dudes and us. And we were told to not play too loudly. Which is fine, but A+I is a rock band so it seemed a little weird to not be super loud. I play bass in this band, which is fun and way less pressure than singing/guitaring. There are also fewer things to unplug. We did a Weezer cover! Yay!