That’s right! There’s my damn food premise! One of the most awesome rocking bands to ever get within swinging distance of
Oderus Urungus' flapping cuttlefish of Cthulu! That’s right
Green Jello! Fuck you Kraft fucking Corporation and your stupidly sad, yet successful, lawsuit against the band. No matter what you make them put on their albums, we’ll always know who is hard when they know that, counter to Strunk and White’s Elements of Style, you pronounce an umlaut over a “y” with an “o” sound, because it’s fucking metal!!
So shit, there I was. Lost and alone in the Starline Bar and Grill. Well, technically, I was neither. I was bookended by the infamous
Scurvy and the jizz rocket known to the unlucky as
Chuck Leonard. Seriously, this guy comes by the gallon. But nevermind the volume capacity of his vas deferens. While I’m politely attempting to avoid the booze devil who is ever chanting on my shoulder to drain any given bar which has the mistaken happenstance of hoving into my view, the Phyllis Diller of punk rock happened to toddle in with her rocking Pabst blue ribbons and brings to my attention that the infamous Green Jello was prepping to go onstage next door at virtually any moment.
Here’s the fucker of it all. I had the chance to see
Wesley Willis before he died brillaint, fat, black and schizophrenic and totally blew it off and have always regretted it. Yet I was somehow lucky enough to see Brad and the Sublime before he O.D.’d and I mostly hate ska. Back on the plus I got to see Joey with The Ramones before he took the dirt-nap as well. So as I wrestle with the inevitability of my needs to see a band that learned their SFX chops from the greatest fucking band in the goddamn galaxy…we get to make the call home. “Yes honey, love you honey. No…don’t really need that ride. I think I’m going to check out the Green Jello concert so I don’t kill myself after the obvious eventuality that they’ll drive screaming off of a cliff just to spite me, because they’re 20 feet from me and if I miss this show, I’m just a freaking poser.” And bless her for being the best human being with tits on the planet. “Sure babe, be safe, have fun!” Who could not love her?
Well you fuckers better not! But I sure as hell do. Because not 10 minutes after I pay the bouncer my cash and grab a tall Red Stripe, Bill Manspeaker, the tower of vocal power is asking for volunteers from the crowd! Holy shit! Do we get fed to Shitman or something? But no matter how I howl and spill my beer, he’s locked in on a 15 degree wedge of the crowd that is filled with screaming tits. Can’t hate. Just gotta drink more beer to make my beard-tits more alluring to the talent. But wait! What’s this? He needs two more! And so I bellow my loudest “You can fuck me after the show and I won’t sue!” shout; and what do you know? I get the nod!
So off into the back of the Starline I trudge and find myself back into the parking lot. A sweetie tells us to grab a mask, suit up and when asked to, kneel before THE COW GOD! HOLY SHIT! I’M GONNA GET TO WORSHIP THE COW GOD?!? ON STAGE!?! This is it! I’m done! All I have ever hoped and dreamed for is now in my lap! I’m in a stinky and moistly stored latex mask of Gee Dubyah, that I have mashed my cowboy hat down over and am three quarters blind in, as I stumble onto the stage and do my sexy ape dance for Manspeaker in my best parody of a properly underfed and oversexed GWAR slave, while he parades around in his bovine Technicolor savior costume and wails out my third favorite song in their repertoire (Obey the Cow God for you who have yet to be saved. Shitman and The Bear Song just barely edging it out).
And so there I was. Half suffocaded, blinder than a fucking bat and just buzzed enough to consider this the height of my current, self indulgent, male life. Seriously, being on stage tonight with one of my musical comedy icons was far more awesome and way more braggable than being hella stoned directly in front of one of Fresno’s most respected crime fighters and getting a smile and a shake of the hand (priceless, btw). If you had asked me whether I would have like to burn down all of the credit companies computers a la Fight Club, or gotten to get knocked around by the Cow God as he blindly whipped the Fresnans into what passes for a froth in this town, I’d have told you to fuck Tyler Durden in his stupid multiple personality ass. It’s fucking Jello time!
Here’s the shittiest thing about a band that meets your highest expectations…they play just as good as the fucking album! I dunno how you’re supposed to find magical words to kiss the ass of a band that honestly knows their shit so damn well that they can play it, nigh note-perfect, each time and every time. I only know of 2. Jello and Gwar. Fuck Metallica with their reimagining of their songs, or riffing or whatever it’s called when you have absolute contempt for your own music. These fuckers play it the way you want to hear it and shove it right into your ear hole, take it out half way, diddle it around your ear-rim and then slam that shit home until you’ve lost the knack for math.
So, even though I lost my ability for the numbers learnin, I’ve got to say that Green Jello did a great job of jabbing it into my face, smearing it around and making me like it. And ignoring my overt fandom, they really bring what I love to a rock show. They know why their fans are there and they give it to us as hard as they possibly fucking can. That’s my type of band. Play every show as hard and as fun as you can.
But as they all must do, mostly due to the bastards at the ABC, the show came to a close. But yet the band did wander and rage on. Mike Odd was earfucking the stragglers with his pitch to sell the limited, almost totally unfindable and ultimately unique Green Jello video compilation. And he worked and he tried and he strived. And ole Pook could see a dog in need of a bone, so we played the (unpaid) rube that stepped up for the first copy. Eventually I think Art’s Mom with her Rockin Tits decided to pick up a copy, which made me feel better so I at least halved my odds of getting jumped by fans who drank all of their pocket money during the costumed pit sessions. Which, by the way, Fresno, Tower and the Starline deserve some serious love for an old school style pit without all the dumbshit fucktardidness that drove me out of metal shows during the Pantera era. One love pit fiends! I even got to help up a guy who was in absolutely no danger of being stepped on. He just straight flew out of the pit and onto his ass. That guy, you rule! It was small, but it was mighty and it took me back to the Caddy club circa 92. Bad. Ass.
So after taking my DVD over to Odd for one of the most literal autographs I’ve ever gotten, he mentions that I should run up to Manspeaker since he wasn’t busy and get him to do a cartoon. A fucking cartoon? How fucking awesome is that? Not only did I get quick sketches of all the major characters on the DVD jacket (that I was also so drunk I had to ask one of the bouncers how to put the fucker back into the plastic) but he even threw down the logo on the actual plastic DVD cover and said that if I grew my tits out a little bigger next year I could be their bearded butter dumpster groupie! Oh joy! I finally have a long term goal in life!
That’s all the awesome, but there are a couple good follow-ups. The bartender mentioned to me when I ordered a tall Newcastle that she had just tossed them into the fridge. Pimp move on her part. I opted for a currently cold Red Stripe and waited out the English nectar’s coolings. Bouncers! On top top helping my drunk ass get the jacket back into the DVD cover, the guys were really on top of things and excellently polite. During the run for costuming, I found I couldn’t take my beer because I was going to be in the back parking lot. The rear bouncer let me stash it on the side of the stage as I gleefully ran out to play dress up. And there wasn’t even that much urine or spit in it when I finally got back to it! There was a little bit of herpes on it, but what the hell, country boys are mostly immune to that shit.
What the hell else is there to say after that sort of completely random accomplishment of bizarrely meaningless (to some) goals? If I would have had the spare time to think about what I was doing I probably would have ruined that pair of shorts I was in….which might have made the show more awesome…but hell who has the time to lose control of their sphincters when you get to rock the fuck out on stage with the band and not get a heavy ass bass upside the head before you’re thrown back into a rapidly parting pit? Nobody, that’s who. If you’re ever at a Green Jello show and get to be GWB II on stage and remember to shit yourself, you just send me the Youtube link and you’ll be my super best friend forever!
-Pook
P.S. There was a super pimp couple of humans that perchance were before me to bask in Manspeaker’s glory. So being a pernicious snot, I asked if I could take their pitcher and put it up on the interboobs. And contrary to most of my forays in speaking to people and asking to involve them in my typey madness, they most happily agreed! And so I give you, Manspeaker and humans, a study in band love:
(Eat your heart out Joey O!)
No comments:
Post a Comment