Adventures Update: The Mountain Goats

I have this habit of foreshadowing my own actions more than seems statistically likely. Admittedly, everyone probably does this and I'm just the only one who has a record of it because I write everything down in a borderline obsessive compulsive manner. Although I must say that picking up amusing patterns in my own life is sort of the aim of the whole endeavour, so I'm quite enjoying it.

Last night, after writing that entry about being an indie wanker, I went to see the Mountain Goats. Vegatrain and I were quite excited about it because, obviously, we're music nerds and are obligated to get excited about John Darnielle.

Sadly, going to gigs is a bit of an ordeal for me these days. I have this awful affliction where I love indie music but I hate all the wankers who are at gigs for the wrong reasons. If you're wondering, the wrong reasons include: to look 'hip', to pick up indie girls, to get drunk and draw attention to themselves to the detriment of everyone who has paid to see a band that probably doesn't often come to Australia, and so on. The 'Mumford and Sons' crowd, as I call them*. It's very conflicting for me, because those people are at every gig I ever go to and it drives me bonkers when I just want to watch a band that I really like. One particular thing that annoys me more than it should is hipsters who spend hours perfecting an outfit that they think makes them look 'creative'.

Here is my message to hipsters everywhere: STOP TRYING SO HARD. I have been friends with a lot of actually creative people and the thing is, they will never spend that long making themselves look cool for a gig. They're too busy writing stories and playing instruments, thinking they should probably start getting ready but getting distracted by an idea before throwing on some clothes at the last minute and running to catch the bus. And while I'm on the subject, there is a major difference between finding something a bit funky in an op-shop and making it work and spending half an hour flipping through over-priced cardigans at American Apparel until you find one that makes you look 'indie' but still shows off a bit of boob.

I get way too annoyed by douchebags at gigs. To the point where it's a problem. I have punched jerky guys at both Splendour in the Grass and St Jerome's Laneway Festival, simply because they were clearly ruining the experience for everyone within a five metre radius of them by being drunk during the opening act, climbing on each other's shoulders, pushing people over who were significantly smaller than them and yelling over the music. At a punk gig that would be fine, but when it's the xx or something it really doesn't fly with me. And while I never want to hurt people, if you're as poor as I am and have spent the last fifty dollars in your bank account to see a band you've loved for years and some total fuckknuckle goes out of the way to make the experience unpleasant, it gets a bit frustrating. I now have to actively remove myself from these situations, just because I don't want to get a reputation for being the 5'1" girl who goes around indie gigs punching douchebags. Except for the small part of me that totally wants that reputation. I could call myself 'Buffy the Hipster Slayer'. But I won't, no more punching. No more.

ANYWAY.

Vegatrain and I missed the bus and we were running late to see the Mountain Goats. I had just written that thing about being doomed to be an indie wanker for all time. We called a cab and jumped in the back. The driver was listening to a local commercial station but because I haven't listened to the radio in such a long time, I sort of forgot how commercial radio announcers operate. The guy was doing his back announcement/promo spot, talking over the intro to some awful dance song. But the thing is, because I listen to a lot of ridiculous music on the internet, I automatically assumed that this was a remix that someone had made of a local DJ making announcements. What's worse is that I wasn't even surprised.

And it gets better. We got out of the cab and were hurrying to the show. As I've mentioned, we were running late and really didn't want to miss any of it. I ran up to the gate, but there was a car driving up onto the path that stopped in front of me. I turned around, slightly annoyed that I was clearly going to have to wait for this car to be let through and thus be even later to the gig. But then, I looked into the window and it's John Darnielle at the wheel with the rest of the band in the passenger's seats. And they were all laughing at me because I really obviously recognised them straight away and was literally caught in the headlights for a moment. Vegatrain and I moved to the side, pretending that we didn't want to go inside yet anyway and just started giggling hysterically like teenage girls at a Miley Cyrus concert.

And sure, they were driving quite slowly and didn't even come close to hitting me but there's a very small part of me that wished they had. As you know, I've suffered more than my share of ridiculous injuries and am still recovering from the latest one. I suffer from a brutal combination of being both a total klutz and a massive hypochondriac, meaning that I actually considered making a list of all the things I wanted checked out before my last doctor's appointment, just so I didn't forget anything. But if the Mountain Goats hit me with their car, that would just be my favourite injury for the rest of my life. You can't top that.

-Smackie Onassis

*Seriously, don't ever mention Mumford and Sons to me if you have anywhere to be in the next half hour. In brief, I think they are a mediocre band who have taken all the groundwork done by significantly more talented and original bands, released a commercial tune that they've labelled as 'indie folk' and convinced every douchebag in the world that they are the pinnacle of folk music. If they weren't so successful it wouldn't bother me, but for the fact that there are so many other folk bands out there who are so much more original and talented who get none of the acclaim and attention and financial rewards that Blandford & Sons get. And I go on like this for about thirty minutes. But the best comeback I've heard to that was from a guy who I went to high school with who responded by saying:

"Sure Sarah, but unlike most modern folk bands, they're successful."

Shot through the heart, and I have only myself to blame.

On Being An Indie Wanker

I'm going to put it out there: I talk about music a lot. I can't help it, it's a subject that really interests me. I also know a preposterous amount about it, which helps. Unfortunately for everyone I talk to, I don't own a radio or generally pay attention to the outside world (much) so the only music I listen to is stuff I've found on the internet. And that's okay, the internet is an acceptable tool to use for that nowadays, there's a lot of great music out there that most people otherwise wouldn't be hearing. And hey, they play some of it on the radio too. But I'm a bit adventurous and experimental in everything I do and, ok, admittedly, sometimes I look up bands because I like their names (I still maintain - Someone Still Loves You, Boris Yeltsin are actually a good band). As a result, I've become so obscure that people now haven't even heard of the genres of the bands I listen to. On a personal level, I'm okay with that. I really enjoy the music I listen to. But sadly, if you start talking about a new Swedish folktronica band (seriously though), people will almost definitely think you are a wanker.

To be fair, I'm not denying that I'm an indie music wanker. But I have a little story that I think you should know before you judge me too harshly.

When I was a kid, my parents won a lot of raffles. They were just those awful, lucky people who win everything they enter on a whim. I can remember them winning a 'Mystery Flight' which turned out to be to Perth (gee whiz guys, why'd you make that one a mystery?), and a chocolate bunny one easter that was as tall as I was. There was also a movie/soundtrack pack that they'd won at the local Video Ezy - Baz Luhrmann's Romeo + Juliet. My parents sort of put it aside and forgot about it. Then one day, maybe a year or so later, I was looking through their cd collection and picked up that soundtrack. I started listening to it and well, I really liked it. It got put on my regular rotation. But then our house got broken into and they stole a bunch of cds, including that one. Or so they thought. The cd was still in the player because I listened to it a lot, they'd just taken the case. Take that, crime!

I kept listening to that compilation, liking it more and more. I was just a kid and the only other music I knew was whatever was being played on the radio. Nothing else I'd heard was really like it. But because I didn't have the case and google wasn't really a thing yet, I grew up not knowing who performed some of my favourite songs.

I looked up that track-listing today. Of the songs that I can remember being my favourites, there was a Swedish alt-rock act who list the Pixies and the Go-Betweens as influences, an experimental dream-pop singer who was also Swedish and, of course, Radiohead. And not even Creep or Karma Police, it was an obscure b-side. Smackie Onassis, age 10, indie wanker.

I'm not sure how to feel about this. On the one hand, this confirms that I always have been and always will be a total indie music nerd. On the other hand, this also confirms that it's not because of society, I am actually just like this. And there's probably nothing any of us can do about it.

Look forward to many more years of obscure mix tapes, my friends.

-Smackie Onassis

Seeing People Play Music Is Fun To Do

When I heard the Pixies were coming to Australia, I flipped out a little bit. I read the details of the tour, getting more and more excited. They were not only coming to a place where I would get to see them play but they were going to play all of Doolittle, in order. 

"Holy shit," I thought, "Doolittle is not only my favourite album, but the one with the most personal significance to me. It's like this tour was custom designed to suit my Pixies needs!"

But then I logged onto the internet and saw every indie kid I knew saying that exact thing. Doolittle was EVERYONE'S favourite album. It is a joke I've heard a few times from Pixies fans that the band could release a new Best Of and it would just be Doolittle with a different cover.

When I arrived at the venue, I realised that it wasn't just the indie kids who were excited about this. While waiting for the doors to open, I cast my eye over the crowd. I can honestly say that I have never seen a more diverse group of people all so excited for the same band. People of all ages, representing every musical and societal subculture you can name bumped shoulders trying to get to the merch stand.

Sometimes when you go to a really important gig, there are a few people there that you wish had stayed home. I remember when I saw Belle & Sebastian, it was a huge deal for me. In the years I'd been listening to them they'd never once come to Australia. Then in 2006, they finally came to promote the Life Pursuit. The nearest show to me was in Sydney and I even had to leave a university exam early to catch the last train that would get me there in time. Luckily it was a multiple choice linguistics exam which involved having to correct the grammatical errors in set sentences. I was done in about fifteen minutes.

I was ridiculously excited. We had standing tickets and ended up staking out a spot about a metre from the stage. It was amazing, being so close to this band who had been so influential on my music tastes. The only problem was this group of awful girls. There is a type of person who goes to gigs with the strange need to make themselves the centre of attention. It's a level of narcissism that gives me no end of the shits, especially when it's a band I've loved for that long. Everyone else has paid to see the band, not you being a tool. But these girls. They got Stuart Murdoch's attention between songs and cried out that they wanted to come up on stage. He laughed it off at first, but they persisted. Murdoch has quite a good sense of humour so he giggled and told them they could come up for a song if they wanted, but they had to act it out. They squealed and pulled themselves up in front of the crowd. Asking to get onstage with one of your idols is one thing, I can understand the appeal of that. The problem is that these girls had clearly only listened to the most recent album and jumped on the bandwagon. And it's fine if you want to go to a gig in that situation, I just don't understand why this type feels the insatiable need to draw attention to themselves. You see them all the time, trying for some reason to act like they are the number one loyal fan, screaming when the one song they know the words to comes on. If people seeing you enjoy the band is more important to you than actually enjoying the band, kindly stay home next time. It's obnoxious. 

When the girls were on stage, Murdoch made a joke.

"What would you do if I started playing the Chalet Lines or something?" he said with a smirk. The crowd burst out laughing, knowing that this particular song opens with the line 'He raped me in the Chalet Lines' and continues along that vein. But the girls on stage? Blank looks.

Ok, I thought. That's fine. Fold Your Hands Child, You Walk Like A Peasant was in no way their most popular album, I could see how that reference could slip through. But then the band started playing Judy and the Dream of Horses. If you are a Belle & Sebastian fan, you know that song. It was from one of their most critically acclaimed, influential early albums and it's a beautiful song. The crowd went wild to hear it but the girls on stage who were supposed to be acting it out had obviously never heard it in their life. They didn't have a clue what was going on and Stuart Murdoch was loving it. He played it slower, repeating lines when he wanted to see them struggle to act them out and laughing to himself when the girls made strange horsey gestures, having no clue what the song was about.

Admittedly, it was pretty funny and Murdoch approached the situation in the best way possible. But more than that, it was annoying. This was a band I had been waiting with baited breath to see for a long time, and these jerks had picked up one album and decided that they needed to go to the gig of the band that very rarely comes to Australia and make it all about themselves. 

Luckily, there was none of that at the Pixies. It was something that was really noticeable about the crowd - this gig was extremely meaningful for every single person in attendance. There was no-one I could see that was there for any reason that couldn't be expressed by the phrase 'It's the motherfriggin Pixies'.

And it really was amazing. They opened by playing a bunch of b-sides, silhouetted in fog. I was in the seats up the top (not brave enough to face being crushed in the standing room) and it was a strange and wonderful thing to see unfold. When the band came on stage, a sea of phone screens appeared in the crowd. People were taking photos, filming bits of songs and then putting their devices away. But for the duration of the gig, as soon as one turned off, one on the other side of the crowd would turn on. The effect was a sea of dancing, intermittent lights appearing randomly throughout the crowd. I liked it. 

The crowd lapped up every moment, but it was when the first few chords of Debaser started playing that people started seriously losing their shit. They played through the album as if they'd never spent any time apart. The songs still had the quality of the recorded versions but the live performance added a whole new element of raw sound. Even though it's not my favourite song on the album, Tame was a huge highlight for me simply because of the way it sounded being shouted across the Thebarton Theatre by Frank Black, whose voice has gotten more intense if anything.

I'm not going to describe every song in detail. All you really need to know is that it was good enough to procure two separate standing ovations. Before the second encore, it seemed like something went wrong. There was a unusually long gap in the music while the stage was invisible through the intense amount of fog that they'd used. It could well have been that there was too much fog and no-one could see anything, because they played the last few songs with the house lights on. This meant that for their closing song (Where Is My Mind, as if it was ever going to be anything else), I had the strange experience of being able to see the faces of every other member of the crowd. People were closing their eyes, swaying to themselves. People were dancing madly in the aisles, not giving a fuck what anyone else thought of them. People were grabbing each other, staring at the stage in awe.

That was when I realised that this was a defining moment in the lives of every single person here. A once in a lifetime experience, seeing the Pixies playing what was probably their favourite album, one they assumed they would never get to see performed. Every one of these people was from a dramatically different background to the person next to them, but they were all experiencing the exact same thing.

This did lead me to start thinking about how the music of the Pixies could create universal harmony a la the Wyld Stallions in Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure, but that's not something I need to go into. You must admit though that if one band were going to do that, it would be the Pixies, right?

-Smackie Onassis

Why I Can No Longer Listen To Love Shack

People are always surprised when I tell them I can't listen to 'Love Shack' by the B-52's. They'll spit back at me that I should like it, that they would have expected better from me. I always find myself explaining that it's not that I don't like the song. It's a good song. It's just that I physically can't bear to listen to it, due to an unfortunate case of extreme overexposure.

It was a birthday party, not so dissimilar to every other birthday party I went to in high school. All you really needed was a backyard, a barbeque and a few beers handy. If only the hosts of this particular party had kept to that tried and tested formula, I would have no need to write this explanation. But somewhere in the planning stages of this particular event, someone had uttered the immortal words:

"Hey! Why don't we hire a jukebox?"

Apparently everybody else thought this was just a top notch idea. As a result the party's soundtrack would be chosen for the people, by the people. It was all very democratic. Unfortunately, it is a scientifically proven fact that democracy doesn't work if "the people" consists entirely of drunk sixteen year olds.

It was still daylight when the juke was turned on. Those of us who were unfashionably early started tapping our feet to the B-52's most popular jukebox hit, Love Shack. I joined in. I probably even sang along. As I said, it's a good song and at that point I had no particular problem with it.

Then the second song came on. Again, we tapped our feet to Love Shack. After all, hearing the same song twice can be a good thing. Just ask Sublime or the Reel Big Fish*. But the third song was also Love Shack. And the fourth. And the fifth. I was starting to see a pattern and I didn't like the results it forecast.

Apparently some class clown thought this was pretty funny. That, or one of my friends really honestly likes that song to the point where it could be classified as a mental disorder. The song played over and over, more or less constantly for the entire duration of the party. Just thinking about it sends a small shiver down my spine.

I can remember the relief I felt when the jukebox was finally turned off for everybody to sing Happy Birthday. It washed over me like a hot shower. Or a shot of heroin. The song had stopped AND there was cake. Admittedly I've never done heroin and can't say for sure, but I imagine that's basically what it's like.

But then, out of the blissful silence came a sound I would have been happy to never hear again.

"If you see a faded sign at the side of the road that says 15 miles to the looooooove shack!"

The last thing I remember is the anguished cry that escaped from my mouth. I'm not saying that I went briefly insane and murdered everyone within a 10km radius. I'm just saying that I don't think a jury could have found me guilty if I had.

Admittedly, people I went to school with will tell you that I had a jukebox at my own 18th. But that was actually hired against my will, by my parents. Considering that I had already made a lengthy playlist for the party on the family computer, I'm guessing they realised that I was planning on playing music that no-one other than myself and a scattered few of my music nerd friends would enjoy and intervened accordingly. I was a bit disappointed, but the party was probably better for the easily recognisable pop hits.

Love Shack, however, was banned.

-Smackie Onassis

*For the few people who will get this reference, it is worth it.

The Neglected Sister Blog of Thinly Veiled Threats

On my walk today, I listened to one of my favourite Canadian indie-rock outfits, Mother Mother. I really like this band, you guys. They only have two albums out at the moment, but I have listened to both of them way too much. I came home with the need to tell the world about how seriously great they are. I was going to do a post in here, but then I remembered the much neglected music blog that Vegatrain and I started together a while back. There is not much on it as yet, but it does now contain my lengthy rant about how much I love Mother Mother.

Hopefully I will be adding to it a bit more often. I have been feeling a bit useless recently and writing helps. Especially when I get to rant on about music, which I do most of the time anyway.

A New Cult

Check it. Also: yes, the name of the blog is a Belle and Sebastian reference.

-Smackie Onassis

An Ode To The Newcastle Regional Library

People are always talking about what they would do if they became really, really wealthy. Houses, holidays and hookers are usually the favourites ('The Three H's'), but there is something a bit different that I have always thought I would do. If I ever got even slightly wealthy, I would make as big a donation to the Newcastle Regional Library as I could afford. I would also like to live in a house where the walls are made of aquariums but that's a whole other kettle of fish, or house of fish as the case may be.

"Why a library?" you might ask, "There are so many worthy causes out there, what makes you think that is the best place for your dollars?"

Here's the thing. The Newcastle Regional Library was one of my favourite places in the entire world when I was growing up. This was mainly because of the music section. Most libraries these days have a cd section of some description, but it is usually limited to Vivaldi and Delta Goodrem. The music section at this library was like nothing I'd ever seen before. It was updated on a monthly basis and contained music I had trouble finding anywhere else. This was before the time of internet torrents, so it really was that amazing.

I am not exaggerating when I say that the cd section at this library changed my life. Borrowing these cds was the first I had heard of music that wasn't just played on the radio. I can remember picking up a little album called 'If You're Feeling Sinister' by a little band by the name of Belle & Sebastian. It blew me away. I didn't know music could be so... good. I went on to feverishly get my hands on everything they had ever recorded. The night I finally ended up seeing them live was just one of the best nights of my life.

From there I picked up Darren Hanlon's 'Little Chills' and my mind was blown again. I remember taking it to school in my little discman. My friends got so mad at me because I spent the better part of a week not talking to them in favour of sitting by myself, listening to it over and over again. Seriously, the things I would do to Darren Hanlon. I can't even go into them without feeling filthy and disrespectful, but let's just say: it would take several days before I would be finished.

Other bands I heard for the first time because I picked up their cd at the Newcastle Regional Library include: Beck, The Pixies, Augie March (years before Moo You Bloody Choir brought them to the mainstream. I'm talking Sunset Studies here. Man, I am going to listen to that right now), The Bees, Bright Eyes, Broken Social Scene, The Fiery Furnaces, Built to Spill, Camera Obscura... the list goes on. Let's just say: all my favourite bands.

The Newcastle Regional Library was the single biggest influence on my musical tastes. It taught me not only that there were excellent bands out there, but because there was such a vast supply of material it taught me how to form my own opinions on music, how to decide what kind of things I liked. Every time I considered moving away from Newcastle, I had to seriously evaluate whether I could move away from the library. It was that good. I honestly don't understand how such an oasis of musical culture could exist. If I didn't still have all those burnt cds, I might think it had all been a mirage.

Of course, I eventually did move away. I can honestly say that the library is probably the thing that I miss most about Newcastle. I mean, there is the internet now, but it's just not the same. Don't get me wrong, I love the internet, but nothing can compare to seeing the shelves upon shelves of such wonderful albums all free for the borrowing.

-Smackie Onassis

Adventures Update: Apocalypse Party

I probably wouldn't have gone to Apocalypse Party if it hadn't sounded like such a uniquely awesome idea. Originally, it was planned to simulate a drill for any kind of impending apocalypse. These guys who had some property out in the country decided to invite a bunch of people to kick back in the wilderness for a weekend, eat tinned food and sleep in cars, pretending the world as we know it had come to an end. The plan was also to crank a stereo, drink and pretty much just party the whole time.

The location was shrouded in secrecy. The only directions given were some very exact map co-ordinates. Anyone who wanted to come was supposed to enter them into Google Maps and work it out from there. When Buglustre told us she was driving, Vegatrain and I jumped at the chance for a road trip. In our haste, we had both completely forgotten to make elaborately obscure mix cds for the trip, but Buglustre had us covered. The all-ska playlist that resulted reminded me of being on tour back when I was in the band, driving from gig to gig and listening to similar mixes. It was a nice thing to be reminded of.

The drive itself was mostly uneventful, apart from the indignant terror I experienced when I realised the woman in the car next to us was watching a TV in the dashboard of her car WHILE SHE WAS DRIVING. DON'T DO THAT. I hate it so much when people break the road rules, or act in a generally careless manner while driving. Safety first, everyone. Safety first. Buglustre managed to bring me back to the conversation by telling me about her recent experiences mixing vodka with spumante, although that had the unpleasant side-effect of making my liver recoil in terror. Soon enough though, we were bumping around on the dirt road that led to our post-apocalyptic destination.

At first it didn't look like much: a group of people standing around, talking and laughing. Like every other party, only, in the middle of nowhere. Kind of like the parties I went to when I was sixteen, held in a friend's back paddock so we wouldn't get caught underage drinking.

But when I saw the main set-up, I was pretty impressed. In the hollow of a hill was the ruined remains of an old cottage. This is where the party was set up. Old couches, probably collected from the side of the road, were scattered around a fairly impressive stereo system. I'm pretty sure there was an old boat amongst the rubbish. The hosts struggled to string up some lights before it started getting dark. A guy with a camera was eating from a large tin of beans. The view was spectacular. 

The outhouse was pretty authentic, too, although a lot of the girls didn't seem to look at that as a good thing. I first needed to use it at dusk, just when it was starting to become difficult to see (the boys were still struggling with the lights). It was basically an aluminium box. Some girls offered to hold the door shut for me, because apparently that had been a problem so far.

"Wow, just like solitary confinement," I said, to no-one in particular as I stepped inside. The girls laughed awkwardly and then ignored me. Inside, it was pitch black. The only light filtering in was through tiny pin-pricks on the walls, which created little dots that danced on the back of the door. I had to be careful where I stepped, as the heels of my boots kept finding their way into holes in the floor. I quite liked it, really.

Although I didn't know many people there, it seemed to be one of those places where just hearing a one-line conversational snippet was enough.

"It's too cold for an orgy, everything would shrink"

"Hey, did you hear? I parted the red sea."

There was this outgoing goth girl there, who seemed to take a real liking to me. I was introducing myself to the group by teaching them some dances that I (or friends of mine) have created over the years. The 'These Are My Feet' dance (consisting mainly of gesturing wildly to your feet in time to the music) was the true winner of the night, although I felt that the 'Psychology Cat' didn't get the recognition it deserved. I soon found myself relying on a dance I termed the 'Existential Crisis', which consisted of me bobbing awkwardly along to the music, feeling self-conscious and contemplating my own existence. I moved off the dance-floor and found myself talking to people.

Me: You know, this reminds me a lot of 'Tomorrow, When The War Began'.

Goth Girl: What?

Me: You know, the books?

Goth Girl: I don't read.

Me: Oh.

Goth Girl: Except for necrophiliac porn.

Me: Oh.

I enjoyed the time I spent there, but for me, the party was over when they started playing Mumford and Sons. I hate Mumford and Sons. I hate them. It is not that they are a bad band, they are okay. But because folk is one of my favourite genres, I have listened to enough bands to know that they are well, kind of bland and unoriginal. It wouldn't bother me so much, except that somehow everyone seems to think they are these amazing indie-folk superstars, pioneers in music, Triple J Hottest 100 Number One!

They aren't. Seriously. For anyone who thinks Mumford and Sons are in anyway an original or interesting band, listen to Local Natives. Listen to Noah and the Whale. Listen to Andrew Bird. Listen to The Middle East, who were playing alongside Blandford and Sons at Laneway this year and got not even a tiny percentage of the recognition that they got. That's what annoys me. It's the fact that there are these amazing bands slogging it out for peanuts, and then someone releases a commercial tune labelled as 'indie-folk' and everyone thinks its revolutionary. It's not.

Anyway, back at the party. At one point the stereo was turned off for a haphazard band to start playing. I was hopeful, but then quickly disappointed. I guess they didn't really think they needed to rehearse together beforehand, then when they got there realised that they didn't know what they were doing and packed up after about three songs. I guess in a post-apocalyptic wasteland, you're not exactly spoilt for musical choice.

When the band packed up, a lone saxophonist took their place, and just started jamming. He was really good, but by this stage I had well and truly recoiled into my cocoon of introversion, and hearing a saxophone just made me miss the instruments my parents still have yet to send over. This is the longest I have ever gone without playing music regularly, and I am craving it so badly. Just one hit from a nice piano, please. One sax riff, I'm desperate. I'd settle for a glockenspiel at this stage.

Feeling totally old and boring, I ended up napping in Buglustre's car for awhile until she was ready to go. I did have a good time, and I'm glad I went, but I guess I'm a bit too fond of pre-apocalyptic comforts to make a habit of such adventures.

-Smackie Onassis