Show Journal 1998-08-29
After being awakened by a biker guy who’s presence is so disturbing I can’t even write about it we got moving and headed to California. The place we were playing that night was about 2 hours west of San Francisco but we really wanted to see S.F., so bit the bullet and drove the extra miles. We got there mid afternoon and played tourist for as long as we could. We saw Alcatraz, the Golden Gate Bridge, Fisherman’s Wharf and even Lombard Street (no – the van would not fit on it!) and then bolted for Merced. We ended up getting there really late. There were 3 other bands playing that night and since we arrived last we had to play last. Usually that sucks, but the good news is that about 15-20 people stuck around and seemed to have fun, even at 1 in the morning. The bad news is that $5 really doesn’t help out the gas tank too much when you are 14 hours from home. That night we slept in the van outside of Yosemite Park with plans of touring the park in the morning before driving home. It was really hot in the van and 3 hours of sleep just didn’t cut it. We awoke at the crack of dawn, bathed in some campground sinks and then crusied around the park for a few hours. Yosemite is beautiful. Everything there is so big, the mountains, the redwoods, etc. We wanted to stay all day but we had to get back to Portland. All in all it was a good trip, but 1800 miles is probably a bit much to cram into one weekend.
Show Journal 1998-08-28
Tonight’s show went really well. Daddy O’s is a rad club and John is a great guy to work with. People who see shows in Ashland are very nice, especially the ones who let us sleep on their floor (Kyle and Jason). We were each offered a chance to sleep on “the ghetto couch” but with a name and reputation like that we all opted for the floor.
Show Journal 1998-08-08
Before I get into this I want to say that all of the wrestlers we met tonight and all of the wrestling managers were very cool and very friendly. They are the only ones who made this evening remotely tolerable. Ok now that that is out of the way here’s what I want you to do … think of an obscene word … preferably a verb. Keep thinking of that word … now insert it into the following sentence … ____ Portland Pro Wrestling. Hopefully your word started with ‘F’ and was four letters. Mine did. So here’s the deal, we were supposed to play at this wrestling match to try to get wrestling to appeal to a younger crowd. Wrestling and loud music .. seems natural to me. I tell you they have got a long way to go. The first four people in there had walkers. Over time, the place kept filling up with gray haired old women and little kids. However we were actually expecting this, so we were smart and had set up in the far corner of this huge gymnasium (as far away as possible) and sound checked everything at half volume. We were informed that half volume might be too loud so we turned it down to 1/3 volume. So here we are set to 1/3 volume and tucked away in the corner of this gym. However it just wasn’t good enough for the fine fans of Portland Pro Wrestling. After the place fills up we start to play. About 30 seconds into we realized that everyone (particularly the old people) hated it. Hate isn’t a strong enough word … loathed it would be more appropriate. This should symbolize it all … within two minutes, we saw an elderly woman holding her ears and being rushed from the gym in her wheelchair by another old woman who was trying to cover her ears as well. It was awful. Little kids and grandparents sat in utter and complete misery as we played our songs. The smart ones got up and left. The other just sat and complained out loud. I felt like the biggest idiot … playing for an empty wrestling ring, a bunch of empty seats and some kid with down’s syndrome who insisted on air guitaring along with me. (Don’t get me wrong, he was a pretty nice guy, but you need to appreciate the utter crappiness of this scene). So, we trudged through 4 songs and were told to quit. Not asked … told. So a 15 minute set kinda sucked, but it was no big deal … because we were still set to play one song in between each wrestling match, which would make it 5 more songs plus the intermission. So the first match ends and we start playing “still the same” right on cue. About 90 seconds into it the owner comes over and gives us the signal to quit. Totally cut off … mid song … I think even mid vocals. They promptly started the next match. So Dave walks up to the owner to find out what was up. He tells us to go ahead and pack up and then leave. We drove all the way up there with our entire PA, set the whole thing up and didn’t even get to play 5 songs. Dave tells the guy what to do with his attitude and job. I didn’t get a chance to say anything at the time so here it is … on behalf of 800 Octane … fuck the marshall center, fuck the owner of portland pro wrestling, fuck the promoter of portland pro wrestling, fuck all of the management of portland pro wrestling, fuck the fans of portland pro wrestling, fuck anyone associated with portland pro wrestling and most of all fuck that old goat in the wheelchair covering her ears who couldn’t get out before the rock hit her upside the head. Octane 3:16 mother fuckers!
Show Journal 1998-08-01
Our first Saturday night show at EJ’s and its with Black Jack. You just can’t do much better than that in Portland unless you are opening for a major national band. I was expecting such a killer show. So guess what happens … the sound guy doesn’t bother to show up. None of the other sounds guys were avaialble either. So to make a long story short, Dave and I end up running the sound for all of the bands, including us. How did we end up doing this? We were the only ones who could find the power switch. Needless to say I was a little disappointed with this evening. Thank god so many people showed up or I would have jumped out the window. Amazingly, our show went pretty well. People are actually learning the words to our songs, which is cool because I still don’t know them all. In fact I don’t think Dave does either. Unfortunately, I missed Black Jack’s set, but Dave’s quote was “oh my god dude they are awesome.” That should tell you something about them. This evening’s highlight was when the sound guy finally showed up at 1:00 and had to re-wire and re-mic everything we had set up.
Show Journal 1998-07-25
Talk about hot, holy cow Richland, WA is hot. 103 degrees when we arrived. Still over 90 when we left at night. The Uptown Tavern is located in a small strip mall of bars with live music. Its also conveniently located on the town’s main cruising strip. Every redneck and jock in tri-cities seemed to visit this area at one time or another this evening. Whether entering the clubs or simply driving by making the token redneck “woo” sound at girls they all seemed to make an appearance. Needless to say we were not in our normal element. The booking guy Dustin and the Burning Cindy’s were the thing that kept us sane in this club. The show was … uhmm … interesting. It was one of the first time I’ve really felt like a “bar band” … and I don’t mean that as a good thing. Let me explain. Two doors down at the next bar there was a cover band of 40 something’s playing the current spectrum of “alternative hits.” Whatever they want to play is their business but its annoying to think that we have spent the past 4 years playing and writing these songs and to the average live music fan in this town its probably just as memorable seeing us play our balls off as it is seeing some balding, washed out 40 year old playing a Green Day cover from the radio. (They probably get paid 5 times as much too!) Perhaps I’m over analyzing this, but sometimes it really is frustrating when you play to an audience that is generally apathetic at what you do. There were lots of people and no one really booed us but it just felt awkward playing that show. After the show was the redeeming part of this evening. A couple of people came up and said how they really liked us and that bands like us don’t come through their town real often. Even some of the people that I had pegged as stereotypical “rednecks” seemed to really like what we are doing and were far more receptive than I had though. It was a nice surprise.
Show Journal 1998-07-24
Woohoo … hemp fest. A noble cause that we generally choose to ignore. I really don’t care about the 10,000 uses for hemp that were addressed in between bands. Anyway, we arrived very late and the owner didn’t want to let us play. After arguing with him for a while he kindly (get it … kind?) decided to let us play “for about 20 minutes.” Oh, the generosity. Anyway the guy turned out to be ok after all, but what a pain right up front. This evening’s highlight for us was Big Tooth Comb. Metal. Pure and simple, metal. This was not metal of the new school variety either. This band covered the spectrum of politically sensitive topics from the commercialization of native american culture to the preferred length of certain types of female body hair (don’t ask). Pretty cool … made me feel like it was in 1987 again.
Show Journal 1998-07-17
Rad, rad, rad is all I can say. If you were one of the lucky 200 or so people at Jim and Lyle’s birthday you saw one of the best shows in Portland this year. Best part was that it was free and in a basement! It was a fun party and a great show. Everyone rocked except for the six and a half foot tall cross dresser. I can’t wait until next year.
Show Journal 1998-07-04
So we get to Goose’s House and there are 5 people sitting around with some beer. Some party. After all it is the 4th of July and we were told to expect 100 people. So after about 2 hours of standing around watching some kid blow stuff up with gunpowder we finally took off to another house where more people were at. We get there and it’s like some weird alley way hippie/crusty punk Mecca. Of course they had no idea there was going to be a band, but the crusties thought we looked cool and the hippies were all too intoxicated to complain. So next thing we know we are playing on some dude’s porch to a group of people who didn’t seem to mind slamdancing on a gravel and stone driveway. I’ve never seen so many bloody wounds at a show before (well at least until Bomf! played). Most of the people there were actually pretty nice except for a few notable exceptions, but the annoying ones were the ones who kept ending up meeting the gravel head first. Unfortunately by the time the Bar Feeders played the cops were arriving to shut them down. Bummer for them, they drove from San Francisco and only got in about 10 minutes. Before we went home we did manage to light off a few fireworks. Very unimpressive. This evening’s highlight was the poor guy dressed from head to toe in stars and stripes riding a unicycle who made the mistake of riding by the party. The poor guy he tried so hard to keep his dignity but it was only to be shot down but a group of 15-20 rather vocal individuals who just didn’t care for his style of patriotism.
Show Journal 1998-06-30
Tuesday night at the Satyricon means a low turnout and a dull if not sleepy atmosphere. This evenings highlight was Dave’s frequent mumbling of incoherent if not bizarre sentences between songs. For example “I just got back from Louisiana … it sucks there.” How profound! Its been a few months but we got to play with the Leeches again. Of course I’ve seen them about 500 times since our last show together so it really wasn’t that special. If you see them on the street please offer to buy Paul a new amp. Dangerous Bob is a country/hillbilly/punk band that has very cool equipment. Don’t believe me? When was the last time you saw a bass amp disguised as a metalflake refrigerator with pink shag carpet inside of it? The guitar player’s amp is built into a stove! Try and try we just can’t compete with that and feel terribly inadequate.
Show Journal 1998-05-23
I had never been to Spokane before. I wasn’t sure what to expect and after it was all said and done I’m still not sure what I thought of it. Our Spokane adventure began at Dick’s hamburgers when we were greeted by Spokane’s local resident weirdo (benny?) who insisted on saying hi to all of us, showing us his collection of pennies and telling us about rock and roll and football. Apparently he’s something of a town icon. After collectively ingesting several pounds of burgers we moved on to Ichabod’s and prepared to … as Dave puts it get rid of several pounds of burgers. After clogging the toilet and upsetting the management the show began. We actually met and played with a band called Furburger. We also played with the Felons whom we had actually met last year in Kelso but never played with. We also spent a great deal of time listening as Dave fine tuned his “10 pound theory” at the expense of some poor girl who was dancing up front. As for our set it was probably the most fun we’ve had playing ever. I was jumping around, Dave was jumping around and if Bryan didn’t play drums he would have too. Even Nate busted out some hardcore roadie skills during the show … including the highlight – fixing a fallen cymbal stand in under 15 seconds. So anyway the show went great and as usual Bomf kicked some serious butt (I get tired of writing that, but its always true). After the show some Japanese foreign exchange students took our pictures. What an ego trip. I’ve done the sign an autograph thing, but pose for a picture? Rad. Well, thanks to everyone who came out and a special thanks to Donny for letting us stay at his place.
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