Some days are like drugs and some drugs are like days. There's a point where you're not sure how much, or how long, it's been. You want more, you know it's best to stop, but more could be good....but maybe it's time to stop...you get the idea.
That was Wednesday night.
Monday we had played a show at the Satellite In Silverlake and, maybe for the first time, felt that “tour-tingle”, the thing that happens when bands play together a lot and you start rising above mere execution, the simple playing of notes, when you start going with something else... listening, weaving, finding it until finally a glimmer of magic appears, (over)tones that shouldn't really be there start swirling overhead, like a ghost in a polaroid picture. It's a good feeling.
Strangely, I'd been having similar thoughts recently, ranging from mild irritation to what you could call anti-digital revenge fantasies. Basically, imagine the last scene in fight club, but with melting handheld devices and computers blowing up in place of houses. I'd write a soundtrack to that!
By the end of the night we were plotting some kind of an “Analog Backlash”. Or maybe that's a misnomer, it was more a “Manifesto on how to live in a digital revolution without swamping the planet with useless information and bad art.” Analog Backlash just sounds so much more catchy.
Next morning (alright, noon) I was picked up by Jason O to go up to SF to see Pulp. We had a good , uneventful ride and got there just in time for sunset beverages at our lovely host Aero's flat, an absolutely gorgeous piece of vintage San Francisco architecture equipped with a roof terrace and what can only be described as the punk rock version of a winter garden. All with amazing city views and the warmest hospitality.
It was there that it happened, again. Our hostess, 20-something, whip-smart, funny and a thoroughly modern human being, was giving the digital lifestyle a good going-over, before launching into a beautiful rant about her love of vinyl and hand-written letters: “Something has to happen, we can't live our lives like this, staring at screens”. So there it was again Things were getting interesting, but too soon we had to leave to make our show.
Pulp rocked, thrusted, sang about shagging, thrusted some more, then rocked some more. All in all an amazing performance. Well, apart from the bits I watched through the person in front's phone-in my face.
20 minutes after the last tune rang out, Jason O and I found ourselves on a late-night cigarette hunt. From having been on the road together a lot, we have a little bit of pride about finding things like food, smokes or our hotel room without any outside help, even if we happen to be a long way from home. And so we did.
After all that walking, though, we felt quite thirsty... and still had a bit of a way to go back to meet back up with our host. Mouths were getting dry, moods dampened...and that's when it appeared. A perfectly fine can of lager! Under a street light, on a corner, by itself, no-one in sight. We looked around. First for rightful owners, then for cameras, then for ghosts, then Ashton Kutcher...this was just too good. And no, no one was around, just us and “The Jesus-Beer”, as we now call it. “Ah probably warm and old”, one of us said. Jason went to touch it, pick it up, only to find the can ice-cold. I mean perspiring-ice-cold. Where could it have come from? What's the story here, what's the deal?
The deal is at some point you stop asking questions and drink. And that's what we did. Delicious, ice-cold Jesus-beer, tiding us over all the way back to that amazing rooftop, where the night went on the way it wanted to go... but that part stays in the punk rock winter garden.
Some days are like drugs, folks.... stay tuned for more news on upcoming shows, video and quite possibly more about the Analog Backlash.
Sincerely
Flying Dutchman
Sincerely
Flying Dutchman
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