Excerpt from "I Sing When You Shut Up," chapter 3

("I Sing When You Shut Up" was serialized on the "Internet" in 2012 as a sequel to the "Comeback Road" novel. I'm editing it for an eBook release and will drop nuggets as I go. This is from chapter 3.)

I nodded. "So... you're doing good?"

She smiled. "Yeah. How are you?"

I'm drunk and sick in my guts from seeing you, I thought to myself, I've been missing you for two years, taking myself apart and trying to figure out how to put myself back together so that I could be the guy that a girl like you would want to be with, even though I had been the guy you wanted back at the beginning, but then when you got to the bottom of me you found me empty and decided that I wasn't what you wanted after all so I've been trying to fill in that emptiness but the more I try to fill the emptiness the more empty space appears, and I've been trying to figure out who I want to be, always with an eye over my shoulder looking toward an unseen image of you, trying to figure out if any step I take is the one you would want me to take, and it's been driving me crazy and it makes me love you and hate you and want you and resent you because I don't know who I want to be anymore except that I want to be the guy you want. But I couldn't say all that, so I said "I'm fine. I think I'm going to grab another drink."

"Cool," she said. "We'll be here."

So I smiled and backed off, went to the bathroom and then up to the bar. I checked my wallet and realized I didn't have enough money for another beer, so I left the bar and went to the ATM across Spadina and took out another forty bucks. And then, once back in the bar, with another unnecessary beer in my hand, I went to the back and found that the second band was nearly through their set, and that the members of Seam/Fault/Flaw were all gone.

I drank the beer and then another while I waited to see if they would show up again. I was completely wasted, rolling my head around and wishing I could lie down under a table. I decided it would be a good idea to head home while I was still able to walk. The night had been a wreck. A depressing, humiliating wreck, and I felt like a fool. I zipped up my coat and got the hell out of The Horseshoe.

The beer didn't like being sloshed back and forth while I walked, and vomiting was a real possibility. I pissed in an alley, and I started thinking: just make it home and then you can pass out in your warm soft bed. If you have to puke, you can puke in your bathroom. Your nice, clean bathroom.

I almost made it.

There's a tree in front of my four-story building, and I ended up leaning against it, holding myself steady while a stream of beery vomit forced itself out of me and onto the snow-flecked grass. I just remember trying to spread my legs as far as I could to avoid splattering my shoes.

I must have been making a lot of noise, because someone came out onto their second floor balcony and a female voice asked me what I was doing. If I live a thousand years I'll never know why I replied, "Goddammit, I'm a music journalist!"

The Old Material: Late Night Television

(Originally published in the Late at Night short story collection, available at many eBook retailers.)

We got home from the bar late, and while my girlfriend (now my wife) puttered around the apartment getting ready for bed, I flicked on the television to see if there was anything interesting on. There was nothing on the few channels that sometimes had English programming, but I was patient and after a while I found something interesting on a Korean station. There was a broadcast of a Thai kickboxing match. Usually I have no interest in kickboxing, but this time I noticed that one of the combatants was an above-the-elbow amputee.

I refilled my beer glass from the two liter bottle of Korean draft I'd bought at the corner store, and when my girlfriend asked why I wasn’t coming to bed yet I told her what I had found on the tube. She didn’t sound impressed, but for the moment she didn’t pester me further.

The amputee, in blue shorts, had a boxing glove on his stump (is stump the politically correct term?) and a mean looking face. He reminded me of the little guy that hangs out in the bar looking for much bigger men to beat up so he can prove his size isn't holding him back. Napoleon Syndrome, they call that. I don’t know what they call it when amputees want to beat up non-amputees to prove that nothing's holding them back. Maybe they could name the syndrome after this kick-boxer, whatever his name is.

In red shorts, his opponent looked uneasy. He seemed to know he was going to have a rough fight on his hands, and from a certain point of view there would be no way to win. If he lost he would have the shame of being defeated by an amputee, and if he won he couldn't claim much glory from beating up an amputee, even though the amputee was undoubtedly well-ranked.

The bell went to start the first round and they went at it. It was a violent fight, and the crowd was clearly on the side of the amputee. He used his shortened limb to parry punches, but had only three-quarters of the striking options of his opponent. Even so, he fought hard, clearly wanting to give the man in red shorts a thumping. His major handicap was the balance he lost from missing part of his arm, so his opponent’s kicks occasionally made his stumble before he could regain his stability.

Unwittingly I found myself cheering for the two-armed man for the simple reason that the look on the amputee’s face was so mean-spirited. As well, the crowd was behind the one-armed man and I seemed to see the two armed man as some sort of reverse underdog. Because one man was an amputee he was immediately the crowd favorite and everyone wanted to see him win. That seemed unfair to me.

I watched half a dozen rounds of combat and each man gave as good as he got. They beat each other up pretty badly for our amusement. I didn’t get to see how the fight finished or whether it ended in knockout or decision, because at long last my girlfriend called me to bed, not understanding why I should possibly care who would win a Thai kickboxing match on television at three-thirty in the morning.

Vampiro and The Misfits in WCW, 1999

I tweeted a link to this video earlier, but I wanted to expand on the idea here: twenty years ago this month, Canadian-born but Mexico-famous wrestler Ian Hodgkinson, better known as Vampiro, helped bring horror-punk pioneers The Misfits into World Championship Wrestling. This isn't the Glenn Danzig fronted version of the band that released the group's classic catalog of music, but the American Psycho and Famous Monsters era group that featured Michael Graves on vocals, Dr. Chud on drums, and Danzig-era members Jerry Only (bass) and Doyle Wolfgang von Frankenstein (guitar).

Vampiro invited the band to join him ringside for a match, and WCW signed the band as performers. They didn't play any music, but they accompanied Vampiro to the ring for several appearances and occasionally got involved in the action, as seen in this match between Vampiro and The Wall. Yes. The wrestler's name was The Wall. He was the muscle for a guy named Berlyn. I feel like naming a wrestler "The Wall" these days would have a different connotation. There would probably be some running joke about the new wrestler "The Wall" appearing soon, but he just never shows up, or something equally painful. Anyway, here's Vampiro, accompanied by The Misfits, versus The Wall: 

As in most things, the action behind the scenes was a lot more interesting than what was going on in front of the audience, as the situation quickly drifted out of hand. Jerry Only slapped WCW with a cease and desist order against the company using their music or imagery, and Doyle walked away from the scene with Macho Man Randy Savage's girlfriend.

The whole affair has long fascinated me. Will there be more to tell? Perhaps...

Excerpt from "I Sing When You Shut Up," chapter 1

("I Sing When You Shut Up" was serialized on the "Internet" in 2012 as a sequel to the "Comeback Road" novel. I'm editing it for an eBook release and will drop nuggets as I go.)

The Horseshoe Tavern is a long, narrow club located on Queen Street West, a few doors east of Spadina Avenue in downtown Toronto. On the wide sidewalk in front of the music venue is a small patio enclosed by a black iron fence, where the drinkers from inside stand in the winter cold or the summer heat and smoke their cigarettes.

Inside is the front room, a bright, blond-wood space with a long bar on the left. The wall on the right is coated with a collage of newspaper clippings, set lists, and a generous photographic record of the bands that have graced the famous stage located in the Horseshoe's darker recesses.

Past a pool table and the bathrooms, past a displayed Triumph motorcycle and up a few steps, is the back room-- the venue itself. The light of the front room gives way to a low-ceilinged black cavern with another bar on the left, seating and a sound booth on the right, all leading up to a smallish dance floor and the stage which has hosted an endless progression of music royalty.

Country stars like Willie Nelson, Waylon Jennings, Charlie Pride, Loretta Lyn and Stompin' Tom Connors played The Horseshoe in the early days. Punk and new wave acts like The Police, The Ramones, The Talking Heads, and The MC-5 visited later. A who's who of Canadian rock, including The Tragically Hip, The Rheostatics, Bryan Adams, Nickelback, Billy Talent, The Constantines and Arcade Fire have passed through. Monster acts like The Rolling Stones have arrived to play secret sets, while a constant stream of acts on their way to eventual stardom like Niko Case, Franz Ferdinand, The Decemberists, Death Cab for Cutie, and The Shins have graced the stage.

If you play Canada, eventually you will play the legendary Horseshoe Tavern.

Bar prices are typically steep for a downtown Toronto bar (a bottle of Labatt 50 is a five-and-a-quarter hit, plus tip) but to the club's credit, live music from emerging artists is cheap. Monday night has three bands, free. Tuesday night has four bands, also free. I try to make it most Mondays. I don't miss a Tuesday.

Tuesday is new music night at The Horseshoe. Four bands, usually local or regional acts, show up and play. They don't get any money, but they get to play in a famous room in front of a good crowd, usually numbering a hundred or more people. It's a place for bands to gain experience and exposure, and a place for music fans to see what's being played by the newest of the new. It doesn't matter who is playing. You show up and see. Tuesday night is a mish-mash of rock, punk, country, pop, glam, or whatever else. You show up and take what The Horseshoe gives you.

Every Tuesday night I get home from work, eat, shower up, and pre-drink a few tall cans. Then I pick out a black t-shirt, grab my notebook and go. It's not a long walk from my apartment. The first band is usually on by a quarter after nine, and every week I'm there by nine o'clock sharp. I go alone. When I'm at a gig I'm taking notes, changing spots so I can isolate and focus on particular players on stage, or chasing down band members to ask questions, make contacts, exchange info... you get the idea. I collect information, and I'll write about them for a website, either my own or someone else's. I usually write up at least one band a week, sometimes two.  Since retiring from actually playing music (more on that later), I've been trying to get a career in music journalism off the ground. So while I'm there to enjoy the bands, I'm also working. It's hard to keep track of friends when you're operating like that.

Another reason I don't bring friends to gigs is that I have no friends. More or less, anyway. More on that later, too.

Hotel Room: a poem by Jerry the Bird

(originally posted somewhere July 19, 2014)

So this is what it's like to be famous

A blurb review in The New York Times
Some royalty checks
And people I've never met wanting to talk to me

And now a hotel room in San Francisco

I heard they talked about me on a TV program
but I don't know which one
or who was talking

I've never owned a TV

I suppose I could afford one now
but if I spent my time watching TV
where would I find the time to write you these poems?

It's a nice hotel room I guess
It might be the nicest room I've ever been welcome to sleep in
Although that isn't saying much

One hundred people bought tickets
to hear me read the poems I wrote for you
and the organizers gave me bottles of fancy beer
and bought me a sandwich
and gave me another check
and drove me to this hotel room

and now I'm in a hotel room
and I guess this is San Francisco
and I guess this is what it's like to be famous

it's being all alone
in a nicer room.