Seasons - The Echo - Monday, October 24, 2011

"The only thing we knew for sure about Henry Porter

is that his name wasn't Henry Porter."

-Brownsville Girl

I may or may not have anything to say about this show. You'll have to keep reading to find out, I guess. (How's that for an instant cliffhanger? Have I roped you in yet?) It hadn't even occurred to me to write about it until Kaitlin from Seasons asked me if I was going to, and I believe I mumbled a vague affirmative. Or maybe I didn't commit either way. I don't know. I was stoned.

It's rare for me to venture into a show review--whatever that means these days--without some sort of game-plan or unwritten outline as to what I'm going to say, how I'm going to say it, the ratio of music-content to me-content, and various other sexy concerns. But tonight I've got nothing--no plans, no outlines, nothing in particular to say. Generally, when you have nothing to say, it's wise to keep your mouth shut, or your blog unupdated, or whatever. But when I'm not writing I'm just some jerk who hangs out at shows too much. And who wants to be just some jerk who hangs out at shows too much? Not me, apparently. It's okay if you do.

So let's write. Let's find a point of view. Let's find an angle....

Angles used to be much easier to come by. Back in the glory days of The 704--a golden age that may only exist in my imagination, since I can't bear to re-read any posts predating this year's Silver Lake Jubilee--I'd keep my mind wide open for the entire evening of a show, taking note of every observation, every stray thought that could potentially be extrapolated upon for five hundred words or so. Once I'd seized upon one of these threads, I was free to pay attention to the music which, with some padding, could account for the next five hundred words. And, like magic, the hard part of a thousand-word show review was done.

A major problem with this routine always arose when the first angle I came up with was lousy. Since I'm nothing if not a lazy writer/thinker/human, even if the angle was lousy, I'd run with it. I'd be so relieved that I had something to write about, I'd assume that no better idea was possible, so I'd write about the first one, most likely to the blog's detriment. But, in spite of all those shoddy posts, even I have to admit that my productivity back then was inspiring. If I'm not mistaken, there was a period there where I consistently reviewed four shows a week, always within twenty-four hours of leaving the venue. Even when I knew the output was subpar, I didn't flag. Such was my desire to prove my existence.

Nowadays when I go to shows--even those rare ones that I tentatively plan to write about--I don't seek out angles. Ever since the Silver Lake Jubilee post, this search for angles has seemed phony, like a cheap trick, a way for me to wear a mask and be a clown and put on a show. If I were a more entertaining clown, this would be entirely defensible, but I don't think that's the case. (Correct me if I'm wrong. I'd love to be a great clown. Clowning is a noble calling.) (That's "clowning" as in "acting a fool for the benign amusement of others," not "clowning" as in "wearing clown make-up and a wig and weird clothes and scaring children," because there's nothing noble about that.) (Once at a carnival, in a touching though misguided attempt to allay my knock-down, screaming-tantrum, pants-pissing fear of clowns, my father had his face painted in a traditional clown-like manner. His intention was to show me that clowns were nothing to be scared of, just regular folks with junk on their faces. And, oh, how I screamed and cried, petrified that all it took was a little face-paint to turn my father into one of those deranged freaks who had tormented me all me life. Also, clowns with beards are extra creepy.)

Anyway, as I was saying, ever since that Silver Lake Jubilee post, rather than contriving a semi-legitimate point of view to approach my memories of a concert, I just ... write. I take what's in my head and I write it down. Which is scary, since I'm not all that crazy about much of what's in my head. It can be weird and personal and boring and indefensibly self-indulgent. But sometimes it seems to work. In that Jubilee post, I was mortified to find myself telling the internet about my dead grandfather and my oddly conflicted feelings upon his recent passing (very recent--I wrote the thing in a weird, sleep-deprived frenzy after arriving home from his funeral well after midnight). But people seemed to like it. Geoff Geis linked to it in his column on Sean Carnage's website, so Sean Carnage's readers got to know about my dead grandfather and my oddly conflicted feelings upon his recent passing. After some initial anxiety, I was okay with this. When you come from a place of honesty, it seemed, people would respond kindly.

But the potential self-indulgence of it all still nags at me. The increasingly diaristic nature of this venture and the growing imbalance between the music-content and the me-content have left me feeling, at times, a bit absurd. And the proliferation of more, um, traditional music blogs would suggest that the majority of music fans want to know about music, how the band sounded, what songs they played, et cetera. This sounds horrendously boring to me, but I don't judge. It's just that when I want to know about music, I will listen to music. If I care about a show, I will go to it. But when I read words, I do so to learn about life, and people, and ... I don't know ... love? Pain? Neuroses? Drunkenness? Whatever the hell it is I write about.

And, let's be honest, there are so many people saying so much about so many different things, especially in terms of music. It's a big internet. Any topic I can think of has been exhausted by a million other voices before I can churn out even a paragraph. This is one reason why I chose to focus so resolutely on local music when I started this thing. Plenty of other people were writing about it, sure, but not so many that I couldn't successfully compete for your attention. I have no desire to take on thousands of other people to see who can write the best St. Vincent review. But I'll gladly take on a dozen other people to see who can write the best Seasons review. I might not come out on top, but I'll make a respectable showing.

Then again, I've already written many Seasons reviews. Everything's been done, every subject burnt out. The only thing that no one else is writing about is me.

You do what you have to do to be original.

So here we are.

*

What now? I guess I'll write about the show. Or, you know ... not about the show. Maybe a little bit. I'll write about me in and around the show.

I got to the Echo way early for Seasons' set. The president was in town, so I adjusted my schedule to allow for increased traffic. (I don't think about the president much, but when he's in town and he makes me leave early for a show, I get very upset about his corporatist agenda and his war crimes.) Strangely, by the time I hit the streets they were empty.

So I walked along Sunset to kill time. I ran into my friend Ian, whom I almost didn't see. I'd like to pretend that I didn't see him walking straight towards me because, as a very deep thinker, I was lost in thought. But I think it had more to do with the fact that I don't look at people because I'm scared that they might be looking back at me.

We smoked outside the Echo. I'd describe our conversation but I wasn't planning on writing about it at the time so I didn't make an effort to remember the details. Plus, I don't know if he'd want me telling you about what he may or may not have done last Saturday.

The Echo opened. We made our way inside. John Seasons promptly met us at the bar and escorted us to the green room. Someone passed me a pipe. I don't smoke weed much these days--I generally don't enjoy it, and I have a history of enjoying it too much--but drinking at the Echo has become prohibitively expensive, so I opted for the organic (and free) alternative.

It felt good. Two hits wrecked me. It was much better than the last time I smoked weed which was way back ... last Friday. Nik from Seasons and I were leaving Casey's after Judson McKinney's show to go to Randy from One Trick Pony's apartment to drink with him and Nick from George Glass and Matt and Katya from Manhattan Murder Mystery and Christian from Bright Beast and some other kind folks. (Isn't this all so sickeningly insidery? What happened to me? I used to be uncool. This is another reason why I've abandoned most of my pretenses towards music writing: the majority of the shows I see these days involve people I'm friends with. And I really have no desire to tell the internet that last night my friend's band sucked/was awesome/was okay. Not because of any conflict of interest. It just feels dumb.) (That sounds like the lamest brag ever, but I don't mean it that way. Believe me, being friends with Randy is no picnic. But that's where I've arrived. There's no getting around it.)

Anyway, on the way out of Casey's, John Seasons talked me into taking a couple hits. After we made it to the car, I proceeded to talk Nik's ear off about God-knows-what all the way to Randy's place. Once we arrived my well-being dissipated. I zoned out. I recall fantasizing aloud to several people about how nice it would be if I could just flip a switch and make it so my life had never happened. I'd be gone, and no one would miss me, because I had never been there in the first place.

In spite of my generally bleak outlook, my thoughts generally don't run that dark, particularly when I'm drinking with friends. And I'd had a lovely, promising night.

Perhaps I was feeling too good. I knew it couldn't last. I wanted to shut it down before the hopelessness returned.

Or maybe my brain just doesn't react well to weed. I decided that I probably shouldn't smoke any again for a while.

And that resolution lasted until Monday.

But, like I said, it was nice. My thoughts weren't making any sense, and I was perhaps a bit too eager to share them, but that's okay.

I saw my friend Deseret. I said something to her that didn't make any sense.

"That didn't make any sense," she said.

"Sorry," I said. "I'm really stoned. Anything I say for the next hour or so probably won't make any sense."

"How will that be any different than usual?" she asked.

Then Seasons played. Would you like to know about Seasons' set? How they sounded? What songs they played?

They sounded ... good. They sounded like ... a, uh ... thunderstorm ... when you're on ... mushrooms....

I can't do this. Were you there? If not, why not? Why would you miss a Seasons show, dummy?

Hey internet, my friends' band was awesome.