NY SHE

"A thousand butterflies from your lips to mine"
Kiss of Life - Friendly Fires

Three weeks ago I was out with a friend discussing bands we wish we could see live. I was vehement that Friendly Fires should tour with The Yeah Yeah Yeahs and come to Florida.

Three days later I got an invite to a VIP party for designer Fred Perry at which Friendly Fires were doing a private show in NYC.

I had a week to get a flight and get there. No one else could drop everything to
go with me, even though I had comped plane tickets as well. I have friends and family
in NYC, I used to live there, but no one could go! Solo SHE.

The first person I saw upon entering was the actor Judah Friedlander. That and the open bar indicated to me that this would be at the very least, interesting.

I met loads of cool people including this awesome chick who is a mortician by day and a burlesque dancer by night. Oh yeah, she'll have a book out at some point. I had front and center for a f'excellent performance and got to meet the FF singer after. His face redefines male beauty and he was super nice, yet I wasn't attracted to him (as if he gives a fuck). Weird.


(click to enlarge)

Me w FF in the background. That dude with the camo undies behind me had BAD B.O.! Cab driver worthy.

I had a blast but couldn't get too trashed as that was the early part of the evening. I had to head to Soho for drinks with someone else after, and then I met these gorgeous girls that were DJ's from South America so I took them to a club where a friend of mine spins - more free drinks, yeesh. I became a vodka filter.



Next night I hung out with rock legend Lenny Kaye (google him you clueless fucks) and my friend Tom who is a legend himself. Somewhere there is footage of me playing bass with those two and Jeff Buckley at a Thanksgiving party in Brooklyn when I was just a young SHE. I'm not allowed to have it for reasons unknown =(


Lenny and I.

Oh yeah, I nearly forgot...I saw the space shuttle launch from my plane:

Train in Brain August 7, 2008

"It's 4:00 a.m. I've got the Dr. Hfuhruhurr Ale
I've got nothing to lose so I'm pissin' on the third rail
Groggy eyed and fried I'm headed for the station
D-Train ride Coney Island vacation" Stop That Train - The Beastie Boys

It's strange what memories remain at whim to our instant recall. I often wonder what sparks the mental rolodex and why it can hang on so clearly to a snowy walk home, but yet block out a life changing conversation someone swears you had with them.

The weird shit that I've seen in the New York subway constantly frolics through my grey matter, no matter how long I've been away. It pirouettes through my thoughts at the oddest of moments. Two instances in particular.

The Broadway/Lafayette station in Manhattan has three levels, and a million stairs. Once you depart the train and go up one set of stairs, there is a platform where you can cross over to another track or more stairs to continue up to even more stairs (it takes approximately 5 hours to exit to street level if you're even remotely out of shape).

My ears were encapsulated in Radiohead's "OK Computer", when I bounced up to the semi-deserted platform after my jaunt on the D train. I can't recall why I was there that day, but I definitely remember my peepers zoning in on this man who could easily pass for Pavorotti.

Seeing Pavorotti in the subway, alone would make an interesting tale, but I hardly think it was him. This man was dressed exactly in his likeness though, and even had the Italian trench coat draped expensively over his shoulders, accented with a silky white scarf that probably cost more than everything I had on my person (including electronic apparatuses).

What stopped me in my tracks was what he was doing. He was "skooching", for lack of a better term, sideways across the platform, the way someone would sidle along a ledge of a high rise building before making veiled threats to leap to their demise. He was also sweating like a Republican congressman caught bare-backing a pierced up 14 year old boy behind a McDonalds.

Ironically, "No Surprises" had just entered my ears as I slowly moved past this gigantic panic attack that I so couldn't look away from. He was attached to some earphones as well, and when he reached the center of the platform, he just started bawling as if someone had whispered through them that Toby Keith was penning an all country music opera in German, and that Lincoln Center locked down a 2 year commitment to running it (assuming he liked opera - the mix of that and country definitely brings the idea of cochlear torture to a new disturbing level, not to mention the German aspect).

For some reason I can't forget this, but the last name of the 3rd guy I ever slept with is lost to the ether. (Does that make me a HO? F'excellent.)

The other event that lurks in my back catalog is when I was waiting for the 1 or the 6 at 72nd in the Upper West Side. I was going to rehearsal and had my guitar slung over my shoulder as I paced for what seemed like eternity (that's about 15 NY minutes) waiting for the train.

I'm not usually into hippy looking guys, but there was this one in a tie dyed shirt scoping me out, and he was kind of delish. He had shaggy blonde hair; kind of suntanned as it was summer, and a scarf tied around his head. He looked a bit like a Deadhead pirate from California, but with a great face (and a nice ass, I must say).

He circled around me twice and then went behind whatever those giant pillars are that keep the tunnel above your head (as opposed to crushing it to bits).

I looked away and then back as I saw him peer out from behind the pillar. He smiled, opening wide to bare some fangs at me! Seriously, he had fucking vampire teeth! Not fake waxy shit either; he had the real surgically implanted (or veneers?) bite-bites!

Now a pale Goth doing this at two in the morning in the East Village would not have shocked me (it's almost a pre-requisite on St. Marks), but a tan hippy vampire dude at 72nd hissing about around 5pm? That completely flabbergasted me.

Some other guy interrupted my wide-eyedness to ask me what kind of guitar I had, so I quickly answered and then glanced back but un-deadhead was gone, and I never saw him again (thankfully).

If this kind of yip yap flutters through my brain's waking moments, you can only imagine what I dream about.

I just hope that whatever flashes before my eyes in the seconds before I draw my last breath has absolutely nothing to do with the New York Transit system.

Watch, I'll be killed on the subway now, simply because I wrote it. THAT would be hilarious.


Currently listening :
Paul's Boutique
By Beastie Boys
Release date: 1989-07-19

That is Some Sikh Sh*t June 28, 2008

"Things are shaping up to be pretty odd
Little deaths in musical beds
So it seems I'm someone I've never met" That Green Gentleman - Panic at the Disco

Last night when I was on my way home, the exit I needed was closed and I got lost for a bit. I usually have an impressive sense of direction, and I wasn't drunk, but I got all turned around just from one glitch in the itinerary.

I didn't have to inquire of myself as to HOW I got where I was, as that was obvious. In this case, it was just a matter of resolution.

My mishap added another ½ hour to my ride, and I was thinking about some weird shit in my life and wondering the origins of said shit. How did it come to this?

Then I thought "Eh fuck that analytical nonsense! Thinking about that stuff is probably why I got lost in the first place!"

I really missed New York at that moment. I mean, I love driving, but I sort of missed being able to get pissed out of my gore and then carted home by either train or cab.

I REALLY missed being able to annoy the shit out of the Sikh cab drivers that totally hate women too. I got one to laugh once, which is a feat, since showing any facial expression at all is probably against their belief system. I'm normally quiet in the cab, but these people fascinate me, and the act of annoying sexist ass holes is a far more interesting hobby than scrap booking, wouldn't ya say?

Once I got into the cab and gave the destination, I started asking him questions like "Hey do you like The Clash?" - NO! (A Soup Nazi from Seinfeld kind of NO.)

"How about Pavement?" - NO!

"Kula Shaker? My Bloody Valentine? Echo and the Bunnymen?" - NO! NO! NO!

I'd go through a list of 20 or so bands, getting the same response every time; neither of us changing tone or inflection. It almost felt scripted, like a flat scene from a Jarmusch flick with a hint of Bugs Bunny.

I then leaned towards the malodorous front half of the cab and bellowed oh so obnoxiously, "CUNTTTTTTTTTTTT tree music! That's your thing isn't it? Five bucks says you have some ass-less chaps on under whatever that thingy is you're wearing! You're one of those line dancing fuckers aren't you? YOU are a TURBAN COWBOY!!"

Then I quickly sang this made up twang: "Turban Cowboy, I swear that was his name. He drives a cab in Brooklyn, goes line dancing when he can. He says he's got a woman who sings them country songs, and when he gets his green card he gonna move to a Honky Tonk! YeeeeeeHawwwwww!"

He absolutely lost his shit.

I couldn't have timed it better as my building was in sight. Still giggling, he refused my money and waved me out of the cab saying "You are a VERY crazy."

To which I replied, "Yes, I are."


Currently listening :
Coming To Terms
By Carolina Liar
Release date: 2008-05-20

It Wasn’t Pablo’s Honey 4/29/08

One week from tomorrow (May 6), Radiohead will be gracing Tampa with a concert, and I don't have a ticket. =( I guess I got an attack of the "schmucks" when they went on sale, thinking like I was back in NYC where the formal buying of such commodities was next to impossible. Even if you camped out and were 3rd in line with your cell phone speed dialing Ticketmaster, in Manhattan, this means nothing.

"Sold Out" only sounds good when it's your gig; otherwise it's a car door slamming on an already cold hand.

When I first moved to New York, Radiohead was touring, but raising John Lennon from the dead for a square dance would have been more feasible than getting tickets to see them. I even went to ask Satan in Newark (if there is a Devil, he for sure lives in Newark, New Jersey) for a possible selling of the soul, but he was all "Sorry bitch, even if you had one of them soul thingy's, ain't NOBODY gettin' no Radiohead tickets up in here". (This evening, the voice of Satan is brought to you by Ru Paul, the only girl I'd kiss with tongue, and even then…)

I went down to the venue the night of the show anyways, in hopes that someone maybe got jilted, stuck with extras, or maybe I'd just kill a scalper and take what he had on him. Alas, there was nothing.

I felt so dejected, I usually am pretty resourceful and I really love Radiohead, but maybe I was never going to get to see them LIVE? My head sunk right down to my belly button and just rested there on my belt buckle as I reluctantly drowned in Lake Give Up. It's in Midtown on the West Side, if you're ever in the neighborhood.

I can't recall who all was with me, but I remember leading the pack when we finally decided to bail. I walk fast, and on this night I was doing that bitchy, impatient, "everyone get the fuck out of my way" stomp one does when disappointment so nonchalantly pisses on them.

On approaching the crosswalk, there was a cluster of people facing away from the street. Traffic was light so I stepped off the curb early to get around them. At the precise moment my boot heel kissed pavement, one guy from the cluster quickly did a 180 counterclockwise, completely unaware that I was directly behind him in the street preceding this act.

I wish I could tell you that our eyes met and that we now breed Andalusian horses together in Spain, or that a bus hit me and from the waist down I am now bionic and can leap over mid-sized SUVs while eating cheese fries. But no, that's not what happened.

Look to the right of this page and you'll see my avatar photo where I'm brushing my hair back with my hand. I was doing that exact thing when this clusterfuck turned around and hacked a goob right into my freshly revealed ear!
I screamed so loud, my future self in 20 years felt it. The chill in the air compounded the feeling of warm, wet, foreign goob (as if "friendly" goob would've been any better) leaking down onto my neck as I fell to my knees like I had been shot. One's hand wants to immediately clutch where the assault has taken place, but my fantastic aversion to snot/phlegm provided a small force field so instead, I probably looked like I was doing "jazz hands" with one hand while the other was pointing at the HE that took me down.

I don't remember his hollow apology or how long I convulsed over it, but the thought of it gives me the skeeves to this day, man. ICK! All my poor ear wanted that evening was to hear "Fake Plastic Trees" live, which it did do eventually (three times), and hopefully will again.

My trip to New Mexico next month totally came together today so maybe fate will keep smiling my way and send me a great seat (not lawn-bugs yuck) next week in front of one of the only bands that can totally generate the WOW for me. =)

Fang the DJ 4/11/08

Almost the entire time I called NYC my home, I never went to a dance club. Given the choice, I much prefer to see live bands as I like to bounce my bones around to BASS in real time. The only thing comparable to watching someone pluck the low E and feeling it pulsate into you from the bottom of your hooves is actually being the one holding the pick.

I've played some venues where the stage had loose floor boards and every time I hit that E in close proximity to my rig, I would be catapulted into the air nearly crashing into a raging drum kit. How bizarre that would've been if I had pelted into the Ride cymbal at just the right angle and got decapitated. What a fantastic tale that would be for those who had witnessed such a thing: "Dude, she hit that low E and I caught her face! It was fucking amazing! I was hoping she'd throw me a pick, but hey man, turns out she gives head - for reals!"

This last winter (if you can call it that) I had things to get over (more than one thing, mainly I needed to get over myself), so I had to get out more. Tampa is so not NYC and it wouldn't be fair to even speak of them in the same sentence, I know, but I had to work with what is available to me. Live bands are a limited resource, good ones anyways, plus it was free in NYC and it's not here so one must invest wisely.

I like going out dancing but I bore so easily and I don't always have a drink. That seems to be key in tolerating the incessant sameness that Florida so graciously offers up. It progresses about as fast as a turtle on heroin. The dance options here play songs only if there is a video available to them, and the DJ's are about seven exits behind every city north of the Mason Dixon.

I should be a DJ, the control freak in me is certain of this. Not on the radio, I've been allowed to do so as a guest, but I don't have the nicotine soaked voice required to make a go of that. Whenever my yaps cross the airwaves, I sound like a female version of Butthead sans Beavis.

No, I want my own night at a dance club that will allow me to play tunes that one can dance to, but aren't necessarily DANCE songs. You can dance to Interpol, Vampire Weekend, and current Radiohead. Just not in Tampa, at least not that I'm aware of. Where is the NEW? Why can't you play something that isn't a "single"? Not everything the record company deems suitable for video is the best on the album dammit!

I'm not feeling the dance scene here at all, and I've not been out dancing that much in the last 2 months. I dragged myself out last night as it's nice to see friends but I was so fucking bored of the tunes that I spontaneously combusted at about 1 am - talk about self entertainment.

My charred, skeletal remains are thinking that even though I'm over things, I may need some hermit time. Maybe it's not boredom. Maybe I'm just not ready to be out there right now.

Ok, where's the chocolate?