Last Sunday while at work spinning music at The Hole In The Wall Saloon I couldn’t help but notice things being exceptionally bizarre. The place was a bit more festive than usual due to a small group of guys celebrating a birthday with a game of clothing optional pool and general merry-making, then the ethereal Bambi Lake dropped in dressed in lingerie like a Vargas girl pin-up on her way to a go-go dancing gig somewhere in the neighborhood, then a strange man with very long hair extensions wearing a pair of tiger-striped chaps suddenly appeared out of nowhere with a suitcase full of cockrings and dildoes and similar gear and before I knew it was on his hands and knees getting spanked by a slightly rotund Bettie Page look-alike with a big black dildo right in front of the DJ booth. It was then that I asked a regular patron with a shocked look on his face if every freak in the city had decided to stop in that night. Then I decided to shut the door as the display on the floor had progressed to something that looked a bit too close to penetration for comfort.
Apparently there were a few more freaks present than I had seen. I was told by a rather selfish rather star struck, foolish, even dumfounded friend of mine well after the fact, that popular singing sensation Pink plus a couple of her female friends had been in the bar playing pool for almost two hours. Two hours and he couldn’t even be bothered to tap on the dj booth door and fucking tell me. I mean, I’m not sure exactly what I would have done besides maybe nervously say hello or something but I like to be kept abreast of such things. Had I known she was there I could have asked her if there was something in particular she’d like to hear, maybe even put on a long player and try to play a game of pool with her. I could have even played “Pretty in Pink” by the Psychedelic Furs for her but no, I just kept to myself and wasn’t even told about it till she and her friends had slipped out of the bar and into a limo, driving off for destinations spectacular, like New York’s Radio City Music Hall where I just watched her give a pretty spectacular vocal performance on the MTV Video Music Awards show, not to mention take home the award for best Female Video and candidly confess during her acceptance speech, “I’m too drunk for this,” and thank her fans for sticking with her through changes and knowing that music is freedom. She was definitely drunk, as she stated, and I got to admire her for being so forthright about this while surrounded by a group of artists and peers more likely to admit being in rehab than being inebriated. Well, at the Hole in The Wall Pink apparently felt free enough to ask my friend and the weird guy with the suitcase full of toys to demonstrate how to properly put on a cockring, nor did she shy away from giving the naked birthday boy a spanking, who responded in kind with a couple of swats for her, which she complained about being painful as she slipped in her limo and departed. I hope the next time she comes to the bar someone tells me about it, I love to formulate dj sets with a particular artist in mind.
Back to the awards, it was also really great to see local girl and former bassist for Stone Fox and Hammers of Misfortune, Janice Tenaka onstage as a part of Pink’s band looking as absolutely stunning as always. I know she must be missed by Hammers of Misfortune, a great local heavy metal/prog rock band and a fine match for Janice’s extremely skillful musicianship, but it’s pretty exciting to see a familiar face televised to millions from Radio City Music Hall. Go Janice! The only other revelations from the MTV VMA show that I could see was the opening number by Bruce Springsteen who somehow looks better and sexier than ever at the age of 51 and prompted me to remember my Lit major college era crush on the poet/rocker, which I cant believe I’m admitting here. I was also pleased to see that the White Stripes “Fell in love with a Girl” won for best Breakthrough Video. The duo looked fantastic, jack in a white bowler hat and suit with red tie and handkerchief and Meg in a red dress. The host and announcers and presenters kept hinting that some big unprecedented surprise event would be closing the show and when that moment rolled around it was an appearance by Guns and Roses, or Axl Rose and a bunch of new musicians, two of which looked suspiciously like Twiggy Ramirez, Marilyn Manson’s former guitarist, which translates as ugly. “This is it?” I thought. So fucking what! I’ve always hated that band but people acted like it was the second coming of Jesus Christ. It was lame. I don’t get it. Axl Rose looked like a bloated Bo Derek and his vocal performance was weak. It was fun to watch Kurt Loder lie through his teeth to Axl backstage about what a great performance it was, a real moment in Rock and Roll, etc. Please! The Hives and The Vines turned out performances 10 times more visceral in the rock and roll sense. Hell, Shakira rocked harder than Guns and Roses did. But hey, what does it all really mean in the long run, winning an award that the members of N’Sync have several of sitting around their various mansions? To rock and roll it means nothing. In fact, what music industry award does mean anything to the world of rock and roll? The Grammies clearly mean nothing, and sometimes the chosen artists annually inducted to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame are even questionable.
The next day after my near brush with celebrity at The Hole I went to the Virgin Megastore for a record release and performance by a band who just might catapult rock and roll right up into the charts currently dominated by boy bands, slatternly former female mouseketeers, and rappers produced by P. Diddy or Dr. Dre. That band is Queens of the Stoneage and their third LP, Songs For The Deaf is an aggressive, inventive and solid bid for putting rock back in the consciousness of the masses. That is not to say a good rock band has sold out or gone commercial but rather a great band has gotten better and better in a natural steady progression, showing a versatility and an intuitive unified growth, all at what seems to be an opportune time for a rock release to shake things up on Billboard’s Hot 200. It’s happened before, like when Nirvana’s Nevermind knocked Michael Jackson out of the number one position so many years ago. That was a pretty auspicious event in Rock and Roll history and it’s a little unfair to draw comparison but Songs For The Deaf is easily the most potent and astute rock release I’ve heard all year and I believe the people are going to catch on and buy this disc hungrily.
I had never been to an in-store performance at the virgin megastore so I had no idea how it would be presented. I just showed up about an hour early for the 11pm showtime. The stage was set up on the ground floor and the bins of CDs were pushed together in islands for the people to crowd around, and slowly but surely the store was filling up with fans. I ran into Chris from Pansy Division and we passed the time talking up the bands we liked currently and of course how great QOTSA are. I was pleasantly surprised by the estimated median age of this crowd—it seemed firmly set in the 26-28 year range, but 11:00 pm is well past bedtime for the younger record buying demographic. The age group to me indicated that QOTSA appeal to a more intellectual rocker, kind of like the thinking mans rock band, with even a hint of prog rock ala Yes or Emerson Lake and Palmer found in a few of their new songs, but I’ve always hated that Middle Earth-ian crap and most any music played by guys wearing tights and kimonos with furry boots playing a double-necked guitar, but QOTSA deliver these influences with a wry sense of humor and irony that keeps it just below the surface of the song but still present. More apparent influences would be the hard distorted and driving force of Garage-rock and psychedelia but presented here with more effective technologies that bust the sound free of the limitations of the low-tech recording properties of yester-year. Every one of QOTSA’s three LP’s have featured skillful and unique guitar heroics that could pique the interest of even the most jaded of listeners, both ardent and refined yet fresh and unique. At times there are guitar solos that meander safely at first then construct themselves gradually, building up, assuming the place and pace of where a vocal would be mixed and achieving an emotional depth from guitar tones comparable to that of the human voice. This makes for guitar solos that you want to sing along with, and Jimmy Page is pretty much the only other guitarist whose solos have that effect on me. Finally, there’s another element that really seals the entire package nicely and that’s the steely smooth, ice-cold vocal delivery QOTSA use. I consider their vocals a distinct pleasure because they are generally easy to understand, mixed up front and unburied, subtle lower register harmonies richly congruous to the guitar sound, passionate and unfettered, save for a few screaming and tense entries by guitarist Nick Oliveri. Also to their credit is their use of a guest vocalist Mark Lanegan on Songs For The Deaf. He’s the former vocalist for Screaming Trees and has a much-underappreciated solo career and a pure, haunting rock and roll croon that just seems to improve with age. Also present on SFTD handling drums like no one else can is Dave Grohl of Nirvana. It’s no wonder this release is so strong, it sparkles with hints of rock and roll supergroup via these additional players.
The lights of the Virgin Megastore remained up at fluorescent shopping level which was strange but the band took their places and started in with my favorite QOTSA song “Monsters in your Parasol” and all seemed right. Dave Grohl wasn’t present but the drummer they had was truly holding the position down with authority and thuggish tattooed tough guy style. The band played a set of songs from all three of their albums, delighting the crowd which grew larger and continually more focused as their hour-long set progressed. Mark Lanegan joined them for about three songs and during their final number the band drew it out for a lengthy and magical sonic reduction, dropping the decibel level down to low and delicate and quiet with a precision that captivated and hushed the store, then slowly brought it back to a bombastic and powerful close. It was amazing.
As soon as the band left the stage the Virgin announcers directed the crowd to form a single line at the escalator where they would be allowed to ascend in groups of 10 at a time to purchase Songs For The Deaf. This created a herded cattle funnel of bodies towards the escalator, a bit crowded but not a Who concert by any means, and groups of 10 filtered up the escalator at intervals. The process was orderly enough, just a group of people all anxious to lay hands on a copy of a new record on its release date. I waited patiently and just as I made it to the bottom of the escalator, being very conscious of the people around me and trying to ascertain if the ten head quota had been filled, the security worker who was posted midway up the escalator singled me out and told me to leave the store. I asked, “What?” and he started down the escalator telling me to leave the store again. I asked “Why? What did I do?” and he said “Hit the door behind you now!” I turned towards another security person on my way out and asked him “What did I do? Why am I forced to leave the store?” and he wouldn’t say a word, just motioned to the door and I slowly exited in disbelief.
As a regular customer who drops more than a few bucks at Virgin Megastore with each visit, I was outraged by this flagrant and random abuse of big-man security worker power. I was conducting myself in an orderly fashion, everyone was considering the crowd size and maneuver at hand. My elbows were in, my demeanor was calm to jubilant considering I had just seen a great show for free by one of my favorite bands, and I was literally dressed much like a middle-aged man ready to mow the fucking lawn, no spikes, no leather, no emblems of white supremacy tattooed on my neck. What was his damage? Did Mr. Security guy just have a reality check at the urinal of dicklessness before he took his post or what? Was he an advanced student of the profiling academy, specializing in skin headed punk rock fags just entering their dangerous angst-filled fourth decade of life? I waited outside in disbelief to see if any other security threats or miscreants like myself would be ejected and there were none, zero—just me, the only person ejected from the store for trying to purchase a copy of Songs For The Deaf. I replayed the moment in my mind over and over trying to figure it out and came up with nothing. The reason I was booted out of the store must have been personal, but I had never seen this security person before. So, Mr. Security Guy with bandana and little red beard, if you are out there and can read, I have a question. Do you want to fuck me or just be like me? Whatever your answer might be, I’ll think twice before I drop a chunk of change at Virgin Megastore again. Rasputin Records is just a block away.