Category: From the archives…

At long last, the third and final chapter of my terrifying and tedious relocation triptych:  I’ve found a new place, secured it, moved my belongings in with the invaluable help, devotion and technique of three friends who deserve much more than the paltry libations and treacherous attitude I was eventually serving up that day, and at long last I’m settling in to my new home.  Handsome my cat was a bit traumatized by the move until he realized that there was some prime bird watching out the back windows so he’s happy, and once I recover from being so stiff and sore from all that lifting, I’m sure to enjoy making the new space my own.  It’s very odd getting used to a new neighborhood, and it amazes me that while my move was a relatively short distance from my old home, just a matter of blocks, it seems so very different—like same planet different worlds.  My first post-moving excursion was to the nearest corner store for some beverages and kitty litter.  Upon wandering into the stores entrance, a whirling, chattering gesticulating, twitching, talking-to-the-voices-in-her-head, crack addicted woman ran right into me and didn’t seem to notice.  The men behind the counter chuckled, as did I and I proceeded to pick up the items I came for.  I paid and started to leave just as the woman who ran into me shot back inside the store like a pinball on extra-play, spun a quick circle or two and grabbed a four pack of toilet tissue, then headed for the counter as another customer said out loud, “You can’t tell me that you people actually wipe your ass!”  Then the whole store including the woman started laughing and wishing each other a happy new year as I strolled out.  I smiled and wondered if that would become my corner store or if another one nearby would.  We’ll see.

It was after all New Years Eve, not your average night in the new neighborhood, or any neighborhood so I didn’t count anything as generally characteristic of this area, especially the firecrackers and other explosions at midnight.  However the non-fire crackers seem to be indigenous to this territory.  I treat the situation like one would treat the bears at Yellowstone; I don’t feed them and as I travel through their habitat I keep my arms in and my windows rolled up, metaphorically speaking.  I’m a bit friendlier and will actually have eye contact and pleasant greetings with the tranny hookers, because they’ve always been friendly to me for years, like back when Hayes valley wasn’t a trendy place to buy expensive shoes and tedious folk/crafts and the girls hung out under the freeway.  They’d say hi all the time as we passed through late at night, even persuade would be muggers to leave us alone at times.  So I’ve always got a smile or a “hello darlin’” for the girls.  It never hurts anyone to smile and be polite to the person you pass on the street, or tell them they look pretty if so inclined.  But also try to remember, they are indeed at work and to disrupt a productive workday is never good.

My new neighborhood also features a rock and roll scene that I’ve completely ignored over the past couple of years.  Having gotten a bit too entrenched in the whole living and working south of market dynamic, I rarely ventured out of the once vibrant world-class nightclub district, now crippled by so many financially catastrophic socioeconomic trends over the past decade.  Don’t get me wrong, some of my favorite haunts are still there but if you’ve been in San Francisco for a decade or more you would have to agree that SOMA just isn’t what it used to be.  Several clubs and venues have disappeared or become paler versions of their former selves, often under the fascist regime of the SFPD and zoning committees and housing developers who at one point really seemed hell bent on eradicating a nightlife completely down there.  We now feel lucky that a few of the areas mainstays are still in operation, like the 29 year old institution The End Up and the soundproofed-within-an-inch-of-its-life 1015 Folsom, former home of some of the city’s finest moments in nightclubbing ever.  More recently came the demise or hiatus of The Paradise Lounge, a great venue that featured many rock bands nightly but as a consolation the Eagle Tavern has been featuring live rock bands on every Thursday for about two years now and these nights have become very well attended and popular.  But up here on the other side of Market, an infamous strip that I was instantly drawn to when I first started exploring San Francisco in the early 80’s, Polk Street, is playing host to Rock and Roll music at a couple of locations that have left their former identities as drag and/or hustler bars behind.  One of those locations is Kimo’s, the on again off again live rock venue beleaguered by noise complaints from neighbors but stringently trying to sound proof and strike an accord that works for all involved.  I’m unaware of the tiny two-story corner bar’s current status, but I believe I saw a sign saying something about the return of live music there soon.  It’s a surprisingly pleasant place to see bands and not so long ago Metallica played an unannounced show there.  I remember it as the first gay bar I ever laid eyes on when I was 16.  How great that twenty plus years later it’s a rock venue featuring a variety of punk rock acts and some of the loudest scariest black metal bands around.  I hope the music returns there amicably.

Just down the street is another live music venue that has been going strong for over a year and I didn’t even realize it called The Hemlock Tavern.  Located in the space formerly known as The Giraffe, a hustler bar where the bartenders and servers were required to wear white shirts and ties to cover up the syringes on the floor and other somewhat unsavory elements of Polk Street –past, The Hemlock has been playing host to a long list of bands both local and from as far away as Japan and many European locations.  I visited their website at www.hemlocktavern.com and they always have a calendar of events listed.  This includes some weekly events like Monday night’s punk rock sideshow featuring DJ Tragic and The Duchess of Hazard plus some other regularly featured DJ nights, always a welcome and unusual thing, DJ’s that play rock and roll (three cheers for the cause, you are not alone!), and during this month look for shows by the likes of Drunk Horse, Bonfire Madigan, Tami Hart, Deer Hoof, The Slings, The Sixxteens and more.  Looking over the list of bands that have already played there, I saw quite a few acts that have been featured at The Eagle as well, like local favorites The Quails, the Coachwhips, Tussle, Gravy Train, Extreme Elvis, Waycross, The Vaticans, The Vaxines, and more.  Other bigger names that have played there include The Sun City Girls, Stereo Total, Neil Michael Haggerty, The Country Teasers, Los Super Elegantes, Paula Frazier, Mecca Normal and more.  In February look for shows by local Rap acts Mack Hand and Gold Chains, the latter being the man who took a popular Stereolab instrumental and rapped out a hilarious call for international peace over it called “Rock The Parti”.  In all, I’d say this busy Polk street tavern has been busting ass to bring you a great deal of interesting live acts.  Now that I’m in the neighborhood I’ll undoubtedly be taking more in I bet. There’s also a daily happy hour from 4 to 7 with $1 off all drinks.

Finally, I’m not one to spread rumors that might not be the least bit true, but a friend of mine who seems very in-the-know told me that there was to be a secret Butthole Surfers show at the hemlock sometime this month, but you know, it might just be a rumor, urban legend type stuff—or is it.  Buttholes or not, The Hemlock is yet another bonus that leads me to believe I’m going to like my new neighborhood a lot.

It was a somewhat unexpected Christmas present for the neighborhood, something that made me feel all sentimental and warm and fuzzy inside, sending me back to a time when things were very different here in the legendary South of Market neighborhood.  I recalled waiting in long lines of hushed men in this or that alley, waiting to gain entrance to a dark even decrepit old house transformed by dim lighting and a few homo-erotic murals and holes cut in the walls about waist level, into an all night wonderland of wanton male flesh lust.  There was a time when as many as 6 or 7 such places known as “sex clubs” flourished in this neighborhood just after the forced closure of the bath houses in the 80’s left a large part of the more reptilian community without a place to express their sexual proclivities in an abundant and round-the-clock manner as they had for many years.  San Francisco had experienced it’s first huge wave of AIDS-related deaths and the baths were demonized as the singular “hot zone” the most active petry dish for risk of infection by the Department of Public Health and Safety.  Granted, business was down at the baths due to, well, death and fear and new guidelines for safe sexual activities were established and moralistic judgment flew in every direction, both within the community as well as from authorities and varied members of The God Squad (Falwell, Anita Bryant, Donna Summer, etc.), then local government struck the final blow and San Francisco became the only major city to shut down all the bath houses for good in hopes of curtailing a rapidly growing rate of infection.  This was a huge modification for a subculture whose identity was based on sexual preference in the first place.  It prompted a period of introspection and big questions and research and a mission to gain more knowledge on this killer disease.  Gays embarked on a new quest for survival, pushing for acknowledgment of this crisis by heads of state and the medical multi-conglomerate, not letting the thousands of deaths be forgotten or overlooked and pushing for education of the masses on how to prevent infection, because, after all, human beings do have sex.  It was then that Sex Clubs began springing up here and there, heavily promoting safe sexual guidelines, even touting themselves as centers for proper safe sexual instruction.  It was clear Gays were not going to stop having sex, and it’s still barely becoming clear to the powers that be that all people are going to continue having sex, even the brood born of traditional family values, America’s greatest resource—all those precious children, so pure and full of goodness, unhindered by knowledge of birth control and safe sex and masturbation or where to get condoms or any of those things that will lead them down a path towards promiscuity or damnation, and now even death.  In the face of a global health crisis, the Pope and Reagan and Bush and even Clinton as he caved in to pressure from conservative forces of his administration, are all responsible for stanching the education and protection of young people against a disease they should be explicitly taught how to avoid and given the tools needed for self protection without the stigma of shame.  Shame is what these no count retard politicians and sellouts and especially the Pope should be feeling, for all the lives lost or wasted by archaic moralizing and making birth control a sin and keeping entire portions of the worlds population from controlling their destiny by denying them proper education.  I really cracked up the other day when I saw a news segment from Rome about how The Pope was named an Honorary Harlem Globetrotter in a recent ceremony.  Maybe having reached that supreme pinnacle, Pope Drool-Cup can finally just die. Whether apologizing for the holocaust or becoming a member of a comical exhibition sports team, the man looks like he doesn’t know where he is or what he’s doing, and I bet it’s hard to hold a basketball with all that blood on yr hands.

But back to the business at hand (a chance to bad-mouth The Pope is something I cant resist), the new place that cropped up right on the very block I live on is the return of the sex club called Mack, absent for two years after it vacated it’s old location on 10th street, Mack has returned making it’s new home in a large warehouse style space at 1285 Folsom.  A non-descript doorway beside the relocated Taste of Leather store is the entrance and it’s doors open every night at 6:00 pm till 6:00 am except on Friday through Sunday when it remains open 24 hours. It reopened in a quiet way, no grand opening banner, no balloons, no naked guys with sandwich boards, and with just a print ad or two running in some of the gay papers.  I was completely shocked in this day and age of tripled and quadrupled rents forcing out the older businesses on this block then transforming into some vague dot.com venture, that suddenly an old and notoriously nasty sex club closed for two years blasts back into action in a prime location.  Of course, this signaled a small reason for something like rejoice—a sex-positive venue cropping up just when you thought the number of such establishments would continue to dwindle as it has over the last five years.  Another odd detail of this change of location that I couldn’t help but think about is the fact that the two-flat apartment building that used to house Mack for many years now has tenants who call it home!  EEEEEWWWWWW!

Of course I felt it my duty as a good neighbor to march on down there and welcome the new business on the block with my enthusiastic patronage.  The staff was personable and helpful in explaining that you get a locker and a complimentary towel with the $15 price of admission on weekends, $10 on weekdays.  Also complimentary is piping hot institutional coffee from a big silver vat, self served in Styrofoam with non-dairy creamer.  One night I’ll have to show them the magical pyrotechnic qualities of coffee-mate.  Moving onward past the check in counter, the place opens up into one big room with lockers, two showers, two sinks and two toilets and eventually a bathtub (not exactly for bubble baths I’d guess) against the one wall.  The rest of the open space in the room is dominated by about five well constructed towers made of wood and metal bars and elevated platforms looking like elevated jail cells or gigantic go go cages if you will.  Under each tower is usually a little sling room or a bi-level glory hole gallery, or an exhaust fan equipped smoking room with a terribly bright light.  In the one far corner are three dark little glory stalls in a row and directly above that is another elevated cage, this one made of chain link fence.  These higher altitude show places can easily accommodate probably 12 to 16 people comfortably and are accessible only by steep tilted ladder stairs with handrails.  These can be climbed with relative ease but I really sort of had to worry about the safety of patrons who maybe had a few drinks before coming there, went upstairs, got their brains fucked out and perhaps miss a step or grab a handrail that’s covered with sexual lubricant.  The club has a zero tolerance policy regarding drug use and condoms and lube are distributed liberally throughout.  Several video monitors are scattered throughout the room very close to the ceiling

The overall design of the place I find to be very creative.  They’ve transformed a stark and bare space into a sexual multi-level funhouse with enough visual jailhouse elements you halfway expect to see Elvis appear and lead a production number, or the cast of Oz witnessing another prison rape scene.  Jean Genet would approve of the new Mack.  One element of the old Mack they seemingly left behind completely, thank God, was the overwhelming aura of filth and decay.  I know I know, for some people that was a part of the ambiance they craved and returned for.  Filth to me is not a sexually charged condition so get over there and wipe those handrails down, prisoner.  I predict a steady rise in this particular Folsom Prison population and I welcome the presence of this institution on the street where I live.

Ah yes, once again christmas is upon us, only this year it’s just a little different.  It definitely seems that a lot less people are flying home for the holidays largely due to that airplane airplane building building thing, not to mention the highest national unemployment rates in many years and the evening news driving home the fact that we are indeed in a full-on economic recession, then telling us that if Christmas retail revenues don’t start climbing soon, because our whole economy is fully based on this annual commercialized response to a celebrated religious event (hoax), that the country is in really deep economic shit.  Well I’ve never really been much of  a holly jolly Christmas type guy, so all this doesn’t really take christmas to any new undiscovered or unendured level for me.  If anything I’m feeling sort of smug in my anti-holiday attitude.  It’s like, “So sorry America, that the world situation has kind of rained on your indulgent parade, or you might say drained it’s ugly festering boils on your parade, and peace on earth and goodwill towards men aren’t even registering on the applause meter so if you even want your nation to keep its head above water you better get out there and at least spend your damn money on gifts unless you wanna join forces to militaristically squash all of those anti-peace-on-earth type muslim  terrorist enemies completely like heroes do, if they don’t die, leaving an entire family sighing, “Christmas just isn’t the same without…”   Remember about a decade or so ago when all the pop stars got together and recorded a song called “Do They Know It’s Christmas,” to benefit the starving children of the world?  Well, have american children ever not known it’s christmas, or even had one that wasn’t filled with Nike shoes, playstations for a host of violent computer games, expensive and ugly oversized designer clothes as seen on MTV, personal cell phones and pagers and vibrating cartoon fuck-me-up-the-ass Elmo dolls that parents had to weild a knife at FAO Schwartz to get?   Will the simple fact that 19 men planned and executed an attack that killed more people than the concerted Japanese military forces did when they attacked Pearl Harbor sixty years ago have any effect on the greedy holiday wishes of  children protected and shielded from the harsh reality of life during war-time and ultimately the unpredictable future methods of destruction, devastation and almost certain poverty this War on Terrorism will likely plunge us into?  And what is the best and most useful tool to shield the children, our greatest national treasure, from these truths?  George W. knows.  It’s called Patriotism, a simplified and unifying system of belief, kind of like Allah but different.

Enough about the tired old traditional Christmas, this year I’m celebrating early with a newer tradition, something started well after that one night in bethlehem but quite a few years ago nonetheless, right here in san francisco with a couple of legendary seasonal runs of a cabaret style show that for many changed the meaning of Christmas forever.  That of course would be the phenomenon known as Kiki and Herb and their legendary early engagements at a now defunct bar/restaurant here in San Francisco.  Justin Bond and Kenny Mellman created this pair of characters, a duo of show-biz lifers, who through song and meandering banter and storytelling whipped up an instant following that packed the house every weekend for runs up to 8 months long.  The act  quite naturally addressed the holiday season as it rolled around and something truly magical kicked in.  There was something endearing and transformative about hearing Kiki recount the many tragedies of her life with her bitter reluctantly sweet and happy christmas songs that would weave in and out of an amazing array of punk rock and rock and AOR schlock songs as disparate and unrelated as “Heroin” by Velvet Underground, “We Wish You A Merry Christmas,” “The Thin Ice” by Pink Floyd and “Total Eclipse Of The Heart.”

Those were some pretty trying times, many people feeling the loss of so many vibrant and wonderful members of the community to AIDS and with the emotional baggage Christmas can pack, the show became a cathartic joyous wonder to behold.

I suppose it did us a lot of good to see a character ripping the pretty false front off of the face of the most sacred holiday.  I dubbed Justin Bond San Francisco’s most dangerous performer and Kenny Mellman a genius who left blood across the ivory keys nightly.  To me they were the greatest show on earth.  It was a miracle that had to move on, and it did—to NYC.  And the rest is history.  Now Kiki and Herb are two-time Obie winners who have played all over the world, entertained at madonnas 39th birthday, played the premiere party for David Lynch’s Mullholland Drive, recorded a wonderful Christmas album, have become the unequalled press darlings of some of the nations most esteemed and respected publications, and have numerous celebrity fans that seem to believe as I do, that theirs is the greatest show on earth.

So christmas comes early for me this year as I for the first time fly to New York to see Kiki and Herb:  A Stranger in The Manger.  It’s funny how a nouveau sort of holiday tradition in a strange place can actually feel so much like coming home.  Hopefully I’ll arrive intact so I can visit ground zero or “The Hole” as I’ve been calling it, instead of becoming another one, or worse yet a hero. I hate flying.

Speaking of The Hole, or The Hole In The Wall Saloon, that is where Kiki and Herb told their audience to go for an afterparty following their sold out appearance at The Great American Music Hall last month.  She had heard that business at the once bustling dirty little biker bar that at one time sold more budweiser than Candlestick park and frequently had a line out the door had dropped off significantly ever since the smoking ordinance went into effect some time ago.  For some reason after the ordinance passed, the Hole came under intense scrutiny by the authorities who enforce it, as they must respond to any and all complaints ever phoned in to them.  Other bars in the neighborhood had structural options like a back door outside area to be designated for smokers and the Hole did not.

When customers continued to smoke inside the authorities responded with quick and severe penalties that included large fines and or forced closure for a penalty period.  Eventually came threats of liscense revocation which prompted employees to really crack down on the smokers or lose it all.  Well, no one who frequented the spirited outlaw-ish renegade bar took well to being told to not smoke and the drop in business continued, and I believe the scrutiny was much more intense on The Hole than other places—more than once the Newscenter 4 van would pull up and try to do a bit of investigative reporting.  Business continued to just drop off.  It was a huge fucking drag and all I could think was only in the state of california would we have to put up with such a bullshit legislation as this.

But my point in bringing all this up was simply to say hey folks, is stepping outside of the bar for a smoke really such an inconvenience that you don’t want to go there anymore?  We still offer the best and most consistant and relevant rock and roll music of any queer bar save for the Eagle and that’s because we share DJ’s, basic musical concepts, and the two bars are owned by the same people.  I still spin there two nights a week and I do my best to keep current and respect the rock as it has always been a personal crusade of mine for over a decade to play rock and roll music for the fags and dykes who love it, for the queers from all over the country who migrate to S.F. and are thoroughly stunned to hear the music they love being played in a queer bar—often for the first time.  I’ve noted that other bars in the neighborhood have even bent their usual formats to include more rock or feature specific nights with rock themes, although I cant vouch for the consistency on a purist level.  Aside from the focus of the music, a bar is what the patrons make it, and all the glorious wild goodtimes that bar has been over its 7 year history needn’t be thought of or referred to in the past tense and needn’t cower in the shadow of  it’s sibling bar The Eagle Tavern.  Go to the Hole, loyalty has it’s rewards.

As for The Eagle Tavern with it’s forever unrestricted-by-ordinance outdoor patio, a smokers refuge and cause enough for celebration, there has been one of the greatest developments in the local music scene brewing there for about a year now with their regularly featured Thursday night live bands for free.  It got started up in a sort of modest way but has really grown into a very busy, fun and increasingly well-attended weekly live showcase.  They’ve featured bands from as far away as sweden and various points across the states, showcased popular and well-known bands like the incredible Zen Guerrilla, Pansy Division, Black Kali Ma, Drunken Horse, Subarachnoid Space, Fabulous Disaster, Lost Goat, Vicor Krummenacher and far to many to name, all of which play their gigs for suggested donations collected by passing the hat throughout the night.  Last Thursday I admittedly put a tape in while working at the Hole in The Wall so I could dash over to the Eagle to catch Fabulous Disaster play an asskicking set and appear to be having the best time doing so and it struck me more than ever as I looked around at the crowd and saw so many other musicians from other bands present, just what a magical thing was happening with Thursday Night Live at the Eagle.  Great bands  from a broad spectrum of styles and origin want to play there because its fun.  A sense of community has really enveloped the event  and  right when the whole rock scene here in SF was very threatened by the economic difficulties of creating as a musician or artist in this high rent city of money grubbing slumlords.  Thursday nights are better than fucking Christmas any day.  For a list of upcoming shows visit the Eagle’s website at www.sfeagle.com.

It took me by complete surprise when I read it in an e-mail from a friend who obviously thought I knew about it already, as it had been in the gay newspapers locally but I somehow missed it.  As far as I know, the queens didn’t produce a makeshift shrine at the B of A on 18th and Castro like when Lucille Ball or Princess Diana died, so the actual news managed to evade me that our community lost a member who has always stood out in my mind as a true original, a master at her many creative endeavors, from her amazingly funny pitch-perfect work as a cartoonist, her incredible ability and masterful skill with the written word and the multitude of styles of writing she embraced over the years—poetry, prose, lyrics, speeches, sermons, spoken word and the nearly lost art of storytelling, perhaps what she was best at.  I felt a tremendous loss when I learned that Kris Kovic, a gifted, vibrant and constant source of inspiration for me as a writer, a queer, an activist, and a party monster, succumbed to a long battle with breast cancer.  Kris was a real live wire, a creative catalyst, always in motion and often prompting that creative flow in all those she touched as she traveled through the years like a jack-of-all-trades, trying her hand quite effectively at so many different artistic accomplishments.  Kris fucking rocked and news of her death really hit hard.  Rationally I knew that she had been struggling with breast cancer for quite some time, but when I learned Kris had died it took the breath out of me, the thought of such a vibrant, amazing, inspiring creative force, so important to so many, a friend to so many, forever taken from our midst by a medical malady, I was overwhelmed by sadness.  I thought I had gotten used to this death thing during the body count early 90’s.  I wrote about death so much I thought my byline should have had a Kubler-Ross thrown in the middle.  I processed through it very openly in print, eventually almost leading readers through the process like I was an aerobics instructor leading a class to Buns or Abs of  Steel in just 10 minutes a day.  I learned the value of  helping others as a way to help yourself in time of crisis,  but you never get used to losing people you have such a great amount of admiration and respect for.

I believe I first met Kris Kovic at  a  staff  meeting or party for a now-defunct local gay community paper we both worked for in the late 80’s.  She was a regular cartoonist whose contributions were hilarious depictions of dyke life, from ribald and sexually explicit to politically urbane and self-deprecating, Kris poked fun at the lesbian scene she was unquestionably a part of  with a refreshing honesty and candor that really chiseled away at the walls of separatism between gay men and lesbians, kind of showed a side of the dyke scene that many hadn’t been prithee to, in a time when the gay and lesbian communities were rapidly re-defining and growing and changing.  When we were introduced she shook my hand and said, “You really have a way with the turn of the phrase.  I like your work.”  I thanked her and complimented her similarly and we got to talking and before too long others joined in and an immediate rapport among a few of us writers and photographers on staff began.

We’d attend Kris’s various readings and events regularly, have occasional small dinner parties where we would listen to Kris tell us the most incredible stories about her family and her past, like a certain thanksgiving dinner with her family where her brother showed up careening a loud muscle car into the garage and quickly shutting the doors as if the cops were on his tail and entered the house with a beautiful transvestite hooker on his arm to meet the family.  Kris got to talking with the tranny later and learned that she was notorious in San Diego for picking up service men and taking them to her apartment and slipping them a mickey so they’d  pass out and then she would proceed to shave off their pubic hair and save it, using it as the primary stuffing material for these little handmade throw-pillows she crafted as a hobby.  She also told us about a time when she got on a municipal bus in a hurry one morning, and it must have been many years ago as she was wearing a long skirt and no underwear (“my hippie days,”) and while depositing her coins in the fare box she heard her pair of steel Ben Wa balls fall and hit the floor. She bent to quickly retrieve them and the bus accelerated and they rolled all the way to the back.  Like this, many of her stories were bawdy and for me quite shocking.  With a curt “this is off the record” intro she would relate a small handful of past sexual exploits with certain notable figures that would leave us cackling or with our jaws dropped open in disbelief.

One time she invited us to one of her organized readings at Red Dora’s Bearded Lady Café and we arrived just as they started to show a short film by a local dyke filmmaker.  We were the only men present, me, Marc Geller and Adam Block.  We took our seats and the film started, which was simply a series of odd tortuous things inflicted upon someone’s penis, including pounding a nail in the end of it, and letting a jar of stunned wasps loose on it, and a few other choice, well beyond pleasurable manipulations.  The dykes were roaring with laughter and various cat calls and when the lights were turned up they all turned around and looked at us and we looked back at them and we all burst into laughter.  That was typical of Kris, pushing for a dynamic that was unfamiliar or unusual or just plain funny, linking varied people together who might not generally mix it up, often bringing talents together that could benefit from or inspire each other or collaborate or just have dialogue and conceive of new possibilities.  She always seemed to be thinking of infinite possibilities and capabilities when considering her fellow artistic peers.  Her enthusiasm in this way never waned.

One time about ten years ago Kris called myself and Marc Geller and Adam Block on the phone and asked if we would meet her at a bar in the Castro one early evening.  We all assembled at the chosen place and Kris announced that it was her 40th birthday and after being clean and sober for eight years she had made the conscious decision to step off the wagon, and she couldn’t think of three people she’d rather be in the company of for this auspicious occasion than us.  I was so honored and couldn’t help but think, if she’s this much fun sober I can’t even imagine how much fun she might be in her planned departure from abstinence.  I was also reminded of her whole-hearted endorsement of my own proclivities towards certain illicit substances and the forthright pro-drug, pro-honesty mini-crusade I had begun in my columns.  She supported my position and did so while she herself was still very much clean and sober.   I was always impressed by this because in the late 80’s AA groups were terribly rabid and overwhelmingly large and they knew it all and reminded me of the Jehovah witness people that used to go door to door when I was little with their glassy-eyed look and Night Of The Living Dead creepiness, telling you what to believe, knowing what you were and what you must do to save yourself.

It’s also hard to forget the surreal night when Kris, an ordained mail order minister, officiated at the blessed union of Elvis Herselvis and Justin Bond at Klubstitute.  That was when the legendary club was being held at Brave New World on Fulton and was enjoying it’s most fertile, rich, and freak-happy time period.  The bride and groom exchanged cock rings and Kris pronounced them man and wife.  I believe she attended the bachelor party for Elvis the night before as well, departing before the mysterious exotic dancers and other naughty antics took place.
The last time I ran into Kris she appeared out of nowhere and solved a difficult situation like a guardian angel, and it all took place at the Walgreen’s on Castro and 18th.  I had just undergone some minor unmentionable and very painful surgery and walked directly from Davies Medical center to Walgreen’s to get my post surgery prescriptions of antibiotics and pain medication filled.  I reached the window and turned in my prescriptions only to be called back to the window and told that my doctor had failed to sign the prescription for the pain meds.  Panic shot through me as it had become increasingly more apparent that my local anesthetic was wearing off rapidly.  I asked the pharmacist if he could possibly just phone my doctor for verification as I had just come from there and had just undergone surgery and my anesthetic was wearing off.  He said no, that wouldn’t be possible.  I started raising my voice a bit, telling him it was ridiculous and absurd for him to deny me my necessary medication.  People started to note the situation and I suggested as I grabbed the unsigned script from his hand that perhaps I should just mark my own fucking chicken scratched initials on it and take it to another fucking pharmacy where I’m certain they wouldn’t have a problem with it.  He told me that would be against the law and he would phone the other pharmacies and warn them of my arrival.  I was furious and I suddenly heard a familiar voice ask,  “What’s the problem here?”  It was Kris Kovic.  I hadn’t seen her in about two years or more.  I explained my predicament and she said, “Honey, you just come over and sit down with me, I’ll take care of your pain needs.  Just forget about that jerk and sit with me.  I’m waiting for some really excellent morphine-one tab works twelve hours and they don’t make you throw up or anything.”  We sat and caught up and waited together, filling each other in on our particular ailments, latest projects, etc.  She of course had a grand plan she was working on to as always connect varied people together that could all help each other further distribute their work to a broader audience more effectively.  If Kris believed in your work then you better believe she wanted to enlighten as many new people as possible to it.  She was slightly evasive about her own physical condition when asked but concerned about my own.  The pharmacist behind the counter called her name and she went to pick them up and he asked if she needed a bag.  She said, “That’s okay, I’m gonna tear into them right now.  But wait, I do need a small bag so I can give my friend here a handful of these since you won’t.”   My hero fucked up the nasty pharmacist and reigned supreme.   He looked stupid, she distributed the meds to me with a warning not to over do it and we walked on out of the store.  I said to her that I don’t know what I’d have done without her and she smiled and said she was glad she was there for me.  She then invited me to an upcoming reading of hers at the John Simms center, saying there would be lots of fun people, “.people you should meet there.”  I told her she was my angel of mercy.  She smiled and we said goodbye.  That warm dreamy carefree blanket of relief enveloped me just as I reached my bed at home.  Thank you Kris Kovic, for everything.

—

Well, needless to say, while DJ-ing lately I’ve gotten a lot of requests for The Gang of Four’s song “Anthrax” since my last article.  I’m glad because Gang of Four was a truly fantastic band worthy of  reconsideration in so many ways.  They were the first post-punk blast of visceral angst-ridden politically outspoken, intellectual and loud music to remind us that the revolution was far from over.  They opened a dialogue for malcontents when most of the world seemed more than happy to seal the coffin closed on punk rock with the sugar coated, fashion friendly, mass market acceptable and vapid “New Wave”.  Their approach was in some ways far more intense. Taking their name from a group of chinese revolutionaries active during the chinese cultural revolution from 1966 to 1976, four Leeds University students formed the group in 1977.  Other acts from the same era and scene include The Fall, The Mekons, and The Delta 5.  The lyrical content showed not just cartoon anarchy and nihilism of a general nature directed towards any and everything establishment, but rather a more than passing knowledge of political theory and history.  Their song titles sounded like titles of radical political essays, “Guns Before Butter,” “At Home He’s A Tourist,” “It’s Her Factory” and the music was a completely fresh and charged exercise in hard somewhat minimal rhythmic assaults with terse angular sputtering guitar and vocals that were almost spoken rather than sung, flat and intense.  It doesn’t sound like a very appealing combination, and over-intellectualized political manifestos to boot, but Gang of Four managed to have a gripping jarring effect, cathartic and angry and and somewhat sloganistic and oddly enough you could dance to it.  This was due to the pushed-to-the-fore rhythm section of Dave Allen and Hugo Burnham, arguably among the first players in a rock outfit to dabble with a more R&B based low end funkiness matched with an aggressive and hard edged guitar sound.  Today that combination is very commonplace and bands like Red Hot Chile Peppers, Limp Bizcuit, Korn, and Rage Against The Machine have rode it to great success.

Gang of Four put out three absolutely essential records, Entertainment, Solid Gold, and Songs of The Free, all of which have been reissued recently, and their final studio effort before splitting Hard, a somewhat uneven but not without merit foray into a more R&B flavored realm. Before they disbanded in 1984, they played their final show here in San francisco, and I was lucky enough to catch that show as well as their Songs of The Free tour, the record that produced their first hit single in the U.S. “I Love A Man In Uniform.”  Both live sets were astonishing although by that time the original line-up had changed.  More recently there have been a couple attempts to reform the group in the 90’s yeilding two studio albums, Mall and Shrinkwrapped that were disappointing but with a few worthy moments, not enough to warrant big sales or massive touring.

There are two excellent collections available, History of The Twentieth Century and a more recent two disc set called A Hundred Flowers Blooming.  

This recent resurgence of interest in Gang of Four hasn’t been solely because of the new meaning current events have given to that one particular song, “Anthrax.”  It seemed to start well before the postal terrorism thing judging by all the new young bands who are sounding like Gang of Four are among their influences.  In fact there seems to be a great deal of  new bands heavily influenced by quite a few bands from that era currently, which I think is great.  Quite often a new record will remind me of  an old band and prompt me to start appreciating and listening to that band again, as well as the band they’ve influenced.  I think any musician being influenced by the abilities and style of other artists and that fact reflecting in their own music merely shows a pure love of music, the love and excitement of a fan as well as the drive of a musician creating their own.

As for “Anthrax,” I heard that recently when Victor Krummenacher, former Camper Van Beethoven and Monks of Doom Bassist, played at one of the EagleTavern’s always bitchin’ always free live Thursday night shows he led his band through a great cover of the song, with someone actually speaking the lyrics while he sang them simultaneously just like on the recorded original.  Recently after I played the song because someone requested it, the person who asked for it thanked me and said, “I knew you would be the only one tasteless enough to play it.”  I beg to differ, but thanks nonetheless.  Of course at the very sold out, absolutely mind-blowing Kiki and Herb show at Great American Music Hall last week, Kiki had a comment about the anthrax postal scare. Never one to shy away from frank discussion of current events she cautioned, “I tell all my friends, if you get any mail with white powder on it, don’t snort it!”  Earlier in the week I met an interesting person online who posed this thought on the subject, “So anthrax has killed two postal workers, isn’t that a mere fraction of  the total body count that disgruntled postal workers amass in a good year?”  He’s right you know.  My friend Jerry stopped by the other day while I was checking my e-mail and cautioned me, “Don’t open it, you’ll get anthrax.”

I remember once on an episode of The Big Valley one of the finest tv series of all time about the matriarchal Barkley family led by Victoria Barkley (Barbara Stanwyck), anthrax reared it’s dangerous head in the context of  the plotline.  I had never heard of it before which was odd being from a big cattle family myself.  But the story went something like this:  Victoria and her daughter Audra (Linda Evans, young and fresh from a controversial playboy pictorial) were travelling home to Stockton by stagecoach and decided to stop overnight in a small cattle town around auction time.  It was bustling and unruly with ranchers selling their herds and the ladies retired to their rooms to rest.  Victoria woke up and went to check on Audra and she was gone.  Then all the help at the hotel and drunks in the saloon and everyone basically told Victoria that she was mistaken, that she had arrived alone, there was no daughter nor anyone who even resembled the delicate blonde prarie flower arriving by stage that day.  They kept suggesting that she was travel weary and confused and that perhaps she should get more rest and maybe Doc could give her something to help her rest, etc.  Victoria was determined to prove that she woke up and suddenly the entire town was gas-lighting her, trying to drive her crazy and kidnapping her daughter.  By the time she really was starting to lose it, they ordered her to get on the coach and leave town alone.  She finally agreed and just as she was getting on the coach she reached in her pocket and found two ticket stubs, proof that she didn’t arrive alone.  That’s when they finally fessed up.  They had to hide Audra because she had come down with a case of anthrax and if any word of it got out it would spoil the entire economy for the town and all the hardworking ranchers  whose livliehood depended on selling their healthy non-diseased herds at auction.  So you see, they only drove her to the brink of madness because they had to.  They took her to the barn where they hid Audra and she was already in her travelling suit—the doctor had a vaccine so the fever broke and she was just fine.  Nothing was said about the cattle of  central california but audra didn’t die so throughout this crisis I believe I’ve managed to stay calm just by thinking of that episode on television.  After all, aren’t we all supposed to believe and resemble what it dictates to us anyway—especially in this time of national crisis?

Crisis, crisis, crisis, I’m so over it all!  I sometimes sit awake at night thinking about where the next terrorist attack will be, or if one is even possible or one of a similar magnitude at least.  I was moaning about it to a friend who stopped by and he brought up a very interesting thought that hadn’t occurred to me at all and I really wondered why it had never occurred to terrorists either, and that was, why hasn’t The Vatican ever been the target of terrorist attack?  Why hasn’t anyone flown a passenger jet right smack up the popes ass while he sleeps?  In fact, come to think of it, the pope has been relatively quiet during most of this situation.  Very Curious.  Odd how certain acts of terror can actually seem like better ideas than others.  I’m terrorism-jaded.

Finally, I have to say that Kiki and Herb’s sold out one night only appearance at the Great American Music Hall was by far the duo’s finest hour to date.  All the people I urged to go who had never witnessed the brilliance were totally blown away by a tour de force so huge and epic that it defies description.  Clearly San Francisco’s finest export, these two monumental talents gave us a two hours of pure genius, an act so politically incendiary and over the top you could watch the jaws drop, hear the laughter, and even notice a tear or two, but more than anything you knew that kiki and herb are at the top of their game, doing something no one else in the world does.  They are originals in the grandest sense of the word, making sense of the chaos, making life worth living.  All I can think of to say is thank you, Justin Bond and Kenny Mellman, you’re a class act.

Here it is, one month after the historic terrorist attack on the world trade center and in so many ways the situation and the commentary and coverage of it is still very, well…tender.  The ongoing reports are very detailed, showing the long winding bending tendrils of every angle of touching human interest imaginable from this unprecedented act of international terror, from the amazingly odd personal human coincidences and near misses, astonishing figures regarding man power and total amounts of debris, down to the overworked bagpipe band who’ve played firemen’s funerals non stop since the event or the families who lived in neighboring condos and the choices they face.  It’s undeniable that people from every walk of life have had to rethink, re-evaluate, and think twice before saying certain things ever since the attack.  It’s especially interesting to see how celebrities and artists and writers and basically the whole entertainment industry is responding and /or modifying their usual schtick or candor or business operations in the aftermath of the terrorist assault.  I noted on all the late night talk shows the somber and awkward first night back, where basically the funny guys like Jay Leno, Conan O’Brien, and David Letterman were faced with the entirely un-funny situation of slipping back into their work, something that would be delicate and difficult and almost compromised or even censored.  Most noticeably absent were the many usual pot shots at our president, the president who (as the news constantly reminds us) is enjoying the highest approval rate of any president in the nations history, although I’d like to know the history of national approval rates for the presidents, or how this nefarious and questionable polling survey figure comes about and gets bandied about as hard fact, the final word on the majority of the populace.  I just don’t understand this approval rating thing.  I mean, hello, remember the Kennedy administration? Popularity pales in comparison?  I don’t think so.  I’d also like to know how Mary Todd Lincoln might feel about this statement.  Whenever I hear about it I think to myself, “Says who?”  It’s just a crock of shit fed to us as usual, one bite at a time, vitamin enriched with Survivors guilt and emotionally manipulative tear lubricated patriotism supplement, plus time released bursts of doubt-blocking allegiance, for those times when rallying around the war-hungry leader is interrupted by the pesky little memory that you once lost sleep over the thought of this man ever becoming our president.  The news comes in so handy when you’re trying to forget certain things, while not letting you forget others.

A lot of decisions for sudden changes in plans hit Hollywood after the September 11 bombing.  A couple of major motion picture plans were scrapped completely for having plots that somehow prophetically involved terrorist attacks on the world trade center, and whole episodes of certain prime time television shows were held back or rewritten or modified due to the heightened sensitivity of having something we usually view as entertainment actually happen to us.  Imagery and plotlines and dramas and action adventure features have been dishing up events like this with regularity forever, we pay money and stand in line to see it, they pour it on thick in television at specific times to achieve record ratings, but when it really happens, watch out!  Everyone had to change their tune and quickly so as not to appear ghoulish, or make light of the tragedy, or trounce all over the victims graves, trivializing the many lives lost.  If something you said or did or wrote or sang or produced seemed even remotely unpatriotic or stuck the wrong way in the orbital rings of compassion, honorary gestures to the brave, heroic and dead civil servants, and the impending and nationally nurtured hunger for retaliation spinning around this event, it could very easily spell the end of having a career as an entertainer.  The dynamic could be similar to what Hollywood went through during the McCarthy era when careers and lives were crushed by accusations of alliance with the communist party.

There is a specific instance of a rather unlucky coincidence that rolled out at just the worst possible time for a local rap act called The Coup.  Known for their steadfast commitment to create songs that rally against societal injustices faced by the afro-American population with a gritty fat dose of street-level truth and a more than pedestrian knowledge of political theory and history, The Coup, (Boots and DJ Pam the Funktress) stand as the most politically motivated and outspoken rap act since Public Enemy.  With album titles like Genocide and Juice, Kill My Landlord and Steal This Album, you kind of get an idea where they’re coming from.  They shy away from much of the Gangsta-rap mystique and cop killing manifestos of violence associated with southern California rappers like N.W.A., have a minimum amount of sexist lyrical content, have songs that admonish the common rap self-reference of “Nigga,” and are opposed to the current slew of east coast rappers and the imagery of outrageous opulence that could prompt a whole generation of young blacks who choose Donald Trump as a hero rather than Malcolm X.  Their fourth and latest record, Party Music 2001 was due for release on September 18, but that date has been pushed back indefinitely due to the band’s chosen artwork for the cover, an image that was developed at least two months before the terrorist attack and luckily never even made it to the presses and was pulled off their labels’ internet site faster than imaginable.  Spin Magazine reviewed the disc and they had a postage stamp sized version of it partially obscured by a number so you couldn’t really see what it was.  The review makes no reference to the image but in no uncertain terms proclaims it a great record, charting the ever-changing moods of the discs political manifestos, musical ironies, and the band’s historical development in such an exciting manner I mentally placed it on the top of my list of music to buy.  The number that obscured the tiny cover art was a nine, the album’s rating on a one thru 10 scale.  This could be the disc that finally achieves the recognition The Coup so richly deserve.  Then came the terrorists by jet to Manhattan and changed everything.

The chosen cover art for Party Music 2001 was a photo of Pam the Funktress and Boots standing at the base of the World Trade Center, boots holding onto a detonation device and the towers above them exploding in orange and black balls of flame at slightly different levels.  It looked so much like it looked on television September 11 it gave me chills.  Each explosion seemed to literally match the actual point of impact of the two jets.  It was uncanny, and it took a fair amount of searching the internet to find a copy of it.  To date the record has yet to be released with a different cover—something I thought they might do as quickly as possible considering the fair amount of anticipation and positive press it had earned in advance.  Mysteriously there has been no word on a new release date.  I’m certain that the intention of the albums cover art was simply satirical, the comic book-like destruction of an enduring landmark of capitalism.  It’s such a twisted bit of fate that it actually happened, nobody believed it ever could, not even after the first attempt on the structure a few years back. But it did, and I hope for the sake of a pair of committed artists who have consistently put out great music with a unique level of political sensitivity you rarely find in the genre of rap, that this uncanny coincidence doesn’t hinder the public’s embrace of their latest and arguably best work.  Lets get it to the shelves, we want Party Music 2001.

Another odd post-destruction coincidence that undoubtedly will affect another musical group comes to an Austin-based synth-pop duo that have been around for about two years now.  They have a light, airy and pleasant sort of futuristic Stereolab kind of sound that I have started to enjoy immensely.  The name of this band is I Am The World Trade Center, and when I first heard of them I thought it was the best new band name I’ve heard in ages.  Let’s hope they can keep the name with out encountering too much adversity.

While I was DJing at the Hole in The Wall recently, post terrorist attack, it suddenly struck me that certain songs I might play with regularity could be construed as insensitive, vicious or unpatriotic to the patrons of the bar, and I briefly began to censor myself, even denying certain requests because I feared they might offend in a whole new fresh way.  Well I got over that pretty quickly, prepared to defend myself if necessary with the pat response, “It’s all open to interpretation.”

I played “Anthrax” by Gang of 4 twice that night.  “….and that’s something that I don’t want to catch.”

Finally, one thing you are all going to want to catch takes place at the great American music hall on October 25, and that is the triumphant return of Kiki and Herb to the San Francisco stage!  The illustrious duo managed to squeeze a date in for the folks who watched them grow, head out and conquer the goddamned world with their act of no compare.  I’m so transfixed with excitement I can hardly breathe.  If you see one motherfucking show all year, make it this one.  A friend of mine in LA just caught the act last night and she described it as “life-affirming.”  I’m curious about Kiki’s level of post terrorist sensitivity.  Lighten up isn’t something Kiki would do, ever.  Why should she?  She is a landmark and vulnerable isn’t a part of her vocabulary.  The glory is yours to behold.  8 pm.  I’m counting the hours.

In the wake of last months terrorist attack, I bet many of you were
wondering about the safety of certain former San Franciscans who had
relocated to New York, and I hope that, like myself, you’ve finally gotten
through to the friends and relations who live there and have found them to
indeed be alive and safe.  My thoughts went immediately to Justin Bond and
Kenny Mellman the geniuses behind New York’s hippest and most popular
underground cabaret act Kiki and Herb.  I knew they had just returned to New
York from Seattle where they made an appearance opening for the fantastic,
unusual, brilliant and utterly sick British outfit, The Tiger Lilies, who
were being courted by various labels and reportedly the whole gang launched
their own form of terrorist assault in the form of accepting an invitation
to a “wine ’em, dine ’em” expense account dinner with some poor label
representative whom I’m sure was scared to death of this crew of truly
fabulous booze-swilling miscreants popular for singing songs and telling
stories of  murder, prostitution, beastiality, freaks, perverts, crucifying
Jesus, killing children, drug addiction, and execution, all with an
accordion, a stand-up bass, an unusual drum kit and the otherworldly
falsetto of vocalist Martyn Jacques.  And need I remind you that many years
ago Justin Bond was lovingly referred to as San Francisco’s most dangerous
performer with good reason.  What a hazardous and delicious group of fun
that would be after a few dozen oysters and bottles of port, but I’m pleased
to report that Justin and Kenny are indeed fine, both not finding themselves
anywhere near the WTC at 9 in the morning on that fateful unforgettable,
etched-by-the-media into our manipulated brains and knee
jerk-patriotic-souls day, September 11, 2001.  I wasn’t going to be
satisfied till I heard it myself though, and was relieved when I finally
talked to them. Relieved and thrilled as well to learn that Kiki and Herb
will be the brave and fearless Americans we’ve always known them to be and
will soon board an actual airplane and cross the amber waves of grain to Los
Angeles for a three-week engagement in the month of October.  Like soldiers
overseas, we’re starved on this coast for an extended run from this pair of
true entertainment greats, we need to see that firm and resolute “the show
must go on” spirit in the face of adversity, like infantry men in need of a
morale boosting USO show.  Who better than Kiki and Herb can show us the
true meaning of Enduring Freedom?  As Kiki has said in the past, “Ladies and
gentlemen, people die. That’s all you need to know.”
I know I’ll be making a pilgrimage down for the shows, by car instead of
plane, as we can’t all be heroes and L.A. is so much easier when you arrive
with wheels.  It actually takes about two hours more if you just drive than
it takes to fly into LAX and try to get to any of the fun spots in L.A.
where your friends might live.  I’m not a driver myself but I will say that
as a passenger on a long car trip I can be a hell of a lot of fun.  I’m not
fully clear on the details of their run at this point except that it will
take place at a venue called The Atlas, 4 nights a week for three weeks.  At
press time I’m still seeking the reservation process out, as will anyone
truly dedicated to the unequaled heroics and devastating inspiration of Kiki
and Herb.  We do what we can.
The other night I found myself cruising online using a popular web cam-based
streaming video program called Webcamnow.  This program enables you to
project whatever image is being picked up by your personal web camera into a
community forum for other people to view and be viewed live and to chat with
them in corresponding chat rooms simultaneously.  You know, the old “simple
phone calls will broadcast live images of the person you’re speaking to in
the future” tech prediction has finally come to be!  Someday is today, but
did anyone at all anticipate that the majority of moments captured by this
technological advancement would be gay male cock shots in varying stages of
excitement/ undress?  Also included are a small handful of straight couples,
straight guys looking for straight girls and vice versa, and the rare and
occasional instance of a same sex pairing on cam, but the definite majority
of all live streaming broadcasts are gay male.  You can peruse through the
long list of individuals who are broadcasting and pick your favorite one to
view then try to locate what chat room he’s in so you can send him instant
messages like “Hey dude, nice basket,” or “Are you going to lose the pants
soon?” or “where are you stationed?” as a great deal of men in the armed
forces seem to choose this web cam avenue to satisfy certain urges.  Well,
my screen name is Rockfag so the moment I send a message to a predominately
heterosexual room I get a myriad of unpleasant responses like “Get lost
faggot.  Room 8 is the gay room.” Or “I’m straight, dude, I like ladies.”
Depending on how mischievous I might be feeling I’ll badger and spar with
the subject, replying with something very nasty in the sexual sense like, “I
‘m gay and I like straight dick slapping my face, so what?”  or  “You’re
getting a rod just thinking about it, huh soldier boy?”  More admonishments
sweep the room directed at me and my kind then some of the other members of
the chat, females and gay guys pretending to be females start working the
hot military guy with the “You’re a hero” angle and “I really admire your
patriotism” in an effort to get to the same thing I’m aiming at-naked hard
military cock.  “So, hero, you really owe it to this nation to show us your
huge cock.”  He replies “Pathetic-You are the enemy.”  Falwell said it-did
this moron listen?  Time for the big guns I thought. “Does it count as
friendly fire when yr buddy shoots a load on yr face in the shower?”
“Admit it soldier boy-your cock is getting hard just thinking about it”
“You’re touching it now Huh?
At this point the young marine became so furious he told me that if he gets
sent to the battlefields of Afghanistan for actual combat and has to kill
others to survive he’s going to pretend that each and every one he kills is
me!
“You’ve had time to memorize my picture?”
“You are a cock hungry little butt boy aren’t you?”
It is such a blast to be juvenile to the conditioned patriot
“Hard to ask or tell when your mouth is full, isn’t it?”

Now what was I going to write about this week before our nation was turned upside down by an act of terrorism the likes of which this country has never witnessed and in the minds of most Americans was an unfathomable possibility?  I can’t quite remember really.  And here three days into the continued live media coverage of this catastrophic, devastating, ruthless act, replete with buckets of blood, buckets of tears, yards of stars and stripes, rally-around-retaliation unity inducing motivational programming, it really seems like overkill for me to go there as well but I think I must.

I just happened to be watching the early morning news as the story broke.  An airplane had crashed into the world trade center, one tower was smoking and burning and I’m catching the details as they unfold, the pentagon was also hit by a plane, the nation was clearly under terrorist attack of an unprecedented magnitude.  I’m watching live footage of the smoldering tower and I see a plane and I think, “Gee, isn’t it kind of risky to be flying so close to a burning building, oh my god and it’s a passenger jet,” and then boom it careened right into the second tower, creating a huge ball of flame and it was clear to me at that moment that life as we know it, like the New York skyline, was forever changed.

One of my first thoughts was, “I’m going back to London,” but it was clear that for the time being no one would be traveling anywhere by air for awhile and basically immigration of any kind would take on a whole new meaning.  Then my thoughts went directly to trying to imagine the utter and complete horror of being a passenger on a hijacked plane steered off course for the sole purpose of destroying the world trade center.  It sounds like an action adventure film starring Nicolas Cage that you saw the preview for once and the soundtrack music was that cool song by White Zombie.  And that is the song that I heard in my head as I saw the second plane crash into the tower and explode into a massive ball of orange and black flame, because the attack was so very Hollywood.  It was a heinous crime with a huge body count of totally innocent people, incredible that it could even happen, and so economically and brutally low tech.  Hard to believe that such a low budget attack translated visually to an Irwin Allen wet dream.  It was dramatic and mind-boggling and rich with plots and sub-plots and stories.  I don’t mean to trivialize the event by saying this, but it was the stuff Hollywood thrives on.  It was a cinematic execution.

I then started considering the hijackers willingness to die in an attempt to strike a deadly blow against America.  It meant enough to them to die for it, but then again, it probably meant an e-ticket to heaven as well in that charming faith in which these culprits possibly live their lives.  I know it doesn’t seem fair to judge on this level but certain fundamentalist religions are known for providing justification for a variety of atrocities against humanity and have for thousands of years.  One need only to recall the many apologies made a few years back by the pope regarding the Spanish Inquisition to know that one faiths actions could be viewed as freeing the lives and souls of the devout from certain evils while another faith could view it as mass extermination, a holocaust, a war crime or a crime against all of humanity.  This makes it very difficult when an American asks himself, “Why us?” because starting with our nuclear retaliation on Japan for the attack on Pearl Harbor, directly and insidiously this nation has clearly had the blood of similarly innocent people on it’s hands.  Many Americans including myself try to search their collective memories for events of a similar nature that we’ve been involved in and a clear picture is practically impossible due to the possibly covert nature of our involvement.  Of course the only perception of certain events we have to go on is what the media has provided.  The ideology of heroism, the act of defending freedom can always embrace or justify a heinous unthinkable bloodbath and tremendous loss of innocent human lives when ever the moral barometer is set by the church or any form of fundamentalist religion.  What singular church or religion is currently setting the moral barometer for the United States?  Perhaps the one that hasn’t returned to regular programming since the morning of September 11.

And speaking of fundamentalist religions and atrocities to humanity, The Reverend Jerry Falwell made some of the most vindictive, retarded and savagely stupid statements of his entire career in the aftermath of the bombings, a time when former presidents both democratic and republican, defeated candidates, former opponents, etc., all laid their previous differences aside in a show of solidarity in the face of this crisis, what does Falwell see fit to do?  In an interview with Pat Robertson for the 700 club after they both expressed their sorrow and outrage over the attack, Falwell went on to say,

“Throwing God out successfully with the help of the federal court system, throwing God out of the public square, out of the schools,” he said. “The abortionists have got to bear some burden for this because God will not be mocked. And when we destroy 40 million little innocent babies, we make God mad.”

“The pagans and the abortionists and the feminists and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People for the American Way — all of them who have tried to secularize America,” Falwell continued, “I point the finger in their face and say ‘you helped this happen.’”

Was that not perfect?  Just a chance for him to manipulate a devastated nations anger and fear and pain.  Just a twist of modern televangelist essence in a cocktail as purely barbaric and eye-for-an-eye old testament as anything Bin Laden might come up with.  Does anyone see that one fundamentalist religion is just as bad as another?  Can one imagine just how a leader might train an individual to do certain things by playing on his fears and offering up eternal salvation as a reward for acts of terror?  How can I say that Reverend Falwell is anything like that monster Osama Bin Laden?  Oh I don’t know, let’s see—bombed abortion clinics, assassinated medical doctors, celebrating the death of hate crime victims and AIDS activists, to name a few.  The quest for salvation seems to be at the root of living and carrying out a terrorist existence.

A white house official stated the next day that the president definitely does not share those views, and Rev. Falwell, a beacon of truth, intelligence, decency and spirituality then retracted his comments, claiming they were taken out of context, and saying that indeed the only ones responsible for this act of terror were the actual terrorists and the people and nations who enabled and harbored them.  Such conviction you show for your beliefs.  Perhaps you should stick to criticizing those horrible tele-tubbies painted up like gay whores.  No, just keep doing what you’re doing and we’ll be just fine—all of us predatory homosexuals, women, the cult of abortionists, the ACLU, and the federal court system that helped bring down the World Trade Center.  Thank heaven America now knows where to logically direct its anger and sadness and possibly vengeful acts of violent retaliation when the dust finally settles.  Dust is tragically what as many as 5000 people still considered  “missing” by hopeful but sadly deluded relatives, is what these lives were reduced to at the hands of some depraved individuals willing to die in their attempt to harm America.  It still just doesn’t seem real, but in the coming days the complex effects of this event will throw many harsh realities of immediate and certain impact directly at the American people, like salt in a wound, so many things you haven’t even thought of but once they start, the logic behind each one will be apparent.  Brace yourself for the long-term effects of an economy shattered, prepare to give up certain basic human rights, anticipate governmental funding of numerous programs to be cut in lieu of beefing up the military not only for our continued protection (which obviously didn’t work) but for the soon to unfold military plans of retaliation, which will likely be the most intense, extravagant and sci-fi high tech assault ever known to modern warfare when ironically the act they’re avenging was pulled off with xacto knives and razor blades and computerized pilot courses and Floridian flight schools There are countless subtle things this event has changed and will change forever.   I found myself saying something the morning of the attack that my nasty cantankerous doomsayer witch of a grandmother used to say about a lot of events historically—most of the time probably just to scare us kids and give us nightmares so she could tease us when we reached the point of tears and sobs and came to her for comfort.  Yeah she was a major bitch, and she would say, “It’s the beginning of the end.”  I’ve often reminded myself that throughout my 39 years on this planet, and the centuries preceding, that sentiment has been expressed numerous times and it was never true.  It seemed like a superstitious ridiculous cop-out, a ploy to frighten children into proper behaviors like a fable.  I’ve seen enough to know that catastrophe would not engulf all of humanity before I died of natural causes and decomposed to dust and a couple pieces of jewelry in a casket underground.  But I said it that Tuesday morning, and there were no unruly children within earshot, needing their carefree childhood bubbles to be burst.  I was alone, and I think I believed it as a layer of acrid dust fell from the sky in Manhattan.  The fucking bitch got me, from beyond the grave even and I was lost for a moment in fear—a dreadful fear that at one time paralyzed me till mornings light, blankets pulled tightly over my head.

To explain my sudden absence from the past two issues of bay times, I took a vacation to London, leaving this country for my first time ever, if you don’t count Tijuana and Montreal, which I don’t really, as they are technically all on the same land mass and neither of them were near as much fun as London.  This I’m certain has a lot to do with my gracious hosts and former roommates the notorious Adam and Michael, also known as The Canadians.  Just prior to my arrival they persuaded an undesirable roommate to vacate the premises, no doubt running and screaming just so I could have my own room.  The poor thing left a trail of anti-depressants and high-tech gadgets in his wake and rang the doorbell and ran away a few times during my stay, but having my own little room in a council flat in the heart of Brixton was great.

There were a couple of things I hadn’t anticipated at all about traveling to London, one was the sweltering and humid heat, a near constant for the entire two weeks and the other was jet-lag.  No kidding, you’d think that by now I had artificially altered my own body clock well beyond being affected by the crossing a silly little international dateline, but the first three days consisted of sleeping interrupted by occasional minor outings, yawning and nodding out on the Tube-London’s totally incredible underground subway system, the scope of which and experiencing it definitely requires all of ones faculties, energy and focus.  It frightened me at first but eventually the tube became my friend, whisking me through its labyrinth of tunnels, stops, connections, walkways, platforms, escalators and rush hour insanity.  Adam and Michael had devised a fun little game to help me learn the stops.  It involved being on a crowded train and making up dirty variations on the upcoming stops names and asking me out loud within earshot of other passengers questions like, “Are you going to Twatenham Cunt Road?” (Tottenham Court Rd) or “We’ll transfer to the Circle-jerk Line at Splooge Street,” (Circle Line, Goodge Street) or “We’re getting off at Felchley Road before Wet Humpstead,” (Finchley Road, West Hampstead) or “The stop you take is Fuckhirst Hole, not Fartingdon,” (Buckhirst Hill, Farringdon) and you get the picture.  Infantile as it seems, my sides were splitting trying to supress laughter on a crowded train over this word game, all the way to their home address on Crusted Rod (Croxted Road).

I also had the pleasure of meeting up with ex-patriot Ggreg Taylor for a wild evening out.  Now three months into his residency in London and essentially he is happy as can be.  He was getting ready to return stateside with his charming boyfriend Warren for Burning Man.  I’ve never seen Ggreg being more happy, thrilled with the prospect of being able to act more himself than the media savvy activist/organizer/opulent superstar image he forged in this town and upheld for a decade.  For a change he’s organizing his own life, indulging in selfish pleasures he’s possibly denied himself in the past, and devoting himself to having and being a boyfriend and I really couldn’t be happier for him.  I’ve never known him to do the boyfriend thing and it really agrees with him.  However, I feel like I know Ggreg well enough to say that I could see wheels turning in his head and fabulous ideas will in time be unleashed upon London’s world class nightclub scene, something San Francisco retains but a dim memory of and seems in constant danger of being stanched completely.  Tis a pity.

Warren and Ggreg met me at a place called The Vauxhall Tavern for a drag act called The Dame Edna Experience.  That scene was very very crowded with hot men all of whom had serious buzz cuts—not a full head of hair in the place really, which I cant say I didn’t like.  And the boys are fanatical about their drag divas, replete with audience participation, and choral booming chants of “Ed-na-aaa, Ed-na-aaa Ed-na-aaa.”  She was pretty funny, and belted out a tune like first verse as Dame Edna, second as the original artist (impressive Karen Carpenter, Atomic Kitten, Celine Dion etc) and third verse as himself I think.  It was clever and Edna has a delicious mean streak—sparring with an annoying heckler.  She joined the crowd out of drag afterwards and seemed like a very fun person.  Something else I hadn’t realized was such a common practice for a night out in London was the massive amounts of ecstasy people do.  They’d pop a half tab in yr mouth every couple hours.  It was the act that said, “Welcome To London.”  Not my drug of choice and having not done it for 10 years or so, it was like a new experience.  People would ask me if I was okay and I’d say, “I’m so high,” and they’d say, “So American—here we say,’I’m off my face.’  Would you like a bump of K to even things out?”  Who am I to refuse when a bullet full of powder my cat has done more of than I have is slammed to my nose.  It was all done so openly too, and I didn’t end up hugging people too much or walk wobbly and pee on a stack of magazines thinking it was my litter box like Handsome my cat did after he was neutered.  I certainly missed him while gone.  He would have liked the fact that foxes roam the suburban streets and backyards of Brixton—I saw one.

One of our major planned outings for my trip was to attend the famous annual Reading Music Festival, a three day long multiple stage multiple act rock and pop music festival that I had read about for years.  Reading is just a train ride away from London and is a curious little otherworldly resort-ish town that about 80,000 young people descend upon for three days of music towards the end of summer.  It was very hot outside so we were spared the burning-man-esque 60,000-person mudbath it has turned into in years past.  It was a strange trek to the site of the festival through a makeshift tent village and a huge fair-like mass of merchants booths set up to provide for the concertgoers every need, from head supplies and smart drugs to glowing jewelry and Indian parasols and bootleg CD’s and Rave fashion accessories.  It all felt rather weird, like a cross between a hippie/raver chill-out zone (a popular club term in London, chill-out, not quite sure of the meaning but it has made it to the front windows of many corner grocers) crossed with a Turkish earthquake refugee camp.  The people were bent on partying bigtime but I must say the crowd was quite civilized and free of many of the anticipated trappings of such an event, like say no one vomited on us, we weren’t beaten or raped or dosed by a stranger and we got to see all of the days acts we were interested in seeing.

The first act we caught was the “It-band” of the moment, especially in England, whom I had just seen here before I left on vacation at Bottom of the Hill and for all practical purposes, the sensation surrounding The Strokes is fully warranted. At the Reading Festival they were moved from one of the smaller stages to the main stage at the last minute as they truly have hit London like a full on pop sensation, Radiohead and Kate Moss and Vivienne Westwood in the audience, Japanese girls outside paying 500 pounds for scalper’s tickets, etc.  I was delighted to see that an old favorite of mine, The White Stripes are currently enjoying a similar response in London as well, like the second coming of Christ or something.  Told ya so.  When I left London the entertainment guide Time Out featured The Strokes on the cover with the headline, “Why does everyone want to shag the Strokes?”  Easy, they are all totally adorable   They have a really likeable and fresh sound that is seemingly drawn from mostly influences indigenous to their native New York City from a host of bands dating back about twenty years or so.  They remind me of Television, The Velvet Underground, a little Modern Lovers, a bit of Talking Heads, that sort of thing—all blended up and spit out with a solid pitch energy that envelops you in a warm irresistible and familiar pop/rock joy.  Their songs do what songs should do, the instrumentation while far from bombastic provides a fervor and fury that is exhilarating with melodies and constructions that shine with half innovation and half homage.  Their songs hit your aural senses like a well-tailored article of clothing—it feels good on.  There’s a vocalist that sounds just like Strokes vocalist Julian Casablanca and I can’t for the life of me figure out who it is.  Any suggestions?

At Reading their set was picture perfect—the sound was excellent, they seemed extra boisterous and self-assured performing to their largest audience to date and I’m sure they were thrilled to be moved to a main stage spot just before Iggy Pop and P.J.Harvey.  Their 12-song set hit the high marks in my opinion but the pressure must really be harsh for a young band deemed the next big thing and causing an international sensation.  I hope it doesn’t eat them alive, but they do seem to be somewhat careful and levelheaded about it.

As we watched from the small patch of shade provided by a soft ice cream truck, inhaling exhaust just to be in the shade, Iggy Pop hit the stage, bearded and looking like the hottest guy to ever play the role of jesus.  I’ve never seen Iggy and I’ve heard how great he was and must admit, for such an old guy he looks great half naked whipping around the stage like a maniac.  His set consisted mainly of his latest LP, which has one or two decent songs but is an overall disappointment.

I couldn’t wait to hear something from the Stooges era Iggy—some of the most important and seminal rock music ever recorded, and he eventually did “I Wanna Be Your Dog” (big surprise there huh?) and it was lackluster and I began to see him as a former great with a bunch of Slash-wannabe L.A. studio musicians aping out this bought and sold rock and roll angst thing so I went on a search for batteries for our digital cams—both had gone dead, leaving Adam and Michael in the shade so they wouldn’t whither in the sun with heat stroke.  No batteries but I could have gotten body pierced if I wanted.  Next up was PJ Harvey, our main reason for attending—and it was high time the sun start to set.  This gave us the confidence necessary to get closer to the stage, which was flanked with two huge video screens which were great for watching from afar all day.

We actually got pretty close with relative ease and then P.J. Harvey was announced and what we saw onstage had all of our jaws just dropping.  She walked out on stage wearing a black bra, a shiny little black slit mini-skirt, knee-high five-inch spiked heel boots, red red lips and nails and very black hair.  This was the furthest thing from an outfit I would have anticipated from her and she looked phenomenally acutely sexy and aggressive.  She is a fucking goddess.  Also another element to her multifaceted mysterious image came to the fore twice during the set when she stopped two different songs and made her musicians do it right.  “We’re going to give Eric a chance to tune his bass guitar and start that again properly.”

She was giving full on I-can-be-difficult Diva supreme, which I always suspected might be the case.  Her set was a welcome respite from that hollow power-chord mongering that riles the crowd up.  Her songs were more subtle and softer but no less intense.  She did mostly material from her latest, Stories From the Ocean, Stories From the Sea including a really great song that I learned was on the British version of that disc but not the domestic U.S. release.  My favorite part of her set was a chilling version of “Rid Of Me” which she performed alone with just an electric guitar, and as the cameras for the screens focused on her face and she started to sing that quiet high part of the repeated words, “lick my legs, I’m on fire, lick my legs of desire,” I swear it was like she was channeling a personality, her voice almost thrown, her face contorting slightly like she was speaking out of one side of her mouth.  It gave me goose bumps.  I think the only other vocalist I’ve ever seen that manages that intense quality, a psychological complexity, like the keeper of many voices is Diamanda Galas.  And then she’d just rip into the guitar parts so furiously and loud and powerful and solo.  By the end of her set all the other artists back stage were crowding the wings watching and thinking there was no way they could top her performance.  Billy Joe of Green Day told the press that it was at that point that he decided they would have to light all their equipment on fire at the end of their set, which they did but we missed it, opting for a leisurely train ride home before the rush.

And I’ll have to tell you more about London in my next column because I barely dented it.

Recently I attended a book release event that I not only found very interesting but was actually invited to take part in as one of four people asked by the writer to read passages from his latest book, something he doesn’t ever do himself because he is painfully shy and seems to go to great lengths to maintain a certain anonymity by not creating a recognizable public persona.  The writer is the young and extraordinarily gifted literary wunderkind JT Leroy and the book, his second is called The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things, a collection of shorter works of his, mostly written before his first novel Sarah.  The event took place at Books Inc. on Market St., former place of employment of Michelle Tea, kick ass writer who won the Lambda Literary Award For Lesbian Fiction for her novel Valencia, and only recently has relocated to Los Angeles to do glamorous readings with big stars like Ann Magnusson at super hip places like the courtyard of the Coral Sands Hotel, and I’m sure a world of other good things too.  We’ll miss you Michelle but L.A. isn’t that far away and basically you will be a blast there.  Michelle is the one who introduced me to the writings of JT Leroy in the first place.  It was after his first book release event for Sarah (basically structured in the same way with other writers reading selections from the novel while JT remained conspicuously absent sending only an e-mail to be read to the assembled group beforehand) that I personally began receiving an occasional E-mail from JT.  I was of course thrilled to hear from him and doubly thrilled to hear he was familiar with my column and what not. His e-mails were hilarious and animated and sweet and unpretentious, much like I figured an e-mail from a shy 21 year old with a background of drugs abuse, prostitution, and a much played upon in his work abusive and neglectful relationship with his mother.  It’s kind of hard to tell where exactly the blurred lines between his real life experience and the bizarre alternate world of truck stop pimps selling the blessings of a little girl said to be a saint who is really a little boy where a type of onion-like vegetable when cooked produces a tear gas like effect and a raccoon penis bone signifies which pimp you are owned by.  I asked JT a lot of questions about odd details in his first novel and he’d always have amusing anecdotes in explanation.  I also started to hear around then the ever-rising voice of doubt and speculation as to who JT really is and if he even exists or is he a character merely invented by another more famous literary figure.  After all, no one that I knew had ever met him in person once, and this included people who had interviewed him for publications, arranged events in his honor, etc.

I decided to invite him out to see a show with me one time but he was able to decline as he was embarking on a location hunt with Gus Van Sant who had recently agreed to put Sarah to film, something the director disclosed in a local interview, along with the fact that he and JT had been hanging out and collaborating.  Eventually I asked JT what I should think about the varied reports and theories and speculations about his true identity.  He responded saying, “Everything you read or hear is all true.”  At that point I became a bit frustrated with the mystery.  If JT were someone else that would mean all of our correspondences were elaborate tricks designed to fool me or keep me in the dark about his true identity. Just as I finished reading Sarah I became almost offended enough by the whole situation to kind of stop thinking about it, like I had been duped or had fallen prey to a manipulative gimmick.  I stopped e-mailing JT.

When I first read a review of his new book I of course planned on picking up a copy but before I managed to get out and do so I got an E-mail from Silke Tudor, a local writer who was organizing JT’s latest book release event.  The e-mail invited me to read aloud from the new book, along with Susie Bright, V. Vale of REsearch Magazine, and Lynn Breedlove, front-person from dyke rock outfit Tribe 8, writer and spoken word artist.  I immediately agreed to do it and went out and got the book.  The Heart Is Deceitful Above All Things is a far cry different than Sarah.  Where Sarah only begins to scratch the surface of the darkness that one could assume to be the more autobiographical details of JT’s life (before the storyline goes almost sci-fi Dukes of Hazard action/adventure fantasy with gun slinging Asian trannies and daredevil stunt drivers) The Heart Is Deceitful plunges you deep into the darkness of abuse and degradation, told with a certain odd tenderness and lush abstract beauty that is harrowing and effective and powerful.  It’s no light-hearted romp through ones childhood by any means, sometimes illustrating at times a picture perfect psychological and developmental response or defense mechanism employed by a victim of abuse yet in a non-figurative, brilliant and lyrical way.  He yields such power and transport with a relatively economic number of words.  This writing shows an effective and extremely compelling ability and sense that is shocking to think of coming from a writer under the age of 20, which he was when he wrote most of this book.  He is now 21.

I can certainly see and understand the waves of adulation and praise and guidance and endorsements JT has experienced from so many other influential writers and artists like Dennis Cooper and Mary Gaitskill and Suzanne Vega and Gus VanSant and many more notables that I’ve seen referred to as JT Leroy’s Celebrity Support Group on his website somewhere.  That website, http://www.jtleroy.com/ is a very interesting site to find out more information on the author and the unanimous praise he has received for his work.  It also references a fair amount of interviews he has conducted with a few rock bands, musicians, directors and other writers for a variety of magazines and publications, most regularly NY Press.

After picking up the book I chose the piece I wanted to read and consulted with Silke by e-mail and she agreed it was a good choice and I asked her a bit about her own experience with JT, the main question being, of course, have you ever met him in person.  She has not, but has spoken to him briefly on the phone some.  Aside from that, they have communicated solely over the internet.  It was through talking to Silke and reading the first half of the new book that I finally was able to let go of my suspicions regarding the mystery of JT Leroy’s identity.  I finally was settled upon simply letting the work speak for itself and seeing the obvious bond Silke has developed with JT which she spoke of at the beginning of the reading.  I’m confident that no one is putting anything over on anyone; it has more to do with an individuals need or want to maintain his personal privacy, to perhaps never become a “public figure.”  I consider his past and the many ways it could have produced a fragile or guarded person, or a damaged sociopathic fuck up, or a serial killer for that matter. But what it did produce is a survivor, and one of the most gifted writers I’ve ever read.  His work is beyond exciting.  Now watch, it will come out that JT is really some middle-aged female probation officer at some Appalachian county juvenile detention facility or something.  After all, when I recently proclaimed that the would be brother and sister duo rockers The White Stripes must be blood relatives, as they claim, because of the instinctual manner in which they play music together, it came out that they aren’t siblings at all but rather a couple who used to be married.

The night before the reading I wrote him an e-mail, telling him how nervous I was about reading his stuff to an assembled group, and what an honor it was to be asked and how I used to read aloud to a certain group of friends sometimes when we were all high and up all night.  I’d read Flannery O’Connor short stories and my friends found it more riveting than say group sex or petty crime or any number of things drug use might lead a group of guys to do.  I resolved to draw on that experience to ease my nervousness and sell some books.

JT responded almost immediately saying he enjoyed the letter and that reading Flannery O’Connor was like doing drugs and definitely better than sex anytime.  He told me of his meeting with a famous actress who might be directing a film he wrote, that the script for Sarahwas complete—written by someone he collaborated with, and that he was honored that I was reading for him.

Like many writers say of JT Leroy’s work, “I was blown away.”

I was very and visibly nervous when I read, but I’m pretty sure I projected enough to be heard.

Lynn Breedlove closed the event with a lengthy animated and hilarious commentary on the book, the mystery of JT Leroy, and how she’d be pissed off if he wasn’t who he said, and some well-chosen passages.  As I watched her grab that room by it’s literary nut sack and fully command the space with her riveting and tough candor I suddenly decided that Lynn Breedlove is my favorite homosexual on the planet, hands down.  I can hardly wait for the arrival of her upcoming first book.  She’ll be doing her own reading.