Recouperating...slowly

The mush-brained hangover I'm currently suffering is really the only thing I can fault yesterday for. Otherwise: it was a perfect day, oh such a perfect day, like that Lou Reed song. The many reasons:

First and foremost, we again have transportation. I brought our team of highly trained sherpas back to Nepal, thanked them for their hard work, and explained that they were just another victim of the mechanization of society. Sorry sherpas, we got a van. And it's a beaut.

Of course, we only have this vehicle in the cosmic sense. We put a downpayment on it but it's not literally sitting in our driveway. But, it's ours. I'm excited because it has captain's chairs in the back and the interior is the color of moldy cranberries. It also trumps the original birdvan, since it's over a decade younger and isn't planning on overheating and spewing coolant in my face everytime it gets past third gear. The only thing it's missing is a name. I think Tessie is nice. Maybe we'll go with that.

Secondly, I saw the National and Division Day last night. I'm jealous of myself. They both gave me hope for the continued brilliance of mankind. And, I gots me a new Division Day CD, which kicked my butt this morning while I was trying to find a clear shirt to wear. I was unsuccessful. In fact, I'm at work wearing cut-off jean shorts and no shirt. Quite a sight.

Lastly, it was my birthday, which, coincidentally, is also the anniversary of John Hinkley shooting Reagan because Holden Caulfied told him to. Hence the mush-brained hangover. See, what I forgot, between work, practice, and that fantastic show was dinner. Which is bad. Mainly because the alcohol really does it's duty when you forget about food. Thankfully, left-over pesto fussilli saved my life.

Tonight: Slim's. And it's sold out. So if you don't have tickets yet, I apologize. What you should do instead is just plan on coming to our CD release shindig on April 19th, which will be cheap and, well, we'll be releasing the CD. You can also pet the aforementioned Tessie. Just don't get all naughty about it.

Yes, I've been writing this all day and this is the best I came up with. What's it to you?

I think I'm living in a vortex. Not only am I back at my old job---wearing a headset, for God's sake---but we are again scouring the internet and the Bay Area for a new birdvan. It's the exact same thing I was doing last time I was parked in this chair, late last month. Peter and Zach are spearheading this noble mission and we've got a few promising leads, not including the unregistered Dodge that makes mysterious noises and has an unfathomable 320,000 miles on the odometer. Oh yeah, and it doesn't start. That actually sounds exactly like our old ride, except he's asking for three times as much as we sold ours for, and ours had the plaid seats and smelled like poison. The chutzpah of that guy. I hope he finds his sucker. It just isn't going to be Birdmonster.

So, it's my first day back at work. I feel like an ex-con who got out after a petty theft charge, said his goodbyes and swore he'd never commit another crime, only to hold up the gas station twenty miles away, live in a friend's trailer for a month, then head back to slammer after a positive ID from the drunken redneck in the Airstream on lot 212. I came back and people just shook their head. I think I'll have a beer at lunch, to wash down my pride and dignity.

Of course, it's a short sentence. I'm out again April 20th, before the tour with Division Day. It'll only be a week long little jaunt up there in the Pacific Northwest, but I'm looking forward to it. Maybe we'll team up as DivisionMonster and cover Graceland from start to finish...or maybe we'll just both play our own songs. I'm voting for a little of both. I just want to sing that line "ever since the watermelon." Is that too much to ask?

Last night we did an acoustic jamboree in Peter's living room in hasty preperation for tonight's NoisePop Happyhour shindig and got some delicious dinner from Maureen, who really should have been playing the xylophone the entire time, but instead made pasta. It was the sort of set Oldmonster will play when we're Rolling Stones-aged and no one can spaz out anymore. I'm looking forward to that. I'm going to have really high pants and a floppy fedora. Just you wait.

Plan D

I'm writing this from the birdmonster mobile command center, which, no matter what you're imagining, is really just zach's sidekick in the
crampy backseat of a borrowed 4-runner. My god. The keys on this thing are tiny. I predict popeye-esque thumb muscles in two weeks. Call the circus.

So: the car. I haven't yet divulged the entire story, and, since I'll be in this backseat for quite some time, trying not to piss all over my lap---mental note: less coffee before endless drives---I figured I could yammer at you for a moment.

Plan A was to buy an incredibly fancy super-mobile. Turns out incredibly fancy super-mobiles are incredibly expensive. So we moved to plan B: purchase a replacement birdvan. But when the best option you find has no back window and needs a spray of ether on it's engine to start, you move to plan C. I don't want my van addicted to 19th century painkillers. Plan C, though: it was an atrocious plan. Plan C: take two cars. Sheer misery. Plus we'd be missing out on the innevitable insanity that will
set in in about twelve days time.

And then there was plan D: the car trade. An old friend with a 4-runner offered to take Dave's grandpa sedan in exchange for a car with actual chutzpah. So Kelby, we salute you. I'd write you a sonnet if I could remember the rhyme scheme and if my thumbs weren't already burning.

Tonight: Los Angeles. We missed you. We've got one song left to mix and I get to shake Brad's hand for the phenomenal job thus far. And we're playing with division day tonight, who are some of our favorite people in the world. In fact: Einstein, Ghandi, then Division Day. I think we can all agree on that.

Now, a scratch-off awaits me. I hope it's one of those bingo scratch-offs. I like the implied drama of long, drawn out lotto tickets. They almost convince you that you didn't just flush three bucks down the toilet.

I need to be quiet now

I was thinking about our stint in LA while out on my not-so-hard-earned lunch break today, probably because I've basically got a one-track mind right now (must release CD....must release CD) and I realized I don't think we've even mentioned the name. How 'bout that? So, time to remedy that oversight. The album will be called "No Midnight."

...

Whoa. That was sort of anti-climactic. Well, now you know. And like GI Joe said, knowing is half the battle. The other half of the battle, is, of course, buying the CD. "Whoa" yet again. That was shameless.

Before this post spirals any further out of control, I'm going to retire. I'm still wearing all black & am in serious mourning mode (see below). However, since I spent roughly four thousand hours on it, I thought I'd share the poster for our upcoming show. My favorite part? The eskimo.



And with that, I think I'll retire. I'm a bit sleepy after a dinner with my folks and a late night of agonizing photoshoppery. Good luck with Thursday. Me and him, we ain't getting along so well.

A eulogy. Or is that "an eulogy"? Either way.

Dearly beloved; we are gathered here today to get through this thing called---wait. Wait. That's a Prince song. Let's start over.

Dearly beloved; we are gathered here today to bid a fond farewell to your friend and mine: the birdvan. It was a brave van, a van that defied the odds, that cost 800 dollars and made it up and down the West Coast more times than it should have. It died, like so many vans, by the cruel, overworking it's masters gave it. That and a bum radiator. And transmission. And a broken radio. And that weird sound that the seat made everytime you went over a speed bump too fast. At any rate, birdvan, we'll miss you. I hope the man we gave you to will treat you nice, or, at least gut you proper and put your five working parts into finer automobiles, such as a Gremlin or a Rabbit. Rest in peace, buddy.

Back to Lalaland. For some of us, at least

Ah, President's Day. There's really nothing like having a nine to five and getting paid to sleep on a Monday. It's like having your cake, eating it too, and having that cake give you some sort of superpowers; not unlike that radioactive bon-bon which gave the Incredible Hulk his crime fighting powers. But I digress.

Today finds both Dave & Pete down in Los Angeles*, back at the Castle, keeping Brad company whilst he mixes, mixes, and mixes some more. Of course, I don't think they've shown up yet, considered that we're still safe ensconced in the AM. Anyway, they're there for moral support, to try out a few small ideas that turned out impossible to explain over the phone or email, and to pick up Zach's itinerant cymbals, which, although rusty, ugly, and jangly, are the only cymbals we've got. They have that well-worn sort of sound. They're the percussion equivalent of that really comfy chair your roommates want you to throw out because it's hideous & sort of smells like hobo sweat, but it's just too soft to get rid of. They'll be flying home on Thursday.

Also, if you wouldn't mind, look over there to your right. Under the stupid joke about us being from Bangladesh. See that? Yep. We're on pre-sale, people. I promise to not harp on that, but, hey, I figure if you're reading this, maybe you'd like to buy a CD. I can promise nothing less than a dozen songs we're very, very proud of with absolutely no filler. We're not Aerosmith here people. We're not giving you a single, a joke-song, and 10 meandering rip offs of 40s blues ditties. No. We would never do such a thing. It's going to be like the EP, times roughly a million. Maybe two.

Oh. And for a moment, let me share my joy. I just did a bit of arithmetic and discovered I have eight, count 'em, eight work days left. And that's counting today. I just twitched with glee.

Which reminds me: we don't have a van. We don't have a van but we've got to leave shortly. We've got our peepers and hearts set on one that may involve Zach & I flying to Vegas (danger! danger!) to pick it up. But, hey, you never know. For now, we're still waiting for one of you readers to send us the genetically engineered sperm of that cheetah-man hybrid you told us all about. If we go down to Vegas, you can expect hilarity. No amount of poorness will dissuade me from the craps table. I'm a degenerate like that.

I have a feeling this will be an interesting week. Stay tuned. For now, enjoy your MonTuesday. I'm finishing a poster tonight too that I want to share with everyone. It has a brontosaurus (which don't and never did exist), a mustachioed man with a top hat, a walrus, and an eskimo. If that doesn't spell kick-ass, I'm not sure what does.



*How much does that link remind you of Ghostbusters 2? Oh. It's just me. Somebody put on the Jackie Wilson and get this sludge back to it's sewer home.

Well, we made it.

It turns out there are other people in the world. I remembered this last night at our free Mezzanine show, which left me with a big fat grin, a few dead nerves in my pinkie, and quiet inklings of tinnitus. After all, us four birdmonsters have been quarantined in LA for three works, spending time only with each other and Brad. If we were women, we’d’ve been menstruating simultaneously. At any rate, it was good to get back into the real world and back to San Francisco, which, regardless of where you’re coming from, is a great place to come home to. My umbrella, it missed me.

As for the birdvan, she’s sorry she couldn’t make it home. She tried. She really did. But an exploding radiator and an apparent allergy to transmission fluid kept her down in Los Angeles, where she will no doubt be donated to charity with a floor full of crushed Cheez-its, crumbled t-shirts, and food of questionable age. We’ll miss you darling. Au revoir.

So, thus begins the later half of our album-making experience. Mixes will be transported through the wilderness of cyberspace and sent back down to Brad with our cogent, genius commentary, then sent back to us, then back to Brad, and so on: apply, rinse, lather, repeat, ad nauseum, until the album is done. It sounds like a good reason to stare at the computer and to get my iPod fixed. I’m sure you’ll agree.

As the mixing lopes along, I plan on updating the blog, perhaps with a few old pictures, and hopefully linking a song for streaming when it’s properly mixed. It’ll be fun, I promise. As for now, I’m just happy to be in my own bed, not mooching off the generous couches of LoCal-ers. Now, if only I could figure out what happened to all that money I left with…

Homeward Bound. Sort of.

I'm on a computer with a barely functioning "n" key. Gerunds and other "n" heavy words will be strategically ignored or accidentally misspelled. Be wary.

Tomorrow, Zach & I hop into (which was just "ito", by the way) the birdvan and depart for home sweet home. LA, we'll miss you and your smoggy, near nuclear sunsets. Au revoir. Both of us are pretending that the birdvan trip will be free of radiator catastophe, but of course, you never know. Anyway, Pete & Dave will remain behind so that Peter can sing and Dave can sit in a big comfy chair (alright, and also play guitar), then they follow us up in a nearly equally fucked automobile, also known as Peter's car. Then, it's Wednesday, for free, at the Mezzanine. Back to San Francisco. I can almost smell the foggy homelessness. It smells like victory.

Aw.

So...I guess this is goodbye. Sort of. I'm thinking about keeping up the blog, in fits and spurts until the album is actually done, which we're hoping is around February 22nd, followed by printing which, god willing, will happen with suave alacrity and come out sometime in March. So, yeah, I'll keep writing. But that might just be drunken, post-show at 3:30 a.m. Justin talking. Pay him no heed.

All in all, thanks for reading when you did. Hopefully, the pointless ramblings (
"rambligs"?) and pictures kept you interested enough to check out the CD. I mean, it's pretty good. But that's our little secret.

I best get some sleep. I've got a long day of van-pushing, gatorade drinking, and listening to music that isn't Birdmonster tomorrow. If there are missing "n"s, poorly constructed senteces, or mongoloid style mispeak, forgive me. I blame the fine people at Sapporo.

You know what? There's a few random thoughts that will surface when my brain and motor skills regai their former glory tomorrow, but after a long van odyssey, I'll doubtfully be in a mental place to write it. So, I'll throw one up later this week. Blogging, god bless it, is quite fun. It's like the cigarette of the internet world, if only the cigarette of the internet world wasn't watching people embarrass themselves.

Good night.

Calamity Strikes

I tried to post yesterday, Really, I did. Circumstances outside my control, however, prevented your Thursday reading. Say a prayer for the birdvan.

So I left the house yesterday around 2, hoping to go to the bank and my girlfriend's mom's house to say hello, then scoot on home for a long half day of recording. It was the perfect plan, really. At first, getting out of the house was nice, and the smoggy sunshine was doing me good. Then, somewhere on the 134, the van started clicking. Then, the heat gauge went from "moderately warm" to "goddamn volcano" in the span of about a quarter mile. After finally making it to my destination, AutoZone was visited, and cheap-ass radiator fixes were bought: aluminum powder called "Stop-Leak" and some crazy-ass putty if I was able to find to putty. Helped by Michael & Emily (thanks you two), the radiator got a quick dosage of aluminum and the leak seemed to stop. All for two bucks. Of course, at this point, it was 10 at night. Drat. And, naturally, when I was two miles from home, the radiator shat out again and the van devolved from sensible bird transport into rolling biohazard. Several showers later, I still smell coolant.

But, well, it had to happen sometime. As the old saying goes: "The only problem with buying an 800 dollar is that you have an 800 dollar van." For now, let us concentrate on good things.

Like yesterday. Almost every single guitar was finished in my absence. They were either re-amped, honed, re-played, or just kept as was. In fact, everything I hear this morning is just barely different than when I left and much better. Actually, every instrument is slowly sounding exactly as it should and we're honing on the sound this album will have. Mixing and some singing and Rhodes still remain, but the finish line is now apparent. When all's said and done, this is going to be a really damn fine CD. It sounds full and live and fun, which is what we were trying to do when we came down here. Not to toot our own horns or anything but...

Toot-toot.