Wednesday, September 29, 2021

drinkdrankdrunk: "Iowa Party Report" by The Midnight Rider

i’m 48 and live in the middle-of-nowhere, so don’t expect this paragraph to be a pittsburgh rave with a topless rubdown rooms and a dude in a bunny suit giving out free bumps of special k (aka horse tranquilizers) . . . this is also where i live/used to work and a smart dog doesn’t shit where he eats . . . the cubs just won the world series, so a dental hygienist party bus might be a good place to start . . . i’m pretty popular at my dentist’s office--i’ve gone to a couple plays with my (married) dentist and the hygienists follow me around the office like i’m charles manson . . . there was even a day when i put on scrubs and they gave me a dental tool and i pretended to operate on an unsuspecting assburger’s g (who is a patient at the same office) . . . a couple years ago, hygienist d (who is a huge stoner) came into the room and asked if i wanted to ride on the office party bus to the cubs’ game the following weekend . . . she said the receptionist at the front desk was going too, and i knew j because she used to be the athletic department secretary at shady state (before she got fired for complaining to the lesbian vice president that the lesbian athletic director was having an affair with the lesbian softball coach--who just happened to be a’s sister) . . . i had never been to wrigley field before, so i immediately said yes . . . i guess i should also mention that the majority of professional sporting events that i have attended over the years have either been in washington, dc (where everyone talks on their cell phones and leaves early) or cleveland (where everyone complains about the price of the tickets, parking, and food) . . . i was hoping that chicago would be a good, ole-fashioned drunken orgy, and i certainly wasn’t disappointed . . . i didn’t necessarily know what the people on the bus would be like, so i made the decision to be low profile (and for me that’s pain pills and bloody marys) . . . when i arrived, a section of lumpy rednecks were already half-drunk and singing “cubs gonna win today” . . . j waved me over to my seat and immediately pulled a giant white baggie out of her bag--for a second i thought she had a fucking kilo of cocaine, but it turned out to be white russians that she planned to sneak into the game with her . . . after about 45 minutes, the bus driver pulled over and got on the loudspeaker to announce that “if anyone else grabbed a woman on the way to the bathroom” that he was gonna kick them off the bus and they’d have to walk home--and then the food fight started . . . the redneck behind me knew that i was a professor, so every time he threw food towards the front of the bus he would “accidentally” elbow me in the back-of-the-head and say “sorry, professor” . . . some dude with a harelip threw up in the aisle, and another dude asked me if i wanted to buy weed (which i did a few days later in a grocery store parking lot because i really didn’t want the fucker to know where i lived) . . . wrigleyville was nuts as well . . . we went to a bar called the cubbyhole both before/after the game, and there were people passed out on the floor both times . . . did the cubs win the game?--how the fuck would i know?; i was just as hammered as they were . . . on the way home, d-the-hygienist got in a screaming match with her redneck husband for the bus to hear . . . d would scream: “tell ‘em why we can’t get pregnant” and her husband would yell back even louder: “you married up and i married down”--to the point where d started punching him in the face until her friends pulled her off . . . and then it was over . . . i’ve never been to another cubs game and i don’t think i want to--the dental hygienist bus was everything i’d hoped for and more . . . other memorable parties?--well, there was the “bluetick coonhound graduation party” at this redneck girl’s parents’ house on the mississippi river . . . j2 had been a student in my technical writing class--she had big tits and liked to drive 4-wheelers, but that’s all i really knew about her when she invited me to her graduation party . . . it was way out in the country, and you had to drive down a dirt road for the last 3-4 miles until you hit the river . . . her parents’ house wasn’t that impressive, but i could see some weird taj mahal looking structure peeking out from behind . . . it turns out that her parents bred bluetick coonhounds for a living, and the fucking dog house was nicer than the main house . . . there were also more dogs at the party than people . . . there were kegs, horseshoe pits, and a hot/little redhead from the track team that had been in my film class whom i chased all night (i didn’t know it at the time, but a2 was already pregnant by some blockhead on the track team) . . . towards the end of the night (and after smoking a lot of weed with current/former students), we wound up playing hide 'n' seek in a graveyard that paralleled the river . . . i kept trying to “catch” a2, but she would always scream uncomfortably (almost as if i were hurting the baby or some shit) . . . by the end of the evening, i had scaled a fence and was sleeping in a pen between two (rather smelly) bluetick coonhounds--it kinda reminded me of a virginia field party when i was 16 . . . next up: before i ever hooked up with a, i got invited to a party at her house by the 300-lb baseball coach (who was her roommate along with a’s sister) . . . as my luck would have it, a wasn’t even there that night because she had to work (and obviously i wanted to hang out with her over the baseball coach or the posse of butch lesbians who were always trying to have sex with her sister) . . . i arrived after midnight in the middle of a driving thunderstorm . . . the party was supposed to be in the backyard, but because of the rain, it had mostly moved onto the long/extended back porch . . . after a few minutes, i realized that the baseball coach and i were the only men at the party . . . after a few more minutes, i realized that every female in attendance was a lesbian (and soaking wet) . . . and when lesbians are drunk/wet, they start giggling and removing articles of clothing . . . and as the baseball coach and i concentrated on talking about hunting or fishing, i noticed more-and-more bare lesbian breasts on the porch . . . soon there were squeals of delight as two chunky soft ballers started scissoring each other in a dark corner of the porch . . . i think they all still had their pants on, but a scissoring frenzy had begun with a’s lookalike sister smack dab in the middle of the pile . . . the baseball coach and i focused even harder on “baseball”, but dear lord, it’s hard not to stare/drool when the 2008 lesbian olympics are taking place at your feet . . . i waited around until 2 a.m., but i don’t think a ever came home that night . . . the baseball coach and i never spoke of the lesbian olympics again and he never invited me to another party . . . i think a’s sister saw me staring at her out of the corner of her eye (and on top of the pile), and it didn’t bother her in the least . . . the final party entry has to do with a rock n’ roll fantasy of mine: partying with a rockstar . . . rock n’ roll shows are few and far between in central iowa, so i was stoked when old student l asked if i wanted to see np with him and another kid (who looks like rocky from the rocky horror picture show) in rock island . . . we picked up a quarter of weed on the way, but no one remembered to bring a bowl . . . we stopped at a quickie mart for rolling papers, and i rolled them (rather poorly) on the dashboard . . . it was a small club in rock island, and i didn’t necessarily believe that we’d get to go backstage to party with np . . . l has since become the guitar tech for the o, and he thought we had a pretty good chance . . . the show itself was kickass, and i noticed that l went outside a couple times to smoke with the np tech guy . . . after the show was over, l came over and asked if we wanted to go backstage to party with b and r . . . the joints that i had rolled had been in my pocket all evening, and i told l that i wasn’t sure if they would light . . . he said, no worries:  that if all else failed that we’d smoke out of a can (and i thought to myself: there’s no way that the lead singer of np is gonna smoke weed with me out of a can) . . . when we got upstairs, r (who has been married to b for over 15 years) noticed how good-looking rocky was and immediately scuttled him off to another room . . . i tried to make small talk with b about professional wrestling and his southern roots, but b mainly just wanted to do some drugs . . . the ratty joints weren’t working, so l poked some holes in a beer can and we were indeed smoking weed out of a can with the lead singer of np . . . i don’t remember much of what b said but he reminded me a bit of my friend mt (the lead singer of cleveland’s kth) . . . b was obviously exhausted from the show/the road, and it seemed as if there was someplace he’d rather be . . . most strangers would be intrigued to smoke weed out of a can with a long-haired english professor and his even longer-haired student, but rockstar b’s brain had already checked out and was on the road to omaha 

The Midnight Rider prefers to remain mysterious.  You could visit his website, but he won't say where it is.  You could read his books, but he won't say what they are.  You could email him, but I'm pretty sure spam@gofuckyourself.gov is not a real email address.  In a world where everyone is repping their Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, sex tapes, line of clothing, new microbrew, virus panic vaccine status, and overall brand, I find that refreshing.  I am happy to have the Rider ride on drinkdrankdrunk.

Monday, September 6, 2021

New Wred Fright Album!

So I took the tracks I've been rerecording over the past year and turned them into an album.  I called it Severe Platter Damage because they are kind of noisy.  It's also a bit of a joke because the songs are older, and severe platter damage is a term used in data recovery to describe the worst possible condition a hard drive can be in and still be at least partially recoverable.  I think the tracks work well together, and I tried to sequence them in a way that works.  I thought about mastering the tracks so the volume was more even, but I kind of liked the wild and varied nature of the original recordings, so I let them be.  It also fits the spirit of the album title.  I'm not sure if Soundcloud will let you download the tracks from the playlist, but they are all available individually there as well, so you can download them and make a MP3 playlist if you wanted to.  I'm also open to anyone reviewing the album (please just send me a link so I can see what you think).  I doubt this will be pressed on vinyl, but you're welcome to burn a copy on cd for yourself if you want to or copy it onto cassette if you're into the whole retro thing.  For vinyl, a record company would have to step up as I am still selling copies of a record I pressed in 1994, so that's enough for me (I was sold out of them, but then a friend found a small treasure trove of them in his closet).  I'll probably start another album of songs next year, but for now it's time to turn back to writing.  I'd be fine with playing a show or two, but these days everyone has to show their health records to get into a concert or something, and I just think that's creepy, so I don't think it's likely I'll get invited to play anywhere anytime soon, or ever again.  I only play guitar and sing when I play, so it wouldn't sound like the album anyway, and I don't see myself getting a backing band anytime soon, or ever as well.  Anyway, I hope you enjoy the album/playlist and have fun rocking out to it.  It certainly doesn't sound like much else around these days, but given what passes for music these days, people may not like that.  Maybe you will though.

To hear more music, get the Yeast? 7".