The GoGoBots - "Earful"

This video is from an early show of The GoGoBots. In fact, it is our first show ever, which happened on 13 Oct. 1996 at Verder Hall on the campus of Kent State University in Kent, Ohio USA. Three members of the band were in a precursor to The GoGoBots called The Hot Glue Guns. I don't recall why exactly we changed the band name. We may have found out that there was another band called The Hot Glue Guns, or maybe it was because Micah, our second guitarist, joined the band. In any case, this was the first show with the four of us and under The GoGoBots name. I'm not even exactly sure why Micah joined. We might have just liked him, or he might have been the ticket to getting a practice space. We had a lot of trouble at that time in finding a place to practice. For The Glue Guns, we used to practice in our apartment. Since we lived next to the laundry room, we'd do laundry to cover up the noise. We changed apartments in 1996 though, so that wasn't a possibility anymore. We had some goofy experiences like playing on the back loading dock of the music building at KSU, but obviously with winter coming we needed something inside. Micah was friends with a couple of women who had a practice space, so that might have been his ticket into the band. In any case, we started rocking as a quartet. Mike and I both wrote songs (Micah also contributed one or two during his tenure) and you can hear us finishing up a Mike song at the beginning of the video. Before the next song starts, I was seeing if any of my students were there (I might have been giving extra credit). This lineup lasted only a couple of months, and then Todd left to go play in Songs: Ohia or something. We replaced him with Greg and carried on. There's another VHS tape of The GoGoBots, so expect some more videos down the road. This one is again courtesy of Jimi Imij.

The GoGoBots - "Gumshoe"

I went through another VHS tape. This one was courtesy of Jimi Imij. I found a few gems that I will be sharing over the next few posts. The first is this video of The GoGoBots playing our "home" venue, the Mantis Gallery in Kent. The Mantis was a trip. It was a BYOB performance space run by Sam, an old punk rocker. Sam was a cool guy and definitely was open to new sounds, so we played there quite a bit. This song is from the trio era of The GoGoBots, which was my favorite era. It features the end of the song "Gumshoe", which was one I wrote after reading a few too many hardboiled detective novels. The lighting makes it look like we had cool dramatic lighting, but really The Mantis just had bad lighting (also, the toilet was usually broken).

New Thirsty Bear & Hungry Snake Comic!

Every once in a while, I get the urge to whip up a Thirsty Bear & Hungry Snake comic.  This one is different because I decided to forgo the fumetti and draw this one.  The result is below (click on it to make it bigger).  Enjoy!

New Song: "Bonehead"

I wrote this while I was in Pennsylvania this summer. We're all boneheads from time to time and must pay "the stupidity tax", but some people live it. The lyrics are below.  It's the same deal as always.  If you like a song, then feel free to cover it if you're in a band or whatnot.  I love to hear covers of my songs, so please let me know about your version.  If you start making money, then send me a check/we can work out a deal.  Similarly, if you want to use a song for your Youtube video or whatnot, then just let me know.  It's usually fine by me unless it's a commercial product or whatnot (and then it's likely fine as well--I just want my cut).  Find out first though.  Write me at wredfright ATATAT yahoo DOTT com.

I don't want to be a bonehead.
Don't want to be like you.
Always making the same mistakes,
Never knowing what to do.

Ooh! Bonehead.

You always say you have no money,
but you always have cigarettes and booze,
plus a new cell phone
and a new tattoo.

I've got to get out of this town
before I become like you.
That would be my worst nightmare.
I don't want it to come true.

Written August 2019
Recorded August 2019

The Escaped Fetal Pigs - "Final Song"

This is the final song The Escaped Fetal Pigs ever played. This was recorded on 28 April 1992 (though it might have been 29 April 1992 by the time this song was played) at Howard's Club H in Bowling Green, Ohio USA. For this one, we switched things up, and Simon sang, Jim played guitar, Mark played drums, and I played bass. At the end of the set, Mark "kills" us to make sure there would not be a cheesy reunion show. At the beginning of the clip, you can hear the end of "I Hate French", which is why one of our pals is speaking French onstage at the end. How we got into playing "The Cult Of Pogo And Porky Pine" switching instruments is beyond me. It might have just been because it is such an easy song to play. In any case, the pogo party at last call is glorious. Playing in bands that last for a bit is fun, but it is always bittersweet when the end comes because people whom have become as close as siblings scatter, and typically the relationship is never the same, even when the parting is friendly. With the Pigs, I am happy that I still get to see Mark, and he's still creative. Jim and Simon, I only stayed in touch with through letters and then social media. Jim I would see a year later when I visited B.G., but the last time I saw Simon was about a week after this gig at graduation (he seemed to be drunk at ten a.m. in the morning and wearing mouse ears on his graduation cap as he was headed to Orlando to work for Disney--I doubt he even remembers seeing me). In any case, The Pigs were a good time overall. It was certainly a great band to learn how to play rock and roll in. I know Mark and Jim, like me, went on to play in other bands--I'm not sure if Simon ever did--but The Pigs will always have a special place in my rock and roll heart. I don't remember who filmed the show, but at the end, whomever it was gets nice and avant garde freaky, which I enjoy. It provides a nice brief postshow primer of a band packing up, in this case, for the final time (as one of the guys in Pere Ubu, probably David Thomas, supposedly once said, rock and roll is mainly moving big black boxes from one end of town to another and then back again). It is also nice to see our friends The Copulating Crabs again near the end. They and the other attendees of the final show made for a great audience!

The Escaped Fetal Pigs - "Cockring"

This one is a parody of cock rock. We boiled it down to its essential element. We found the word "cockring" to be funny, and the actual device even funnier, so, of course, we wrote a song about it. The lyrics are all of one word, except for some of my rap/rant, and the song is basically one rocking and funky riff. Does it cross the line into actual cock rock? Probably not, as we were laughing too hard playing it usually. Cock rockers aren't known for their sense of humor. Our friend Buzz liked the word also, so we reference him at the beginning of the song. I don't know where we got the giveaway from, maybe the club's restroom. There is one more Pigs video from this tape, and then we're done with the Pigs for a time. Even with the last show, I think there may be more Pigs videos in the pile of tapes.

The Escaped Fetal Pigs - "I Wanna Be A Mason"

I have no idea why Simon is throwing a shirt or whatever at Jim at the beginning of the video, but the dynamic between the rhythm section was always fun to experience as they were both a couple of characters! This is the first song of the second set that night, so the audience is sparser as the hour is growing later, but they are drunker. This was always one of my favorite tunes by The Pigs. Again, I do little on this song beyond banging my head. I just go along for the ride. On the demo, which ended up being the most heard recording of the song (it was one that got played on the radio), Mark plays everything. The band had plans to make another cassette album, but we never did so because we were so busy. Near the end of the band, probably not long before this show, we did a document recording of many of our songs with our friend Chris Comer, but there was no point in releasing the recordings as the band was essentially going to be defunct shortly thereafter. I did make a nice Escaped Fetal Pigs "Greatest Hits" CD-R for the band members and some friends years later, and I used some of the tracks from that session on it, but that's probably the only time we recorded "Mason" in the studio as a band. Mark was obviously listening to a lot of Slayer then, but he kept the humor in the lyrics. Simon would make a lot of jokes about his drumming ability, but by the end of the band, he was a pretty good drummer, as you can tell from this song, which is not an easy one to play drumwise. As far as I know, Mark has never joined the Masons. Maybe he gave away too many of their secrets in this song! Yes, that is a plastic toy pig in front of us that the women check out at the end of the video. If I remember correctly, we had a few of those at the show, along with some Three Little Pigs coloring books we altered to tell the story of The Escaped Fetal Pigs.