Team Fright - "Mary Black Mary Black Mary Black"

I wrote this song while I was in The GoGoBots, but Team Fright might have played it best. Our pals The Balomai Brothers liked it so much that they sampled it for one of their records, which was really cool (I miss those guys--they were a fun band!). Anyway, I really like what Ray does on the guitar here. It was nice to have this as my last band--they were really good--and it is fitting to wrap up the VHS project with them. The song itself is about the game teenagers play where they dare one another to go into a darkened bathroom and say the local witch's name three times in the mirror. According to the legend, she will then come out and scratch your face (more likely, you bump into something in the dark). For the song, I used the name of the local New Castle, Pennsylvania USA legend. The song goes on to comment on how the men in power were often afraid of a powerful woman who didn't need a man, giving rise to those witch rumors and resentments in the first place. I don't remember much about The Tower Of Treason. It was one of those DIY places that spring up for a year or two and then disappear. It was pretty cool and on the West Side from what I remember. I really like the "WE Heart Love" graffiti in the background. Our pal Zartan made the video, so big thanks to him! It looks like I am wearing a Spider-Man t-shirt here. Fashionplates, the band was not. This is the penultimate video from my VHS stack. We have one more, also from this show, and we are finally done with this project! Hooray!

Online Dating Haiku

If you've ever had the opportunity, er, misfortune to do online dating, then you know the special circle of Hell it is.  On the bright side, it did inspire me to write some haiku over the years.  Some of them may someday appear in an anthology about dating over age 40 called Can You #!*% Believe What Happened?:  True Tales of Midlife Daters, but since I submitted the haiku back in 2015 and the last time I corresponded with the editors, I was told the project was on hiatus, I think we can safely assume that book will likely never appear.  Since the haiku were too fun to vanish into Limbo, in the spirit of Valentine's Day, here are the dating haiku:

Finding love online
Could just be a click away,
But you have to click.

Charming and handsome
Or ugly and obnoxious?
Count the likes today.

You never replied.
Months later, you're still on here.
Good luck, you need it!

Photos from high school?
That was a long time ago.
You need new photos.

Maybe I am wrong,
But profile castration jokes
Won't land you a man.

That billionaire hunk
You've been waiting for? He will
Ride a unicorn.

Ten people or more
In each photo that you post.
So, which one is you?

Thank you for the wink.
If you unhide your profile,
I will return it.

Nobody today.
Is it too late to be gay?
Hmm . . . yeah, probably.

Nobody today.
Is it too late to be straight?
Hmm . . . yeah, probably.

Uh, why did I think
This was a good idea?
Oh, yes, I was drunk.

Unhappy couples
At supermarket tonight.
Happy I'm single.

Swipe right and swipe left.
Is there anyone out there?
No, but keep swiping.

Tinder and Bumble?
When did dating start sounding
like Santa's reindeer?

I found a new date.
Hoping to God that this one
seems more or less sane.

Why the hell did you
swipe right if you were never
going to message?

Some days I just swipe
left on everyone just to
be misanthropic.

She's cute.  If only
she weren't shooting guns in each
and every photo.

A dick pic?  Really?
We can work up to that if
needed.  Just say hi.

A threesome?  Wow!  Thanks
for the invite, but, I'm sure
there's an app for that.

I admit those breasts
are great, but how about a
picture of your face?

Despite the complaints
I took my shirt off for a
pic and likes went up.

If you aren't going
to message me back, then why
did you message first?

Yes, I know, you're all
not into hookups and all
want an LTR.

The guy who hits on
a hundred women a day
is a creep with dates.

I know I said I
was into bears, but you could
at least comb your hair.

I've been ground by the
Grindr and now my steak has
turned to hamburger.

OKCupid, you
can fuck off now.  Enough with
arrows in my ass.

Plenty of fish, huh?
Not enough to find me a
date apparently.

Hot Or Not?  Judging
from the response so far, it
is looking like not.

I never thought I
would miss singles bars, but at
least there I got drunk.

When the date stamped is
2012 on your pictures,
time for new photos.

I'd guess that ranting
about how Hillary sucks
doesn't get you dates.

If you love God so
much, why don't you date Him and
stop wasting my time?

The invite to find
you on Adult Friend Finder
caused me to lose you.

You have kinks, big deal!
I have some Kinks records that
I like a bit more.

Bumble, buy a clue!
I swiped left on her sixty
times before.  Enough!

First date ended with
hug and no kiss, taking it
slow is fine with me.

Second date ended
with a kiss and that was sweet.
Delete the profile.

If there's a third date
though, you better put out or
it's back to the app.

The GoGoBots - "Vagina Dentata"

I found another good one from one of the last videotapes I'm shedding. This one is of a GoGoBots song I haven't posted yet. The video is arty. I am assuming the cameraperson was one of Mike and Micah's art school buddies. It must have been Greg's first gig. The song is about men's fear of women and how people claim to believe in stupid things but live their lives in a completely different manner. At the beginning of the clip, we are playing one of Mike's instrumentals, and at the end, one of Micah's songs. Maggie, Mike Dee's girlfriend at the time, was playing keyboards that night for some reason unbeknownst to me. Coming up, I might have a couple of Team Fright tracks from the other video, and then this project and trip down Memory Lane is complete.

"Canaries" by Team Fright

This might be the last video from the VHS tapes unless I find another gem from the remaining two tapes. This is a version of "Canaries", a song I wrote while I was in The GoGoBots. It's about women in World War I London working in a bomb factory. They were called canaries because the material they were working with gave them a yellow tinge. This version is by Team Fright and comes late in that night's set, so it's a bit ragged and out of tune, but the energy comes through, so you should get the idea. It's a good song. I still play it. I always liked playing Pat's In The Flats. The bar is gone now, but it was a working class bar by day that turned into a garage rock club by night. It was run by an old woman named Pat who was really nice and who had inherited the club from her parents. I went there once for breakfast, and it was really good, and it had to be the cheapest breakfast in town. I don't know when poor Pat ever slept if she was serving breakfast and having bands play until 2 in the morning.

Team Fright - "A Kiss, A Cheek"

This song originally appeared on the Let's Get Killed vinyl compilation. On that recording, it was just me and a guitar. It sounds even better with a full band though, and Team Fright does a nice job here. It was nearing the end of the set, and my voice was getting a bit ragged and the guitar a bit out of tune (I had broken a string earlier, and fortunately, Joe Meno was on hand to read a chapter from his then new book Hairstyles Of The Damned to fill in the time, but the new string was still settling in), but overall, I like this version. I particularly like Ray's background vocals, but the entire band really gives the song a nice Wedding Present feel with those hyperstrummed jangly chords. The song is still in my set. It is a fun one to play and as timely as ever since it points out how daft religions are. I am wearing my shiny shirt in the video. I bought it at a Fashion Bug sidewalk sale in 1996 or so and always found it good stagewear. I still have it. Now that I seldom play out, the poor thing languishes in my closet. It's not something one wears for everyday use, at least for me. We had played a Smiths song that Jason liked, so I had channelled my inner Morrissey and hugged the audience while unbuttoning my shirt. That's why for this song the front of the audience is all female. It's not so much that my bare chest attracted them so much as I terrified all the males into retreating to the back. Sorry, guys! The political sign at the end references some inside joke that Ray's friends had, something about a teacher of theirs who had done something naughty (I forget the details now). I have at least one more Team Fright video from this show to share, probably next week.

Team Fright - "Dead Man's Food"

Here is another gem from my old stack of VHS tapes. This one's from a Team Fright gig. Team Fright was the last band I was in. It was a good band. It featured Ray from The Joslyns on guitar and Matt and Jason on drums and bass respectively, who kept playing together after Team Fright broke up, most recently in Bwak Dwagon. This clip is specifically from a gig at Pat's In The Flats, a cool club in Cleveland, Ohio USA. It was recorded on 7 August 2004. This song was based on a true story where I went with my friend Rob to guard his uncle's house after the uncle, who had lived alone, had died. We had to spend the night there, so we were told that we could eat all the food in the house, which was nice but eerie since we were eating food the uncle had planned on eating. Ultimately, it was a creepy experience but an interesting one. Musicwise, I particularly like the riff leading into the chorus here. You can see some more Team Fright videos courtesy of my pal Zartan here.

PFE Live!

It may be a new decade, but I am still going through my old videotapes.  This track comes from the one and only performance of PFE.  PFE was the joke industrial band that Mark of The Escaped Fetal Pigs and I always wanted to do as a side project.  We never quite got around to it, but in 1992/1993, The Pigs were invited to play an AIDS prevention benefit for the Bowling Green State University Campus Democrats.  Since The Pigs were no more, Mark and I decided to do PFE but as a serious project.  Unfortunately, we were billed as an Escaped Fetal Pigs reunion, which was not true, and which probably annoyed Jim, the bass player from The Pigs, who was working at the bar we were playing at that night (talk about awkward).  I believe we smoothed it out with Jim that night once he saw the band, which sounded nothing like The Pigs.  We had two drummers, Jeff from Pogeybait, whom I had played with in The Flaming Toasters, and Dave from The Angry Housewives (in fact, this might have been Dave's first show, and he might not have been old enough to be in the bar otherwise).  Brett from Armadillo played bass, and Mark and I played guitar and sang.  We had to throw the entire show together quickly since Dave and I lived in Pennsylvania, so we basically had the day before to learn the set and practice in Bowling Green, Ohio USA.  It came together pretty well.  This track, which probably isn't actually "Here And Now", but whose actual name escapes me, was a bit more garagey than the rest of the set, which indeed was fairly abrasive like Ministry (we even did a pre-Marilyn Manson industrial cover of "Sweet Dreams"), which you can hear a taste of at the end of the video.   It would have been fun to see what this band would have developed into, but since the band lived in different states, it was not to be.  Dave and I would go on to play in Yeast? and Anal Spikemobile, but it was the last time I played with the others.  This band in a way was a bridge between my college rock days and what was to come.  PFE didn't really stand from anything.  We would just make jokes that it was an acronym for Pure Fucking Energy and whatnot.  It later came in handy though when I needed a name for the rock band in my first novel.

Poem Of The Week!

It looks like The Red Fez has chosen "Wednesday Evenings" as their "Poem Of The Week".  Back in 2015, they chose a couple other poems of mine as poems of the week, so it's nice to have another poem of mine join them.  I didn't write much poetry in 2019 as I was concentrating on the new novel, but we shall see what 2020 holds.