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08.26.07

Moving Right Along.

We have been having a good time of it lately.

Last week the record came out. If you'd like to hear it, you can click [ here ] and listen to it on your computer as you file another tax return extension. Parasite.

But enough of this negativity. What's our problem, anyway? The results of the contest have been broadcast to the entrants and we'll make note here if there's more to say.

A few nights ago we played a show that was the record release business for this new thing. I hope you don't mind if I go on for a moment about it.

We started off by playing a song that we've played more than any other. It's called Song 12. We usually start a set off with it because it lets people know pretty quickly where we stand on things.

So this is Justin typing this. Thad and I had arranged the amps up on the rickety 8" plywood stage this bar used. So he's perched in the middle of the stage and I've got my pedal board and me on the floor. No mics on the amps which was fine - we know how to fill a room with our songs. After we'd set the levels, prior to playing the first song, I jabbered to the crowd for a minute and then we kicked it into gear.

Almost instantly, I'm hit hard with the notes that I'm playing. We're now at the right volume level - so loud that the music takes a dominant physical presence and the balance between the instruments is solid. The bass drum sound is hitting me so that I can feel my clothes shake a little bit with each thud. And this is the moment, this is the moment. The overwhelming feeling that the sound can create when I just hear it is now well matched by a tangible, physical force. When sound gets this loud, it moves from something you hear to your dominant sensation. Sight becomes pale and blurry, tactile things shrink in importance - it is a transcendent moment.

But it's more than just so, so loud. It's music as well, and music that you love, and - for us - music that we are making happen right at that moment. So I'm pounding away on this 16th note harmonic, waiting for the riff to really break and I can feel the pick scraping against the string like a butterfly. And, almost instantly, this scrape is shot through the distortion, burns through the amp's tube, hits the amplifier section, pounds through a cable into the speaker, explodes into the room, shakes the membrane in my ear and I can feel it moving my brain like a headache. So, for this song, we have dropped any sense of before and after. Like I said - transcendent.

And dammit if the club manager didn't pop up in front of me as soon as the song was over to tell us that the cops were demanding that we turn it down. That SUCKED.

More shows coming up, though.

Photo by [ Damien Neva ]. This is the show Justin's talking about over there to the left.



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2007

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