Dead Kennedys Epics: A Personal Top 5

Motherfuckin Woody Allen on bass

"Short, fast and loud" is the cliched description of hardcore/punk.  With good reason.  Virtually every Misfits song is 1:20.  I remember an ancient review of Operation Ivy's "Energy" on CDuniverse.com that described each song as "two minutes of perfection."  Minor Threat, Agnostic Front, SSD....short short short.  And for good reason.  Could you imagine a classic like "Filler" stretched beyond two minutes?  How about a five minute Misfits song?  Ugh.

When it comes to 80s punk bands, there are a relative handful of long songs, and I think the Dead Kennedys wrote a good chunk of them, ranging from truly masterful songs that pass the five minute mark without losing the intensity of their shorter songs, to songs that are the aural equivalent of playing a board game with a little kid -- it takes forever and there's a good chance you won't finish it.  But for the most part, DK really nailed the long punk song thing.  Here I will rank these "epic" DK songs, and by epic, I mean the original meaning: LONG!  I'm talking pushing 5+ minutes.  There are long-ish DK songs like Holiday in Cambodia, We've Got a Bigger Problem Now etc that I am not including here, although they certainly are epic in other ways.  There a few other DK songs of this length, such as "Cesspools in Eden," and half the songs on "Frankenchrist," but I am limiting it to five here.  Which would make your top 5?   Let me know in the comments below.

5 - Chickenshit Conformist (Bedtime for Democracy, 1986)

Hardcore formulas are dogshit Change and caring are what's real Is this a state of mind, or just another label?

Leading off the top 5 is one of the more famous Dead Kennedys songs, considered a favorite by many.  Honestly, I rarely listen to this song (or album, for that matter) but it deserves a spot in the top 5 simply for the lyrics, which are a not-so-subtle stab at what punk rock had become by 1986.  This song is in the same category as Operation Ivy's "Take Warning," in that both songs warned us of problems in the scene, but the scene didn't listen and the lessons remain unlearned almost 30 years later.  "Bedtime for Democracy" is a mediocre record by DK standards, and the production is sterile and unexciting which makes even the good songs suffer.  

It makes me laugh all these years later that many of the bands Jello is singing about have become some of my favorite bands: "When the thugs form bands look who gets record deals/From New York metal labels looking to scam/Who sign the most racist queer-bashing bands they can find/To make a buck revving kids up for war."  It doesn't take a genius to figure out that this is a stab at bands like Cro-Mags and Agnostic Front, and their labels Profile, Combat, etc.  Ultimately this song has earned its place in punk history, but Jello & Co. could have saved themselves some time and stopped after the opening lyrics, which basically sum up the point of the song in just a few lines.  For this reason I find myself enjoying this 30-second semi-cover more than the original song:

  Punk's not dead it just deserves to die

When it becomes another stale cartoon

A close-minded, self-centered social club

Ideas don't matter, it's who you know

4. Stars & Stripes of Corruption (Frankenchrist, 1985)

Finally got to Washington in the middle of the night I couldn't wait, I headed straight for the Capitol Mall  My heart began to pound Yahoo! It really exists The American International Pictures logo 

By their third album, Jello's lyrical tendencies began to trade subtlety and suggestion for a more direct approach.  In this sense, this song is similar to Chickenshit Conformist, in that it has a lot of great lines, but the point is driven home again and again over the course of 6 minutes (!!!).  There is still plenty of sarcasm and satire to be found in lines such as the one I quoted above, and Jello describing how he feels like saying "Hello, old friend" to the Capitol Building, only to "piss on it when nobody is looking."  The music is energetic and well-paced and this is a great way to close the album.  But it is not the best song on Frankenchrist, as you will see later on in this post. 3. Pull My Strings (Live: March 25, 1980)

Is my cock big enough, is my brain small enough, for you to make me a star? This live recording ranks up with Fear's performance on Saturday Night Life as a great moment in punk history where a punk band was given the opportunity to perform for a mainstream audience. Basically DK was asked to play at some awards show to lend the event some "new wave" credibility, and they begin playing their "hit" only to cut it short, pull their ties from around their necks to make dollar signs (see above), and perform this hilarious, biting mockery of what music execs had deemed "new wave," as well as the music industry in general.  Its utter Fuck You-ness makes this one of the most important statements the Dead Kennedys would make, and it's a pretty damn good song to boot. It is a tragedy that there is no known video footage of this.  The utterly subversive nature of this performance make this #3 on my list, even if members of the band would betray its message years later.

2. This Could Be Anywhere (Frankenchrist, 1985)

I linger late at night waiting for the bus No amount of neon jazz could hide the oozing vibes of death

The best song on Frankenchrist, and arguably the last great DK song.  Great opening guitar that sets the tone before staccato drum rolls set the pace, this song is nothing short of a masterpiece.  The band sounds great, and the tempo is driving but slow enough to hit you repeatedly with moments of utter brilliance.  The break around 2:45 will never stop blowing me away.  Kids at school are taking sides, along color and uniform lines...
If the Dead Kennedys peaked on their second album, this song could be considered something of a second peak.  The music is on point, with classic East Bay Ray guitarwork that is eerie and reverberous.  Jello's lyrics are vivid and interesting, with lines like "empty plastic culture club suburbia's a warzone now" invoking imagery that makes this song more than just a song -- it is an experience.  And it should be treated as such -- this is the sort of song where you put down your iPod, dig the vinyl out, crank up the stereo, and just let the music encompass you.   This would rank #1 on my list, if not for one song that is not only one of DK's all-time bests, but is also tragically relevant right now.
1. Riot (Plastic Surgery Disasters, 1982)

But you get to the place where the real slave drivers live It's walled off by the riot squad, aiming guns right at your head So you turn right around, play right into their hands And set your own neighborhood burning to the ground instead Plastic Surgery Disasters.  Is it the best punk album ever recorded?  It may very well be.  And it is a favorite of mine because I remember the first time I heard it as a 7th grader in his post-Rancid punk rock discovery period.  I bought the CD and came home and Jello's vocals immediately made me go, "Ugh."  But after a few listens I realized what incredible music this is.  The songs are great.  The lyrics are great (as I said earlier, Jello was at his lyrical peak here, with songs that were at once scathing and humorous, with just enough restraint to make the words really sting).  The production is incredible early 80s punk production, with buzzsaw guitars threatening to slice the music down the middle. And no song hit me quite like "Riot."
This is in many ways the quintessential DK song.  Loud parts and quiet parts, fast and slow, dissonant guitarwork, and a bassline that is the sonic equivalent of a bratty kid yelling "na-na-na-na-na-na!" But just as important are the lyrics, with Jello indicting the system as a whole -- taking aim not only at the authority and powers that be, but also at the average person who in many cases can be his own worst enemy, and become the victim of his own actions.  Classic Dead Kennedys irony is in fine form here, with a chorus that proclaims rioting to be "the unbeatable high" and in the same breath denounces it as a short-term release with no meaningful long-term effects, and certainly not to those in power: "Tomorrow you're homeless, tonight it's a blast."  The song ends with these lyrics repeating, sounding more and more uncertain as the music slows to an end.  At the end of 7th grade, I would write these lyrics in a journal we had to keep for English class, and although I didn't quite grasp the true meaning of the song at the time, my teacher didn't have to tell me she wouldn't be surprised if I "turned out to be one of those Columbine kids," a mere month or two after Columbine took place.  Guess what Mrs. Levine, I'm still here, and you are where?
Ten years after this song was recorded, Los Angeles would be set ablaze during the riots following the aquittal of the police who beat the shit out of Rodney King.  22 years later, we bear witness to a similar scenario, as people across the country react to the upsetting, if unsurprising, Ferguson grand jury decision. It is easy for us to condemn the rioters, but it is hard to put ourselves in their shoes.     How can we expect peaceful protest when there is something is so clearly wrong with our institutions?  And how do we expect protesters to remain peaceful when they are met with a militarized police force, tear gas, and automatic weapons? 32 years later, the lyrics of "Riot" ring true: "They club your head, kick your teeth/Police can riot all they please."  And that makes me sad...but it makes for a timeless song.
Till next time...

Going Metal: The Crossover Debate

I've always loved metallic hardcore.  Nowadays, metal infused hardcore (or sometimes it's the other way around...) has become the norm, and although there are critics of this heavier approach to hardcore punk, metallic riffing and chugging are commonplace.  But this merging of styles is nothing new -- the fusion of metal and hardcore goes back three decades, with pivotal releases from bands all across the US, from Suicidal Tendencies in California, DRI from Texas, and NYC's Cro-Mags and Agnostic Front.  And even though metal crept into hardcore almost from the beginning, there were as many people repulsed by it as there were people who dug it, if not more.  Why would we want metalheads taking over our scene....

This post is dedicated to 80s hardcore bands who went metal  -- some who did it the right way, taking their hardcore roots to the next level with new sounds, and bands that failed miserably, either by abandoning their hardcore roots entirely, or simply releasing uninspired (and uninspiring) albums that people wish they could forget.  There are records that alienated segments of their punk audience but later became classics, and there are records that people simply hated, records that left a lasting impression that has not changed over time.  The bands who succeeded helped define crossover.

So here is my take on this phenomenon.  In the spirit of keeping the post from going on forever, I'm only focusing on a handful of bands.  There are plenty others.  I also haven't included critical crossover bands Leeway, SOD and Carnivore, because they didn't "go metal" the way the other bands I'm talking about did.

THOSE WHO NAILED IT!

DRI - Crossover (1987)

Your time will come when you least expect it

Expect it

Hardcore history made easy -- one of the first and best crossover releases is in fact called Crossover.  This record shows DRI fleshing out their songs with heavier riffing and slower tempos.  But the music is no less furious, and DRI's snotty hardcore vocals are intact (and would remain so for the rest of the bands prolific career).  The records got more metal as time went on, but they have a punk energy too, although sometimes it gets obscured by slicker production.  This record is genre-defining, as are these next two releases from, where else, NYC.

Agnostic Front - Cause For Alarm (1986)

These lyrics made it onto fucking DONAHUE This record was double trouble -- the thrash riffs and guitar solos made punks mad, but the lyrics made them madder.  Agnostic Front didn't seem too concerned about people's feelings when they released this record. This record is the product of both the time and the band's environment.  Metal was started to break out and get people's attention, including  punks who had long rejected and ridiculed metalheads. On top of that, AF shared a rehearsal space with Carnivore, whose 1987 LP "Retaliation" is another crossover masterpiece, which no doubt shaped their sound. They also benefitted from having Carnivore's drummer Louie behind the kit. The drumming is just insane on this record.  It gives the songs such intensity that I consider this one of the fastest records ever.  There are obviously faster records, but they don't all feel like a jackhammer.  Roger's vocals are weird, but his vocals on basically every album are weird in a different way.  This record rules.

Cro-Mags - Best Wishes (1989)

In these days of confusion much illusions try to get ya

Try to trick you every single day-yay

Best Wishes signified a new era for the Cro-Mags: in the three years since 1986's Age of Quarrel, metal infilitrated the hardcore scene.  On top of that, the Cro-Mags were a different band following the departure of singer John Joseph and drummer Mackie.  Bassist Harley covered vocal duties, while Petey Hines from Murphy's Law was brought in on drums.  How is the result?  Pretty god damn good.  Cro-Mags mixed metal and punk influences (as well as audiences)  from the beginning, but the thrash influence on this record is a completely different animal. This record sounds huge, classic Normandy Sound production here with booming drums, razor sharp guitar, and an overall clarity that turned off many listeners with its gloss.  People either love or hate Harley's vocals, but in my opinion he nails it.  Harley is a talented musician, which I think enabled him to approach his vocals like a musician as opposed to just a singer -- his vocal phrasing is incredible.  Just listen to Days of Confusion above.  Is Best Wishes as influential and significant as Age of Quarrel?  In a word, no.  But viewed on its own, it is a crossover classic and absolutely essential.  And now that many bands are on the crossover tip, I think this record only gains more significance and relevance as it ages. 

Review from MRR #73, June 1989

Suicidal Tendencies - How Will I Laugh Tomorrow... (1988)

Are you kidding me with these insane riffs?

Suicidal Tendencies are one of the greatest hardcore punk bands of all time.  Their s/t LP from 1983 is an almost-flawless masterpiece, with smart lyrics and a sense of humor.  I don't think it would be unfair to consider that record the West Coast Age of Quarrel -- both records combined elements of punk and metal and established a framework for their respective coasts and future generations.  In 1987 Suicidal put out the transitional Join the Army, a poorly produced record that was stylistically somewhere between the first LP and How Will I Laugh Tomorrow, but lacked the magic of either.  How Will I Laugh Tomorrow... is on another level.  Is it crossover?  Is it speed metal?  Is there a difference?  The songwriting is very sophisticated, with lots of incredible lead guitar and furious riffs; there are as many melodic moments as there are downright nasty parts.  The lyrics are sophisticated as well, tending towards the personal and introspective with less outright political lyrics, although that anger remains.  Like Best Wishes, this is a record that pales only in comparison to their incredible debut.

THOSE WHO FAILED IT!

DYS - Fire & Ice (1985)

This isn't the worst song in the world, but it symbolizes something truly awful

Basically Boston as a whole failed the metal experiment.  I'm going to focus on the two major culprits, DYS and SSD.   With the Boston bands the influence for their new sound came less from thrash metal and more from straightforward hard rock, resulting in boring, slowed down songs instead of intense anthems.  Listen to this crap.  I hate to use the term sell-out, but Christ almighty, I don't know what else you can call this.  Listen to that near-falsetto around 2:40.  Fortunately for the scene, DYS hung up their boots after this and Smalley redeemed himself with Dag Nasty.  Fast forward 25 years and he un-redeemed himself by reforming DYS with a mostly scab lineup, rewriting DYS's history in the process and giving them credit for releasing one of the first "crossover thrash" records.  Unfortunately for Mr. Smalley, Fire & Ice is nothing close to Age of Quarrel, Cause For Alarm, or any true crossover worth listening to.  If you happen to see DYS in 2014, expect an Elvis Costello-looking Smalley shouting about straight edge and Boston even though he's had nothing to do with either for 25 years.  

SSD - How We Rock (1984) & Break It Up (1985)

SSD went a similar direction, although people now look back somewhat favorably on How We Rock.  That record combined some rock/metal elements with a hardcore foundation, and didn't sound like a completely different band (a la DYS).  But to quote a Youtube commenter, "it was all downhill from there."  Break It Up sounds like something you'd heard blasting from a pickup truck at a barbecue or tailgating party in the 80s.  I saw Springa get off the Provincetown ferry once, which makes me wonder if he is behind this jewelry I found in a shop there:

Man that final SSD album makes my earring 

Warzone - S/T (AKA Warzone III) (1989)

The first song is actually pretty good, considering.  NO REGRETS!  

Be sure to check out the blatant Sabbath rip off in "Judgement Day 2"

The dreaded third Warzone LP.  Some people call it the metal record, other people call it Warzone's rap record.  The riffs and solos are totally metal, and the drum machine basically follows the same beat the entire record.  Why is the snare so loud?  This record sounds like Run DMC with Raybeez singing.  When you listen, you can hear the gentle sobbing of skinheads everywhere.  The demos that were recorded for this LP are superior, and can be heard here (with a download link included). This is a truly bizarre record that captures the band in a time of total disarray, whether it was lineup changes, label issues, or whatever.  

Review from MRR #83, April 1990

Token Entry - The Weight of the World (1990)

This record sounds kind of like the Warzone LP, but a little faster, with some funk elements, and a real drummer.  A lot of people wrote off NYHC by 1990, and this record didn't help.  Bands like Supertouch and Burn did a great job of putting a fresh spin on NYHC, but this final Token Entry record was met with disappointment and didn't change the negative opinion some people had of NYHC's metal direction.  I'll be damned if this isn't a fun song though.

Discharge - Grave New World (1986)

Their A&R took their punk clothes and gave them a makeover

I end this section with the ultimate sellout.  Sure, DYS went rock, but it's not that surprising from a bunch of macho Boston kids.  But Discharge going glam metal...who saw that coming?  One of the seminal political hardcore bands, their influence can be heard in classic bands like Cro-Mags to any of the countless "d-beat" bands going today.  The lyrics, music and vocals alike betray Discharge's roots.  It is interesting to compare Discharge to Napalm Death -- both bands started around the same time, playing political hardcore punk, but while Discharge went the way of slick, mainstream metal, Napalm Death took the speed and brutality of extreme metal and created something original and amazing (namely, grindcore).  This record is an example of a band that could have, should have, broken up, and created new music under a new name.  Maybe then it might've just been another bad record.  Instead, it was every punk's nightmare, and 28 years later remains one of the most glaring examples of punk going metal...gone wrong.

THOSE WHO...WELL IT DEPENDS

Reagan Youth - Volume 2 (1990)

I've already posted about Reagan Youth and my love for them.  "Youth Anthems For the New Order" (AKA Volume 1) is phenomonal early New York hardcore punk.  I have mixed feelings about Volume 2.   The songs are pretty good and the lyrics are actually really good, way more punk than the music behind them.  Although this record is nowhere near as good as their 1984 EP, it is not without merit.  There is some incredible guitarwork on here, Paul Cripple really worked on his chops and it shows.  See the intro of the above song, and the dualing guitar tracks in "Jesus Was a Communist."  But this record depresses me -- it depicts the band at a low point, marred by drug abuse, which led to Dave Insurgent's downward spiral and eventual death.  This is a very passable, if a little sad, punk-gone-metal record.

Final words

My assessments of some of these records might have been very different if I had experienced them when they were first released.  If I was a young punk who was blown away by Victim in Pain in 1984, only to be utterly disappointed by the metal direction AF took only two years later, I would probably look at that record differently all these years later.  Context is everything, and I appreciate and understand that there are people from back then who probably disagree with some of the things I've written here.  Someone who went to the record store in 1989 and purchased Best Wishes will have their own perspective on what that record means, how it sounds, and ultimately, whether they like it.  I urge anyone to leave a comment sharing their feelings or experiences with any of the records/bands I've talked about, or about those I didn't mention here but very well could have.  Thanks for reading.  Until next time....

All art is temporal. All art is lost.

It has been a while since my last post.  I had a lot of fun putting together that post about Encounter, and it was great that it reached some of the band members and other people involved with them.  Whenever I do a post about music, one of my hopes is that people might reconnect with something from their past, or appreciate a different perspective on it.  

In the two months since that post, not a lot has happened except the passing of time and the changing of the seasons.  Although today isn't the best example of the warmer spring weather (as a matter of fact, a woman with a horribly bruised face stopped in front of me in Central Square today and asked me, "This is spring???").  My health is continuing to improve although I did have some manifestations of graft-versus-host disease (something that was expected to happen eventually).  That seems to be under control now and I will learn more at my appointment tomorrow, which will mark 10 months out from my transplant.  

What has really kept me busy has been my art.  I've continued to paint and decided that since people continue to express interests in my paintings, I opened up an Etsy shop to make my art available to those who might want it.  At first I was selling originals but quickly realized it made more sense to make prints of paintings and offer those instead.  At the advice of my friend Dave, I took my time to gather materials and get everything ready.  Right now, my shop has 8 different prints available, with more to be added soon.

As you can see, items from my Etsy should be showing up on the right.  You can click to the shop from there, but the URL itself is www.etsy.com/shop/HarrySkoylesArt.  If you see something you like, enter coupon code BLOGMONEY for the "loyal reader" discount. 

I owe megathanks to my friend Dave who really helped me throughout the whole process of getting my shop off the ground.  He is an incredibly talented artist working on his thesis at Mass Art, and you can check out his own shop here.

The cliche about art is that it survives us.  That the things we create will remain on this earth long after we've left it, maybe even forever.  It's not difficult to see why such importance is placed on art and man's creations in general.  People hate the fact that they will die, and have dreamt up elaborate stories and religions in the neverending quest to establish meaning in our lives.  The significance of "leaving something behind" simply reflects man's struggle to find meaning in his life.  Do man's creations hold the only meaning that persists through death?

When we first invaded Iraq a decade or so ago and everything was blown to pieces and looted, an Iraqi painter was asked how he felt that all of his work had been destroyed.  He admitted his sadness, but ultimately accepted as a fact of life that all things come to an end.  The great poet Alan Dugan explored this idea in one of his later poems, which I have included the complete text of, but I encourage you to listen to him reading the poem in the video below.

All art is temporal. All art is lost.
Go to Egypt. Go look at the Sphinx.
It's falling apart. He sits
on water in the desert and the water table shifts.
He has lost his toes to the sand-
blasts of the Saharan winds
of a mere few thousand years.
The Mamelukes shot up his face
because they were Iconoclasts,
because they were musketeers.
The British stole his beard
because they were imperialist thieves.
It's in the cellar of the British Museum
where the Athenians lost their marbles.

And that City of Ideas
that Socrates once had in mind
has faded too, like the Parthenon
from car exhaust, and from
the filthiness of the Turks
who used it as a dump.
If that city ever was
for Real in public works
and not just words he said:
No things but in ideas.
No ideas but in things
I say as William Carlos Williams said,
things as the Sphinx is our thing,
a beast of a man made god
stoned into art to guard the dead
from nothing, nothing and vanishing
toes first in the desert,
sand-blasted off into nothing
by a few thousand years of air,
sand, take your pick, picker,
go to Egypt, go look
at the Sphinx while it lasts.
Art is not immortal.
Art is not mortal.
All art is ideas in things.
All art is temporal. All art is lost.
The imperial desert is moving in
with water, sand and wind
to wear the godly native beast of man apart
back to the nothing which sculpted him.

And remember the Mamelukes, remember the Brits.
They were the iconoclasts of their own times,
primitive musketeers, primtive chiselers. This time
we can really blast the beast of man to bits.

The view from behind my Sphinx

Thanks for reading.  Till next time...

Encounter - Lost EP (early 90s New Jersey Hardcore, download included)

It's about time that I posted about Encounter, and this record in particular.  This is one of my favorite EPs of all time, and one of my absolute favorites from my personal collection.  I think most music lovers would agree that in many cases, it's not just the music that makes a record a favorite.  My favorite records hold a significance and meaning that transcends the music itself.  Some represent a particular moment in my life that I flash back to the moment I hear them (or even think of them).  Some have stories attached to them that are unique to me and make them special.  This record does both.

When I was in middle and high school, every now and then I'd go with my dad to Boston and check out record stores.  There was Newbury Comics of course, where I scored lots of of awesome records (back when punk seven inches cost 3-4 dollars). There was also the now defunct Second Coming Records which specialized in punk/hardcore as well as other used record shops like In Your Ear.  During one of these trips around 2000/2001, we went into a bookstore in Harvard Square (I think) so my dad could look at books after having been so patient as we went from record store to record store.  I don't remember the name or the exact location, which is a damn shame because I never made it back there and I don't think it exists anymore.  Anyway, we entered this bookstore and I was thrilled to discover they had a very decent selection of used records.  I flipped through them, found some punk shit here and there but nothing too exciting.  Then this one record caught my eye.

I was very into old emo at the time and anything that looked remotely "emo" caught my eye (this led to some truly horrible purchases, but hey, that was the fun of record shopping -- a lot of hit-and-miss). The cover of of this record struck me.  Pretty dark and lonely, huh?  I did all the proper checking to make sure that this was in fact a hardcore record and not some sort of goth crap before buying it (along with a Danzig II promo LP that I sold on ebay like a fucking moron back in 2005).

When I got home and threw it on the turntable, I was blown away.  This was some truly great hardcore!!!  Strong songwriting, mostly straightforward introspective lyrics, and overall excellent production with a beefy guitar sound and clear bass that really shines through during the more melodic parts.  But don't take it from me.  Listen for yourself while I editorialize:
Extend your hand and help me to break free Excellent opening track that really sums up Encounter's sound: moshy, heavy hardcore with melodic leanings. If I had to compare this to another record, I'd say the first Lincoln 7" would be a good pick, as both records have a similar heavy east coast hardcore sound with nods to the budding emo sound at the time.  (In fact, Joel & Jason Jordan released the Lincoln record on their own Watermark Records, so there's that connection.)  They don't take the melodic influence as far as their NJ brethren Turning Point, and there is plenty of awesome riffing and driving hardcore to be found on this 7". Feign a stable reality but I can hear your cries Why can't you see through those walls and look into my eyes A melodic intro builds to one of my favorite riffs ever.   My voice - unheard My position - unnoticed Come on.  A slow moshy intro into a gnarly bassline into an awesome fast part into some short but sweet chugging and an awesome divebomb.  COME ON!!!!!

Their hate will not let me up

It holds me down

It holds. Me. Down!!!

Ok things get a little emo here.  There's clean guitar (awesome), it's over 3 minutes (not bad when compared to 7 minute emo epics) the lyrics are a little dramatic (what can you do?)...but still an awesome song and a good end to the record.  Listening to this record you can hear the different influences, and they really come together instead of working against one another.  The result is a distinctive style and a great record.

Aside from this record, Encounter released a couple splits and appeared on a couple comps, and managed to tour Europe.  The guitarist and singer (brothers Joel and Jason Jordan) would go on to form Rain Still Falls who played straightforward emocore.  They were good too, worth checking out if oldschool emocore with lots of octave chords is your cup of tea.  They definitely had both feet in the emo sound, as opposed to Encounter who only dipped their big toe in it.  

Add caption

Encounter's relatively short existence and limited output kept the band from leaving a stronger impression, and they are largely forgotten.  Redemption Records released an 8-song discography some time ago, but it's out of print.  The Redemption website mentions something about a possible reissue of some Redemption releases, but the last update was almost two years ago, so all of this stuff is out of print at this point.  I managed to find some other tracks that don't appear on the Redemption discography and I've compiled all of the tracks that you can download here.   and hear the songs in the meantime.  

If anyone has any flyers, photos, thoughts or recollections of this band, please feel free to share them here. In the meantime, thanks for reading and listening (or listening and skimming).  Hopefully this post gives Encounter some new fans, and for any old fans, a trip down memory lane and a way to hear these songs again without dusting off your old records.  If any band members come across this, thanks for the awesome music but I thank you especially for the special moment in that bookstore 14 years ago where I discovered my favorite record...and also made my best record shopping memory.  Until next time...

Encounter - Discography

Encounter - Discography

Encounter - Discography

Encounter - Discography

Encounter - Discography

Seven months post transplant, ominous nosebleed, alienation

The summer before I was diagnosed (summer '11), Heather and I were walking down Mass Ave in Porter Square on our way to a friend's going away party when suddenly my nose started bleeding.  I don't remember exactly how I realized.   I think Heather might've pointed it out to me.  Once she told me and I saw the drops of blood on the ground, I noticed the cool sensation of blooding dripping onto my lips.  We stop and I try to clean myself up with some tissues.  I watch each tissue become soaked with blood until I was holding my nose close with my bare hand and Heather had to run across the street to some Indian market for some tissues.  

I am leaning against a cement wall watching the blood hit the ground while people walk by and wonder what the hell is up with this guy.  In the bright sun it was the most vivid color red I'd ever seen.  It was perhaps the ultimate Red.  I can't fully describe it -- this must be why many shades of red are compared to blood, but blood itself is compared to none.  
Bandits with planes and Moors,
bandits with finger-rings and duchesses,
bandits with black friars making blessings
kept coming fromthe sky to kill children
and through the streets the blood of the children  ran simply like children's blood. This nosebleed will always stand out in my memory because of the blood, but after I was diagnosed a few months later, it took on greater significance.  I began to look back at it a foreshadowing of the illness that was waiting for me (even thought it had already silently claimed me).  Maybe it was some Divine warning and I should thank God.  Or it was a symptom of the disease.  Or it was nothing. It also foretold the alienation I would feel.  Hard to feel normal standing on a busy street with a faucet for a nose.  When I got sick the my life became the busy street, and the bloody nose was me.  You can't join the cancer club quietly.  No matter how strong your support system is, you'll always have this distinction that draws invisible lines between you and the rest of the world.  In the year since my transplants, I've felt alienated even from other patients. The busy street is now the waiting room.  The mask and gloves I have to wear are my bloody nose.  At least there are a few other bloody noses there with me from time to time.   I'm just over 7 months since my transplant and my health is continuing to recover.  My immune system is getting much stronger and some of my restrictions have been lifted.  I can go to a restaurant ("Try to go at a time when it's not so busy").  Heather and I had dinner down the street and it felt amazing to be back in the world and eating food someone else prepared and interact with normal people again.  So everything is going good. These are the times when I look back at things and today that gave you all a post about a nosebleed. Thanks for reading.  Time to reheat some beef stew. 

The New Year, Stories from a Hotel Security Guard: Introduction

Hi, it's me again.  I hope everyone enjoyed their holidays and rang in the new year with style.  My Christmas and New Year's were most excellent, thanks for asking.  Still, every holiday season I think of my childhood orthodontist, a short, bald, mustached man (picture if Cheech was Armenian, not Mexican) who never used gloves when working on my braces and whose office was decorated with pictures of professional boxers.  One time around the holidays I was waiting in my chair and upon entering the room, he mutters to himself, "Fucking fucking Christmas."

Anyway, today I was furiously digging around my desk drawers for a gluestick and I came across the journal I kept while I worked overnight security at the piece of shit DoubleTree Hotel in downtown Boston, on the edge of Chinatown.  I worked there from May to October of 2009, and this journal covers July through August.  I'd bring it with me and write down thoughts I had or crazy stuff that happened.  And there was a lot of it (much of which fell outside the timeframe of the journal, but that I remember well).

Doubletree Downtown Boston.  This is a recent picture.  The outside was much crummier looking.  Since I quit in October 2009, the hotel's undergone renovations but there are some things you can't renovate....

What I intend to do for these "Stories from a Hotel Security Guard" posts is to transcribe a few journal entries at a time, depending on their length.  I'd scan the pages but the journal is totally beat to hell, not to mention my handwriting is virtually unreadable.  Consider this an introductory post to provide a little background information, and share a few stories that I didn't write down.

Let me set the stage a little bit.  The Doubletree Downtown Boston, as its called, likes to advertise its closeness to city attractions, transportation, etc.  What they don't tell you is the hotel is located on the edge of Chinatown, across from a hospital filled with homeless people and other undesireables, and quite frankly is in a shitty area that at the time was (and probably still is) full of all sorts of street riff raff, from drug dealers to addicts to prostitutes.  I couldn't tell you how many times I would have to "escort" some crackhead, hooker or thug from the lobby in the middle of the night.  There was one black girl who I would see walk up the stairs with some dopey looking guy trailing ten feet behind her, then ten minutes later they'd return from her room in the very same fashion.  A minute later she'd be back with another putz trying to act like he didn't just solicit a hooker.  And so on.

At one point there were two high-class escorts staying at the hotel for over two weeks (paying over $300 in cash every night), until Boston police and detectives arrived one night (I will write more about this in another post).  Throughout all this, the front desk proudly displayed this bullshit plaque from the Community of Chinatown commending the Doubletree for providing "excellent service to the community."  Excellent oral service would be more accurate.

When I sin, I sin real good
Aside from removing "non-guests" from the hotel, you could hardly call me a security guard.  Mostly I was a glorified bellboy.  Since the only employees at the hotel from 11pm-7am were me and the night manager, I had to do all the crap that would've normally been taken care of by room service and other hired help.  "Room so and so needs towels."  "Could you deliver a fridge to room whatever?" Oh yeah, and I handled valet duties, which was really fun when the lot was completely packed and I had to move 20 cars to retrieve one way in the back, or when I had to try to drive a manual transmission I had no idea how to operate.  One night, backing into a space in the garage, I heard the awful sound of metal scraping against concrete.  I managed to get away with that one, although karma came back to bite me in the ass a few months ago when I did the same thing with my own car.

Since my journal doesn't cover all of my time working there, I'm gonna list a few memories off the top of my head that aren't in the journal:

- One day the day manager tells me that homeless people must be sleeping at the top of the dimly lit, Nightmare On Elm Street-esque emergecy stairway, because hotel staff found blankets and syringes there, and that I need to check the top of the stairway a couple times a night.  I told him I would, like a good employee should.  Do you think I did?

-For a couple weeks this young black dude used to enter the hotel earlier in the evening and try to sleep in the halls once the night shift began at 11.  The first time I found him I asked him if he had his room key (a polite "Are you supposed to be here, because I know you're not") and he said no.  I'd run into him a few more times and I never had to ask again, and he would accept his removal with grace and dignity.

-During some gay pride celebration earlier in the summer, the hotel was packed with gay and lesbian people.  I was sitting outside on the bench when this twinkly David Spade looking guy starts chatting me up and eventually propositions me.  I let him be and don't see him for the rest of the night.  The next night the front desk gets a call about a passed out guest on the third floor.  I go to check it out, who is it but David Spade, his pants around his ankles, passed out in his own piss.

I love this song and video.  Wait for the moustached guy with the hat and bandana.
-Another weekend night, I saw this big guido looking guy taking a piss in the parking lot.  I go up to him and tell him he has to leave, and he starts getting irate.  He grabs me by the neck and walks me over to the hotel and keeps telling me how he's going to smash my face into the concrete.  I managed to slip away and quietly call the police on this lunatic.

-One weekend night a taxi driver gave me a cell phone he found in his cab after dropping someone at the hotel.  The phone rang and it was the owner of the phone calling from a friend's phone.  He was thrilled it wasn't lost and we arranged for him to pick it up at the concierge desk which I commandered at night.  A little while later, a muscular guy with one arm comes up to me and asks for his phone.  He said he didn't have any money but he would give me $20 later.  An hour or so later, that black hooker I mentioned above entered the hotel, with the one armed guy trailing 10 feet behind her.  There goes my $20.


-One night someone called in a noise complaint about their neighbors.  I go up to the room and once they let me in, first I see that the window was broken.  Then I notice the toilet tank cover on the floor.  The guests were a couple who looked to be in their early 30s, and they were acting extremely nervous and sheepish.  The guy starts telling me that they heard a beeping noise and thought it was a CO2 detector, and they panicked and broke the window so they wouldn't die from CO2.  He is overly apologetic, they clearly got into a fight and someone was compelled to smash the window with part of the toilet. I just tell them I will let the front desk know and they will make sure everything is straightened out.  I get back to the front desk and tell them what happened, and the night manager tells me, "We don't have CO2 detectors."

So ends this introduction to the life of a one-time overnight hotel security guard.  Thanks for reading, and I promise to be posting on a regular schedule again.  Got some fun ideas in the works as well as continued tales from the Doubltree Downtown Boston.  Take it easy.