thin. They are restless and not having it. A gaggle of 4 up front keep yelling “DTB, DTB!!!” over
my words, then stop, then start again with “YOU HATE BLACK PEOPLE, YOU HATE BLACK
PEOPLE!!!” I break my routine and stop the hecklers with a “NOT TRUE. Anyway, moving
on…”
When I finally get to the part where I meet Obama, the crowd has turned to a hushed
silence. So I drop the punch line. No one laughs, but they look whimsical. Then I go, “You know
what Barack said to me? He said Ryan Bartek, you’re going on tour with the craziest, moistest,
most ludicrous band ever from Detroit. You’re gonna fuckin’ eat hot dogs and battle luchadores
with the sweatiest, man-hairiest, hot-rocking band in the world, motherfucking Downtown
motherfuckin’ Brown!!!” The place explodes. “Can I get a hallelujah my brothers and sisters!!!”
“HALLELUJAH!!!”
Place goes wild and I dodge out back stage. The Screaming Mechanical Brain guys pop
up immediately, Reverend John Wheeler with his dreadlocks and bifocals. They totally dug it and
are psyched to be featured in the last half of the book. The positive reception feels good, but I
can’t shake the “YOU HATE BLACK PEOPLE” thing. Where the fuck did that come from??
CHICAGO (9/1)
“What’s the big deal? It was a CD release party. That’s the key word -- PARTY. Even my mom
bitched at me.” Neil is still piecing together last night, when after three free shots too many, he
blacked out and couldn’t remember how to play the last few songs. People were walking out, the
staff were shaking their heads. They got through an hour of material before Neil started making
up new songs off the top of his head and farted all the way off stage.
It was total chaos. They had their live horn section of Benny and Swisher, with tiny
Benny in an over-sized rubber Smiegel mask complete with the little brown loincloth. Swisher
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was hammered in a wrestling leotard, and ran into the backstage waking me up by pissing all over
the wall. So nonchalant with his penis in his hand while all these groupie girls are drinking, and
all he wants to do is talk about Trailer Boys.
Neil was in drunken retard strength mode, laughing & dry humping Swisher on the floor
of the former mosh pit in plain view of all their fans. It took all our combined efforts to get him to
pay the opening bands and shove him in the van, because he was an unstoppable belligerent
juggernaut Commented Neil: “It’s my party and I’ll black out if I want to.”
We hear a lurching clomp the stairs, and a solanum-infected Glover dredges from the
basement, quivering in shakes of white-ghost alcohol poisoning. He’s soaked in shit water
because the freezing basement had flooded overnight. For hours he’d incubated in a piss-soaked,
feces ravaged sleeping bag…
MINNEAPOLIS (9/2)
It’s a 6 hour drive from Chicago to Minnesota, “The Star of the North.” Minneapolis --
Screaming Mechanical Brain’s hometown. Last night’s gig was at the Oasis Café, a quaint all-
ages Coffee House. There were 150 kids for DTB, and they kept feeding us chocolate cake &
Scotch stolen from their parents’ liquor cabinets.
For this tour I’m resigned to tales specifically pulled from the city in which I’m
appearing. Better way of connecting with the crowd, and a good way to cut my teeth. Problem is
I’m going in with totally untested scripts. I had a moderately receptive performance, ranting about
hobos from Chicago like the “Blankman” bum with the garbage can accessorized superhero tool
belt and aluminum foil cape; the chain-smoking Jesus in the purple robe slinging a massive
wooden crucifix.
The big-set ender – besides Obama, which I’ll be dropping for every finale – was the
Grant Park tale where my friends smoked a “wicky stick” of PCP with the homeless. One was
aced out his mind and kept telling me of the Bum King in the subway tunnels, a hushed mythical
character known only as ”Red Dragon” (“Red Dragon know all… Red Dragon gunn get you!!!”).
We’ve been killing time during our Minneapolis haul with a Billy Jack marathon, since
no one was aware of the spin-kicking, hippie protecting, kung-fu Indian. Billy is to be our
symbolic guide throughout this journey. We’ve a lot to learn from his nomadic ways, especially
me, since I’ve only $180 bucks left for the next 6 weeks.
Outside the Triple Rock Social club the first band to visit me is a local called THEY
LIVE; a black-haired piss-n-vinegar guitarist named Casey Boyd takes the controls: “We’re really
influenced by Samhain, 80’s stuff like The Cure, doomier goth stuff. Goth these days is for the
most part a cartoonish fashion show. We are goth more in the timeless cosmic horror sense of an
author like H.P.Lovecraft, where if you are considering suicide it's because of some great cosmic
terror and not because the girl that works at hot topic broke your heart. We just played in Iowa
last night with some hate-core sXe band called Total War. That was interesting, ha…”
“What do you have to say about Minneapolis?”
“The music scene here’s alright. I’m into The Falls, Corpse Show Creeps, The Funeral
and the Twilight, Full Moon Massacre, Blue Ox and anyone else that's not all about total cookie-
cutter conformity. I think a lot of the bands are lazy, don’t make any money off it, so they just
quit. We’re kind of like those old rappers like Easy E. They put out those CD’s with criminal
activity money. We do things very illegitimately. Like our shirts, we just go out and steal them
from Michaels Arts & Crafts, silkscreen them ourselves. Even if we sell them for a $1 we’re
making a profit. Last night we just gave them all out.”
“How do you feel about the Minnesota punk scene?
“The punk scene in general is pretty stale. I like high school punk bands, where it's just 3
chords and angry, nihilistic lyrics. When I see alcoholic punks in their mid to late 20s who blame
all of their problems on the government it really brings me down. Most of the crust punks that I
have encountered live in mansions in financially affluent areas. I'd imagine that their whole crust
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image is not much more than a rebellion phase against their rich college educated parents. I
myself am into cleanliness and order.”
“I take it you got your band name from…” “That John Carpenter movie. The aliens that
run everything but no one really knows”… “Do you think that could possibly be real?” “Oh
definitely; all the successful people pray to the lizards. They really run things.”
“Multidimensional cheese faces…” “Crabs for the eyes…”
STEVENS POINT (9/3)
“Killswitch Engage is so heterosexual they ought to be lifting weights onstage!” The thin, Labor
Day weekend crowd roared at Neil’s latest hit single, and my rant for last evening was the nature
girl CVS photo story c/o Denis Wilson/Brenner’s quasi-pagan campsite march. Tonight carries
the holiday weekend tradition further with another dead gig in Wisconsin and no local support.
We’re playing a little coffee/booze hut called Mission Café, and Main Street looks like
the humble town from The Blob remake. An obnoxious 40 something guy named “Morphine
Mike” keeps trying to grab Neil’s microphone. He’s dancing around like fruitcake, shouting
anecdotes about booting up. He’s audible on the recording as I chat with Sandi Plaza, the
promoter of the evening.
She’s a middle-aged oldschool metalhead biker with tats running up and down her arms.
She played bass for ONIS, Eternal Silence, and Legion. Amusingly she also has that Francis
McDormand Fargo accent: “Legion was my self-proclaimed death metal project in the early 90’s,
and I promoted a lot of shows here in Stevens Point. Legion was a message of things that people
didn’t want to face - death, dying, religion, the hypocrisy -- rape, grotesque rape, just crazy shit.
Eternal Silence was pretty much the same, kind of like the old Carcass days. ONIS was about
suicide, the realities of life, an ugly side to everything. Sadly I’m no longer in either band -- the
drama thing, which I want no part of.”
“We’re in kind of a desolate small town in Wisconsin here. Do the locals stare you
down for having all the tattoos and the scary demon shirts or have they relaxed over the
years?”
“Wisconsin used to be 10 years behind, maybe even 15. Back in the early 90’s extreme
metal was not seen here at all. People would look at me like ‘Oh my god, she’s a Satanist. She’s
evil, she’s terrible, she’s marked.’ People are accepting it now. Parents are starting to say this is a
good thing. The kids are supervised.”
“How do you feel about extremist actions in underground metal?”
“To each his own, but I just recently lost a friend who took his life. I’ve seen this happen
a lot in the extremist metal, like the black metal. I personally draw the line with cutting yourself
onstage. I’m not a fan of that. I don’t even want to watch it to be honest. I can see people pouring
fake blood… To me it’s like I’m an actress putting on a play. I had the gauntlets. Sometimes I’d
corpse-out. We weren’t making a mockery of it, we were just being fun.”
“What do you think of Glen Benton? Do you know Will Rahmer?”
“I love Glen. I’ve known him since ‘91, we’ve been good friends… Will is a good friend
of mine. He started NYDM. He’s a biker, so am I. So I know what it’s about to be a brother and a
sister. A good friend of mine, Don Decker, he’s the regional NYDM president for the 5 states in
this area. I’m not a member, but I’m a supporter. My plate is full, but I still reach out to help.”
“Is it true that Will Rahmer never smiles?”
“No, he smiles a lot, ha ha. He’ll kick my ass, but he smiles. And Glen smiles too. And
he does have an inverted cross very deep into his forehead. It’s about that same thing –
brotherhood, sticking to the music. That’s we he’s got a mark. I have my marks too, each one has
a meaning…”
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ALLEGEN (9/4)
Swinging back through Michigan for a show in Allegen, a town I’ve never even heard of. Last
night we ended up at the house of a guy who played in a band with one of the other guys from
American Headcharge. Everyone got trashed and shaved their heads. SMB vocalist Reverend
John Wheeler now has bricks like Vanilla Ice, and Glover has a zigzagged, sideways Mohawk.
We did get a free breakfast though, through a 17 year old high school girl that worships
SMB. She threw down $120 on grub, which I thought was raw. I had to scold everyone into
paying the tip out of courtesy. Regardless of ethics, the table across the dining room was filled
with her jocko classmates and she was so happy rubbing it in their faces, flipping them off,
feeling oh so super-cool to be hanging out with rock stars she idolized. That one breakfast tab
made her Senior year. She is the most beautiful thing in the world right now…
Allegen: the Groundsphere Rhythm Café. It’s Labor Day and not far from Kalamazoo –
we are playing an old barn silo turned into a coffee shop/booze-stocked multi-purpose venue. So
many tables & couches & pool tables & neon & ultra-slick design. I’d have killed to have an all
ages spot like this when I was a kid.
Instead there are only 7 people here, and it’s the venues last show ever due to lack of
attendance. Terrible, but what else can you expect hooking up a monster venue like that when
nothing surrounds you for 30 miles but pure farmland? Another leviathan dies forgotten…
CLEVELAND (9/5)
Peabodies in Cleveland. I’m on one knee with my hand reaching towards the sky epically,
spotlight shining intensely on me. What a dramatic way to get across Battle Mountain. It’s a
pretty hammered show, and no one really gets why I’d want to fly an airplane into a hilltop to
score a record contract.
Onward to the after party, the three-level house of a Betty Page type. There are Boris
Karloff posters all over the walls, and the nice straight-edge Jewish girl who Glover and I chased
around all night saying, “Billy Jack isn’t real…BUT TOM LAUGHLIN IS!” happens to be
drinking tequila and smoking bong loads. Turf from SMB drags her off somewhere, and SMB’s
merch guy Skode and I keep drinking Everclear.
Lord we are so wasted. Peabodies gave us endless drink tickets and this house has so
much vodka lying around that everyone turns Barney Gumble. It’s my first time alone with the
SMB caravan, ‘cause DTB took off with some guy that looks like Rick Moranis for a night of
strip club hijinks.
Skode ups the ante by stripping naked. He’s got green hair, sort of looks like a young,
scruffy Brad Pitt with muttonchops, and is trying to woo the Betty Page girl. She spreads Skodes
buttcheeks wide open and shaves his asshole in front of a roaring, obliterated household…
Another shot of Tequila and I too am wandering around butt naked. I usually don’t go skinny
dipping at 3am, but Betty shaved a pentagram in my chest and it seemed appropriate…
BUFFALO (9/6)
“How do you feel about the tour so far?”
Reverend John Wheeler: “It’s been more fun than our last. We didn’t have a merch guy,
it was just the four of us floating through the blankness of space.”
“Any harsh Bible Belt experiences?”
“We didn’t run across any angry yokels. In Iowa we tried to turn around off this weird
road, and this guy that had this haircut from the 70’s, Napoleon Dynamite glasses and a mustache
came running off his porch yelling something at us. But I just rolled up the window up and drove
away. I think he was just sitting there doing drugs all day waiting to attack someone on his
property. I almost ran him over. I figured that was probably best.”
“Tell me what awaits us in Nashville.”
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“Well not the pussy of lore. None that you’d be interested in anyway… Nashville’s kind
of stinky. It’s a dirty, bummy town. Last time we stayed with Turfs’ uncle. It was this storage
space and everyone got covered in these weird bug bites ever