NOW AND THEN
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FEBRUARY 3 2006
Had lunch with convertino today. The usual joint. Poca cosa.
Hadn’t seen john in a long time I think. I was just in the old 65 barracuda. Primer black and running like silk as pappy used to say. I was in my own world. Big sun glasses behind the wheel. Earphones dripping out the next piano record. Idling in the drive way dirt and john just appeared at the window. Never saw him coming.
We headed off for some lunch then, him following behind in his 50’s vw bug of beige. No parking spots down by the restaurant, and I could see they already had posted the “cerrado” sign out front, probably chasing off “gem show” stragglers. So I careened around the block to find a spot quick enough to still get me my chile relleno fill.
Zipped up the next block, almost past wavelab studio, and there was joe burns standing on the corner. One foot on. One foot off. Looked like he was talking to jon rauhaus and unaware. I was having to turn around wide because of oncoming traffic. The radius is dangerous. I am heading right for joe. I miss him by an increment, shouting like you do when your horn don’t work …and cracking myself up.
“look oooooooooooout!!!!!!!!!”
John then came barreling around the same corner on my trail, which continued the crack-me-up. I got busy then finding my parking spot and getting in to lunch land on time.
I have not heard from joe in many years. He lives about 3 blocks away. It occurred to me, one day about 5 years ago,
if I do not make the effort to get in touch with him, if I do not call a band meeting, if I do not track him down while he is away on tour, to wonder how long it would take for him to ever feel like getting in touch with me. Apparently more time then it’s already been. Oddly, this band line-up never ended with a fight or disagreement or any lover’s triangle.
I think it ended by interpretation.
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FLASHBACK - PARIS 1993 = END OF A GIANT SAND TOUR
We added a few shows at the end of our tour that got set up by friends or fans. These extra shows would turn out to be the coin we would walk away with from an entire tour that just about broke even. 2 paris shows were graciously offered up by marriane dissard so we took ‘em. The first show was a normal club setting and was fairly empty when we played. Promotion on these extra shows were always iffy. This was the end of a very fine and well attended tour that had rainer opening up and jamming along with, as well as the psycho sisters [susan cowsill (the cowsills) and vicky petersen (the bangles)]… all of which had since left the tour at various stages of dictated schedule crunching.
Now we were in hell. Hell was a parisan crash pad in the hands of an aging bohemian woman of notable girth. The part that was bad was that she was mad. The place was of alarming filth with no real place to sleep. We were fucked. John took to dipping into endless amounts of bottled red while stubble sprang from his cheeks like something escaping. Chris cacavas was also on this tour and still with us, except he had found a red haired clown puppet along the way and named it “clowny”. Chris and clowny were getting very tight. He wouldn’t go anywhere without him and there were conversations being had. Joe still seemed happy to be anywhere back then and was very up and sparky. Crew wise: Bhudda the brit had a glaze of weariness and darkening eye baggage. Bonner the kiwi was always thickly stoned and half lidded. Anthony the aussie was still holding up well and maintaining a permanent smile. Sofia the Dane was still along for the ride and dealing with the end-of-the-tour-no-man’s-land scenario. Her and i opted to sleep at a flat down the tracks on hard wood floors with only our coats to nest in. She made it better then bearable. But john was losing it fast back at the stinking crash pad, vowing never to sleep that night. And clowny would not shut up.
The next night we were supposed to play at this same joint. Not likely. I made plans with anthony to escape. The rigors of responsibility always befell me to look out for everyone, which in itself was a dichotomy. I may have been the elder, but was long haired and scattered, skinny and a sonic gambler. I still had the overbearing urge to watch over the posse and attempt to avoid train wrecks.
So anthony checked with the trains. We were due in Munich the next night and told the opening band they would now close and we would open the show instead. No problem there. We started playing around 8:30. We were all still crusted with the murk of this dim cluster muck. There was no stage, just a corner of a room. We tore into the set and then we tore out of there. People were still coming in. We were going to attempt to make the overnight sleeper train leaving at 10:30. We were hungry and coated with muck. Sofie, Chris, Bhudda, and Bonner were to head out in the rented “sprinter” van back up to London and make there way home from there. [unfortunately they would get stopped and severely searched at the border because of someone’s book on board about “home grown” gardening.]
We, on the other hand, barely made our train. Anthony, john joey and me. Crammed all the stuff we could carry with us on the train and tried to fit it in the little room where we were assigned. It had 6 bunks. 4 for us and 2 for some other passengers already there.
So we met our new neighbors. Then the train started moving right away. We went to find the food car, but instead found out we were all locked in our “sleeper” car. The windows were locked too. We were stuck in a tiny train room in a locked up car and all we managed to bring with us was a bottle of scotch whiskey, which would now have to be our dinner. I don’t think we ate at all that day. The other 2 passengers were much younger and brought out their stash pipe to share. Back then it was deemed medicinal in such situations. We would be stuck in this train all night and still just mostly happy about making tracks from the wreck room we left in Paris.
John was shambolic and steadfast. Anthony managed to remain clear eyed and up. Joey was still amped to be out there and taking in all in hard and fast. I was already missing my future wife and trying to figure out exactly what might lie ahead. We were now in uncharted territory, like what we just escaped, here on tour after the tour. Munich should be good though. It usually had the best crowd for us in all of germany for some mysterious reason.
We left hungry and figured the train would provide. So instead, with every mile, we would slug and toke and literally put the past behind us. Sometime later I noticed joe had gone missing, but there was no where to go. We all had managed a healthy buzz to buckle into a state of dormancy for the remainder of the rails. I went off to find joe. I had this annoying habit of being the “care taker” back then. I found him on the floor of the bathroom. He was a mess. He had indulged too fast and way too hard. I know the spins when I see them. He couldn’t move. When the spins set in, you are damned if you do and damned if you don’t. You get the spins from drinking too much on an empty stomach and then topping it off with smoke. It’s worse if you try to sleep.
There was a swish of water ebbing back and forth there on the floor where joe lay. He could not get up. The rhythm and wobble of the train became his enemy. I got him back to our little room, and john figured out how to open the locked windows with his drum key. Fresh air was the only possible cure. It was a suffering ride for him from that point. I kept watch over him until it looked like he finally found some sleep. Munich came early and grey. I got the poor plebe some pretzel bread at the station. Absorbing food is like penicillin to the early morning spin hangover. He looked at me like I might be trying to poison him and then managed a nibble. He was starting to come around, but badly wounded from the road. Maybe then he indelibly blamed me for the road to ruin irregardless of his own indulgence. John and I were fine. We were already well seasoned at that point. Been out there on the road together since ’89, and me before that, even longer. Knew the proper increments. Knew when to surrender to what it would render. Joe was still the kid.
So we set up that night in munich. The substanz club, which had always been good to us. The place packed out. We made massive coin just playing for the door. And we played very very good. The tormenting days on the road often give birth to impossible nights of grandeur. It was a great night. We were brothers blurred to perfection.
The end
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howe on 02.10.06 @ 07:50 PM GMT [link]
