Ladies and Gentlemen... Your 2052 Presidential Nominee

I was reading recently about a mentally challenged child.  He’s only two year old but already exhibiting aggressiveness issues of control and greed.

And I really feel sorry for the kid because he’s going to grow up to be a politician.

I’ve been reading candidate statements for the upcoming primary elections and I’m always astounded at the delusions of new candidates.

“I’m going to change everything!  I’m going to end the war!  I’m going to create jobs!  I’m going to fix the medical system!”

And I have to say, “You’re running for the Board of Supervisors.  Cool your jets.”

The statements from experienced politicians are like reading the diary of an abused puppy, cowering in a corner.  Oh they sound all optimistic.  They may talk about a couple things they accomplished.  But the underlying theme is “Man, this is way harder than I thought it was going to be and I really can’t do much of anything.  By the way, can you donate some money for my next election?”

What the newbies don’t seem to realize is that they’ll be one of thousands of decision makers in the government.  Getting a consensus is like trying to get 1000 people in a room to all agree on where to have lunch.  Except the government has to decide where the country is going to eat for lunch.

Now I’m not the smartest dude in the world.  So if I can figure that out, the people running for office and spouting off about how much they’ll accomplish in 2-4 years must have more cable TV channels than IQ points.

This Duke University study says that 49% of presidents had some sort of mental illness.  To be fair, the modern definition of “mental illness” is way broader than it needs to be.  Thanks drug companies.  But for the sake of reality among politicians, I think we can round that 49% up to 99%.

I don’t know about you, but that little sample ballot with the candidate statements is my most used resource for voting.  I have to ignore all the advertising that’s the equivalent of angry monkeys slinging poo at each other.  Editorial writing in the press is just as slanted.  What the candidates say about themselves is damning enough that other side really doesn’t need to do anything.

DIRK ALLEN KONOPIK of Rancho Cucamonga, CA, running for Senate
“Christian, Veteran, American.  NRA, VFW, American Legion.  Will stand boldly for Christ.”

See?  I don’t need any more than that.  That guy is old and set in his ways and will refuse to listen to anyone else’s opinion ever.  That certainly sounds like forward movement, doesn’t it?  And I do like how he states “American”, as if the other candidates are Swedish or something.

MARSHA FEINLAND of Berkeley, CA, running for Senate
“The 99% want housing, health care, education, and environmental protection.  The 1% give us war, prisons, and discrimination.  They control the wealth that we have worked to produce.  Let’s decide democratically what we need and make the rich and their corporations pay.”

Well, I’m sure her campaign coffers runneth over.  I know she thinks driving a Prius makes her better than everyone else, but how exactly does she think she’s going to accomplish all that?  And if you have to use buzz words like “the 99%” to make your case, just stop.  Or just go all the way: “OMG! I can haz political office!  ROFL!”

And if I’m normal at all, then that’s all that most people know about these candidates.  If you sound like an idiot, I’m certainly not going to dig deep on your website to get your positions, am I?  So my attention immediately goes to the longer candidate statements that might have actual ideas in them.

Usually, they don’t, but hey, gotta start somewhere.  I’m just saying, spend a little extra dough on the things people will look at if you want to get your point across.  But then again “Bible Nut With A Gun” and “Angry Hippie Who Actually Reads All Those MoveOn.org Emails” pretty much sums it up, eh?  Why waste the dough?

Do I have a solution for all this?  Of course not.  If I actually was delusional enough to think I did have the solutions, I’d run for office.

You can help.  Please donate to the Children’s Defense Fund so they can help disabled children live like normal people before they decide to run for office.

I thought today I’d continue my series of “Boobs I Haven’t Seen” after my recent post about the lady who only wanted me to lie about showing me her boobs.

Years ago, I used to play the Borders Books circuit.  They used to have indie artists perform in their cafes.  It was a nice gesture towards the local arts economy that didn’t really cost them much but did bring in some business.  Then they started putting all sorts of restrictions and rules on the performances and eventually stopped doing them altogether.  Now they’re out of business.  Coincidence?  I think not.

So one time I was booked to play the Borders in Santa Cruz, CA.  Not remembering, of course, that Santa Cruz isn’t fond of chain businesses.  But hey, the local bookshop wasn’t inviting me to play.

Like a good little artist, I got into town early that day to do street promotion with my sample CDs.  Early in the day I talked briefly with two women on the street and gave them CDs.  They seemed nice enough, but not particularly interested in the show.  Didn’t expect to see them again after that.

Did the show that night for a small but enthusiastic crowd.  I used to open those shows with my song “Two Of Me” because it turns out if you start screaming like a nutcase in the middle of a bookstore cafe, you can gather a crowd.  Try it sometime.

At this same show, a guy drew a little cartoon of me and gave it to me after the show.  That would be the same one I use around the web and on my Stuff People Like CD.  I wish I knew who the guy was so I could give him some money for it.

Just as I’m finishing the show those two gals from earlier in the day walk in.  They had obviously had a few drinks with dinner that night.  And they came in saying “Aww! We missed the show!  We wanted to hear Whale Blubber!”  I had already played the song earlier in the show and there was an act on after me so I couldn’t go long.

I’m never one to let a potential fan get away, drunk or not.  So I said, “Hey let’s just go out on the street and I’ll play the song for you on the sidewalk.”  They settle unsteadily onto the window sill outside and I dig into the song.  As I hit the first chorus the movie theater next door lets out and this huge rush of people crowds the sidewalk, with a huge portion of them stopping to listen to me sing this ridiculous song.  Cool, a second audience for the evening.  Wish I’d had CDs out to sell or at least and open guitar case.

The further I get into the song, the more these two girls are cuddling up to each other on the window sill.  As if this actually were some sort of romantic song and not a song about eating whale blubber and blowing grizzly bears.  But hey, I’ll take some googly eyes when they arrive.

The song finishes and I get a big applause break from the crowd that had gathered.  Then the two girls totter over to me and one says she’s always wanted to learn how to play guitar.  So we do the “drunken try to show her how to play a G chord” thing.  They ask how the show went.

Then they start telling me why they’re in town.  They’re yoga instructors in training and they’ve been at a mountain retreat for the past 3 weeks.  This was their first time off the mountain in that whole time.  As they’re standing there holding each other up, one leeringly asks me, “So what are you doing now?”

Freeze frame: Lonely drunken yoga instructors starved for fun after 3 weeks of isolation.  TWO of them.

Yoga instructors…. Think of the possibilities.

The letter started composing itself in my head.  “Dear Penthouse… I never thought it would happen to me…”

If I were writing a cheeseball porn script, there’s a good chance it would start exactly this way.  But it would end differently.  Otherwise it would be one hell of a crappy porno.

Immediately remembering my girlfriend of a decade plus waiting for me at home, my answer was “Going home to my girlfriend.”

“AWWWWWWW!” they replied.

“Awwwwwww…” the 15 year old in my head chimed in with them.

Then I did go home.  And they didn’t buy a CD from me.  I probably could have gotten ten bucks out of them at least.  But I’m not one to take advantage of drunk people with money.  (Shush, Brendan Lynch….)

And that, my friends, is another time where I didn’t see the boobs…

   I finally had a chance to dive into Pinterest yesterday.  My profile is at http://www.pinterest.com/philcomedy/ if you’d like to come and check it out.

I’ve never claimed to be an early adopter with this stuff.  Apparently I had to wait until Pinterest became the 3rd most trafficked social media site on the net.  That happened amazingly fast for them too, so they must be doing something right.

But I just didn’t want to.  Another site to update regularly?  Ugh.  But the game here on the net for anyone trying to create a career is “Be Everywhere”.  So I jumped in.  But sometimes I feel like my whole life is sucked up by searching for things to post to various places.

Ok, enough grousing.  Pinterest really is pretty easy to use.  I’ve got the little button on my Firefox toolbar so whenever I land on a page with something pinable on it, I just click on that and it sucks in every picture on the page.  Then I just choose which one I want to pin.  I would like to be able to pick multiples from that list of pics, but that may be coming in the future.

I do really like that I didn’t have to do a lot of friend adding when I signed up.  It goes and grabs your Facebook people and automatically follows them.  That save a bunch of time.  Plus all your stuff is public right off the bat.  It’s almost a backward step from the regularly updated privacy stuff on other sites.  But then again, people are sharing super personal stuff on Pinterest either.

As of yesterday, I’ve only put up my album covers and some gig pictures and pics with fans.  I haven’t done the more personal stuff yet.  I do plan on littering the place with Disney and Star Wars images.   And the scent of estrogen there is so strong, I feel like I should pin pictures of monster trucks and tools.

Not completely sure what the purpose of it all is yet.  There’s the immediate benefit of links back to my sites.  I have to update some of the descriptions as I just found out you can put links there and they are do-follow.  Good for SEO.  Then I guess it’s like everywhere else.  Post and comment, like and follow.  I haven’t had a chance to really feel out the dynamic yet.  And looking over the “Popular” page, I didn’t really see a ton of discussions I felt like getting involved with.

Right now it seems like just another checkbox on the mental to-do list.  But it’ll be interesting to see how it all works out.  Again, I’m at http://www.pinterest.com/philcomedy/  Come check it out and let me know what you think.  Happy to follow you back too and we can share pictures of puppies or whatever we’re supposed to be doing.

Not currency, ladies... To be used for manipulation of males only.

This happened at one of my shows recently.  A lady comes to my merchandise table outside the showroom while the other comic is on stage.  She hands me a $10 bill and said she wants a CD.  Then she tells me that her husband doesn’t want her to spend the money.  So if he asks I’m to say that she showed me her tits in exchange for a CD.

I’m not sure how that was better than dropping $10.  But it did give me just a little insight into their marriage.  In my head it was as if millions of marriage counselors suddenly cried out in terror and were suddenly silenced.

I assume my CD will be a disputed item during their inevitable divorce proceedings.

Has she used this ploy before?  Does her husband wonder how she comes home with “free” groceries all the time?

Part of me wanted to give her the ten back and hold her to telling the truth.  Lying in a relationship is bad.  So, you know, it would be for the sake of her marriage.  The other part of me remembered that my car doesn’t run on boobs.

But honestly, she was making mountains out of molehills.  There wasn’t much happening under that training bra.  Jack Black has a bigger rack than this lady.  And I don’t really care if she has a small chest.  That doesn’t make her any less of a woman.  But look, you don’t walk into a Lamborghini dealership with a McDonalds gift card.

If I were actually going to do this deal it might be a couple of download tracks, but probably not a whole CD.  Or maybe she gives me a flash and a fiver.

I was hoping she and her husband would just quietly slide out after the show.  Nope. They and all their friends show up back at my merch table.  Her husband says, “So I hear you got a treat…”  At least he didn’t sound happy about it.  I was worried they were the kind of couple that BOTH wink at you at the bar.  I just kind of said, “Uh, yeah. Perks of the job, I guess.” and moved on to talking to someone else.

So of course her friend goes, “She got a CD just for showing you her tits?  I’ve got bigger tits than she does!  I want a t-shirt!”  And I’m starting to fear a pleasurable yet financially disastrous chain reaction of me doling out t-shirts to women who won’t even keep them on.

I told her I can’t do that because the shirts cost me more and I was sold out of CDs.  And I suspect she’d have been pretty pissed if she had flashed me and then found out later that her friend was lying.  Thankfully instead she just gave me $15 for the shirt.

And so kids, this story ends not with a moral to carry with you, nor with an hysterical punch line.  My life simply goes on with twenty-five more dollars and 4 less boobs in it.  Maybe I’ll call my next album Anti-Climax.

I recently released a survey to mailing list to get some feedback on possible models for future distribution of my music and comedy.  Quite a few other artists were interested in seeing the results as well, so I thought I’d post them here.

Now, I would not hold this up to any sort of strict scientific review as it’s a fairly small sample and just from my particular type of fan.  I’ll run down the results and then talk about a few ways I plan to implement them.

Thanks to everyone who filled out the survey.  It’s going to make it much easier for me to offer my art in the way you’d like to receive it.

Section One: Distribution Models

1. Which model is most appealing?
44% – Downloads of individual tracks/albums/videos for a price you choose, including zero.
31% – Regular fixed prices for downloads and hard copy goods
25% – All-you-can-eat annual membership

2. Name your own price downloads – Averages
Single Track – $0.99
Full Length Album – $8-10
Full Length Video – $15

3. Annual Membership Model Price Average
Digital Only – $40
Digital plus One Hard Good Per Year – $50
One person suggested a name-your-own price for the membership model which is an interesting idea as well.

4. Fixed Price Downloads – Averages
Single Tracks – $0.99
Full Length Album – $9.00
Full Length Video – $12.00

A couple implementations for this section:
I think the best plan is going to be a combination model.  I’ll be offering all of my official releases for download on a name-your-price basis.  My experience with my “Stuff People Like” CD at live shows has shown that this is a workable model.  I will also include an online store that uses fixed prices for hard copy CDs/DVDs/T-shirts/etc, as those have more costs associated with them.

The idea of a membership model is still interesting, but I want to wait until I can make it an irresistible and worthwhile experience for the members.  Besides my official releases, I’d like to include archive releases, advance access to new material, extra videos, ebooks, and stuff from other artists I think you’d like.

Section 2: Listening And Buying

5. Which streaming music services do you use?
27% – Pandora
10% – Spotify
10% – Rhapsody
5% – Rdio
5% – Slacker
43% – Other – Includes terrestrial radio, Grooveshark, Turntable, Napster, Zune, etc.

6. Which online stores do you buy downloads from?
37% – iTunes
31% – Amazon
8% – Rhapsody
15% – None
9% – Other – Includes Liquid Digital, Zune, Google Play, etc.

7. Preferred place to buy CDs.
27% – Amazon
15% – Target
14% – Best Buy
14% – Walmart
22% – Other – Includes local record stores and directly from artist at events.
8% – Do not buy CDs

8. Preferred place to buy DVDs.
26% – Amazon
21% – Target
18% – Best Buy
14% – Walmart
14% – Other – Includes local stores, direct from artists, online deep discount sites.
7% – Do not buy DVDs

Implementation ideas:
I think I’m pretty well where I can be here.  I’ll be getting more material into Pandora soon.  Already well represented on all the others.  And the chances of getting into Target, Best Buy, or Walmart are slim and none right now.

Section 3: Socializing and Live Shows

9. Which social media site do you spend the most time on?
56% – Facebook
18% – Youtube
5% – Twitter
5% – Google+
8% – Other
8% – None

10. Do you own a blog?
74% – No
26% – Yes

11. How many live shows of any sort do you attend each year?
45% – 1-5
29% – 6-12
16% – 21 or more
5% – 13-20
5% – None

12. If you could would you attend more/the same/fewer shows than you do?
82% – More
18% – The same
0% – Fewer

13. What one major obstacle prevents you from attending the number of shows you’d like.  This was an open-ended question, but I’ve summarized and ranked the most common reasons.
1. Time/Schedule
2. Effort – driving, parking, etc
3. Accessibility of shows in my area
4. Cost

14. What kind of smartphone do you use?
37% – None (regular cell phone or none)
32% – Android
24% – iPhone
5% – Windows
3% – Blackberry

Implementation Ideas:
There’s some interesting stuff here.  First off, if you still own stock in Rim/Blackberry… Maybe time to unload that.   I’m very glad to see those numbers for the live show attendance question.  The obstacles question is one I’m looking closely at.  How can I eliminate some of those?

Two ideas.  First is a short weekly live online performance.  Granted, online isn’t the same vibe as a real live show.  At least until I can have a Tupac-like hologram beamed to your living room.  But it will be a live performance.  I’ll keep it short, probably 15 minutes or so.  This way time, effort, and cost are minimal.  I will probably also offer the show as a downloadable podcast afterward too.  This will, of course, be in addition to my regular live tour dates.

The second idea addresses the accessibility problem.  House concerts.  I’ve done lots of these in the past.  And on my current tour I was privileged to play Amy’s living room in Hudson, IA.  Not a town a lot of artists are stopping in.  These types of shows are easier than it sounds.  You invite a bunch of friends over (10-20 is a good starting point) and they each chip in some money, just like a cover charge, to pay me.  You avoid, travel, parking, drink minimums, service fees, tips, and all that hoo-ha of going to a venue.  You’ll also generally get a longer show from me than you would in a club.  If you’d like more information on this idea, email me at phil@roadsideattraction.com .

If you have comments or ideas, please leave a comment below.  I’d love to hear them.  A sustainable business is built on communication.  Thanks!

The view from today's hotel room. Not the classiest joint I've stayed in.

As a comedian, I spend a lot of time traveling, particularly by car.  I often tell people they pay us to drive and we do comedy for free.  Since I’m in the middle of a tour right now and thinking about all this stuff, I thought I’d impart a little wisdom on how to travel on the cheap.

Now I don’t go nearly as cheap as some of my brethren.  I worked with a guy this last weekend that ripped out the back seats of his minivan and put an air bed back there.  He just parks at a rest stop on nights he doesn’t have a hotel and sleeps there.  I’ve certainly done my time sleeping in the back of a van, but I try not to anymore.

So here’s a few tips on traveling on the cheap:

1. Get a credit card that gives you either airline or hotel points.  I had the Southwest Airlines credit card for a long time, but I won’t deal with Chase anymore.  Now I’ve got the Choice Hotels card instead.  For the most part, my hotels are taken care of by the people booking me, but on off nights I’m on my own.  That’s when I can whip out some points and not have to dig into my stash to pay for a room.  You’ll love the feeling of being able to check in somewhere without paying for it.  So find a hotel or airline chain that you plan to use on a regular basis and collect those points!

2. Buy your airfare on Tuesdays.  That’s when the new deals come out for each airline.  I usually do a quick check on Monday and then check again on Tuesday to see what works.  You can also use sites like FareCompare.com that give price forecasts.

3. Don’t take any upsells on the rental car.  The prepaid gas is a scam.  Unless you bring the car back exactly empty, you’re paying for more gas than the care will need.  Just fill it up before you return it and you’ll spend the same or less.  Also, don’t bother with the insurance packages they offer.  If you pay with a credit card, there’s a good chance that the credit card company offers a complimentary rental car insurance program.  Double check with your exact card to be sure.

4. Return the rental car to the same city you got it in.  They will charge you sometimes 300% more on the rental is you drop it off in a different city.  Try to fly into a central city for your trip and use that as home base.  You may end up with some extra driving, but you won’t have to pay nearly as much for the car.

5. One last recommendation on cars.  Southwest’s website always has the best prices.  I’ve comparison checked a zillion times and I always end up back there.  Also, be sure to recheck the prices about a week before your trip to see if they’ve gone down.  I did that with this current tour I’m on and saved $100.  There’s no charge for changing your car reservation.

6. As much as possible, buy snacks at regular grocery stores instead of gas stations and truck stops.  They’ll be significantly cheaper most of the time.  And if you are buying at a gas station, make sure they have price tags on the items.  Some don’t put prices on any of their items (knowing people will buy anyway) and they’re always more expensive.

7. If you can, bring a cooler in the car and keep healthy snacks on hand so you’re not tempted to grab a Snickers at every stop.  Some fresh fruit, a jar of peanut butter, nuts, and beef jerky will get you through the snack cravings.  Also, pick up a case of water and keep it in the car as well. 4 or 5 bucks for a whole case is way cheaper than buying them one at a time.

8. One can not live on nuts and jerky alone.  You’ll want a real meal eventually.  I try to keep the carbs down, so I have two recommendations for cheap and healthy eats.  Wendy’s is my go-to place.  For $5 or so you can get the half salad and a cup of chili and that will fill you up.  Their salads are pretty good for fast food salads, and lower in calories that others.  My back up plan is Subway.  You can order any of their sandwiches as a salad instead.  Unfortunately, they’re pretty bland.  Another good choice is either Chipotle or Qdoba.  The bowl or salad versions of their stuff will give you some good hot, filling food without breaking the bank or your belt.

9. To contradict myself, avoid chain restaurants as much as possible.  If I’m going to have a sit-down meal and cheat my diet a little bit, avoid Applebees and Denny’s.  Use Yelp.com to find a cool local establishment with good food and reasonable prices.  You’ll be supporting small businesses, getting way better food, soaking up the local color.

10. If your hotel does a free continental breakfast, look for boiled eggs and have a couple of those.  Otherwise, don’t get caught up in the pastries and waffles.  If you want to be real brazed like a friend of mine, show up at a Holiday Inn or some of the mid-level Choice hotels where they have a decent free breakfast of eggs and sausage.  Yes, even if you’re not staying there.  It’s always different people on the desk in the morning and they don’t know who’s actually staying there and nobody watches very closely.  I can’t say I do this myself, but hey, there it is.

11. A great tip for staying awake while driving.  Leave the vents open on the AC.  You can change the temperature to whatever is comfortable, but having that fresh air circulating instead of the recirculated internal air will do wonders for keeping you alert.  I just discovered this recently and it’s made my drives way more pleasant.

12. Audiobooks and Podcasts.  Listen to something that keeps your brain engaged while driving.  Heck listen to someone you don’t agree with and argue with them.  It will keep you alert.  Intersperse it with music when you get tired of listening to the drone on.  But if you’ve got something interesting to listen to you can actually learn something while you’re driving.

13. Keep a notebook or voice recorder handy.  While listening to that engaging content, you’ll probably get some ideas of your own.  The kernels of some of my best bits appeared while driving.  Pull over real quick and make a note so you don’t lose it.

14. There’s plenty of low cost stuff to do.  Wherever you are, find something to do that you can only do there.  Don’t just go see a movie that you can see at home.  Go find that quirky little museum or town landmark that will be a better story later.  I visited a saddle museum in Mile City, MT.  And just yesterday I spent 3 hours at the Herbert Hoover Presidential Library and Museum in West Branch, IA.  Cost me all of six bucks.  Every town has a little something like that.  And if you do want to visit a larger amusement park of something, check the local grocery stores for discount tickets.

15. Bring an exercise band.  Inexpensive hotels rarely have gyms.  So if you’re have an exercise regimen, try to adapt it to an exercise band.  They’re light and easy to stick in a suitcase.  You can do it right in your room.  There are plenty of hotel room exercise plans out there.  Here’s two good ones:
http://nerdfitness.com/blog/2010/12/20/the-20-minute-hotel-workout/ http://www.menshealth.com/fitness/hotel-room-workout

There ya go kiddies!  Get out and see the world!

Should this guy be taken any less seriously than Buckethead?

There’s been plenty of news coming out of Coachella over the weekend.  And if the outrageous success of acts like The Swedish House Mafia or the appearance by a long-dead Tupac Shakur is any sign, our business of show is in for more groundbreaking changes.

Strangely, the hologram stuff is exciting to me.  Not because corporations will be able to whore out dead stars to money (which the will, with relish), but because of the options it will give live performers.  It’s the next step up from live stream concerts.  When they get it to the point of being able to do it in real time and let the performer react to the audience, the entire concept of live shows will be flipped on it’s head.  And I won’t have to travel as much. 

The success of electronic dance acts is something else though.  First off, I’ll say that I never want to dislike a style of music.  Music is music no matter the source.  But I’m having a lot of trouble connecting to the electronic acts.

Usually, when I’m not too hot on a particular artist, it’s because I’ve heard whatever they’re doing before, and better.  But you can’t say that about the electronic acts because it hasn’t really been done before in this form.  It’s much like when hip-hop emerged in the early 80′s.  It was funk and soul flipped on it’s head and reworked.  Same thing here.

The parallels I see?  Besides the obvious nods to hip-hop culture (even further watered down for suburban white kids?), there’s a classical music sensibility to electronic music.  They’re creating longer form works with little to no lyrics.  And I’d wager that it’s the first time in 130 years that an instrumental (using that term loosely) form of music has grown to popularity.  Jazz in the 60′s maybe coming close.  But not with the numbers the electronic acts are doing.  And even in jazz, 90% of the standards are lyric based and not strictly instrumental.

So I think it’s good that the people listening to this music are using a similar ear to classical music.  It is, of course, considerably more repetitive.  Mind numbingly so at times.

The composition chops are interesting, though they tend to use many of the same tropes over again.  It’s the build up/breakdown over and over that is the go-to for jam bands the world over.  And maybe that’s part of the dis-attraction for me.  I’ve listened to a few artists and heard the same ideas over and over.  Though I’m not ruling out the idea that my ear just isn’t familiar enough with it to distill the differences yet.

Electronic acts will take over the marketplace for the next few years.  No doubt about it.  The big question is the lasting power.  Will it be like jazz where, after a heyday, it exists as a strong genre on it’s own that plays to a small but devoted audience and re-emerges every so often in the mainstream?  Will it be like hip-hop where it becomes part of the DNA of modern pop music, but comes back to a more middle of the road type of composition?  Or will it be disco where in 10 years we’ll be looking back at it and laughing about how we could possibly listen to it.  Until another 20 years later when it becomes nostalgia, of course.

There is no more mainstream of course.  Which means nearly everything is coming down to the market level that jazz is at.  I think option number 2 is very possible.  With the way technology is running, these sounds will continue to be sloughed off into other styles.  Electronic singer/songwriter material?  It’s coming.  Lyrics will be the first things back.  As much fun as it is to dance to the music when all the lights and smoke are blazing away, people still connect with the words when they’re listening in the car.

To the untrained ear (and I count myself in that group at the moment) it kind of resembles disco.  A new kind of background music to Saturday night hookups with questionable fashion sense.

So as with any music I don’t understand at first, I’ll keep trying until I get it.  And I’m sincerely hoping that it turns out to be more compelling than I’m giving it credit for.  And if it does just turn out to be a non-chemical way to numb your brain, I’ll be happy to leave to those that need it.

Feel free to leave me some recommendations of who I should listen to.

She'll just plead insanity at her murder trial when you're dead, guys.

One of the major problems with having so much media at our fingertips constantly is that those media outlets have to often really stretch to find something worthwhile to talk about.  There really isn’t THAT much going on in the world.  So media outlets will usually opt for fear mongering of some sort to earn your eyeball time.

And I can hear you saying, “But Phil, isn’t that a little hypocritical of you to say since you’re writing a blog with that title and really only writing this because you spent the week writing new music instead of new comedy?”

Yes.

So anyway, Yahoo puts up this article about “6 Surprising Health Hazards Lurking In Your Home”.  That word “lurking” is always a good one to add when you’re fear-mongering.  And they highlight such life threatening atrocities as the air freshener refills in your plug-in thing, toothpaste toxins, and furniture polish fumes.

Let me assure you, the chances of you dying from any of those things is on par with you winning the lottery.  And you’ve seen how well that’s worked out for you.

Yes, don’t eat an entire tube of toothpaste.  Don’t inhale furniture polish directly from the nozzle.  And don’t eat your air fresheners.  If you do any of the above, you are no longer really welcome among human beings anyway.

So in response, let me offer “6 Real Non-Bullshit Health Hazards Waiting To Ambush You In Your Home”

1. That thing you keep hitting your knee on every time you walk by.  You know the corner of that coffee table that you’ve cracked your knee against so many times your significant other doesn’t even “poor baby” you anymore?  Move it already.

2. That stack of unopened mail on the counter.  It takes all of 1 minute each day to sort your mail and throw most of it out.  If you’ve got a big pile, chances are your credit report is going to sustain some injuries when you miss another payment.

3. The dirty dishes in the sink.  Your wife seriously considers killing you every time she sees them.  Really.  The dishwasher is right next to the sink.  Use it.

4. That horrendous mess of wiring connecting your home theater system.  Not because it’s a fire hazard.  Just because if you have to swap out a component you won’t know which wire goes to what and you’ll get all pissy about it and probably whack your head on the shelf above you.

5. Dust bunnies.  Yeah, I don’t know either.  But there has to be something evil about them.  They are probably antennas contacting an alien civilization that wants to destroy the Earth.  Or they’re just unsightly.

6. Those couple of old pictures of you and your ex stuffed under some sweaters in a drawer.  When your current significant other finds those, you’re going to wish you had just eaten an air freshener refill instead.

"Yeah, I had to get out of that cave. I couldn't get any bars in there. Ok, so WHO was dragging me through the streets last Friday?"

So, it’s Good Friday, the day Jesus died.  What’s good about it, I have no idea.  If I were dragged through the streets then hung from a cross, that’s gotta be the definition of a bad day.  I won’t say it’s THE bad day.  My internet was out for a whole day once last year after all.  But it’s got to be one of the most famous bad days.  It seems even too goody-two-shoes for religious zealots to call that a good day.  Maybe the Romans named it.

And certainly, the extra turn of the knife was to do it on a Friday.  Totally blew his whole weekend.  Ever wake up on Sunday morning and not remember what happened the rest of the weekend?  Yep, Jesus had his lost weekend too.  The first thing he did when he got out of the cave was probably to call a friend and ask how much he had to drink at the last supper.  “Dude, do I need to apologize to anyone?  Did I tag that waitress from the supper?  Why do you keep calling it the LAST supper?  I’m hungry now.  Let’s go to Denny’s.”

It has been suggested that to me that maybe Jesus was just narcoleptic.  But then we might have heard snoring coming from the cross, yeah?

In the past this day has also been called Black Friday, which seems a little more appropriate.  But you can’t use that name without people lining up at Walmart at 2am to get the best deals.  Though honestly, someone getting trampled at a Best Buy over a $49 blu-ray player does seem like it fits the theme of the day better.

I think it’s fortunate though that even Hallmark hasn’t been able to commercialize Good Friday yet.  There’s no card that says, “On this special day, may you also be deserted by your friends and accused of treason.”

Traditionally Good Friday is a fasting day for Catholics.  But unlike Jews, Muslims, and Hindus, fasting for a Catholic means one small meal and two snacks.  It’s not really a fast.  More of a diet plan.  They might be able to sell the idea better if they called it “The Crucifixion Diet”.  “Get lean, toned abs just like Jesus!”  I think they’d get more people to buy in that way.

Although you’re supposed to abstain from meat for some reason.  “How are you serving the Lord today?”…. “I’m avoiding chicken.” I guess for the diet plan to work you’d have to get your protein from somewhere else.  Not sure if they had tofu back in J-Dog’s day.  Technically you could have a small meal of mashed potatoes and chili, plus a Hershey bar and a trip to Baskin Robbins and you’re still within the bounds of propriety.  Ok, now THAT’s what I call a Good Friday.

I’ve done a lot of awesome shows.  I’ve done a lot of really bad shows.  This particular one was a really awesome bad show.  It was February 10th, 1997.  I only know that because I googled the bill and someone actually has it listed on a webpage.  That makes me think that person doesn’t get out much.

The show was at the Edge in Palo Alto, CA.  The booker asked me if we’d like to open for Ronnie James Dio.  Now, we weren’t a metal band and I didn’t think Dio’s audience would like us.  The booker, however, seemed to think it would work.  And he said the show was a guaranteed sellout (1000 people) so we wouldn’t have to promote that much.  And we’d get to play the middle slot instead of opening like we usually did.  How could I say no?

I’d seen Dio play a couple times before, so I knew that it was a “dude” crowd.  When an 80′s band comes to town the mullets come out from under the rocks in force.  But hey, we would just do what we do and hope for the best.

We get there for soundcheck and a voice booms “Welcome to the Ronnie James Dio stage,” through the monitors.  “Here are the rules…” And it was stuff like don’t put your feet on the monitors, yadda, yadda, yadda.  They made it clear that we weren’t the stars in the house that night.  Great, we get it.  Turn my guitar up.

Show time rolled around and the opening band, Mystic Rage, went on.  Now, MR is a metal band.  And they worked their asses off for the 20 minutes they played.  They put blood, sweat, tears, and more blood into that performance.  And the crowd booed them the whole time.  Yikes.  We assumed this would be the worst 45 minutes of our short career.  And we were wrong… and right.

Mystic Rage gets off stage looking like they’d just performed in a live war zone and then tried to sell CDs to the wrong side.  My guys and I took a deep breath and headed up to the stage to set up our gear and…

…the crowd went nuts.  Cheers, screaming, woo-hoo’ing.  Devil horns in the air, as dudes are wont to do.  I looked over at my roadie and said, “Is that for us?”  We’d been playing around town a lot at that point, so we figured out reputation had preceded us.  Awesome.  We were going to tear the house down.

I did notice that none of the girls were cheering.  They looked bored.  Like they’d been dragged there by their boyfriends.  Looking at me as I got set up like, “You’re not going to play more of that crap are you?”

So we’re set up and ready to go.  My singer is still backstage since he didn’t have any set up to do.  This was before I was a singer.  The lights dim and the place goes … ape… shit.  Hardcore.  1000 people cheering before we’ve even played a single note.  It was a turning point kind of moment where the world feels like your oyster and the trajectory is solidly set to “up”.

I take a deep breath and focus on my strings.  The announcement comes… “Please welcome to the stage…. ROADSIDE ATTRACTION!” and…..

“BOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!”

If there were ever at “WTF?” moment it was that one.  Then my tall, blond singer walked on stage and the booing doubled in intensity.  We hadn’t even started playing yet.  Was the sound guy playing ABBA through the PA system and I couldn’t hear it?

The only thing possibly more surreal than 1000 people cheering for you if hearing those same 1000 people start booing you for an unknown reason.  Had my singer decided to wear a “Metal Sucks” t-shirt on stage?  What in Satan’s name had started this crowd booing?

Ok, well… Let’s start playing and see what happens.  I honest don’t remember what songs we played.  But they sure didn’t like them.  At the end of each, the booing would grow louder.  Except…. I did notice the girls in the front row smiling and cheering for us.  Apparently we weren’t the crap they were expecting.  At least there was that.

About 15 minutes into our set the booker called up to the sound booth to pass us the message of “You guys don’t need this.  Do one more song and exit the stage.”  Now in the moment, that sounded like we were getting kicked off.  In reality, he was doing us a favor by letting us off early and still paying us.  But we were pissed.

A quick pow-wow in the middle of the stage..
“What should we close with?’
“We should do something heavy.”
“No, screw them.  Let’s do our regular closing song.”

It was a song called “Love Makes You Stupid”.  It was in a sort of early Red Hot Chili Peppers vein and I was sure the crowd would hate it just like everything else.  We ripped into the song like a jilted lover into a tub of Ben and Jerry’s.  And the most bizarre thing happened.  They danced.  They cheered.  They laughed.  They gave us a solid applause break at the end of the song.  We’d won a good chunk of the crowd over with our funky little love song.

… And we got the hell off stage quick.

Needless to say, we didn’t sell any CDs that night.  And my singer headed straight from the backstage to the bar and looked like he was ready to pick a fight with the first jackass to say something to him.  I huddled in a corner trying to ride out the rest of the night and figure out what the hell happened.

To his credit, Ronnie James Dio didn’t take the stage early.  He didn’t even start on time.  That crowd waited almost two hours to see their main attraction.  He may have been just pulling some Axl-inspired rock star shit.  But in our minds he was paying the crowd back for what they gave us.  “Oh, you don’t want to give them your attention?  Well you can’t wait extra until you get mine.”  We couldn’t ask him because we never saw him.  He stayed on his tour bus the whole time until he hit the stage.  And he was gone just as fast afterwards. Like the little magical elf man he was.

We found out the next day that the local radio station had been announcing that Dio was on at 10pm.  WE were on at 10pm.  And when we came out to set up our gear, without our singer… Well, who the hell knows what Dio’s band looks like?  They assumed I would be ripping into “Rainbow In The Dark” as Ronnie the elf took the stage.  So not only were we dealing with not being a metal band, we were also dealing with the misplaced expectations of a drunk crowd.  That’s like going to a baseball game and them showing a complete episode of Oprah Winfrey on the big screen before tossing out the first ball.

I spent months explaining to every booker in town what happened.  All they heard was we got booed off stage.  And every weekend for the next two years I’d run into someone at a club that said, “Dude, you guys got a raw deal at the that Dio show.  I thought you were good.”  And I’d say, “Thanks.  Were you booing?”  And, sheepishly, they would answer “Yeah.”

Ironically, we made a lot of fans from that show.  They booed, but they reconsidered later and decided they liked us.  It’s not an optimum way of gaining new fans, but I won’t say I haven’t used it since.  Piss them off and sluice out the few that like what I’m doing.

And that, my friends, is the worst most awesome show I ever had.

Phil Johnson