12/7/2007 due to my busy routine and regular work schedule and routine this account of last month took this long to complete. photos are to be added to enhance the stories later. enjoy- az
Where do I begin?
Oh yeah, It’s me AZ and I’m on about 3 hours of sleep in 3 days and somehow I got through work 2 days and produced very well exceeding my goals. But I’m damn tired and tired of not being able to sleep.
My Rx is useless. What’s the point. After a year I finally built up some sort of immunity to them. I’d take one. Then it got to taking two, then 3 and last week finally 4. And with no results I decided not to risk and overdose although my doctor just prescribed me 9 more moths of refills. I guess I’ve give my body time to get it out of my system.
w/ chris and julie at 666 flags
w/ cc and count midnight at the music box massacre
So as usual it’s been busy in my world. The last time I posted in DOD was the weekend after Chris and Julie went home to Indy and I learned that Paul Raven was dead. It was Saturday night and we just got home from shopping and eating and I don’t even unpack when Yvette Lera calls me crying. I was in SHOCK! The last time I saw her she was with him at the House of Blues. So I had already called and left some dumb redneck sounding message on Al and Angie’s vox mail. Now I had to call and ask how they wanted me to report on it. I left that message.
So I called Martin Atkins, to actually get a message out to him, and as opposed to being on his book tour, he was home and picked up. I had to tell him.
Then Al’s wife Angie calls me backand she’s really shook up. And she tells me to wait for her official announcement the next day. And she’s been on the phone all day calling his loved ones. And hoping his family doesn’t see it in the press before they can hear it from her, so she’s pulling double duty by also playing damage control.
tommy victor, al jourgensen and paul raven at the 2007 grammy awards
Martin sent the following to me to post and copied the Jorgensen’s on it:
My drums sounded louder when we played together
Anyone that spent any time with him always loved his spark and smile
thats for sure - for anyone in a band with him - fuck - this is
horrible.
I didn’t really understand how well we locked together until
i started messing around with digital audio - and saw waveforms - then,
seeing the hairs breadth that made the difference between great and
horrible - i had a better understanding of just how special the thing
was between us. My drums sounded louder when we played together - not
just the science of phase but the emotion, the spirit - maybe it was
just ‘cos we were a couple of fuckers and he played with a quarter? it
just was.
But just as my drums sounded louder, everything was MORE when he was
around - sometimes good, sometimes baaad but always sparked and
involved.
He was a great bass player - but, i don’t think thats why i’m sad
today, i’m sad to not be able to launch into a song with him again and
look up, and have so much bounce around without being said. solid solid
solid. i’m sad to not have him call once in a while out of the blue to
say hi. maaan i’m sad for his kids.
Anything I can do to have his back, their back, lemme know. I’m there.
and, yeah, there are some stories.
I’m going to stick some photos and stuff up in the next few days.
peace, love, respect
MA
It was a fucked up night and we had to go see Type O Negative.
And we did and we talked to their drummer (see interview section) and Jason Meudt was filming. We talked about Raven which we didn’t include in the interview because it wasn’t like they were friends. He knew of Raven through his work with Tommy in Prong.
Well Shelly, Jason and I got into an opera box after hanging backstage a bit. We had met the guys from LORDI and invited everyone over to BRODY’S ON CLARK for free drinks. The whole interview and concert is on film and we’ll have it up here anytime now. it’s killer because we’re the only people who have footage of Dave Draiman of DISTURBED singing Black #1 with them. Though he didn’t do so well on knowing the words, WTF it was an awesome thing to see. It’s always great to see bands jamming like that. No egos just friendship and respect, and loads of talent.
It was a great show and a vast improvement from the last time they played here in mid April.
We also were invyted to attend Marcia’s (Sinderella Pussies) Baby Shower. As I reported last night her and JT now have a new beautiful offspring named Zoie. We saw some people there that I hadn’t in a long time and made a few new friends.
The following weekend was the weekend before Halloween so Chicago was celebrating being the Helliday fell on a weekday. Shelly had to be on base so I invited Jeff Brown up for the weekend to go out to events and tear it up w/ me. I was Al Jourgensen and he was one of DEVO. Nobody pulls that off like Creepy. He is a natural. I didn’t do too bad myself. You can see a lot of the pictures at www.myspace.com/alexfuckingzander
az as al jourgensen
I guess the pix brought a little light to my friends in El Paso who I was imitating. Hell, I even had a few people really thinking I was Al. I get that a lot so why not just go all….AL!
So I spent a lot of time buying books and getting some movies I’ve wanted. I am no reading GONZO, and I bought a book of HST photos called Gonzo. Marcia gave me Nikki Sixx’s book, and I have Slash new one, and the Chris Curry’s new book “FILM ALCHEMY” came in the mail, and I also have Walk The Line by Johnny Cash’s first wife to read. Then I found the new Coops sketch book titled THE BIG FAT ONE. Oh yeah and another big FAT one called TOUR SMART by Martin Atkins. A very essential book for every band. More on that later.
In between work and the madness Shelly and I pretty much have the new place done. I finished my office in about 10 hours one day. I ordered a couple Warhol’s for the living room that I’m still waiting on. But the office in fantastic and bright. I even have a back room init, which is where all of the “adult” material is stowed.
Prong were playing a place all the way out in Mokena. A lot of bands have been playing there lately that we’re used to seeing in the city. Bands like Doro, Devildriver etc. It’s quite a haul and when you’re good friends with the bands leader you know the idea of even driving home WITH a designated driver is not a good idea. It was going to be a LATE night either way. And this was to be the first time I would see Tommy Victor since MINISTRY last came through, and I hadn’t seen Monte Pitman in years either being that him playing guitar for Madonna has kept him away from duties in PRONG.
I had made a reservation at the only motel in town. Now isn’t that messed up? That’s a state of where things are in life when a Super 8 can charge $80 for a single bed way out in the sticks. But it was directly across from the venue and that was good enough to consider as “stumbling distance” at 2 AM.
I checked in and we grabbed a bite to eat. I drove around the back and saw the RV and knocked on the door. Monte greeted me and we went in to find Tommy, who was at the time showering. I waited a bit and figured this was a chance to give Shelly some rest so I dropped her off at the motel and went to find some wine which took FORRRRRRRRRRRRRRREVERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR. This little piece of IL backwash had a lot of bars but no grocery stores or carry-outs. So I found a gas station where they sold beer and wine and just getting through traffic was a horrendous enough experience, but the lady that kept harassing everyone to sign up for the Touch Pay fingerprint ID pay system was the worst. She was relentless. And like I’m going to fall for that. Ummmm Hmmm. It may be 2007 but it’s really 1984 arriving just a little late. But this isn’t the time or the venue to air my theories on that matter.
I waited an hour or so and called Tommy and his reaction was “Where the hell are you?” which as Shelly would later learn is typical.
(The view of the Damned Girlfriend)
I went to the hotel to shower, and decided maybe I could lie down for about an hour before I had to get ready, considering I was running on one of those typical Zander sleepless nights. Try as I might Zander returns from getting wine, in his usual style and I decide to get ready… trying to sleep at this point would be sheer insanity. He tells me it will be alright, since he knows I’m not a party animal I can come back here and sleep if he wants to hang out longer than I do. He makes a phone call to Tommy Victor and after I look halfway decent we decide to venture over.
Let me rewind at this point and tell you about a long day and late night of transcribing, so that you can better understand how I felt about having the privilege to meet Tommy Victor. Zander did a phone interview a couple weeks prior to this that he asked me to transcribe. Being a Midwest country girl I have little experience with Manhattan accents. Tommy Victor has quite an accent and talks very fast so I was holed up in the office for at least seven hours straight listening to the mans voice, and trying to capture the feeling interview exactly how I heard it… Tommy Victor, talented, intelligent and easily irritated. Would have been the title if I had written it… He sounded like the most aggravated man alive.
Needless to say I was curious to meet this incredibly talented, intelligent, aggravated man so I could find out if he was really all of those things. Besides that fact I enjoy his music on my quite long and exasperating rush hour trips home, and find that is calms my nearly uncontrollable road rage. So it would be nice to meet the man that has kept me from potentially obliterating my car.
We were escorted to the “green room” at the venue. Alex saw a couple of his friends Shawn Glass (Dirge) and Monte Pittman (Prong, Madonna). Introduced them to me and continued with a conversation that I can’t keep up with due to my ignorance of the music industry and its workings. I, being rather shy in new environments, looked around the room taking in the décor as well as the people in the room and the general atmosphere. I was also anxiously awaiting the moment that I could meet Mr. Victor. So keeping track of the comings and goings of the room, I simply spoke when I was addressed and listened intently to the conversation to see what in it I could learn.
After little while Tommy entered the room, and out of excitement, but trying not to draw too much attention to myself, I began lightly tugging on Zander’s jacket to get his attention. Tommy came over and warmly greeted Zander. Tommy was very busy but told Zander that he would be back in a little while.
After Tommy was done, he came over and sat at a stool in the center of the bar. Zander introduced us, and being proud of my military training, and the fact that he seemed to get a hold of “a smart one”, told Tommy what I do. I’m not sure if the look from Tommy was shock or appreciation but I took it as a little of both. Zander and Tommy started to catch up, and in the middle of their conversation Tommy looks at me and says,”I like your glasses. They look very nice on you.” Then he immediately turns to Zander and says, ”Yours look like shit.” The look on Zander’s face was priceless. It took a few seconds for him to find something to say back. I can’t even remember exactly what it was that he said, but it was something like, “See, this guy give me shit all the time.” This caused me to snigger a bit due to the fact that he dishes it out all the time but I have never seen anyone EVER leave him at a loss for words. At this point I knew I really liked Mr. Victor.Alex received a phone call and his friend Fred came up. Fred drinks about as much as I do which is little to no alcohol, and I was happy to make his acquaintance feeling that since sometimes Alex can be a little excessive it would be nice to have a sober person there with me. After a bit Susan came with her friend and another of Susan’s friends Brett came. It was nice to have a few people to talk to. Like I indicated I always feel a little out of place at these things, but nothing builds character more than being out of your comfort zone. While the opening acts played Alex went over by the pool tables to talk with Tommy and the other band members. I made my way over there where they were all sitting, and like the complete gentleman he is, Tommy got up and let me sit next to my special man.
Now I don’t know whether it was on purpose or an accident but he brushed my ass a bit when he walked past. I am pretty sure it was an accident, however he then said to Alex. “Hey, I touched your girlfriend’s ass.” To which Alex replied isn’t it great? They both laughed.
After he played an amazing concert Tommy hung out and mingled with the various people in the green room. I wanted to get a photo with him, and he laughed and let Alex take our photo. At this point he says to me “I wanna bust his balls a bit.” And grabbed me tight around the waist. The last photo he licked my neck, I looked a combination of happy and disgusted all at once in that picture.
As the evening was winding down Alex invited the whole bar to our hotel room (I can’t pretend to be too thrilled about this). Alex harassed the two other women (especially the one with the big ass) there for the rest of the evening I think attempting to piss them off as much as possible. All he really ended up doing is irritating me. Lucky for him Fred was there to guide me in a small study of the bible entitled “to read in times of suffering”. Tommy, Fred and the two ladies stayed until 4:30. It ended up being quite an evening.
- s’HELLY z
Backstage at the Pearl Room was really nice. We had a bartender named Jillian that made sure we all had been taken care of. We all got to hang out for hours. Aaron and Monty and Tommy all spent lots of time with us. Tommy as usual busted my balls all night. Money and I talked about his beard and how Madonna felt about it. I guess she loves it. He will get to play at the rock N Roll Hall of Fame Ceremony if she gets inducted this year. He’s still a metal head at heart though. Shaun Glass was back there and a few other friends, Fred and SuZn joined us. We watched the show from the balcony which was nice and Prong rocked heavily with that Tommy groove and little trademark squeal on guitar which he invented years ago.
I made a new friend in Brett who is the box office manager at the House of Blues and she is a big part of another part on this document which will begin with My December.
After the show I met up with Shelly Tommy and some girls back at our room where we drank lots of Heineken and joked around till 420 AM when Tommy left. I woke up not knowing where I was for a minute and we got our things together and checked out looking for a place to eat. We ended up at a Fridays. Then we made the slow crawl back home. I stopped by the HOB box office before noon and got our tickets for the Cult. I was amazed to see that Brett was there, since 8 AM. Damn that’s hardcore dedication.
We finally got home and I started getting things together for our guest Stephanie and Marlon who would arrive en route to San Fran from somewhere on the east coast where she was art of Leonard Nimoy’s new book tour. She had also lined up a gig later that week to open for Lydia Lunch. Steph is one of my oldest and dearest friends. We’ve been through a lot together even though miles between us have never hampered an occasional stay over or visit. I saw her in SF when I went there a new years ago back when she lived with Jello Biafra which whom I introduced her to a few years prior.
I picked them up the next morning at O’Hare and we all just sort of hung out and ate then went to Brody’s for drinks early where the owner treated us.
I was completely exhausted when it was all said and done and I made sure they got back to O’Hare and I got some much needed rest.
Thanksgiving was around the corner but before that I had a trip to fly back to Pittsburgh and spend the weekend in Wheeling with Nicholas. I hadn’t been there in 15 years and things changed a lot, for the worse if you can imagine that. I do love the airport at Pittsburgh, where the terminals are more like Malls and the restaurants are better than at O’Hare. But outside of the ‘burgh there is nothing but rolling hills and hillbillies. Somehow they have wiggers as well.
Talk about a town where there is nothing to do but get drunk and have sex, that is Wheeling and another reason I left there years ago. I attended my firs year of college there before transferring to Pitt.
Wheeling is a city in West Virginia, in the United States. Most of the city is in Ohio County, with a small part in Marshall County. It is the county seat of Ohio County. Wheeling is considered part of the Pittsburgh Tri-State area and is the principal city of the Wheeling Metropolitan Area. As of the 2000 census, the city population was 31,419 (31,059 in Ohio County, 360 in Marshall County). The population now is estimated at 29,639.
Wheeling was originally a settlement in the British Colony of Virginia and later an important city in the Commonwealth of Virginia until 1863 when the western counties of Virginia seceded from the state.
The weekend was here and gone before I knew it as great as it was to see Nick, Sara and Carson there is little about that trip worth mentioning. That place is the only place that depresses me more than Indianapolis. Only in Indy I made a lot of good life long friends. The only people I’ve stayed in touch with from Wheeling is my friend Mike who was just about the only person from the valley other than my brother to get out of there.
The work week was a short one and Thanksgiving was just around the corner. But as I got off work on Tuesday the Chemlab show was that night. Mark Williams flew up from Baton Rouge to film the show and interview. Jared the singer and I go back to the early days of the original Chemlab line up and I had set it up so Marks sound company, Presonus would sponsor the tour. We had lunch at Heaven on 7, I finished up my workday and he was waiting for me at 5.
We had to cab directly to the venue Reggies on the southside. This place is new, and the concept is amazing, however it is in a very unsavory part of town and the management has severe attitude issues. For example. I had a plus 2 on the list. Mark had a plus one and we were give laminates from Jared. That means all access etc. However the manager told me that it didn’t mean shit. I offered to cut my list down for just Shelly and Mark eliminated his plus one all together. This was still not good enough for her. So I paid for Shelly’s ticket and made sure they noted it on the guest list. Well by the time Shelly arrived and I was backstage with the band they refused to let her enter. I had to go up there myself and take care of it in person. I had not had to deal with this type of bullshit and attitude since Mike Elko back in Pittsburgh. And that was over a decade ago.
As rigid as the house manager was to us I can say that the rest of the staff were by far the most easy going and accommodating people I’ve seen in a long time. The bartenders in the restaurant where we did the interview were attentive, polite, and went out of their way to make sure the music was down where we were sitting and that we had full service the entire time. And later Chemlab put on the most rocking show I’ve seen in a longtime. Jared is just the front man to be reckoned with and this was his best line up to date.
We hung out backstage for awhile after and mark and I got in the car a little woozy with Shelly as the designated driver and we were the designated drunks. We got home after all the bars had closed and had no nightcap but that was okay. We needed sleep and got up the next day and went to El Palmar for brunch and margaritas at 10 AM.
As we sat there enjoying our food mark was hoping as were we that his flight would be delayed. It was not so he had to get on his way. But all is not last as we’ll see him in New Orleans in February.
Shelly and I set off to buy food for our massive Thanksgiving feast which was the next day. Jeff Brown was coming up early the next day and we were having guest through all day on Friday. We found a 30 lb. bird and everything else and got it home. We did a little prep work and got a good nights sleep and was up early prepping for a huge dinner for only 3 people. But like the late great Hunter S. Thompson, there’s nothing worse than not having enough food. I was excited at the sheer fact of cooking a 30 pounder.
Luckily the gas grill on the deck made cooking a breeze. With the oven and all 4 burners going inside we had a burner and the grill acting as an oven. Jeff arrived around noon and we carried a pony keg up the stairs and then we went to the store to pick up cheese trays, shrimp, and other munchies for the guests. Jeff also brought a couple bottles of Mead as well. So the next day the dining room would also be turned into a social center for snacks and drinks.
Dinner was done around 630 and we all had a couple beers in us and had a good time reuniting and Jeff and I stayed up pretty late watching DVD’s, South Park and other funny programming, but most of all just catching up.
The next morning as always we were up too early and began preparing for guests and spent most of the day drinking. We did our best to knock a dent in that damned keg but it wasn’t happening. We went out looking at comic books and hanging around as friends such as Tanya, Gade and Matt McVader came through. And in this time I had made arrangements for Jeff to get a free ticket to the Cult concert who were playing the HOB the next day. We had foundation room access thanks to Steve roach and to Brett at the venue. Brett joined us, and Fred and Bill from Brodys whom we spent $136 on earlier that day eating brunch at his restaurant.
The last time I’d seen the Cult was St Patrick’s Day 2006 and it was the best concert I saw that entire year. Greg Miner and I and 3 friends sat front row center at a sold out crowd at the Vic theatre. There was no opening band and they show was stripped down to a wall of Marshall stacks, no drum riser, 3 mics and a spots only. Nothing fancy and truly it was amazing. At this point I had seen the Cult more than a handful of times as well as Ian fronting my favorite band, The Doors. But this would be their best set to date.
I had heard from 3 of my best friend in Indianapolis that the band weren’t into it, the arena was half capacity, with over 200 free tickets given away to people that just won them on the radio and went for the “free” show. I can’t think of many bands that are thrilled to play in Indianapolis. In fact a big legendary act like the Cult would have nothing to do there but drop in play and leave. That’s it.
But as Jeff had seen a poor performance he was about to witness from the balcony the first of 2 sold out Chicago House of Blues shows. The 3 of us arrived, met w/ Brett who joined us upstairs and Bill from Brody’s got in but left at some point. Steve Roach dropped in later to say Hello.
The show just was rocking. The band was as good as ever. I didn’t catch the opening acts and I had wished once again like before it would have just been them. Be we all ended up having a REALLY good time. And a lot of that is thanks to Brett.
So it was Sunday and the long week was over and I was looking forward to getting through work and having nothing to do the following weekend but write. And I could get a lot done since Shelly had to go back to the USAF base for the weekend. But as my life has it, it just wasn’t meant to be. Or I should say ISN’T meant to be.
On Friday Nov 20 Rusty Nails offered me a chance to interview Crispin Glover in person at his hotel. And then later attend his latest slide show presentation and as well as his movies “It’s Fine” and “What Is It?”
I practically pled PLLEEAAAAASSSEEEE. And it was in motion.
At 5PM as I waited for my bus I got the call. I was to meet Crispin at his hotel which I was stand around the corner from the next day at noon. I agreed and promised to be there and then I thought…. LUNCH AT THE HOUSE OF BLUES !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
