Sunday February 19th
7pm EARLY at The Saint 
601 Main St. Asbury Park, NJ
$8 18+
Accidental Seabirds
Puppy Grease
No Use For Humans (featuring my housemate Mike “Deli” DelGrasso on cell phone noise)
Otis’s Gun Stash
Sir Dove (aka SRDV, featuring me on bass)
Thieves of Leviticus
…Here it is on FB.

Full lineup:
SLUMLORD
117
HIPSHOTS
REBEL PAWN
XYLOPHONE OF WRENCH

8pm Dec 30th 2011
EJ’s Tavern Music Co-op
919 Boardwalk, Seaside Heights, NJ 08751
21+ to enter and get tore up.
Did I mention, NO COVER??? FREE PARKING???

*This is a Small Socialisms Production. You and your can band can maybe play one of these too. Email me and I’ll put you in touch with people who know people.

New boy in the neighborhood
Lives downstairs and it’s understood
He’s there just to take good care of me
Like he’s one of the family

Charles in charge of our days and our nights
Charles in charge of our wrongs and our rights
And I see I want Charles in charge of me

$5 for the charity album goes to Asbury Park’s Mercy Center.

HERE’S THE DOWNLOAD FROM NACHT RECORDS!

And wish us luck in the big game this Saturday!

Two crazy nights in the Nutmeg State. What could go wrong? This has the makings of an Adam Sandler film.

Tonight! Friday July 15
5pm EARLY at the Pigeon Hole in New London, CT
19 Union St., New London, CT
$5 donations for touring bands like me.
Darren Deicide
Mark Leonard
Mike Arsenault

Saturday July 16, 10pm @ PJ O’Connor’s in Jewett City, CT
10 S Main St, Jewett City, CT
$3 for one person, $5 for 2
It’s Jim’s birthday! We don’t know Jim yet, but I bet he’s a great guy and it’s gonna be great!
Darren Deicide
Catfish Phillips

SUMMER SUMMER SUMMER BBQ BBQ BEACHTOWEL BEACHTOWEL SUN SUN SUN SUN FUN FUN FU N FUNNNN GO SURFIN WIT DIS!

July 14th in Cambridge cancelled by All Asia. Who cares? Maybe we’ll replace it? Who knows? Find out soon!

NEW ENGLAND TOUR WITH DARREN DEICIDE!

Friday, July 15
The Pigeon Hole – New London, CT

Saturday, July 16
PJ O’Conor’s – Jewett City, CT

Sunday, July 17
***CANCELLED***

I know my photoshop skills aren’t the greatest but damned if looking at this doesn’t crack me up. It’s an unbelievable learning experience to compare “guido” pics to black metal band photos. Not spoof ones, real ones. Same poses. The face contortions, ridiculous hair and makeup choices are different, but they come from the same inner place. Irony is, these genres of male human rarely interact, and if they did, they would 100% hate each other. Why can’t they see they’re cut from the same cloth? It’s like religious fundamentalists. They curse each other from across oceans but if only they could see how their sick delusional ideas are parallels for each others’, and that together they sing the chorus of human expression. Look up at that picture again. Look at it! What you’re looking at is what world peace looks like. Dream.

We’re going to try to bring our tiny worlds together this Friday at EJ’s on the Seaside Boardwalk, 919 Boardwalk to be precise. It’s day 2 of the anti-show of the Seaside Music Festival, curated by Pat Veil. It’s a FREE SHOW at a bar, which not only means that you could go, but also that you could easily invite one of the typical Seaside frequenters (see above) in for a drink. Let’s reach out an olive branch. They’re just like us, only on steroids, racist, and drinking Bud Lite.

I just got finished watching Howl, the movie where James Franco plays Allen Ginsberg. Never checked out much Ginzo, but there is a great, great interview sequence where Ginsberg is explaining his writing process. I could not find the quote or the clip anywhere, so I’ll have to paraphrase it, since the DVD is already on its way back to Netflixlandia, USA. More or less, it goes:

Writers are afraid to use their actual language in their poetry. People talk about cock and drugs when they’re having a few drinks with their friends, but when they sit down to write poetry, they don’t sound like themselves. Why wouldn’t I speak to my muse with the same language I use when I’m with the people I’m the most comfortable to be around?

The title sequence of the movie claims that every word of dialogue comes from actual records and recordings, so I’ll take them at their word that he actually said this. And if anyone has access to this quotation I’d greatly appreciate you letting me know how badly I butchered it.

Essentially this gets to the heart of something I’ve been thinking about for some time. Why is it that some of the funniest, most insightful and creative people change their tone completely when they begin to write lyrics or poetry? Are we afraid not to write music that doesn’t sound like “Pie in the sky, Why oh why? I love you, Buckle my shoe?” This is something I’ve been trying to tackle lately with the 117 stuff. I spent a lot of years writing about insanely overblown romantic shit and occasionally preachy political shit. Not that there’s a whole lot wrong with either; I’d chalk most of that up to being young. But the language of most songs like that comes out sounding like stuff you’d never expect to hear anyone, let alone yourself, actually say.

I also blame the media. When you walk through a supermarket you might hear someone say he just “died in your arms tonight,” followed by how “everything I do, I do it for you,” followed still by maybe one of the worst songs of all time, John Mayer’s “Your Body Is a Wonderland.” Can you actually picture John Mayer seducing a swooning fan with a lines about her bubble gum tongue? Saddly yes. But what do you suspect is really going through Mayer’s head?

Well, I’ve got enough tour money for coke to last through the next 2 weeks, so let’s see if she’ll snort up the rest of this bag. I could use some too -it’ll be tough to maintain this hardon, drunk as I am. She’s pretty into me. She even bought my newest piece of shit album, so that’s half the battle. The way she keeps talking about her waistline, I’d bet her self esteem is just low enough that she’ll be down for some real nastiness. Eh, maybe she’s got a point, she could use to binge and purge a pound or two. Maybe I’ll let my drummer hit it.

OK, that was pretty crass of me. But wouldn’t it make so much more interesting of a song that the actual one? Don’t you think this is what’s really going through the mind of someone with more money and looks than he can stand to know what to do with. And if it’s not true, John, I challenge you to write about what is going on in your mind. It doesn’t have to be vulgar. Write about your stock options, your new Yamaha jet skis, like the rappers do. At least they’re honest. Cuz I’m not buying this smooth pop love song bollocks. Neither would Allen.

Sheesh!

Philly show this Friday, Pics and movies from last weekend coming soon.

Then came the independent movement, which hit its stride in the 90′s. Indie labels signed indie artists. The music was played on college radio. It wound up in the hands of independent record sellers. This is my favorite time of all time. I remember distinctly going to hardcore shows in the late 90′s, just as this era was coming to a close, and seeing the guy with all the huge tupperware boxes of CDs and vinyl. It was exciting to find the Codeseven or Zao CD I’d heard about but hadn’t yet seen anywhere except that one kid’s house. Who was that guy? Where is he now?? I also remember listening to WPRB and WSOU at around that time, which is how I got into lots of stuff that ended up meaning a whole lot to me later on, stuff like Pedro the Lion, and later Sufjan Stevens. There was a feeling about discovering new music that was a bit like riding your bike through some underpass in a part of town you’d never seen, and looking at strange graffiti and stickers. You felt more like a grown-up, a little scared, and really fucking cool.

I don’t know what changed more, the times or me. Now I’m a really fucking cool grown-up. I’m in a bajillion bands, I have like ONE tattoo, I have like 3 or 4 famous people’s cell numbers. Not to sound jaded, but it doesn’t feel the same. Maybe it’s everyone else. Maybe the fact that you can download the new bullshit frat rock ringtone as quickly as you can get the new Mofodishu album makes things seem like they’re on a level playing field when they’re not. I don’t miss the record labels. I dance naked and spit on their smoldering corpses. But what happened to 90′s media? What about all those actual humans who made some kind of income from playing good music on the radio and selling it? In an effort to destroy what we hated with our laptops, did we remove the mystery from punk rock? Hmm. Funny, from a guy with a band blog.

Fuck it. On April 15 and 16 we’re turning back the clock with 2 free “events.”

Friday, April 15, 10pm-12am
First, we’ll be on WRSU’s Overnight Sensations. It’s college radio at it’s most collegiate. 88.7 in the New Brunswick area, or streaming and podcasting at wrsu.org. These shows are fun to play and fun to listen to, especially the interview sections. They usually turn into a free for all of saying dumb things. Here’s Intense Men at WRSU:

Saturday, April 16, all day
It’s Record Store Day! Come celebrate at an actual record store, Sound Station in Westfield, NJ.
433 South Ave W
Westfield, NJ

Come on, it’s right off the parkway, or the train. Sure we’ll be performing, as will future tour-mate Darren Deicide, but what about the records? The CDs? You should buy something you haven’t heard. Seroiusly, just try it. Or at least have a look around at what you’re missing. Plus, there’s the time-honored tradition of bullshitting and ballbusting with the people who work there. Don’t just take my word for it, listen to this guy: