War stories.

Gather 'round, kiddies ... ol' grampa Big Green is going to spin a few tales about the glory days of yesteryear, when it was us against the world, gas was 35 cents a gallon, and love was just a buck forty-three away. Heh heh. (Get off my lawn!)

Yeah, the truth is, Big Green is pretty short on war stories. That occurred to me today as I was driving along, listening to an old Fresh Air interview with Keith Richards. (In truth, the most interesting parts were when Terry played some of the old Stones hits, which I still like o'plenty.) You expect some of the pillars of rock and roll to have the ripest, pithiest tales about backstage exploits, drugs, women, men, asteroid wrangling, pretzel bending, and so on. But bands like us, clinging to the clammy underbelly of pop music ... well, we don't have a lot of that.

Sure, there are stories. But nobody wants to hear about riding back from Middlebury College on NY Route 8 in the dead of winter, in a battered old van that had no heat and kept threatening to stall. Nobody's interested in the gig we played in the dive bar in Syracuse to a bunch of somber patrons who later explained that someone had been stabbed there the night before. And who wants to ride along with us to Oneonta to play in a music store doorway in the pouring rain, then hike over to an old railroad station bar where we played into the night? Nobody, that's who .... nobody!

There was this chicken, see? And ... Ever get down on your hands and knees and beg a potato to get fat? Ever shake your fist at an apple because it shriveled on a stick? Yeah, me neither. But if I had, those would be in the memoir, for sure. All we have are pointless stories of low-grade adventures that any plain clothes musician in the northeast could probably top without even trying. Maybe that's Big Green's true calling: giving other bands something to feel good about. (At least we're not THEM!)

Hoo boy, is that the time? Peace out.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Getting there.

Image
Well, anyway... why do we have to do the same thing every time? I mean, I know safety is important, but frankly we can't afford a spaceship at this point. Can't we just hitchhike to Neptune? Good god, man. Whatever happened to the spirit of adventure? We never used to be so risk averse. We used to bear to the left and take chances. Now look at us. (You can use a smoked glass lens, if you prefer.) We're worried about lack of gravity, lack of oxygen, exposure to radiation - what a bunch of wimps! The only one who's really not intimidated by any of this is the mansized tuber. (At least he hasn't said anything about it to me.) Fact is, we have to do these tours on the cheap, what with a recession on and all that. Money's tight, and our corporate label is even tighter. They don't even want to budget for us , let alone a ship to carry us in. Looks like we'll be relying on comped meals again. Ever try to get a free lunch on Uranus? Hah. Take it from me - it...
Read more

Rubbish in.

Image
Anybody seen my tuning fork? No, damn it, THAT'S not it. That's my tuning spoon. I said fork , you moron. This .... place ! Oh, yeah ... hi out there. I'm just attempting to replace a string on a second hand guitar that's been lying around the abandoned Cheney Hammer Mill since before we started squatting inside this big old drafty barn of a place. In as much as Big Green is a collectivist institution by nature, we make use of what resources avail themselves, utilizing only what we need to accomplish a mutually agreed-upon task, then replacing the surplus in such a way as to benefit all. Yes, we're all equal here. Except, of course, anti-Lincoln. Fuck that guy! Why am I restringing an old, abandoned guitar? Well, if it makes you feel any better, I'm doing it with used strings. We're scraping the bottom of the stewpot here, folks - I won't make any bones about it. (Typically, what you find at the bottom of the pot is not so much bones as sinew and fat...
Read more

Inside April.

Image
What's that rattling you hear? Could be the sound of Tomahawk missiles. Or maybe it's just a loose screen in the upstairs window. Those may be the same exact thing, in effect. But there is a third possibility, and that is the April THIS IS BIG GREEN podcast. We've got another boatload of sound for you this month - here's a brief look inside the ship's hold (just to overextend that little metaphor) ... NED TREK 32: All Our Festeryears. A take-off on the "All Our Yesteryears" episode in the original Star Trek series (I believe their second or third to the last episode ever), Willard, Ned, Pearle, and Sulu pay a visit to a strangely deserted world, the entire population of which has retreated into old B movies on VHS tapes. The caretaker of the library (or Blockbuster Video) and his various doppelgangers are played by Ronald Reagan. Ned and Sulu have to deal with cheap-ass cinematic cowboys, whereas Willard and Pearle face-off against cave men. Kind of ...
Read more