River's Edge

Hiya! Miss me? I missed you. We should get together more often.

So River's Edge happened last weekend. I won't go into huge detail, but it was the coolest thing ever! Most of the bands throughout the day we didn't care about, but it was nice to hang out with music going on in the background. A surprise was seeing Sublime (with Rome). I really like Sublime, but the videos I'd seen of the 'with Rome' (the new version of Sublime since Bradley died) weren't that good. It just wasn't the same, and I thought they shouldn't continue under the Sublime name. But seeing them live was a big surprise. They were actually pretty damn good. I had heard that the original drummer had left the band last year, but didn't know who replaced him. Then come to find out that it was non other than Josh Freese, from A Perfect Circle, The Vandals, and Devo fame, among others. He's been one of my favorite drummers for a long time, and I'd only seen him live once before. So that was a great surprise. That probably made me like Sublime better too.

Josh drumming with Nine Inch Nails



Then came Tool. It's kind of hard for me to remember everything that happened, but I know it was awesome. Seeing them outside was interesting. It was hard, since they have a lot of visuals and the sun was still up when they started, but they made it work. And they busted out some new visuals that were amazing. I tried to find good quality videos on youtube, but there really aren't any. I found one that's pretty good though.



Sunday, all I cared to see was Puscifer. They went with an airline theme (Vagina Air) and it was hilarious seeing Maynard and crew dressed as a pilot and flight crew for the whole set, even though it was 90+ degrees out. Again, I don't remember much, but I'd say it was the best time I've seen them live. I looked for videos, and they were even worse than the Tool one's, so I won't bother. I'm hoping sometime soon some good quality ones will show up, but who knows.

Also, last weekend was Minneapolis' gay pride fest. The timing sucked, because I was in St. Paul at the show, so I couldn't make it to any of the festivities. But I heard it was a great time, and I'm proud to live in such a gay friendly city. Yeah sure, we still have the fucking assholes that think it's an abomination and all that noise, but as a whole, I think we're pretty accepting. They even re-lit the new(ish) 35W bridge for the weekend.




Uhhh.....What else...Oh, I guess I can upload the other song I wrote for E.M.P. Again, it's a little different than how it was going to be with the band, but it's still fun to play. Oh, and it helps if you record with a metronome if you're not going to record drums first....



I guess that's about it for now. Working through the weekend, and a bit on the 4th. Going to see Crankshaft and The Gear Grinders on Monday with my mom, so that'll be cool. Have you guys checked them out yet? Have you gone bankrupt giving them all your money yet? Yeah? Good! (whore moment)

So yeah. That's it. I should go to bed now. It's almost 4 AM. Smoke a smoke, and we'll see what happens I guess.

Hope you guys are well!

143

_Kevin

Don't Wanna Be E.M.P.

Hey guys.

Now that my band is deceased, I was disappointed that some of the songs I'd written never got recorded. I thought they were relatively good musically and lyrically, and they had a special meaning to me. But then I thought, I have the ability, and the technology (we can rebuild him) to do it myself. So last night I recorded this song. This one especially has a special meaning to me.

This one is a little different than what I'm used to, and I changed it a bit from how the band did it, but I like it. I present to you:

Alcohol (Doger)



Hope everyone is well!

143

_Kevin

Build Me Up, Tear Me Down

Well fuck, I've been a bad blogger, and emailer, lately. I could list off excuses, but would you care? Nope. So to all, I apologize. Hopefully I'll get it back together, but if I don't, please don't kill me.

Uhmm, let's see...I took my motorcycle safety class a couple weekends ago which was pretty interesting. Most of it was pretty easy, but there were a few challenges. Most of which were weather related. The first day wasn't too warm, but it was raining almost the whole time, so that made it pretty slick out. But I got to experience things like locking up the rear wheel and skidding in a controlled environment, which was nice. Then the next day it was 95 degrees out with way too much humidity, so we were all drenched in sweat. In the 5 hour class, I drank 4 liters of water, and another 2 when I got to work after, and I was still dehydrated. Took me a couple days to recover from the weekend. But at the end I took the test and passed, so I got my motorcycle license! That's one of my excuses for being a horrible blogger, I've been spending almost all of my free time riding the bike. Even getting home from work at midnight and going for a ride. It's awesome!

What's really cool, now that it's so fucking hot out, is I don't have to wear my big leather jacket anymore. Well, I guess I never HAD to wear it, but I like my skin on my body. Anyways. I found a company online that makes long sleeve shirts out of kevlar. They're really porous, so at speed it doesn't feel like I have anything on, but kevlar has a high abrasion resistance, so when I fall, I won't get smeared on the concrete. It doesn't have any padding, so I'll still probably break my arm or whatever, but my leather jacket doesn't either, so I'm basically at the same level of protection. And the company also makes kevlar liners for under your pants. They're basically long underwear made out of kevlar, for the same reason. So now when I go out in 95 degree weather, I'm not baking alive in leather! Yay!

Uh..I've got some concerts coming up that are going to be pretty sweet. June 23rd is TooL, and the 24th is Puscifer. I was amazed to learn that they were playing at the same festival. Usually Maynard (Tool, Puscifer, wine. Google it) likes to keep all of his things separate, but for some reason, he's playing with both. What's really cool, is Tool tickets are usually around $60, and Puscifer tickets are usually around $60, and the two day festival tickets were $120. But there are a whole other bunch of bands playing. Granted, most of them I don't care to see, but some will be worth checking out. I'm not a big Flaming Lips fan, but I hear they put on a great live show, so that might be cool. River's Edge

Later in the summer, I'll be going to Big Wu Family Reunion, but I'll talk more about that when it gets closer.

Most of you, if any, won't remember a band I mentioned on here a while back called the Mojo Spleens. They're a local surf punk band, self described as 'the fastest surf band around. It's kinda like Dick Dale on PCP'. Well it had been a while since I'd heard anything from them, and since I've rather dropped out of the local punk scene I was out of the loop. But I came across a new band the other day, fronted by non other than Alex Larson, guitar player for the Spleens. So I decided to check out his new project, Crankshaft. It started as a one man band, just him playing guitar, the drums with his feet, some harmonica, and singing. But now it switches between that and a whole band. Both versions are great in their own respects, offering different moods and feelings on the same songs. I bought a cd, and really liked it. Even my parents, who after hearing the Spleens were convinced they would hate it, liked it a lot. Then I went to a show of their's, and I feel in love. So now I'm kind of a Crankshaft whore, and am peddling it to anyone and everyone I know. So I'll do it to you guys too! Hey, who doesn't love down and dirty blues? So go to the website, buy some cds, give them all of your money, and check him out when he comes to your town. Alex quit his day job and is trying to make a living as a musician, so just start throwing money at him. After you listen to it, you'll want to anyways.

Well this got a bit long. Sorry about that. I'll leave you now with a Crankshaft video (or 2. Hey, I said I was a whore) and another cover that I did.

Hope everyone is well!

143

_Kevin


This is him solo



And with the Grinders




Skyscraper