Give that man a blue ribbon. House parties are the greatest. I can't wait to get a house. As most of you on our mailing list know, I currently live in an apartment with walls like vellum and neighbors whose noise tolerance is equally as thin. My apartment manager called me once regarding a complaint at seven in the evening when Josh and I were playing acoustic guitars at a volume comparable to that of speaking. Not to mention that my neighbors stuffed a wig in my roommate's muffler and later slashed his tires. That's when we decided that it was time to move. Apparently we weren't the only ones who thought so, as we got an informal eviction notice around the same time. In retort I wrote my apartment manager and the owner a two-page formal report of the offences made against us and left it at that. Come the month of May, my ass will be found in a house.

Last night provided some great inspiration for my future dwelling, as the place that we played at was decked out to the nines, complete with hand-painted walls, tons of cool knick-knacks like a well-dressed mannequin (See photo), vintage "chopper" porn, and a basement converted into a dance-club / tiki palace. Slowdance Records provided the preliminary conversation starters for the night by stocking up on 120 cans of Pabst Blue Ribbon from the local Fred Meyer. We helped Ezra carry them out (See photo).

The night got off to a rockin’ jump-start with a high energy set by Captain vs Crew (See photo), who were in top form, despite the technical difficulties that somehow seem to follow them like the plague. They shouldn’t worry about it as much as they appear to though ... good melodies always come with tiny maladies. You can’t help it. They really played a great set and the crowd was way into it.

As we were setting up our stuff, we met our first heckler of the tour. Now, in all my years of being in bands and going to concerts, I’ve found that there’s really only one rule to heckling: If you are the heckler, you will always lose. Always. This guy was a Caucasian youngster who thought it’d be funny to start yelling things at me in Spanish, to which I responded “I only speak American, buddy, get used to it.” He then came up to me and started spouting things in my ear about my “madre”, and although I’m not fluent in Spanish, I know enough to recognize when somebody’s trying to insult me. I decided to remind him that I had a microphone and was therefore much louder than him. I beat him over the head with my dazzling wit and then kicked his sorry ass with a dose of maniacal laughter at about 120 decibels. Then he invited me to a party and handed me a flyer. Yeah, buddy.

Josh and I both helped ourselves to a number of PBR’s before our set, and flew onto the stage with both fists flying, so to speak. Logan had gotten hopped up on Dr. Pepper and was reeling from such a monstrous sugar high that all you could see of his arms was a red blur. He was a stump with a head; a human hummingbird. It was the most intense rock set we’ve played thus far and was fiercely good time. Peeps were dancin’ a hole in the floor.

For now, on to Faux Stonehenge ... happy St. Patty’s day, y’all.

Judah