Thursday, December 9, 2010

Tis the Season Day-3 Guided by Voices- Game of Pricks



Oh GBV how do i love thee, lead singer and band boss Bob Pollard was 35 in 1995 when this band finally started to take off in the wasteland of the american indie underground, he'd call it quits 9 years later and re-formed this year with the original line-up, Pollard is a prolific pop genius and writes songs at the rate of one every hour or so, the first time i saw them was with Ginga Yinza Ninja and they were good but i was mainly just drunk cuz the band drank so much on stage you almost felt the need to keep up, afterward we tried to get Pollard to go down the street to this dive bar but he had hurt his knee doing one of his patented leg kicks, a move i would later emulate when i was drunk, one time ending up flat on my back in a swanky bar, it was after that first show i actually bought an album and began listening closely and was soon hooked, this band was one of my favorites circa 1997-2004 and still gets regular spins because they have to many good songs to even list, they also may hold the title of band i've seen in the most cities, those being: Cleveland, Akron, D.C., Pittsburgh and for some reason i'm forgetting something, of course this may be a double story post cuz there are many adventures when it comes to GBV...

Lime Spider, Akron Ohio- Ginga and i had driven up and found a hotel just a block from the venue, a tiny place as far as this band was concerned at this time and this show was a warm-up for an upcoming tour, the bonus was they had an outside deck on the roof and it was summer and it was hot and it was glorious, the band tore through two plus hours and i remember smoking my one hitter in the bathroom when some guy was like "mind if i hit that that smells pretty good", funny thing is it was Jim Pollard, Bob's brother and i said hey you're Jim, who was an original member of the band, and he smiled and we shot the shit and smoked a bit and when it was over he got me a beer and smiled and said that was some real good shit wasn't it, i grinned and slurred yup and we laughed like only the insane know how, of course there was much drinking and after some idiot tossed a bottle at the stage and Bob dove off and tried to punch him the show was over and we were out on the lovely streets of Akron (nickname Crackron) in the early a.m. hours, luckily there was a porno shop right there and since i was hungry and porn shops sell candy i ventured in while the Ginga One tried his luck with the ladies, i exited a few minutes later with a Snickers, 48 nitrous canisters, a cracker and some balloons, i also purchased a hardcore gay porn mag called Jock and nonchalantly handed it Ginga and said here's the mag you wanted which soon sent all the ladies running which was a good laugh until we realized that's not really what we wanted but then again i was standing there with a bunch of nitrous, Ginga took up the call to walk up and down the street and ask the indie kids if they wanted to buy a subscription to Jock Magazine but alas we got no takers, we then proceeded to the nearest bus stop and sat down next to a homeless woman and started doing nitrous, we asked if she wanted some but she declined and we asked if she was waiting for the bus and she said no that this was like her spot and we apologized and walked across the street to a park where we proceeded to kill the rest of the nitrous while we debated the pros and con's and possibilities of Akron's finest working girls, we heard birds and wondered if dawn was approaching and wondered how long we'd been sitting in some park doing one hits and sucking down balloons, estimated how many brain cells we'd killed and laughed and talked about what a good show we'd just seen, the sound of birds sent us stumbling towards our hotel where Ginga started in on the phone book and i cracked a beer, me being the voice of sanity talked him out of any entertainment cuz i think sunrise and checkout was swiftly approaching, a few hours later i woke up in the same clothes i had on the day before, brushed my teeth and headed for the breakfast buffet where i ordered Vodka and OJ and swallowed a couple vicodin to take the edge of the drive home, Ginga watched and said you're a fucking genius, i said i know and then i got up and headed towards all the bacon i could eat...

4 comments:

JMH said...

Nitrous is a lovely lovely thing and probably very bad for the brain. Did you have a name for the sound that seemed to come from the corner of the room where the wall meets the ceiling? We called it the Cosmic Mosquito or the Cosmic Ceiling Fan.

After my turn with the balloon, the punch ball, I always seemed to discover the meaning of life and then forget it. Given what I know now about depriving my brain of oxygen, the meaning of life most likely can only be found in the instant before death. God is funny like that.

sybil law said...

Holy moly - guided by Voices. Haven't listened to them in years.

I really love reading your stories. Amazing the shit we put our bodies through and lived to tell. Now our kids wear helmets to ride a bike, and everything's all rounded corners. I hope we're not turning them into a bunch of pussies.

I can really get off topic... Sorry. :)

nursemyra said...

Got any spare vicodin?

Kono said...

JMH- we weren't very smart, we called it the Wa-wa's.

Sybil- you can get off topic all you want it's cool with me, and yes i wonder what will happen to the kids with padded playgrounds and bike helmets, i mean shit we used to build bike ramps and jump our bikes off them and we couldn't even spell helmet and the playgrounds had gravel on them, damn i'm sounding like Fred Sanford.

Nurse- i'm nothing if not resourceful Nursie, wink wink.