Castor Oil...sickeningly good

Tuesday, January 18, 2005

Ali Baba Hails a Cab

Oh my!

As I mentioned in yesterday’s blog we were using almost all of Maggie’s gear and had given away our soundcheck time to some completely unappreciative roundheads with a wall of amps from Boston. I don’t know what they were called but goddamn they were surly. I’m sure they were good but I didn’t watch them. Anyway…
Publish
So as always happens when you’re last up and from out of town the local yokels start filtering out a bit so we changed up and got onstage pretty quickly to reel them in with our incredible songs that are like auditory manna from the lord himself. With a battlecry of “ROCK AND ROLL BABIES THAT’S THE ONLY WAY TO DIE” leading him Wesley launched into our opening tune. His guitar sounded sweet, the drums cascaded in, I looked at Philitio (we enter together as is fitting) and……….

BWOMP BOWMP BBBBBBBBBBBBBBTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT…………….

I was pretty sure it was the bass but it wasn’t 100% clear that it was. Whatever it was it was fucking loud as hell and it was scaring the shit out of the people in the room. Ali Baba looked at me….I looked at him…we all looked around and there was nothing else to do but have faith in the soundman and keep on rolling. I think he was off doing something though because changes were not seemingly forthcoming. At least the THWOMPING was in time with the drums so we could play off the fact that we were some kind of crazy German industrial noise band. It was worth a shot anyway. So while the sound was terrible at least the booze was flowing in the crowd and people were gamely rocking. Suffice to say it was a decent set but nothing to write home, or to a blog, about. Philito unplugged my guitar with his big shoes a few times and I told him I was going to behead him and throw his remains in the river. He seemed to like that.

Set over I was packing up my gear and looking at the amazing array of cocktails that Ali Baba and the Thieves had so kindly brought to me whilst the rock was in session. I tossed down a whiskey and coke and was working on a beer and really getting revved up for some serious carnage but the strangest thing happened…all around me people were totally shitcannned drunk and I was absolutely no-lie 100% clear headed and sober. It was awful. Philito gave me a flask-driven bearhug and Ali Baba was all over the place and people were dancing and grooving and damn it all I was totally sane and cognizant. I drank two more whiskeys and it didn’t do anything but make me gag (rail whiskey…shiver me timbers).

Ben and Wes in a manly and utterly perplexing strategy had decided to head back home directly after the show with the gear. Philito was MIA and as I later learned was busting some serious moves on the dance floor to the chagrin of his lovely lovely so it was the sober 75% of the Prophets loading the gear along with one extremely drunk Ali Baba. I was trying to direct Ali Baba but he was beyond direction and so full of helpful energy that trying to corral him would have been useless. At one point when he was spinning in circles with two guitar cases in the middle of the street I considered borrowing a TASER gun but he stumbled back to relative safety and we got Wes and Ben on the road,

All that was left to carry was a single amp to my ride which was in the garage next door. So me and Ali Baba each grab an end and start weaving through the club, fall down some stairs, hit the door and down the sidewalk we go. We get to the corner and Ali Baba puts down his end, runs into the street and hails a cab! I say “ALI WHAT ARE YOU DOING?????” and he yells, “BUT BOWES….ISH TIME TO GO TO THE AFTERRRRHOWERZZZ PARTY….” and gets into the cab. Now normally I would have let him go but I do truly love Ali Baba and have on many occasions been the spectacularly drunk and highly motivated good time boy so I ran to the cab and foisted Ali Baba out of it. He looked confused but when I said “You should come with me…..we’re in New York you know and I need your help” he gave me a smile and a manly embrace and the two of us toddled down the ramp to the car and got rid of the amp.

Ali Baba turned to me and we talked

Ali Baba - “Bowes…are you mad at me”
Me – “Why would I be mad at you”
Ali Baba – “Because I only brought 30 people to your show.
Me – “Someday, like tomorrow, you’ll realize how fucking stupid that apology is.”
Ali Baba – “I hope so because right now I feel pretty bad. And drunk.”
Me – “Concentrate on the drunk, the bad will work itself out.”
Ali Baba - “that sounds good, you’re smart Bowes….like Yoda”
Me – “I know, c’mon. I need to get drunk.”
Ali Baba – “You’re not already? How did that HAPPEN???”

So who says I’m not a nice guy? Ali Baba thinks I am at least. I’m pretty sure the parking attendant thought we were going to start making out with all the close talking and manly embracing and spectacular fashion sporting that was going on. But we kept it straight and headed up the ramp to the next chapter in the evening…..we were heading uptown.

Next up…a muffin meets a grisly demise and the hangover bag from Hades. That’s the plan at least but I'm going out drinking in a limo tonight for Adam’s end of singlehood shindig so lord knows what might arise from that. It will be the first time that all the core members of Luka Brazzi have all been together in a long long time so we have some destruction to catch up on.

Burp.

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