Now THAT'S Rock and Roll!

When I think about some of the situations my band has been in all I can do is laugh. My band consists of five individuals including myself, and I am the only one that isn't married. I think that going in they thought that they would live vicariously through me, experiencing my lurid tales after a weekend of debauchery. They quickly found out that my love life has been about as exciting as a wake, and I feel like an utter disappointment in that department. But we have experienced some things together, here are just a few examples.

1. Impressing a Girl: If you have read my blog for any amount of time you know that I have a temper, somewhat. Well, this particular young lady that I was dating came to one of our shows one night. I planned on being on my best behavior, I didn't want her to figure out that I was a loudmouth, obnoxious asshole until after she had already succumbed to my charms. Anyway, she shows up and I give her a quick shout-out while I am on stage. She smiles from ear to ear, and I can just see the chances of me seeing her naked increasing by the second. Right after our 3rd song some asshole rudely shouts out a song request, which is usually met by some strong retaliatory words from yours truly, but because my date was there I didn't say a word back. My band-mates looked bewildered at my new found "restraint".

After our set I sat beside my date and had a pretty good conversation, until a young couple came to our table and expressed "how full of shit" I was, and that I would get killed talking about Bush where they were from like that. My hand actually started shaking, trying to put on a good face for this woman that I adored, and simply said "I see we have a difference of opinion. That's life I guess." I couldn't believe I was behaving myself so well that night. She told me that she really liked my band, and that she had to go because she had a "long day tomorrow." I kissed her on her cheek and told her I would call her later. As soon as she left I went on a verbal barrage like you wouldn't believe. I told the guy that requested "Stairway to Heaven" that he could kiss my black ass and that we were not a goddamn cover band. I told the young couple who approached my table earlier that they were pieces of fecal matter, and specifically told the man that I didn't appreciate him saying that I would get killed for my views, and that we could discuss it further outside. Right in the middle of my profanity laced diatribe my date had came back because she had forgotten her jacket and she had heard damn near everything. I guess I should go back to telling a woman that I'm an asshole on the first date, huh?

2. Where's my money??: Like any DJ, rapper, singer, or band knows, some club owners will go out of their way to stiff you out of your hard earned money. My band was promised money after one of our shows at a club we were performing at in Miami. The show went good, people liked our stuff, and everything went off without a hitch. When we went to get our money the owner tried to act like our fee was 150 dollars under the agreed upon fee. Then when we wouldn't accept it he refused to pay it at all. If this guy was in his 20's, 30', 40's, or early 50's, I would of just beaten it out of him but this guy was like 75. I think beating up the elderly goes on your record when you reach the pearly gates, so I'm wasn't doing that, I do have a moral barometer. We raised hell for about a half hour when the main act, a pretty famous group that we were opening up for, emerged out of nowhere to save the day. The lead singer of said group informed the owner that if he didn't pay us our money that his group wouldn't perform. Now THAT'S Rock and Roll! The owner quickly changed his tune and decided to give us what we were originally promised. I don't want to really say who the lead singer was but I will give you a big hint when I say, "Give it away, Give it away, Give it away now!".

3. Prince in the Building: Prince was performing in the same town that we were at a couple of years back, and rumor had it that he was stopping by the concert hall we were performing at. Not for us, but because that particular hall was special to Prince for some reason. Personally, I didn't think Prince was coming so I basically brushed it off and didn't really think about it. We started our show and everything was fine at first, until people started screaming that Prince had just entered the building. As we are in the middle of a song I look in the back of the establishment and I see people crowded around a person that resembled Mr. Purple Rain himself. I started to absolutely show my ass with long ass guitar solos, extra exuberant singing, acting like a dickhead just to impress the man I had been a fan of for more than 20 years. After the show I was excited to get Prince's opinion of my band and specifically my performance. When I reached the back of the club to meet one of my personal hero's I found a quite disturbing discovery. Prince wasn't Prince at all, it was a motherfucking impersonator! As I stood there, and people starred at me like I was nuttier than squirrel shit, I laughed for about 5 minutes straight.

4. Cover Band for a Night: One thing that I hate is when some miscellaneous asshole screams out a request like we are a fucking cover band. Usually, regardless if you are a man or a woman, you will get cursed the fuck out if you ask us to play "Stairway to Heaven" or any other song that is constantly requested. That is until a fateful night a few months ago. Listen, we are a black rock band so the amount of African Americans in attendance outside of our faithful fan-base is pretty slim to none. But this one night we were playing at a straight up "country and western, we love Toby Keith" bar. We started playing some of our songs and the crowd didn't boo, but they weren't digging our music either. Then, out of nowhere, I hear some lady say "Sing Sweet Home Alabama!". I was ready to lace whoever said that with a slew of profanities, probably an insult suggesting that her parents were siblings. I look at who saw it and it was a woman in her 30's, in a wheelchair, looking like she was sitting at deaths door. As I stood there speechless for about 20 seconds, the woman's girlfriend came up to the stage and told me in my ear that she was dying, and if I could play some songs for her.

So I grabbed the microphone, hopped off stage, and started talking to a woman who revealed herself to be named "Grace". Since the stage had a ramp, I wheeled Grace on stage and began to actually sing "Sweet Home Alabama". Come to think of it I sang most of her requests like Van Halen's "Hot for teacher", Jimi Hendrix's "Purple Haze", Led Zepplins "Stairway to Heaven", Guns and Roses "Sweet Child of mine"(I didn't realize that I knew that one), and various other songs. Grace had a great time and I am glad that I could provide her with some joy that night. Looking back, Grace is probably the only reason that we didn't get booed out of the building. Recently Grace came to one of our shows, looking healthy as ever. She asked me if I was disappointed that she didn't die, since I did something that I never did and played cover songs. I told her that I was just happy that she was alive and gave her a big hug.

5. Fuck the Police!: We were playing some small town in middle America around election time. My band played a pretty big club, where we performed our anti-establishment songs and called George Bush everything but the son of God that night. The crowd was great, showing us love through the entire process. After the show we load up the bus and begin to make that long trek back to Virginia. About a mile into it we see some flashing lights in the rear view so we pulled over to the side of the road. The cop walks up and I said, "Is there a problem officer?" The officer replies, "Yeah, you were speeding!" I said, "No we weren't! Listen, we are in a town with a population of 500 and a black population consisting of a guy named Kenny, trust me I was mindful of my speed." The cop orders me out of the car a immediately starts frisking me. As I have my hands against the bus the cop says, "I was doing security at the club you guys just played and I was appalled at how anti-American you assholes are." I replied, "That's what this is about?? Man, this is some bullshit!!" I had a dilemma because I wanted to talk shit, but I didn't want to put my band-mates in danger. As the cop talked shit about our band, as I stood against the car, I looked inside the bus at my bandmates and they gave me a look saying, "Do your thing HumanityCritic!" When the cop turned me around I said, " Fuck you pussy, you had no reason to stop us in the first place motherfucker!" I suddenly felt handcuffs being secured around my wrists and I was thrown in the back of a cop car. As we drove off I kept thinking that I wasn't going to make it, that he would shoot me and throw me in a ditch somewhere. So I talked shit the entire time, from saying everything from him having relations with sheep, his mother being a dime-store whore, and comparing him to a sanitary napkin. In the end it all turned out fine, especially since I have a good lawyer who even scares the shit out of me. But, that night, I thought that my blogging days were over.