It’s already been five days? Oh, how the time flies when one is having an amazing time. Too bad it’s so fucking hard to get a job in the city…I’d move back quicker than you could say, “Pick a coast and stick with it, gunt nosher!”
In case you just missed that, I’ve introduced you all to “gunt nosher,” which I will be proudly writing and yelling ad naseum as I attempt to make “gun nosher” the new “douchebag”. Let’s make it happen, people. I’ve already submitted it to the Urban Dictionary. Now you people have to do your part to — literally — spread the word.
The final day of the WFMU Record Fair was a bittersweet success. It was sweet because I was paid for my work for the past three days, and bitter because what the hell am I going to do now that I’m in suburban New Jersey for another four or five days? Also, it was a success because I scored some of my best deals of the weekend today. For the scum:
Hella – Hold Your Horses – $3
Fear Falls Burning – I Am One Of Those Monsters Numb With Grace – $6
Inca Ore – Brute Nature Vs. Wild Magic (still-sealed) $7
The Frogs – The Frogs – $20
Will Oldham – Joya (sealed) – $5
King Kong – Me Hungry – $5
Gram Parsons – GP (original) – $15
Nick Garrie – The Nightmare Of J.B. Stanislas (limited edition re-issue) – $15
Palace – “Trudy Dies” / “Come In” – $5
Palace – “Ohio River Boat Song” / – $7
Pavement – Slay Tracks 1933-1969 (numbered, still-sealed) – $50
What’s impressive is how the dealer selling the Pavement 7″ offered me half-off her initial price. I guess she wasn’t aware that copies of the band’s first ever release are selling for close to $200, and no one in the last three years has ever sold a sealed copy on eBay. I’m anticipating a lot of action once I launch that auction in the coming weeks. The self-titled (and self-released) first record by The Frogs was another good score, as were the Gram Parsons record and the Nick Garrie record, which I’ve never seen before. Cool, right? No? All told, I spent about $330 in three days. Two-thirds of that was covered by the Spinal Tap eBay auctions last month, so I really only spent $100 of my own, and, well…I should make that back with the Pavement record, so I really didn’t spend a penny. Wait a minute, isn’t that sort of obtuse rationalization the same sort of thing alcoholics and drug addicts do to convince themselves they don’t have a “problem”? Shit.
The silliest moment of the day was during a live performance by a band called Monotonix, an Israeli punk band. Their music sucked and their singer tried too hard to demand the attention of everyone in the room. He attracted a small crowd, but his cliche punk antics were mostly stupid and douchey. Anyway, at some point during their set, the band (with help from some audience members) grabbed the drum kit and ran it across the room, placing it up directly in front of our store’s table. It was quite interesting to see the looks on my bosses’ faces when the annoying singer started humping at a table and throwing his body around in the presence of tens of thousands of dollars worth of records and memorabilia. The band (the guitarist was somewhere in this cluster) played two songs before they were forced to stop. This happened when the annoying singer had the crowd lift the drummer’s bass drum above their heads, and climbed up onto it, announcing to everyone that he wanted to leap off the thing into the awaiting arms of the crowd. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much of a crowd. He kept calling people over, but nobody cared.
Andy Breckman (followed closely by WFMU station manager Ken Friedman) stormed the area yelling for the guy to get down or he was going to get the entire operation shut down by whoever was in charge of the Metropolitan Pavilion. Breckman, bless his heart, was sincerely trying to be polite and silly, and the mongoloid singer kept yelling into the microphone about how he wanted to jump. When the gunt nosher (#2!) singer realized Breckman was being serious, he began to rant about how his band had been “banded” from performing in Israel and Canada, and that he did not want to be “banded” from America, too. Breckman played along, but his attempt to remain affable and courteous was overshadowed by the obvious fact that both he and Friedman looked genuinely concerned that the dickhead was about to ruin their event. The singer finally climbed down, and the band’s set ended. For a few minutes, everything returned to normal, except for one record dealer who verbally threatened to kick the shit out of the singer. A few minutes later I saw and heard the dealer yelling at Breckman/Friedman in the corridor leading to the loading dock. His concerns were valid but his handling of the situation was inappropriate. Also, I thought it was ironic that a collector/dealer of high-end punk rock merchandise could completely lose his shit over the actions of fellow snotty punks.
DMBQ played a set that was better than Monotonix, but ran maybe twenty minutes too long. They started out strong, but like most of the bands I enjoy just enough not to want to see live, I eventually grew disinterested. The coolest part of their set was when the drummer had the crowd hold his entire kit above their heads, then he climbed atop the crowd, sat on his drum stool, and played his entire kit while literally being supported by the audience. Having the audience hold you and your gear in place (above their heads) certainly appears to be the newest and most-retarded trend that is sweeping an “indie” scene that is definitely not bereft of utterly dumb trends. For example: why do 98% of “indie” bands dress like young Republicans? I don’t know, but it sure is stupid!
As their set drew to a close, I began gathering my belongings, and helped my bosses deconstruct the displays we worked so hard to make Friday afternoon. They were nice enough to pay me for parking and for a few hours of work, which was very cool of them. I walked down the street, grabbed my car, and met them to pack up all the supplies they won’t be bringing back to L.A. (so we don’t have to buy more for next year’s show, which I guess I’ll be attending, seeing as how all their stuff is being stored in my mother’s garage!). There was a bit of traffic heading back into Jersey, and once I made it home I met my entire family for dinner at a local Italian eatery. The pizza was good. I miss good pizza about as much as I miss good bagels about as much as I miss many other great and pleasurable things I can only experience when I’m on the East Coast.
Jack and Ken are coming over to drink and goof around, maybe I’ll shoot a video of us playing that drunken game where we spin a needle to see who takes the next shot. Who knows! Anything could happen! I don’t have to wake up at 9:00am for work tomorrow!
