Salvation by Lunacy (or: Revenge of the Instrumetal Divebombers)

It was 1:00 in the afternoon when I realized I was the only person in Jacksonville dressed like a rock musician. Jarheads were giving my bumper stickers murderous looks at stoplights before rocketing away in their Iroc-Zs. People were blasting squirrels with high powered rifles in the parking lot of the Arby's on Lejeune Boulevard and my loyal assistant was in South Dakota, picking through a junkyard.

It hadn't always been like this. I watched constantly over my shoulder as I nursed my semi-warm domestic beer. These guys are three times my size, I could be taken apart like they regularly dismember their dates and wives. It was Custer's last stand in reverse, and I was trying my hardest to get back to my lodge.

A few nights prior I had seen Irata and The Bronzed Chorus up in Greensboro. They were to be joined by Talons, who are like Pelican with a good drummer, but it was not to be so. The audience was a bizarre mix of music and art nerds and pregnant homeless women smoking cigarettes. Irata blasted the walls of the building apart. The Bronzed Chorus leveled everything on the block. It was so much like the episode of the Simpsons where U2 plays on top of the Springfield wall. It would have been too much if it had been anything but music, but I relished in it and felt my tinnitus worsen.

I was playing the Bronzed Chorus's CD in traffic, my windows open and my sunglasses barely keeping blindness away. The sun is closer to Jacksonville than any other part of the state save Fayettenam. So far, neither have been burned away, but not for lack of trying. "People are staring!" had hissed my assistant, minutes before being whisked away by private helicopter. I don't know how he hires these fucking things.

But people were staring, and he was in the shadow of the Black Hills searching for a 1992 Chevy Cavalier (powder blue) that had been buried, some say, under tons of Ford trucks and wrecked Hondas with Montezuma's gold hidden where the engine block should have been. I'd be getting a call on my cel phone when, and if, he found it.

I was playing with the cracked parts of a broken iPod I'd found outside this shit bar, behaviour like a wildebeest among Nile River crocs. No eye contact, just get through the water. My destination was still Wilmington, my goal was to crash the set of the first movie or TV show I came across. I had a cooler full of PBR tall boys, a 1996 Dodge Caravan retrofitted for silent running, and a foot locker full of paintball guns. I had come to Jacksonville to recruit soldiers, people to man the cannons in my Dodge War Machine, but ended up way over my head. My undersized shirt and sissied up tattoos made me stand out worse than a dreadlocked hippie at an ROTC rally. I was humming a Preacher's Gun song to myself when my phone rang. I stepped out to back door, setting off all number of alarms and abandoning my tab, and hit the talk button.

"I found the car," said my assistant, out of breath. I could hear the barking of large dogs, "But it's not a chunk of gold under the hood. Just a dinged up old engine. Somebody left a Harmony acoustic guitar with a broken neck in the back seat, though."

"Listen," I said, "I need you to get back here before I get rammed through a wall by one of these Neandertals. They've already slashed all four tires on the War Machine and I want to still be alive when Pinback comes to the Cat's Cradle."

"Use the War Machine's self destruct," said my assistant. "Anyway, man, I'm on a chartered flight back to the state. I'll be touching down in Wilkesboro at 3am. Can you come and get me?"

"What in?" I shrieked. I could already hear the bar's patrons, getting louder and louder, having realized that the strange little guy who had set off their emergency exit alarm had walked on his tab.

"Whatever. I know you'll figure something out," and he hung up.

I knew what to do. I took out my keys and pressed the Fear button, which I had wired myself between the Panic button and the Lock/Unlock button. The War Machine exploded, spraying an entire parking lot full of 23 year old soldier types with orange paint.

the Parable of the Moron in the Michael Vick Jersey

The moron is proud.

The moron parades up and down sidestreets in Charlotte in a Michael Vick jersey.

The moron argues with his friend on the shitty side of Durham in a Michael Vick jersey.

The moron checks his email in a computer lab at ECU in a Michael Vick jersey.

The moron is proud, the moron thinks he has achieved something.

Another moron, passing nearby, shakes her head at the obvious buffoonery of someone who would casually walk around in a Michael Vick jersey. Occasional famous morons defend Vick's sick actions, citing their bullheaded beliefs that dogfighting is "a sport" or "cultural" or "not that different from hunting." This is wrong, wrong, wrong and dumb, dumb, dumb, but that is all another argument. Dogfighting is a fashionable crime on both sides of the fence... it is fashionable to those who partake for the same vile/bloodthirsty/abusive reasons it always has been. It is currently fashionable to hate and speak out against the sick crime.

I've taken down actual dogfighters, and they are no joke. They're meth heads and they are notoriously hard to destroy, but when set alight will illuminate the night like the olympic flame. Few of those currently speaking against dogfighting would have the sand to take to the frontlines and actually bring these fuckers to the ground where they belong.

I digress.

The moron watching the moron in the Michael Vick jersey is herself wearing a shirt that says "Support Local Music" that she got at Hot Topic. She feels very good about herself when she walks around, her money going to a publicly traded megacorporation instead of actual independent music, while the great Spazzatorium of Greenville slips underwater like a sinking U-boat.

The Hurculean efforts of Jeff Blinder, the Spazz's everything guy since the Legion of Supervillains faded, are not going to be enough to keep the Spazz afloat much longer. Unless people come out with money in their hands this Cathedral of independent talent will be gone to time, much like the Library at Alexandria. Here it is in Jeff's own words.

THE SPAZZ IS CLOSING IN ONE MONTH...

Unless we can perpetrate a change.

Fellow Greenville residents and patrons of our space,

Our efforts to keep The Spazz going are becoming harder and harder to realize. This semester has been brutally harsh to us so far. All of the shows for the past few weeks have brought in nothing for the space itself. The few that have we were forced to out-of-pocket that excess. The last 4 shows had us out-of-pocketing close to $300 so we are at the point where we need your help in keeping The Spazz alive. At this rate come Oct. we will be unable to operate (Any bands reading this worry not, all shows scheduled after that will be honored but no new shows will be added.)

Ideas that might help us stay alive:

FIRST, AND FOREMOST, JUST COMING OUT TO OUR EVENTS

Without you we wither and die. Please understand The Spazz exists to bring together everyone and to have a creative outlet for local and travelling artists to showcase their talents. We are far from perfect and not all shows are gonna be your preference but we go way out of the way to book bands of all styles and genres and do so to branch everyone together and not just have a punk space...or an indie space..we're an every space!

Yes, shows will fall on nights where you have to study/work/want-to-drink, but making that extra effort is all we need from you. When deciding what to do with your night check out if we've got a show scheduled, listen to the bands when the bulletins are posted, and at least make that effort to care. The artists coming through need us and we in turn need you to support them.

Most shows we're ready to go by 8PM If enough of you come out we can be done by 11PM every time. This is ,of course, wishful thinking but even if we can get just 10 people out earlier enough we can kick things off!

SPREAD THE WORD

Most of you have classes and have met new folks this semester. How about a bring-a-friend-to-The-Spazz night! In all seriousness, spreading the word about us is so important. We cannot use the regular means of getting the word out about our events so it's up to you to let folks know what's going on. There is is quality live music and creativity happening in Greenville, it's just under-the-radar! If you spot someone wearing a rad band t-shirt, as profiling as it is, chances are they'd probably dig The Spazz so let them know about us!

ART MAJORS?

Any art majors interested in making up flyers for our space that we can hand out on campus or strategically place at designated shops? We could definately use your expertise in the matter. I do have access to printers (color even!) so even if one design is made I can reproduce the shit out of it. We could definately use your talent and it'd probably look good in your portfolio to boot!

COOL NERDS?

Any knowledgeable individuals that understand website creation that might be able to design us a site outside of myspace? As convenient as myspace is for information our dear Tom seems to have those bulletins go down at the most inopportune times. We need a website that has our information and show dates 24-7. Plus think how easy it would be to tell people to check out www.spazzgallery.com instead of googling us. Not to mention some folks don't have a myspace account (gasp!)

HELP!!!

Any more ideas please let us know! Hit us up with a message or post under the comments here. We need everyone to pitch in their ideas. This is crucial folks. Think of The Spazz as a friend in need. Motivate yourselves into caring and participating because we're dying here. Think of Greenville without The Spazz. I've been there and it's way lame.

STARTING TODAY ANYONE WHO WANTS TO MAKE A DONATION TO OUR SPACE CAN NOW DO SO VIA THE LINK (WELL, BUTTON) LOCATED ON The SPAZZATORIUMS PROFILE PAGE. ALL YOU FOLKS WHO JOKINGLY ASK IF WE TAKE CREDIT CARDS AND BREEZE RIGHT THROUGH W/OUT A DONATION. WELL NOW WE'VE GOT YOU COVERED! ANYONE WITH EXTRA FINANCIAL SECURITY PLEASE HELP OUR WORTHY CAUSE. NONE OF YOUR DONATIONS WILL GO TO ANYTHING BESIDES THE SPACE ITSELF. WE DO NOT PROFIT AT ALL FROM THE SPAZZ. WE'VE GIVEN ALL WE CAN AND YET IT ISN'T ENOUGH SO WE TURN TO YOU IN OUR TIME OF NEED. DO NOT LET THIS DREAM DIE. WE ARE FIGHTING THE GOOD FIGHT BUT ARE NEARING ROUND 7 AND OUR KNEES ARE WOBBLY. HELP US!

This is nothing new in my field. Asheville's Akumi and El Nuevo suffered this exact fate, though Akumi was pushed out of existence by the Asheville Cops (pig demon bastards). Westville Pub had a very brief spurt as the home of unknown badass bands and was an O.K. tour spot for a few months in 2006, until it sputtered and died from lack of interest or effort. Raleigh's scene has witnessed the death and changing hands of more venues than I can list, and Greenville's attic has gone to a bizarre afterlife hell in which it is a floundering club that has turned to underground pro wrestling to try and score a crowd. Most of Charlotte's clubs (the Milestone, Tremont Music Hall) are too weird and violent for anything but the most savage audience.

The moron in the Michael Vick jersey is more obvious in their criminal idiocy, but is the ideological cousin of the hypocrite in the "Support Local Music" shirt.

Laptop Killed the Video Star Killed the Radio Star Killed the Vinyl Star (or: Hounded by a Freak. Asheville, 2003.)

Four years ago, in 2003, I left one of the few Orange Peel shows I've been to. It was Junior Brown, and I'd left my cel phone at home (I wanted to prove that it was possible). Even in those pre-technological days, when camera phones were the new shit and there was no such iPhone, if it can even be imagined, I had to prove it to myself.

Instead, the opposite was proven. Somewhere on Smoky Park Bridge heading into West Asheville some goon with South Carolina plates in an Asian two door coupe (one of those fast and whiny little Hondas, I believe) the color of dried wasabi started following me. At first it was casual, he was just behind me at all times on a deserted three lane road. After probably two miles of this I got the Fear. It was 1:00 in the morning and I was in no mood to be pistol raped by some lunatic from the Rabies State.

It got weird and Fear was in full swing when I tried to pull into a gas station... somewhere reasonably public where I would at least have the option of an impromptu posse should my pursuer want blood. The station was closed, and the mystery honda of Death and Fear pulled in behind me, hovering with great malevolence as I circled the parking lot and then drove away from town, to the dark hills I knew so well. I'm not tough, but I trusted my ability to lose this bastard somewhere in the strange and twisting roads away from town, if not run him off the road into some creek.

He followed me, I could almost see the grille and lights of his car as red demon eyes and tusked pig mouth, through every turn of the backcountry roads. I flew around curves, my pickup behaving like a Boxster, and ran stop signs. The pursuing minion changed into the left lane several times, trying to match my speed, which I did not let him do. We were locked, he and I, in a bizarre automotive mortal combat. I was not prepared to be rammed into a tree at 50mph by some sadistic yokel.

I ran a few red lights, in full and unabashed animal flight from danger, headed back from the hills to town. I lost him when he turned onto I-40, presumably to find and devour the soul of an easier target, but I didn't stop until I saw my first cop.

I didn't have his tag number, or anything, but I have never been happier to see a cop. I spewed some gibberish all over his shoes, something about ohmygodohmyfuckingod I just got chased by this IDIOT FREAK WEIRDO WHAT THE FUCK fromsouthcarolinaandididntgethistagnumber but it was GREEN FUCKING HONDA FUCK WHAT THE FUCK. Some wide eyed gibberish, but nothing could be done. The cop and his friend cop were very nice to me about it, but we knew the doomed nature of whatever manhunt I had in mind. I wanted helicopters with missiles and machine guns and crazed bastards with sniper rifles combing the highways with a thirst for asshole blood.

I went home and didn't turn on my lights. I locked every door and closed the blinds and found my bed in the darkness, occasionally creeping to the window with dread, anticipating satanic cackles as a possessed car crept up my long drive. After some time I fell asleep, and with further time this panic-ridden night chase faded among all my other bizarre stories of life and near death.

***

Asheville has since been conquered by a stranger thing. Dancepop. The Morrissey fans, in their eternal paleness, have hopped the fence and now shake their malnourished hips to boomchick boomchick from the Northeast. New Wavers parade up and down Broadway like so many Attilas the Hun. It's because Greenville beat them to the dancepop fad. Asheville is stunned that such a shit town (as Greenville is viewed by anyone ignorant to the quality of their underground) would beat them to the next Big Thing. Asheville has always been the state's arrogant talent sniffer, and to have been beaten by Greenville... to even have bands PREFER Greenville? They are not amused.

The Spazzatorium Galleria, more a legend around the country than any stage or restaurant corner in Asheville, has been shaking its collective booty to laptop beatz and pink shirted howlings, yo, for a very long time. The latest recycling is huge. The uniform is almost the same, only more pastels and shorter shorts than before, as gutterpunk bands. Implicitly, these bands are not wanting for money. Generally people who are broke enough to be expected to dress gutter make every effort to not appear to be that gutter. Uniform, uniform, uniform.


***

If I had been carrying my phone that dark and instinct-driven night four years ago, I would have probably felt a lot more secure. However, brushes with death and extreme violence have always been spiritual growth spurts. I know the value of my life. I know the soundtrack I want, and the soundtrack that the underground is pushing right now is not always to my standards.

Imperial Battlesnake is descending upon North Carolina right now, blowing through in two days and two shows like a pack of enraged Mako Sharks being chased by a herd of snowblind Bison. Maybe I'll drop these memory demons off at the sitter for the evening and let them deafen me into a lighter mood.

They are quite good, after all.

Hawk Season (the skirmish/battle/war metaphor)

War has been declared on creativity. Thousands already have died, perished in the flames of perdition, while the endless tide of myspace bands creeps across the land. Apartment dwelling twenty-somethings with Fender Standard Stratocasters and Marshall Half Stacks roam the woods, killing the innocent and skinning their carcasses, while trust fund babies in their post-hippie stages slay the unwilling in back alleys by bashing their heads soft with their drum machines and Korg single octave synths. These are dark times, with a dark focus.

It is a dark lack of focus, rather, reminiscient of the dreaded eighties. I was alive and cognizant in the eighties, I remember what a dark and braindead time it was. New Wave, relatively fresh and brought to life by advances in synthesizer technology, battled Dumbass Metal and Cock Rock for the adulation of the hordes. The underground was one of righteous indignation, the shouts and howls of the Hard Core army. Indestructible motherfuckers, not even twenty years old, changed the world from the invisible shadows. The Guerrilla victory was so complete that by the early 90s decent music was available to the mainstream. Without the DC Hard Core scene there would have been no stage set for the 1989/90/91 explosion of good music through mainstream avenues. Over the first half of this sacred decade were more geniuses per capita than any Renaissance city.

We all rode around in dirigibles eating caviar from platinum dishes, wiping our chins with thousand dollar bills until there were none left. These sacred years shall never be forgot.

Regardless, the underground has become confused. Things are very, very backwards now that the major record labels have gone over completely into the Prince of Darkness's camp. Now battles that would have been waged upon the radio waves are waged underground, pushing the less accessible (and generally more musically adept) acts even farther into obscurity.

Now we approach an international situation that makes the Reaganomic Nightmare of the eighties seem like a methodist dinner party. Now we need the smart music the most, the vindicated protest songs, the twin blades of screaming guitar and fuzz bass slicing to the central nervous center. Instead, we drown in self-righteous moron metal and smilingly oblivious dance pop. There are rare venues scattered around the state and nation where one can go to have their face melted by real music, but they are often either so far underground that you will only hear about them after the fact or they are shut down within the span of months for lack of interest (read: profit).

Raleigh has house shows, a few bars that occasionally will put an incredible band in front of five or six barflies, and several major venues. The house shows are almost too underground, and tend to be of the "invite only" category. If you don't know about them, you probably won't. Good luck getting booked to one, too. As for the major and semi-major venues, occasionally there is a decent band, but more often than not the acts are either has-beens or the latest one hit wonders. Disco Rodeo (previously the Ritz) averages two or three decent bands a year, but is a pretty lousy venue. It's evidently a booty club that either folded or changed hands. Generally, acts worth catching bypass Raleigh for the next town listed...

Chapel Hill keeps hope alive better than most places in the state. I'm woefully uninformed on their house show situation, but only because I can catch really good music at their clubs and haven't had to look for the showhouses. Local 506 brought Red Sparowes and William Eliot Whitmore IN THE SAME NIGHT, the Black Angels, all kinds of mindblowing sound comes through that club. On the same strip are several more holes in the wall of note, such as the Cave, where local acts dominate. Not as much of the idiotheque here, Chapel Hill tends to hold up their end of the bargain. Carrboro I include here, too, for the simple fact of the legendary Cat's Cradle.

Asheville has the Grey Eagle, but the catch is that it's damn near impossible for local acts to get in there. Only common members of a few bands, specifically the elitist alumni of Piedmont Charisma, are ever invited. They do not accept press kits. They bring the best independent label music to town, giving people a righteous alternative to the bloodsuckers at the Orange Peel. Pelican, Dungen, Mono, Explosions in the Sky, Akron/Family... all kinds of future music. This would be the best venue in the state if only they would acknowledge the quality of their local scene.

Gushing about the Grey Eagle aside, the rest of Asheville has been effectively hijacked by the same braindead dancepop that's been shaking Greenville for so long. The only difference here is that Asheville has undergone a kind of self-lobotomy and now drools helplessly on the floor as rich kids from Philadelphia and Baltimore gyrate over them in pink tube tops, screeching over a deafening wall of laptop beatz and prerecorded synth loops. This was the New French Bar's fate, turning it from the best place in town to get cheap visibility to a useless supplicant to the synthbeast (666). Fred's Speakeasy was once the home of the best unknown rock music (and rock crowds) but has been bought out three times since the days of Mary and Kristen, who would bite the cap off a PBR and dance on the bar, and is now the sterile graveyard where bands who used to fill Akumi now go to die.

Greenville would not belong on this list if not for the tenacity of the local musical elite. A rare creature has power here and few other places. See, there are no real venues in town. The downtown exists only to pay talentless cover bands thousands of dollars per gig to fill idiotic ears with poorly delivered versions of radio hits. Occasionally there will be a momentary hiccup, during which a venue will appear and promise original music. However, the Greenville mainstream is several years behind the rest of the world, and this "original music" venue will only feature either heavy metal or meandering jam bands that no other city will book any more.

Greenville's underground, though, is anchored as far in the future as the mainstream is in the past. Where Asheville has gone braindead for dancepop, all for jealousy of Greenville for finding it first, Greenville approaches it intelligently. A dancepop act from the Northeast will share the stage with a three hour old local noise band, an independent rap duo from Wilmington, and a prog rock band from Texas all in the same night... and each act will receive appropriate attention per their level of radness. The Spazzatorium Galleria and 21 Eleven Beer & Wine are the two best places in town to see music. Whereas occasionally a crappy act will slip through the cracks, the quality control tends to be spectacular. Media coverage of these venues is terrible at best, but word of mouth is unstoppable.

Wilmington doesn't always export the best music, originality tends to be a little wanting, but they have a surprising score on the import board. Lake Trout has come through the Soapbox a few times, though they've only attracted an Asheville-esque wallsnob crowd, as well as the Avett Brothers. The Soapbox is like a more successfully executed version of Asheville's Stella Blue, in that both have an upstairs venue for better known acts coupled with a downstairs venue for local or up & coming acts. One of the weirder venues in the state (though nowhere near as weird as Murfreesboro's Zakk's Coffeehouse) is Lucky's Pub. It's on the way out of town, in a stripmall opposite a CVS. Their average night consists of three or four poorly rehearsed acts deafening ten or fifteen drunken ska fans who are still trapped in a Monday night in Boston, somewhere in early 1993. However, several times a month this sad little venue brings national ska and punk acts. I want to say Mustard Plug has played here, as well as other bands of the same caliber.

Greensboro, and her neighbor Winston-Salem, have been off and on import/export towns. In the early 2000s it was hard to find decent bands from either. It was not that they did not exist, just that they were a bit invisible. Recently, though, a few righteous bands have made themselves visible statewide. Greensboro is one of the first places in the state to have a self-actualized post rock/post metal scene exist independently of semimajor independent label instrumental music. Find these towns' instrumental bands and go see them play, you will love them. Also, there are decent venues springing up or in development. For years these have been "We can't stop here! This is bat country!" towns for me, but my mind is rapidly changing due to the quality of their export. Badass badass badass.

Charlotte really doesn't feel like part of NC to people who don't live there. It's kind of like the Cincinatti of NC. That said, it's really the place to go for intense Hard Core or evil ghetto death rap (nothing like the brainiac stuff coming out of Wilmington or parts of Greenville these days).

***

There is the army of Righteousness and Creativity and there is the army of Wickedness and Radio Friendliness. You must choose for yourself which one to join, if you aim to be a discriminating consumer of independent music. Avoid those who are DIY because they can afford to be (financially) and not because it is burned into their soul by the desire to be pure, spurn and destroy those who flaunt the underground because they think it gives them the right to make others feel like shit, and above all, turn up your CD player.

It's going to get louder before it gets quieter.