Who Are The Mystery Girls?

Hunter at her apartment in Ghent with her friend Lynn (left).

I hauled ass to Hunter's house immediately after work, wired on too much coffee and shaking like a chihuahua, soon reeking of a putrid combination of Narciso Rodríguez perfume, spilled Cafe Americano, and the two bowl hits I took (only the second time in my life and it was almost ten years ago) trying to mellow out on the couch while Hunter had the movie Wild Guitar on continuous loop in the DVD player. With me behind the wheel we passed the Norva, looking for a place to park along the road in order to bypass any parking garage fees, and saw a valet parking sign pointing around the corner. Turning the corner, all we saw was what appeared to be a strange little man in a floppy hat and pink shirt with clear plastic gun holsters on his hip, standing alone rocking on his heels, and I laugh and say jokingly "Well there's our valet right now! Should I pull up next to him and offer him my keys?" And as we cruise by slowly Hunter says, "Yes, let's just pull up a little closer and BLAARRGGHHH AHHHH OH MY GOD IT'S SYLVAIN SYLVAIN AHH BACKUPBACKUPBACKUP AHHHHH!" But hell my friends, I was on a one way street, with cars parked along both sides, and I was too stoned to dare attempt it. But I looped around the block again but alas, he was gone, like a sweet, pink pixie into the ether (actually I think one of the roadies dragged him in). Dude. What if Sylvain Sylvain agreed to park my Taurus? Would I never wash my front seat again? Oh hell, not like I've ever washed it before.

But wow. The turnout for the show? Crikey. We're talking maybe 200 people, if not slightly more if I were in a generous mood. Or at least that's what Alvin was speculating when I asked him to guess. Oh yes, Al was there. And so was most of the old local music scene. Rachel, of course, whom I first told about the show. Rose. Diane. Nathan. Anthony from Antic Hay. Dave from brunch. Barry from Birdland. Steve from Skinnies. A few others. Hugs, kisses, how've-you-beens all around. But really, that was kind of it. At least we got there early enough just to catch most of the opening act.

Black Joe Lewis & The Honeybears

Apparently most everyone at the show had already heard Black Joe Lewis & The Honeybears on local DJ Paul Shugrue's show "Out Of The Box" on NPR, or at least Rachel had because she kept telling me how much airplay he'd been giving them before the show. So I suppose Hunter and I were the only ones not really familiar with the material, but dang... Lewis sure puts on a funky good show. Blues and funk with a small horn section. Damn fine stuff. Bought his Tell 'Em What Your Name Is! CD at the t-shirt stand, which I still haven't heard yet so I don't know how well he translates over from live to studio. Maybe I'll still have some time in the afternoon tomorrow, after listening to the recent purchase of Anvil's Metal On Metal album (yes, seeing the movie made us want to run out and buy some of their music -- I am a monster dweeb).

The New York Dolls (Sylvain Sylvain far left)

I kinda wished a had brought my actual camera, because I was up pretty close for a spell and for once photography was allowed legally into the show (not when I saw Elvis Costello it wasn't). But since I have a friend who is starting her own website called "Shitty Cell Phone Photos Of Bands" I thought I may as well whip out my cruddy Motorola and start snapping away. And honestly, you can't do much more poorly than these, which could be any band for all you can tell. They did from what I understand most of their new material off their current album, but threw in a few covers, including their version of The Cadets' "Stranded In The Jungle" (I thought Rachel was going to tackle me and then pee down her leg with excitement when they went into that one) and of course their classics "Pills" (Hunter's favorite song), "Looking For A Kiss", and "Personality Crisis", breezing through each performance with the kind of effortless stride that comes from being relatively tight and having done this for almost 40 years

David needs lyrics sheets?

And you know, I think that was precisely the problem with the entire performance. I was reminded of what Joe told me about the time he saw the Sex Pistols during their "Filthy Lucre" tour in 1996. How really quite good they were. Very tight, really on the mark, and what well-rehearsed entertainers they all were. Which of course was nothing like the Sex Pistols back in 1976, when they were a bunch of snotty kids who hated each other that couldn't play and spat on the audience. He didn't feel as if he had gone and had the Sex Pistols "experience", but instead went and saw a good clean concert performed with note-by-note perfection with a room full of outdated mohawks and safety pinned t-shirts either trying to capture the nostalgia or try to imagine that they were there when it all happened. Filthy lucre, indeed! Alvin was saying something to that effect to me during the Dolls show, how he sneered in my ear "Yeah, this ALL couldn't be about the MONEY now, could it?" But I can't exactly say that I hated their show the way Al did. The band did just fine. But like the Sex Pistols, it wasn't 1974 and I wasn't in platform shoes standing ankle-deep in someone's vomit at a crappy little club in New York's Bowery, watching a clusterfuck of cross-dressing heroin addicts on stage stumble through "Jet Boy" for the second time because they were too wasted to remember that they had already just performed it. In other words, the show was okay. I was neither moved, or repelled. And something tells me Al had a better time than I did just because he was so repelled. At least he came away from it all with a more passionate emotion than mine.

Afterwards there was the usual mumbling throughout the crowd of getting together for the traditional after-gig party down at the Colley Cantina, but Hunter and I decided to skip the noise and the crowds and head down to Granby Street to get our grub on at Havana, where the nachos are far superior and all the waitresses are unearthly hot with push-up bras and low-cut shirts. Some friends of Hunter's were already there, and they bought us nachos and I, still high as a kite, spent most of the time leaning hard against the bar nursing my Coca-Cola while the 13-year-old boy in me couldn't stop staring at the bartender's cleavage.

Then I went home. And this is precisely why I never partake. I was still so racked with the "munchies" I actually stopped off at McDonalds on the way home! Oh sweet, sublime Mickydee french fries. Let us never part again.