Billz

Welp, it's 6am , i haven't gone to sleep, and im stuck in you tube land. please bare with my fast typing i feel sleep coming on like nobodies biznasss

here we go:

Man... I really really really really wanted to go to this show...

I remember looking at the "weekend section" of the washington post, where i always looked for shows every friday morning, and begging my mom to let me go for weeks and weeks to this show. i still remember seeing "Rage Against The Machine with The Jesus Lizard at the Patriot Center Fairfax Virginia"

It's one of those "top 5 shows i wish i could travel back in time and go to" type of shows. Evil Empire had just come out... i wanted to see this band more than anything at that time in my life. I had the self titled album since the 3rd grade or something when my friend stole it from his older brother to give to me... but in my opinion, it was nothing compared to evil empire...

evil empire encompasses the most purely angry screams of any human i've ever heard in my entire life. I talk about this with Mr. Puciato all the time and we def agree that he was easily the angriest man in the world at one point. you can hear it at the end of "down rodeo" and at the end of "year of the boomerang".

still to this day one of the reasons why i feel i play music is that picture on the inside cover of evil empire when they are all in their practice room going off... that says so much. practicing with your friends and writing music you care about and putting your all into it. not really doing it for anybody but yourself.

Anyway, the summer of '96 was my 6th grade summer (going into 7th) and i was skateboarding ALLL the time. I was really pissed off for some reason and i don't really remember why haha (i've kind of put that stuff behind me). It probably had to do with sleeping on random floors and sharing floor spaces with my sister of whatever "whacked out rich guy" boyfriend my mom was seeing at that time but yea.. i was young and pissed off and I constantly listened to Evil Empire, not for political content obviously at that time but more as that "wow... i'm feeling something awesome" content.

I had a white Rage "ringer" shirt with the logo "type writer" font that just said "rage against the machine" on the front and the globe/cage thing with people on the back trapped/ trying to get out. I wore it everyday to the point where it was yellow and permanently stretched out neck holes from playing drums at my friends house and skating all day around bethesda or wherever i was at the time.

I knew that Jesus Lizard was opening and was very familiar with them. i had heard about them through seeing that they had opened for Nirvana on one of their tours... i think it had been on "live tonight sold out" nirvana tape... I'm not sure. anyway, i had asked for the jesus lizard album "shot" earlier that summer and actually got to go to the cd store and buy it i was so excited and not disappointed by any means... random but i really think that album "shot" had a huge influence on my drumming subconsciously.

anyway... i really really really really wanted to go to this show....

and I still ask people, who were there, about it all the time. good ol' mr. moffet went and said it was awesome, so did metal nick. and i just thought at the time that the jesus lizard opening for rage was such a perfect and weirdly awesome thing to happen even though i was in barely 7th grade. (like later when dillinger opened for mr. bungle @ 930club). i tend to like it when that happens.... (also like ISIS opening for tool etc...)

so yea... it's fucking august, it's gross and hot and i always think about this show during this month and the amount that this album got me through.

so fucking angry and raw and awesome...

it's so late/early (god that's depressing) and i'm going to sleep. this rules.

like I said... I really really really really really wanted to go to this show...

I get goose bumps at like 4:15 till that part ends still.

-sir james a lot

The venue is called The Basement, located in Nashville. It's probably barely over 100 capacity. Super small place.. maybe slightly bigger than Velvet Lounge's standing area. Anyway, Metallica played an unannounced show there the other night, I guess as a warm up for their Bonnaroo set (Bonnaroo is an hour south of here), for a crowd of 120 fan club members and 'in the know' people. My friend got in (he is one of the latter group-- apparently a few people got a phone call that was similar to "Come to The Basement right now.. I can't tell you why, but goddammit just come") and while he shares the "Metallica's old shit is sweet but their new shit is gay" attitude that we all probably could agree with, he said it was fucking awesome.. that they were super tight, loud as fuck.. and tore through a bunch of old stuff. Apparently there were like, 8 tour buses around perimeter, and the owner of The Basement, Mike Grimes (also owns Grimey's, the upstairs record store) was absolutely terrified all day that word was gonna get out, and that there'd be some metalhead riot outside his business. Anyway, I guess the show went on without any problems.. And I'm jealous as shit!