09.18.04

It's a quarter to two in the morning. The Ash Street Saloon is emptying. A few pierced and tattooed folks wander with drinks in hand. Does that guy actually have votive candles wrapped in duct tape through his earlobes? My feet hurt. The pain/performance art troupe, Elsewhere, takes down the pulley, rope, and shark hooks from the ceiling. Bands break down and shuttle equipment out to a ragtag flotilla of vans, decrepit sedans, and oil-burning junkers.

A young (very young) army infantry boy with about seven drinks in him is hitting on me.

"So you're like, what, 25?" he says.

"My, aren't you just darlin',"

"27? 28? 33?"

"No, snookums. Don't you know it's impolite to ask a woman her age?"

Last night I broke my MC cherry at the Ash Street Saloon in downtown Portland. I didn't fall down, go boom. No one threw anything. No one ran screaming from the bar. And (here's the best part) I got paid. Paid, as in cash, scratch, wampum, ducats, zlotys, lire, rupees, clams, dough, etc. ChaosRing took care of me--giving encouragement, telling me that I did a good job, and asking if she could hire me again.

Must remember earplugs next time.

Three bands played, erm, rocked OUT, man.

The Bonobo Project opened. They're young musicians who're still learning the nuances of performance. The lead singer should never wear a black lace, skintight t-shirt and vinyl pants. They pushed CD sales a lot (and who could blame them?). Their sound was basic, 4-chord rock. There was one song "...about riding the Greyhound and killing people" which I found, uhm, moving.

Second up were Diesto, kinda death-metal-lite. They seemed too nice to scare the crap out of the intended audience's parents--which is what death metal's all about. They sounded a little muddy, and there were some unconventional rhythm breaks.

Then I went up, did my MC-schtick. Thanked Ash Street, thanked all the tattoo artists and body piercers from SW Washington and Portland, places that made donations, that sort of thing. All the while ChaosRing was jumping up and down and hooting at me.

The Lovelies rounded out the musical part of the night. They call themselves "LA glam rock." The lead singer wants to be Steve Tyler/Mick Jagger; swinging his mic around, hand on hip whilst singing, shaking his tiny, little, white boy bootie at the audience. They seemed to be quite popular with the crowd. It was obvious that they clicked musically and fed off of each other's groove.

I hopped up again, and introduced the headliner, Elsewhere. Meanwhile, they laid plastic all over the stage, and on the floor in front. They put up yellow CAUTION tape, and got their ropes in order.

Elsewhere took the stage.

Two shirtless, tattooed, and pierced men played drums. A dreadlocked DJ laid down a slew of minor chords as the drums began to beat. A man, also shirtless, pierced, and tattoed, got up on stage with a woman. They began to turn around each other, connected by shark hooks through the skin of their sternums. Turning and turning, like a Gemini top. I could see the blood on the man's chest. The woman wore a pink satin camisole, corset outfit, so I couldn't see if she bled--though I assume she did. The drums and rhythm ebbed and flowed. The audience hooted and climbed on tables to get a better view.

Soon they went to the floor. As the background music pumped, a dreadlocked man stepped on-stage. He pierced the woman's knees with shark hooks. After a few minutes, as the music got more intense, the woman was raised in the air. The drums came to a crashing climax. The crowd cheered. The woman was spun by her partner who remained on the ground. It was like some grand guignol circus act.

I looked at the crowd as this happened. The most common expression was of intense curiousity, and a kind of drunken blood-lust. One girl said, after the show, that she was going to have nightmares.

I'm too jaded for nightmares. I've seen too much in the name of spectacle. Or maybe it's, "Is it safe, sane and consensual--knock yerselves out." I know enough about the modern primitive mind-set; these people actually know what they're doing. They're pretty damn serious. And they should be. Me? I wouldn't do it, but hell, who am I to live anyone else's life?

About a 150 people showed up, so it wasn't a tiny crowd. The bar made decent money, so ChaosRing should be able to continue to do shows there. She wants to hire me again, and is pumped about floating my name out for other MC gigs.

Golly.

By 3:13AM, I was snuggled into my narrow bed, book getting heavy, and sleep was moments away.

Oh yeah, it was interesting.

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