Coachella '09

Coachella. What can I say about Coachella. Hot. A lot of stages. Even more bands. A whole lot more audience members clueless how to take care of themselves and have a good time at a music festival. I had a blast. I had a blast because I refused to have anything else. One of the fundamental problems with a music festival the size of Coachella is the fact that although you want to see 50 bands that play on the bill, there is no fucking way short of being Schroedinger’s cat that you can see all those bands in the time there.
Do the math. Roughly 100 bands. 5 stages. Stagesets lasting from 1hr to 2.5 hrs.
100/5 = 20, which says if you want to watch a whole stageset, that at the most you can only see 20 bands.
100/5 *2 = 40, which is to say if you watched only half of the stageset of a band the most you could see is 40 bands.
You get where I am going with this? And that isn’t even considering how much time you lose walking through crowds from one stage to another.
I can’t say enough how great it was to see My Bloody Valentine, Paul McCartney and the amazing performance of Leonard Cohen. Above all else I went to Coachella to see my personal heros, Throbbing Gristle. This is a band I could write for chapters and chapters upon. For Christ’s sake they invented the genre Industrial and Genesis has boobs and penis these days! Anyways I was amazed how enthralled they had the crowd. About 300 folks stuck around at their stage and seemed truly captivated by what must have been a first time experience for almost all of them.
Other bands to receive mentions would have to be The Yeah Yeah Yeah’s, The Bloody Beetroots, The Crookers, The Kills, Turbonegro, and definitely The Presets. Review my pics and tell me you couldn’t have a good time too.

Sakuracon and Cosplaying... naughty-style

My good friend Origami has been running the Main Events soundboard at Sakuracon and this year he was asked to DJ from 2-4am. He really wanted me to come and check out all the homemade beats he had made to fulfill their request for Happy Hardcore. I know, Happy Hardcore is for people who like getting their teeth drilled at the Dentist. Still he stepped up and took it in stride and decided to have fun with it. In his glory he offered to get me passes to help me in. I ofcourse invited my good girl, Ms. Sprocket, a former model with me on a skin-site. She is a looker and the perfect nerdy girl to cosplay at a comicon that I know nothing about.

We both agreed to dress anime-like and make up character names, of which I decided we were in a Hentai (porn anime) named Bukkake-san. This plan was full proof. Check these out.


Lastly we toured the halls and saw some incredible and oh so fucking nerdy cosplay outfits all of which were climaxed by our visit to the Cosplay Chess game. Get this. A variety of kids dressed as characters from anime to sunday cartoon classics to video game characters all set up on a human sized chess board. The two players call out there moves over a PA while thousands of equally nerdly dressed on-lookers watch with amazement. When a piece was called to attack another piece, all the other pieces would back off the board and the 2 characters would act out a dorky little cosplay battle. In two words AMAZING and DORKTASTIC.

PDX: Voodoo Doughnut, Ex-GF's, and the boys they bang

So almost a month ago I failed to write blog entry chronicling my trip through Portland on the way to visit my mother in Bend, OR. Every time I go through PDX I have a responsibility to make some contact with one of the many people that helped me along through my drunken years in the Northwest. I had to leave this town once I got to a point where every stripper, bartender, and club-owner knew my name and liked me... it was the liking me part that was a bad sign. I was a Chef in the town for a place, now defunct but awesome in it's day called The Brazen Bean. I managed to work as a Pantry cook at another famous landmark that went under after more than 2 and a half decades called The Brasserie Montmartre. blah blah blah... I have to honor the food of the town sometimes too.

On this trip I made a point to call 2 ex-girlfriends. One on the way down and one on the way up. Oddly enough, Helix(not her real name, guess what she does for a living now... hmmm), was not from PDX days. I mether when I was a young 24 and she was a meer 19 in Seattle. We went to the same Audio Video school and we made some fun times in city. She was making some part-time money still working at the World Famous Voodoo Doughnut. This place has been featured on several shows and is as wacky as it is made out to be.
Nyquil filled.
Cock Shaped.
Peanut Butter and Rice Krispies.
Fruit loops and a whole assortment.
Regardless if you can adventure into trying these new monuments to white trashy food art, the place is awesome. The interior boasts some impeccable signage and the doughnuts are just as colorful as the staff. Make it a place to stop by after breakfast and before a stripbar and you wont regret it.













This part here is where I would have told you about my lovely trip to Deschutes Brewery in Bend, where they make Mirror Pond and Black Butte, but instead my mother got in a verbal disagreement and just drove around the parking lot instead. Moving on.

On the way back over Mt. Hood through snow in an un-chained honda 2 door I was excited about the thought of seeing my ex, BG. WE had met on another famous alt-pinup site as founding member and model and after I made my way through dating several of the models over a years time, it turned out the smallest blondest thing was the only libido that could stand up to Big Dirty me. Good things come in small packages. I hope that filthy pun wasn't lost on you.

I met BG with her husband, also a good friend of mine. We agreed to meet at Beulahland. She looked hot as ever but we all needed a drink to catch up. The beer was good and cheap and the sandwich, well I got a sardine sando. Delic! Not much to it, but it's good to know where you can get a diner that still serves this ol' euro classic.

We decided to grab another drink down the street at a place I recommend highly called, The Standard. Really cheap drinks and a great patio. Stop by for a new spot that hasnt got too hot yet.

Trenchmouth @ Mulleady's Irish Pub 3/4

First off let me mention right away that this is not the Chicago Punk Band of the 90's. This is the self-proclaimed Folk / Celtic / Punk band of the modern Seattle days.

I happened to see these guys perform while celebrating my good friend Elo's birthday at the 2nd incarnation of Mulleady's Irish Pub in Magnolia. They were also friends of some of the birthday party's company and thusly we all made acquaintances rather quickly. The group consisted of 3 young fellows who appear to take their Sea Chanty's seriously. Trenchmouth play a variety of folk instruments including fiddle, guitar, bohdran, and perhaps more I may have missed. They seem to come to 3 part harmonies in most of their songs of which tend to be an even mix of Irish folk songs and the aforementioned lost ballad of the Sea Chanty. They keep a rather modest stage presence with no particular need to engage the audience but also staying true to their love of the songs.


Mulleady's menu is quite upscale reflecting the simultaneous upgrade that the food scene has seen in Ireland in the past decade. An item of note is the Port-Braised Pork Belly which makes for a beautiful plate. Although I normally despise the gentrified and soulless feel of so many Irish Pub's in the US, I found the unorthodox cleanliness and subtle class of the place to actually feel genuine and compliment an Irish perspective.

Antony and The Johnsons at the Moore Theater 2/28

This Saturday I saw Antony and The Johnsons at the historic Moore Theater with some very good old friends and some very good new friends including a agnostic priest and several fire performers. It was a soul-leveling experience. He is quite the phenomenon who's angelic likeness only seemed appropriate in a theater that seems like a lasting monument of a dying golden age of architecture. His blatant androgyny that bleeds into his vocals are the perfect compliment to his classically influenced yet contemporary piano stylings. The supporting band who don't seem to have anything to do with the name 'The Johnsons' were incredible as well. Each member of the string and woodwind section seemed to be a very well accomplished multi-instrumentalist. I think I was most taken by the clarinet player who took up the electric guitar on half of the songs to belt out some crunchy blues lines that although they were thick with soul and edge still maintained the ominous sanctity that Antony and his music seem to always create. 'You are my sister' and 'Epilepsy is dancing' seemed to have stolen the show for me. Anyone given the chance to see this group now will not regret it as I am sure their infamy is only growing. Please take a listen to the video below and maybe take some time to review the beauty and history of the Moore Theater.

Holy Fucking Surprise Dirty 30 Birthday Party Batman!

So I knew something was in the works. Elo was making a buzz about having a dinner with some select friends before a night full of surprise for me. In fact I was told that I had to dress in nice clothes for dinner but to then dress in my normal night out clothes. That's when I started to smell what the rock was cooking.

The night turned odd as soon as I started opening my presents to find that not only had the great orchestrator, Elo, bought me a Snuggie/WTF-Blanket, but so had my girl JC!!! I loathe these fucking things. I noticed their vapid waste of human intellect even before the almighty YouTube enlightened me that others felt the same as I. See here:


2 snuggies, WTF!!!!!!!!!

Anyways the dinner was excellent woodfired pizza made by the same folks who made the oven in my last entry at The Vita Loft. Everyone was quick to depart and leave me in the clutches of Elo who ran into the bathroom to "change." And then it began...
She emerged dressed as me. I was handed a present and told inside was a clue to the first destination in the nights event. Inside was a crown and wand. "Kings Bar in Ballard" I exclaimed, and off we went.

Arriving at Kings and being escorted to the back I was shocked to find a number close to 20 of my closest friends from several groups all DRESSED AS ME!


At which point I was given another present with the clue to the next destination. It was a stuffed animal horse, and after a little coaxing I deciphered it was time to go to The Bit! And low and behold as we tromped to The Bit we discovered 20 more people as seen here.


The night carried on like this from The Bit to The Copper Gate to The Tin Hat to Goldies and finally to a friends house. More and more people collected and all were dressed as me and everyone found the entire ordeal funnier and funnier until the crowd was more than 60 strong Dirty's. I can only say with great thanks and shock and awe how much I love my friends and how incredible everyone was to come out in my honor and make a healthy mockery of my person and dress. I love my life.

It's My 30th Birthday!!!

What better day to launch my blog?!?

I started off my birthday celebrations last night with two of my favorite things in the same place at the same time. I helped my friend Michael Hebberoy, of 'One Pot' Dinners Fame cook lamb, artichokes with spring garlic and several other amazing middle eastern influenced dishes in a wood fired oven to a crowd that was 20 people over capacity for the small Cafe Vita loft.

The guests of the evening were The Master Musicians of Jajouka from Morocco. They played magnificently and reminded me of the many artist I was fortunate to grow up surrounded by and was able to play with like Hamza El Din, Zakir Hussein, and Ali Akbar. The food and music were both perfect to ring in my 30th birthday at midnight. Aywah!