A batch of songs

After a several year hiatus, I have begun writing lots of songs again. The songs posted below were written and recorded in the last several weeks. I play all the instruments, sing all the vocals, and program all the drums (I throw in a bit of hand percussion, but it's difficult to record drums in an apartment.) These are the almost final drafts, I've been making mental notes of the minor corrections I'll need to do before finishing the album.

I'm not sure how to describe them, so how about downloading them, giving them a listen, and doing it for me in the comments section.

Knuckles and Noodles

I think you're pretty

Headshrinkers

Rob a Bank

Killapede

Scraggle Mountain

Nice Outside

Balloon Boy Saves the Day

All 8 songs in a 30.2 MB zip file

Also, many thank yous to my brother, for buying me theassbutts.com. There's not much there now, but I'm hoping I can keep writing songs and putting them on the internet. I'd like to do a blog sort of thing, except releasing full or partial albums, or maybe even individual songs, with each post.

Anyway, enjoy the tunes, and please let me know what you think, even if you think it's crap.

Caleb: the upbeat Christian.

My grandma has always, as long as I can remember, been a very religious woman, and very active in her church. It has been her primary social network, and through this network she met a family who lived just down the street from her place. They had a kid named Caleb, and one weekend day while visiting my grandma, she wanted my brother and I to go play with him.

I was in 7th grade at the time. Caleb was a year or two younger than I was, and my brother several years younger than he was. My brother had met Caleb previously while visiting my grandma.

Being a grunge-obsessed junior high cretin, I kept asking Caleb if he liked any of my favorite bands. He didn't like any of them, and would always answer by telling me about his musical preference.

"Do you like The Smashing Pumpkins?" I'd ask.

"No, not really," he'd answer. "I'm pretty much just into upbeat Christian music."

"You don't even like Nirvana? Kurt Cobain is the coolest!"

"No, I pretty much only listen to upbeat Christian music."

He took my brother and I into his room and popped a tape into his cassette player, so we'd be able to experience upbeat Christian music. He told us it was the tape was of his favorite singer. Before anybody even started singing, I knew it sucked. It lacked the distortion and roughness that I required in my listening. It was offensively soft to my ears. When the singing started, it just got worse.

"It sure beats Hell. It sure beats Hell. Anyway you look at it, you're doing pretty well. It sure beats Hell. It sure beats Hell. Anyway you look at it, you're doing pretty well."

After the song finished, somebody on the tape started taking.

"See? He's a comedian, too!" Caleb told us. He kept chuckling as the guy spoke, but none of it was funny. It was all fire and brimstone. He'd bring up a bad scenario, and then say "It sure beats Hell!" and Caleb would laugh as if it were a joke.

"You might think you've had a rough day, you stubbed your toe and your dog died. But lemme tell you something: It sure beats Hell!"

Caleb had a Super Nintendo, and we kept asking if we could play with it. We didn't have video games at our house, so it was always an extra treat to play when we could. Caleb didn't want to, though. He was bent on playing soccer. He kept asking us if we wanted to play, and we'd say no, and ask again if we could play video games. Eventually, instead of playing video games, he put on some shin guards, even though we had never agreed to play soccer.

We never played soccer, though. We went back to my grandma's house shortly after he put the shin guards on.

Mike's reflective shoes.

Right after I graduated high school, I started spending a lot of time with my friend Mike. Mostly, we'd play punk rock in his basement, with Mike on a drum set that came out of a dumpster, and myself banging out power chords on my guitar. When we got bored with that, we'd drive around, digging in dumpsters and getting harassed by rednecks. Mike was probably the punkest guy I ever knew. He wasn't some dumb rich kid who shopped at Hot Topic and secretly aspired to be a successful rich guy. No, Mike was a high school dropout who dug in the trash, made his own clothes, and aspired to be punk as fuck forever.

Mike was the only person who I ever actually saw smoking crack. We were sitting in his bedroom one night before going out for a night of dumpster diving, and had just finished smoking some weed. Mike dumped the ash out of the pipe, and then popped in a crack rock.

"What the fuck, man?" I asked, concerned that my good friend was about to smoke crack.

"Don't worry, man," he said, "I can't afford to smoke this shit. This is just something my brother stole from some guy."

I'd always wondered if crack instantly turned a person into a crazy person, or if it took a lot of smoking to get them to the point where they wandered the streets talking to themselves. Mike didn't seem any different after he smoked his rock. He just seemed like Mike.

As far as I knew, he never became a crackhead. He came from a family of potheads, and I never knew any of them to be too interested in anything else. When his brother was in a serious car accident and was prescribed a bunch of powerful pain killers, he sold them all for weed money.

Mike loved to make and modify his own clothes. While most of my clothes-modification experiments consisted of me safety-pinning things to other things, Mike learned to sew. A routine dumpster-diving expedition once landed us a fine bounty of brand new clothes intended for obese women with preferences for extremely loud clothing. For a while after that, our clothes were often lined with pieces of that bounty: leopard prints, plaids, and plastic imitation snake skin. In addition to lining things with other things, Mike would paint his clothes, add spikes or straps or zippers, and sometimes briefly set his clothes on fire because he liked how it looked afterwards.

Another time, he glued bike reflectors to the bottom of his combat boots.

Mike was a young guy, several years younger than myself, but he had already had a number of run ins with the police. It seemed to be common in his family. One day, Mike was walking around outside when he saw the police driving nearby. He wasn't carrying any contraband, and he hadn't done anything wrong, but the sight of the cops scared him. He started running, and when the police got too close, he jumped into a ditch so they wouldn't see him.

They didn't see him, but they did see the reflectors on his shoes shining in their headlights. They arrested him for resisting arrest, since he was evidently trying to hide from them.

I haven't seen Mike in a few years, but when I did, he still had his mohawk and leather jacket. Everybody else I knew had gotten rid of them long ago. Punk as fuck, I tell you.

Flo: professional gangsta rapper.

There was a retarded kid at my high school who everybody called Flo. I always assumed he got the name because of his imaginary rhyming skills, but I later found out that it was actually short for Florence, which was his real name. Flo would walk around the cafeteria, taking peoples' trays up to the conveyor belt when they were done eating. Every so often, though, for absolutely no reason, he would decide not to take a person's tray up, and ask, "What am I? Your nigger?" A friend of mine hypothesized that the whole tray-taking routine was nothing more than a ruse that would give him an excuse to say that once in a while.

The true awesomeness of Flo wasn't the fact that he'd usually save you a trip across the cafeteria to drop your tray off. No, the true awesomeness of Flo was that he would "rap." If you gave Flo a few coins, he would generate several lines of gangsta-rap cliches that almost never rhymed.

"I was walking down this street. I had my hoes at my side. And then I saw this nigger. So I capped him in the ass. Damn! Payback's a bitch!"

I always wondered if Flo actually thought he could rap. People were enthusiastic about his raps, and encouraged him by giving him their pocket change, but his raps always ended with the table of people listening to him laughing enthusiastically, and Flo walking away with their empty lunch trays. I didn't know whether or not I should feel sorry for him, but I gave him a fair share of nickels and dimes for his trouble. It was undeniably entertaining as hell.

"I got a fat sack of weed. I got cash money and a gun. Don't mess with me on the street. I'll pull out my gat!"

The last time I saw Flo was on the last day of eleventh grade. Instead of making us go to class and showing us movies, which was the usual last day of class routine, they let all the students go outside. I sat with Flo and a group of friends on the bleachers on the far side of the football field, away from the meddling eyes of authority figures. One of the substitute teachers, only a few years older than the graduating class, was walking around the track that circled the football field with two female students. Every time they'd walk by, we'd all make semi-loud, but vague, comments about how he was going to get laid. On the fourth or fifth time around the track, Flo decided he would join in on the fun. Unfortunately, the art of subtlety escaped poor Flo, but he did his best.

"Hey!" he screamed at the top of his lungs, "You fucking faggot! You're going to fuck them in the fucking ass!"

We all started laughing uncontrollably. The substitute teacher turned around momentarily, puffing out his chest like he was going to beat up a retarded kid, which made us laugh even harder. They walked away, and a few minutes later a different teacher came and told us we weren't allowed to sit on those bleachers since there was nobody there to supervise us.

Mr. Bayling hates certain white people.

Prior to moving out to the middle of nowhere in the fourth grade, I didn't even know that normal people were ever racist. I was shocked to hear people actually use racial slurs. By seventh grade, I had grasped the fact that racist attitudes were very widespread, but I hadn't yet caught on to the idea of white people being racist against each other. When a teacher casually called me a Polak, I had no idea what it meant, and had my friend not caught it, I'm sure I wouldn't have even remembered the incident.

Mr. Bayling was my seventh grade music teacher. He was a douche, to be sure, but I was also an incredibly obnoxious kid. I would laugh at any spoken word that could be construed as sexual in any manner, and that was probably a nightmare to deal with for a teacher who needed to talk about beats all day long. I don't remember what other sorts of shenanigans I used to pull in his class, but I recall being in trouble in his class basically every day. He would make me sit in the back of the class in a desk facing the wall, and while I was sitting there I would have to copy a letter he had written specifically for the purpose of punishing students. It was a letter to the copier's parents, explaining that they were a rotten trouble maker in class. Mr. Bayling, being the douche that he was, would make me write it over and over again until it looked nice enough. Supposedly, if I got in enough trouble, the letter would be sent home. It never was, despite being written nearly every day.

"This looks like hieroglyphics!" he told me once, crumpling up my copied letter and throwing it away. "You're going to have to copy it again!"

I copied it again, this time taking great care to make sure it the whole thing was printed immaculately. When I was finished, I drew some hieroglyphics along the margin. He crumpled it up and made me write it again.

This continued for the majority of the grading period. Music was one of the classes we were rotated into briefly during 7th grade, so I think I only had him for six weeks. For probably four of those weeks, I spent a good deal of time in the corner. During the last two weeks, though, things changed dramatically.

I was being bussed into the school district from another one, and that meant I had to leave a few minutes early so I could catch my bus. Music was the last class of the day, so it was Mr. Bayling that had to dismiss me when the time came.

One day, as I was leaving, somebody asked why I got to leave early.

"If he wants to ride the Polak bus, that's none of my business."

Polak is the Polish word for "Polish man," but is usually used as a derogatory term for anybody who is Polish. In high school I would wind up hearing a lot of Polak jokes, all of which had a punchline suggesting Polish people are all complete idiots. I'm not Polish, and in seventh grade was not aware of the slur or the stereotype, so I didn't even notice what he said.

My friend Gordon, however, did notice.

That night, Gordon told his mom what he had said, and she had called him.

During the rest of my time in Mr. Bayling's music class, I didn't get in trouble even once.

I got fired, so I have to work.

Megan was neither intelligent nor physically attractive. In fact, I had previously thought that she looked somewhat deformed; she lacked a proper chin and had the slightly droopy eyes of a burnout. She was racist in an ignorant but innocent country girl way, and had a boyfriend who was racist in a mean redneck way. Megan had no problem lying to him constantly as she fooled around behind his back with any guy willing to talk to her. I know I never would have started talking to her at all had I not been really drunk at a friend's party. She sat with me, completely sober, and listened to me ramble on for hours, and then wrote her phone number on my hand before she left. I probably never would have called her had I not just broken up with my girlfriend of almost three years, but some female company sounded nice.

For several weeks, we hung out all the time. She would get off work, go hump her boyfriend and clean up his apartment, and then come see me. I didn't feel guilty about anything I did, because her boyfriend was a Nazi. I was worried he might find out and kick my ass, but she assured me that he would never find out. Sweet girl. It didn't bother me too much that she would give her phone number to guys when she was out with me, or that she fooled around with nearly all of my friends, because she wasn't mine to begin with. I was happy to have a girl to make out with, and I thought she looked hot when she'd wear my jacket, covered in patches and spikes and safety pins. She was my fake punk girl.

"Do you want to go to a punk rock show?" I asked her one day, "The Queers are playing with Screeching Weasel in a couple weeks. It's going to be great."

"I don't know, I'm kind of scared. Do girls go to those things?"

"Yeah, lots of them. It's going to be a lot of fun. The Queers are the best."

"Alright," she said, "I'm in."

I had been having bad luck going to shows only to learn that they were sold out, so I bought tickets as soon as I could. I wasn't going to risk missing my chance at seeing The Queers and hanging out with Megan on the same day. It was going to be great.

The night before the show, I called her.

"Hey, you ready for that show tomorrow? It's gonna be so fucking great."

"Well," she said, hesitating, "I got fired yesterday, so I have to work."

I didn't care that I had bought her a ticket she wasn't going to use. I ended up selling it to some kid outside of the show when we got there. I did, however, care that she couldn't even be bothered to make up an excuse that made any sense at all. Fucking bitch!

I never spoke to her again.

Drive safely.

I wrote this song a few years back. This is a cover and animation by Tommy. Fuckin' sweet, dude.

The Slackers.

Speaking of reggae, check out the Slackers. They're generally considered a ska band, but they play plenty of reggae.

Instead of just taking my word for it, though, you can go download or stream a show for free. They're as tight live as they are in the studio. Here's another one here. If you're even half-interested, what do you have to lose? These guys are great.

Ray Gay is NOT a musical genre.

"Hey, Ray, do you like reggae music?"

"Shut up!"

"I'm serious, like Bob Marley. You like Bob Marley? That's reggae."

"Shut up!"

"Dude, I'm just talking about reggae, I want to know if you like Bob Marley. You know, reggae."

"Miss Sharon! He's calling me gay!"

Sharon, my bus driver in 6th grade, told me to shut up.

"There's no such thing as reggae music," she told me, "I know you just made that up to make fun of Ray. If you keep talking about it, I'm going to write you up and you'll get kicked off the bus."

This was the same bus driver who also knew, for a fact, that I was a Christian and not a Buddhist, as I had claimed when she tried to alter my disruptive behavior by playing the Jesus Card. She knew this to be fact because "Buddhas have dots on their heads." The truth was that I was neither.

Ray was this guy who was older and bigger than I was, and had a mullet. He once puked on the bus, on a day when the driver made me sit with him for lack of seats, prompting me to jump over our shared seat. It smelled like dog food, so I'm pretty sure it must have been corned beef hash. I was friends with this guy for a while, but then he got caught fondling a retarded girl, and I didn't like him anymore. It wasn't that I really cared whether or not he liked Bob Marley, it's just that I thought it was a way I could push his buttons and not get in trouble for it. I wasn't calling him gay, I was just asking a simple question about his musical preferences.

After I was told I couldn't speak of this imaginary music form, I went to a teacher to write me a note to give my bus driver. She did, and I gave it to Sharon that afternoon.

Sharon, Reggae is a real style of music, originating in Jamaica. You can hear it on the show Northern Exposure. Mrs. McKinney

"That doesn't say ray gay! That says re-jay! And you're still not allowed to talk about it!"

In the cafeteria the next day I was discussing my defeat with my friends, telling them about how Ray and the bus driver don't believe that reggae is a sort of music.

"What'd you say about Ray?" asked some random kid walking by. I explained the story to him.

"You better not be talking about Ray Milhouse!" he said.

"No, I'm talking about Ray Watson, who rides my bus and doesn't believe reggae is a kind of music."

"Oh, man, you're calling Ray Millhouse a fag? He's gonna kick your ass!"

"No...whatever."

A week later, during gym class, the boys and girls were segregated. The girls had to go do some girly exercises or something, and the boys had to play dodge ball, shirts vs. skins. Ray Millhouse and I were both put on the skins team.

During the first game, I was hit by a ball pretty quickly and I had to wait on the sidelines. Moments later, a shirtless, mulletted Ray Millhouse appeared at my side, along with the kid from the cafeteria who told me Ray would kick my ass.

"I heard you called me a faggot."

"No," I told him, trying to explain the situation about Ray Watson and Bob Marley. Halfway through a sentence, he punched me in my bony chest. I groaned. The other kid laughed.

"You're sorry, aren't you?" he asked me, pushing me against the wall.

"Yeah," I said, and got punched in the chest again, his knuckles bouncing off my sternum.

"Ok...now...we're...settled..." he said, punctuating each word with another punch.

Then the two of them walked away. I never spoke to either one of them again. I did find a paperback book about monsters with RAY MILLHOUSE written on the inside cover, though, and I kept it, 'cause fuck that guy.

After high school, Ray Millhouse had a job working at local campground. He parked a company pickup truck at the top of a hill, and left it in neutral. He got fired when it rolled into the lake at the bottom of the hill.

The last time I heard Ray Watson even mentioned was towards the end of high school. Apparently he had a mean pitbull, and rode a Harley around harrassing people until they wanted to kick his ass, at which point his mom would call the cops.

The Ramones and Rancid

Alright, looks like I'm gonna give this blogging thing a try. We'll see how it goes.

Here's the Ramones doing 53rd and 3rd with Rancid.