Is My Band Cool? DOT com

Before I dive into this, my first blog, I should probably introduce myself in case someone reading this didn’t just follow a link from my facebook… My name is David and I play in a band. If you don’t know what band that is you’ll be dying to know by the end of this blog.  Everything else about me you can just learn on the way while I chronicle my adventures and misadventures…which will just be embellishments of actual events that were really neither.

Maudlin, my totally sweet band, is headquartered out of the frigid metropolitan ‘Twin Cities’ in Minnesota.  However I hail from the exceptionally bizarre little college city of Winona, where I met and fell in love with a gal named Priscilla.  Because we have family and friends there we return often, and since we’re both also in the before mentioned totally awesome band, Maudlin, we force Jason to go down with us and play music.

So, Jake, my little cousin, set up a show at the local lodge in Winona and asked us to come down and play along with a bunch of other local acts- most of which are friends of ours we went to high school with.  It’s nostalgic as hell- and for a guy who names his band ‘Maudlin’ obviously I’m game for stuff like that.  We were pretty much grossly unprepared to play.  …I’m sure us being grossly unprepared is going to become a primary theme in this blog…

We had been working all this summer on our upcoming album, Maudlin, and the Second Law of Thermodynamics.  (ha… I typed that and then had to correct the spelling  when I saw the red line… that’s sad) We finally finished it in November, and will just be getting around to officially releasing it in March.

Between November and now, we haven’t done anything… aside from one perversely awful Christmas show  that was so humiliating Jason almost left the stage.  In fact, he was so sure it was going to suck that he was overheard talking about how pissed he was with me for booking the show in a Minneapolis restaurant.  This prompted internet rumors and bloggings that Maudlin was breaking up… Needless to say, the eavesdropper was not familiar with Jason’s assertively pessimistic demeanor.  …Anyway, after all the excitement we dropped off the face of the earth bandwise, and went back to normal lives for a while.  So, we cram jammed right before the show this past week, but we hadn’t had a real practice in about four months, and we haven’t been in good shape since this summer.

The day of the show was a typical Maudlin cluster.  All of us had come down with the flu.  Priscilla and I went over to Jason’s after work, and dilly dallied our way to packing up a few things and calling the other bands to see if we could borrow the rest so we wouldn’t have to carry so much.  Stopped for cokes and rockstar beverages, and we were off to Winona.

Holzinger Lodge in Winona is nestled in the eerie and striking bluffs along highway 61, which is a highway Bob Dylan liked.  Right next door to it is Woodlawn Cemetery.  Woodlawn is probably the creepiest and biggest cemetery I’ve ever been in.  …granted I don’t spend all that much time touring cemeteries.  There are at least three songs I’ve penned all on this last album that were inspired by, or happened in, Woodlawn.

When we got there we were several hours late, and there was one more band to go before we closed out the show.  It’s a stark contrast for me at the lodge.  If we go out to the bar, or play a show in downtown Winona, everyone recognizes us, and probably went to school with one of us.  But the lodge shows are all ages, so they attract a younger crowd.  This is good, bands always want to attract the all-ages crowd. But it also makes me feel really old.

Now, we all know that young people don’t live in the real world, but it’s important to remember that the reverse is also true. Wherever the hell they do live, is a hop, skip and a jump from your apartment.  There was this fuzzy-headed little man leaning up against Jason’s van when I was grabbing some guitars.  During the course of my invading his space to get our crap, he began to ask me questions about my band.  Inquisitive measuring questions like I was trying to sell him a vacuum, and he was pretty sure the Kirby he had was way better than the Hoover i was selling.  “If you could name one band that’s… blah blah blah… who would it be?”  What do we sound like? Explain it to me in terms I think are cool.  …crap. Honesty? Go for the deep musical trenches and pull out something obscure and weighty… or should I try and think of the most recent band I can think off that Rolling Stone called hip that sounds remotely like us at all? Making and breaking sales for Hoover right here.  So, I said “The Pixies.” Why? Always the Pixies.  If I don’t say it about us, someone will.  They are a huge influence, and everyone has heard of them; they also garner huge respect even among music elitists. …Then I have to wait to see if that registers with fuzzy, and he’s not to young to know who that is.  “Cool.  We’ll stick around for you.”  Success.  I’ll be able to tell US Bank to stick their job up their stuffy rectum any day now, and the money will roll right in.

So, we take to the stage… or rather the corner of the lodge designated to be used as a stage.  The room lights go down with a ‘click.’ I can see the attractive, smooth-skinned mass waiting with skepticism, wondering if we’re cooler than the conservative late model vehicles we rode in on.  There’s always a shift from when they’re looking at you waiting to hear what you sound like, and when they’re waiting for the next song.  Usually that, ‘oh, I thought this would blow, but it’s bearable’ kind of look.  I love it.

Now, Jason fled the scene as always when we finished, and refused to stay the night in town.  Even with the flu. Priscilla and I went out on the town.  Abby, or “handful” as I like to call her, kicked me square in the gut and I went down an icy staircase where another friend, Joel, caught me like I was a rag doll.  That was about it. Then we went to Perkin’s where I talked way too much and Priscilla fell asleep at the table.

But, what does it all mean? What did I learn from it all?  Don’t talk when there’s loud music.  It will hurt your throat, and if you already are sick, that sucks.  If you thought this blog sucked, read the first one that’s up before you give up on me, cause that one’s funny.  I brought it over from our myspace, http://www.myspace.com/maudlinmusic

Your pal,

David