children, gather fireside for a tale or two

I woke up this morning heavy headed, muscles stiff. I got out of bed and my hips weren’t walking correctly. I suppose this is due to the abuse I exposed myself to yesterday:

April twentieth, a Friday, a sunny one too. Thursday had been a failed attempt at a surprise party for the other half of the Clique downtown. Getting home from the center of town can be difficult at midnight on a weekday, but I hopped two busses for free, ran across a neighbourhood and finally hitched a ride at the north end of the second narrows bridge. Small world syndrome, a prime example of it; I thumbed and got picked up by a local mother. I know her kiddo’s. She was tipsy and fun, and driving an’ Audi, driving it all the way to my house. So I made it home with zero dollars from downtown in just under 50 minutes, nothing to complain about I think.

Have you ever moved big fucking rocks? Fucking big rocks man, fuck. They were so big, some of them, that I swear more now. Fucking big heavy fucking fucks. Shit. That was about five hours. Beach and weed and lunch and beers, then beers and fire at Cates. Cates parties, fires, underage, walking in the dark are all back for another season.

I was the older person at the fire. I suppose it’s up to the older peoples to make the fire, and pass the torch and creep young ones out. I remember it happening to me when I was younger. The emotion and urge these partiers displayed was massive, bigger then the flames spewed from pallets once the fire had well caught. No discretion amongst most of the males, yelling and ear piercing shrieks are commonplace. This is the beach scene. The girls, I see two divisions, no, two groups or a binary amongst them. The social ones, when drunk, and the unsocial ones, anytime; though I do suppose it has something to do with the people trying to talk to them, fuck them, get their attention, etc.

When I tired of the festivities and the incredibly witty banter the kids came up with, I wanted to call it all off, and call the police. I miss the threat of arrest, and the rush of adrenaline from running, hightailing it through the bush. Thanks to Dan for talking me out of it.

muddled mouse

Modest Mouse is not a new band. As such, it was easy to pick out the aging ex college radio volunteers amidst a swarm of mickey slamming teens. There were even a few bearded fathers taking their young kids to the show. I bet Dad hasn’t told them their conception story; a late night in some pacific-northwest dorm room, a “Talking Shit About A Pretty Sunset” cover. You know how these things work.

Rifts between new and old shouldn’t be looked at as a bad thing, instead more as a testament to Modest Mouse’s longevity and ability to span generations. But longevity means lines are going to be drawn not only between fans, but throughout the bands career as well.

The venue was the PNE Forum aka shitbox of sound. This was bad news for 87% of the crowd, although it would’ve been great news for fans of pre polished Mouse. The hollow yelps and desperate guitars found in Isaac Brocks lonely soundscape of the mid nineties are perfectly matched to the barren Forum. So yeah, “Oceans Breathes Salty” and “Float On” sounded terrible. “Tiny Cities Made of Ashes” sounded more fitting.

We Were Dead Before The Ship Even Sank obviously made up a good portion of the evening. Hearing the punchy guitars of Johnny Marr and Brock swerve down mainstream highway put a thought in my head. If spunky songs like “We’ve Got Everything” allow Modest Mouse to compete in the charts against a bunch of songs featuring Akon then so be it. It’s just shitty to think that gems like “Cowboy Dan” and “Polar Opposites” might get forgotten.

lightning striking itself twice

Can’t get enough spiky and pointy, but first and foremost, Canadian music from just one fresh indie band? A union seems to have formed; the first partners I knew about was Wolf Parade, and I quite enjoyed them, and hadn’t heard anything like it before. Then, I was turned onto Sunset Rubdown, and quite liked them too. And if I liked them too, well I should listen to the rest of the lead keyboard player’s bands. Swan Lake turned out to be pay dirt, and Frog Eyes not far behind. In common amongst all these bands is the waif-like voice that scratches and projects it’s way our from between the hyped-contrasted piano keys and staccato plectrum thrusts.

Now which one came first? Frog Eyes, I suppose, forging the sound that Spencer Krug would use, and then try and change on Sunset Rubdown Snake’s Got a Leg, their debut release. But then the chicken and the egg got in an argument, and I, at their side, told them to relax and that it didn’t matter who came first. I think that’s the truth for these Canadian bands. They seem to be able to handle it fine, and create well with the interconnections they’ve formed; an open relationship of the grandest kind. At the bottom of this erratic orgy, labels like Jagjaguwar and Secretly Canadian (not a Canadian label) are the ones getting all the pleasure.

but i fall asleep with the tv on

you cant be straight gunned and suave at the same time

Here at HotClique, we pride ourselves on being the young intellectual go-getters our community expects us to be. Known for possessing keen conversational skills, heart on the sleeve passion and above all, unprecedented maturity and perspective. Essentially we’re half respected, half infamous. Then sometimes we wake up and piece together the night through Facebook, debit receipts, outgoing call history, text messages, bruises and the varying accounts of our belligerence as detailed by others.

Beautiful. I was excited about the barbeque. Everything about the evening was to be beautiful- the people, the house, the view, the respective soirées of both parents and kids coexisting. I am quite fortunate for the lifestyle I have, weekends split between lurking dive bars in the city and drinking cheap beer in expensive houses. Funny thing is I call posting up in our bourgeois-esque suburban community, in clichéd ironic fashion, slumming.

Excitement turned to cockiness, which turned into excessive drinking. Conversations became slurred, vision blurred, intellect scarce. I doubt I was looking/dancing as good as I thought I was. Resembling a well-dressed zombie and occasionally drooling, impressionable pretty girls got the wrong impression of me. A stimulating discussion about the UFC turned into me struggling to keep my eyes open. I was being the guy who I routinely chastised. In the end, I was out before midnight.

Though admittedly our antics were a bit over the top, ultimately I think they were pretty harmless. We’re well meaning guys. Restraint was even exercised when we didn’t drink the apology wine purchased for Morgan’s parents on our second liquor store mission.

“Vice is nice if you can handle the guilt”, a seventy-four year old Norwegian man mused in the sauna earlier that day. I felt a little guilty, made some more humbled amends and thought about things. Somewhere along the line a lesson was learned.

million dollar mansion kids

Somewhere between HotClique’s first and second trip to the cold beer and wine store in two hours, I was unconscious but walking, talking, and best/worst of all dancing. All done in the revealing guise of a shirtless clubbing fooling. I hate that guy. He’s always trying to get down on the dance floor but he looks so lame. Well, I was that guy last night. I guess my shirt kept coming off because I was hot from the vicious and constant arm flailing and ass grabbing and wild moves I pulled off.

Somewhere in the heat and sweat of young dance lust, I threw my shirt at someone by the stairs, knocking a model Harmony Airlines airplane off a shelf, smashing and crashing to the stairs below. That’s kinda symbolic I guess, as harmony just went out of business. Hardee harrr eh. The engine broke off, and I got flustered and shit, and apologized to Todd, my friend’s father. Anyways, I went back today and fixed it, and he cooked more burgers for us.

Sometime during the evening, I got to talking to a mother about things of no consequence. Turns out I had walked her daughter home the other night. Her young daughter. And picture me, face fuzzy like an out of focus photo, wasted and slurring, smoking and picture me walking your daughter home. She was very nice though, and we talked about housing problems facing communities now, I think. She’s rich too.

ghostface style stream of thought

Sunday 4:57pm. I’m hung over (duh) and watching the last few minutes of Remember The Titans on TBS. Football movies have always tickled me the right way. They combine the indulgences of nostalgia and youthful glory. I should’ve specified that only high school football movies do it for me, with the exception of the Devon Sawa classic Little Giants.

Umm.

There were some points I was gonna make here, promise. Oh, does anyone remember TBS pre “very funny”? A few years ago channel 47 was the go to place for a Sunday afternoon Lethal Weapon marathon. I guess Ted Turner thinks playing Somethings Gotta Give three times in a weekend is a better idea. Dang.

Back to Remember The Titans. In the funeral scene the team sings that na na na na hey hey goodbye song as the casket is lowered. This strikes me as odd. Now I am not an avid sports fan by any means but I was under the impression that the crowd sings that song to mock a losing opposing team in the last few minutes of the game. Why then, would the team want segue their friend into the afterlife with a na na na na hey hey goodbye? Before I got too concerned with this Drumline came on and the channel, as well as my thoughts, were switched.