The following is an excerpt from a short story I read this past
Saturday at the Crystal Theatre here in Missoula as part of the
greater 6th Annual Ç (pronounced sa-dee-ya) literary arts journal
release party:
I always get jittery come the beginning of March. Perhaps I read Shakespeare at too
early in life when my brain was still soft in the cotton-brained infancy of the
emotional bewilderment that is pubescent American life. Though with most of my early
Shakespeare experiences, the meanings my 9th grade teacher Ms. Cadwallader tried to
impress upon me were mostly lost on me until some years later. The madness of March has perpetually
imposed great consternation, trials and tribulations upon me. One such experience dates back nearly
ten years ago to the day when I was a punk 24 year old paralegal living and
working in D.C. and otherwise trying desperately to break out of my
shell.
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| my boys |
One place I always honed my shell-breaking was rock and roll
music. In those days my bread and butter was hard driving music, the
louder and more aggressive the better. My favorite band at that time was
Audioslave. Surely you all remember Audisolave. They were comprised
of the lead singer from Soundgarden, Chris Cornell matched with the musicians
from the then newly defunct Rage Against The Machine, lead guitarist Tom
Morello, bassist Tim Commerford and drummer Brad Wilk. As a devout fan of
both of those two previous bands, Audioslave from the jump was a musical match
made in heaven for me.
This super group hooked up in the late summer of 2002 and dropped
their self-titled debut later that fall to much fanfare in the world of hard
rock. Me and two of my best friends, ZigZag and Wilson, were a part of
that wider audience thirsting for a new totally kickass record and performing
act. Audioslave, the album, was a platinum-selling masterpiece, blending
driving and bullying rock with delicately soulful ballads for twelve
tracks. To put it mildly, this band was everything we dreamed it could
be. So when tour dates got set up, we naturally went ‘all in’ to attend.
Our motley crew consisted of ZigZag & Dub. Zigzag was my
childhood friend and oldest child born to a Pakistani family living just
outside of Baltimore. His given name was the same as his father’s,
Zulfigar, and while that is a truly great name, we could never comfortably
abbreviate it, so we borrowed the nickname from the Wu Tang Clan’s Rza which
was ‘Rulah ZigZagZig Allah’, and shortened it to ZigZag. For a Muslim, ZigZag
sure did love to drink and smoke. Then we had Wilson, better known as
Dub. Dub and I hooked up while working at a firm just off DuPont Circle a
few years prior. Dub hailed from Blue Grass country, raised on the
mother’s milk which around those parts meant none other than Kentucky
Bourbon. He was a decade my elder but if you got him wound up on the milk
there was no telling where that spinning party top might stop. As a child
Dub was tossed out of elementary school for sipping moonshine on his lunch break
– I kid you not.
So, Audioslave first announced two exclusive shows before they
would hit the road for an official tour later that spring. The first was
a Thursday night jam at the Hammerstein Ballroom in New York City while the
second was appropriately placed in Philadelphia’s Industrial District at the
Electric Factory. As epic as the New York City show would be, we couldn’t
really get the time off work so we decided it’d be easier to just bop up to
Philly. Dub was a professional concertgoer/ticket haggler so when I gave
him the green light for me and ZigZag, it was only moments later he was
printing off electronic tickets from his office computer. Our three way
date with rock and roll history was set for Friday, March 7th.
One might say a harbinger of things to come was the night
four days prior to the show when I slid my car into a curb making my way home
from work in the driving snow. It wasn’t too damaged but the
alignment did require some shop time. Graciously, my
insurance agency comp’d me a replacement I was to pick up the day of
the show. So, on my lunch break that day I walked down to the rent a
car spot to claim my ride. I looked forward to and even romanticized
the possibilities a rental car may afford me outside my daily
functional reality of a Nissan Maxima. Turns out they had me pegged
for a goddamned Lincoln Continental, indeed befitting of its own
continent. At this point there was no turning back, I asked for
compact economy and I got the four-door Executive. While at the helm of
this massive land beast at no point did I feel too big to fail.
I cruised down L St feeling self-conscious and insecure.
When I got close to Wilson’s office I called up and requested he hightail it
downstairs: “Dub my man, hustle your ass ‘cuz I’m afraid I’m going to need
landing signals to parallel-park this mofo.” With Willie in tow, I
swerved down Connecticut Ave and did the same for Zulfigar at his office: “Yo
Z’s, get down here pronto ‘cuz I may have to wait for you at the bus
stop.” After a few end arounds, a couple of hazards otherwise known as
wayward hot dog cart vendors and only one roundabout, we had finally made it on
the beltway to Philadelphia.
Once we cleared the district, we took the first highway off ramp
to pick up the few remaining outstanding rock and roll roadie essentials.
These essentials came in the form of a twelve pack of Miller High Life, two
packs of smokes and a pack of cigars. Before we could get to the
register, Dub impatiently ripped open the fresh cigar pack and one’s end off ,
chewing it up, spitting it out then smiling maniacally as he made our final
impulse grab of the afternoon - a 24 oz can of Steel Reserve. He was
positively (and oddly) giddy about that Steel Reserve. Back now in the
Executive, Dub as elder statesmen of our delegation took the back seat.
The distance between us from drivers to back seat was nearly six feet.
This gulf made me feel like we were transporting the head of state of rock and
roll fandom and as ZigZag rode shotgun beside me I also felt as if I was now in
some fucked up Driving Miss Daisy trip.
We now had 140 miles to go in a sailboat with the wind at our
backs. After we hit full speed on the interstate, I lit up the twelfth
letter and we all cracked open the first of our fresh cold ones to
celebrate. I leaned back to pass the freshly lit J to Wilson but he was
so far away I had to throw it to him. The trip up was some kind of
exhilarating. The best part aside from the celebratory smoking of
everything smokable and the drinking of the cheap cold beer was rocking out to
a host of albums from Vol. 6 Dylan Live 1964 to Audioslave to the Very Best of
Deep Purple.
Approximately two hours later we arrived triumphantly at the
Electric Factory high on rock and roll and actually we were just high.
Once we got to the parking lot, we ripped our final few puffs of the Mary, had
a quick cigarette and made our happy way into the club. The Factory scene
was grungy and intimate, just the way we liked it.
The crowd buzzed with anticipation chattering amongst themselves:
How’d they sound in NYC last night? Did they cover any Rage or Soundgarden
tracks? Soon the rock gods came onstage heavy on swagger and light on
banter. Brad mashed the drum twice, before Tim struck the pulsating bass
line followed by Tom leaping in the air as high as he could, synchronizing his
descent back to earth with that of his right arm across the guitars face.
Cochise was kicking in and Cornell stoically paced the front of the stage.
The show was incredible. They played every song on the album
and even covered Rush’s Working Man, and hell I don't even like Rush. It
was loud, it was intense, it was 90 minutes long and it was everything we hoped
it could be. Yet now the show was over and our night was just
beginning...
===============================================
I'd like
to thank everybody for coming out this past weekend and if you weren't there,
well you just missed a literary party like no other. The 6th
Annual Ç literary arts journal release party showcased twenty
poets and writers, two photographers, one musician (thank you Eric Bostrum for
setting the mood, kicking ass and also for covering Townes Van Zandt), one keg
of beer as well as three tables of food catered by two of the best chefs in
town who operate under the radar, Alex MacKay and Fred "The Machine
Gun" Dealaman, Jr.
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| Singer/Songwriter/Musician Eric Bostrum |
Here's a
bit of local press from the run-up to last weekend's party:
and some
post-game from the previous year's event:
http://www.kpax.com/news/missoula-celebrates-poetry/
http://www.kpax.com/news/missoula-celebrates-poetry/
If you'd
like to read the rest of the story, stay tuned to Pie In The (big) Sky for
further details on Ç 7 to be published sometime this Summer 2013 under the
editing stewardship of Alex MacKay. More details to follow and if you'd
like to submit a poem or a piece of prose, please send your submission or any
questions to cedillavii@gmail.com. Submission deadline is May 15, 2013.
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| Guest Editor, Dr. Casey Charles |
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| Dr. Lisa Simon |
-PPG
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