Not long ago I wrote about the Green Day SUPERFAN! and how I was relegated to never be one. Well everyone get out your shock because this past weekend, I too, became a SUPERFAN! and let me tell you it was good…ohhhhh, so good. I would like to say that I was lucky enough to go see PINHEAD GUNPOWDER, but it really had very little to do with luck. I have always believed the SUPERFAN! experience has nothing to do with luck, rather it is more about persistance, planning and an overreaching drive to make it happen. For me, it took planning, a bit of a leap of faith that this show was actually going to happen, a fair amount of sheckles, and the friendship of a truly selfless and wonderfully beautiful woman to make my trip to Berkeley, CA to see PINHEAD GUNPOWDER happen. I will emote more on the SUPERFAN! experience in a later posting.

PINHEAD GUNPOWDER is Aaron (Cometbus) Elliott, Billie Joe Armstrong, Bill Schneider, and Jason White. The vast majority of lyrics are written by Aaron, and to me, have the amazing spirit of COMETBUS in them. PINHEAD played at 924 Gilman, the collectively run punk performace space in Berkeley whose history can be read in the book 924 Gilman. Needless to say it was the performance space that birthed a legacy of bands, and for that, 924 Gilman merits a trip there, regardless who is playing, if you find yourself in Berkeley. As both a GREEN DAY fan and an even larger COMETBUS fan, this was not a show I could miss . The show kicked off rather…well…mellow…as a sing-a-long (!?!?!?!?!!!) while GILMAN got itself together with the sound. If I remember correctly, we sang “My Boot in Your Face is What Keeps Me Alive”, “Find My Place” and “Achin to Be” sans mics. Then, with working mics, Billie and Jason quickly got into a zone, Bill jammed like a mofo, Aaron kicked in with drums POUNDING it out and the show really began. The rest of the show was a bit of a blur, with highlights for me including LANDORDS and LOSERS OF THE YEAR, MPLS SONG, WESTSIDE HIGHWAY, ANNIVERSARY SONG, and NEW BLOOD. I could have lived without 2nd STREET, MAHOGANY and BIG YELLOW TAXI and would have preferred KATHLEEN, SWAN SONG and KEEPING WARM IN THE NIGHTTIME.

There was a bit of crowd surfing and the heaving of fans towards the stage throughout the show which probably crushed a fair amount of people. A Gilman friend dropped me a tip on where to stand and it worked like a charm…I was magically moved from the side wall behind some people, to where I ended up - sitting on the stage at Bill Schneider’s mic stand (thanks again for that tip.) One of the cheesiest highlights for me was my screaming out the words to LOSERS OF THE YEAR at Aaron, and getting a smile out of him for a split second before he reverted back to angry punk dude. It was, for me, a once in a lifetime show and something that will be close to my heart for a long time and probably life-changing in ways I havent even realized yet.

[Me at Pinhead Gunpowder 2/12/10]

Now there WAS luck involved for this next east bay event I attended, the COMETBUS art show. How it coincided with me being out there for the PINHEAD show was like a perfect alignment of the stars. So, yes, Im a COMETBUS fan. I cant remember how I found his zine but Im sure it was from something GREEN DAY related. How to describe COMETBUS zines? Im not quite sure I have the words…I could sit here staring at this computer screen for a solid week trying to finesse a pithy statement to describe it, so in the interest of getting this on to NWWM, I implore you to just pick them up and read them. They are heartwarming, heartbreaking, insightful into both the individual and collective human experience, and they make me laugh…and laugh HARD…and they make me think…they have layers upon layers to them which make reading and re-reading them pure joy.

So, clearly I give the pieces written by Aaron and his tribe of contributors some real brain-time, however, what I NEVER kicked around in my brain was the artistry of the covers for his zines. I never thought of them as, well, as art, I just never thought much of them at all. That ended the moment I stepped into 1-2-3-4 GO RECORDS which is displaying the art creations of Aaron Cometbus - musician, writer, AND artist. It was like seeing a side of someone that was always there right in front of me, but I had always overlooked it. Aaron pretty much pulls his skirt up and lets us into his creative panties. He writes in his intro to the show “my medium - pen, paint and xerox - was probably my mother’s fault. She was an artist, working in fiber and textiles. I was inspired by her use of shading and ability to define form with just a few lines”. He then adds “Through distorting an image, I try to bring out some darker, more vulnerable truth hidden underneath the surface. I like to combine different moods and different faces - unlikely combinations that mix pleasure and a sense of dread and unease”. Aaron uses multi-layers of imagery in his art in a very parallel way that he uses the multi-layers in his writing. Now having gotten a peek at Aaron’s creative panties, all those COMETBUS zine images make so, so, so much more sense to me now. I left 1-2-3-4 GO RECORDS absolutely GIDDY! I was just made privvy to this amazing secret that really was never a secret to begin with.

I will leave you with the PINHEAD GUNPOWDER cover Aaron created for SHOOT THE MOON. The photo on the left is the original photo which looks to have been in some fishing related book. The image on the right is the altered image and album cover. It is difficult to see via this photo captured from my phone but you can see how he created a much “darker” image from a completely emotionally-neutral image….the face of the man is now hidden, the tools in front of him have a menacing feel to them. I was really quite taken by seeing the original images next to his creations. It heightened for me the complexity of his images in a way I had never been able to appreciate before.

Shoot the Moon album cover, artwork by Aaron Cometbus

The Aaron Cometbus art show runs thru February at 1-2-3-4 Go Records in Oakland.

I’ve been reading a book called Dark Mirror: The Pathology of the Singer-Songwriter by Donald Brackett. It’s about the emotional aspects of writing music. The struggle to say something really meaningful without going too far. Digging around in your soul for universal human truths is heady stuff. If you aren’t careful you might get stuck back there. How do you touch a nerve without frying it? Thinking about that, the first thing that came to mind (nutty little fan that I am) was what happened to Green Day around 2003. I remembered an article talking about how Saint Jimmy kills himself, to which Billie Joe said, “Thank god for art”.

Yes and no. In the end it was Saint Jimmy who imploded, but he came from a real person. He was a live wire of emotions wrestling against any effort to keep him under control. That’s the kind of thing they have to deal with, and it nearly drove the band apart. How could it not, trapped in that stupid maze of regrets and aspirations, all the while knowing there was a way out, if they could find it. Ironically that way was Jimmy himself. A raging, spitting boy with fire in his eyes now contained by a degree of isolation. The artist always knows what makes his brainchild tick. Sometimes it’s best to give him a lead and let him run with it. Saint Jimmy did, straight off the edge of the world. He served his purpose, just like Christian and Gloria are serving theirs.

That’s what really floors me about Green Day. They keep going into the strange half-lit world at the back of the minds. Nobody said they had to. They just keep digging while we wait safely on the other side of the caution tape. Showing us all how to deal with our own live wires. Carefully, and with a lot of patience. Because even our darkest moments are just that. Fleeting.

There are so many videos of Green Day performing live, and so many of them are shaky, blurry, and noisy, that I don’t bother to look through them most of the time. These may not be the best recent ones — since I only sampled a few — but I thought they were worth sharing, as a reminder of how both heartbreakingly touching and stupidly and hilariously goofy our boys can be within the blink of an eye.

“Last Night on Earth”, “WMUWSE”, and “Good Riddance” in Melbourne:

Male strippers and more for “King For a Day” in Melbourne:

And if you haven’t seen it, here’s Tre getting a cake in his face for his birthday, in Brisbane.

A book I co-wrote with my friend Richard has been published and will be out in January. It has nothing to do with Green Day. It’s a handbook about working in egalitarian collectives (an example of a collective that you’ve all heard of is Gilman St.). I used to volunteer with a few. The one I’m most fond of is Food Not Bombs.

You can read a description and an excerpt here. There are more excerpts in the publisher’s catalog (pdf), on pages 8 and 9. Comics are by Strangers in a Tangled Wilderness.

Last week I went to a talk about the book Gimme Something Better at Bluestockings, a radical bookstore in Manhattan. The speakers were Silke Tudor, who is one of the book’s authors, Larry Livermore, Aaron Cometbus, journalist A.C. Thompson, and author Jennifer Blowdryer, all of whom were part of East Bay punk history.

The audience was more book nerds than punks (including my book-nerd self), but it was nice to see the topic of the book discussed in its own context. Bluestockings is part of a wide community committed to social justice and equality that extends all over the world, and that includes creative and subversive subcultures like punk rock.

It might seem odd to refer to punk rock as “subversive,” because it’s so accepted and commonplace nowadays, but its essence has always been as a vehicle for independent expression (often of radical ideas), separate from and an antidote to commercial music made only for profit. That hasn’t changed. Wherever you are, there’s probably a DIY punk rock scene somewhere not too far away.

That wasn’t specifically discussed that night, because it’s all kind of a given. But the panelists talked about how they each experienced the East Bay punk scene. Aaron Cometbus said that one of the things he liked about this book is that it talks about a particular time period without disparaging what came before or after, something that accounts of punk scenes tend to do: everyone thinks that punk is dead once they stop paying attention to it. A.C. Thompson talked about how goofy and fun the East Bay scene was: it was highly political but not dead-serious all the time.

Someone in the audience asked the panelists what show was the most memorable for them. Larry Livermore said that was impossible to answer, but he mentioned the last show Green Day played at Gilman before Dookie came out, but after they had signed to Warner, in December of 1993, which was moving and bittersweet, because everyone knew things were going to change. I think he said people were actually waltzing, if I heard him right…

Tudor said that they were approached to write a history of Gilman St., but the project became much bigger than just Gilman St. It took three years to compile instead of the planned-on one year, and ended up being 800 pages, which had to be cut down to 400 for publication. Some of the outtakes are on the website.

If you haven’t read this one, about Blatz (a band Billie Joe played in, apparently while on acid…) and the zine Absolutely Zippo, it’s pretty funny… Ben Saari says: “I never even knew Billie Joe. But from a distance I was like, ‘Oh, I don’t like that guy, he’s too nice and too pretty.’”

Billie Joe talks about Absolutely Zippo in the book (and I’m posting this here just because it’s funny):

“Robert [Eggplant] would come to school with copies of his zine and he’d say, ‘Billie, take ten and go around. They’re a quarter apiece.’ It was filled with profanity, and the trendier kids in 11th and 12th grade, of course, thought it was the coolest thing ever. My teacher came up and grabbed one, ‘What are you selling there?’ and I said, ‘It’s my friend’s magazine. It’s a quarter. Do you want one?’ The cover said ‘Legalize Crack!’ I got suspended for five days, something like that.’”

—————
Related post:
Pinhead Gunpowder, Absolutely Zippo, and DIY

Everybody loves a spectacle. Lots of flashing lights and flames, and maybe a rotating stage just for kicks. Everything whizzes past your eyes and ears at such speed that a one second blink makes ten things you’ve missed. At the end you walk out babbling in loud voices while waiting for your hearing to come back. “So,” someone says a day later, “what was your favorite part?”

Erm. That thing with the elephants. Yeah, and the time that guy did that flip, the one where he almost crash-landed but didn’t. That. It’s hard to say what happened when there was so much going on. It’s all a blur. The Washington Post music blog reviewed U2’s concert at the end of September by talking mostly about the stage set. “It was stunning, surreal — oh, and a rock band played beneath it, too.” I’m pretty sure it’s supposed to be the other way around.

That’s why I love simple, heartfelt performances. The “Macy’s Day Parade” video, or the one for “Last Night on Earth”. Just some guys with a guitar and a microphone. I love special effects as much as anyone, but after a while it feels overloaded. Maybe we don’t need a car chase, a shootout and a dramatic rescue all at once. Without the flash, the focus is on the song. It’s only then that you realize how incredibly gorgeous the music really is. Everything in black and white, with Billie Joe singing “And I’m thinking ’bout the only road, the one I’ve never known, and where it goes” while Mike and Tre plug away behind him. All those heart-stopping notes filmed in a junkyard. Because when you’re really good at something, it shows. Without any flashing lights.

[ Written by Stacy (classof13). Thanks for sending it in! -Delfina ]

As the decade draws to a close, many lists of the top albums of the decade have been published, and of course, American Idiot has made most, if not, every single one of them. Most of the lists I have seen talk about the social importance of American Idiot, with its call-to-arms anthems; rebellion against the leader at the time, George W. Bush; and its anti-war sentiments. They also talk about the music of the album, which is both inspiring and intelligent, something you can bang your head to but still learn valuable lessons from. And, yes, while all of these aspects were important in the shaping of this album to be one of rock’s classics, I would like to look at something else either equally or more important: the personal importance of American Idiot.

Many people probably have stories just like mine. (Feel free to share them!) I will not go into detail how I found American Idiot, but it was one of the happiest moments of my life. As an eighth grader (Yes, I was one of those reviled tweens…) living in the closed suburbs at the time, it was a new world that I could know and understand. I had other music I liked, like The Beatles and The Who, but it was mostly because of my parents. And I liked Kelly Clarkson’s album, Breakaway, but, as said before, I was a tween. I did not yet have music I could call my own, until one important car ride. I can vaguely remember the first time I heard the album, and can only remember it was one of my family’s long car trips, but I can remember the experience I gained from this record as vividly as if it were yesterday. Putting American Idiot into my old CD player (i-Pods weren’t “in” yet.) and listening to it was one of the best moments of my life. Every time I listen to it I go back to that moment as an innocent eighth grader finally being opened up to the outside world.

Even though I didn’t yet understand all the anti-war lyrics and its place in society at that moment, I knew it was good music. Oh, was it good. I found myself banging my head along with every song and listening to the album multiple times, until I knew every word and every note by heart. “And there’s nothing wrong with me/This is how I’m supposed to be/In the land of make believe/That don’t believe in me,” Billie Joe Armstrong belted in my ear over and over again. And I knew exactly what he meant. I was never the coolest person, and still, five years later, am not exactly cool, but that didn’t matter anymore. There was a world-wide famous band out there who knew exactly how I was feeling.

After I saw them at Giants Stadium September 1, 2005, I began to listen to their older albums and greatest hits, and although they had great songs and lyrics, nothing could beat American Idiot for me. (I have to say “Geek Stink Breath” scared the hell out of me, though.) And to think that when I had first seen the “American Idiot” music video nearly a year before, I had found it wild and stupid, to say the least.

I found that not only did I love the music, but the boys in the band were great as well. Mike Dirnt, although the quietest member of the band, had a great sense of humor and a mean bass riff; Tre Cool, a wild, wacky and fun guy who was never boring, to say the least; and Billie Joe Armstrong: what can you say about him? All I knew was that I was literally in love with this man. I had never felt this way about a singer before. He was quiet and at first I was surprised by his slightly nerdy voice, but that did not matter. The way he spoke his mind, controlled the crowd at concerts, even the fact that he had a wife and was a loving and doting husband: hell, I just loved everything about him.

American Idiot helped shape me into the person I am today. I learned not to take anything at face value, to speak my mind and to not care what anybody else thought of me. And five years later, now almost 19 and more mature, I can understand the importance of the album and what it meant to the world back in 2004, both socially and musically. But, most of all, I had found a music I could call my own. I loved everything this band wrote, something that never happened with any other band I had listened to. Billie Joe Armstrong once said that everybody has that band that just changes their life. Well, Green Day was that band for me.

So, after a long five-year wait, I was very happy when I listened to 21st Century Breakdown to hear it both lyrically and musically beat American Idiot. But American Idiot will always have the special place in my heart. When the world is looking ugly, and I may not feel so great about myself at the moment, I just turn on my i-Pod and listen to my all-time favorite album. No, there’s nothing wrong with me, and there sure as hell is nothing wrong with this album.

Sorry for the lack of posts. I was away and then just in a funk. Thanks to Abbey for picking up the slack, including in the sidebar news.

With the Christmas season in full swing, here’s some punk rock to get you in the proper mood. Personally, I can’t stand the commercial frenzy of Christmas — I’m not a fan of commercialism the rest of the year either — but I love the cheesy tinsel and garlands, and shiny glass ornaments. And yes, the silly songs.

So here’s the new 2009 Punk Rock Advent Calendar, with one new song posted each day until Christmas.

Jimmy Severe and The Blue Christmas Boys “picked songs that portray all sides of the season - from revelry to irreverence - from White Christmas to Mary’s Boy Child - with strictly for drinking songs like Senor Santa Claus and The Merry Christmas Polka for good large measures.”

And here’s a couple of punk rock and rock Christmas songs that I like:
Pansy Division - Homo Christmas

The Dickies - Silent Night

The Kinks - Father Christmas

Happy punk Christmas!

~”21 Guns” recorded with Green Day and the American Idiot musical cast will start airing on radio tomorrow.

~The Grammy nominations are in: Green Day was nominated for: Best Rock Performance “21 Guns”, Best Rock Song “21 Guns”, Best Rock Album 21st Century Breakdown.

~ Green Day casually mention another full US tour in 2010…spring, summer, fall, whenever at an AMA interview

~Some nice videos of Green Day in L.A. Nov 23.

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