I Shook The Hand Of Mike Watt

It’s a bit strange to write all of this at this moment. I just got home a few minutes ago from, I don’t even know the words to describe it really. Seeing Mike Watt play bass, less than five feet from my goofy smiling, purple hair died, peter pan face was akin to what others might call a religious experience. But clearly, if there is a God, and I don’t propose that there is, but if by some off-chance I am misreading the universe and there is a God, God is not nearly as amazing as Mike Watt.

In less than an hour, that presented itself more like an eternal vortex in which really I am still existing in, Watt and his Missingmen melted mine and every other bass player in Albuquerque’s faces off by performing, in full, without pause, the entire contents of his new rock opera, Hyphenated-Man. I’m beyond breathless, beyond taken away, beyond transfixed and transformed forever. I am validated in a part that I didn’t even know needed validation. It is not something I sought out, studied in a book or became aware of until it was handed to me. My life has changed by watching the fingers of one of my heroes walk with precision, love, and effort along the bass.

Mike Watt is my hero, someone I look up to and feel very emotional about. He’s a father figure, in fact, he reminds me of my father in that he larger than life, but full of deep resonate emotion and love. Yes, of course, as a bass player I look up to him. But failing to admire him for that prowess on the great instrument is tantamount to a willful ignorance that shouldn’t even be tolerated by anyone who calls themselves with pride and will, a bass player. Watt is my hero, my role model because he goes full steam, with a hunger and passion for life that is transformative. He glows and exudes positive vibes, that wavelength I moved to Albuquerque to get a piece of and am finding. Now, my body burns with some kind of radiant life force that is beautiful and strong and intimidating. I stood at the foot of a gentile giant and watched him play this monstrous, chiseled instrument like it was a kid’s toy. It’s Watt, it’s humbling to be in his presence, no matter how gracious and thankful he is for all of it.

After the rock opera, Watt and the awesome Missingmen huddled behind Watt’s giant rig. They took to their instruments one more time and proceeded to rock a seven song encore of Minutemen songs. I would be remiss if I didn’t give praise to guitarist Ron Watson and drummer Raul Morales. They are playing with a certified legend of music. Night after night they get on stage with they most respected bass player in the history of music on this planet and they hold their own. To have the courage to actually play Minutemen songs is noteworthy in itself. To make everyone feel so moved and touched to hear those songs, and in the case of Watson actually sing D. Boon’s lyrics, is a form of magic that can not be denied.

Mike Watt, he’s 53 years old. He was marked with a cane and a knee brace. And yet neither age, nor injury, nor any one’s bullshit idea of what it is to be an adult slowed him down in the slightest. Watt is an organic machine, perfectly crafted to put that bass in his hand and play it for the people. It’s what he’s done since he was a teenager, and he’s doing it well into a time where most men his age have safely put away in their 401k, raised shitty, pussified, asshole kids, and do whatever they can to repress the rest of us. He was an original and he still does it better, longer, faster and stronger than piss head children not a quarter of his age.

I made my way to the side of the stage. I wasn’t the only post-young adult that wanted to shake his hand. There were dudes probably older than Watt himself surrounding him. When I got my chance I just had to thank him for all he taught me, that I keep playing bass because of everything I’ve learned from him. It didn’t say all I wanted in those words, but Watt is a wise man, he knew what I meant. He said to me, “I learned it all, the bass from D. Boon.” I will, never ever, ever forget those words, that amazing smile on his face, the happy, grateful, loving and kind eyes the he used to looked me and everyone else, awe-struck, in the face. All us mortals who just wanted to say thank you. Should we all be half the human being that Watt is, the world would be the paradise we all claim we are seeking.

I didn’t know where to add Jenny Invert, the great, soon to be not local band that opened this show to this post so I’ll just do it down here. I had seen Jenny Invert a few weeks ago at Kosmos and liked their set. Something about them was really, really great. They are quirky for sure and cool, but I think that’s unintentional because I met their bass player and the main songwriter dude tonight and they seemed way too laid back to be trying too hard. Which is what makes them great, it’s effortless and precise at the same time. Plus they have two piano players. They remind me a bit of Nick Cave, a bit of Tom Waits, a bit of Stephin Merrit, mostly his Gothic Archies project. I was into it. I was excited this band was from Albuquerque. It was something I could get behind and support. And then I found out they are moving to Seattle. Good for them, bad for me. Also, bad for Albuquerque. They are, from what I gather, a seemingly big fish, in a nearly dried up pond. Or at least, that’s the impression they gave me for why they are leaving. I can’t fault them for that. I hope anyway, they find support for what they are doing, because they truly are an exceptional, creative, unique sounding band with spot on songwriting and great stage presence (the new lady bass player doesn’t hurt by the way fellas). Our love affair was short, you will be missed. Check the link above for their new album.

Mike Watt Hyphenated-Man

Mike Watt
Hyphenated-Man
clenchedwrench

I thought I had suspended my eMusic account indefinitely, but I guess not. This morning I rolled over and checked my phone to see what time it is. I have one of those hipster, asshole, first world mini-computer iPhones so I also checked my email and the device informed me that my PayPal account had been charged for my eMusic account. I was not in the mood to deal with eMusic this morning, but I also know if I didn’t download some shit I was going to forget about it. And since they are all anal about not letting balances run over (I am loosing $1.40 in credits this month because I just can’t be bothered) and they have switched up their pricing schematic, I knew this was gonna be a bad morning. That was until I saw Mike Watt had a new album.

I love Mike Watt. I mean, I don’t know the man personally, but I love him. From all I can tell, he is the kindest, gentlest, most emotionally aware person on the planet. He also played for The Minutemen who are the greatest American Punk Band and generally is thought to be the best bass player in the entire world. I worship at his bass playing alter and all that he teaches about the bottom sounds.

Having said this, his post-Minutemen work, which really is the majority of his musical career is not the easiest to listen to. First of all he’s really prolific with a lot of different Jam bands. Some I have heard, some I haven’t as there are too many of them. As for his solo albums, they are affairs that I don’t think the average listener can really enjoy. You sorta have to know and love Watt to get into those epic masterpieces. They are very Mellvillian in there grandeur and thickness. Sometimes they can be a tough listen. But as I reviewed the track list for Hyphenated-Man I saw that the 30 track album was full of songs all under 2 minutes, a form of song writing that Watt has not employed since even before the Minutemen met their untimely and tragic demise. I was curious. I started to listen, I was BLOWN AWAY.

Hyphenated Man is of course not the Minutemen. First, obviously, is because D. Boon is no longer on this world (in my version of heaven, which is imaginary, he and Joe Strummer are in a band together and it sounds amazing). Second, while the drums are pretty solid, it’s not George Hurley and I really, really, really want it to be George Hurley. One because he’s amazing and so oft over looked in the Minutemen history, and second, it would just make me feel better about the universe. But, having said this, Hyphenated Man is as close to The Minutemen as Watt has ever gotten since, and it’s very refreshing. There is a lot of energy, pounding, hollerin’ and just really great playing. Some of it’s an expanded sound that Watt has been working in, but tightened up and kept purposely contained. Other times it feels and sounds so familiar that I want to cry. This could be due to the fact that Watt himself wrote all the guitar parts on an old Telecaster of Boons. He never has let go of his spiritual and musical brother and for all the tributes he’s ever done for Boon, this one rings highest of all.

As for the lyrical content, Watt looked to the art work of Heironymus Bosch, which delights me even more. One of these days I will make it to Bruges to check out his work in person. He’s always been a favorite of mine, so the combination of Watt spiel about Bosch’s surrealistic, fucked up head space paintings is totally awesome. Every song is named after one of the broken, half, pieced together or just bizarre creatures that can be found throughout Bosch’s greatest work. Watt always likes the concept records, but to date, this is his most successful both musically and thematically.

It’s fantastic to have Mike Watt in the world. So many of punk rock’s heros have grown up, grown old or dropped out of punk rock. Some of them are now long away from this mortal world of ours. Mike Watt is like the ultimate rock, the foundation for everything that punk has been, is and will be. He glides effortless through the rock and roll landscape, untouched and seemingly unconcerned about what the masses, media whores and cool kids are doing. Watt does what Watt wants to do, searching in musical and artistic ideas that are unable to be duplicated by lesser men. The giant of a man has been making music nearly as long as I have been alive, and he gets bigger and greater and more God like with each year.  Long live Mike Watt. I mean it, we need you.

Spray-Paint The Walls: The Story(?) of Black Flag

Spray-Paint the Walls: The Story of Black Flag
Stevie Chick
Omnibus Press

I still remember pretty vividly the first time I heard Black Flag. It was the summer of 1991, I was getting ready to go into high school and Perry Farrel had some Lollapalooza tour. I read about it in Spin magazine and remember clearly a photo of a muscle and tattoo clad angry dude named Henry Rollins, sweating profusely and screaming into a microphone. The side article mentioned that he was a former member of Black Flag.

Here is the catch, when I was eight, my dad used to own his own business. A few storefronts down from his was a record store. For years, when I would accompany my father to work, I would spend HOURS in that record store, flipping through all the vinyl covers. Before I heard the music, Black Flag, Slayer, King Diamond and many others really effected me with fantastic, frightening cover art. I really wanted to hear what was inside (or sometimes I was too scared, I still don’t own King Diamond), but being relatively small, I knew there was no way this shit was going to get past the mom filter. Poison, Warrant, even Metallica seemed on the surface harmless. But no way was “the hard stuff” gonna get in.

So it’s 1991, my friend Keith and I go to the Waxie Maxie’s in town to flip through tapes. He buys Jesus Jones or EMF or some other big name group at the time. I buy Black Flag’s “The First Four Years”. We get back to his house and I put on my tape at some point, and Keith looks at me funny. He is not into this tape at all. Me, I fucking love it. It’s the most violent, fierce, balls out music I have ever heard. The three singers all sound different wave lengths of deranged, the guitar sounds like it’s going to shoot electricity out. Everything just sounds chaotic and fucked up and desperate, just like I felt at 14.

Weeks into high school, Keith and I went our separate ways. We didn’t have a falling out or anything and at the core we were still the same kids who liked rock music and skateboarding. But Keith was into Zepplin and AC/DC and those bands seemed like a bunch of pansies to me. And they still do. Black Flag changed the direction my life would take permanently. It dictated who my friends would be, what I would read, how I would view fine art and the way in which I would play music and create art.

Having said all this, when I first saw Spray-Paint the Walls: The Story of Black Flag at Smash Records a few months ago, I pretty much had to read it. Sure, most of the story is pretty well-known. Henry Rollins did a good job with Get In the Van and releasing Planet Joe by Joe Cole. The former is Rollins’ account of much of what occurred during his tenure with the band. The later is a tour journal from the last tour written by the ultimate roadie. And there have been a few essential interviews and book chapters on the group. But nothing defining on the band. Spray-Paint The Walls is a first attempt at tackling this band.

However I wish I had done some research before buying this product. I’m not saying that I was dissatisfied with Spray-Paint The Walls as a story. It’s fairly well written and pretty thorough and covers a part of the Black Flag story that I’ve wanted to read more about, IE the first four years. The interviews with Keith Morris and Ron Reyes are essential reading, parts of the story that are rarely heard. It was a total pleasure to find out more about the earliest, most formidable years with the band.

There are some major problems with this book. Those problems would be the fact that Greg Ginn, Henry Rollins and Bill Stevenson were not interviewed for this book. Now, I don’t blame Stevie Chick for this at all. All three of those guys have pretty much said that the story of Flag is in the past and thus closed. None of those guys are talking about the history of the band. Nothing Chick could do about that, but the source material used barely scratches the surface and in the case of Rollins and Ginn are pretty well read and well-known. Chick uses a great deal of reference from  Get In the Van to add Rollins perspective.  More often than not these passages feel forced and is better used for historical points rather than interjection. And Greg Ginn basically comes off looking like an asshole, which I am sure he is in a way, but the man isn’t given an opportunity to defend himself. Further, Dez Caden and Raymond Pettitbon are also absent and only scant effort is made to include them. For me and many others, Pettitbon, whether he likes it or not, is essential to the Black Flag experience.

Further depth and analysis into later Black Flag releases are also pretty sparse. Chick does a phenomenal job with the Flag up to the Damaged LP, but after that, details about and even mention of later albums falls off. Granted, it seems most of the albums after this were recorded during marathon sessions, but jesus they are so awesome. Chick has the vocabulary to cover this material, but it feels, like many, that after Chuck Dukowski exited the band, so did interest. Of course, in my opinion, the best music today influenced by Black Flag is born from the later period, rather than people coping from the early stuff.

All in all though, I was sad when the book ended. It didn’t have everything I was looking for, but it does a really strong job of capturing the early history of punk through the eyes of one of its quintessential bands. It also tells some of the story that hasn’t been totally there. Mike Watt and Kira Rossler both contributed interviews to the story that are invaluable. If punk rock history is important to you, and it should very well be or you wouldn’t be reading this nonsense now, then it might behoove you to pick this sucker up and turn the pages while the chaos of Black Flag rages around your head.