"For Whom the Bell Tolls" (...Yes, the Metallica Song!!)

Originally published on October 26, 2007 (via MySpace)

You hear it.

The Bells.

And you think to yourself, "Oh! This could be one of two songs..."

Cuz it could be AC/DC's "Hell's Bells", and that could be cool.

But then it hits you...

duh DUHNT, duh DUHNT, DUUUUUUUUUUUHHHN...wee neh nee neh, weh nuh wee nuh nuh...

And you know EXACTLY what fucking song it is. The power. The menacing, descending riff. Oh glorious day!!

Everyone knows this song. Who the fuck doesn't like Old Skool Metallica? I understand people's distaste for "newer" Metallica, but you can't say shit about this one. A song from their early days, when their metal was fucking METAL!!! It's one of those songs you just have to headbang and shout along with. There's no denying it's an absolute fucking classic.

It was never really a single, but they did release a live video from the "Live Shit: Binge and Purge" concert video. It's great song writing, and doesn't really follow the conventional "pop" formula...but then again Metallica didn't really write like that back then. If you're not readily familiar with it, (then why are you reading my blog? get the fuck out!!) the lyrics concern a small military unit, probably a platoon or squad size ("Men of five still alive thru the raging glow...") who are possibly pinned down by advancing forces.

I feel it's about how soldiers have to deal with death. They know that they may not survive the night, but their pride and bravery get them thru. It's actually very inspiring. I understand that it's an "anti-war" song, but if you think about it, most good war songs are.

Take for example, "Disposable Heroes" from their album "Master of Puppets". Or even my personal FAVORITE SONG EVER, "One" from their metal masterpiece, "...And Justice For All". Both anti-war songs, but I have known many of my fellow Marines who took inspiration from Metallica's music. Even I did.

Now, the reason I thought of writing about this particular song, is that last weekend, Chris and I did a quickly thrown together jam with Caleb and Josh from Chaos. We had to pick a half hour's worth of songs to fill in their slot at Gallery. We picked mostly Black Sabbath and Metallica songs, and we had to throw this one into the setlist. Not only does everyone KNOW this song, but every metal musician should know how to PLAY this song. It's the easiest one (next to "Seek and Destroy", which we also rocked out) and it's instantly recognizable.

Plus, if you are a hard rock or heavy metal band, and you can do it well, it garners you almost guaranteed instant credibility. Who wouldn't enjoy a cover of a metal classic? Fuck Yeah!!

So if you're a rock musician, you MUST learn this song. It should be a goddamned Commandment or some shit. Seriously. I guarantee you, it will come in handy in a tight spot.

The Ballad of Fred Overmeyer

If you're anything like me, I bet you have a voicemail box that you hate and rarely use. Yeah. We've gotten to that point in our culture. It's funny, we still call it a telephone, but this generation doesn't even use it as a telephone. There was even a joke on Community (fuck I love that show, I'm so excited Yahoo! is bringing it back!!) where Britta was bitching about something and Troy says "Oh yeah, she was born in the 80's. She still uses a phone as a telephone."

But earlier today a friend of mine in the Great State of Texas posted something about voicemails and it got me thinking on this topic.

What's your outgoing message? If you acted like a freaking adult, I bet it would be some sputtered nonsense about leaving a name and number. Why are you giving me instructions? I know how to use goddamn voicemail. (This was pointed out by Jon in his post, BTDubs...) Or if you're even less interested, you probably have the Robot Lady read off your number (which fucking blows cuz it honestly takes forever and the bitch has a goddamn creepy voice and cadence). That, or opt to record your name. Which honestly, sometimes sounds creepier cuz most people sound weird when they say their own name. I always hated hearing my mother's. She has a weird way of saying her full name.

Speaking of mothers, My mother is the only one who usually leaves me voicemail messages. Nobody else. Seriously, if you're reading this, Mom, stop fucking leaving those. It takes an hour just to get to the part where I hear it and it's just you telling me you called. Yeah. I know you called, Ma. It's called Caller ID, it was developed by GTE, and it came out in the damn 90's. It's the 21st Century, mom. Get with it.

Also, I love you. (Hey, fuck off, and stop snickering. I love my mother, okay!?)

But here's what my outgoing message usually sounds like. "You've reached the voicemail box of..." and the part where you're supposed to hear my name, I record a quick 4-6 second message of me yelling for help and shouting about being kidnapped. I'm pretty fucked up. And that's not even the best story.

I don't remember where I got this idea from...probably a movie or TV show, but I had a message that would start off like "Hello? ... Oh hey, what's up!? ... ... Hang on a second, getting another call...it's my mother, hold on a sec..." And then it would switch to record. You'd hear them sitting there just waiting and hear shit going on in the background. I got my old friend Matt Epright with that prank once. He called back and told me I was a dick...and laughed. Cuz well, it's a pretty funny prank.

The show Archer, of course, takes that prank to complete other level. Epic Prank Voicemail!!

But check this out...

About ten years ago, when I came home to Florida, I had my phone switched to a Florida number. This was kind of a mistake. Because I wound up getting, like many of you might know, some previous person's former number. As those same people may understand, that can be kind of annoying but tolerable, but it can also be a fucking nightmare.

Now, the Overmeyer Situation was no nightmare... but it was kinda close sometimes. I got calls for Fred Overmeyer for years. At first I was mostly polite. Hey, they obviously don't know that the guy switched phones or whatever. This was in 2004, mind you. People didn't buy new phones every week. As much, anyway.

But anyways... I started out being polite. But the calls were sometimes quite frequent. Like sometimes 2 or 3 a day. And often at inconvenient times. I started answering calls that asked for Fred Overmeyer telling them that he was fucking dead. Or some shit. It was funny to me. Some people took offense...and aaaaahh...I didn't fucking care. I was getting annoyed.

So I immediately instituted a policy of screening all unknown numbers. Unless I was feeling froggy at an opportune moment. Cuz I like fucking with people live and in person. (Fuck it!! We're doing it live!!) But I eventually switched my voicemail message to say something along the lines of... Hello. If you're looking for Fred Overmeyer, I sorry to tell you that he's passed away. This is his cousin, Troy. If you'd like to attend services...blah blah blah..." And I left a fake phone number. I also did it using a really effeminate voice. I thought it was fun to play Troy.

There was one time I had a guy really going, live. I had a spare moment when I received a call for Fred, and I just went with it. I told the guy he died in a car accident. Dude asked me if it was the Crossfire, I said "No, no, the other one..." (All the while thinking 'aha! this guy has money!!') I can't remember how it ended, but I do remember him realizing it was a prank. Some people had a sense of humor about it and even had a laugh. Others not so much, but who cares, they take themselves way too seriously.

The best of the Voicemail Funeral Era, was a guy... and I can't remember his name... left a series of voice mails. He was extremely interested in coming to the funeral, and I wanna say called back something like 4 times. And he treated Troy like he was a real person, which was fucking surreal, I gotta say.

But that's not the most surreal it got. The epilogue is the Kicker.

One day, I'm driving down...I dunno... Tuttle...or MacIntosh Road in Sunny Sarasota with my girlfriend, and I receive a phone call. And I don't know what the fuck possessed me to answer it while driving (cuz I rarely do it) but I hit SEND, say "Hello" and I hear,

"Hey! Troy! ...It's ME, Fred!! I'm back from the dead!"

It was Fred Fucking Overmeyer, himself. No shit. I was dumbfounded, and I look over at Liz, and say to her, "Um...it's Fred Overmeyer. Yeah. No shit. I can't deal with this at the moment, do you think you could talk to him?" Liz already knew the score (was 'in the know', as they say), and thought it was funny, so she took the phone and talked to him. After the call, she gave me the scoop (the lowdown, the rundown, what's the haps wit da craps?).

Apparently, for years now, his wife would randomly receive these flower deliveries and messages of condolence about her husband. And he heard about the message. And also, apparently the name Troy came up. (Like, 'Who the fuck is Troy?') Fred had a sense of humor about it, and that made me happy. He was in real estate and had been giving out business cards for years with that number on it. There's no way he could possibly control that, ya know?

But it was cool. And now I guess we both have a funny little story about it.

This Ain't A Scene It's A Goddamn Shitshow

A dark day is upon us. A close friend of mine is quitting his band. They play originals and... well... used to have a pretty awesome following. But now he's concentrating his musical efforts into a Cover Band.

Yeah.

Now, this isn't necessarily a rant about shitty cover bands (but there are a lot of them) but more about the death of dreams.

Years ago, he and I wanted to form a band. That never happened. (That happens to me a lot really) But he's a talented guy. And unfortunately, the music scene in Sarasota & Bradenton fucking crumbled. Why, do you ask? Well, lots of reasons.

Bands don't want to do fun shit anymore. What the fuck happened to the Art of Putting On a Goddamn Show? Motley Crue, musically, were just like every other Sunset Strip band in the early 80's. Why did they get signed? Because they had the audience's attention. How did they do that? By putting on a fucking big stage show, and promoting the shit out of it. Plain and simple.

These days, here in sunny Southwest Florida, nobody fucking bothers. There are a lot of great bands with good music and zero stage presence. No real show. The last underground band from Bradenton that I saw that had something was Crash Fist Fight. Somebody once described them as Guns N' Roses on crack. It was pretty accurate. My old band Death Makes a Holiday used to do shows with them, because we were all friends and it's fun to play shows with your friends. We loved playing with them, but they were a tough act to follow.

Bands aren't putting together a package show. How many times have you gone out to see your friends play? And how many times did you have to sit thru 2 or 3 shitty fucking bands just to hear your friends? Or, even worse, come see your friends and leave because the other bands were fucking garbage? I know the answer for me is "too goddamn many".

Why are bands letting some fucking clueless bar manager or wannabe booking agent dictate who gets on the bill? Why are you letting shitty bands ruin the scene? If your band is good, you must know other good bands, right? Why the fuck aren't you putting a package deal together to a booking agent and promoting the shit out of it? Why the fuck are you letting the venues in this area run the scene when it's fucking obvious not a single one of them has a fucking clue?

Bands don't promote. Just make a Facebook Event Page and hope for the best. Right? Wrong.

Design the posters. Get them printed. Hang them up in the venue. Hang them up around the venue. Get to the venue early and hand out a few flyers. No shit.

Don't be so fucking pretentious that you won't throw in a few cover songs. Every band should have a list of 4-5 covers they can whip out any time. Maybe not every show, but it's like a surprise. I knew one band that they had everybody pick a cover song, and they'd all learn it, adapt it to their style. And it made shows fun and awesome. So stop thinking you're above that shit, because sometimes it'll win fans to your music by adapting someone else's song.

I dunno, maybe I'm just yapping at the mouth, but it kills me. It hurts my fucking heart that the Music Scene is losing talented people because nobody fucking cares anymore. Not even the bands that are active seem to care anymore. And it makes me not want to care anymore.

The scene died because we all let it. It's our own goddamn fault.