Sometimes you stumble across something truly awesome on the internet. (thanks Nicole and Stu) This band was featured in “21 painfully awkward band photos”. It won’t link…but cut and paste this into your browser, if you want a good laugh..(http://www.buzzfeed.com/pipcowley/21-painfully-awkward-band-photos-cuob)
I think I know these guys. Or at least, wanted to be in their band.
At fifteen, I had my future laid out. I was going to be in a band, we were going to tour, and I was going to partake in all sorts of things my parents didn’t want me to do. Turns out, you only need to go to college to do that, but I didn’t know this at the time. My guy friends and I formed a band; we had several names depending on the week (my favorite was Charnel House). Our touring name was Primitive Radio (touring as in, the junior high school gym dance, the “battle of the bands” outside the guitar shop, and a few local bars). A few years after we split up an actual band with a record deal called themselves Primitive Radio, so don’t get confused. It wasn’t us.
We had a blast playing in Jon’s garage. It was there that I formed a few chords and an identity. This is really what being in a band is all about, asserting yourself as a persona other than your geeky, acne-laden self. In later years it’s about getting laid. A record deal, sure, but mostly it is about delving into the pants of the opposite sex. It’s also about the comaraderie of the music industry, bullshitting about reverb pedals and “orange” crate amplifiers, and spending endless hours in record shops.You can’t find a crowd of more interesting people than musicians.
My musical career was a small one, I was in and out of bands, did some back-up singing, met my future roommates after being pulled on stage to belt out impromptu blues, and the highlight: singing a New Order song in front of 200, dressed as a large piece of toast. It’s hard to explain, but I’m pretty sure alcohol was involved.
A few years ago, when I joined the facebook craze, a long-lost roommate contacted me.
“I thought you’d be playing music!” he said. I cringed inwardly. dammit, I thought I’d be in music too. My profile explained otherwise: Married, children, jewelry designer, writer. Nothing about music, or my love of it, or how it had shaped me as a person. The first thing my husband and I ever talked about was music. It was like air and water to us, essential to everything. It still is, to some degree. Some of it I can’t listen to now. It’s like hearing the voice of unrequited love, the lover who walked away when you weren’t looking without any explination, breaking your heart.
Is my musical career over? Maybe, but never say never. A friend who sings Latin jazz and I have plans for a children’s album. I’ve listened to a few; most of them are crap. I think we can do better. I know we can, actually. Now all we need is a good name, which is more than half the battle. Hats off to Turds of Misery. That folks, THAT is a good name.