She's a voodoo doll

You can't beat a guy rocking out with a big ol' Gretsch and a grass skirt. These guys are going to be entertaining my local honky tonk this evening with their songs of psychobilly and I plan to be there with a beer in my hand and a goofy grin on my grill. They look like they're gonna put on an interesting show. (Hopefully the public access TV crew won't be along)

Snakeout -- 'Scary Mary'

UPDATE:

The bluegrass band was playing when we first walked in. Brad and I went downstairs to smoke before the show. The green room is always a better place to have a smoke but especially on a cold rainy night like this one. Quis was there talking to some smoking hot girl who was a hanger-on of the big fat lead singer ('from Canned Heat') from the bluegrass band.

Quis and Brad and I smoked while Earl and Luallen were hammering out a set list over on the couch. The bluegrass band finished up and they came streaming in, big burly corn fed kids from the sticks layered in denim. I only watched them for a few minutes but they seemed pretty good. They looked and sounded right--and not surprisingly, they've got a lot of competition around these parts. I think they were hoping for more of the romantic back stage life and got the harsh reality of a handful of drugged out slugs lazily taking up space and not paying any attention. Oh well.

I split to grab a beer before Snakeout took the stage. Turns out I had plenty of time because as they did take the stage Len (the mad scientist) blew a fuse on his amp. Earl appeared, then Hendricks, then Blaine and there was quite a crowd standing around the dead amp poking and prodding from all angles. Though he was the most knowledgeable of the amp (for he built it), Brad was actually the last one to arrive and the one least likely to give his input. Len switched to Blaine's amp and played on.

Man, Snakeout absolutely flat out rocked. Len's energy was superb, the songs were all cool and funny and the bass and drums were able and ready. The bass player told me later on that they hardly ever practice, they all have day jobs and families and the band tends to only play a handful of dates each year. Len was a cool dude, very smart and a very friendly fella. And he flat out rocked on stage.

9 Pound stormed the stage after that and rocked well into the evening. The mosh pit threw me to the right at first over by Earl. After gathering a bit of permanence over there, I was shoved back towards the right of the stage and soon enough I was able to get all the way up to the stage itself between Blaine and Luallen. It was a good thing. There was a crowd behind me of amateurs just bashing into each other and generally being dumbasses. Someone would get up to the stage and try to take more space than they needed or could hold and would eventually get usurped and thrown back into the roiling pit. They were all a bunch of idiots and it even felt like Blaine was getting pissed at them for being so unnecessarily pugnacious. There was also some dude who kept running on stage and diving off into the crowd that would invariably step aside and let him plunge to the floor--he did this 3 or 4 times!

It was a killer show.

Brad and I drifted back down to the green room and waited for everyone to sift back in hoping weed would be available. All the Snakeout guys were there, all the 9 Pound guys, even a few of the bluegrass guys were hanging around and there were, predictably, a handful of other just taking up space. We smoked a bit, argued over whether Brenda Lee was better than Patsy Cline or Bad Company better than Queen. I got locked out front (as my hand stamp had long since been sweated off) for 20 minutes or so as '80s night dance party revelers filled the street. A coupla older broads from another bar drunkenly chatted me up for a while. I squeezed back in and got back downstairs in time to grab a coupla tall boy Budweisers and catch up on the conversation. Earl was putting on a show on the washtub bass, Snakeout chatted about the Red Wings, Blaine told wild and crazy stories of partying too much in Europe (or maybe it was Texas).

Eventually we all went out to Perkin's, a good time was had by all. My ears were ringing for 2 days and my neck was sore for more than a week. I'm getting old but not too old.