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2004-09-06 - 5:38 p.m.
we can't even function when we're not in a band
Around the time of our fairly triumphant show at the Sidebar in July, Zuul almost got on the bill of a show at the Ottobar for the first time, opening for a band we all really like and would be excited as hell to play with, Skeleton Key. But that gig ended up going to another band and we were all very disappointed and bitter about it. But about a week later, the owner of the Ottobar, who is friends with Sean, called him with another offer for a show, opening for Brant Bjork, who used to be in Kyuss. But the date of this show happened to be during the 4 days I would be out of town visiting my brother in Wisconsin. I had booked might flight months ago, and I wasn’t changing my plans. So I had to break the news to Sean that I wouldn’t be able to play the show. I knew he was really disappointed, so I suggested they try and find another drummer to teach the songs to to play that one show with them. So that’s what they decided to do, and within a couple days I realized how much I regretted the decision to pretty much give them my blessing to do the show without me. I understand the drummer’s place in the totem pole of a rock band, and they were a band long before I played with them. But for the past year, and especially the last few months, I feel like I’ve put in as much work as everyone else, and sometimes more. I practiced at least twice as much as every other member of the band before the last Sidebar show. So I was kind that I wouldn’t be able to play our first show at the Ottobar, our biggest show to date. It would’ve been easy for Sean to tell Craig from the Ottobar that we couldn’t do it and probably he’d offer us another show a month or two later. Of course, at that point I’d already said it was alright and pretty much gave Sean the go-ahead to book the show, so it was a little hypocritical and pointless of me to get angry about it at that point, but I did anyway. I pretty much let them all now how bummed out I was about it. But I promised to get together with them once or twice before my trip and teach the replacement drummer, Corey, the songs. Of course, those guys are so disorganized, they ended up not playing with him until a few days before the show, and it was on a night I wasn’t available, so I wasn’t able to make good on that. Oh well. I was just bitter at that point. So part of me was kind of glad I didn’t get to help the new drummer and hoped they’d just crash and burn and play a shitty show. I knew that if they didn’t have a good show it would hurt the band in the long run and we might not get asked back to the Ottobar and then I wouldn’t get to play there at all. But I didn’t really care about. They don’t need me so much musically, but I think they do need me organizationally. Those guys don’t have their shit together at all, if I didn’t e-mail everyone and pester them about when we can practice, we wouldn’t get together half as much, if at all. So I went on my trip, and they played their show, and I didn’t talk to them until a few days later when I decided to e-mail a simple “so...how’d it go?”. And they told me about how they wore bathrobes and shower caps onstage and it went alright, Corey learned the songs alright and only made a couple big mistakes. And apparently there was some craziness about someone in the audience getting a bottle smashed over their head. Sounds like it was fun and went alright. In the 2 weeks since I got back from my trip, we’ve practice about twice, once without Nick. For a while over the summer, Nick had really lost his enthusiasm about the whole venture, and we pretty much had to work to convince him not to quit the band. One of his gripes was that we weren’t really going anywhere or getting much accomplished. So one of the points we pushed was that we were going to get our shit together and record something we can sell at shows and start really promoting ourselves and playing shows outside Baltimore. But pretty much ever since that last show at the Sidebar, my enthusiasm has taken a nosedive. Since we only have one show booked right now that’s almost 2 months away, we’re taking time to write and get ready to record. But writing has gone pretty poorly. Aside from a couple somewhat whimsical songs that we threw together just before playing shows and played them that one time, we’ve only written one keeper song in the past 3 or 4 months, and even that one is kind of incomplete. And the stuff we’ve been working with for the past month or so has been pretty much garbage. Slow sludgy metal riffs and awkward, halting rhythms. Our old stuff isn’t that great, but it was fast and relatively simple and fun to play. But the other guys keep getting sick of the old songs and have tossed half of them out, and I’m not feeling this new stuff at all. I’ve pretty much accepted the fact that I’m the only member of the band who isn’t metal at all, never really listened to it, don’t know much about it. It’s just not in my blood. And that’s ok, I’m kind of used to being the odd man out in bands as far as influences are concerned, and sometimes it’s good for the drummer to bring a different perspective. But increasingly over the last few months I’ve been taking a lot of shit from the band, especially Sean, about my drumset. I’m about as punk rock as I am metal, but I kind of come from that background where the quality of your great doesn’t matter and you just play what you like. So I have a shitty old Pearl kit and for the last few years I played with no toms and cracked cymbals. At first the guys didn’t seem to mind, but over time they’ve given me more and more of a hard time about my set, telling me I need more toms, telling me I should think about a double bass pedal (one word: NO), etc. Even after I bought a tom tom a couple months ago, they got on my case even more about how I need more. I’d love to expand my kit, but I’m not made of money. And I need to replace my cracked hi-hats before I buy any new toms. Plus we’re not even sure how long we’re going to be able to stay at our practice space. We’re basically dependent on the other band that uses our room to stay there, because their name is on the lease and if we leave we’re out on our ass. And we’re kind of on thin ice with the owner, we always seem to be pissing me off. One time we were messing around and I started banging on one of the metal columns holding up the ceiling, just to get a weird percussion sound, not doing any damage to it or even chipping the paint, and he came in and yelled at us. And the other day, Mike left to get food and he left the front door open, and he came and yelled at us about it because you’re supposed to keep the door closed at all time. So all these accumulating things have just made being in the band less and less fun for me. Playing shows is fun, and I’m looking forward to the next show at the Sidebar in October. But our main priority is getting ready to record, and I have less faith in the material than ever. And since I own better recording equipment than anyone else in the band, they’re putting me in charge of recording the demos, which means more work for me. And just when I’m starting school again, I’m less thrilled about putting more work into this band. I don’t know if I’ll quit, but I have to admit I’d be relieved if we all just decided to break up, and some days I wish for it more than anything. -al
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