Thursday, January 8, 2009

It Never Fails/Drunk people on busses

It seems that no matter how I conduct myself, what clothes I am wearing or where I am going from or to, at least once a month, if I have my guitar with me I will most assuredly be bothered by someone yelling "Freebird!" too/at me. Let me start by saying I have never and will never play Freebird. First it was because I didn't like the song, now it's because I'm tired of having drunk assholes yelling it in the middle of my sets (sometimes in the middle of songs) because they think it's funny. It's not


As a result, from now on, whenever someone yells "Freebird!" while I am playing I will do one of 3 things:
A) Completely disregard then when he/she yells it again I will try to convince him/her that I played it but they weren't listening
B) State that I have never heard of freebird and ask the yeller to play it for me on the spoons
C) Assure everyone that I will play the song and then play "Take on Me" by Aha then try to convince everyone after the set that "Take on Me" and "Freebird" are actually the same song.

But I digress...


The latestet "Freebird" incident was one of the most awesome experiences of my life. Let me explain.

The last time I was bothered by a Freebirder was on the #9 bus going from center city to the outskirts of Philadelphia. I was headed to play a weeknight show at a coffee shop in the city's Roxborough section. The coffee shop is really nice but because of its location and the day I was to be playing I was not expecting much but I was pleasantly suprised with a decent sized crowd. But again, I digress


At the 16th and Walnut stop (roughly 2 blocks sw of City Hall) a very, very inebriated individual stumbled onto the bus. He looked at my guitar, then looked at me, then back to the guitar, then back to me and yelled "FREEBIRD!" almost proudly. For the next 15 minutes he tried to get me to join a band with him proving to me his sick guitar skills by playing air guitar and making "bwah bum bwahwahwah" noises with his mouth. I have to say I was impressed.

During his most shreddingest solo the man (who introduced himself as glen) peered down under his seat and found a half full (or for you pessimists, half empty) box of chocolate truffles. Glen went on to accuse everyone on the bus of being wasteful and, after nobody on the bus responded to him he called whoever left them "a fat pig." He then offered me the contents of the box. I declined.

For the next 10 minutes Glen gave me all of the reasons I should join a band with him which included (but were not limited to) his bitchin' guitar skills, the fact that he could consume alcohol, his former heroine addiction, his brand new cell phone and the fact that he could rock... HARD (the last reason is a conclusion that I came to myself)

At this point (roughly 5 minutes before my stop arrived) Glen leaned over during a solo or while showing me his brand new phone, I really don't remember why he leaned over but it's not important. What's important is he then fell and laid against me and did not get up for a good 3-4 minutes. At that moment I wondered if that's what being in a band with Glen would be like. Would we tear up every show with him shredding for a good 4 hours then we'd go back stage and he'd awkwardly/drunkenly pass out on me while I try to maneuver out of the situation? Because if that is the case sign me up!

From now on I will be ending every entry with lyrics from a song that are either incredibly bad, make no sense or are some other type of stupid... Your lyrics for today are from the song "The Joker" by Steve Miller. Please feel free to nominate some lines of horrible lyrics.

Youre the cutest thing
That I ever did see
I really love your peaches
Want to shake your tree
Lovey-dovey, lovey-dovey, lovey-dovey all the time
Ooo-eee baby, Ill sure show you a good time


Take Care
--KR
www.myspace.com/kevinricci
www.soulasylumpoetry.com/jamroom/kevinricci

2 comments: