stop me if you think that you've heard this one before

The cd player at work is skipping, and my ipod hasn't been updated in a long time. So I decided to do something about it. Go old school, if you will. Bring in cassettes, and crank them up.

First up is a live album by The Smiths called Rank. It came out in 1988, and I haven't really been played it more than a couple times since 1990. I remember liking it a lot though. It was raw and emphasized the guitars. It's basically the sound of a rock band beating Morrissey into submission.

When I was a kid I bought a lot of cassettes. I started out on vinyl, and I bought a lot since then in the late 1990's when I got on a streak, but it was the cassette that pretty much dominated my youth.

Every scrap of money I earned, whether it was my allowance when I was younger, or the fast food paychecks that started around 14, went to buying tapes. Well, that and cigarettes.

The last time I brought in a stack of tapes to play at work was 1988. I was working at this ice cream place called Swensens in a mall in Kansas City. They served sandwiches and had a little cafe thing going on during the day, but at night it was all ice cream, and the place was run by a bunch of 15 year olds.

I was the first of the ruffians to get hired. Then I got a bunch of friends jobs there. Pretty soon we're all sitting at the back table smoking cigarettes and listening to tapes.

I remember a girl I like introduced me to The Clash. Combat Rock. Then she ended up giving me the tape for some reason. Well, probably because she liked me. I also remember playing some R.E.M. albums, as well as the new David Lee Roth album. Weird time. I was into pretty much everything.

It was Led Zeppelin that got me in trouble though. I think it was Led Zeppelin II. My friend Mike had introduced me to Led Zeppelin the previous year. Well, beyond Led Zeppelin IV anyway. I'd had that one for a while. Mike was great. He gave me one tape at a time. Teased me with it, and hinted at what would come next. Man, what I'd give to experience "Houses Of The Holy" or "Led Zeppelin III" again for the first time like that.

I showed up for my shift as usual around 4:30. Tina, the firecracker redhead manager, was still there. Which was a little unusual. Usually she left early and I didn't have to deal with her. I'd had my run-ins in the past. She wasn't too fond of me leaving my Camel Lights in the freezer, for instance. Back at the back table one of my 15 year old friends had told me that cigarettes taste more refreshing if you keep them in the freezer. Tina didn't like this.

I was far from an ideal worker. Some kid sitting at the back table with a smoke hanging out of their mouth isn't exactly what someone wants to see when they bring their grandchildren in for an ice cream cone. I spent more time socializing than cleaning or restocking items too. But I felt like I was sort of invincible because I'd gotten so many people jobs there.

"We need to talk," Tina said. I thought maybe she was going to get on me for smoking at the back table or something. I knew she didn't like me. I was a hire of the clueless old people who owned the place. They were nice and seemed to like me on the Saturday mornings I had to work with them. But they were probably in bed by the middle of my 5-9 evening shift.

"I'm going to have to let you go."

I was shocked and I asked her why.

"For playing Led Zeppelin too loud."

I didn't know what to say. She hit me where it hurt. She insulted Led Zeppelin. "What's wrong with playing Led Zeppelin?'

This got her going. "Some people don't like Led Zeppelin, Todd. I don't like Led Zeppelin."

I was horrified. This was beyond belief. How could anyone in their right mind, especially an older person in their early 20's, not like Led Zeppelin? Suddenly I didn't want to work for her anymore. But I cared about references. My food service career was at stake. What if someone called and asked about me?

"Well," Tina said, "I suppose I could lie a little."

I really missed that place. There was nothing like sitting at the back table with your friends, smoking cigarettes, complaining about school and parents, and then making malts and ice cream sundaes for each other. Life didn't get much better than that.

Thanks Tina. You ruined my life.

...and the cradle will rock

For over 20 years I've been waiting for this to happen, and now it appears that it has. Van Halen with David Lee Roth. That's right. They're getting back together for a summer tour after first being inducted into the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame in March.

I was a Van Halen freak. When I was 12 years old it's pretty much all I talked about. My dad used to say that if they sold Van Halen toilet paper I'd buy it. I was sort of insulted by that comment at the time, but damn, some retro Diver Down-era Charmin would be a pretty cool thing to have up on a shelf.

Those first six albums rocked my world. They were larger than life. True rock stars in a very flamboyant way. They weren't quite a pretty boy glam band, and they weren't really a hair band either. They were party rock. Or cock rock, more appropriately. And David Lee Roth was lord of the cock rock.

Diamond Dave doesn't quite look the part anymore though. His hair has thinned and he looks like a bad caricature of his former self. Not that he couldn't rock out though. His last couple tours have been almost all Van Halen songs, and apparently he sounds pretty good.

I just wish they'd done this in 1996. They came so close. And they'd look a lot less absurd up there. But I'm willing to embrace a 2006 reunion under one condition, they ditch the bass player.

Eddie Van Halen's 15 year old son has no business being in Van Halen. I don't care that he has the last name. That seems to be part of Eddie's problem in the last several years. The name. How much simpler it would have been if back in the day David Lee Roth hadn't suggested they change their name from Mammouth to Van Halen. We come this close to a reunion, and now Van Halen's original bass player isn't invited? Because he has the nerve to want to play some rock and roll instead of sitting on his ass all the time, and accepts Sammy Hagar's invitation to play with him? Is Eddie Van Halen really that petty? And does Eddie forget that Michael Anthony sang all the backup vocal?

Valerie Bertinelli can't be that thrilled with the prospect of her 15 year old son touring the country with one of the world's most party happy bands. My hope is that she'll threaten legal action and Eddie will realize his error. If this doesn't work, maybe David Lee Roth looking at Wolfie and singing "have you seen junior's grades?" will do the trick. Child Protective Services will come a'knocking, and Michael Anthony will be reinstated in his rightful spot.

It's going to be really interesting though. The Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame itself should get the fireworks going with the two warring camps: Hagar/Anthony and Van Halen/Roth all nominated under the name Van Halen. I hope someone's going to document this whole thing. It would make killer reality TV.

things that blog me

Now that my albums of the 1990's series is complete, what do I blog about? Here are some ideas:

Songs I heard on shuffle
Things that annoy me/irritant of the week
Products I will chose in order to make decision making easier
Bands I don't get
Favorite foods/things that make grocery shopping more fun
Fake bands/discographies
Awful albums in history
Jobs from hell
Overheard conversations
Things that make life better
Digging into my cassettes from the 80's (that I haven't listened to since) and reexamining them, one at a time

1999- MULE VARIATIONS

Tom Waits records are events. Or at least they were when Mule Variations came out in 1999. It had been 7 years since his last real record. 1993's The Black Rider was more of an exercise in theater than a proper record. But even if you count that one, it had been a long wait. 1992, Bone Machine, I'm living at home while I take some time off from college. By 1999 I'd grown up a bit. For better or worse, Tom's characters were a little more real to me. And he always had some interesting things to say.


Got to get behind the mule, every morning and plow

I had a cat I hated. A kitten actually. A kitten with a rotten personality. I was feeling really down that winter and thought I'd go to the humane society and get a furry companion. A few minutes in the little room and I had bonded with him. "A Siamese," the lady at the counter said, "oh, you're going to have your hands full." I wasn't sure I liked the sound of that.

Niko was a waste of a good name. He liked to climb me like he was a monkey climbing a tree. And he never avoided my face either. I had to close my eyes and hope that he wasn't easily startled as he made his journey towards the top of my head. He liked to sit up there. Right on top of my head. I'd pull him off and put him on my lap or the floor, and then he'd run up my body and do it all over again. And more often than not, he'd jump from my head onto my papers. The little bastard had no respect for me working out of my home.

Mr. Curt lived across the hall. His first name was Curt, but I liked to add the Mr. because he was a very fastidious man. He didn't like me to do laundry after 9pm, for example, because he thought the noise would keep him up- even though the washers and dryers were in the basement and we were on the second floor. And if I had a girl over, no matter what hour she came over or left, he was sure to notice. But he was a good guy. We had our own little Kramer-Jerry Seinfeld relationship going on. The doors were usually wide open, and it wasn't long before he took quite a liking to little Niko.

I don't recall Niko ever making the journey to the top of Mr. Curt's head, so maybe that explains why Mr. Curt liked him so much. Then again, who doesn't like a kitten? His nose had likely never been clawed either, and therefore wasn't hindered in anyway in its sensitivity to smell. "Is little Niko liter trained?" Well, yeah. Or at least I thought so. I mean the stuff in the box was all covered up. I had my suspicions that maybe he was having accidents though. When this happens your nose kind of goes crazy and you think you smell it everywhere. So Mr. Curt was sort of my validation that maybe there was something wrong. I had stockpiled a huge stack of envelopes from the newspaper clipping service I used for sales leads, and I had a sneaking suspicion that he was doing his business back behind my couch where the bulk of those clippings were stored.

Presidents Day. I have the day off and decide to go record shopping. But I don't quite trust Niko. I'd had him about a month, and my apartment was starting to get a little funky smelling. Nothing I could pinpoint though. So I put Niko in my bathroom and closed the door. At least that way I could keep track of him.

So I come back to my funky smelling apartment. Mr. Curt is gone. He didn't have the work perks that I had, and didn't have the day off. I open the door to check on Niko and see him on top of the sink, ready to pounce on me. All around him, on all of the white porcelain are little tiny brown specs. It didn't take me long to connect the dots and trace them back to Niko.

Bye bye Niko. I didn't like him anyway. And he was kitten enough that I didn't feel too guilty. "It just wasn't working out" isn't an excuse that would keep him from getting adopted.

Mr. Curt on the other hand wasn't too happy. I guess looking back it was sort of like his cat too. I did tell him where he could find Niko though, and he didn't seem like he was in any hurry to go there and adopt him.

You don't meet nice girls in coffee shops

You don't. You meet them in rock clubs when your three sheets to the wind after seeing another band perform at another club a few hours earlier. The key was in my car door, but the night was beautiful. The perfect summer night. I didn't know who was playing at the 7th Street Entry, or even if I'd know anybody there, but I was set on making the most of the night.

Margaret liked rock and roll. And she went to shows by herself. If there's a weakness I have for women, that's it. You go to a rock show by yourself, you're pretty cool in my book.

We dated for close to a year and saw a lot of rock shows. Then we broke up. Right after having breakfast in a very coffee shop like place. To the sounds of Joy Division. To this day I can't think of a more miserable band to break up to. Awful.

When you share my bed, you share my name

I always thought this was a real bad ass thing to say, and I love Tom for saying it.

When the weather gets rough, and it's whiskey in the shade, it's best to wrap your savior up in cellophane

I'm not a church going man. I wasn't in 1999, and I'm not now. Some of my favorite songs in the whole world deal with spiritual rebirth or the longing for personal salvation though. Chocolate Jesus, however, is not one of those songs.

It does sort of present an interesting idea though. I mean, maybe taking a little time out on Sunday to enjoy a little Chocolate Jesus wouldn't be such a bad thing. If it's dark chocolate it's going to be rich in anti-oxidants, which is good for you. And there's a sort of zen-like quality that comes from taking a few moments out of your day to really focus on something. Even if it's something you eat. After all, people focus when they're taking communion. The way I see it, you're just consolidating things.

Come down from the cross, we could use the wood

Ouch. This one could really put someone in their place. You probably want to be careful who you say this to. I can think of a couple relatives that almost got this verbage from me, but I came to my senses before actually saying it. Again, pretty bad ass.

She's my black market baby, she's a diamond that wants to stay coal

I can't stand it when people ask why other people are still single. Hate it. I mean, right now, I wouldn't mind being married. Does that mean that the next person I go out with is THE ONE? No. Not at all.

It's also weird when people ask what "type" you're looking for. Usually I want to say "someone not like you", because usually the people who ask are so not my type. But I think I'm going to start saying that I want a diamond who wants to stay coal. Seriously. That's my line (well, actually Tom's) and I'm sticking with it.

fell in love with a gadget

I knew Apple was going to announce something yesterday. My hopes were that they'd finally reveal an iPod that either had satellite radio capabilities or at least a built in FM tuner. I've held off buying a new iPod for this reason, and thought of all of the new iPods received over the holiday season and how those people would be bummed that Apple one-upped them in much the same way that I was when I bought my Powerbook only to have the Intel version launched just a couple months later. This didn't happen.

Instead they came up with the kind of gadget everybody's been dreaming of since the invention of the cell phone. Finally, it appears as if one small device will be capable of everything we need for life on the go. Phone. Basic computer. MP3 Player. Camera.

Currently I bring my laptop, a cell phone and an ipod to work with me on most days. Sometimes I even bring a digital camera. Of these devices, my cell phone is the one I'm most attached to. I have an office computer I can use, and there's an office stereo and stacks of cds and other people's iPods around to fuel the soundtrack to my work day. But if I forget my cell phone it's like I'm running around naked all day. I can hardly remember what occupied the space in my front left pocket before the cell phone. Sure, I can call in and check my messages from my office phone, but it just isn't the same. I mean, someone could call. Or I might need to call someone. Or there could be an emergency. It's my lifeline to the world basically, even though I would hardly consider myself a heavy user.

With Apple's new iPhone, I would probably leave my laptop and iPod at home. I wouldn't get rid of either. I mean, surely the iPod would still be great for roadtrips, exercising or just about any other occasion when you need to have your musical library with you. And a large screen computer isn't going to go away anytime soon. But for everyday on the go use, I can't think of a better gadget than the iPhone.

I might have to be an early adapter for this one. It comes out in June, which means I guess I better start saving now. This thing is not cheap, at around $499 for the 4 gig model. And I'm sure there will be some bugs in it. But I know as soon as I see one I'm going to have to have it.

Brilliant invention.