christ666's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- There is no other pill to take, so swallow the one that made you ill There was a good, long duration of time during the band’s lifetime when we played shows to almost no people. Between Boise not having as much of a metal scene as we do now, and the band just not having the age or experience to gain traction with fans, there were several times when I’d come to a venue completely exhilarated to play a packed show, only to go home disappointed at the poor attendance. Sometimes we’d open for bigger touring band’s or get a spot on metal festivals in other cities, gigs that would fill the venues with a sea of heshers and punks, only for all of them to vacate for a smoke break during our set. It was so persistent that I’ve now been psychologically conditioned to believe every show is gonna turn out bad in some way or another. Nowadays, with the metal scene much more active and vibrant, and with the little collection of fans we’ve been able to amass over the last few years, things are so much better for the band. Though, I do still carry that pessimism whenever I show up to a venue to play now. Ironically, the times I still feel most confident and impressive are when I’m performing, so it stands to reason that not long after Heather and I connected, I’ve been wanting her to see me play at a show. I invited her to the Suffocation show back in March, but she wasn’t able to make it, and at the time I believed I had been saved some embarrassment considering we had made an obvious fuckup during that set. We decided to add a song from the first album that we haven’t played in a couple of years, and even after rehearsing it plenty of times during the practices leading up to the show, Brandon got lost in the middle of the song, and the confusion on stage was distractingly apparent. No matter. The next Imposter show coming up was in May, and Heather was adamant that she was going. The last charity show in October went very well, though I always felt a little haunted by a couple of performance mistakes on my part. For one, I completely skipped a verse on the first song, forcing the band to follow my lead and rush ahead. For another, I accidentally started one of our encore songs in the wrong tuning, and didn’t realize until halfway through. But we decided to do a follow up charity in the spring with an updated Rage set, and I was dead set to redeem myself by locking in those goddamned Morello riffs and shredding the shit out of them. Between my out-of-character determination, and my excitement at Heather seeing me play, I was actually excited for the show. In fact, things were going so well between me and her that there was this spiritual certainty that the show was going to be epic, and I was going to completely bewitch her with my guitar playing, solidifying myself in her eyes as the man of her dreams. Wwweeeeellllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll…………… On the day of the show, I dropped off the kids with their mom, and drove to Heather’s to pick her up. She answered the door dressed in a Mortal shirt (one I had given her to wear when she stayed at my place), very short black denim shorts, fishnet stockings, and big, fuck-you, black leather boots, looking unbelievably sexy. We made a quick stop at the bomb shelter to grab my amp and cab, and to show off our practice space, then arrived at the Shredder later in the afternoon, finding the rest of the band chatting in the parking lot. I introduced everyone to Heather, and she had zero problems jumping into the conversation and mingling. The soundguy arrived a little later to unlock the gate, and we backlined our gear before soundchecking around 6:00. The time from soundcheck to our set was actually great. We got to watch a few awesome bands perform, and I got to show off my hot, young girlfriend to a lot of my friends in the scene. We even got to make our first reel of cute snapshots together as a couple before heavily making out in the Shredder’s photo booth. By the time I had to retreat into the green room to warm up and get psyched for the set, I was on cloud nine thinking I was invincible. It was time. We walked onto the stage in front of a HUGE crowd, Eric gave a speech about the homeless in Boise and the charity we were benefiting, Boise Mutual Aid to thunderous applause, and then the first four hits of the hi hat counted us off. We started the set with Testify. I hit my wah pedal and began the opening riff, scratching my pick on the guitar string, Neil tapping his drumsticks on the snare, both of us gradually increasing our volume as the buildup began to swell. Kevin comes in on the bass, Eric paces the stage, bodies are starting to move in excitement as the hook riff is near, and I see Heather close to the front of the stage smiling at me. I know no fear. I am a musician. On the downbeat of the very first hook, I brought down my foot with a heavy, exuberant stomp to turn off the Wah pedal…. and kicked almost all of my pedal set up off of the stage into the crowd. The hook (the opening riff that is supposed to make the entire crowd headbang and jump with enthusiasm) was being played by just bass and drums while I frantically retrieved my hardware from the gracious patrons in front of the stage monitors. It’s not until the second verse, a full minute and thirty second, that I finally had everything plugged back in and the sound of my guitar joined the rest of the band. But what’s this? The tuning was wrong. As we finished Testify and immediately jumped into Bulls On Parade, the pitch of my guitar would ever so slightly shift upwards, and it takes until the middle of the second song for me to realize that the vibrations of Neal’s kick drum through the sound system was so bombastic that it was shifting the position of the Whammy pedal I was using. I then had to be cognizant that every time I was finished using it for a lick, I had to switch it off. And as if that wasn’t enough of a showstarter, right after we finished Bulls, a patch cable in my pedal system had become detached, causing me to lose signal right before we started Take the Power Back as our third song in the set. In a panic again, I began the process of troubleshooting the issue while Kevin and Neal try and ramp up the audience as a distraction, which didn’t really work considering it took me about 30 seconds to notice the cable as the problem. 30 seconds might not seem like a long time, but when the show comes to a standstill and hundreds of people are staring at you while you try and remedy a rookie performance problem, it feels like an eternity. Once the issue was resolved, we jumped into the song proper, and somehow by the grace of the universe, we hadn’t lost the audience. Eric’s vocals were on point, Kevin’s bass slapping was incredibly funky, Neal kept everything grooving on the drums, and I even nailed my solo better than the last performance in October. By the end of the song, you wouldn’t have even thought all those fucking issues had occurred with all the screams and applause. It was at this moment when my eyes met Heather’s, her smiling at me while I gave her an exasperated “whelp ¯_(ツ)_/¯” expression. It was the only time I caught her glance since I avoided her eye contact for the rest of the set out of shame. Even though my mood had immediately soured by my cosmic humbling, the rest of the set was actually pretty good. We played a lot of the same songs from the last show, but a few new ones that really got the audience exploding with energy. They carried that intensity up until the very last song, which almost salvaged the night for me…. … if not for the very last riff, which began with me stepping to the edge of the stage, goading the audience for one last display of movement as I began ramping up the guitar. I’m center stage, spotlight on me, their cheers flowing in my direction as the music gained momentum. The drums kicked in and every one was jumping, myself hopping from one part of the stage to the other, the last hook of the song. Two measures in, my knee gives out as my meniscus tears again, an injury from high school that never properly healed, and I immediately fall to my ass. If I could have, I would have committed seppuku right there. Nobody cared, or course. I was able to immediately get back up, hobbling slightly as we finished the song. People cheered and clapped, I retreated backstage and sat on the couch behind the stage riser, contemplating whether this was the right time for me to quit music all together. Heather would find me a few minutes later to tell me how awesome I did, and how proud she was, telling me she couldn’t believe I was her boyfriend, etc. etc. She’s a good sport lol. It was a huge embarrassment. I think I’m going to be more haunted by this performance than the show in October. But, we actually ended up raising more money than before, and despite all the mistakes that I made, the rest of the band did not seem deterred from scheduling the first rehearsals for the next charity show. I don’t know. My reaction to the night is pretty binary. On the one hand, I’m mortified that this was the first time that Heather got to see me play, but on the other, I can’t help but be amused at how “in theme” the night ended up being. She ended up seeing me play again with Mortal at the Atheist show just last month, which ended up not being a bad performance for being scheduled so last minute. I guess what I take away from all of this is that I need to not put so much thought into how well or terrible a show is going to go, and should instead just invest in a new pedal board, and some more self awareness. But, I’m thankful the rest of the musicians I play with still consider me worthy of inclusion. The next Imposter charity show will be in October again, this time to cover White Zombie’s Astro Creep 2000, and we’re currently leaving towards raising funds for the Boise Trans Collective. I’m also thankful to know Heather will be there to support me :) There’s more to update, but it’ll have to be another time 6:00 a.m. - 2023-07-10 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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