Band practice was a bust. Vanessa woke up too late, forgot the mic, and overall I just said fuck it. They're bringing out amps, we're giving them their stuff, and the band is officially totally dead. Considering the luck of our band, it only makes sense.

Last day in San Francisco, and I am so totally bummed. I really don't want to leave, haha. I'm moving back here ASAP-- goal is still six months, which works out to October. Earlier if possible, but we'll see. And please do not mention how expensive it is here, I've been hearing that for years and I'm painfully aware of it. kthx

So for my last day I'm gonna grab lunch with Kenne, hang with Marlene, then get to the airport by 5 and be back in WA around 8.

Speaking of why I'm in San Francisco, the conference was pretty rad. Not knowing what to expect, it was actually a WAY larger affair than I could've hoped for. Altogether, 25 or so people showed up to our workshop, The QPOC Unicorn: Where are all the queer PUNKS of color? Some came specifically becase the name was so awesome. Q&A was rad, lots of involvement, good music was had, learned of new bands myself, and even pimped out my band and comic a bit.

I've been super inspired by this city as far as my comic goes, too. Not the city itself, but something in the air got my brain going. I think I'm ready to outline, finally.

Oh yeah, band has a show on the 10th. Haven't said anything 'cause it's in Tacoma, and no one on my list is from there. Oh well ^_^

Time to poop now.

So I'm still highly on the fence about Apropos. Alicia posted a blog on myspace today wherein she took responsibility for the blow-out, and admitted some fault overall. It's not exactly what I was hoping for from her, but it's still actually more than I was expecting. Overall, I feel a bit better about the situation but I still need some cool down time.

But as luck may have it, there's a dude I've been talking to every once and a while. He works at the corner gas station I go to a lot for drinks and junk. He just moved up here from California with his wife, and he's been looking to get into a band. I talked to him tonight and talked about the situation, and he definitely wants to jam.

I listened to his stuff too, and he's really good. I have no idea what we're gonna do-- if we're gonna start a new project, or if we're gonna try and bring him into Apropos as Vanessa replacement.

I'm just not sure what's going on right now. But it may work out okay.

Going to TCC tomorrow with Eric, see about getting into community college for now.

1_ I filed my tax return, and it's been accepted. Soon enough I shall have some money so I can buy myself a new PC. It's a bitter-sweet thing, 'cause now this means I have to cancel my plans on heading down to California in the summer.

2_ I've talked about it with the band, and while they're not fully supportive for their own reasons they agree, I think, that we need to kick Vanessa. Tomorrow is gonna suck.

3_ Working on a Firefly fic. Anyone interested in beta'ing it in a while?

4_ My friend Mitch made me some Death Head fan art! How neat is that? I don't even have a real comic, and yet I have fan art. His name is Chase Donovan, only after I forced Mitch to name him, haha.



5_ Speaking of death, I was playing Left 4 Dead versus and on one level my team UTTERLY ANNIHILATED the other team in less than a minute. I know I don't talk much game stuff here, but that was worth noting. Almost as epic as when I was made tank on the rooftop, jumped into the helicopter and killed EVERYONE.

I've pretty much decided we need to kick Vanessa out of the band and find a new guitarist. Now it's a matter of doing it and not losing a friend over it...

The show last night was totally awesome, our demo sucks ass right now, I'm so tired I want to just sleep all day, and there's a lot of pr0n in my friendslist. I think it's a good day.

Read yesterdays tweets to get a good idea of how insanely busy I was.

So tomorrow before the show we're going into the studio one more time to finish our demo. Tonight, after eight months of having a song with no lyrics, I've completed something I'm happy of. In celebration, here's the lyrics for all four of our songs on our EP! Hurrah!

( The Flesh I Leave, DMZ, What The Bullet Sang, and Sing You Sinners )

PS: We totally did not get on Queer Control Records. Bummer, but we didn't have anything to show them yet.

REMEMBER!

What'cha doing for Mardis Gras? If you come by, you'll get a free copy of the new Apropos demo even before it goes online!

Going into the studio tomorrow. Nervous, 'cause I don't have all the lyrics for the songs we're gonna record for the demo written. I'm awful at writing lyrics-- terrible, I know. I want them to mean something, but they never fully work for me. Eh. Well, in any case, here's what we're doing.

( The Flesh I Leave, DMZ, Sing You Sinners, You Me, and possibly What The Bullet Sang )

Dear Late Brunch I just made,

You pretty much rock. Gordon Ramsey is a golden god from on high. Next time, I'll be more prepared to make better sides-- though the cooked ham-lone and pepperoni pieces with toasted hamburger bun lightly buttered was still pretty bomb.

I should have had tea instead of coke, though...

In other news, Apropos has another show with Innuendo and Offtrak at the Funhouse in Seattle (across from the EMP) on February 24th! Starts at 9:30, 5 bucks, 21+.

In even further other news, I'm applying for scholarships for a college I'm not exactly enrolled in yet. But if I want to go to this school, I need the money to pay for it. It's weird, but I'm doing it anyway (on their recommendation). Let's see what happens.

Hrm, maybe next time I can slice some avocados and tomatoes with my breakfast...

It's a punk show where only one band is punk. Totally. Awesome.

Speaking of my band, we're going to be recording an album soon-- if all goes according to plan. At this rate, no. And we'll need a new guitarist. Awe. Some.

PS: Never chase a lesbian in a truck while wielding an axe. She'll peal out and kick up rocks at you. Ouch.

Apropos has a show on the 31st in South Prairie at the Wagon Wheel, same place we played before. My Seattle friends should consider going-- 'cause it's totally free (albeit way the fuck out there). I promise it'll be a good time... until you discover the bear traps on the dance floor. Then it's amazing.

We're playing with The Americommies, Innuendo, Fun Fun Fun, Destruction Island, and another one I think. A few of the bands are still iffy.

SETLIST:
Equality Now
The Flesh I Leave
DMZ
What The Bullet Sang
Sing You Sinners
Yu+Me
New Hurt
OneWord
He's A Creature (if we can get it solid by the set)

FUN TIMES!

Last night was hella fun. For Apropos' first show, we had a hell of an awesome reaction from the kids who endured the snow to see some free punk rock. I'll give you a breakdown of the night.

After a short practice, a broke down truck, and an hour trip on the road we show up at The Wagon Wheel not sure what to expect. But hot damn, the parking lot is packed and a crowd of punk heads are standing outside smoking. We load our equipment and stand around awkwardly for a bit, trying to figure out what's going on. At one point we overhear someone talking to these two kids with a video camera "Man, stop recording us! Go talk to those guys! They're in a band."

"What band?"

"I dunno, nobody knows how to say their name."

I shout across the room, "APROPOS! UH-PRO-PO! Silent S, unless you're American."

They record us, and we talk about being a queercore band and stuff. When I get the video I'm posting the hell out of it. So after a bit the bands start.

To start out we had Three Days Ago, aptly named because they had formed three days ago. They were metal, but not bad at all. Kind of reminded me of weirdlovemaker's band, whats-their-name. I don't know metal that well, but I liked them.

Next up was an acoustic guy named Eli Kay. Did nothing but covers of mostly 90s songs, and had a punk drummer backing him up. Altogether he was pretty rad, really nice vocals.

Apropos was third in the line-up, which was better than we were expecting as far as placement goes. We loaded up, turned on, and after a bit of hesitation on Alicia's part (goddamned drummers, too damned talkative) we broke out into our first song. Here's our setlist, with commentary (I fucking love listing things).

Equality Now is our intro song. It's straight ahead punk with simple repetitive vocals: What do we want? Equality! When do we want it? Right now! It's supposed to be gang vocals, like a protest chant, but the others didn't learn the vocals (my fault) so it was alright. The crowd perked up right on this song, 'cause they were all punk kids and the two bands before were decidedly not punk. Big cheers after that one.

Next up was The Flesh I Leave which I kinda fucked up. There weren't a whole lot of people there, maybe 50, and most were sitting in chairs-- but this is when we got our first introduction to our dancers for the night. Just one guy at first, then three, haha, all hardcore dancers. Fun stuff.

I introduced Hurt as our shittiest song of the night. It's a kinda ska song that none of us quite have right, and the lyrics aren't finished. But everybody got into it.

We followed that with our New Song, which we had just written this week. It's slow right now 'cause, y'know, it's our new song. Not much reaction during, but people liked it still.

After the new song I dropped my guitar for What The Bullet Sang, mostly because I don't know the lyrics in full for this song. The reason for not knowing them yet is because the song is actually a poem by Bret Harte of the same name, so it's a bit tougher to commit it to memory despite how much I love the words. During this song I ran into the crowd, around the whole bar, and generally acted a'fool. I got mad props on it later, which is always nice ^_^

I picked up the guitar again for Sing You Sinners, which kinda blew because I can't seem to write lyrics for this song, so I 1) fucked up my (lead) guitar stuff trying to remember what I had, and 2) fucked up the lyrics like crazy. One of our best songs ruined by me, haha. Still, though, pit went crazy (what there was of it).

The last song we had planned out was DMZ, which went fine until the bridge when Eric seemed to forget there WAS a bridge, and everything kinda got jacked. We ended it out alright. I was a bit surprised by the lack of pit on that song, since it's our hardest song. Whatever, it was still cool.

After that they kept telling us to play more-- specifically to do covers (I know they were messing around, but I like to mess back). So I turned around and told Alicia to just do a punk beat, and Eric y Vanessa to just go from 5 to 7 real fast. It sounded like ass, I screamed incoherently, and there was actually a pit, haha. I called the song Every Punk Song You've Ever Heard.

They weren't content with that and kept calling for an encore. So I went into the crowd with the mic and was like "Okay, so then... what do you want to hear?" One guy said "Elton John!" I turned to the other guy, and he said "SLAYER!" So I went back on stage and said "Alright, Vanessa. Drop the guitar. Eric, just play something fast and scary. We're gonna do an Elton John song as done by Slayer, as done by Death From Above 1979." So Eric and Alicia just played whatever for a long time while Vanessa and I screamed randomly into the mics. I, again, went into the crowd and went between screaming the same line, then shoving the mic in someones face. Sometimes they'd scream, sometime's they'd give me that look like "OMG! What're you doing?!" It was awesome. Best part was this guy was there with his two younger girls, so I put the mic in front of the younger girl and she took a second before screaming something, haha. Totally awesome. She looked happy.

Ironically, during the song I came up with a really great idea of turning it into an actual song, so next practice we're going to write what is now called God Save The USA! (We're Not Okay, Baby)

Finally, long after our time limit was up, we were like "Alright, we're done!" But we weren't. They wanted a cover, so I shouted "ALRIGHT! I concede! We're gonna do a cover! We're gonna cover a song that we already played tonight!"

Someone in the crowd, who turned out to be Nick from The Distracted, came forward and was like "OH SHIT! You're gonna play a cover... of a song you already played tonight?"

"WHICH IS," I continued, "A cover of an 18th century poem!"

"That is the most punk rock thing I've ever heard."

So I grabbed the mic and, deciding my voice was giving out, asked if anyone else wanted to sing the song. After a moment this one kid shouted "ME!" and came up front. I asked if he even wanted the lyrics to which he emphatically shouted "HELL NO!" So, we broke into the song and he started screaming whatever. Halfway through the song he handed the mic over to Nick, and disappeared. LAter Nick informed me that the lyrics went "Elvis couldn't finish the song because he had to pee!" Elvis being the guy who was singing.

It was an awesome way to end the set.

As we were breaking down every one of us got bombarded by people giving us props. A lot of 'em were surprised it was our first show, haha.

The next band was Innuendo. They were fucking outstanding. A lot of guys were hounding on them 'cause it was two hot chicks and a bushy-bearded drummer. But they were legitimately awesome, and I want to play more shows with them.

After them was The Distracted. Some good straight up punk fucking rock. Again, totally want to play shows with them.

Last up, and the guys who threw the whole thing together, were The Americommies. Goddamn, the place blew up when they went on. So much so a fight broke out in the middle of their set-- srsly. It was pretty lame, but it got contained and dissipated. I, unfortunately, decided to take that particular time to go outside and take a few photos, so I missed the whole thing. What I did catch of their show, though, was sick. Crazy good live.

We were invited to an after party with the Americommies and whoever else was going, but by that point it was snowing pretty hard and we were far from home. Drive home was kinda scary, but we made it.

So instead of going to an afterparty, Eric and I went home and got well rested so we could take a walk through the park and take fancy photos of the snow, then got tea at the local cafe. Pinkies up. Now I'm knitting a scarf.

God, I'm so gay sometimes.

Drawings of everyone in Apropos. Photo reference, ball point pen over pencil, and a touch of photoshop for border and background. Begun, finished, and uploaded within six hours. All four, even! Neat.

Current set-list for Apropos:

Apropos / Intro song
The Flesh I Leave
DMZ
Hurt
What The Bullet Sang
Azrael

Songs we're working on:

Robots Dream Electric
He's A Creature

Just updated the shit out of the band's page. Go check it out, add us, and comment like you love us*!



* Fake it if you have to.

http://www.myspace.com/AproposPunk
http://www.myspace.com/AproposPunk
http://www.myspace.com/AproposPunk

http://www.myspace.com/AproposPunk

My band, Apropos, recorded a shitty demo yesterday on a tiny tape recorder, haha, and we put it on myspace! WOO! Go listen to that shit. It's only our third practice and we just added a new guitarist, but it's still fun.

Pardon Me - Song about gay bashing. The only one we actually have a full real song for, but no second guitar.
Unbelievable - About heartbreak. Vanessa sings this one, using Alisha's lyrics. This was literally the second time we played it, and everyone was on different instruments (I was drumming, Eric on guitar, Alisha on bass, Vanessa singing). It's totally sick for that.
Azrael - Song about the mythology of Satan, totally making up the words as I went along.
These Bombs Save Lives - Going to be a song about donating blood, and how the Red Cross and Canadian blood donation system totally discriminate against gays hardcore.

http://www.myspace.com/apropospunk
http://www.myspace.com/apropospunk
http://www.myspace.com/apropospunk

1) Recorded a rough EP for my band Apropos. Hella.
2) Got a second guitarist for Apropos in the form of Vanessa. Super.
3) Ate pizza and watched hentai with the mates. Awesome.
4) Didn't work on my comic, nor the fic like I promised Nari. Balls.
5) Applied to be a new writer at Pink Kryptonite. Hope!
6) Learned that not only are Hugh Jackman and Leiv Schreiber in the forthcoming Wolverine movie, but so is Ryan Reynolds as Deadpool. Illustration.



7) Went to bed. G'NIGHT!