Doktor Ross Sewage

Dateline: San Antonio. There was something I was supposed to remember in this town. Something someone said to remember. Whatev.

This was the first show of the tour with Kylesa. No lie, I was worried about their gear set up and staging everything in some of these places. Two drummers, keys, a theremin… what with our already full set up, this could get messy backstage.

I shouldn’t have worried. Kylesa are total road dogs and eminent pros. I’ve known Phillip and Laura for some time and they know what they’re doing. The rest of their crew is also top notch dudes. The shows are going to go smooth.

It was fun to surprise at least Laura with my appearance. I’ve surprised her before, showing up with Wolves in the Throne Room. With this band, she didn’t know I was one of the goons with a bag on his head. What a proud life to lead.

We headed to hot and humid Corpus Christi next. It was like driving into an old Voivod record cover, what with all the oil refineries. The downtown also was kinda like a ghost town. Maybe Körgull had laid waste to the citizenry. Nah, once it was show time, they all came out and we had an amazing show.

At this show I had to acquire a fan for my amp. I’m stunned how hard it is to find a clip-on work fan these days. See, Beefcake’s head broke, so he took Jase’s from Legacy of Disorder. Unfortunately, the GWAR stage set up requires things to be strapped down. So now Jase is using my old-ass Ampeg V4-B, which he apparently digs the fuck outta. But in this climate and running twice as long, I’ll be damned to blow out a transformer from overheating for lack of a $20 fan.

One girl in the crowd unwittingly showed us how to do the Graveyard Mosh. We’ve been playing that song since the beginning, but no one ever though about how it was done. It was awesome. Stick your arms out, head down, and start goose-stepping like Boris Karloff as the Mummy.

This guy also came out with the best unofficial GWAR costume yet. Beef-fake the Mighty. We were trying to figure out why he would wear something so heavy to a show in this hot place. Then I noticed every girl in the place wanted a photo with him. Smooooth.

The next day we headed to New Orleans for a one-off show away from tour. We were headlining a punk show at Siberia, the best metal / punk dive in NOLA. Maybe the only one?

It was a lot like a show back home… plenty of cavewomen and crusty dudes outside spanging and not coming in, and then plenty of punks on the inside. Some of the GWAR and Legacy of Disorder camp came out on their night off (to see yet another show?) and we had a great time. Total anarchy. Sammy from Goatwhore and Dez from High on Fire also attending was an awesome surprise. We headed to the French Quarter and drank away.

best shirt ever

Our troupe got separated as we headed to the van. I called Balzac, who’d been with him last. In hushed tones I heard, “yeah?” “Is Dino with you?” I asked, which he quietly confirmed. “Why are you so quiet?” I questioned. “We hopped the wall into the cemetery. Bye!”

The next day we drove through the ghetto in the lower ninth ward. Boarded up houses, closed schools with signs that hadn’t changed since 2005… Meanwhile in the French Quarter, lotsa white folks were walking round sippin’ on $5 lattes and buying tees that said “I got Bourbon-Faced on Shit Street”. Oi vey. NOLA, you’re a sad ghost of your former self.

On the way into Florida, I got one of my favorite regional treats. Mostly found in Georgia and Florida, so far as I can tell… boiled peanuts. I wish these were EVERYWHERE. They look like the inside of a teste, and they taste as good as one, too! Seriously, these are amazing.

We had a great show in Pensacola, FL that night and then drove all night to Orlando. The show was a bit of a cluster, having two venues run simultaneously side-by-side with largely the same crew. Three tour buses had to find parking, along with all the openers’ vans. All the spare tables for merch had been used up, so I jerry-rigged one for us and Legacy of Disorder out of a broken bathroom stall door I found in the back. That other show had a bunch of fancy hair cuts, tight jeans, and that new breed of hardcore tee that looks like it should be on Pauly D. from Jeresy Shore instead of at a “rock” venue. I wanted nothing to do with that.

The show went fine. As fine as it could while I took center stage because of the shallow space. My feet were literally up to the edge of the stage with Dino’s cymbal stands in my back. I proceeded to get drunk. Very drunk. I also had the best veggie dogs of my life from this dear street vendor. I ate four or five, I can’t remember. I just know I couldn’t stop.

Gerrity, who’d done merch for Municipal Waste, came to the show and by the end was unofficial caretaker of me and our van. Dan and Dino split with GWAR while the others went to lodge at a condo that Jim, (our merch guy) had secured with his sister. Gerrity DD’d my ass over to his friends’ place. Daniel, guitarist for Possessed, and his lovely girlfriend Lyndsey, put me up and made sure our van was safe in their driveway.

Sean, Scott, Jim, and I met up the next day to head to Jacksonville Beach. Having arrived early with GWAR, Dan had acquired quite nice looking sunburn while surfing, or whatever hippies like him from Santa Cruz do at the beach.

The show went great, and we drove all night (again) to Asheville, NC. I was impressed, never having been here, by the amazing cross-over of latte-sipping liberal hipster and gun-toting redneck, livin’ side-by-side. Kinda like Portland, but more rifles.

Asheville really is beautiful, too, with rolling hills and lush, green foliage. And monuments to the Confederacy. Well, ya can’t win ’em all. Anyway, the Orange Peel, where we played, was awesome with a huuuge stage and much ass was kicked. The next morning, we woke up to a flat tire in the hotel parking lot. It made us a little late, but I’ll thank my lucky stars it wasn’t a blow out.

We headed out the next morning to North Myrtle Beach for another House of Blues, Inc. gig. Nothing says down home southern blues like a chain of corporate interest held music venues decorated with the same kind of dedication to homogenization as a Starbucks. The super cool part about was any entertainer at the House of Blues got a free pass to the park next door, Alligator Adventure!!!

I can’t say enough about how cool it was to be able to hold a small alligator. I think they’re fucking cute buggers. All full of hate and cold blood. And the chinese alligators, the albino alligators, the amazonian crocs, the malaysian crocs, the 20′ croc… Holy snap. It’s geared to families, obviously, but I made the lone reptile showman give me, Laura, and Matt Maguire the full-on reptile lecture he’d give any school group.

Afterwards, I headed to the beach. It was beautiful at sunset, but a little depressing that all but one entrance for miles around was private. This is a beach for rich folk, and I got many funny looks as an interloper.

The show was as ridiculous as we’ve had yet. I’m pretty sure everyone was a little sauced as we bantered the night away. The playing? I don’t recall. I headed over to the Olive Garden to see my family, as advertised, and then passed the F out.

I woke up in Richmond, VA. We had stopped at Jim’s for a visit on the way to Baltimore. He went to his doctor. Turns out he’s had walking pneumonia. Shit. I’ll bet he’s not the only one as the sickness has been passed through all the bands this our. Ugh. I always wanted our metal to be the sickest, but this is ridiculous.

On April the Sixth, we returned. Our port of call was San Francisco, the homeland. We were to play the fabulous Regency Ballroom, where I’d seen GWAR a number of times before. Now, I was gonna share the stage with them for the best audience of all: family.

Yes, that’s Ma, Bro, and Sister Sewage in attendance and doused with a tidbit of blood. Pa couldn’t make it, he was watching over the littlest Sewage, my niece. I seriously have the best family ever.

We also had an amazing show. We’ve honed our act, tightened our chops, and delivered one of our tightest sets ever for our beloved Bay Area. We got to see a lot of friends and loved ones.

Sadly, my poor girlfriend was eaten by the World Maggot. She will be missed, until I can sift her outta the pile of maggot poo I collected. Here’s the tragic video. Try to guess which one she is! (hint: it’s not the dude)

It was hard to leave the next day, sleeping for just one night in my own bed. Alas, Reno waited! Reno, the biggest little shitty in the world. Reno is what Las Vegas would look like if it retired, lost its pension because its former employer declared bankruptcy, and then had to work as a Wal-Mart greeter so it could afford arthritis medication.

I was starting to feel under the weather AGAIN this night, maybe that affected my ‘tude. Still, we had a fun show and hung out afterwards in the casinos. I didn’t win anything, but I was gifted some much needed new socks for the rest of tour! Viva la différence.

We charged out of Reno into the Nevada desert towards Las Vegas. There were ghost towns galore, run down Indian reservations, and so many crumbled buildings with no one left to tell their stories. It’s no wonder the Air Force could hide something so well in plain sight out here. When I entered it into Google Maps on my phone, though, it just pops up. Area 51.

At least I think we saw Area 51. Or one of the gates to it. Who the hell knows, really? It was a long drive out of our way, dodging free range cows that sat in the middle of a darkened highway. Down a dirt road for twenty minutes, and we found an ominous fence. A door was slammed as we approached. I guess this was it.

And that was that. We headed out but not before stopping by the Little Áléinn for some souvenirs and completely average grub from one of the most foul mouthed line cooks I’ve ever encountered. Dino: “$7? That’s a lot for a cheese sandwich.” Cook: “It’s a fucking good god damn cheese sandwich.” Etc. A scene from the movie “Paul” was also shot here, but that’s hardly interesting because that movie wasn’t good.

We made it to Vegas that same night and met up with a small faction of the GWAR camp at the Double Down, Vegas’ filthiest bung hole punk dive. I highly recommend the “Ass Juice.” It’ll fuck your shit up good, as it did me, exacerbating my sickness further.

The next day I holed up in our hotel room. My throat felt like I’d gargled razor blades. Writing this days later, it still feels rough. This tour, though so amazing and maybe the best I’ve ever been on, has been a petri dish of communicable diseases from the get go. I wasn’t too sad to miss Vegas in the day, though. This town is full tourist douche bags. It’s built on artifice and vice. I don’t like to gamble, I can’t afford the shows, and so the whole artificial oasis sucking up so much energy and water in the desert is entirely lost on me. That said, we had a great show, though my personal worst due to feeling like I got mauled by a tiger in a magic act. Too soon?

Sadly, we would become bereft of Cartel Brownbuzzardepicbeard. He was doing sound for us and Municipal Waste, as well as tour managing for the Waste. He was leaving the tour this night, the first casualty of the Waste’s limited time on this tour. This was dose of reality that the magic would inevitably come to a close.

Tuesday reared its ugly head and our drunk asses had to be woken up for a drive to Salt Lake City. We were playing at the Great Saltair, which we thought was the location of filming for the classic flick Carnival of Souls. Unfortunately, it was not. The original location burnt down. Still, the place is cool, located on the Great Salt Lake itself. It smells like shit walking towards it, with scores of dead birds who’ve apparently tried to drink the over-salinated water. Stupid birds. According to those who swam in it (I did not) it was refreshing… until the salt starts to tingle and then burn your skin. It’s quite a sight to watch people walk for hundreds of yards in the shallow yet enormous lake and still only stay waist deep.

Thursday was the final day for Municipal Waste on the tour as we headed into Fort Collins, Colorado. The club was tiny tiny, and the security barrier was gone. Ruh roh! To add to the chaos, Mr. Tony Foresta was suffering more of the illness that was besetting the whole tour. Unfortunately for him, a sore throat seriously impinged his raison d’être. As a consequence, the night before in SLC, he’d made a sign up sheet for Municipal Waste karaoke. Lots of folks on the tour joined in, included a couple hooded menaces.

At the end, we all jumped up and let the Waste know they fucked us up… real good. Sayonara, fellas. Touring with these old friends was the amazing fun experience I imagined it would be. It’s weird when your expectations are actually met. In celebration of the tour, spew tech Germ doled out some final matching tattoo work to the Waste folks and a few of our own.

That blurry finger on the lens wasn’t a mistake… seriously, I’m not that bad a photographer. I’m blocking shit. You’d thank me.

From Colorado to… San Antonio, Texas. Fuck, that’s a long drive. We had to have a day off and drive all night to make the 20 hour trek. Plus, we added one hour for a little tourist diversion before the show that awaits us tonight. We had to see… who would survive and what would be left of them!

If you don’t recognize that building from a massacre that happened round these parts years past, then the saw is probably not part of your family.

If I have any more fun today, I don’t think I can take it!

Doktor Ross Sewage

Maybe I should’ve shut my stinkin’ trap about how smooth things had been going. Breaky brakey!

We had a four score of fun in Lincoln, NE. Lincoln was particularly fun watching all the whitest ever Ed Hardy wearing douche bags go out on the Friday night pub crawl. We got to watch one get arrested and taken down after trying to cold cock his friend and then resist arrest. It’s fun when you get to cheer for the cops beating the shit out of some one, and oh so rare.

We rocked out in Boulder, CO. Grand Junction was grand. We were all a bit zoned out from some night drives as we rolled into Flagstaff early. It was about time that we got the rebuilt transmission checked out at another AAMCO. BAH!!!!

The trailer was dropped and the van went up on the lift. And then it sat there. We watched across the street from a diner as the van was not let back down. This is a bad sign. Turns out, the front rotors needed replacing and some coolant tubing was leaking that was missed when we had the rebuild done in New Jersey. This free van of ours was costing us a lot of money.

The staff was friendly and took us and our trailer to the show over at the Orpheum Theater. They said they’d have the van done by five o’clock, and indeed they did. It cost us a bunch, but we hope, we pray, this is it. The show in Flagstaff was great and we saw a lot of friends out in force for that one.

For this tour we’ve upped our game a bit, taking notes from Every Time I Die and Gwar on the last tour. We’ve incorporated wireless systems into our rigs. This is hardly punk, but when you’ve got a robot and a proto-human fighting on your stage while trying to play, having the ability to nimbly get around becomes paramount.

That’s my new, and more expensive than my own amplifier, wireless unit. My Sansamp Bass DDI sits atop it. The wireless receiver is part of the Sennheiser ew172 G3 wireless pack made for guitar and bass. I was looking into the previous model, a G2, but it turns out that it doesn’t carry the full note frequency below 40Hz. That’s theoretically detrimental to my bass. Tuned to D standard, my lowest note is 36Hz. The G3 goes down to 25Hz. It also has infinitely more transmitting frequencies available than its predecessor. I can’t say I’m stoked on investing so much on something made after 1980, but we really needed it for these kinds of shows. I can bounce around stage so much easier these days.

We drove all night yet again to San Diego. Heading into California I was excited, until I was stopped at three different checkpoints along Interstate 8, the most fascist of American interstates. The border guards took especial delight in asking me why my face was covered in red dye. Try explaining shock rock to a guy looking for trucks full of Mexicans. It was all worth it to get to some California air and sunshine and play an awesome sold out show at the House of Blues. I even got to pull apart a fight between some dick bag and the lady security guard he was hitting! Reminds me of all those old blues houses along the delta, alright, right along with the nine dollar beers.

Apropos of little is this awesome picture of Sean at our friend Doug’s house in San Diego. Coolest house ever, with a coffin entertainment center, multiple skeletons in the wall, and secret compartments everywhere.

We made our way to Ventura the next day and more much needed California sunshine and weather. We hit the beach, looking kinda like the gang that Frankie and Annette were going to have to expel in order to save the Big Kahuna hut along the shore that all the kids did the twist at.

The show was loads of fun with lots more friends coming out again. Joel from Toxic Holocaust sang a ditty with Municipal Waste, which gave time for Tony to drive onto stage on a pink scooter with a pink sparkly helmet in an attempt to emulate Judas Priest. I think even Rob Halford would’ve said, “That looks a little gay.” But what fun!

Another night drive, and we showed up to the Senator theater in Chico, CA. Hippies abounded. Fuck hippies. Good god, there was more burnouts here than in an Oakland sideshow. The show itself was a lot of fun, though. The kids raged and we got great back stage seats to see GWAR. We’re still a little desperate for cashola, though I didn’t have any idea how much until the band tried to auction me off.

Luckily, Ross Sewage is not an in demand product round those parts. Halfway through our tour, we head home for a night in a city we all left our hearts in… and a few hearts we dug up along the way.

Doktor Ross Sewage

The best part of the last week is that there has been so little to write about. After the drama and problems of the previous week, we’ve had a largely smooth ride of it. Like the Bones Brigade, we just been rolling.

We drove all night to Toledo, Ohio and arrived early at Headliner’s. According to Jim, a terrible teevee show, but according to Jim the GWAR truck driver, he was surprised to not see us late. Yipes. Anyway, we took the extra time to get an oil change, an oft forgotten piece of tour maintenance.

Headliner’s was… interesting. It’s a place in flux. So much so that the backstage toilet was installed DURING the show. The load out was a bit chaotic as well. It started raining and our trailer was unhooked because a jack ass parked in front of our unhooked trailet. Who does that? Luckily, someone from the club, or we’d have been figgedity fucked moving the trailer to the load out area like pack of bipedal mules.

Lexington, KY was next and a total surprise at the awesomeness of it all. Not saying I expected anything less, it was just over the top awesome fun with an absolutely mad crowd. We got to hang with our friends in the Hookers and had a smashing time.

Joliet, IL was a bit rough. The entire tour took over the tiny kitchen area for a backstage. The GWAR “castle” had to be downsized to a split level apartment to fit the tiny stage. I played next to the staircase, literally menacing people headed to the mezzanine face-to-face. It was another great night, though, and we got to meet the artist of our album cover, Bill Hauser. Awesome artist and great guy!

On the way to Wisconsin, I picked up a rather important piece of new gear. See, I got sick of hacking up from being a weak addict, so I’m trying out the eCig. So far, it’s helping me cut down and I’m digging it.

One thing I don’t mind be addicted to is Wisconsin cheese. Near the Majestic Theater in Madison I had the second best ever bowl of mac ‘n’ cheese ever. First best? Unicorn in Seattle. Oh yeah, the show was great, too! Fuck, this is boring. Everything is great.

Madison was another nice night when we met our new pals Kristen and Mercedes. Kristen took good care of us and ripped it up as punk rock DJ at her pad and made sure we got fed the next day.

In Des Moines, I got to meet up with my friends Krista and Josh. Krista met Josh at an Impaled show in Des Moines some years ago and they ended up married. Impaled brings love! And G.O.R.E.! The show was great. Again. Sigh.

Next we drove into the night to Tulsa. Muggy, muggy Tulsa. This show was a bit more worrisome, being that it was earlier and I was afraid the tigers wouldn’t even be outta school before we went on. I was wrong. Another great show. Holy shit tards, something best go wrong soon or this journal is gonna be dull as fuck. Well, at least Dave Brockie finally got to meet his hero, Oderus Urungus.

Now we’ve had a day off between Tulsa and Lincoln. We’re in ghettotel and recuperating for more awesomeness to come. And some of us have decided the best way to beat a cold is to galavant about town, drinking until they puke on themselves. You say tomato, I say potato.

If this continues, I may have to just start breaking things for something to do. Time for a relaxing swim in the lovely pool.

First day of the tour, and already things were getting tense within the band. Sometimes aggression just has to be vented, and sometimes that just takes a machete to the head.

Right up to the last minute, we were working on props and running errands all over Richmond. I was pretty disappointed that we didn’t have time to see the Slave Pit. Maybe at the end of tour.

Continue reading “Ghoulection 2012: Transmission One” →

It was a dark and stormy night. Then she rolled in… a grey dame who needed some work. I was gonna ride her like Mitt Romney’s convictions… all over the place.

Thanks to all the kiddies who donated, we got ourselves a van. It was better than ideal… it was available. A ’94 Ford E-350 Club Wagon Van. For that year, the mileage is low, like the point of a career after making “Jack and Jill.”

After purchasing the van in SF, we took it to a shop. It ended up needing more work than the citizens of the state with the currently most unemployed, i.e. Nevada. Our weekend of doing interior work to the van was shot full of more holes than a “suspect” detained by the BART police. We had to begin our work around 7PM, the very night before we were gonna 23 skidoo.

The previous owner had installed a loft and a vintage loveseat. All it was missing was a fixed gear on the roof to really be from San Fran. Sean and I ripped out the loveseat like a pair of divorcees… he took half. We ended up dumping that sofa in Oakland like… like all the other fucking sofas that are dumped around Oakland.

The loft was made well with back doors in the back that locked. It was big, a queen size. The exact dimensions required by one Elizabeth II. Not being beholden to the commonwealth, we cut that fucker down about a foot. We had to fit in a coupla benches so our band of roving troubadours could sleep like a real touring band… homeless.

To bolt down the bench, I thought we’d have to make new holes like a Roman decorating his cross. Sean had the idea to move the mountain to Mohammed, or in modern parlance, move the building to the plane. We’d move the legs of the benches to fit the stock mounting holes in the van. I drilled some holes and used some self-tapping bolts for the job. By Tuesday 1AM, we were more finished than a crappy rock band dressed like monsters winning the Eurovision Song Contest.

5AM and we were on our way. We packed up our shit like a port-a-potty attendant and headed on our way to Richmond, VA. The rain was coming down on us hard and thick, like Peter North after drinking a banana smoothie. I checked my smart phone and the prognosis was bad… blizzards, and not the kind that come with crumbled Oreos. We turned away from our path towards the Sierras and headed towards the Mojave, instead. We wouldn’t be heading through all those weird, NASCAR-lovin’ pro-lifin’ militia-havin’ immigrant-huntin’ guv’ment-hatin’ states, rather we’d be headin through those other weird, NASCAR-lovin’ pro-lifin’ militia-havin’ immigrant-huntin’ guv’ment-hatin’ states. America, truly the melting pot.

And somehow, magically, after a 3,000 miles long drive we’ll be in Antarctica livin with monsters like Kurt Russell in the best horror movie ever made. Disagree? “Yeah, well fuck you, too!” But first, taco night at Jim’s in Richmond. It’s so nice to be back in my jammy pants.

For a list of the tour dates we’re going on with GWAR, Municipal Waste, and Kylesa check out it out here. 

Doktor Ross Sewage
www.doktorsewage.com