Dislocated. That's how I feel.
Dislocated from my surrounding,
Dislocated from people.
I'm an observer and not a participant and I like it.
It helps that I'm wearing a mask for Halloween. It deadens the sound of those around me as if I'm under water and gives everything a surreal quality. There's no periphery vision and everything is sharply eyes front focused.
I could get used to this. It fits in with my isolationist mood.
Safely ensconced within it I don't feel the need to smile or make much effort to socially interact with anyone apart from the bare minimum to get by. It's a pleasant break from wearing the usual mask that takes a considerable effort to maintain.
People swim in and out of my vision and my rubbery countenance remains rigidly impassive.
There is a guy about to do an acoustic set called Bareback Obama aka Psychedelia Smith.
A little earlier he had been telling me that it was his thirtieth birthday and he's pretty drunk from the celebrations. A natural gutter raconteur he also filled me in on how he had picked up a young lady earlier, but blew it when he attempted to break wind and followed through with a more solid delivery.
If it was a one off he could have chalked it up to experience, but it's the third time it has happened and he thinks he may have to address the issue sooner rather than later.
On stage he tells everyone to “shut the fuck up and listen” before breaking into something or other that is a bit country, bit blues and a whole lot pissed.
He introduces the second song of the night by telling us it's the last. It's an equally rambling and shambolic affair and about three quarters of the way through it he stops mid refrain and takes his guitar off and proclaims “I'm fucked. That's it.”
I'm impressed, but I'm also unsure of what I want to do next. Wait around to watch “Bloodlust”, a band who owe a great deal to The Birthday Party? Or slip away to the bar upstairs and occupy a stool and nurse a drink?
The bar stool wins by a country mile.
The Universal horror mask comes off and I slip my usual one on instead, stretch the muscles in my face into a smile and I ask for a beer.
No one bothers me.
There is a blue light below the glass top of the bar and it gives the impression that my pint glass is floating, suspended in front of me waiting to be snatched from the air. There is also a two headed cat looking down at me from the wall behind the barman and I feel like I'm a character in the Naked Lunch. Even more so when the bar staff start passing around a pumpkin-head between them to sniff.
One catches my eye and offers me a hit and I feel compelled to accept.
The candle inside has been gently roasting it and the sugar within the pulp is giving it a slightly sweet caramelised odour.
It's nice.
I feel quite happy with the situation.
I'm sitting at a bar with a beer and alternating between having a sip of it and smelling a lobotomised pumpkin-head
It's not what I had planned for the evening, but I roll with it.
On my return to the basement where the bands are playing I find Bloodlust midway through their set. It's better than the lo-fi bootleg quality live tracks that I heard on myspace, but they jar with my mood and I can't get into it.
Tragic City Thieves are in Halloween mode with Stu dressed as a Jedi Master including light saber and other worldly contacts, Jim's a 50's zombie a la Stephen King's “Sometimes they come back” and Div looks like just about anyone who occupies an accident and emergency unit on a friday night anywhere on the west coast of Scotland. He's basically just battered, bruised and bleeding on the floor. Frontman CJ is Betamax man of the Mighty Boosh, but sheds his costume for the performance.
It's the usual high octane affair with a couple of new songs thrown in for good measure.
I'm still waiting for people to get up to speed with these guys though.
Elsewhere in Glasgow there will be people paying far more to see far less talented bands and I can only say it is their loss so often.
Heads need to be removed from rectums, the coffee needs to be smelt, the writing on the wall needs to be read blah, blah, blah.
People just need to go and see this band, and keep going back to see them.
Tonight it's a poor turnout and there is a lack of atmosphere that contagiously spreads an apathetic vibe throughout the small basement.
The band are fighting it and energetically ripping it up, but the flickering flame they are trying to fan is stubbornly refusing to ignite into anything bigger.
It's heart-rendingly difficult to watch four guys give it their all and receive so little in return.
I firmly believe that if Tragic City Thieves were on the cover of kerrang or NME that they would be headlining a sold out show in one of the bigger venues and be lauded as home town heroes.
It pisses me off that this patronage by mainstream magazines needs to be in place before anyone gives a rats arse.
Lazy fuckin' sheeple pretending to be scene fashionistas bore me to tears.
It's slightly raining when I step outside and it's cold. Very cold.
I wish I was sniffing on pumpkin and wearing my mask.
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