Been a long time...

So Stuart and I went back to San Francisco at the end of June for the At the Gates/Repulsion/Darkest Hour/Municipal Waste tour stop at the Fillmore. Municipal Waste sucked as expected, but every other band KILLED IT. Even Darkest Hour, whose latest two albums have sucked, and hard. I picked up some more sick vinyl, too:

• Lack of Interest - Never Back Down on red vinyl
  
• Unholy Grave/The Grade Grubbers split on blue vinyl
  
• Agathocles/Black Army Jacket split
• Insect Warfare/Flagitious Idiosyncrasy in the Dilapidation split
• Rudimentary Peni - No More Pain EP on clear vinyl
• MK Ultra/Seein' Red split
• Los Crudos/Spitboy split

I swear Thrillhouse is my new favorite record store. Every time I've been in there I have found a trove of awesome shit these bay area "punks" don't even know about! Check out the rest of my collection, and trade or sell me your grind/punk/hc records.

With classes resuming today, summer is officially at a close. I'm back in school, still working in the library, still trying to keep Grinchfinger's momentum going. I moved in with my new room mate, Juan, on Saturday. We have a sick studio with a kitchenette and bathroom, but these IT folks did not bother putting in our ethernet ports, so we are temporarily without internet access... My schedule this semester is:

• Eng1101
• Urban Ecology
• Astronomy
• Environmental Sociology

I really couldnt ask for a better schedule- my earliest class, I think, is at 10:45. The only thing I'm really dreading is the 4 hour astronomy lab every Thursday nite. I think I will be a successful Sam this year though, I can feel it in my bones. I learned the secrets to success by nearly failing last semester, and I will be able to apply them this year.

I also found my camera and its charger this summer. Soon these will be REAL blog posts, with PICTURES!!

Summertime

After finals, my grades were not bad enough to cripple my academic career, after all.

LSK-Pass
SCI-B
PSY-C
MAT-C
ART-B

This year I feel I am robbed of a summer break, at least partially, for the first time. No longer do I have three months to ramble aimlessly, driving the wheels off my car, and working fast food jobs to support adolescent drug habits. Being now content to live a life of the mind, as close to the Frankensteinian lifestyle as possible, I will be working, living, and attending class on Mercer's campus over the course of the upcoming summer. The last vestige of my youth will be a trip to San Francisco to visit my mother, acquire new long players, and finally relax. I have two tickets for the At the Gates/Repulsion/Darkest Hour/Municipal Waste set at the Fillmore in SF on July 25th. Though the AtG "Slaughter of the Soul" lineup/album is not my favorite, Darkest Hour is trapped in Boring Metal Land, and Municipal Waste shamelessly apes D.R.I., I expect the show to be good. I am most looking forward to the Repulsion set, which 5 years ago I never believed would happen. Hope springs eternal.

The Two Man Gentlemen Band - Heavy Petting (2008)

A couple of years ago, the neo-Americana genre really took off with releases from O'Death and The Old Scratch Revival Singers. While championing a once-neglected, distinctly American/spiritual sound, the direction of the artists can become muddled- post-Squirrel Nut Zippers/Modest Mouse trappings, post-hardcore snarling, young white guys from the Midwest imitating old black guys from the South, etc. Fortunately for The Two Man Gentlemen Band, they have managed to avoid all these cliches with finesse. Dressed to the nines and kazoos in hand, professional buskers and raconteurs "Smilin'" Andy Bean and "The Councilman" Fuller Condon have crafted their finest album to date.

Released in 2008, Heavy Petting is the third album the Gentlemen have recorded for Serious Business Records. Sometimes swinging Charlestonian numbers, other times ragtime, or even a hint of Western flavor, the Gentlemen's "one style, all occasions" has found a definitive voice on this disc. Minimalist in every sense of the word (bass, banjo, kazoo, voice, and the occasional session drummer), the Gentlemen have most importantly converted an aging American form of composition to viable contemporary entertainment, complete with overt sexual innuendo. Stand out tracks include "William Howard Taft", "A Gentleman Knows How to Love", and "When Your Lips are Playing my Kazoo".