Alejandro Escovedo In-Store @ Elizabeth Records, Monday February 24th, 1 pm. CANCELLED CANCELLED CANCELLED

Hey gang - It's 11:40 am on Monday morning, February 24th, and Pencilstorm has just learned that today's signing session with Alejandro Escovedo has been cancelled for today, possibly rescheduled for April.  Alejandro has been battling a stomach flu the last couple of gigs and wanted to rest before tonight's Kent Stage show in Kent, Ohio.  That show (with Peter Buck of REM) is still on but the Elizabeth Records meet & greet is OFF.

Sorry to bring this news, but wanted to get the word out.  Thanks.

Hey folks, Pencilstorm fully realizes this is truly short notice, but we just found out that Alejandro Escovedo - whom many of us consider a truly legendary practitioner of the art of the rock & roll - will be doing an in-store "signing session" at Elizabeth Records, 3037 Indianola Avenue (right by Studio 35 Cinema) on Monday, February 24th, at 1 pm.  We talked briefly to somebody at the store and she indicated that Alejandro won't actually be playing at the store, it's more a "meet & greet" and Alejandro will be signing items fans bring in.

(The phone number at Elizabeth's is 569-6009.  It probably couldn't hurt to call Monday morning to make sure the in-store is still on.  It's taking place between shows Alejandro is doing with Peter Buck of REM on Sunday night at Stuart's Opera House in Nelsonville and Monday night at Kent, Ohio's truly great Kent Stage venue.  After doing in-stores with both Watershed and Hamell On Trial, I've learned it's always best to double-check.)  (IN LIGHT OF TODAY'S CANCELLATION, I'M GLAD THAT WE RAN THIS.  SORRY FOR THE INCONVENIENCE.) 

Pencilstorm further fully realizes that some people have jobs and can't just fuck-off to the local neighborhood record store in the middle of the day to meet their rock & roll heroes, but COME ON, it's Alejandro Escovedo, for Chrissakes!  At any rate, Colin & Ricki C. will be there bothering Alejandro and trying to monopolize the conversation, so why don't you take your lunch hour late on Monday and drop by? 

(Following is a piece Ricki C. did on Escovedo in his Growing Old With Rock & Roll blog, March 16, 2012.)

Occasionally in my job as road manager for Hamell On Trial there were perks; genuine perks, epic perks, once-in-a-lifetime perks.  One of those took place in the summer of 2008 when I got to meet and hang out with Alejandro Escovedo.

For the uninitiated, I consider Alejandro Escovedo one of the five best singer-songwriters currently criss-crossing this great land of ours, trying to spread the gospel of rock & roll.  (The other four, for those of you scoring at home are, alphabetically; The Avett Brothers, Hamell On Trial, Richard Thompson, and Jack White.  Elliott Murphy would be listed here but he is normally found crisscrossing the European continent.)  I further consider Escovedo America’s answer to Ian Hunter, in that he combines the same superior intellect with a passion for rock & roll power and the ability to simultaneously break your heart with a ballad and pummel you with an all-out rock onslaught, sometimes within the same song.  (Regular readers of this blog will realize I do not throw comparisons to Mott The Hoople’s former frontman around lightly.)

That summer Hamell was playing an arts & music festival in Bowling Green, Ohio, at which Escovedo was also booked.  Ed and Alejandro were friends from way back.  When Ed first moved to Austin, Texas, in the 90’s he sought out Escovedo for advice, counsel and gigs, all three of which Alejandro was happy to provide.  A genuine friendship ensued.  Ed’s introduction of me to Alejandro backstage was, "This is my road manager, Ricki C., he saw The Stooges and The MC5 live when he was still in high school."  Alejandro fixed me with a gaze, shook my hand, and said, "We have to talk later."

And so it was that I wound up sitting at a picnic table at The Black Swamp Arts Festival in Bowling Green, Ohio, talking rock & roll with Alejandro Escovedo.

Now you’ve gotta understand – Alejandro Escovedo is one of my big rock & roll heroes, one of my favorite songwriters of the past 15 years.  Sitting and talking with him put me right back into my shy, quiet, 13-year old, eighth grade self (see The Transistor Radio blog entry, January 2012).  As we sat and talked on that warm evening I found myself really wanting to shout to the other performers and crew members who were eating & hanging out in the backstage canteen area, "HEY, LOOK YOU GUYS, I’M TALKING TO ALEJANDRO ESCOVEDO!!!"  Luckily for any sense of rock & roll cool or decorum I had managed to acquire as Hamell’s road manager, I didn’t shout.  (Out loud.)

We talked about Mott The Hoople and how the perfect mixture of deep feeling and loud guitars met right in the blood flowing through Ian Hunter’s heart.  We talked about The Kinks and the battles between brothers in rock & roll bands, including Alejandro’s and big brother Javier’s fights in their 1980’s band, The True Believers.  We talked about the aforementioned Stooges and MC5.  I told Alejandro about pissing next to a smacked-out & wasted Johnny Thunders in the bathroom of the Second Chance club in Ann Arbor, Michigan, in 1979 during a weekend road trip to see Fred Smith’s mighty Sonic’s Rendezvous Band.  Alejandro told me about offering a wasted Iggy Pop a ride in his car during one of Iggy’s down & out late 1970’s Los Angeles nights.  (Strange how often rock & roll conversations turn to the wasted.)  We talked about heroes for life, we talked about wins and losses, we talked about shared sonic love affairs.

I fully realize that there’s very little chance Alejandro would recall that late summer rock & roll conversation.  I also fully realize that I’ll never forget it.

Ricki C. / March 16th, 2012

"The Common Man" Was Wrong About LaQuinton Ross

I was driving around killing brains cells listening to sports radio on Thursday when the host, "The Common Man" started throwing around the words "stupid" and "idiot" when describing Ohio State Basketball player LaQuinton Ross. "Q" had fallen out of favor with the 97.1 intelligentsia  when the previous night he shoved a Northwestern player and was thrown out of the game with a double technical foul. 

I was at the game with my ten year old son and I applauded Q when was escorted from the court.

"Whoa. Hold on, psycho sports dad. You applauded a player for being thrown out of a game? What kind of message does that send to your son?"

Okay, fair question. Hear me out. The Buckeyes were up 16 points with about five minutes left. Some goon for Northwestern intentionally picked a fight with OSU center Amir Williams. He pushed Amir out of bounds and then threw a punch at him. He then proceeded to stand on OSU's home court and start running his mouth. LaQuinton came up and gave him a good hard push. Considering the situation, I thought it was a fairly well-reasoned response.

For a Buckeye team that has been accused by many - including The Common Man - of looking passive and disinterested on the court, I was happy to see somebody step up and show a little fire. Would it have been better if Q stood by as an opposing player threw a punch at his teammate and started talking trash? On our court? And to make matters worse, a Northwestern player? (Nerd.)

The way I saw it, Q was standing up for a teammate. He didn't throw a punch. He didn't jeopardize the outcome of the game. He just sent a clear message that this sort of behavior wasn't going to be tolerated in front of the home crowd. Good for him.

Admittedly, it's a fine line between being a good teammate and igniting a malice at the palace, but in sports, as in life, most decisions are somewhere in the gray area. I thought Q handled the situation pretty well. Go Bucks.

Colin Gawel could have just called into the show but decided this would be easier. He writes things sometimes for Pencilstorm. Learn more by clicking here.

Below: This is not the way to handle an heated situation. 

Uploaded by l_XxJiMaYYxX_l on 2012-12-05.

Bode Miller: Point/Counterpoint by Ricki C.

Wow, this is an odd coincidence – or maybe not so odd considering that the Olympic Games are in full swing, the other TV channels won’t counter-program against them and are thereby in full rerun mode and until today it was too shitty in this long, cold, hard winter to do anything but veg-out in front of the TV – but I was preparing my own piece on the Olympics when I read Wal Ozello’s apology to Bode Miller.

I’ve never met Wal, but considering the blogs I’ve read by him on Pencilstorm, I bet we’d get along famously.  That being said, I couldn’t disagree with him more about Bode Miller.  (I don’t think we’ve ever had a Point/Counterpoint segment thus far on Pencilstorm, have we?)

Here’s my deal on the Olympic Games: my lovely wife Debbie – who, believe me, could CARE LESS about sports on any level at any time – every two years becomes an absolute slave to the lure of the Olympics.  NBC realizes this, of course, as pointed out in Ozello’s piece.  Non-sports fans like Debbie DO want to get the human interest slant on the athletes as opposed to just the sports accomplishments of said performers.

And let’s face facts, Olympic athletes ARE performers nowadays: just like rock stars, TV & movie stars, politicians, reality-show participants, idiots who actually demean themselves to go on American Idol, Dennis Rodman, Kim Jong Un, and the latest poor schmuck who winds up being interviewed on the Weather Channel when he’s involved in a massive car, truck & bus pileup during this particularly cruel, snow-blasted winter.  

Unfortunately, in this People magazine/Entertainment Tonight/TMZ celebrity-obsessed culture in which we live, the problem is that we have to keep creating celebrities to fill up all the 300 channels our televisions now accommodate.  (And – Drunk Uncle Alert – don’t even get me started on DVR’s, Netflix, iTunes, binge viewing and kids watching everything on their Smartphones.  Debbie and I still own – and utilize – a roughly 20-year old VCR.)  Thirty years ago, when – for example – Johnny Carson had the only late-night talk show, you actually had to BE a celebrity to get booked.  Now, with Jimmy Fallon, Jimmy Kimmel, Arsenio Hall, Craig Ferguson and my particular favorite, David Letterman, (not to mention Oprah, Ellen, Piers Morgan, E-network, The ladies of The View, et. al.) needing to Feed The Machine, just about ANYBODY is accorded Celebrity Status just to fill up space and talk show couches. 

(Ricki, focus: Bode Miller, we’re talkin’ about Bode Miller.  I know, I know, I know, I’m GETTING there.)

Okay, here’s my problem with Bode Miller specifically – and, by extension almost all Olympic athletes, or by a Larger Extension, any celebrity.  In the little Fawning Celebrity Tribute NBC put together for Mr. Miller’s Sunday night’s Snow Theatrics we were told, among other things, that Bode has two children – two and five years old (by two different mothers, incidentally, which they kinda glossed over, if ya get my drift) – and a younger brother who died from a seizure episode after a helmet-less motorcycle crash years earlier.

NBC delivers this heart-warming montage of info over a shot of Miller’s wife – whom, by the way, he married after knowing her for all of five months – Mrs. Bode Miller.  (I admit, I didn’t catch her name.)  The NBC voiceover identifies the lovely, blonde, former beach volleyball player Mrs. Miller as, of course, “the love of Bode’s life.”  (I found myself wondering aloud to Debbie how the mothers of Miller’s two children felt about that designation when I bet both of them once thought of themselves as “the loves of Bode’s life.”  But that’s the kind of asshole I am, so you can take that with a grain of salt.)  (Also, I find myself wondering whether beach blanket blondie will still be Mrs. Bode Miller two years from now.  Or even a year from now.  But again, that’s just the kind of asshole I am.)

Here’s my point, and then I’ll get out of your hair and off your computer-screen: I grew up on the West Side of Columbus, Ohio.  If we were dealing with a 36 year-old man with two illegitimate kids under six from two different baby mamas and a younger brother who wrecked his dirt bike and later died, we’d have just called ‘em Lowlife White Trash, not Hallowed Sports Hero, anointed as such to feed the Celebrity Threshing Machine.

And Wal, I gotta say, I don’t think for one single, solitary moment that Bode Miller was crying over the memory of his brother.  I think he was crying on accounta ‘cuz he was bringing home a Bronze medal from Sochi instead of a Gold, and he was picturing his projected Bigtime Endorsement Money from Nike, Gatorade, Cadillac and Cialis slip-slidin’ away.  (But that’s the kind of asshole I am.) – Ricki C. / February 19th, 2014.

(coming up – possibly – in a future segment of my Olympic diatribe/coverage: Why those girls in Pussy Riot are more bad-ass than Van Halen ever THOUGHT about being,  why Americans only seem to care about GOLD medals, and Olympic commercials that are making me wanna pull an Elvis on my TV.)

Learn more about Ricki C and other Pencilstorm contributors by clicking here.

Open Apology To Bode Miller by Wal Ozello

Dear Bode:

I'm sorry.

The other night after you won the Bronze Medal for Alpine Skiing Men's Super-G some reporter badgered you with questions about your brother who recently died. It was awful. She basically harassed you into crying and after you broke down the camera stayed on you. The whole nation watched you crouching on the ground balling your eyes out.

But it's not the reporter's fault. She was only doing what her boss asked her to do. It's not her boss' fault either. She's only doing what the Network asked her to do.  See, a couple of months ago someone like me who watches on average 7-10 hours of Winter Olympic Coverage sat in a Focus Group and told someone that I'd increase the number of hours I watch to 10-15 if there were more stories about the people.

I guess seeing you compete on the highest world stage and push yourself to your physical limits wasn't amazing enough for me.  I had to have a "human" element as well. I wanted to know whether or not your dead brother had anything to do with your spectacular run.

I realize now that was an asshole move of me. That I have brothers as well. And if someone would have stuck a camera inches from my face after probably my last time competing in the Olympics, and asked me if I did it for my brother who had passed less than a year ago, well... let's just say you handled it much better than I would.

So in closing, I just wanted to reiterate that I'm sorry that my sports viewing habits dictates the need to have a human element. In the future I'll try to be just impressed with your athletic achievements. (They are rather impressive by the way.)

Oh... and honestly I'm sincerely sorry about your brother. May he rest in peace.

Wal Ozello is the author of Assignment 1989: The Time Travel Wars and is the lead singer of the Columbus hairband Armada. He's a resident of Upper Arlington, Ohio and a frequent customer at Colin's Coffee.

In 1979 Ricki C. Had Lunch With AC/DC. No, really, seriously.......

(apropos of last week's Bruce Springsteen "Highway To Hell" video-grab, we at pencilstorm thought we would run Ricki C.'s close encounter with Bon Scott & the boys in AC/DC, which originally ran in Growing Old With Rock & Roll back in April, 2012.)

In June of 1979 I was working in the warehouse of a K-Mart discount store on the West Side of Columbus, Ohio, and writing for a rock weekly called Focus.  My one and only cover story for the magazine came when they sent me to interview Bon Scott of AC/DC at a downtown hotel and then cover their concert that night.  (Said cover story is reproduced below.)  My boss at K-Mart, Mike Mills (not the later bass player of REM), gave me an extra-long lunch break to go downtown for the interview, which was scheduled for 11 am.  I thought that was an unusually early call for a rocker like Bon Scott, and I was proved correct.  A few minutes before noon Bon staggered into the Holiday Inn conference room I had been ensconced in by an Atlantic Records publicity woman.  She had run out of excuses for Bon’s tardiness about a half-hour earlier and had left me to my own devices.

Bon was great.  He was already drunk at 11:55 in the morning, introduced himself and we got right down to the business at hand.  By my third question – "Have you ever had an orgasm onstage?" – I think Scott had realized that this wasn’t going to be a pro forma interview.  He grabbed my notebook away from me and demanded, "What else you gonna ask me then, if I ever fucked me mudder?"  By 1 pm when the Atlantic Records woman came in to call a halt to the proceedings Bon and I were laughing along like old friends.  I got him to autograph my baseball glove (I was big into softball from my 20’s to my 40’s) and then had to explain the entire concept of the sport to Bon, which he claimed never ever to have been aware of. "Sounds stoopid," was his one-word estimation of America’s pastime, "doesn’t anybody ever get punched in the mouth like in rugby?"

Publicity woman said, "We’ve got to go now, Bon, lunch is ready."  We shook hands as I stood up to leave and Bon said, "Where do ya go now?"  I told him I had to go back to the store where I worked.  "’Ave you had lunch, then?" he asked.  "No, I’ll have something at work," I replied.  "Well, stay and ‘ave lunch with us," Bon said.  "He’s not having lunch with us, Bon," the Atlantic Records lady cut in.  "Do you wanna stay and ‘ave lunch?" Bon reiterated.  "Yeah, I’d love to," I said.  Ms. Atlantic was now staring daggers at me, she was totally pissed at my lack of professionalism, but my only thought was that I was going to get a much better lunch out of this deal than the K-Mart cafeteria had to offer.

At lunch I was seated across from Angus and Malcolm Young, all the way at the other end of the table from Bon.  I think that was my punishment from the publicity woman for cadging my way into the meal.  They had cordoned off a corner of the dining room for the band because back in the day you had to have a coat & tie to eat in the dining room of the Downtown Holiday Inn.  (The hotel is still there, it’s the one right across the street from the Greyhound Bus Station.  I’d be willing to bet that you don’t have to have a coat & tie to eat there anymore.  And I also bet that nowadays you just might be able to get crack from room service, or at least from a bellhop.)

Angus and Malcolm never said a word to me.  And I soon discovered that Angus couldn’t order his own meal.  I just sat and stared as he perused the large, leather-bound Holiday Inn menu, then turned to his older brother Malcolm and slurred, "WhasshouldI’ave, Malcolm?"  "Have whatever you want, Angus." came the curt reply.  Malcolm didn’t even look from his own menu to answer his little brother.

Angus returned to looking intently at his menu, narrowing his eyes and hunkering down to make it abundantly clear he was really giving it his utmost consideration. "ShouldI’avebreakfussorlunch, Malcolm?"  It was a plaintive question from the notoriously fierce little lead guitarist.  "Have whatever you want, Angus!" was the testy, shot-back reply from Elder Sibling.

In the end, of course, Malcolm wound up ordering Angus’ meal for him.  Just as inevitably, when the food arrived, Angus took one quick look at his plate, one longing look at his brother’s dish, and asked sheepishly, "Can I have some of your food, Malcolm?"  Malcolm never replied, completely ignored his little brother, and the two never exchanged another word for the rest of the meal.  There would be no sharing.  It was genuinely sad to watch Angus pick at his food in that swank hotel dining room.  He couldn’t have eaten more than four bites.

That was my first glimpse into the bubble that rock stars exist inside of on big-time rock & roll tours.  To this day I don’t know whether Angus Young just couldn’t decide what he wanted to eat that afternoon or if he literally COULD NOT READ the menu.  At any rate, the editors at Focus took out virtually all of my lunch story, as they thought it would piss off Atlantic Records if I implied in print that Angus Young was illiterate.  (I had already caused RCA Records to pull all of their advertising for two entire issues when I suggested that Canadian metal-clowns Triumph "wouldn’t know rock & roll if it fucked them in a closet," in a derogatory live review earlier that year.)  They also changed Bon Scott from already drunk at noon to hung-over.

Eight months later, February 19th, 1980, Bon Scott was dead from some combination of alcohol poisoning, aspiration of vomit or hypothermia, depending on which magazine you read and who you believe.  At any rate, massive amounts of alcohol were involved.  When I heard about it I thought back to that June afternoon.  Bon Scott was the happiest pre-noon drunk guy I had ever or have yet ever encountered.  Some rock stars just are not supposed to get old.  Would I enjoy watching a 65 year old Keith Moon embarrass himself on some endless Who-reunion tour in 2012?  Nope.  Do I wish Pete Townshend had lived up to his hope and died before he got old?  Sometimes.

Bon Scott, salut.

Valentine's Day is Like Passing the Football. Three Things Can Happen and Two are Bad by Wal Ozello

Maybe it’s just me, but I think Valentine’s Day sucks for just about everybody. It doesn’t promote love. It promotes disappointment.

Ohio State Football Coach Woody Hayes used to say, “There are three things that can happen when you pass, two of them are bad.” Valentine’s Day is a lot like passing the football. You hope that the receiver is going to catch your well placed perfect pass and you’re going to end up scoring. Chances are you’re going to fumble during the snap.

There’s too much pressure on this holiday - for everyone.

Let’s say you’re single. Your week starts and ends in disappointment. You’ll have to field questions of “What are you doing on Valentine’s Day?”, listen to others talk about what they’re doing on Valentine’s Day, watch your friends get flowers and then actually experience the day/evening alone – thinking everybody else is happier than you. Well I got news for you, us “in a relationship” people are just as miserable.

The “Let’s Make This Night Special” couples are totally screwed. Totally. The guy goes crazy trying to secure reservations to the most expensive restaurant in town, trying to coordinate flower delivery, buy chocolates/jewelry/presents, and then check his plan with his buddies to make sure he’s got all bases covered. The girl goes through at least twelve different clothing outfits to make sure she’s going to look her best, including the bra and panties just in case something happens.  I knew a girl that had 18 different bras to make her boobs look 18 different ways. That’s an immense amount of pressure. There are so many variables to this evening that chances are expectations won’t be met and the evening will end in disaster.

Which brings us to the next group, “Let’s Do Nothing.” This group are big fat liars. Because the week starts off with truces and pacts that they won’t buy anything for the other person but one (or both) will be breaking their agreement. We hear what all our friends and coworkers are doing, the guilt sets in, and we think we need to do something as well to express our love to each other. “Let’s Do Nothing” slowly turns into, “Well, let’s at least go out to dinner at our favorite restaurant,” or “Don’t get me anything but flowers would be nice,” or “I know we promised no gifts but I got you this card.”  Before you know it one person is set back $150 and disappointed that they didn’t get anything in return. Worse yet the other person feels guilty a day or two later because they didn’t do anything. BOOM. V-Day creates angst, guilt, and pain instead of love.

But there’s one other final group – those that are so blissfully in love that “we don’t need Valentine’s Day” to show their love. Seriously, these people exist. A couple friend of mine posted on facebook that they sincerely don’t need a special holiday to express their love – they do it every day. Now I know some of you just threw up in your mouth a little bit when you read that, but I think about this for a moment.

Wouldn’t that be awesome? To have a warm loving feeling all year long instead of one night of perfect explosive passion that may never come to fruition?

Maybe love should be more like a solid Rushing Game – trying to get just a few yards every play to get to the next first down. Then after a series of great first downs you get a touchdown (or at least a field goal). For you single folks, that’s a smile to someone at the bar or a friendly conversation with someone while you’re in the line at the grocery store. All those things can build up and lead to something else. For us “in a relationship” that’s a peck on the cheek, holding hands, or a simple “I love you.” No pressure. Just a little romance.

So let’s cancel Valentine’s Day next year. Or at least turn it into a “wine” version of St. Patrick’s Day. Who’s with me?

Wal Ozello is the author of Assignment 1989: The Time Travel Wars and is the lead singer of the Columbus hairband Armada. He's a resident of Upper Arlington, Ohio and a frequent customer at Colin's Coffee. He hopes his wife didn't read this blog entry.