HELLC1TYTATTOOFEST 2008-05-16

DEVILCAKE
COLUMBUS CONVENTION CENTER
Mike Gourley
Michael Bill
Steve Osmun
Ian Stewart

This day was literally the exact scenario of the big Devilcake gig-that-kinda-wasn't at Polaris back in 2002 or 2003 or whatever year that was, when we should've opened for Poison/Cinderella/Winger/Faster Pussycat, but were rained out after 20 minutes. Same shit today, only substitute tattooed outcasts for beery mullet-heads.

I debated wearing my cape today, decided against it, tried it on, decided to wear it, wore it as far as MCB's car & realized it was stupid. So it stayed in the car, which is what we all probably should've done!

We got down to the convention center pretty quickly & hung out & waited for the Gourleys & the Osumuns for a while. Eventually they appeared & we made our way upstairs to where the action was. Such as it was.

Unfortunately the event was not held in Battelle Hall, where, as I never tired of telling everyone today, I saw a shitload of arena metal shows in the 80s. Like Cheap Trick/Krokus/Saxon, like Ozzy/Metallica, like KISS three times. Aren't you glad you asked.

But we did get to cut through the Battelle Hall to get to the service elevator so we could bring our shit up on one of those huge industrial flatbed dolly things. Um. It's sad, the end of the old arena where they used to set up the stage is now partitioned in by temporary looking walls. I really wanted to play a song in there just so we could say we played fuckin' Battelle Hall. The old Ohio Center!

So the dolly thing, yeah, we had to wheel that sumbitch allllllllllll the way down two levels of parking garage to get my drums from Gourley's truck thing. It's nice of him to always drive my drums to gigs. So yeah, we loaded all the shit onto the LOUD dolly thing & lumbered alllllllllllllllllllllll the way back up the two levels. It was tiring & hot & I was sweating like a f8cktard before we even played a damn note. Not cool. Literally!

We set up quickly, amid the stares & glares of the assembled freaks. We were, that's right, the freak show at the freak show. Myself & the two Gourleys were probably the only mofos in the house with no tattoos.

The main hall is packed with tattoo artists & booths, I mean if you really wanted 'some ink', you could fully get it done right now, I'm sure. And there's already a few hundred peeps on site, which is pretty good for a Friday afternoon in cowtown, I think.

My fucking drums never fail to fail whenever possible. Usually their shortcomings are at the front of my brain & I'm always aware of which nut needs to be tightened when etc. But the fuckers were playing dirty, they'd wait until the middle of a song to take a shit, but I'm getting ahead of myself. Cheap ass pieces-o-shiiiiite!

They had big video screens beside the stage, with us being projected onto them while we played. Luckily Steve was blocking my view most of the time, it's very disconcerting to see yourself playing on a video screen slightly out of sync with everything else. You know how there's always that .5 second lag with video screens.

What else. We didn't do a soundcheck, the only PA was for vocals so we rocked it Bernie's/Madlab/Midgard style. Meaning none of us could hear shit. Steve & MCB stood the entire time but Gourley sat on a stool. Which was odd.

My drums & I were in different time zones too. It would've helped if I could've played a beat before we started the set. I did my usual air drumming mime drum thing & it was.....nearly adequate. But not quite!

The MC started to announce us & there was a loud gulping sound from Steve's amp. Which was the sound of his tuner pedal giving up the ghost. The battery just went SQUEENDGE v loudly, then....................nothing.

So, the MC is going "okay, here's Devilcake" & Gourley is going "what's up Columbus, we are Devilcake from Columbus Ohio" etc and Steve's guitar seems to be melting down. Fortunately it's as simple as plugging the guitar directly into the amp & we are in biz. Such as it is.

Gourley greets the crowd some more to no avail. Then we start "Cereal & Beer" and the wheels slowly start to come off of the entire set! Hah. From the word go we are in the shit.

I stumbled a few times, quite noticeably, on the drums. In retrospect it was a kind of fresh madness to open with a song I've only drummed on um twice now. I used to struggle with "Wienermobile" on drums for the same reason, it's a pretty uptempo thing & there's lot of little moments of potential greatness available to the drummer. "Wiener" used to destroy me, I have no idea why, & I'm not sure what happened but eventually I made my peace & it's no problem. But "cereal" & I are barely acquainted............. well, anyway, we made a 'pig's ear' of it but at least it was over quickly? & at least everyone else remembered their parts!

we got to the end of the song & no one clapped, not even Rachel, Bethany (gourley's wife) or the dude they brought with them. OOF! it was the sound of no hands clapping, not even in pity!

3 minutes into the set & we were already stankin' up the joint! hbmmbnhghghgh. It sucks because we KNOW that 'cereal & beer' rules, we KNOW it is a wise thing to open the set with it. So what the hell went wrong!!??

Actually the entire set, we never had a chance with the audience. We're the only band for the entire day & it's a mystery why they even bothered having live music. I don't think anyone would've done well on that stage. I could be wrong.

"Guacamole Damn It" seemed at first to be a shot for early redemption, uptempo & old school as it is. But no. It wasn't bad but it did not kick ass.

"Chicken Nuggets of Sin" is where I finally got my head out of my ass long enough to beat the living f8ck out of the drums. Which is the only reason that song exists in the first place, to detonate & destroy my drums! The p1ssersh1tter/paradox is that once my drums were all aligned properly, I just hit them harder & sped their demise even more. The main cymbal stand, literally, started off at about um like 4-5' high. Ended the song at like 3'. It slowly crept down the entire time. The toms were okay, at least. Hah.

"Caramel Knowledge" might've actually been the best we've ever played it, sorry Steve. I've always struggled (for no reason) with the ending, but I finally got a grip on it today. After um two years. I suck. Steve's only song. Come on.

"Sauerkraut" surprisingly went over um not as bad for some reason? I say surprisingly because we though we'd stick to the uptempo end of the pool & not go for the turgid death drones as much. But yeah, maybe I imagined it but it seemed like we locked into that dark dark groove on that one.

"Wienermobile" was okay except for the cymbals all moving around for the entire song. The hi hat clutch seized up at one point. So it was just loose & flappy there & totally closed. But I recovered in time to beat the living shit out of "Soft Batch Mama." I started it alone with my fake "I Love It Loud" beat & threw in my fake Lars fill at the end. & everyone knows by now that I have a visceral love for that song that goes beyond explanation. I'm not, like, proud of the songwriting or the riffs or anything, it's not the greatest thing I've ever done (or is it) but the riff, the lyric, it just touches something deep within me & I can't help but react to it whenever we play it. So, whee. That was fun.

Wait, getting ahead of myself here, the song after "Wienermobile" was "Sacrificial Leg of Lamb," a much easier Darrin song for me to drum to. Gourley nailed all the vocals & Steve is doing this (appropriately) fruity little chord thing at the beginning since the sustained riff, (the whole point of the song) is mooted by the acoustic guitar. It sounds cool though. But I beat the living shit out of the cymbals & stumbled at the end but oh well. It wasn't horrible but it's better when Darrin plays this stuff & I'm able to loom over him, playing bass & trying not to fall on my ass.

"Hands Off My Oreos" was over in a flash & went kinda sorta okay. I feel like that riff at the beginning is just so rad that by the time we build up into the song part, the acoustics really don't do it any justice. & it's not funny that way. Oh well. "Hands Off" is mr million's devilcake legacy right now.

"Marshmallow" went ehhhhhhhhhhhh not badly. It has certainly sounded worse. But no one cared by this point, possibly not even us. No one was clapping between songs, which makes things very strange. Plus there was a camera dude literally in front of the stage, capturing our every gesture, which ... I mean, I'm self conscious enough without thinking about the camera angle of my farmer's blows or whatever.

"Salad Bar Man" ehhhhhhhhhh. Then we got 3/4 way through "I Can't Believe It's Not Satan" before my bass drum pedal came apart in 3 pieces! I finished the songs on all toms & it was just retarded. By then, the crowd was more apathetic than ever. I tried to sort out the pedal with MCB's assistance to no avail.

And then I took the 3 pieces to Steve, meanwhile the MC was on the side of the stage asking if we were finished. We had like 4-5 more songs on the list but we all kinda went "eh, we can be finished now, fuck it". And as soon as the MC said "okay, ladies & gentlemen, Devilcake" Steve reassembled the bass drum pedal, better than ever! Typical!

Ah well. So we broke our shit down, then read this story backwards for what happened next. ie we rolled all the gear back down the service elevator after walking through the Battelle Hall. And um yeah.

Shockingly we did sell a CD. $5 cash money. Not shockingly, Gourley had to pay to get back into the parking garage, which came to $5.

THE END. It's 6pm and it feels like 3am to me. I GOT BLISTAS ON ME FINGAS!!

& I'm all like philosophical about music & playing & all that bullshit, as ya get after a gig. And especially after a gig-gone-unamazingly.

There might be professionally filmed footage of our set, but I actually hope there isn't. We already apologized to everyone once!

WE PLAYED
CEREAL AND BEER
GUACAMOLE DAMN IT
CHICKEN NUGGETS OF SIN
CARAMEL KNOWLEDGE
SAUERKRAUT
WIENERMOBILE
SACRIFICIAL LEG OF LAMB
SOFT BATCH MAMA
HANDS OFF MY OREOS
MARSHMALLOW
SALAD BAR MAN
I CAN'T BELIEVE IT'S NOT SATAN

thanks to Durb and everyone else behind the scenes, everyone was extremely nice, very accomodating, very professional. It was a cool event & we're grateful to even be asked to play.