HORSE THE BLOG #3: PLAYIN’ IT SAFE — THE NEW PAAAAAARTY!
[For the duration of their current North American tour which runs through the end of November, HORSE the Band keyboardist Erik Engstrom, aka Lord Gold, will be posting tour blogs from the road, exclusively here at MetalSucks. This week Erik enlighten us on the intricacies of sucking dick on the way to the top. Be sure to check out HORSE the band on MySpace, and catch them on tour. Also check out Blog Entry #1 and Entry #2.]
Everyone in a metal band knows that in order to become a rockstar you need to give some gentle rimjobs and come-from-behind ball massages to truly make it to the top. It’s not about music, fans, or not giving a fuck. It’s about attitude. And by attitude I mean acting mature and having a pleasant, respectful, middle-of-the-line demeanor with the promoter of the show, venue staff, audience, and/or any industry people who happen to be in attendance. In order to become a rockstar you need to Play it Safe.
It’s important.
It’s a “career decision”. I didn’t get into heavy music because I felt something lacking in conventional society, I got into heavy music because I felt it to be a wise monetary strategy with a vast, untapped market potential and room for additional business infrastructure.
Our booking agent recently got a complaint email from a promoter about our “disgusting” conduct. We were “rude, late, unprofessional, and drinking with underage girls in the parking lot”.
WELL I WILL EAT MY HAT! A rock band on tour didn’t show up on time?! And then got drunk and tried to pass their boredom by hooking up with girls?! REEEEEEE (car tires screeching) BY PERSIUS’ FLUTE! Now, sadly, we can never play Spartanburg, South Carolina again. I mean, in our defense we usually go volunteer at the soup kitchen before shows start, or build churches. But this day was different, and evidently this type of sickening behavior is completely unacceptable under the charter of the Metal Professionals Union.
What we should have done was arrive to the venue for load in at 3 o’clock. You know… 3 o’clock, definitely the time an opening band’s equipment has to be on stage in order for a show to start at 7 pm. That way bands can get their shit on stage in about 10 minutes and then sit in the fucking GREEN ROOM for 4 FUCKING HOURS UNTIL DOORS (which is when beer finally shows up, maybe). Thank you for the gift of life. I will waste mine away in a sticky, black and red little room with 18 dudes on laptops and sit on a flat of water so I can make this promoter feel a sense of security that his show is running smoothly. Then I will do that EVERY FUCKING DAY OF MY LIFE.
Once Beer Comes O’clock is a reasonable time to get to a show. Once beer comes you can start to forget how you already wasted 8 hours of your life driving to the show that day, and probably shouldn’t be alive because a guy in your band drives with the philosophy “If I hear a rumble strip, I’ll look at the road (but keep texting)” But wait. DON’T DRINK YOUR BEERS! Keep it cool man. Sip on 1 after the show. Or else you might get DRUNK!!!!!!!!!!!!
You might play a few notes wrong and your band will have an intervention with you. You might lose 3.8 fans. What’s worse, you might stray from your verbatim nightly band/audience script and OFFEND someone! You might come off awkward! You might saw the legs off a vanity backstage and then it will collapse the next time someone leans on it (guilty). You might do something memorable with your life. You might laugh, or pee on something that isn’t a toilet, or hook up with an ugly chick, or run away before the venue can steal a percentage of your merch, or even HAVE FUN ON TOUR. Your band might fail entirely if you don’t show the proper respect to people who make their living off you, are most definitely ripping you off in at least 5 columns on your contract, and are for the most part next-to-retarded.
So. I recommend to keep playing it safe and get straight A’s on your booking agency report card, so you can have a good promoter-booking agent conference. Don’t be bad! Don’t get in twoubew. Make safe statements. Stick to your sub-genre’s MPU-approved acceptable topics list for between song banter. Drink only on approved off-days during teamwork conference calls with management to help think of new productivity slogans. Keep pushing to make metal more like a 9-to-5 office experience with each passing day! And most importantly, if you ever have a problem with someone, remember to be as fake as possible to them in person, to the point that you aren’t even remotely being true to yourself, and then have your manager email their manager the next day. Rock. and. Roll.
