Countless Screaming Argonauts

Ah, dog balls. That's my mood at the moment. Nothing noteworthy about it, just dog balls. My biorhythms are a bit jacked due to the new schedule, or, should I say, relative lack of schedule. I had today off and slept until 4 pm. I figured I should go get my money out of the Big Chicken dude, the dude from Monday night's crazy ride, before he forgot. Or rather, before I forgot. I call him the Big Chicken dude because I don't want to use his real name. And he owns a business with a big chicken out front. It's actually a mobile home/used car dealership, so that pretty much gives it away. I'm trying to be careful about this bloggery. No one should sue me, because 1)I only speak the truth (as filtered through my perceptions), and 2)I don't have anything worth taking. Unless maybe you're partial to acoustic instruments or metal working tools, which probably wouldn't be worth the expense to collect anyway. But, I still don't want to embarrass anyone or hurt any feelings.

I also figured I could go look for a new pair of pants at the mall.

But, first, to the big chicken. He owed me $12.55 for the fare and there was the matter of the big tip he had promised. I had written my info and $12.55 on my business card and left it with him. The office was in a double-wide demo home. I recognized dude's car when I pulled up, and saw his old lady going up the stairs to the front door. I went in and found him. He didn't recognize me, and acted somewhat humbled and embarrassed when I refreshed his memory. "It was $12.55, right?"

He went in the office and came back out with $12.55. I wasn't going to hassle over the tip. I didn't want to embarrass him further, and, I figure I'll pick him up again soon enough. I figure when he's sufficiently re-lubed I'll remind him and he should double up but good. I talked to two other drivers who had picked them up and knew them by reputation, so I figure I'll get my chance soon. I imagine he would have gladly tipped me but probably assumed I had included it in the $12.55.

Then I had to get some food. Pork ribs. I decided to splurge with the $12.55 and put it towards some pig. I never ate a pig I didn't like. While I was having my rib breakfast at about 5 pm I remembered that it was Wednesday and that I was planning on catching Jason Ringenberg of Jason and the Scorchers at Mojo's. Dog balls. Better hurry.

Fuck if it isn't November. I was reminded by the November-like weather. I've been spoiled by the unseasonably warm weather and didn't have a jacket. I hit Mojo's as it was getting good and dark. I drank some whiskey and watched Ironweed set up and get tuned. I'm trying to soak in as much as I can about the practical aspects of performing live music, in case I ever get any good, or luck up and land a job as a roadie. I spied who must have been Jason from Jason and the Scorchers. He had a great honkytonk physique, with the requisite long, lanky legs. He had a hooded sweatshirt zipped up over a western shirt, dark Wrangler jeans, and black cowboy boots. There was as much 1830's president in his bushy sideburns as there was country and western star. He had a distinguished face which looked a handsome country young forty-something and was topped off by a well compacted cowboy hat.

Ironweed were good to watch. I tried to follow the banjo player's movements, as well as picking out guitar cords and checking out mandolin licks. There was also some dobro action. They were a tight and technically proficient band (from what I can tell with my limited experience and tin ears), and the mandolin player once stirred people to clap with a resounding solo and two people actually took to dancing for somewhere in the neighborhood of 40 seconds near the end of one song. Jason joined the foursome for one last song which was plagued with some mic issues.

Anyhoo, they cleared the stage and Jason came back out. I can only call him Jason because he was so alarmingly affable that it would seem an affront to address him as anything more formal, even in the anonymous confines of cyberspace. He had lost the jacket and traded his shirt for a shiny gold one with piping and western accents, and an even more scrunched, glittered black cowboy hat. He had room to work. Though the Mojo's stage is quite cozy, it provided ample room for Jason to mosey about, though mosey he did not. He kind of reeled back and forth in a semicircle, loosely tethered only to the mic, like a lion in a cage, minus any anxiety. His legs possessed a definite equine quality as he kicked them behind him and to the side to punctuate the more exaggerated honky tonk conventions in his songs.

And this man was very much honkytonk. In a pure sense. Not in a hokey cardboard cut-out sort of way, not in a nostalgic homage sort of way, not in a stylized cliche character sort of way. He was not a man singing honkytonk songs, but a honkytonk man who sang songs. I find it difficult to imagine any honkytonk pioneers singing a song about an alien robot humping a jukebox without their facade shattering, as if their character was defined by the subject matter of their sad broken- man anthems and could not exist in a third, real dimension.

Jason's music was both playful and poignant, lighthearted and serious. He could unabashedly admit that a requested song was the stupidest song he had ever written and render it with as much conviction and involvement as deeper ballads whose significance and depth to him were clearly foundational. It's as if he sawed the legs off of the intellectual high horse and made them his own, using them to dance around the stage. He seemed to effortlessly capture the elusive blend of self-awareness, context, and communication through music that myself and so many others stab at but never fully harness. As I watched him I imagined him the perfect foil to all of the commercial pop-countryimpostors , the complete opposite extreme end of the bell curve. I believed that with every kick and flourish from Jason another top 40 country star was extinguished, erasing their tinged stains from my subconscious musical landscape, and, that if we just clapped harder, the way you do for Tinkerbell in Peter Pan, I'd never again have to attempt to reconcile the sheer absurdity of the use of the names "Toby Kieth" and "Big and Rich" in the context of "country music stars."

So, yeah, I liked the show. Watching Jason was a great primer for anyone wanting to be a frontman. I bought some merch. He left his CDs by themselves on a table, with a carboard box and instructions to make your own change (noting that the CIA and God were watching). I guess I should to do some more Scorchers research to build up my alt-country cred.