Stage Diving 101

Stage Diving Etiquette 101

Intro:
So you've decided to join our feathered friends (and bats and squirrels) in the sky through the act of flight! Congratulations! The choice to sacrifice your body and equipment through the impulsive and destructive act of stage diving can be a rewarding and entertaining experience. I've cobbled together this primer to help you through the process. Band-mates should have no fear! I've taken the time to include portions and positioning for them as well. Please note the handy guide numbers in the upper left corner of the images.



1) Ascend.
While common stage dives (off a stage or the more simple "crowd surf") can be enjoyable, a true epic stage dive should be executed from the highest point available. In this instance, our hero has chosen a conspicuously well-placed rolling staircase to the left of the stage. Ascend as high as comfortable, but note that the higher the platform, the more awesome you will appear. Bonus points for continuing to play while preparing to plummet.

2) Pose.
Make sure the crowd sees you! We all know the rhetorical question regarding the tree in the woods. Here, the bassist has taken the "notes become bullets" a.k.a. the "...because of the wang" pose. Several paying customers are already laughing with joy as he readies his body for immortality. Band Note: At this point, you should still be playing at top gear, oblivious as to the throngs of women and young girls no longer eye-fucking you.

3) "The Four Winds."
With mind cleared from distraction and body poised for certain doom, one must cast one's mortal being into the abyss with righteous fervor and a complete disregard for the young girls in the front row. What's more, your band friends have noticed you for the first time in months! The drummer expresses joy and jealousy as he is locked behind his cruel metal cage. A proper guitarist will show no interest in the goings on around him or her, but will instead seethe inwardly as the ill trim in the front row has suddenly developed a taste for "bottom end," if you know what I mean.

4) Landing.
Never assume that someone will catch you. Extending your arm to brake your fall will usually lead to a broken wrist and will lead to an end to excellence, so be prepared to tuck and roll. Use the crowd to increase your coefficient of friction and slow your now-bruised body -- like a bowling ball into hapless pins. It is at this point that the drummer has cocked his arm in an "Atlanta Tomahawk" position to deliver a frustrated drumstick to the head of the bassist. This is custom and one should always be prepared to deflect a stick headed for an eye or an orifice.

5) Momentum and the "Last Resort."
If you are out of audience members to collapse into, the guitarist or lead singer is usually the last safety and one should use any and all gymnastic means to use him or her as a brake. Our bassist has cleverly used the neck of his instrument to hook into the kneecaps of the guitarist as a Navy jet hooks into the cable on the deck of an aircraft carrier. Note that he has tucked his chin down to shield his eyes from the drumstick, which has found its target -- a bruised forehead is better than a bleeding eye.

6) Injury, Recovery and Hospice.
Pain! Pain is fleeting, and death is for the weak. You are alive and you will recover thanks to modern 21st Century medicine and the finest health care system that your parents can provide! Take a breath to fill your lungs with life-affirming oxygen and to clear your mind of suffering -- those are not twins you are seeing, mouthing incomprehensible words as you lie prone on your bruised coccyx, but rather the pretty freegan from two towns over who has a 40 year old canadian boyfriend. You're seeing double, friend! Band mates: Now is the time to elevate your concern.

7) "The Checkdown."
Like a boxer that has just been knocked down, it is best to walk through a checklist in your head while on the ground -- if you're on the floor, there's nowhere lower to go, so you avoid further injury due to collapse. It is recommended to take stock of one's limbs from the bottom up: feet, legs, hips, chest and head. It is now appropriate for other band members to abandon their positions and rush to your aide. At this point, the show is effectively over and no more music will be played. All that is left is for the stage diver to milk his feat for all it's worth.

8) Results.
The last step involves regailing the hero for his feat of daring. Audience members should applaud and those of the opposite gender should become sexually aroused. Band mates should stand about and deliver the line, "are you ok?" in as dispassionate a manner a possible. A traditional response should be something along the lines of, "I need a [drink/drug/whore]," but feel free to improvise! After all, YOU sacrificed your body like a virgin to Pelé, YOU have the right to demand offerings of your choice.

(Stupid Party at Java Studios, 2/22/08)

The Audio Department Confounds Project Runway Viewers In General

Did anyone besides Ally see my back (ass) in last night's recap episode of Project Runway? There seems to be some discussion that you might be able to see me molesting Jillian or Kit or some such in the background. A telltale sign would be a 6'2" tall half-asian with a black harness swaddled around his rippling body; lean with sinewy muscle and tense with strain from labor. There should also be a California Flag patch sewn on the harness between his shoulder blades which appears to wave in the breeze as he dances through the motions of his profession with the precise grace of a jungle leopard stalking his prey.

This Bores Me.

February has been a slow month for me work-wise. I've taken to shooting shows more often in order to keep my head out of my ass and get myself away from Photoshop -- the longer I fiddle around with selection tools the more likely I am to do something totally fucking [stupid] like selectively colorize everything.

In this spirit, please do let me know what's out there for the next few weeks. I am actively soliciting interesting bands to shoot. God bless my friends, but they only play so often. Bonus points if you play at a venue that is not totally fucking [stupid] when it comes to lighting.

Hi-V to The Choke, Knife Fight (bros) and WLWL for putting together a game group of bands to suffer through the conditions at Don Pedro's (the worst venue in Brooklyn).

Late Hi-V to Crystal Stilts, Silk Robes (bros), Vivian Girls and My Teenage Stride for making my Valentime's Day less [stupid].

Audio Department Confounds Nation With Its Sexuality

From the comments for The Onion's TV Club breakdown of Project Runway's 11th episode,

RE: I'm going to marry Jillian
by Clownfucks

And she's going to wear overalls and do my laundry.
10:04 PM Wed February 13, 2008


RE: I'm going to marry Jillian
by Me too

as long as I occasionally get to come over for some hankey-pankey.

Umm, that garter thing she was wearing when she was jumping with excitement? HOT! (Fierce)
10:13 PM Wed February 13, 2008

RE: I'm going to marry Jillian
by idiot wind

Jillian's little garter-thing (at first I thought it was a gun holster under her dress, like in the movies) was indeed extraordinarily sexy, but then I realized it was probably just one of those microphone-thingies to hear what she was saying.
11:15 PM Wed February 13, 2008

RE: I'm going to marry Jillian
by dove

I'm going to continue thinking it was a gun holster. because jillian just seems like the type.
6:01 AM Thurs February 14, 2008

Bondange is so hot right now.

The Truth About Chinese New Year

In China it is custom to celebrate the Lunar New Year to unleash a bevy of demons and hoojibs upon mankind in an effort to clear the human species of the old and infirm thus ensuring peace and prosperity in the coming months. In a curious coincidence, the recent motion picture "Cloverleaf" violently and clearly dramatized this annual feeding, whose drama and chaos has bloodied the fields of the Old Country for thousands of years.

The annal blood orgy begins much in the way the Spaniards begin the running of the bulls -- the elderly (below) are herded into narrow passageways and alleyways.



The savage beasts involved in this cruel display include Lions (below) and Dragons. This young lion is held in place by his cruel master. It is custom to starve these specters for months before hand. In tradition, this cruel treatment is meant to build resentment and a taste for human flesh. Recall that the origin of the ritual was to thin the proverbial herd -- a necessary task when crops are small and the mouths many.





When the signal is given the creatures, crazy with hunger, are released into the crowd. The dragon, above, has burst from his chains and has set down into a crowd of elders. Soon the streets will run as red as their traditional crimson toques.



Lions hunt alone or in pairs. There is little evidence that the creatures have a predilection towards teamwork, but desperate times call for desperate measures. Scientists have observed that they have a keen sense of smell but poor eyesight, even in the blinding mid-February sun. The two lions (above) have taken a classic "Two In A Room" formation.

Oh no! An elder Fung Wah Lion (below) has caught my scent! Only by standing perfectly still will I be able to survive. Like a shark, a Fung Wah Lion will beat at a prospective target with his wild maw -- the slightest reaction by the target means the target becomes a meal.





Some brave men hide beneath the mantle of a dragon in order to escape its wrath. It is well know that Dragons require tiny parasites to clean themselves as they are unable to bend backwards.



Each year, a Snack King (above) is chosen to be the final morsel offered to the hungry beasts. It is said that if the creatures are too full, spent on the fat and sinew of their prey, to eat the Snack King, a great disaster will befall the community. This years' Snack King awaits his fate.



The two dragons shown above are enough to sweep a street full of one hundred people clean in minutes -- dragons are notoriously neat eaters, and their excrement smells of fresh plum tomatoes.

It is tradition for men of marrying age to take to the streets to kill and behead a lion in order to impress a mate. Custom calls for a boy -- now a man -- to parade with the bloody carcass of the creature held over his head until his arms burn with acid. Only then will he be suitable for a bride.





(Above) A young dragon escapes. He is lured with a Snitch tethered to a golden staff. If left to his own devices, the dragon would lay waste to the pack of Boy Scouts fleeing from his howls. Fun fact -- J.K. Rowling borrowed the idea of the Snitch for her popular "Harry Potter" stories!



This boy longs for the day that he too will be able to take a chance and snatch himself a lion's head for his prospective bride.



It seems our friend has tired! Will his display of daring and strength mean he will be able to find a suitable mate? Only time will tell.



At the end of the day, dragons and surviving lions are led through the streets to their enchanted chambers. The creatures become docile as the warm goo of human entrails slosh about in their gullets. A dragon has three stomachs -- one for soft tissues, one for fluids and one for bones and other hard matter. The lions have one stomach but their metabolism processes nutrients faster, thereby allowing them to feed constantly. They will be kept in darkness until the next new year when a cruel but necessary rite of passage -- the culling of the old and the triumph of the young -- is conducted in cities and towns throughout the world.

The Hat Goes On The Head! It's So Obvious Now!

If I look particularly greasy today it's because there's no hot water and there's no way in shit I'm taking a shower in the cold -- 64-degree weather be damned.

In better, more exciting news, after trolling through Photocare and Calumet for hours looking for a 90-degree bracket to mount my only Chimera onto an umbrella bracket, I finally realized I'm basically looking for a 90-degree pipe fitting with two different gauges of pipe coming out of the ends. Tony's Hardware on Smith St. provided the seven dollar solution to a problem that's been bugging me since Srael gave me the Chimera unit four months ago. Sheesh.