It was Weaponized State, On Lasagna Beach, Urban Dirt Farmers, and the Chemical Spray at Patti’s Late Night Supper Club, an antique and all but inaccessible diner located above a neon sex shop on Granville which meant that Alice was late for soundcheck.
“Rock and roll is sort of broken. It’s over and it’s dead. It’s like a constant wave of nostalgia that is performing like it’s a brand new thing. New clothes, different hair, fresh plastic pants, the drums are skittering and the guitar has more jangle now. Whatever, it’s like a clothes dryer that won’t stop until the whole thing fucking explodes.” Everyone laughs and Alice says, “That actually sounds pretty fucking awesome.”
“I love the smell of burning fabric,” Parker added as she patted down her denim jacket for a pack of cigarettes.
“Well yeah fuck I know could we just do that become the Exploding Dryers or something?” Jordyn laughed.
“We could call ourselves Mechanical Apocalypse!” Alice suggested. Man, she was quick. Best drummer in the city.
“No way, man, The Homemade Appliances and our first single is a ten minute riot called Fractured Dream!” Parker always had a single in mind and no doubt she had the chorus and melody percolating. She pulled a lighter from the hand sewn pocket of her jacket.
“Guys what happened to Forgotten Lobotomy or Pray for Death?! Remember, we almost became Intestinal Noose?” Everyone laughed. This was a classic pre show exercise. Jordyn would complain about the pointlessness of making music, how everything was prefabricated, compromised, repeated, tired. Alice would break it up and turn his rant into a band name, Parker would give it another angle always with a single in mind, and I’d stumble in with a short history of our digressions.
It was a game that we had fun playing. A little bit of group improv to loosen us up before a show.
No matter how many ideas we threw around the room, or how frustrated Jordyn, or any of us, were about about the tragic condition of making music that was new, together we were The Chemical Spray. A noxious and devastating sonic entity that would peel the flesh from your skeleton and leave it a pristine shell of hope. | image @ellabaudinet