I've found that when I can remember to--- I can be a good friend. But when you forget, or when you wait for something to happen, its just you and only you that looks the fool. You let people down and you don't even know it. But there was more behind that person. At start, You developed an awkward crush. You didn't say a word. She made out with a friend for awhile. You smiled and didn't say a word. And eventually you wrote this song....
Devil's Backbone (2010)
"I want a real live bathing beauty in a tub,
show her what its really like when you have fun.
With dark brown eyes that could cut through porcelain,
and skin so smooth like the bullet in a gun.
We could burn these bridges to the ground, find your love in the lost and found, spread these ashes all around. Cause even if you do or you don't, the back or in front, no they'll never, never understand you.
I want to take your picture and hang it on my wall,
staring back at me saying nothing at all.
How could you say anything anyway,
you're just a picture, trapped in glass behind the frame.
We could burn these bridges to the ground, find your love in the lost and found, spread these ashes all around. Cause even if you do or you don't, the back or in front, no they'll never, never understand you."
The Devils Backbone is a tough trail in Colorado. I feel it was fitting for the theme of the song. It has little to do with nature, and more to do with the nature of the beast. I saw a picture in a magazine once, it was black and white. It was of a young woman, slightly model emaciated look. She was sitting in a bathtub in her black bra and her mascara was smeared. It was striking. When I first saw the main character in this quick tale for the first time, I thought of the beauty in the tub.
We both were in similar situations. So burning our bridges together would have been fun. Feeling like that once strong love has been put in a box of lost and found items. And spreading these ashes of the bridges we had once built would be catharsis at its best. And ofcourse they'd never understand why.
As for the picture on the wall. It is symbolic of who she was, who she is. And trapped behind the glass, represents everything that could never be.
I cannot push off for tomorrow what must be taken care of today anymore.
Sunday, June 13, 2010
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Douchebag or: The Myth of Fingerprints
Ok,
So as you can probably tell by now, I procrastinate pretty hardcore.
I've kept a bunch of blog drafts and never get around to finishing them, but goddammit I'm gonna show some Hal Jordan style willpower and demolish the DC universe as I finally get around to finishing and posting these damn things.
So I'm gonna just keep going where I left off.
I'm going to try and remember this all as well as I can.
I started this post in March.
Its not March anymore.
So when I was in high school I once heard Amanda Palmer say that there's this thing that like touching except you don't touch.
But I'll get to all that later.
So its been just over a month since record release and I'm pretty sure I'm not the only Amboy still reeling from it all. But then again, I was up until 7 AM rocking the heaviest power hour ever with The Bears of Blue River.
Its 5:30 PM and we're all slowly making our way toward Asbury Lanes; fully loaded with tee-pees, make-up, smoke machines, T-Shirts and most importantly our first legit full-length album "Everything Between The Moon & The Sun". And I honestly can't thank the ladies at the Lanes enough for keeping what I feel is Asbury Park's best venue up and running and really giving us free reign on this show. I mean what other place would let us drag in a giant fake horse in from the rain and use it as a stage piece?
Its about 7:30 and the gang is all here. The four boys and our running crew for the night Rob, Colin, Matt, and Sam. Lawrence is in the back running the projective magic machine and we have our first full sound-check for the night. Now if I could be a complete bastard steal these guys away from their respective projects, I would flat out because once we got things rolling and I heard the full live sound I'd been dreaming of for two years now.
And it was pretty well close to perfect.
(this is me finishing the post)
Its somewhere around half past 8 and Bears of Blue River are on. People are slowly piling in from all the wet outside and the night's picking up steam. My only real regret here is that there weren't more people around at this point to see how great these guys are, because they missed out on something pretty fierce.
Its somewhere around 9 and The Riverwinds are on and Colin is shredding life. I'm running ragged. Shaking hands, giving hugs, maybe selling CDs.
I'm drinking gin in a Mr Sparkle T-shirt.
Its around 10 now and we're running a bit late. Backstage Lawrence is prepping us all in Indian warpaint for some reason. Chris is opting for the Adam Ant look. I've chosen to come out in white-face. Or at least half of it is whiteface. The rest is sweat.
I'm so god-damned scared.
Out on the stage I hear Bryan start to announce us in Japanese. I thought he was kidding when he said he'd do it. He wasn't. I swallow down hard and we all rush the stage. With the opening notes of The Right Track, I'm off like a racehorse. Thundercats are go. At this point I'm pretty much running on Mountain Dew-fueled adrenaline. I'm not gonna lie and say that a big chunk of the middle isn't a blur, but trust me when I say I don't think I've ever been happier. Every track was just spot on and just fun to play. It was great to have these guys really fleshing out these songs so that the crowd could finally hear them the way we always meant them to. We closed out the set with This Very Thin Line and at some point Brent and Bryan find their way on stage to grind a bowling ball against the neck of my bass, adding a little bit extra to my normal Sonic Youth closing shenanigans.
We segue into a bit of Talking Heads' Road to Nowhere, something we liked to do a lot last year that we ended up retiring. I called people up to come dance on stage and in two seconds it was packed to capacity.
I'm pretty sure we almost broke the stage that night. But it was a pretty special kind of awesome to be able to bring it back and make it that epic.
From there it gets pretty blurry but you get the point. It was an awesome show and I managed not to let Bears of Blue River drink me under the table. I'm so grateful to everyone that helped us and to everyone that showed up to support us. We're gonna need a lot more of that love in the future as we try to get out on the road and be somebody so help us out, spread the word. Whore us a bit, we don't mind.
Now its almost 3am and I wanna pass out watching Charlie Murphy. So back to my opening statement:
Apparently there's this thing that's like touching
Except you don't touch
And I think that night we all got a little closer to it.
Manny
The Amboys
So as you can probably tell by now, I procrastinate pretty hardcore.
I've kept a bunch of blog drafts and never get around to finishing them, but goddammit I'm gonna show some Hal Jordan style willpower and demolish the DC universe as I finally get around to finishing and posting these damn things.
So I'm gonna just keep going where I left off.
I'm going to try and remember this all as well as I can.
I started this post in March.
Its not March anymore.
So when I was in high school I once heard Amanda Palmer say that there's this thing that like touching except you don't touch.
But I'll get to all that later.
So its been just over a month since record release and I'm pretty sure I'm not the only Amboy still reeling from it all. But then again, I was up until 7 AM rocking the heaviest power hour ever with The Bears of Blue River.
Its 5:30 PM and we're all slowly making our way toward Asbury Lanes; fully loaded with tee-pees, make-up, smoke machines, T-Shirts and most importantly our first legit full-length album "Everything Between The Moon & The Sun". And I honestly can't thank the ladies at the Lanes enough for keeping what I feel is Asbury Park's best venue up and running and really giving us free reign on this show. I mean what other place would let us drag in a giant fake horse in from the rain and use it as a stage piece?
Its about 7:30 and the gang is all here. The four boys and our running crew for the night Rob, Colin, Matt, and Sam. Lawrence is in the back running the projective magic machine and we have our first full sound-check for the night. Now if I could be a complete bastard steal these guys away from their respective projects, I would flat out because once we got things rolling and I heard the full live sound I'd been dreaming of for two years now.
And it was pretty well close to perfect.
(this is me finishing the post)
Its somewhere around half past 8 and Bears of Blue River are on. People are slowly piling in from all the wet outside and the night's picking up steam. My only real regret here is that there weren't more people around at this point to see how great these guys are, because they missed out on something pretty fierce.
Its somewhere around 9 and The Riverwinds are on and Colin is shredding life. I'm running ragged. Shaking hands, giving hugs, maybe selling CDs.
I'm drinking gin in a Mr Sparkle T-shirt.
Its around 10 now and we're running a bit late. Backstage Lawrence is prepping us all in Indian warpaint for some reason. Chris is opting for the Adam Ant look. I've chosen to come out in white-face. Or at least half of it is whiteface. The rest is sweat.
I'm so god-damned scared.
Out on the stage I hear Bryan start to announce us in Japanese. I thought he was kidding when he said he'd do it. He wasn't. I swallow down hard and we all rush the stage. With the opening notes of The Right Track, I'm off like a racehorse. Thundercats are go. At this point I'm pretty much running on Mountain Dew-fueled adrenaline. I'm not gonna lie and say that a big chunk of the middle isn't a blur, but trust me when I say I don't think I've ever been happier. Every track was just spot on and just fun to play. It was great to have these guys really fleshing out these songs so that the crowd could finally hear them the way we always meant them to. We closed out the set with This Very Thin Line and at some point Brent and Bryan find their way on stage to grind a bowling ball against the neck of my bass, adding a little bit extra to my normal Sonic Youth closing shenanigans.
We segue into a bit of Talking Heads' Road to Nowhere, something we liked to do a lot last year that we ended up retiring. I called people up to come dance on stage and in two seconds it was packed to capacity.
I'm pretty sure we almost broke the stage that night. But it was a pretty special kind of awesome to be able to bring it back and make it that epic.
From there it gets pretty blurry but you get the point. It was an awesome show and I managed not to let Bears of Blue River drink me under the table. I'm so grateful to everyone that helped us and to everyone that showed up to support us. We're gonna need a lot more of that love in the future as we try to get out on the road and be somebody so help us out, spread the word. Whore us a bit, we don't mind.
Now its almost 3am and I wanna pass out watching Charlie Murphy. So back to my opening statement:
Apparently there's this thing that's like touching
Except you don't touch
And I think that night we all got a little closer to it.
Manny
The Amboys
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Saturday, February 13, 2010
Sunday, February 7, 2010
Amboys announce their last show ever
We'd be lucky to make it past 2012 with the rate that things have been moving.
Thursday, January 28, 2010
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
Harvest Show
Tomorrow night (Jan21,2010, two years before the end) at the Langosta Lounge in Asbury Park, we'll be performing Neil Young's 1972 classic "Harvest" in its complete entirety. Hopefully you can make it out. We'll have some exclusive, one night only t-shirt designs that are bound to go fast. See ya'll there.
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