Go Team Tour March 89 PT 3

Chicago.

Now it’s the next day. Nothing seems real. There is a real feeling that we are really on our own and nobody knows or even cares or something. My life in Eugene and working at the deli seems so weird now. Like that whole year didn’t even happen. I really almost believe it didn’t actually happen. I feel so isolated. My mom says “people are more alike than they are different”. I can’t identify with that at all right now. Maybe being in Some Velvet Sidewalk is really hard, because it’s so confessional and raw.

Later. We drove across Illinois. It was different from Wisconsin and Minnesota. Really more Midwestern looking I guess. Flat without snow, fields of hay and silos. Bill drove the last stretch. It was classic fun, hanging out in the backseat with Jenny. In Chicago we were supposed to call Calvin. We called Peter from Buttrag and got the answering machine. So we drove towards the water and went walking around. It was called Old Town. Brick buildings, lots of shops. What else…I don’t really understand what kind of area it was, except tourist-y I guess. Bill used the phone, we memorized the directions, drove down an alley and we went to the show. I wanted to eat pizza and we had to go get guitar strings. There were hours and hours and hours of waiting, which was just like…grueling. Buying strings and then seeing the place we had to play. It was a back room to a coffee house that was just too arty. It was from a “beatnik” scene in a movie. If they had shown us any respect or been nice to us I probably could have been more impressed, because it was kind of cool that it seemed like it was from a movie about beatniks, but in real life I guess that sort of thing kind of freaks me out. And it was sooooo coooold in Chicago It just kept snowing but nothing stuck to the ground. So far both shows we played were in really bright places without much of an audience. I don’t really have a sense of who these people are, like why are they coming to see us or whatever. We ate some health food stuff, the guy was a dick and wanted us out of the customer area and to sit in the back room, which was, by the way freezing cold. We didn’t have to pay for some reason and I got free coffee too. Sneaky girl. I am having a hard time playing the shows. It seems unfocused and really random. Singing felt pretty good this time, but I am still too concerned with people’s reactions and expectations. I wish I could be totally removed from that when I play. Peter’s house was too small so some of us went to this weirdo artist guys’ house. There was this couple on the couch who had been drunk for several days and were watching a video. They didn’t want to have to move and I didn’t trust the artist guys there. They had really ugly sculptures on the wall, disgusting pet ferrets and the one guy reminded me of Dustin Hoffman. I couldn’t understand why he would want us to stay at his house except maybe the Wipers (because we are from the NW) Mostly I like their first record and the Greg Sage solo record. Actually I like their other early records a lot too, just not as much and I love seeing them and their live record. And I know why people like them so much, I understand them, I can relate to it. They are so real and completely passionate, about being lost and sad and desperate-- but the desperation is so much in the need to express it rather than the need to overcome it…the Wipers are a soul band…and their soul is heavy. Lately I’ve been thinking about the idea of heavy souls and bands and people I know. So much anxiety, self-pity and depression. Doom town. Being so sad and lost and frustrated with your situation. You know, I feel like that too, but if I let myself sit around or hang around with people who do, or be in a band ABOUT THAT—I would be wallowing. I would be accepting it. I don’t want that. I want to go on, to get by, to live, to lead a meaningful existence. Like Mecca Normal “I want to go beyond the weather or not at all”. That is my desperation. The drive to be more than that. Truth. To understand things. Clarity. To be complete. And I love the Wipers, but they are not the ultimate band to me. Probably the reason I like them is because they are so good at being completely one thing. They are true, clear, focused. In my own songwriting I settle for sad and it needs to be more than that. Empathy…the walking wounded. I know some people are so hurt and affected they can hardly walk down the street and I can feel like that too because the world can totally suck. Everything is so fucked up and nobody cares. And sometimes you feel so powerless. For people who have so much pain they can’t relate, they can’t communicate, the Wipers are so important. To know that someone feels the same as you, to have something to identify with, is so powerful and clear. Empathy is important, but I can’t limit myself to working out of personal frustration. I am driven to create and feel despair about being controlled by capitalism, nuclear war and sexism. I don’t want to accept these things, I want to go beyond it and reject the pain they create in the world. I am confused about what I want in music.
Back to the Chicago artist guy. He wanted something from us, but I don’t know what. And that was Chicago. It was so cool looking there. And freezing cold.