Jesus Chainsaw Massacre: Will Dope Doom the Post Office? Goodbye 2020 Hello 2020.

From the National Affairs Desk- Night Train Division

Freezing wind, flecks of sleet stinging the multitude of human discharge seeping out of the post office, broken windshield blades, broken holiday dreams, the radio unironically on the Christmas station, some lunatic singing "Feels like its snowing inside and out; little kids starting to pout; Christmas tree's on fire burning bright; its Christmas time on a Saturday night." I reach under the seat looking for the riot pistol and rubber bullets in case things get too weird at the depot. Found them. Sigh, shrug, whatever. Spill my notes for this post all over. Part One- The History of JCM as a Live Act Then and Now. Part Two- The Duality of the Media in Eight Crazy Months. Next to that I scribbled "Optional" in something other than pen. Blood? Tears? Acid? That's all you need to know about this post. Two parts, one history, one a hypocrisy. I jump out of the Silver Hornet with my packages forgetting the riot pistol and head out to mail the last remnants of my holiday cheer. Then, back to work with "Save Your Tears" by The Weeknd on repeat (the song I have listened to the most in 2020).

Part One- Free Booze and Foul Rumors: A History of JCM, the Band. For Charity.

From the Sports Desk-

I finally take my hands off my face and everything is still there. Random, unsolicited messages from complete strangers consisting solely of swastika's, the usual physical threats, attempted hacks of the Sports Desk, a death threat for old times sake. The duality of the past colliding with the present is a theme in both parts of this final post. I shrug it all off, deciding to keep that looming monstrosity until Part Two, and close up the National Affairs Desk and get back to my roots. It has been a strange past few weeks, few months, fuck it, year. I have a fear that despite the vaccine, we are on the verge of another wave of sickness and possibly a full scale lockdown. We'll have to wait and see what Post-Christmas holds. Plans are already in place for history's first ever Inauguration Via Zoom. Buy toiletries, water, fuel, stocks, cover yourself in fuel. Now! Worry about the consequences later. The need to see my friends right now has never been greater. Being in the trenches the past half year made me turn blue, not a healthy way to live, even unhealthier way to think. Depression is real, and it has come a knockin'. One of the (many) rules at the JCMsTown Compound is "One Cannot Complain Unless One Strives For A Solution. This Means YOU!" So I made a few calls, came up with a plan, constructed a checklist, and decided to break routine. Worry about the consequences later.

The genesis for this post occurred over a month ago. Tambourine player Elizabeth First had finally returned from Louisiana and was in Covid quarantine. I was at the doctors yet again, this time let's call it an infectious disease. One of my tests was for depression. Weirdly enough, E First also had the same test. Is this common now? I have no idea. The doctors and I shared a laugh; my natural charm versus established science. I left with more medicine (nothing fun) and even more questions. I was intent on burning this illness out of me (which illness?), whatever it takes. Start by writing. I received word from E First that she was out of quarantine and passed her test. I had no idea if this was true and entertained the idea that she may have just escaped. I was feeling better. The time was now to knock this post out. To prove that we are not the same person would be a bonus. Previous efforts had failed.

Worry about the consequences later. There is no gravity...

The calls I initially made were to a few artists in Wisconsin. I asked if they had any original art they would like to donate for a project that would ultimately benefit wild animals. I really didn't have a project at the time, only a few notes. The main crux was to get some unique JCM memorabilia together and sell it with the benefits going to charity. I wanted to go to the North Central Positronics North Outpost which is only able to be located via handwritten directions. It is in the middle of a forest, a few miles from a military base, fully furnished and fully fortified. Unfortunately, it is currently "Winterized" due to me dragging my feet along with the various hospital visits. The plan was to head up there with some firearms and explosives and do my own art project. That will have to wait until Spring; the final Top Ten Hit. For now, I asked the geek in Wisconsin to send me a few unused pieces. It could be clip art for all I care. I then sent messages to anyone linked to the JCM/Too Much Fun Club suggesting a Post-Thanksgiving get together. Hey if Maskless Mayor Duggan can do it then so can we. Yes, I know that was cryptic and vague, but unfortunately it will have to stay that way. But trust me. Have I ever lied to you? Seeing everyone again would be gorgeous and even though money is tight there is construction a few miles away so we could always shoot, cook, and eat some rats. Then we could all get drunk (no alcohol for me just yet), drop acid (no comment from me just yet), and sign the art from Wisconsin. Sell it to raise money for non-vermin animal rescue. "It could be excellent fun, and with things going as they are, I suspect we'll be needing some of that." That was my message to them, a simple plea to man's basic instincts. We knew that nobody would bite on the autographed art, probably thinking it was a scam or a lie, and that's fine. We're pretty much in "Life is a Bonus" Mode so if they don't sell then we can just keep them as mementos, a nice little send off bookend. Either way, I'll post the "Buy It Now" links in the future right here. According to Sidney the artist, one is a cartoon of a sexy female driving a VW Bus and the other is a finger drawing a line in some sand. It took eight days for them to arrive. It was already a disaster.

I was expecting 12X12 prints but what I received were two 4X6 photos, almost wallet size. Still, I can't complain as they do have the required natural charm (and were free). As advertised, there were two. The cartoon female, a buxom redhead, is leaning precariously out of the VW Bus without a care in the world. The eerie thing about it is there are no other passengers in the vehicle. Its as if it were drawn by an Autistic child with a crush. The second is a simple shot of a female's finger drawing a line in the sand, a wonderful metaphor for pretty much anything you can come up with. For me, us, it represents a call to action, a rally cry against the mutant waterheads. You're either with us or against us pardner. I decided this is the one I'll keep.

The first one to sign them was charter member -jr.

When I attempted to explain my theme of recreating our most famous shows in the present day he just left. He can't be bothered with nostalgia. Anyway, my theme was to recreate some of our most famous shows from 2008 to 2018 during the art signing. E First and Vinnie took care of 2008.

2008 was our very first Metro Times Blowout. We had spent the entire year shirt starting and ripping on nearly every local band. The one thing we didn't do was play shows. Nobody knew who these shit starters were. They couldn't process the fact that there were, gasp, people out there who refused to buy in that everything local was good and infallible. Zero shows. This was back when shitty bands like The Hard Lessons and Friendly Foes were playing three shows a week. The Blowout show went off okay for us; had a decent crowd of curiosity seekers. The gimmick was to wear paper bags over our heads, a nod to local blog Webvomit/Five Three Dial Tone, and the fact that nobody believed we would show our faces.

One memorable note is that I left our own set before it ended to take a shuttle to another venue. The punchline being that I eventually came back because there was nothing else worthwhile going on. For the 2020 recreation I lent Vinnie the paper bag along with my Ric Flair robe (the graduation gown was lost) so he could sign the art. E First also donned the bag. We were off and running.

Our next Blowout was in 2010 and our most elaborate show to date. In the months leading up we actually had a street team that horded every Metro Times they could find. Sebastian Owl (then an intern) collected nearly a thousand themself alone. They would wait along a route of bars and take entire bundles of them before the staff could even cut the zip ties. I doubt a single non-JCM person read a Metro Times the winter of 2009/2010. So basically same as it is now ho ho ho. The gimmick for the show was a military themed, Inglourious Basterds type thing where we would end up burning them after the set.

The sound guy refused to let us play until we gave up the gas can and promised to clean everything up(ho ho ho). The gas can ended up disappearing also. The show went on with me as the Blog Jew, Shoshana First, and Aldo -jr opening with a pumped in speaker fuck of Bowie's "Cat People". It was minutes until the crowd swarmed the pile of Metro Times and tore them to shreds. MT actually sent a photographer. I ended up whipping a copy at his camera. The photos never ran. Ten years later I finally got my fire.

We scaled it back for the 2013 Blowout, running with the Spring Breakers theme taken from the film of the same name. It was not without controversy because I set up a pressure cooker filled with local cd's at the Ferndale Public Library. This was weeks after the Boston Marathon bombings. This got us banned locally for a year.

E First donned the pink ski cap one more time to celebrate what was becoming a trend of threatening the crowd (2010-fire, 2013-bomb, 2015-poison).

We took Blowout off in 2014 to hop on the newest flavor of the month, the first ever Hamtramck Music Festival before it became corrupt with fake charities and incredible disappearing money. I always wonder with the festival scene being dormant/dead whatever happened to the HamFest Committee...

By this time we were branded as woman haters, body shamers, and racists. Absurd, I know. We decided to play off of this hatred, boycotts, and threats (Hellmouth never showed up, those pussies) by making t-shirts. That was the gimmick; t-shirts. Well that along with the lone female in the band wearing a giant pigs head covered in blood and attached to a leash.

Fast forward to today. A little older yes, a little wiser why not, and still have the shirt (it has since been signed by Sky Ferreira, a fan), and it is not for sale.

I hope those kids still have Peter the Freshman's broken guitar. Those guys were so happy.

It was back to Blowout for 2015, the very final year of the event, never to be seen again. The theme for this one was a recreation of the Jonestown Massacre, another instance where the audience was the target, a part of the show. We even filmed a promotional video beforehand in Ferndale at the Loving Touch. The video was never posted as it was too dark (E First and I poisoned her daughter with an infant dropper). There is also no footage of the show, only a flyer. The entire bill cancelled the week of the festival and Metro Times just let me play booker and put whoever on it. Things were coming to an end...

For the 2015 update I just set up the cups of Flavor Aid, one for each of the core members ho ho ho.

After that we were officially banned from every festival and venue in the Metro Detroit area. For storyline purposes I fired the entire band except for the tambo player and set up one final show in 2018, September, "The Death of the Local Scene". I went through three different venues that all cancelled due to boycotts and the gestating Cancel Culture (if anyone deserved it, I guess it was JCM), until we settled on Simon's in Allen Park. It was a glorified get together. Either nobody believed a show was actually happening or just hated us and ignored it. You can't say they didn't care. The hits on this site were through the roof leading up to it. I was the Zodiac, E First as dead Sharon Tate, Vinnie as Bruce Lee, and Peter the Freshman as drowned Brian Jones. It was the fifth and final show we killed ourselves off at.

For the modern update I laid out some artifacts from that night (the bloody "Pigs" sign, the Detroit Music Award, Zodiac mask, etc), and signed the art print. My plan was to have all of us sign it above the line in the sand and have the space under it represent everyone else. I purposely waited until I was the last to sign because I knew somebody would botch it and sign below the line. E First signed below the line. So, I did as well. So the meaning shifted from us against the world to -jr and Vinnie vs. Metro and E First. Fuck it.

Whew, that's all for Part One. It was fun to go down Memory Lane. I have a huge smile on my face knowing for a Fact that this town will never see anything like us ever again. And that's probably for the best. There is that sunset. Time to head towards it. I was planning on doing a Part Two with the media and politics but this is too perfect of an ending. Instead I'll include an Appendix with the media stuff that annoyed me this week along with a plethora of our flyers, all of which can be reproduced on photo paper and signed. All for animal charity. As for this post proper, and 2020 in all. Consider this the end. The Sports Desk is closed.

From the Iceman Commeth,

Dr. Bryan Metro

The Too Much Fun Club

Metro

-jr

Vinnie Rawsonville

Elizabeth First

Sebastian Owl/Jean the Secretary

Kentucky Pete

Mitchell Allen

Peter the Freshman

The Indian from the Desert

Suck

You

Appendix: The Politics of Vengeance

From the National Affairs Desk-

The following is just an appendix with rants, links, fliers. The post officially ended up there. This is like DVD special features which nobody watches anyway..

As you know, I hate the media. All media. It both bores and infuriates me. I'll blow through this quick, then get to the show flyer greatest hits.

The duality of the media is nauseating and inexcusable, and they don't even try to hide it anymore. And nobody cares. Well, at least until they have to care.

In October I had a comprehensive expose on the Hunter Biden trainwreck. It was quite nutty, but well done. All bullet points condensed into one place. With a nice little bow. I semi-jokingly said that the media would finally start covering it post election and maybe use it as a jumping point to get Biden out of office. Nobody cared then. Now they do. The media has started to cover it. How long until we start to question how Biden really hurt his ankle?

The thing that pisses me off the most regarding the media is the constant need to revise history. From saying Black Panther was the first black superhero movie (that was Blade, or even maybe Shaft) to this gem from Queerty.

That was from February. This one from this week, December.

The same fucking site. Do they have the brains of fruit flies?

Next up we have the waterheads at Glamour first saying motherhood is no big thing in regards to Justice Barrett. This was in October.

Now here is a post from this week, an interview with Biden's Campaign Manager. Once again the Same Fucking Site.

The vaccine is all the rage these days. Here is MSNBC's "expert" from March along with a CNN contributor from the same month.

Flash forward to this week. The Same Fucking People.

Riddle me this: When is a miracle not a miracle? When it no longer fits the narrative.

If I go on I will end up with a brain bubble. Even if you won't admit it, the double standard here is rampant. In fact, ignoring it just makes the silence and stupidity louder. Go back to your safe zones or whatever the fuck they're called and read the 700th article about Trump not conceding. Go do it. It'll make everything feel better. Finally, from the not a prediction but a spoiler files we have these. To summarize- Disney bends over for dollars and China. Former Disney CEO is on the short list for Biden's Ambassador to China.

Oh fuck it, who even cares anymore? Just zone out and read cutting edge journalism like this...

Ahhh NPR, the paragon of cutting edge reporting funded by You. This unbiased reporting occurred in the same calendar year.

Fuck it, on to the Flyers. Here are some of my favorites through the years. All available to be signed. I left the Carolin one out. All available for purchase. I wonder if he's for sale.