happy halloween! i love halloween! i love things that are scary but not actually dangerous. here’s today’s comment game if you’re bored at work: what is something scary but not dangerous?

let me tell you about my halloween adventures so far

i had a weird dream the other night. i was dressed like michael jackson and all the guys in the band were zombies. i was on a stage with big foot, presenting him with a box of moon pies and a slim jim. then, we broke into “thriller” and big foot started dancing. people were coming up onto the stage dancing and we just kept playing that thriller bass line dum dum dum dum dum, dum dum dum dum dum.
wait maybe that really happened…it DID hapen! if you weren’t at the mad frog friday night, you missed it. this has to go down as one of the most craziest shows we’ve done. we had so much fun. really, that was fun. i mean i always say shows are fun but one third of the time i may or may not be lying. THAT was fun.

wouldn’t be halloween without screaming girls.

the last time we played in cincy it was poorly attended and we did not play well at all. so this felt like redemption. also, in high school i played thriller with some other guys at a halloween show. i think it was T’s first show with me (he played cello on a few songs). but our cover of thriller then was terrible–i mean really bad. people always want to dispute me on this. i’m telling you, i used to be a terrible singer and guitarist and i have been working hard and progressing for years to be better. anyway so this was really redeeming myself for that awful performance too.

guys practicing their undead look. i was the post-zombie transformation version of michael jackson. complete with fedora, sparkly white glove (hot glue gun), white socks…

thanks to dan for the “everything was a weird dream” joke. the all around ridiculousness of the night really did give it a satisfying surrealism. i was dan’s make up artist. this was very enjoyable for me. i went through a short phase as a kid where i thought i was going to grow up to do special effects in movies.

if you’re keeping score, a guy dressed as big foot won the costume contest. he had on stilts under his outfit so he was about 8 feet tall and awesome. i don’t think he was aware that we were having a contest, but when we notified him he won he was delighted to receive a box of moon pies and an extra long slim jim (thanks to sheri mary + nicki!). and even agreed to dance on stage. definitely every show should end with a dancing 8 foot tall big foot.
there were a lot of other great costumes too. my friend and ex drummer sam was the crocodile hunter, complete with a wound in his heart (okay that’s wrong. but so is sam). harriet potter, alice in drunkerland, we had bat girl wonderwoman cats cowgirls ganstas punk cabaret and so on. thanks to everyone who dressed up. it made my fall.

thanks to niles and brittany for taking pictures. and people i stole from on myspace.

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the following night we played in columbus. after arriving and loading-in, a few surprises including the van not starting put me in sort of a cranky mood.

after spending a few hours with the other guys at the bar. as the night wore on we felt better.
before we played, we made a last minute decision to put on our costumes from the previous night. when we took the stage the room felt pretty full. this time, i wore a black robe over my michael costume until the last song (thriller). i guess that was effective. our set was supposed to be 45 but was cut even shorter. we need a lot more time to set up, since we have extra channels a cello, a keyboard, acoustic guitar, and a sequencer. but i think this was a cool venue and everything, and now that i know we have enough people in c-bus to at least fill up the pit, maybe next time we can play an hour or even 1:30.

* * *

thanks so much to everyone for all the support on myspace. because of your enthusiasm for the new song “wake up”, i entered the myspace top artists! in the experimental category (i am listed in three: rock, acoustic, experimental) i am in the top 100. considering myspace has 100 MILLION users, to be the top anything is pretty awesome. please keep playing this song, adding it to your profile, and telling your friends to do the same. i’ve been working it pretty hard.

this weekend we are in cleveland. yay! i am really looking forward to this show. sometimes you just get a good feeling.

again, happy halloween!
mmmm candycorn