I have been known to eat shark. And crow. Jason eats his own foot. The dream I am living is a nightmare. I am here in Seattle and when I wake up maybe I will be somewhere else, swimming in nice warm water, surrounded by Europeans sipping fruity non-alcoholic drinks, glistening in nothing but cocoa butter and grains of fine, black sand. 4Real, I'm losing it. Bring me my scarves and water!
Sorry if this update isn't sexy or too terribly funny. This is to be more a recap of what's gone on. Not so much an update on what's going on. No steamy tales of debauchery. Our lives of rock and roll excess are kept pretty hush hush. Why I can't really say. I don't know. Maybe Seattle's too small? But we're degenerate scum, drinking the blood of smallish boys and younger girls. Just like every other pre-dawn garbage collector in this city.
HERE ARE SOME TRUTHFUL FACTS: Jason likes elephant rides. He just got back from a month in Thailand where his dream of riding the elephants of South East Asia was fully realized. It was all he'd hoped for. His blossoming camera fetish caught it all in lovely color slide film and black and white. He plans on doing a retrospective at New York's Whitney Museum sometime in the early part of next year. His prior fetishes in order: Skateboard shoes. Before that it was skateboards. Before that it was video game entertainment systems. Before that it was comic books. Before that it was records. Before that it was Indonesian grass skirts. Before that it was glue-sniffing and petty crime. Now, he sells pirate's gold to finance his addictions. Seems he's come full circle.
As well, Gabe's a pickpocket, known to steal the socks off a hippie's feet. He can do it without even having to remove their Teva sandals! He will eat pork. He hates HATES Michael Jordan. He loves Tom Waits and The MC5. Gabe is funny and loveable but little does anyone know-his ways are vicious and cunning like the jackal.
Greg? He plays drums. He cannot go out in the hot sun for very long. Otherwise, the man is a total enigma.
Arlie? I ruin people's lives for sport. And like Lazarus, seemingly I can never die. I hate Rick Fox of the L.A. Lakers.
Let's see, where to begin? It's two in the afternoon on a Friday and for the first time this summer the sun is REALLY out in Seattle. That's a good place to start. The sun and Seattle. Let's ponder this. My native city is a total soul-sucking wasteland. YES? OR NO? Email responses to juno1juno@aol.com
The constant rain is really doing a number on me. Advice, please send it our way. Until then...this is what I get told all the time: You say, "No Juno, we've got pretty views, rolling hills, water and nice sailboats drifting through the locks." To that I say die. You say, "No Juno, without the constant drizzle and misery there'd be no suicide, no tortured 'artistes', no chain-smoking, alcoholic unwashed masses flocking to this city's live shows." I say you are absolutely right. But I'm over it. You say, "Without the rain and the feeling of absolute total despair it brings everyday- waking up to low, gray skies, and the sense that nothing will ever change...nothing will ever change...nothing will ever change... Without it we just wouldn't be the same people!" True I say. Right. That's nice. Nonetheless, it is fucking JUNE!!!! Rain. I, like every other ding-dong in this burg, used to believe that our climate lended itself to making things indoors. Things like music. Well, fuck it. As much as I love this city I just don't know how to deal with it anymore. I don't know how to deal with myself in this city anymore. So yeah, advice?
Short of moving away for good (which doesn't seem like it's gonna happen any time soon despite the obvious genius of such an act), I'm not sure what to do. Except make more music.
In the past, our strategy had always been to tour like demon-obsessed bastards. We had a belief that life was elsewhere and usually the belief held true. Our faith in music was sustained by taking it to more people in other cities. It gave us a sense of purpose. It made making music something more than just a hobby.
But now, we are dead fucking sick of touring. At least for a while. Not so much because touring is inherently lame but because we're sick of ourselves. That is to say, we're sick of our songs. We've just played them too many times. So now is time to slow it down and make something again.
A few months ago we toured for 3 and 1/2 months with a few short breaks in-between. Many of the shows were great (DC, NYC, Pittsburgh, S.F., Austin, Chicago, L.A., Chico, Boston, Buffalo, South Dakota, Bellingham...). But it was exhausting and to be honest nearly broke up our band. When you've toured the US ten times in four years you get to know its limitations. Even more so you get to know your own.
As for me, I had gone on tour coming off breaking four vertebrae in my neck. It hurt. More than I was willing to let on to anyone. I was still suffering the residual effects of the spinal cord injury. Seizures and blackouts. Muscle spasms. Four of1999's winter and spring months were spent in a halo, upright in a medical bed and wondering about the point of anything. Thankful that I was still a part of everything. But confused, absolutely mind-blown with confusion. Three surgeries had left me skinny and in more pain than I can explain. The plates in my neck were changing the way I sang and spoke. My hands when I played guitar ached from nerve damage. I felt like a total fuck-up and debated continuing doing anything I'd been a part of prior to the injury.
But Juno had just put out a record. We and our labels wanted us to tour to support it. I pulled myself together for it. I'd rather tour than ponder my fate and spiral further into the depression and and alternate euphoria I felt at getting hurt. I wanted to live more than I wanted to think about living anymore. Does that make sense? I think for most people, when you nearly die, you sorta step back for a bit, sometimes a long while, and just think about what living means. As in, thinking, "Uh okay, I'm alive. What does that mean? Why did I get to live? And walk? What's next?" For me what came next was touring to support a record that took a very long time for us to finally make. I thought it was a beautiful record and I wanted to try to sing it and play it again. Weirdly enough, people liked the record so it seemed like touring would be fun. It gave me a direction and a focus. Better than laying in Seattle any longer. Even without the record, when we'd just tour on 7 inch singles it was alwayshard but always fun.
Looking back, the last year has been the hardest year of my adult life. Maybe the hardest year for all of Juno's lives. Logic gets...uh, flawed. Tour made it better and worse. The shows made it worth it. The time in the van, driving for upwards of 10 hours between shows made it a total nightmare.
I woke up February 23rd, 2000 in San Francisco. We were on tour. It dawned on me that it was the one year mark from having hurt myself. I thought about all that had gone on in the last year and was amazed we'd still done so much. I was appreciative more than anything else. It could have turned out so much differently.
That day I also came to the conclusion that for my part I'd done enough. I'd toured till I was blacking out on stage and vomiting in parking lots from the stress. Back home in Seattle, I had $120,000 in medical bills waiting for me. It was no way to live. We'd gotten to a point where the only time we laughed anymore was in the face of total disaster. A bunch of absolute lunatics holed up in an insane asylum on wheels. We knew something needed to change. And yet, we still had five weeks of touring in Europe ahead of us.
We went out again, up the west coast with our Desoto Records labelmates,The Dismemberment Plan. It was wonderful. They were the best. No really, just the best tour mates. We were going to tour Europe with them. Then, their record started doing well here in the US and they decided to postpone going to Europe in favor of playing more US dates. Smart choice.In no mood to tour Europe alone(lest we break down and lose it for good) we postponed Europe in favor of sleeping and writing new songs.
In the meantime, we've recorded a split 7" with The Dismemberment Plan for a label called bcore in Spain.
In the process of relaxing and figuring out what to do next, our bass player Travis decided it was time for him to move on and pursue more seriously a few of the other things he'd become interested in over the years. Namely, audio engineering and the inner-workings of his piles of aged-analog-technology. He's now back in school. Despite the rumorsand press gossip, it was an amicable split. He just couldn't deal with being in the band anymore and wanted to do something else. No bloodbath, we wish him the best of luck. Thank you.
As for the rest of us? Honestly, music is the only thing that makes sense to me. Every other thing I do just seems like a way to fill time. I fill a lot of time with physical therapy and phone calls with insurance companies and medical bills. I've been writing for a few magazines and skateboarding. I went on a heli-trip and spent a couple of weeks doing work with my sponsors up at Whistler in B.C.
Greg's been working his ass off and laying low. He and Gabe play a lot of basketball. They're developing a 15 point plan on how to become the next WHO. I say fill me in when you got that all figured out fellas.
Jason's taking photos and is freaking out about being back in the U.S. after his elephant rides in Thailand. he, like all of us, is trying to figure out what living in this city anymore really means.
Through it all we're writing songs. Just the four of us. July 22nd we're playing at The Crocodile Cafe, for our friend Terry's PacificoRecords label showcase. Some CMJ-affiliated hoo ha. We'll be borrowing a friend of ours. An amazing, wonderful person will be playing bass that night. It should be fun. The only other show we have planned is September 4th at Bumbershoot. Otherwise, we're making a record. Then touring Europe. Then the U.S.
We're trying out bass players. As for Juno's finding a permanent bass player? We aren't in any hurry to find another frustrated guitar player, we already have three. We want a BASS PLAYER. Someone who can't imagine ever playing a guitar, or banks of keyboards or anything that would be a distraction from the bass-blast. A born bass player. Someone who thinks low end. Someone who thinks about time. Think Chris Bauermeister, Kim Coletta, Nate Mendel. So we're taking it slow. We'll find the right person after playing with a bunch of folks. If you reading this have any thoughts on bass players send Gabe an email at: gabe@bosski.com
To anyone who came to the shows, or found the cd out of the 30,000 cd's released last year, or who played with us, fed us, or had us sleep in your home- thank you. Honestly, sincerely we thank you. Your kindness was the saving grace of this last year. Thanks for reading.
-arlie and juno
"Life's what you make it. Yesterday's favorite."- Talk Talk.