3 Great Shows in Madison Tonight

What a great night for rock n' roll in Madison. If you're not coming to Milwaukee to party with us, you have a plethra of killer concerts tonight. After you guys check out Hitchhiker's, you definitely need to see some live bands.

(Best Redneck Woman voice)Can I get a Hell Yeah?!(end obnoxious pop-country twang)

You know, I actually kind of like that song. But why does country music have to be so goddamn cheesy? I know that too much irony can spoil any kind of emotional validity, but no irony at all? Alright, we'll save this conversation for a different time.

Here's my recommendations for tonight, bitches.

Chicago's Masters of the Obvious is fucking awesome. If you like straight up, catchy, fun rock n' roll, these guys deliver it with no bullshit. They're playing at a house party called The Halfway House it's at 215 South Bassett Street. Go through the side door. I guess Jimmy Murn from BoRd has a new band and they'll be playing too.

The Klinic tonight has the sweet thrash-pop sounds of Beatallica. We sat at the same table as Tinkyr, who's in Beatallica, at the WAMI Awards on Monday and had a lot of fun. They play Beatles songs in a Metallica style and it's fucking great. If you know what a mash-up is (like the Beatles/Jay Z The Grey Album that was out last year), then you can think of Beatallica as a live version of that. They even got into a little legal trouble with Sony over the whole thing too. Make sure you support these guys, not only are they a local band but they're fighting the intellectual property war for us! They're at The Klinic tonight. Our buddies in Flat Atom will be playing tonight too.

Finally, the Violent Femmes are going to be rocking the Memorial Union Terrace tonight. Wisconsin legends and all-around great fucking band, I've seen the Femmes a dozen times and their shows are always badass. I actually saw them at Gen Con one year. For those who are uninformed, Gen Con is the largest role-playing festival in the world. It used to be in Milwaukee every year and the Femmes played in the street in front of MECCA one time. It was awesome. You've never seen geeks, until you've seen a thousand of them dance to "Kiss Off". I'll talk more about Gen Con some other time.

Speaking of geeks, Weezer (one of history's greatest bands)'s drum tech has his own podcast called Parking in Bitterman Circle. He's on tour with them right now and the podcast is all about it. Fucking cool.

I'm a little jacked up right now, I just tried a cup of half coffee / half hot chocolate and it's got my blood pumping. Anyway, wherever you are tonight, go see some live music. It's always more fun to party with the band.

Hitchhiker's Guide Opens

Anyone going (who's not going to our show in Milwaukee) to see The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy tonight?

I'd really like to check it out, but the reviews on Rotten Tomatoes haven't been as good as I hoped.

I love those books and radio series so much. Hey, a copy of the radio series would be an awesome thing to get for the iPod.

One of the songs on Loser of the Year is actually inspired by Hitchhiker. Take a listen to "When The Revolution Comes" and go see this movie. Even if it's not the greatest flick on the planet (or in the universe, har har), we still need to support science fiction and let Hollywood know that quirky British sci-fi comedies make money. You don't need Will Smith to make it successful. I'll be seeing this movie, hopefully tomorrow or Sunday.

RIP Douglas Adams

Local music programs in danger

So, an East High School student wrote to Bill Keyes on the School Board and expressed her concern for the elementary strings program in Madison. He replied by saying, "You are not in elementary school, so this does not affect you." As a musician that got his start in elementary school music, like many of you reading this, this statement is nauseating to me.

Superintendent Art (that name always makes me think of the janitor in Night Court) Rainwater has also been doing everything he can to rob our city of its musical future. Didn't we learn back in the 90s not to trust politicians from Arkansas?

Guitar Bar Tonight

Don't forget we'll be partying at the Guitar Bar in Milwaukee tonight. It's right on Water Street across from Art's Performing Center and next to Fitzgerald's.

Damn, somebody OD'd on heroin in Madison?! That's straight outta Pulp Fiction! I've never seen the allure of H, all the needles and back alley shit, no thanks. Plus the idea of OD'ing is fuckin' terrifying. But I guess you can OD on anything. Did you ever worry about being waterlogged at the bubbler when you were little? You know, drinking so much water that you drown yourself? Somebody told me about that in second grade and it limited my bubbler time for years.

Also, have you voted for the Sunspot Loser Blog for MKE's Blog of the Week yet?

Tax return

Well, I got my tax return. It wasn't nearly as sweet as last year (The IRS had a problem with me not reporting the income from my male escort service), but it is still better than paying. Stormin' Norman (our tax attorney) went to town last year. This year's return will pretty much cover the beer for this weekend and maybe some coke 'n hos for Mike. Just kidding (about the beer). Speaking of hard drugs, Langdon street claimed another life this week. Who does "H" anymore, anyway? Well, AWK's bass player, I guess. I'm all for partying, just not with stuff that can kill you on the first run.

New Family Guy on Sunday

Shit, how did I forget this? First new episode of Family Guy in like three years, is this Sunday, May 1st!

Awesome. Seth McFarlane is the balls.

Cubicle Escape Podcast

Here's a podcast I listened to for the first time today. It's pretty good and I thought if you're sitting around a desk staring at a computer screen you might like.

Check it out at Cubicle Escape Plan Podcast.

Don't have iPodder yet? Get it for your iPod or MP3 player, it's badass.

Evil Beaver Talks Through Their Lawyers...

Hattip to Darwin from The Skintones for finding this one. He started a thread on the Isthmus discussion forum about it.

Looks like there's trouble in the ranks of Chicago band, Evil Beaver who we played with at The Velvet Lounge in Washington, DC a few years back. Wow, that was the show where we were surrounded by homeless people trying to load in and out. The best was the lady with the tumor on her stomach that was dangling off of her waist like a grapefruit in a bag of bloody skin. If you think that's gross reading about it, you shoulda been there.

Anyway, Evil Beaver is basically distorted bass and drums with some screaming. They have this spacey wastoid schtick, like Courtney love, except looser and more into drugs. It's a funny act.

I saw The Murmurs do the same kinda thing back in the 90's. Remember the "And for that you suck" song? You know you do.

One of the Beavers moved out to Los Angeles last year, I guess and broke up the band. Now the other Beaver is out on tour using the name and Beaver One (doesn't that sound like a good name for a First Lady, too?) is pissed about it. Here's my favorite quote from their legal correspondence posted on their website:

"I want to make it perfectly clear that I have never intended to and did not quit the band Evil Beaver. Evil Beaver is and always will be (Mike's note: God, that sounds so biblical, doesn't it?): Evie Evil (Evagelia Lagousakos) and Laura Ann Beaver (Laura Ann Masura). Evil Beaver has always been an equal partnership, and it was agreed by both Evie and myself that the band only exists with both parties, and not one without the other. We discussed this in detail many times over the past 5 years. I find it offensive, troubling, and confusing, that Evie has decided to try to take the name and control of all things Evil Beaver. I find her actions to be degrading to the efforts and support of not just myself but to our fans, friends and family that have invested so much concentrated time, energy and money into this project. Claiming to be Evil Beaver is also misleading to the contacts and friends we have made professionally. It is fraudulent and untrue to the original agreement and focus of this band for the name to be used to represent any project except music and performances by Evie Evil and LA Beaver."

Ha, the best part about that band was the guy who drove the SS Beaver (their tour van) around. They treated him like such a bitch. You know he thought he was gonna get some and that's why he went along (but he completely denied it, we all know "nice" guys like that, hoping to get laid just for smiling, being helpful, and showing up) you also know that neither of those Beavers woulda given it up to him. Ha, what a night.

Here's the pictures from the Sunspot and Evil Beaver show at The Velvet Lounge in Washington, D.C. but I'm not sure if we have any beaver shots. I think it's just us.

Here's a quick pic of us in front of the bar:

Hey, I wore that shirt last night! For real. Now I remember, there's a stain on the back of the shirt from the cap of Ben's truck that night when I was loading stuff in there. Years of bleach haven't fixed it so I only wear it when I want to look sexy around the house.

Vote Sunspot for Blog of the Week!

MKE Magazine in Milwaukee has put us in the running for Blog of the Week! Go to the voting site and vote for Sunspot. If you have friends or co-workers sitting at the computer next to you, they can vote too. You just need an email address.

We're up against Dan Smalls. I know, you're thinking, what, the Outdoor Wisconsin guy? PBS is a tough nut to crack, so we're gonna need your back on this one. I actually met him at Maritime Days one time. Nice guy. Bearded like a woodsman or a bear. I used to catch his show when it was on before Doctor Who on Channels 10 or 36.

On the iPod this morning: Rubberneck by The Toadies

More car issues?

So, I'm driving and every time I hit the brakes it makes a noise like C-3PO taking it in the ass. I took it in today.

Ugh, new rotors, fluid, pads and all that shit came to about $450 (I got new blades, a headlight, oil change, and air filter too, though.) Cars are expensive. For the amount of money and time we put into them, you'd at least expect them to be able to fly by now. It's 2005 already.

I think I hosed the blog

Uh-oh, I think I messed up the blog template when I was trying to add new shows to the sidebar. D'oh!

Well, you can't fault me for tryin'!

The site is back up!

Well, we just bought some more bandwidth on the website, it hasn't exceeded our bandwidth limits since we released "Scott Bakula", so we should be back up until the end of the month. Stop on back by the site and hit the discussion forum.

Last night was so much fun and I'm really happy and honored today, but I'm operating right now on about three hours of sleep. Let's make sure we all celebrate this weekend and PARTY HARD ANDREW WK STYLE at our show in Milwaukee at The Guitar Bar!

On a completely unrelated note, I would have been itching back in the day when I worked in La Crosse news to get a juicy national story like the guy who kept his dead mother in a freezer for years. There was even a police standoff!


Norman would be proud!

Guitar Bar in Milwaukee on Friday 4/29

Don't forget that we're gonna be back at the Guitar Bar on Water Street in Milwaukee this Friday!

WAMI 25th Anniversary Awards

I won't waste time with words. Here is a brief synopsis of what went down last night:

More pictures to come later - Thanks to EVERYBODY for rocking the show last night and really making it an event!

Here's the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel run down of the evening.

Web site down!

WHOA! No idea what's going on, but fear not, friends, Webmaster Wendy is on the case!

WAMI Awards Tonight

Tonight are the Wisconsin Area Music Industry Awards at Potawatomi Bingo in Milwaukee. It's gonna be a fun time. We presented at the awards two years ago and played "Prozac Girl" for the show last year.

We won Best Rock Artist last year and we're up for the same award this year, but also for Artist of the Year and Best Male Vocalist. That recognition and respect feels really great. The other bands nominated are also pretty schweet, including one of our favorite ska punk bands, Something To Do. The awards are really just a cool excuse to have a party on a Monday night and we're happy to be part of something that recognizes what an awesome lineup of talent that we have in Wisconsin. Even if we don't get an award, we'll still win, because we'll still get drunk!

324 Strikes Again

Had a good time in La Crosse on Saturday at the show with Filthy Divine from Minneapolis. 324 Live is always a shitload of fun and I even ran into one of my old employees from the TV Hell I used to work at. He was driving the cab from the hotel to the afterbar and we fit 11 people into his minivan. None of them would shut the fuck up either. Ha. He musta thought we were total assholes.

After Friday night, Ben, Wendy, and I didn't think we had it in us to party again. We were wrong, we found the power. It was inside us all along.

Wow, I Smell Bad

Alright, I feel a little better. I was listening to a little Smokey Robinson and it put me in a hella better mood. Once I heard "Tracks of my Tears", my mood picked up considerably.

I had the Indian buffet at the Maharaja on Odana road yesterday. And I really do love it, I try to hit it at least once a month. But it gives me hideous gas for probably two to three days after the fact and today I think I'm producing enough methane to power a small town. I'm grossing myself out here at my desk. Everyone walking by and in the cubes next to mine probably thinks that someone died. Hell, I think someone died.

I enjoy a discussion of gas just like everybody else. But I find the word, "fart", disgusting. In fact, I think it's more offensive than the word, "fuck". At least fuck has some character, fart, is some kinda semi-onomatopeia that has too much of a juvenile air. One syllable just isn't enough to describe the significance of the gaseous situations that I've encountered.

Alright, sorry, I'm rambling. Oh God, I just did it again. I think I'm gonna head to the bubbler.

More People I Hope Burn in Hell...

These fucking pigs shot down a civilian plane and then murdered the only survivor. Do you ever feel that knee-jerk call to action and thirst for vengeance? I feel that thousands of miles away.

"God is great!", those bastards chant around the dead bodies. Fuck that and fuck any god who would want his creations to behave that way. I would love to disembowel them, eviscerate, slice from nave to chops. Or send in Chuck Norris to blow their fucking heads off.

But what good would it do? My desire to see their blood would only produce more pain, not justice. Sometimes it seems like there's so much evil and indifference and sadness and hate in the world that I wish it would collapse in on itself.

Cuz I'm praying for rain
And I'm praying for tidal waves
I wanna see the ground give way.
I wanna watch it all go down.
Mom please flush it all away.
I wanna watch it go right in and down.
I wanna watch it go right in.
Watch you flush it all away.

Thanks Maynard, for helping me express what I'm feeling right now.

New Mexi place

Tried out Cancun last night, the new Mexican restaurant across the street from my personal favorite, Laredo's. Rumor has it, this place was started by a former Laredo's worker. Makes you wonder whether they are feuding or just across the street to share deliveries. Anyway, the salsa was great, the staff was all smiles and dancing, but in the end it comes down to taste. The food was good, but I think for my next experience with Sr. Sanchez, I'll head for the border at Laredo's.

Sunspot in MKE Magazine

MKE in Milwaukee did a nice article about the WAMI awards on Monday, and they included an interview with us in there, very cool. Click here to check it out.

Urgh

This morning's performance on the Channel 15 Morning Show in town here today was a lot of fun, but waking up at 5 this morning has me just fricking beat. They just kind of rush you in and out when you're on TV and I was still kinda loaded, I think. The anchor was cool, very complimentary and we got to talk about the WAMI Awards on Monday as well as our upcoming show at The Annex on May 6th.

So, the reason I'm so tired was that I went out and made a drunken ass outta myself last night and didn't get to bed until 3 in the morning. Everyone got a little salty by the end of the night and there was some surliness that wasn't pretty, my friends. I think all the Hunter S. Thompson I was talking about yesterday finally caught up with me right before bar time and I totally felt like a character in The Rum Diary. I wasn't at the top of my game. In fact, I was damn near the bottom of it. Luckily it was all sorted out fairly quickly, but for a little while there, it was touch and go.

Right now on the iPod: The soundtrack for Ahnuld's unappreciated classic, Last Action Hero


Didn't Last Action Hero suck? you ask. First of all, the answer is no, the movie actually rocked, even though, admittedly, the script was probably better than the execution. And as a satire of 80's action movies, it feels a little dated now. Second of all, shitty movies can have great soundtracks. Have you ever seen Empire Records?

Anyway, with Anthrax, AC/DC, Megadeth, Alice in Chains, Fishbone, Queensryche and Tesla right before they hit rock bottom, you know this one's a winner. The Cypress Hill song is unique in that it's one of the only songs they don't talk about Mary Jane!

Could "Consume" be the new heath mantra?

For awhile, we've been saying that our Wisconsin state motto should be "Consume" instead of "Forward" because when a group of Wisconsinites get together we try to eat and drink as much as possible, usually until we're uncomfortably full. Well, guess what? It's nice because the food and beer are delicious, but it also makes it totally easy to be a fatass. We joke around about it, but I know that people in my family have issues with weight affecting their health. Diabetes, heart disease, etc...

Here's some good news, it looks like being moderately overweight actually has a lower risk of death than being normal weight. I know you're thinking what the fuck? I am too. Isn't that the exact opposite of what they told us our entire lives?

There must be something more to it, that skews the results somewhat. Like more normal weight people smoke or something, but check out the article linked above and let me know what you think.

It's weird that our bodies have been out-evolved by our minds. We've dominated all the other life on the planet and we're no longer hunting and gathering our food and now our biggest threat comes from the fact that we were a hungry species so we designed better ways to feed ourselves. Our bodies still have starvation modes and don't even react well to the foods that we find most delicious. Anyway, it's fucked up.

So, this is some good news. Maybe people who really are at a healthy weight but don't feel good about their bodies will have a little more ammunition for self-esteem.

Anyway, I thought the study was surprising so I wanted to tell you about it.

On a different note, but definitely a fan of gluttony and over-consuming, here's a book recommendation:

I just finished this most sexcellent work by our dearly departed Dr. Gonzo, who might exude total misanthropism but I don't buy that analysis. I think he believed in humanity's good nature too much and that let him to expect disappointment.

Annex and Bellevegas

Ben was right, we had a great time at the 3-1-3 in Belleville on Saturday night. The most ridiculous thing was everyone calling it Bellevegas. That was kinda funny, the strip clubs are indeed open and serving liquor until 6am in the morning and that my friends, fucking rules. I don't think the owners at the Super 8 knew what hit them.

Great bartenders at the place. We had a pizza there and it was absoutely the greatest drunk food in the world and I totally needed it (thanks, Mike!) Overall, it's a great friendly place and we're really looking forward to playing there again.

I checked out The Annex last night to see our friends in Droids Attack! and The Skintones who are both awesome hard rock bands. I'd use the word metal, because I think it's more appropriate and these guys are totally heavy metal bands, but metal conjures up images of dudes like these:


or these:


and no one really wants to think about that. So, they're totally hard rock, I'd say with some Helmet/Motorhead influences. Either way, they're full of great guys that play great music. Please check them out. Independent original local music is SO much better than cover bands. It's so much better than going to a fucking campus bar and listening to Usher or that Jaekwon. "Everybody in the club gettin' tips..." Fuck you, douchebag.

Anyway, they were opening up for Riddle of Steel, who I've never had a chance to really listen to, but they take their name from Conan The Barbarian. Goddamn, I love that movie. So, the band, by association, is probably awesome.

Two last things:

I ran into my old roommate, Jeremy, last night. His new band is playing at The Inferno on Friday night at about 9:30, for some multimedia art show. We're having a welcome back party at the HQ for Captain Caveman that night, but if anyone wants to check out the show beforehand, let me know.

Also, Friday I'm thinking about heading out to The Annex for Happy Hour Gomeroke at around 5? Anyone else up for that? There's going to be a ticket giveaway for the Spoon show on May 8th. If you haven't heard their album, Kill the Moonlight, ummmm... do it now. It's fucking sweet. They were on M2 for awhile with their "The Way We Get By" video, which for some reason reminded me a lot of "Bittersweet Symphony" video, but the song is about one-thousand times better. If you like the Racine band, The Dammitheads, you'll definitely dig on Spoon.

On the iPod today: Dead Kennedys and their watershed record, Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables.

Crazy, crazy Belleville

Who knew that a town of only 40,000 people would like to party so much. Rumored to have the most bars per capita in the country, they showed us a good time. The night started with us watching Charlie's Angels 2 in the hotel room. Then we went to the new 313 which looks awesome! There were a shit-ton of people there wearing bunny ears who had been bar crawling since noon. They were pretty wasted and were paying the sound man Kevin to play Prince and Meatloaf, so I don't know if they were ready for a live band to come in and blow their balls off, but some of them were pretty cool. The opening guitarist, Aaron, did some cool sampling stuff and had a good voice. The bartenders were really cool and a bunch of them came back to our hotel to party afterwards. I can't believe nobody called the police. Everyone was so excited after the show it was way loud. One of them drew a picture of her lesbian mother engaged in some unmentionable acts. I'm still trying to figure that one out. See our tour journal for diagram :) Another girl invited us to eat at the Pie Pantry the next day where our new friend Bart bought us lunch. I think we hit a worm hole on the way back because it took us like 6.5 hours to get there and 5.5 to get back. Maybe something with the jet stream, I don't know :) Yup, I got that one at the school of Out of My Ass.

AWK Pics from last night

Oh man, the Andrew W.K. show at the Barrymore last night was awesome! You didn't have to be a Cingular customer to get in. T from B was our scout, he went in early, right when the show started to scope everything out.

The show ended up being free for anyone to get in, but Cingular customers got some free shit, like a t-shirt and maybe a comp CD, I'm not sure. They also limited the AWK meet and greet to only Cingular customers, but I bet he would have met anyone after awhile, he's always good about his fans/friends.

Wen and I were driving, realized that Devious loves AWK too, so we called him and ten minutes later we picked him and his lovely bride, Sarah, up, to come party with us. If you don't know we love AWK, here's a reminder:



Anyway, so we get to the show, there's probably maybe 150 people there, so it's not massive by any means. But the crowd's all upfront, people are rocking, and he's just kicking ass. He mentioned once about the small crowd, but he made it sound cool, "A show for those in the know." You're damn right, Andrew. It was a pretty young crowd, there was a decent moshpit, and everyone was going buck wild. He did "I Love New York City" as "I Love Wisconsin" and I'd never heard him play that live before. One thing I noticed at this show that was different was a lot of noise between sets, so that when the song kicked in properly, it was almost cutting through the cacophony, like the two-minute shredder guitar solo before busting into "She Is Beautiful". It was a cool trick, I think, because it let the melodies cut directly through.

He did The Robot for his dancing for a lot of the night and he was pretty good at it. Here's a pic of the action that Devious took:



He let anyone who wanted come on to the stage for "I Get Wet" which was probably the high point of the night, because people went fucking crazy. Timmy and Wendy both got up there. There was a moshpit right on the stage.



For a minute, things got out of hand and I thought there was going to be a riot.

Somebody knocked one of the guitarists down. I guess that's a hazard you face when you invite people up onstage, but I still thought it was pretty poor fucking form. He didn't say anything, though, I thought he was gonna get pissed, but he kept right on rocking through their finale of "Party Hard".

Overall, the show was the titties. The highlight of the show for me might have been "We Want Fun" because it sounded awesome and everyone was really into it. You know it's a good show when you have everyone screaming, "We want fun and we wanna get wasted!" If you'd like to see all of Devious' pictures, I put em up on our server and you can download them right here.

Andrew WK Tonight?

Looks like you have to have Cingular or some shit to see AWK tonight. T from B called me and said that he might know a way in. Hmmmmm... keep me in on the loop, I haven't seen AWK in waaaay too long. In fact, I'm listening to his fucking awesome debut, I Get Wet, on the iPod right now.




It's Time To Party!

Oh My God, my arms are still sore...

Yeah, I'm going back tonight for Body Sculpt too, this is gonna hurt bad. I was having trouble like moving around today, I slouched in my chair and didn't have the strength to get myself up.

I have turned into a massive gaping vagina. That's why I'm gonna go back tonight for the body sculpting class and try to drag Wendy Lynn with me. She knows how much pain there is involved... and she's scared. Scared bad.

WAMI was cool last night. It was mostly about how to take better advantage of tax deductions for being in a band. It was useful. We also talked about the WAMI awards that are in a week and a half. Those are always a good time. Last year we picked up the award for "Rock Group of the Year" and that recognition was really cool. This year we're up for "Artist of the Year", "Rock Group", and they even nominated me for "Male Vocalist" (I think that's for my Deep Throating skills though.) Anyway, it's nice to see that people enjoy our music and stage show enough to want to honor us. That's fucking cool.

Ha, after the meeting, we tried going to the Taco Bell on Oklahoma Ave. a few blocks up from Serb Hall and were going to get some quesadillas, when we discovered that they're the one Taco Hell that doesn't take plastic now. Of course, we didn't have cash. I never carry it, Wendy doesn't usually either, and Ben spent all of his buying us beers at the WAMI meeting (thanks, Ben!) This is after I ordered and the girl spent five minutes trying to decipher my coupon! Ha, so we just took off and hit Little Caesar's for some Crazy Bread before they closed (thanks, Wendy!)

After we got back from Milwaukee, I ended up going to State Street Brats, which, while I know it was voted one of the best sports bars in the country, I still think it kinda sucks now that they don't have trivia anymore. Plus, it was packed last night, so there wasn't much room to sit. Maybe I just didn't feel like going out because I couldn't lift my arm to shake people's hands, haha. Anyway, there weren't any really good specials and the only cool thing that happened was that they write down your description on the computer when you're putting in your tab so they can recognize you later and when I got my receipt back it said "Iron Maiden" on it, because I was wearing the Maiden t-shirt where Eddie's playing bass. It's the same picture that's on the lead singer of Papa Roach's sweatshirt in the video for "Scars". Wait, I found the picture:

Scream for me, Internet!

Alright, I better do something useful now.

I'm Jealous Of Wendy Lynn

She gets her picture in the Cincinnati Enquirer in this cool article about the Chicks Rock!Fest and they said that she "floored the audience with her ferocious drumming." Nice work, Miss Wendy.

I'm gonna try to make the papers this weekend by getting arrested for buggery in St. Louis!

My arms are killing me

So, Captain Caveman got back from Iraq last week and he's been spending time back at the HQ (or should we call it the Sunspot Cave because he's one of the owners?) So last night we both go to work out together and well, I dunno if you've seen him, but if you've ever seen a shithouse made of bricks, you're in the same ballpark.

His upper body workout blew out my arms and now I'm having trouble typing, in fact, I'm typing with my toes like Daniel Day-Lewis in My Left Foot.



I'm looking forward to heading to WAMI tonight in Milwaukee. I love talking to other people in bands that are also giving it everything they've got and not content with just playing with and for themselves.

Not that I could play with myself today, My arm's so sore, I don't think it could reach my crotch.

recording

The last few practices have been outstanding. Even though we have been recording with a $15 mic, it's getting me geared up for the studio and the new material is exciting and full of vigor. It also feels really good to be done with mono and strep! Dan is home! Kickass! Look out neighbors, let the parties begin!

Newport

So, we drove all the way the hell down to Kentucky last friday and we couldn't even see the ghosts in the attic. The Southgate House was like the Rave only a little smaller and much better sound. The original owner was the inventor of the Tommy Gun. Awesome. My favorite part of the night was either partying all by myself til 7:30 in the morning because of too much Red Bull or scaring the pants off of Wendy in the green room by telling her the painting behind her was watching. That and the fact that everyone we have ever met anywhere near Cincinnati kicks ass and is super nice (except the homeless people trying to take our guitars and the owner of Johnny Rockets restaurant for being a prick over 75 cents worth of promotion that his employees ran).

Great Racine Show Pics

Aaron, of the excellent, Sweet Jelly, who we were proud to share the stage with on Saturday night sent us these pictures from our show together in Racine last Saturday. We had such a great time, we even got to see our compatriots from Fat Sandwich, for a little bit.

It was a long set, so we drank pretty hard and busted some covers out for fun. The guy who beat me in the beer challenge at The Guitar Bar on Water Street was there(and he received his Sunspot t-shirt for his unbelievable beer-dropping skills), but he had to drive so I didn't get a rematch. I'll get him eventually. Somebody else took me on but I Lucky Struck him and his Beer Challenge days were over. Anyway, I thought that people got a good glimpse of who we were on Saturday night, we got to joke around, play some new and different material, it was a good party and a lot of fun. We weren't even done with the set list when it turned 2:30 and it was closing time.

I ended up staying over and continuing the party at Uncle Brett's and it was fun as Hell. We ended up passing out after the sun came up. He had downloaded all these weird Kenny Rogers skits from Mad TV and I'd never seen them before. The gist of the comedy is that Kenny Rogers, instead of being the smooth, sophisticated gambler and singer as suggested by his repertoire, is actually just a drunken retard who pukes all over himself and gets hit in the stones by the guys from Jackass. I liked it.

Anyway, I think the new friends and fans we made on Saturday got a good view of what we're all about. That's being passionate about our music and having a great time bringing it to everyone.


Booyah! There's me looking like the ladies' man, I am.


Ben schmaltzing for the camera.


What is she looking at?


Queer Eye For The Sunspot Guy


Now, that's just campy, you queens.


The gang's all here, motherfuckers.

Cat Hunting Meeting Tonight

If you're in Wisconsin, please try to get to one of the meetings tonight about feral cat hunting.

Don't Shoot The Cat has more information about this issue. Check it out.

Jackpot

Looking through my car this morning I found a bunch of CDs that I forgot I had, so I stuck em in the iPod last night.

Right now I'm listening to the excellent Kill M.O.T.O. by the Chicago band, Masters Of The Obvious.


My favorite line is from "The Chicks Can Tell"

I just had sex and I'm walking down the street,
and the chicks can tell, the chicks can tell.
I'm getting looks from everyone I meet,
and the chicks can tell, the chicks can tell.
Don't ask me what it means,
it's just biology,
it would take a scientist to explain.

For some reason that scientist line makes me laugh every time I hear it.

Is AWK coming to Madison?

Just saw this on the Sunspot Forum and verified it on AWKWorld...

THURSDAY APRIL 14
Madison, Wisconsin
Barrymore Theatre - University of Wisconsin
2090 Atwood Ave
www.barrymorelive.com
(608) 241-8864

It looks like our man, Andrew W.K. is gonna be in town next Thursday, but it's not on the Barrymore site. Anyone have any more information?

Good news, I thought I lost it, but I found it in my car this morning- one of my faves, Rust in Peace, Megadeth's finest hour.

Pussy Hunting

I thought this was an April Fool's joke, but it's for real. People want to hunt wild cats. It's called the Question 62 proposal and here's how it reads:

Question 62 - Feral Cats

Studies have been done in Wisconsin concerning effects of free roaming feral domestic cats.These studies showed free roaming feral domestic cats killed millions of small mammals, song and game birds. Estimates range from a minimum of 47 million up to 139 million songbirds are killed each year. Free roaming feral domestic cats are not a native species in Wisconsin. The above mentioned cats do however kill native species therefore reducing native species.

At present free roaming feral domestic cats are not defined as a protected or unprotected species. Thus Wisconsin should move to define free roaming feral domestic cats, as any domestic type cat which is not under the owner's direct control, or whose owner has not placed a collar on such cat showing it to be their property. All such defined free roaming feral domestic cats shall be listed as an unprotected species. In so doing Wisconsin would be defining and listing free roaming feral domestic cats.

That would make killing any cat without a collar legal. The cats I used to have had breakaway collars so they wouldn't strangle themselves and a lot of times those collars came off. If some redneck asshole would have shot one of my cats, I would have shot him. For real.

Anyway, if you think this is one of the stupidest things you've heard (songbirds versus cats? game birds? The cats are hunting birds who we hunt anyway? who the fuck cares?), then join me and act on it by visiting this website, Don't Shoot The Cat, sign the petition, and make sure you Wisconsinites VOTE next Monday.

My computer's down

Unbelievable! Just a week after getting my computer upgraded, I have a total hard drive failure this morning and then it won't boot up at all (not even a screen at startup). So, I can't do half the shit I need to. Oh well, I'll figure it out, but it seems like I don't have the time I used to for dicking around on the computer. Frustrating.

On the iPod this morning: Here's To The Mourning by Unwritten Law.

Cool Band

Just heard these guys on the new episode of the Rock n' Roll Geek Show.

They're called The Chelsea Smiles and they sound a little Hives-ish, but it's still pretty badass. Check out one of their songs on MySpace, you'll dig it.

If you're a MySpace whore, make sure you add us as a friend at http://myspace.com/sunspotmusic.

Chicks Rock!Fest Mention...

...in the Northern Kentucky Challenger, an ever-so-fleeting mention of Sunspot, but it's nice to be noticed!

The Chicks Rock!Fest, where we'll be appearing on Friday night, also got a nice mention in the Cincinnati Enquirer.

Rock n' Roll High School

Last night's show in Wausau was fan-fucking-tastic. We met so many cool people and had an awesome time onstage. Thanks to Dino and the whole Human Pitbull Productions crew for putting on a kickass event. Thanks to Brian for hosting a fine afterbar. The other bands were: Lower Class Citizens, Pocketbook Revolution, and Stall. I encourage you to check out their websites and material because they were all fucking excellent and it was a wicked party.

No one even got beat up this time, but I did hear about an underager trying to sneak in with three bottles of Finlandia in a Hot Topic bag. Not a lot of imagination, man, next time sneak em in your pants' leg or something.

Can't wait to come back.

Wausau Tonight!

If you're in central Wisconsin, don't forget to come down to the Elks Lodge in Wausau for Rock n' Roll High School. All-Ages PLUS alcohol. It's probably gonna be the only non-metal show in the area this weekend, starts at 7. Get more details at our shows page.

The Pope's Dead

Just announced by the Vatican.

There's more than 1 billion Catholics in the world. That's a lot of guilt.

The Pope's On The Way Out

Solidarnose, my Polish brutha. Death is always shitty, but he was a pretty old guy and was Pope for like, ever. I think he's got the wrong idea on a bunch of things (I'm not into papal infallibility), but his fierce anti-communism helped take down the Iron Curtain.

I'm a pretty lapsed Catholic (much to the chagrin of my sainted Mother) and religion doesn't often play a part in our music ("Flesh and Blood" has some allusions, maybe "Burned at the Stake" but there's usually nothing particularly religion-specific in our songs) but the Pope meant something to a lot of people. Remember when Sinead O'Connor ripped up his picture on Saturday Night Live? I remember watching that episode and Joe Pesci taping the picture together the next week. I never quite figured out her point, I always thought of him as a jolly old Polack. Godspeed.

April Fool's Day

It's April Fool's Day, but I'm not really into April Fool's jokes.

My mom gave me and my sister Oreos one time for April Fool's that had Pepsodent instead of creme filling in them. I was about 6. She left them out on the table on a plate. We NEVER had cookies on a plate, so I shoulda suspected something. I was little, how did I know? Anyway, Allison (my sister) only ate about half of one and she figured it out. I didn't, i just thought they tasted weird and then I proceeded to eat six of them.

I remember trying to trick my dad on April Fool's Day when I was a little kid. I have no idea what it was about, it was probably something like "Mom died." or something, anyway, he never fell for it. So, I never really tried it again.

It's the fifth anniversary of the release of Radio Free Earth. The only place to get it is on the web, because we've sold out of all of our copies. You can also pick them up on Amazon.


April Fool's Day was perfect for the release because of the tarot card Fool on the cover of the album and what it represented to us at the time. The beginning of a trip you know, we were all fresh out of college and knew absolutely nothing about being rock n' rollers except that we loved the music. We thought we'd paid our dues then. Five years down the road, another album, tens of thousands of driving miles, hundreds of live shows and we're still just learning and paying our dues.

Anyway, in the five years since RFE came out we've made a ton of new friends, met zillions of people, and experienced things that we never would have dreamed of without Sunspot. Thanks for everything, here's to the next five years!