Robert: I should state that obviously not all of the shows hit the mark exactly, they were often messy and intense. With never really doing the same show we took a lot of risk! Every show was a risk! We certainly improved over the years and the quality kept shooting up as our shows got rarer to almost no failures.

Julian: Indeed, things were rather sloppy at the start as we searched for a voice. But the goal right from the start was to make every performance different, never repeating. That required a substantial amount of dedication on the part of all participants (especially Robert and myself) as new songs had to be learned and created every time.

Origins

Robert: Just Julian and I performing the national anthem before the tournament, which was put on by Jason McLean and Jay Isaac.

Julian: I had just got a clarinet from Mike "Sorehead" Sauret and played in for the first time since grade 9 band.

Random Gigs

Robert: Julian and I found a drummer, a German gal named Denise who really liked to rock. She was into rock! It pretty much started with just the three of us.

Julian: Denise eventually left us to complete her doctorate in cloning. At the time of her departure she was already the mother to a brood of identical fruit flies and squid.

Robert: Sometimes we'd show up impromptu at shows and do little sets spur of the moment in between acts. One such set was at a warehouse space that some fire breathing Modern Primitive act was playing at (hey, it was the 90s). The progressive hardcore Vancouver act Insult To Injury who later became Submission Hold played. Andy their bassist sat in with us as we did three songs including "Everybody Loves Somebody" by Dean Martin. A Mohawked fella in a dress said afterwards that we reminded him of King Uskiewicz and The Uskiewicz Tones.

Julian: Another gig that was documented on video was the Ted Dave Bar-B-Q. The performances were held in the back yard and just as we were getting into the chorus of "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds" the cops interrupted us and forced us into the basement. Eric Napier sat in on bass, and I do believe Meow (later Maow, featuring Neko Case on drums) opened for us.

Battle of the Bands
March 24 & 26, Southwall,
North Vancouver
w/ Wicked Swimming Dog and others

Robert: Sandi Morris had now joined as our bassist. Shayne Ehman of Staked Plain joined to play whatever he wanted, he stayed for at least five years and really added a lot to the band. This was our first "official" show, he was so important to the act. He is an explorer in the possibilities of sound and sounds, a
very needed layer in our dynamic. I cannot begin to name all of the exotic and not so exotic instruments
that he has played! His mates in Staked Plain (do seek out their album for some folk damage) Adrien and Josh Stevenson joined us on many occasions over the years. Adrien was there for the first year or so. Josh still plays with us at times! Shayne left sometime before the first album (unsure exactly when), we were trying to be a "band" at the time. Even so, he was and is sorely missed. Our experiment being a band eventually ended. Shayne joined us - along with Josh - for some of the sessions on Balls Boogie (2008).

Who else played at this point? Hmmm....

For this show we submitted a fake demo that was actually of the band Anal Cunt that played, what did Napalm Death play? Grindcore? Death metal? I dunno.

This was one of those sorta all ages teen venue hang outs. Teens with taste I should add as they voted the multi-pedaled grunge act Wicked Swimming Dog off immediately and us into the finals. For the first round Carl Newman and Keith Parry of Superconductor showed up to watch, we did a Superconductor cover as I mimicked Carl's twitchy mannerisms. For the finals I remember having felt marker written on myself and a nightie. I had made sweet love to my childhood teddy bear a few months before. For the show I threw the stuffing of said teddy into the crowd and the peeps played with it including a gal who joined one of my later acts briefly. John Paul of the infamous act Hump guested with us, his one and only time, he sang "Stairway to Heaven" and also held up an organ for me to play during "Piano Man" as it only worked when held aloft upside down. An honour as I remember this one Hump gig where I was on liquid acid and all these fights broke out through their feedback squalor with one member in a wedding dress doing cartwheels through the fights.

Julian: Didn't John Paul also play the vacuum cleaner?

Robert: The venue's adult chaperone was upset at us, rumors of drugs and alcohol floated around, yet I was sober; they made us cut our set short and we didn't win. Future Toilet member jody interviewed us for his Wow ziney. I was annoying. Hey, I was a naive 21 years of age. And there were a great deal of shows where I was annoying!

jody: I thought they were about the coolest thing I'd ever seen. Of course I was going to feature them in my zine! I knew Robert (Bunyon) and Julian (Rubberneck) because they were fellow zinesters, and the good Rev. Rot N. Hell (Gee-Zuz) was present for the interview, and gave me a ride home in his VW bus art car.

The punks running the show took themselves way too seriously. Someone unplugged the band because they found them a little too wild, I guess. During the interview, the band told me that, hey, that's okay, that's how they know when to end the show. Denise refused to speak English during the interview (jody: "are you speaking German?" Denise: "Nein.") Shayne spoke nonsense, or punctuated the interview with random non sequiturs like "we sniff pocket pussies, man." And Robert got *really* worked up when he talked about his "cummy teddy bear stuffing."

02 April, ANZA Club
w/ Caroliner, Star Pimp and Superconductor

Tommy
11 June, The Old American

Robert: I think a magician was on the bill. The American was gentrifying from skid row bar to alternative rock venue so doing The Who's Tommy fit perfectly. Never cared much for Tommy but it fit, we did the whole thing.

Julian: I got all the sheet music from the library and learned each song to perfection. But when mashed with the cacophony all around, it was pure Toilet.The only change we made from the Who's version of Tommy was to replace their "We're not Gonna Take It" with Twisted Sister's "We're Not Gonna Take It."

Robert: Licorice Whips' friend, a lil black plastic baby doll, played Tommy. My friend Mark Klemola who got back from India played tablas with his friend Ryan. Marc Bell of The All Star Schnauzer Band was in our line up for this one, he played a few summer shows with us while he was visiting town. He played snorkel. I danced with a lady who could barely walk as Marc sang "Pinball Wizard" through a snorkel.

Did we have any shows before this and after Caroliner? Hmmm. Was performance artist Jay McLaughlin in the band at this point? When did jody join? Leave? Join again?

jody: This was my first gig. A night or two before the show, I was on the phone with Robert, and he asked if I wanted to play the show. "But Robert," I protested, "I haven't rehearsed with you! I don't know the songs, I don't know how to play any instruments!" He said, "oh, that's alright, don't worry about it. Just show up, I'll give you an instrument to play, and you can do what you want with it." So I showed up a few minutes before the band took the stage. "Oh, jody, here!" Robert handed me a washboard. Dumbfounded, I sat on the edge of the overcrowded stage, and scratched and scraped the hell out of that thing for the entire show. I had no idea what I was doing, but I sure knew I wanted to do It again.

Marc: I barely remember any of this (I have a terrible memory). Are you sure it wasn't On/Off Schnauzer playing snorkel? But seriously, it's hard to get a sound out of a snorkel. I do remember being very nervous about singing "Pinball Wizard" and messing it up. Yes, I was saved by the dancing antics going on nearby. It's kind of great there was actually a Toilet gig at the (now defunct) Old American.

jody: I remember Marc in rehearsals after this show, rehearsing the snorkel. He was so intense on that thing, really into it. To this day I have no idea how he did what he was doing.

Billy Joel Tribute
25 June, Hastings Community Center
w/ Nimrod and Facepuller

The show was sparsely attended. Wozzle, who put on the show, got the date wrong on the poster: it happened on June 25th. About 100 kids showed up on Monday, July 25th, for no show.

jody: My second show. I actually got to practice for this one and learn a bunch of Billy Joel songs on the washboard. I could sing, even back then; hell, I'd been in choir in high school, and was in a jazz vocal group called The Guyz Who Vocalize who actually did a Joel song for a jazz fest, "For The Longest Time." But I kept my mouth shut, my head down, and I scratched the shit out of that washboard (a metal one, still have no idea who it belonged to) with some half-pound piece of metal. I remember what I wore: a floppy golf hat, a Daniel Johnston "Yip Jump Music" t-shirt, and walking shorts. I don't remember there being an audience at all. Pussyarse put all this reverb and echo and stuff on our sound because he thought we'd sound better or something. I don't think he really liked, appreciated or understood what we were doing, so he was just fucking around. He was just one in a long line of people who figured they could do whatever they wanted with us while we were on stage, out of either a lack of respect, or complete bewilderment.

Robert: Shawn Conner was at this show, he'd later write about us for various papers; a guy turned to him and said, "this is the worst band I've ever seen."

This was Claudio of Blast! Records' birthday party. Can't remember how old he turned. He wanted some Rolling Stones so we did "Sing This Song Together." This show was pure carnage. Sandi Morris quit the band mid-set onstage so Keith of Scratch Records started playing as we had the bass notes written out. Then Pussyarse played bass, every time I turned around there was a new bassist. Pussyarse stayed for a few shows in varying capacities. Some dread-locked guy came up on stage and started ripping pages out of a book. Lick the Pole was supposed to open but canceled, yet the two gals showed up to bump and grind with the 12 foot long scarf my Mom knit me, and to steal Marc's snorkel, his musical instrument, to spank each other with.

Performance artist Alexis O'Hara (under name of Chartreuse Chanteuse) duetted with me on Nancy and Lee song "Sand." Lee was someone I was obsessed with, big reason why I grew my moustache around this time.

Julian: I remember when Robert first grew his moustache I thought he was trying to look like Ned Flanders (without the six-pack abs).

Waffle Queen
14 August, Gallery Sansair

So I confronted Robert and Julian at this show: "Why did you fire me?" I think this is the only time I can ever recall Julian being mad at me. He practically yelled at me, in his quiet way: "you weren't fired!" Um, okay. I was out of the band for six months. Their decision to rehire me was purely political.

Julian: Hmmm. jody wasn't fired. Not that time. The Toilet was continually re-inventing itself. Well, maybe not re-inventing, more like falling apart, mixing up the pieces and gluing them back together with an unstable epoxy. Some of the pieces would fall under the coach, but we'd always find them again eventually.

Tubular Bells
19 August, Maddog's Scrapyard
w/ Lutini the Magician

Boy In The Plastic Bubble
09 September, Malcolm Lowry Room
w/ Three Day Stubble

Robert: We finally get to open for a real inspiration to us, nerd rock act Three Day Stubble!

We decided to pay tribute to The Boy In The Plastic Bubble. This show marks the first costume that Jason McLean made for us! This suit was made completely out of bubble wrap, I invited the audience to step on my back and pop the bubbles. All songs were Travolta based (this was before his Pulp Fiction resurgence) and originals were written about TV Movies and being Trapped In the Bubble. We nonsensically ended with "Tusk" that Donald the Nut played trumpet on. My brother Frank played guitar this set.

This may have been Max Lee's first show on drums. Did performance artist Jay McLaughlin join on this show? Jay was great, man, she was ready for anything onstage, utterly fearless and it showed, damn, she was funny, she smoked cigarettes and it seemed appropriate, I miss that gal. Was Mark Klemola still in the band? I remember there being a conversation about how there was too many unnecessary members so he and jody got ousted. What a stupid conversation for an act such as this. Luckily, at least jody came back. A video exists somewhere, love to see it again. It was a great show.

Julian: Lester provided synth squawks for this one too, didn't he? Thus marking his final live foray with the Toilet.

Country Music Groovin' For Grub - Feed the Food Bank 16 December, 409 E. Broadway
w/ Wandering Lucy and Swallowtail

Robert: This was a food bank fundraiser that college radio station CITR didn't want to mention on their station due to their Battle Of the Bands happening that night. Nevertheless, 800 dollars was raised. We did a tribute to country music. Lots of kids played ball hockey. This was in a church hall. During our country version of "Only Women Bleed," Jay McLaughlin, our sole female that show, started bleeding profusely. I had a crazy glittery lasso I swung around which made some acid tripping folks in front flip out. There was a strange cartoony dog house prop that I sang out of. Adrian of Staked Plain played harmonica throughout the set in a way that I told him was depressing, I shouldn't have said that, he was great.

Julian: As we were playing, a large smiley-faced balloon half-filled with helium floated in from outside and across the dance floor, making for a nice acid moment. Jay got blood on my guitar.

Nadya: The year was 1995, and I was a teenage girl working as a phone sex operator at a now-defunct outfit called Cybervoice in East Vancouver. My parents were under the impression that I was employed by an answering service, which wasn't entirely a falsehood: Cybervoice provided a service, and I indeed answered calls, but M & D didn't have to know that I was spending eight hours a day mostly doing one of two things: describing my fellatio technique in lurid detail, or yelping like a injured sea lion in simulation of orgasmic bliss. Sure, it was pretty much a harmless environment, with about a dozen women at any given time corralled into a windowless warehouse with only a vending machine for company, but my suburban parents would never have been able to stomach the fact that their daughter spent her days in the city moaning and gasping four-letter words to lonely American men. It was my first time living outside of the suburbs, and they feared for my very life; and though the atmosphere was mundane, dull, and unproductive at the best of times, I lied for an entire year about how I made my money.

There were, however, numerous colourful characters employed by Cybervoice. Not all of them were necessarily appealing (one that springs to mind is a lady who would wriggle in her chair like an epileptic marlin as she gasped dirty nothings into her headset, prompting many of us to complain to the supervisor, who had the unsavory task of asking the lady to "calm it down for the sake of the others"), but a few were rather interesting. If we ladies were the hos, the switchboard operators were the pimps, and the two biggest pimps in the place were Julian, who seemed to be an impressive connoisseur of music, and Pussyarse, a fellow with an early Beatles haircut and a caustic commentary on absolutely everything… including the women who worked at Cybervoice.

One fine evening - most likely during a weed-fueled coffee break - Julian revealed to me that his band, the wonderfully-named July Fourth Toilet, was going to be performing up at CITR for a show called Radio Thunderbird Hell. Something like that, anyway.

"We're doing this musical called Teen," he told me.

"Teen?!" I exclaimed. "I know Teen!" And did I ever know Teen. My senior high school had actually staged a production of this overlooked masterpiece, replete with earnest dramatizations, multicolored costumes, and "Up With People" choreography. Having been forced to watch it at school a few years prior by a lazy English teacher who had no lesson plan prepared, many of the musical's infuriating hooks were still trapped in my head, and I think I even started singing a few of them to Julian to prove my comprehension of its existence. Perhaps impressed by my knowledge of this obscure opus, he asked if I wanted to participate.

But of course. I had spent many, many years on stage as a child singing myself hoarse and dancing my toes off for the sake of an audience. If I could engage in some sort of performance that didn't involve describing my labia majora to a lascivious Yankee, I was more than a willing participant. Of course, since it was a radio show, clearly there would be no opportunities for me to show off my five years of prepubescent (pre-)Teen(?) dance training, but I would get to sing, and I would get to act, and both of those things appealed to my show-pony nature. Now, whom I would be singing and acting with, I wasn't sure, but I would soon find out.

We had two practices scheduled before the show. Two. Maybe there were more, but I only attended two. It became apparent to me that Perfectionism and Regimentation were two concepts that did not have any place in the J4T performance ethic, which of course, suited me just fine. It seemed that the freer and more spontaneous the delivery, the more entertaining things were bound to be, so long as the entire piece was held together through sheer exuberance and personality which each person in the band appeared to have by the bucketful.

There was Julian, of course, who was like the impossibly-conceived love child of Bob Dylan and John Lennon if reared by the Monkees. There was his roommate Robert, an enthusiastic, outgoing guy in polyester who always seemed to be raving about some new vinyl he had scouted out. There was this lady Jay McLaughlin, who had her own brand of sartorial splendour and made every word she uttered / barked sound as if it was of the utmost importance. There was the aforementioned Pussyarse, who sounded like James Spader, except much more odious. There were a few other people named Kim, jody, Andre and Mark who seemed to balance out the intensity of the other four.

I met most of them at our first practice, and any nervousness I may have had - though I didn't really have any, being dosed up on various chemicals at the time - dissipated upon our initial meeting. They all seemed entirely comfortable enough with themselves to accept me into their fray, despite my being a) significantly younger than them, b) prone to smoking cigarettes moodily in order to gain attention, and c) in the process of weaning myself off my Bauhaus-and-black-hair phase. They were all kind, friendly, and down to earth, and seemed to legitimately enjoy each other's company.

Let's talk shop: the tale of Teen consists of six squeaky-clean kids on the cusp of pubescence, mostly preparing for the "big dance", all the while navigating the shoals and pitfalls of their burgeoning hormones and budding bodies. Parents! Weekends! Getting rides! Tying up the phone line! Developing romantic feelings for acquaintances with whom they once had safe and harmless platonic relationships (as told in the heart-cockle-warming "When A Friendship Turns To Love")! I was given the role of Mary, and I inexplicably decided to give Mary the most atrocious British accent ever attempted by anyone, anywhere, at any time. This was doubtlessly because, while verbally performing a reverse-cowgirl upon many callers at work, I would take on phony accents out of stoned boredom, and this practice had become almost second nature to me.

There were some extraordinary numbers, which we all learned cheerfully and haphazardly: the opening and closing titular anthem. The angst-plagued "Saturday Blue." The coming-of-age canticle "Becoming Thirteen." The sprightly group effort "On The Telephone." Then there was "It's Alright To Cry," which happened to be Mary's (a.k.a. my) solo, and which I had no choice but to sing. During our first rehearsal, I infused it with the pathos and ennui that only an authentic teenager like myself could. I reached into my sternum and dredged up all the pent-up emotions stored there, and forced myself to confront them through a raw vocal delivery. I invoked all available and willing deities to grant me the spiritual wherewithal to rip myself open and expose my true being for all to hear, judgment be damned.

Actually, I was stoned and self-conscious and had no way of executing this song except to interpret it as a power ballad, and I sounded probably more like a glam-rock fool than I ever wanted to, and will ever want to again. I didn't want to come across as bashful or childish to this colourful troupe of merry-makers, so I just did what I could; everyone else was so gregarious, and so seemingly fearless, and I refused to be the asshole. Nobody wants to be the asshole. (Except, as I will explain in a moment, I actually became the asshole for about three minutes while en route to CITR).

We practiced two solid run-throughs of mind-blowing scripted lines ("I guess being a teenager means you have to learn things all by yourself"), Toilet-added ones ("Let go of my ears, I know what I'm doing!"), and numerous arias celebrating a human rite of passage that didn't resemble anything even remotely close to what you or I went through between the ages of twelve and twenty. Nonetheless, J4T packed up their guitars, noisemakers, hand drums, and samplers, and prepared to assault Vancouver's eardrums with their glorious trademarked cacophony. Considering the way Teen had been written / composed in its organic state, this truly was musical revisionism at its finest.

Jay, Julian, Robert, Pussyarse and I piled into my Honda and we drove up to UBC. And here is where I became an asshole of Olympus Mons-like proportions: I actually played Kate Bush at one point during the journey, and I didn't even have the decency of exposing anyone in the car to her weirder, more appealing stuff. Instead, it was the unrelenting, maudlin stream of treacle known as "This Woman's Work." At best, half of my passengers should have leapt from the car mid-journey, but they actually tolerated it, though I'm fairly certain I heard some uncomfortable shifting-around in the seats behind me. To this day, where I'm presently gritting my teeth and craving a cigarette just by revealing this information, I am grateful that the band did not strangle me; not because Kate Bush is necessarily bad, but rather because here was an artistic collective based on fun and absurdity, joyfully headed towards a lighthearted live performance on-air, and I was subjecting them to a British lady wailing about her lot in life atop minor-key piano chords. Do you see what adolescence, Zoloft, weed and talking dirty will do to your faculties?

Mea culpa, Toilet, thirteen years overdue.

We piled into CITR, got set up, and for some sort of warm-up, the group decided to sing "Band On The Run" (which, with some shame, I admit I did not know the lyrics to), as well as some other number called "Sniff Sniff Poo Pah Pah Doo," which I recently discovered is from the Toilets' beloved Rock Fantasy LP. Quite literally the minute everyone finished singing that song, Nardwuar the Human Serviette burst into the space wearing a hockey jersey and sneered, "okay, I don't know if you guys are going for a Dylan '65, or Beck '94 sound, but…." If I wasn't mistaken, this somewhat deflated everyone's mood, unless that was simply a creeper effect from my Kate Bush assault in the car.

I don't particularly recall any major blunders or obstacles during the performance, which mostly seemed like a blur. I do, however, recall Jay grabbing a couple slices of pizza after the show, and as she was ascending the staircase back up to CITR, a couple of jocks gaped at her, no doubt because of her characteristically flamboyant garb. She stared back at them and said "y'know, to me, YOU guys look pretty fucking weird," which seemed to validate everyone's entire purpose for being. At least in my mind, anyway.

I had asked my then-boyfriend to tape record our live performance, but since he was generally unable to do much more than stand around looking smolderingly hot, he couldn't find the correct station, and when I returned home, he had nothing but a cassette full of static to reward me with. Luckily, I was gifted with a proper recording a day or two later, and it provided me with hours of enjoyment. I was very proud of how it turned out.

Unfortunately, not long afterwards, Julian and Pussyarse got sacked from Cybervoice for reasons still unclear to me, though Julian's parting words to our boss - "you're an asshole. Do you even read? I bet you don't even read!" - should be etched onto brass plates and mounted above the desks of every manager of every company everywhere. I never really knew what became of the Toilet after that, save for a performance I caught at the Niagara later that year, where all I remember is Robert wearing what seemed to be a hooded sweatsuit and positively murdering Barry McGuire's "Eve of Destruction."

It almost seems shopworn to wrap up my reminiscences by talking about how my one-time stint with the Toilet was the perfect segue into East Van life after 19 years of suburban death; how my eyes were forced open by the experience because I was exposed to individuals who did whatever they loved to do no matter their age or economic situation; how my first real collaboration with a band gave way to a subsequent obsession with becoming a rock god…but all of those things would be true. Teen crossed the "t" in my final years as a teen, and ushered me into adulthood with a determination to never really grow up. Sure, I'm in my thirties now, I'm a teacher, I've traveled extensively, and I've had more than my fair share of heartbreak, but at my core, I'm still that anal-sex-describing little girl from the suburbs.

Song Poems
28 June, The Niagara
w/ SMAK and the Loved One

Robert: We were obsessed with song-poems and performed "Little Rug Bug" and "Steal My Music" (from a compilation tape by Don Bolles) and then got the audience to write lyrics for us to play. Many were disappointed we got cut off as they didn't get to hear their poems turned into songs.Around this time some creepy writer guy wanted us to back him up musically, turns out that I wouldn't even be able to sing or dress up and he'd have full control so we said no. Staked Plain did it and they played a gay youth club where this creepy writer kept leering at the youth and making comments. This made Staked Plain verrrry uncomfortable and thus ended their association with him!

jody: Yeah, my fault, the "creepy writer guy (CWG)." When Robert asked me about it later, I shrugged and said "I guess it was revenge for introducing me to Pussyarse." Some background on the "creepy writer guy," who shall remain nameless:

I was offered a bursary to attend an outrageously expensive private film academy that advertised itself as providing folks with the tools to make their own indie film features. The teachers were a bunch of Hollywood North hacks who didn't seem to want to be there, and just used it for their bread 'n' butter while they awaited real gigs, like being the second assistant camera guy on a movie of the week starring Tom Arnold or other nonsense. Anyway, really depressing scene. I was one of two poor kids in my class of 25, perhaps the only self-described "artist," and the only person who didn't worship Reservoir Dogs. The only other non-rich person on a bursary, who I bonded with at first before I knew he was a psycho? "The creepy writer guy." An experimental writer with a couple of books under his belt, CWG was a multi-hyphen, which made him more attractive than the rich kids at first, definitely the other outsider in this environment, a self-described "gay black Jewish skinhead" formerly in the military. So we hung out a bit. I liked him at first, but he would say and do weird things. He was a bit of a perv, he definitely liked younger guys. He grabbed my ass once when we were going up a stairwell, and he laughed when I yelled at him.

CWG wanted some "experimental" musicians to back him up while he did his "experimental" spoken word. He asked about my band, and I was reluctant and non-committal at first, but he kept bugging me, and I guess at some point I relented and gave him somebody's phone number. Persistent fella. I made the mistake once of telling him I knew Nardwuar the Human Serviette, the CITR DJ whose interviews with musicians and other celebrities were legendary. He got really excited: Nardwuar had interviewed Sonic Youth, and he practically jizzed himself as he screamed out how Sonic Youth would be the perfect band to back him up! So he started bugging me about introducing him to Nardwuar, who would introduce him to Sonic Youth, who would... well, you get the idea. I brushed him off for weeks, hoping that would be the end of it.

Shortly after the July Fourth Toilet/Staked Plain fiasco, I ended up working in the same group as him for a student documentary film project, a short about the local "Mod scene." We scheduled a shoot with Ska-T, a local sweetheart of a dude who had (still has!) a ska show on... CITR. Yikes! I was NOT looking forward to this, because I dreaded what would happen if Nardwuar was at the station during our shoot day. And, O! my Lord...

Our motley little crew traipsed into the station, and one of the first people I saw was Nardwuar, and of course he walked right up to me and said hello. Shit. I called him by his real name, just to throw off CWG, and I quickly went about my work (I was cinematographer and sole camera person, a lot of work to do.) But CWG figured out pretty quickly I was talking to Nardwuar, and he cornered Nard in the hallway and started raving at him. "Hi, did jody tell you about me, I'm a writer and I need Sonic Youth to back me up, you know Sonic Youth, right, you can get them for me, right, jody said you could, you know Sonic Youth and they're perfect for me, jody said..." Nardwuar, who had, at that point, handled the likes of Timothy Leary and Mikhail Gorbachev in interviews, didn't seem to know what to make of the creep. "jody, are you with this guy?" I felt so embarrassed. I tried to keep working, setting stuff up, but I guess Nardwuar must have dismissed him or something, or wasn't appropriately responsive. So, as I prepared my camera, the little creep started screaming at me "you told me Nardwuar knew Sonic Youth, and that he could get them to back me! You said!" Okay, the guy was clearly delusional, now he was going off his nut. The station was crowded that day, there were people all around in the lounge, and he was just tearing a strip off me. Everybody was stunned and just stood around listening to him rant incoherently about his failed dream of having Sonic Youth back him up, and how it was my fault.

Now, Nardwuar can be a pretty high-strung guy, and a little odd at times, himself, but that's part of his charm, and we all love him for it. I don't know if it was out of frustration, or to save me from the creep's incessant ranting, but he climbed atop the coffee table in the lounge, kicked off the magazines, and started jumping up and down frantically like a four-year old child having a temper tantrum. He was gritting his teeth and making a funny "vuuu-vuuu-vuuu" sound. He jumped so hard the table started cracking.

We had this funny kid on our doc team, an eighteen year-old Turkish version of the Comic Book Guy with a lisp. He was our boom operator. He got scared of Nardwuar's antics, got this wild look in his eye and gripped the boom pole in his hand like a baseball bat. "I thwear to God, kid, if you don't calm down I'm gonna hit you!" I yelled out "No!" He was going to do it, he was going to bash Nard's noggin! I jumped in front of the boom and grabbed it from him. "This is Nardwuar's place, he can do this!" I heard a big cracking sound behind me, and I noticed Nardwuar begin to lose his footing: he had been jumping so hard the table was cracking. I guess he figured that was enough, so he stopped abruptly and left the room. And I was left there in the middle of the whole thing, holding the boom and everybody... EVERYBODY... shaking their heads in disbelief. At me. This was hell.

I dropped out of the school shortly after this incident, and the next time I saw Nardwuar he asked me, "who were those guys you were with?" I was too embarrassed to tell him anything about them, and still to this day I don't know why CWG figured I could help him get Sonic Youth to "back him." So he settled for Staked Plain, who were smart enough to get away from him even more quickly than I did. Seems like as a young man I was an easy mark for psychos, but after dealing with Pussyarse and CWG within such a short period of time, I smartened up.

Robert: This was that odd midwife who was on trial. I have odd feelings about this one, not so sure of the politics involved. We performed "Having My Baby" and "Gloria" acoustically. The announcer couldn't bring herself to say our name so just called us "The July Fourth Band." I remember we took the bus there with our instruments and then busked downtown after which was fun! Jay, Mark G, Andre, Julian, Robert, Shayne, who else?

Julian: This was the first time I ever saw Ian Hanomansing and I thought "what a hunk!"

Robert: I remember Duotron and Couch from Bulb Records were in town and I told them to come but they didn't, I wish they had as I had a real kinship with those people and still keep in touch with them. They went on to do Monotrona, Wolf Eyes and 25 Suaves, they were some of the few acts doing crazy stuff at the time!

Anyhow this show was actually on the front porch and one can hear car horns and all that. Mark Mark first had his turntable audio cassette suitcase that he put to full use. I really miss that suitcase! The Molestics showed up to play trumpets and brought Susan Box on sax. This may have been her first show with us and she added so much to the band on vocals, sax, and flute! A version of the national anthem performed with a Barbie work out record. We were getting this extremely loose swampy country rock vibe at the time as well. I had a fine beller/caterwaul.

Julian: I really like the grueling cover we did of "That's A Plenty" with full brass accompaniment. "Atlantic City" is swell, too.

Susan: This was my first show with J4T, and right from the first I was welcomed, though I didn't know anybody and the guys who brought me took off again. It was an easy fit

Robert: Some shady guy got all these cartoonists together to make a jam comic that he was going to put out. He never did and no one got paid... hmmmm...

Jason McLean made me a whole Mama bear and baby bear outfit, I had bear ears and a pouch for a stuffed baby bear. For this set I threw a lot of tantrums including bashing a stroller as Jay mothered me and fed me lots of mayonnaise. We did a creepy cover of Nancy and Lee's "Tippy Toes," "Shorty Blackwell" by The Monkees, Jim Copp and Ed Brown's "Messy Bess," and some mod instrumental nursery rhymes from the Kiddy A Go Go album. I remember, after all that, the set being so so. I was really trying hard to get a response but the venue was hard to do that with.

Mike Sauret of The Molestics played trumpet. George of Vancouver's oldest band The Jades played keyboards, his first appearance in July Fourth Toilet. George was 80 years old and really played great pre-war era keys. He could wiggle his ears as well.

Julian: Where is George these days? Cripes, he was pushing eighty when he played with us and that was twelve years ago so he's either pushin' up daisies or scratching and trying to win. We would go out for coffee on a fairly regular basis and even completed a song together that he had started in the 1930s. We lost touch after a couple of years and the last time I tried calling him (six years ago or so) the number was disconnected.

Tribute To Nico
22 July, Mercury Lounge
w/ Manifold and Piezoolie

Robert: We did two sets, the first set was originals where I had these crazy wood block things on my feet and arms loosely tied by rope and I danced around like that in hillbilly encumberment. For the second set I had a great outfit as Nico that Sandi Morris loaned me: blonde wig, make up, scarf, white pant suit et al. And moustache. I sang in a very Nico voice but it was hard to hear me due to the sound being a little rough. The rest of the band dressed in black. They were to have lava lamp projections on them by Jason McLean but somehow it didn't happen. At the set's end I rode my bike around the room until I crashed, just like how Nico died. This room had a large fake tree in the middle of it.

Manifold was a pretty good funny party noise act. Piezoolie was a one off act of two gals playing toy instruments who arrogantly showed up, played their short set and left (they made it known that they didn't like us). I was angry and gave them less door money two weeks later (I had to track them down to give it to them) as I was a very "support your local scene" naive boy at the time. The one gal's boyfriend Keith Parry tore a strip off of me quite badly and they got extra money in the end. On a chipper note it was Jason Mclean's first date with his wife Heather that night.

jody: I guess this was a good night for romance, as this is the first show I invited a girlfriend to see. And she liked it!

Julian: It was also a bad night for romance as this girl I worked with came to the show drunk and crawled all over me. My old lady was furious!

04 August, Malcolm Lowry Room
w/ the Zip Code Rapists

30 Second Songs
06 December, The Hungry Eye
w/ The Molestics and Max Murphy

Julian: The version we do of "One Day..." on Something for Everyone is stupendous.

Michael Nesmith's Tantamount To Treason
28 January, the Niagara
w/ Three Day Stubble and Cricketer

Julian: The Monkees were my first musical influence from when I was 11. They weren't about rock n roll, they were about revolution and Mike Nesmith is a superb songwriter (almost all the tunes he wrote for them are gold: "Papa Gene's Blues," "Listen to the Band," "Nine Times Blue," "Good Clean Fun"). The Monkees are definitely overlooked by the industry purists who are trying to keep them out of the Hall of Fame. They did play their instruments: check out Monkees Live 1967. Sheesh!

Robert: Before our show we sent Mike Nesmith an email telling him about the tribute and wondering what the chords to "Highway 99 With Melange" were. He replied, "happy to hear it, good luck, I have no idea."

Julian: Nesmith actually replied to our email as the internet was still in its infancy at that time and consisted of a mere handful of techno-geeks and computer nerds before the eventual brainwashing the masses. Well, 20% of the world's population by now.

Clancy: My first date with July Fourth Toilet! As a sought after professional drummer with vast gigging and recording experience. I, to this day, do not know why I dipped my toe into this unfathomable dark murky shambolic freakshow.

Battle With The DJ
19 April, Emily Carr College of Art and Design

Robert: Let's face it, playing for art students sucks. In this particular dark era all they wanted to hear was techno. They even asked if we had any techno!!! Julian wisely decided not to play this show. I think this was the only show he ever missed meaning that I am the only July Fourth Toilet member who has played every show! I am going to have to change all that soon and miss a show. This set we did some Yoko Ono and Jimmy Webb et al then tried jamming with a techno DJ who won due to loudness. I felt angry and frustrated this show and kicked off my white deck shoes into the air (a regular live staple of ours) which scared instructor Eric Metcalfe away, though he did enjoy himself.

jody: Perhaps our worst show ever. No Julian, and somehow I ended up playing drums halfway through the set, for most of the rest of the set. I can't play drums! I am incapable of keeping a beat! It was the first, last and only time I pulled a stunt like that, but someone asked me to, I was drunk, and we were horrible. What did I have to lose?

Hipnotique: the Lounge Scene Prank
16 June, Blue Lizard Cabaret

Robert: Ahhh yessss, the infamous lounge prank which we've well documented. Yes, we liked lounge music but we didn't like neo-lounge. The Jades were hired to play a Blue Lizard show so I showed up and found that they were condescending to these seniors and I just hated the whole fake snooty but really snooty vibe. At the time I wrote a regular weekly column for a free paper and in it I criticized that Blue Lizard show. Because of this they sent pissy letters (that were brilliantly self-promotional) and I became the "anti-lounge." We sent a fake demo as Hipnotique to play the Blue Lizard anniversary party.

jody: Classic prank! They were impressed by our "swingin' soundz," so they hired us on. The Blue Lizard took place in the Tiki Lounge of the Waldorf Hotel on Hastings, and they provided the bands with a couple of free rooms upstairs, and a whole lot of free booze. Robert and Julian figured that, in order for the prank to work, they'd have to be in costume the entire time before the show, so they showed up wearing masks and everything. They also didn't speak, which was super creepy. I was getting all riled up, wearing a big straw hat, cheap shades and a banana-print shirt, jumping up and down on the bed, yelling "TV out the window! TV out the window!" as I drank vodka straight from the bottle. Those old kill-joys, the Molestics, were one of the many bands on the gig, and they threatened to rat us out, and probably did, because they didn't want to get in trouble and jeopardize future gigs there because they knew who we were! We took to the stage to do some real live exotica, bird and monkey calls, whistles, the whole bit.

Robert: What we did play at their show was mostly acoustic Martin Denny covers, who we really liked! I was dressed and masked from head to toe in an odd dress and wicker lampshade as Dingum Pho. I mostly just did the bird noises. They cut us off and I unmasked and - scandal! It was really July Fourth Toilet! The hostess was, needless to say, very upset, it was like we ruined her prom. I thought that we played rather well and Sue looked great as a Carmen Miranda type.

Susan: I think Dingum Pho gave a lot of people the willies! And when the Betty Page wannabe said "let the audience decide," they actually did want one more song. We did a pretty decent exotica tribute, all things considered. Oh and Robert, not only did you unmask... you un-bamboo matted as well, down to the star spangled speedo!

jody: I think we were just into our fifth song when they pulled the plug. Robert ripped off his mask and shouted, "I'm Robert Dayton and you all hate me!" The organizer lady had been scowling at us just seconds before the power went off, then she stood beside us on the stage with her arms folded like a cross schoolteacher until we got off the stage! Miraculously, and despite the dent I put in the booze, we got paid.

Julian: I got kicked in the ribs by the sound guy as he walked by me on the stairs. To their credit though, they did pay us which I got by tracking down their money man as he was hiding out with a blue martini.

Knights of Pythias Bluegrass Ritual
19 June, Western Front

Julian: I learned four banjo chords for this gig and was completely out of the loop in regards to its politics.

Robert: The Reverend Delford Brown, a long time legendary artist in his own right of which most in the room had no idea, played silly string and squeaky balloon! And Corinne who was in the audience played glockenspiel after I had asked if anyone wanted to play along. Corinne would later join us for many shows on castanets. She used to be a flamenco dancer back in the 1950s.

jody: I crafted my first great, memorable costume. I made a giant red fez out of cardboard and felt, wore a puffy white pirate shirt and a pleated skirt, and some wicked shades. I played mandolin and I looked like a Turkish gangster. We played in a circle in the middle of the room, with people all around us, with us facing outward in all directions. It was a little hard at times to hear what people behind me were playing. But we worked up a good stone groove, Daddy. When the room began to clear out, we decided to just chase the rest of the people out, shut the door, and keep playing for ourselves.

Robert: We weren't treated well, more like after show entertainment which meant that we didn't get documented like everyone else. It was an artist run centre and so the "document everything" mantra was in full effect; a big dangling carrot was that we'd be documented with professional high quality video, we were the only act that night that wasn't. Why? Because the people documenting the evening didn't want to document us. Artists and Christians will always find a way to renege on things. And some previous performers (who've long since apologized for it btw) just wandered onstage while we were performing to get photos taken for their catalogue et al. However, I was performing a ritual and didn't want anyone to
leave, these asses left anyways even though they didn't leave for the other performances. The door must remain shut! The space used to be a Knights Of Pythias hall, a secret society like the Elks or Kinsmen. We used many of their slogans in our songs to make bluegrass ritual music. I tried to find the spirits of the room but found nothing. No one answered my calls. I have never had a good experience playing The Western Front.

The Western Front Research Library: One Fine Evening At The Western Front: An Overdetermined Narrative. Content Description: An Evening of performance by Emily Carr Institute of Art graduates. Hosted by Eric Metcalfe. Robert Dayton's July Fourth Toilet is missing.

Southern Rock
28 July, the Columbia
w/ The Molestics and Reverend Robert Delford Brown

jody: I really put one over on some of the drunks in the audience that night. Frank was playing lead guitar, all these hot rock licks. But he was at the back of the stage in the corner, I was right out front in costume, hamming it up. I had an electric guitar, sure, but it wasn't even plugged in! I played air guitar, and people thought I was the dude rockin' them out! It was great! I was ZZ Top all the way, man. The material was a lot of fun to learn, practice and finally perform: we did, among other covers, "Down By The Lazy River" by the Osmonds, "La Grange" by ZZ Top and "Slow Ride" by Foghat! We also rocked a lot of new originals, a couple of which have finally been laid down in the studio, and can be heard on our forthcoming Balls Boogie album, which is basically an extension of a tradition we began with this show.

Julian: With Frank on guitar, I sat in on drums and played the only three beats I know: rock, funk and drum rolls. The Osmonds can be credited with three really excellent songs: "One Bad Apple," "Down By The Lazy River" and "Crazy Horses" (covered by Redd Kross years ago).

Rough and Ruined Feast Film Festival
09 August, @ Gallery

Shayne's Farewell
18 August, Grandview Cut railroad tracks

Robert: This was awesome! We went down to the train tracks and played in the mid afternoon. Maybe inspired by our walk across the tracks to the bad Western Front show. We have audio of this somewhere! Where is it? I want to hear it! We played "Mystery Train" as the train went by obliterating all sound except its own, the conductor smiled and waved, we hooted and waved back as its sound faded away amidst our playing. That was truly a beautiful day and it was sad to say good-bye to Shayne but hopefully we gave him a good send off.

Julian: It was nice. I don't think you can go down to that location anymore since they built the Millennium Line. There used to be statue of Christopher Columbus at the entrance. He was portrayed as a fey and innocent skinny teenager sitting pretty on a rock and dreaming the world is round.

Nearby was the SPCA Thrift Store where Cynarra and I spray painted a giant JULY FOURTH TOILET on the back wall which could be seen as you rode the train from Broadway to Main.

Evan Symons: This show was great fun. I believe James Dean the Fourth and I made up at least half the audience.

jody: My girlfriend didn't want me to go because she said it was illegal to go down there, and I could get arrested! We had a big fight about it, and I caved in. I felt sheepish telling the band I couldn't play.

Murder Ballads: Halloween Oct. 25, The Columbia
w/ London, Paris and +Bold axis Arms-

Robert: London, Paris was Brian and Bunny Ruryk's amazing noise rock skronk falsetto beller duo. +Bold Axis Arms- was Josh Stevenson's solo noise act. What a great bill! I was an emotional mess at this time going through a break up with Kim, my first serious girlfriend. We did a lot of murder ballads including "Pretty Polly" that we played Doug Dillard's morbidly spoken intro on a Dillards album into the mic. This song caused me to start seriously crying. We then did "Hickory Wind" and "Monster Mash" five times over as that's what Bobby "Boris" Pickett did at Gram Parsons' wake fundraiser. Also did a long free form chanting improvised music piece where I circled the room with a huge stick; during this intensity the bartender went up to the mic to announce, "last call for alcohol! Last call for alcohol!"

jody: I remember doing "Grave On The Green Hillside" especially, because I've always been a huge Carter Family fan (the only box set I own is the Carter Family box set!) And I remember Robert crying. After the show, Julian asked me why Robert was crying, and I said I thought it was because of his problems with Kim, and he said, "are you sure it's not because of the songs being about murder?" When Julian asked Robert in front of me, he started blubbering, "those songs are so hard to sing!"

Julian: Those songs are quite creepy indeed. I was wearing a mask and played banjo with a tinny contact mic that gave it a hollow, echoing sound. Breaking up is hard to do, especially if you're singing hillbilly songs about murdering your girlfriend.

jody: We also ran into problems with The Man that night that just tells you what a shithole the Downtown Eastside can be, and I feel so sorry for the poor and marginalized people who have to live in this environment every day. A sour, fat cop threatened me when I was loading gear into my car because he didn't want to drive around me: "Move your ass NOW or I'll move your ass down to the station!" The next day, I heard that our two good friends, supporters and sometimes collaborators, Kleinz and Tim, who were in the audience that night, were brutalized and choked by a couple of cops down on Hastings Street when they were play fighting near a bank machine. Kleinz is now a man of the cloth, Tim is now a lawyer, and I wonder if they'd get the same treatment from the pigs now? Probably, as these were the same fuckers who let a serial killer stalk the DTES for years, murdering young First Nations women.

Thinking about that night, what we were doing on stage, in that environment, sends a chill up my spine.

Their Satanic Majesties Request
15 November, Vancouver Press Club
w/ Messy Tones

Robert: We had a huge fake joint that we passed around. Someone set it on fire.

Susan: Pete Bastard lit the joint. The costumes were great. At one point Robert was whipping his mic cable up in the air and it caught on the ceiling fan - I don't think it was spinning at the time - but Robert just kept on singing, unfazed, as he manoeuvered the cord back down.

Robert: I asked how much time we had left. The frantic bitchy bar manager yelled, "you are done!" So we played "We Love You" as a final song. She desperately tried to find the power to shut us down. She finally did but our set was done.

I told the band that set this up, Messy Tones, that our insanity would be tough to follow, I tried not to sound all ego-ish as they were really good yet mellow, we were carnage and when we finished and they saw fake joint ashes they understood.

A Strathcona Party Of Music And Haircuts
18 January, 773 East Pender

Julian: Jeeziz! I don't remember this at all. Might I have missed two Toilet shows then?

Robert: This was an All Star Schnauzer Production. Yes, haircuts were given.

We played "Baby Please Don't Go," "Southern Nights," "A Man And A Woman." I think the theme was for me to sing in a foreign tongue. I jumped on jody's back and tried to get him to carry me for as long as possible.

jody: This took place in the cramped, damp basement where Jason and Max lived, possibly the smallest "venue" we've ever played, really claustrophobic. The greatest thing about those old Strathcona houses is that they really contained the noise, so anytime I ever went to some wild house party in the 'hood, I'd never know it was wild from the outside because I couldn't hear a thing. I guess it must be the wood they used. Apparently, at this gig, there were acts on before us, but I didn't hear a thing because I was upstairs. I don't really remember much about it, except for, when we were learning "Southern Nights," Max played for us the original Allen Toussaint version, and I was so surprised at its lush, mellow, N' Awlins vibe; up to that point, I'd only ever heard Glenn Campbell's rollicking country-rock version. And Robert riding my back, that probably blurs in with all incidents of a similar nature: whenever Robert needs to get physical, and needs someone to play off, well, I'm the guy. He rides my back, he sticks his disgusting dirty fingers in my mouth, he pulls me down to the floor, he wrestles me, he grabs my head. I don't remember exactly when this practice started, but, hell, it works out well for us, we seem to be able to play off each other physically very well. I like it when I get to play the top, a deity like the Sun King or Satan, who gets to physically abuse him for a change.

Playing For All Star Schnauzer Band
date unknown, ANZA Club
w/ The Molestics

Robert: We decided to play for The All Star Schnauzer Band as they never seem to be able to play shows. I think there was a golf injury or something. The Molestics were having a CD launch put on by The Blue Lizard and they didn't know we were going to play and didn't want us to. We almost didn't as Jay and I were busy drinking in the basement bar and almost missed the show. I wore leather pants and suspenders. We sang a "Stairway to Heaven" based number called "Goddamn You All" and I did a lot of Bob Wills style "ah-has" as I writhed on the stage with Jay who wore a skimpy outfit and a weird child's Halloween mask! Someone in the crowd said, "Is this The Molestics? They're quite good!"

jody: The Molestics were really uptight, didn't seem to have much sense of humor when it came to pranks. They sabotaged us at the Blue Lizard, and they seemed unimpressed on this night, as well. I don't wish to bad-mouth them, they all seemed to be nice enough guys, they were excellent musicians, had a great schtick, fun to dance to, and we seemed to be a good fit on bills together. But I think they were trying to make a living doing their thing, and I guess our antics were a little too "out there" for them, they must've figured they'd be found guilty by association. So I think this was effectively the end of our professional relationship with them.

Julian: I think at this point I had quit smoking cigarettes and replaced that with pot coz I remember being on stage but not one song comes to mind. I don’t smoke pot no more. The drinking has become a bit of a problem though.

Sandi Kilby's Tax Party
date unknown

Easter Set
April, The Niagara
w/ The Loved One and the Cowards

Evan Symons: I remember that Robert was truly scaring some uninitiated people in the audience that night with his drunken antics.

Robert: Third and last time at The Niagara. I got pretty hammered this set drinking Jim Beam straight out of the bottle. Apparently at one point I puked off the side of the stage. This was a great set though and wish there was a document of it! We opened with a celebrity roast for Jesus. Jay was dressed provocatively as Mary Magdalene with a large dragon tattoo across her chest and a barely covering vest. Then I came out in a colourful bunny suit that Jason McLean and his future wife Heather made for me. We did all bunny songs from a bunny kids' album I had: "Peter Cottontail" and "The Bunny Hop" (which I got the crowd to do); a swack of originals lost to time including one called "Night of the Lepus," and another about shitting out eggs. I tried to fight a large biker but he just kept laughing jovially as I tried punching him.

I was so drunk that I thought I was still performing when the next band came on, the singer back flipped me on to the monitors. I lay still for a minute. Jason thought that I was dead. I got up and only my back was severely gashed.

The headliner took all the other bands' cash and spent it on crack.

Commercial Drive Tribute
April, Music Waste Festival, Cafe Deux Soleils
w/ Destroyer and the Power Failures

jody: This was a fun show. I especially liked throwing icky tofu all over the place. And I couldn't believe how much dirt Robert dumped in his wig, and how awful Julian smelled! Such realism! Clancy was our drummer, and, man, the guy makes the best-looking hippy: very minimalist, but effective.

Robert: We started a drum circle in the crowd. Originals included "Dream Catcher" and "Single Mom Cafe" (the nick name of the venue), which was a rocker that went, "single mom cafe, going all the way, can I have a cup of coffee?" We covered "LA Woman," as there was a clothing store on The Drive with that name run by a middle aged woman with large peroxide hair and a cigarette.

jody: I really hate the Doors, but "LA Woman" is a great song to play, we can really make it big and then drive it into the ground. This number has been revived in other gigs.

Rock N Roll Revival Part One: The Medley
05 June, the Columbia
w/ Lake of Dracula

Robert: Lake Of Dracula was a Chicago rock band with Marlon Magas and Weasel Walter who seemed to like our set though it went badly.

I was intent on doing a Rock N Roll revival series, this one being Part One focused on the rock medley. I adopted a grumpy Don Ho-like "been doing these songs too long" old entertainer persona who, when people applauded near the beginning, said, "please hold your applause until the end of the set." Forty-five minutes later! Our originals and Roy Wood medley went well but the twenty minutes of late era Beatles covers was absolutely horrible. The hipsters sure hated us that night.

jody: Bah. The hipsters hate everything, why should this be any different? The Beatles medley was tough, it seemed to change up so quickly, and the sound wasn't that great, so I kept losing my place, I'd be on a completely different song snippet than the rest of the band. At times we might've all been working different song snippets, and the only thing we had to go by was our set list sheets on the floor. I thought it was kind of cool, because we'd fall off into this cacophony, yet Julian's guitar kept driving us along, so we'd gel together around it again, fall apart again, come together, lather, rinse, repeat. This is one of the things I think sets us apart from other groups: our mixture of craftsmanship and amateurism, combined with sincerity and a sense of humor, gives us this kind of dualistic edge, like our music is always struggling with itself, trying to get out. It's catchy, melodic yet sometimes obscured by noise or gaffes, but I think this is part of what gives us our magical quality.

Julian: We shoulda done a Monkees medley. Or perhaps a Bill Medley medley.