Archive for 1997

A review by John Dugan that appeared in the Washington City Paper (Washington, D.C.) at some point in 1998…

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A review by Todd Pruzan that appeared in Chicago Magazine at some point in 1997…

A review by Sean Nelson that appeared in Alternative Press at some point in 1997…

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A review by David Poole of my first EP that appeared in Cover magazine at some point in 1997…

I got home this morning/afternoon and there wasn’t any letter under the door or anything. But the bedroom was a wreck… I have this wire closet-system thingy attached to the wall and for some reason it had fallen down. I guess I had too much stuff hanging on it, and blankets and sheets and towels piled on top of it, and maybe I didn’t put it in very well in the first place. It’s just weird that it would hold up all that shit for six months and then decide to fall down NOW, on the same day that I’m all paranoid about my landlady. It left some pretty good holes in the wall, too, so that’ll be one more thing for her to bitch about, if she sees it!! I’m a complainer and a namecaller and now I’m destroyin’ the walls, PERfect. I’d better find a couple of posters and put ‘em over those holes before morning.

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Well, it’s the 28th technically I guess. I just got back from seeing Ryan play with the Jive Council at the Metro, opening for Boogie Shoes. It was fun. But I couldn’t stop thinking about what happened today with my !@)$#*& landlady. I’ve never liked this woman, but now I’ve had it up to here with her!! I had an argument with her today over the STUPIDEST fucking thing. Over our MAIL service. It’s sort of a long story… every time I see one of our mail carriers, they’re always complaining about how they can’t access the building — it’s a multi-unit apartment building and the only way they can get in to access the mailboxes is to ask the lady at the laundromat next door to let them in. There’s supposed to be a key-box for the post-person, but for some reason the landlady thinks it’s alright for them to have to go to the laundry-lady every day and ask to be let in. The last time I talked to a post-person, she told me that the carriers had been complaining to the postmaster and that if we didn’t have a key-box out there by Jan. 1st, our mail would be refused and sent back.

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Played at Lounge Ax with Neko Case; The Sadies; The Peterbuilts

My band: Michael Krassner (guitar); Ryan Hembrey (bass); Gerald Dowd (drums)

Wow, today’s my lucky day. I got a big pile of stuff in the mail, forwarded from the downtown unit. Holiday greetings from some folks I know and some others I’ve never met… people are just so nice around the holidays. It puts me to shame because I really suck at that. Keeping in touch and doing nice things for other people… well, I try when I can, but you know, I’m kinda livin’ in my own little world here most of the time and I guess I pay a lot more attention to myself than anybody else.

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I recorded something funny today… it’s a little 30-second promo spot for a radio show called Local Anaesthetic, on WXRT. They wanted something for the holidays — I think they asked a bunch of Chicago bands to do this. Well I hope I’m not the only one anyway! What I ended up doing was, I stole a cheesy public domain carol from one of the many Christmas sites on the ‘net. I used that as a backdrop, added some la-la-la’s and said "Happy holidays from Edith Frost on blah blah blah…" It came out pretty kewl, I think Rian’s gonna like it.

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Okay, I know I’ve been suckin’ with the diary thing. I avoid updating it for some reason, just like I do with my e-mail. Days go by and I don’t even touch it. ::I’m sorry!!:: Just keeping to myself I guess. In the online sense.

I’ve been having a lot of fun with that van. I took it out to Berwyn on Saturday night to participate in a Bob Wills tribute by Jon Langford & the Pine Valley Cosmonauts, at Fitzgerald’s. I gave Jane Baxter-Miller a ride and took Iris on the highway for the first time. The Eisenhower and, on the way back, the Kennedy even! I’m so freaky paranoid about this thing, even though I’m insured out the wazoo. (My car has insurance but my body doesn’t!?!)

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I got my van last night! Whoo-hoo!!! It’s a Plymouth Voyager named Iris, and it’s the most beautiful vehicle I have ever seen. I got it from the Autobarn in Evanston (the guy wants me to "tell all my friends" so there ya go). George did *all* the talking and cut me a really good deal, haggled ‘em down to the last fifty bucks. I’m so excited!!! I drove around a little last night — this is the first car I’ve had in like eight years so it’s an amazing feeling to finally be mobile and be able to go anywhere I want, whenever I want. That is, if I can find a place to park…

I’ve been messing around with my website, as you may have noticed. I got rid of the cascading style sheets… I guess I got too many complaints from folks with 3.0 browsers that couldn’t see my pages right. I surfed around a lot last night picking out new background images… how do you like the notebook paper?

I suck because I should have gone out to see the Mountain Goats with John Davis and Mia Doi Todd at the Empty Bottle last night. Missed it. Oh well. I’m telling myself that by not going out, I’m saving a bunch of money when in actuality I’m just being as lazy as possible.

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Jeezus, it’s gonna take me a month to finish that story, I’m not even halfway through! I spent the day today looking at used vans with Ryan Hembrey and George Langford (the other Jive Council bassist). George knows a lot about cars, and he’s good at haggling, so I’m letting him do all the talking. I guess I’ve decided to ditch the whole idea of trying to a regular job, and concentrate solely on playing out and touring and working on music. I don’t know if or how long I can keep it up, but I figure I’ve got to try doing that sometime, and there’s no time like the present, right?

I talked to Mike Daly on the phone yesterday, that was cool. We shot the shit. He’s back home after touring with Whiskeytown for awhile.

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Hey, guess what, I think I just quit my job.

ANYway, where was I. Nantes. Okay, well, in the morning Ryan went out for a long walk looking for the cathedral. The hotel’s in sort of a stark industrial neighborhood by the river and it was cold and rainy outside so I didn’t really feel like exploring. So I stayed in, lounged around, had some breakfast and watched some French MTV ("M6" they call it). I’d been a dork the night before and forgotten my jacket at the club, so there was a bit of confusion trying to get ahold of somebody over there to see if we could swing by to pick it up. Finally we all checked out of the hotel, loaded our stuff into the van and drove back to the Olympic.

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We got back to Chicago on Sunday, and I was supposed to go back to work today, but I stayed home… there’s a lot of weird shit going on over there right now; it’s turned into a real freakshow over the past few months. I would really like to find another job just as soon as possible. But how can I find one that suits my wayfaring lifestyle? Hmmm. This being-a-24-hour-musician-and-touring-for-a-living stuff is looking more and more tempting by the minute.

So, our trip to France was like the coolest most amazing eye-opening mind-boggling experience ever!! Okay so maybe I’m easily impressed and yes, it was my first trip to Europe but MANOHMANOHMAN I had such a good time. Whoo-hoo!!! How the hell I’m going to type all this, I don’t know.

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