CleverZenMonkey

April 2, 2009
7:00 pm	to	9:00 pm

I’ll be rocking the taco palace tomorrow. Come feast on burritos while I churn the chili scented air.

Smell Like A Watermelon, Sting Like A Bee

The F-Holes Stink Up The Psychobilly Scene

by Dean “Black Butte Porter? You DO love me!” Bonzani

3-17-09

Flagstaff’s F-Holes are colorful dinosaur-shaped beach shovels made of pure attitude. They’ve defied the conventions of the unconventional with their refusal to adopt a codified look or sound, simultaneously confusing both the Punk and Psychobilly scenes and endearing legions of sweaty fans. Veterans of countless house shows, they’ve toured New Mexico, California, Arizona from the rez to the border and across into Mexico, living on generic Vienna sausages and storing their magical urine in Dasani bottles. They’ve shared bills with The Misfits, Circle Jerks, MDC (Millions of Dead Cops), Three Bad Jacks, and a long list of well-loved Punk and (insert sub-genre here)-abilly outfits. By their own admission, they’ll play anywhere, anytime. Their unflagging determination in the face of little or no financial return was rewarded this March, when they were given the Flagstaff Underground Cultural Kollective’s coveted “Willi” award for Excellence In Punk Musicianship. The award, a shaft of exquisite glass expertly blown by George Averbeck, was accepted in a ceremony attended by a who’s who of local punk luminaries.

On March 31st, they’ll release their new full-length CD at Studio 111, with MDC, Embrace The Kill, and the evil Drunk Armstrong.

In a recent interview, standup bassist Chris Shelton, guitarist/vocalist Jeremy Brougher and drummer Pauly Coochyamptewa discussed the new album, and side topics like hygiene, Raptorcore, cliffside outhouses, rez donkey road hazards and Phil Buckman totally ripping the stripper pole out of the ceiling at a frat and sorority lingerie party.

DB: What’s the name of the album?

CS: “Can’t Seem To Keep It Clean.”

DB: What inspired that?

JB: Shower scene.

DB: You guys gang shower?

JB: We do everything together.

CS: You get to hear him sing in the shower.

JB: There are like sixteen tracks on this one— four of them are shower music songs. We were in the shower. We were all in the bathroom. There was a photo shoot that went along with it.

DB: Who’s the pinup girl in your photos?

CS: Kelli Kills? I’ve known her since she was seventeen. I was at a party and she was there. When I first started going to school here. She used to party a lot— she was in high school. (Pause). This is making me sound like a sleaze ball: I partied with a seventeen-year-old.

DB: But you were younger then.

CS: I was eighteen.

DB: If you were a day over eighteen, and it was the day before her eighteenth birthday, that could be trouble. These days. In the current police state.

JB: Flagstaff has a S.W.A.T. Team.

DB: We have a frikkin’ BOMB robot.

CS: We have a bomb squad. They brought the bomb squad, the S.W.A.T. team, the fire department, the fire brigade, and the NAU police to the Leftover Crack show.

DB: Did the fire brigade dress in old English uniforms?

JB: (With British accent). Here now, chaps! Stop playing that Punk Rock music!

CS: A thousand kids showed up, so they panicked and arrested two people before the show started. The show goes on, nobody gets hurt and yet they needed the S.W.A.T. team, the bomb squad, two police helicopters. They blockaded San Francisco street.

DB: Would you consider that an overreaction on their part?

All: Yeah.

CS: It would have been cool to have cops on horses.

DB: Centaur cops would have been even cooler. Which is your favorite new song from the album?

JB: “Killing Myself To Live.”

CS: “Faction Or Function,” but it’s not on the CD. On the CD, “Electric Couch.” Anything that’s really fast.

PC: I like “Fairy Tale,” but I also like “Velcro.”

JB: Pauly’s always undecided. You’ll be like, “Pauly, what do you think?” And he’ll be like, “I don’t know, man. I could probably get into all of it.”

DB: It was recently written that nothing more can be said about the F-Holes. What hasn’t been said?

JB: What bad musicians we are. People say, “These guys are wonderful.” But they don’t really know. They don’t know how much we suck.

DB: Don’t let this go to your head, but when I first heard F-Holes, I thought of Brian Sezter and Elvis.

CS: You say, “Don’t let this go to your head,” then you compare him to Elvis.

DB: There are elements… maybe late Elvis.

PC: Fat Elvis.

DB: Dead Elvis.

JB: Yeah, man. That’s kinda where I’m from. What I started listening to was Classic Rock and sh*t. My dad was all about Blues and stuff. My parents were very particular about the kind of music I tried to bring home, which in some ways kinda sucked but at the same time, when your parents are overprotective like that, it makes you rebel so much harder.

DB: How did F-Holes start?

CS: I was throwing a party, and Jeremy was sitting on the couch by himself, not talking to anybody, playing guitar. I’d been listening to a bunch of Psychobilly and stuff— a lot of more bluesy Punk Rock—and I walked up to Jeremy and said, “Dude, do you want to start a bluesy Punk Rock band? I know this guy who plays upright bass.” I started out on really bad rhythm guitar and he played…

JB: Really bad lead guitar. And I still do.

CS: This guy, Sean, who played upright, came in and jammed with us a couple of times, then moved to Phoenix with another band he was in. So he decided to skip town and that left us without a bass player.

JB: That guy taught me some of the lead parts to “Stray Cat Strut,” and I figured out the rest. Chris was fucking with his bass the whole time he was around.

CS: Sean wanted to play guitar on that song, so I got on his bass and tried to play along, and was kinda getting it, and by like the third or fourth practice where’d I’d been messing around on his bass every couple minutes, Jeremy and I looked at each other, and we had this look in our eyes like, man…

JB: …I totally want to do you right now.

CS: Next thing we did was drive out to a music store in Ruidoso, New Mexico. They had the cheapest standup basses we could find. So then we drove back and I learned to play the bass. We bought it in April, and we had a show in June. I had to learn eight songs for that first show.

PC: We played with you guys. The other band I was in, Born In A Body Bag.

CS: You were in Born In A Body Bag?! I didn’t know you played drums in that band.

PC: Yeah. AKA Wall Of White Guys. The bass player, the two guitarists and the singer were all white dudes. I was the brown guy in the back.

JB: And how is that different now?

PC: There’s only two of you.

DB: That’s not much of a wall.

PC: It’s more of a step. Step Of White Guys.

DB: How long has it been?

JB: Three years. With Pauly, two years

DB: Is it true that you guys have more replacement organs and prosthetic limbs than any other Flagstaff band?

CS: We have to. Pauly just exhausts us. We have to replace our arms all the time.

DB: Would you say they’re pretty authentic looking?

CS: For the most part. Sometimes they get my tattoos wrong. Sometimes I have a full sleeve, sometimes I don’t.

PC: You’ve got that “Appetite For Destruction” on your front.

CS: It says, “Bug’s Life” on my stomach sometimes, in Old English.

DB: I thought your New Mexico flag tattoo was done in marker.

CS: When I skate at parks without my shirt on, kids ask if it’s real. I tell them I broke into my mom’s makeup and had a field day.

DB: You told the guy at the tattoo parlor that you wanted it to look like you did it yourself in a mirror with a Sharpie™.

PC: Remember those markers that smell like cinnamon?

DB: Mr. Sketch™? The big, fat ones?

JB: Blueberry. I haven’t seen those since kindergarten.

CS: Those inspired one of the possible names for the album, “It Smells Like Watermelon.”

JB: Oh, is that where that came from? You didn’t even give me a reason, you were just like, “Let’s call it ‘Smells Like Watermelon!’” I was like, “That’s stupid. That doesn’t make any sense at all!”

CS: That was the whole point.

DB: You don’t grease your hair. Jeremy could have a huge pompadour.

JB: Part of the whole image/ non-image of the F-Holes is the fact that there’s no particular image. Basically, all this comes from Punk Rock, not Rockabilly.

PC: That’s the whole thing that I remember about Punk Rock. That’s the only place that I was accepted anywhere my entire f**king life, was by Punk Rock kids at school. It didn’t matter what you looked like. It just mattered that you cared about the same music.

JB: In the F-Holes, I do my thing, Pauly does his thing, and Chris does his thing. We play with a lot of Psychobilly bands because we have a standup bass player.

CS: It’s really big in Arizona right now, for some fuckin’ reason. It’s all about the cars.

PC: I listen to Slayer, so…

DB: What kind of car do you have to drive if you listen to Slayer?

PC: Something that’ll get you to the show.

JB: Most of the songs that are actually Psychobilly— it’s like any buttrock song, they talk about rocking. It’s like, “I want to rock!” And it’s like, “Dude, that’s what you’re doing right now!” You don’t have to say it. One of our songs starts out: “Muscle cars and graveyards, zombie love and rat rods, rolled up jeans and dolled up hair, ghouls, blood, guts and gore— we’ve heard it all before. There’s definitely a lifestyle behind this music, and to be accepted, we’re expected to look the part. You know you want to see some larger-than-life band, who can shred at all the licks, building hot rods and fucking groupie chicks, but we’re people, and we’re just like you, we’re not doing anything that you can’t do, too.”

DB: The Psychobilly crowd is wondering where your trappings are?

CS: And then we play that song. Usually, the p.a. systems aren’t the greatest, so they can’t hear what we’re singing about. The thing is, we have friends who have that kind of hair, and who are all about old cars and building them up. I mean, I have a ‘55 Dodge. I’m into old cars. But there’s a point where I get so sick of going to shows and everybody there is dressed exactly the same and nobody’s moving ’cause they don’t want to mess up there hair.

JB: It’s easier to follow someone else’s style than to create your own. The F-Holes have a drummer who’s a total metal head, a bass player who’s a total punk rocker and a guitarist who’s…style-less.

CS: We’re just excited to be doing what we’re doing.

JB: The best fucking thing about Punk Rock is that it doesn’t matter who you are or where you come from, or even how you play. You have attitude and give it three million percent. And you’re up there sweating your ass off, jumping around kicking people in the face. People love it, ’cause that’s what Punk Rock is all about. It’s about the energy and the message and being human, and all-in-all it’s about art. It’s about doing something new, doing something different. That’s freedom.

PC: It’s about dudes in spandex.

CS: Yeah, it’s about dudes in spandex.

JB: You can come onstage in a onesy. You can be naked, you can take a shit on the stage. It’s art. If it’s all heartfelt, even if you don’t know what you’re trying to accomplish, if you’re up there accomplishing anything just being wild and crazy and out of control, that’s still what people want to see. Breaking all the rules for no other reason than breaking all the rules. That’s what the spirit of Rock and Roll has always been about. That’s why people go around saying, “I’m a rebel.” That’s why everybody likes the Fonzie image. That’s why everybody rocks the fuckin’ grease.

DB: Jumps the shark.

JB: (Pause). Jumps the shark? Wassat?

CS: He jumps the shark. Fonzie.

DB: One of the worst moments in television. Okay, lightning round, ’cause we’re running out of tape: how does the band stay warm?

JB: Chris.

CS: Me. Like in Star Wars when Han Solo cuts open the Tonton and crawls inside? That’s what they do to me all the time. My rectum. They just tear it open real quick and…

DB: Like Paris Hilton on South Park.

PC: That was the best ending ever.

DB: Lightning round: what’s your pet turtle’s name?

CS: Sylvesterstallone In Themoviecliffhangers.

DB: Lightning round: best animated series.

All: Animaniacs!

PC: Freakazoid. Ninja Turtles. Ren and Stimpy.

CS: Rocko’s Modern Life. Johnny Bravo.

Sylvesterstallone In Themoviecliffhangers: John Carpenter’s 1974 cult classic, “Dark Star.”

CS: Dude, that’s a film

DB: Lightning round: What’s your favorite stripper name?

PC: Stripper name?

JB: Nadia Nice.

PC: I’ll have to go with a food on this one. Not like “Peaches” or “Cherry.” It’s got to be like “Gravy” or “Stuffing.”

CS: There’s a rule where you take your pet’s name and your street name.

DB: So, my stripper name would be “Spunky Fremont?”

CS: Mine was “Cubby La Macia Circle,” so that didn’t work. My friend who I grew up with had a horse named “Bones,” and he lived in a neighborhood called “The Planet Streets.” He lived on Uranus.

- - - -

F-Holes CD Release, with MDC, Embrace The Kill, and Drunk Armstrong, March 31st, Studio 111, 111 S. San Francisco St. $5. door, all ages. For more info: www.myspace.com/fholesband

My first film, starring the lovely and vivacious Brent Turner. He’s the blurb and the link:

“Brent Turner, former bassist for seminal punk band The Vandals, stars in this gripping tale of birth and rebirth. Turner, as himself, micro-encapsulates the entirety of humanity’s struggle with the deepest questions of existence.

Shot on location in Turner’s famous “Emu’s Nest” loft in the Tenderloin district of San Francisco, this emotion-packed short film features a stunningly comfy Slumberjack sleeping bag.”

Elizabeth and I watched Barack Obama sworn in as our 44th president this morning. It was going to make her late for work, but I insisted that this was more important. This is historic. This is one of the biggest thrills in our lifetime. His inaugural speech was everything that I had hoped it would be. Perfect, and perfectly inspiring. What an amazing and miraculous day.
Now it’s officially President Barack Obama.

This is the complete transcript of my recent conversation with Jerry Joseph, guitarist/singer/songwriter/imp. I first encountered Jerry when his band Little Women used to play at the Monsoons, in downtown Flagstaff, when that band was tearing up stages across the West and North Western U.S. I met him the night Little Women wearing meeting to talk about a breakup, when he tagged along with my band at the time, to go have some beers at the old Joe’s Place, and tell us about his travails. He helped me decide to never become a touring musician that night.

I managed to reach him by cell phone, after several failed attempts on both our parts. I sat out in my car with a tape recorder, because Verizon lost a tower or something to that effect, and he spoke to me while walking through the frigid streets of Harlem, his new home. He was fresh from a run, and full of energy. It had been more than two years since I’d written for Flagstaff Live, and interviewed anyone, but Jerry’s so engaging, and has such a potent mind, that the rust shook off immediately. He truly is an unsung road dog hero of a musical talent.
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Interview With Jerry Joseph 1.11.09

Dean Bonzani: Sorry about all the difficulties.

Jerry Joseph: No problem. My phone went down on like, Wednesday or something— and I got a fucking new Blackberry, too. It got this weird little crack in it from the weather, and they’re like, “No, man, your warranty’s totally fucked.” I had to buy a new one. I’m so pissed. They didn’t want to give me the upgrade. They’re like, “You just got a new one, so you don’t get the upgrade deal.” I’m like, “fuck YOU!” I did find out that when I got to the AT&T place and I was nice, it got me a lot further. I walked in there with my fucking Viking horns and my spear. “Give me a fucking manager!” They’re like, “Alright, alright!” When I got the manager, I chilled out.

DB: What are you bringing to Flagstaff? What’s the arrangement?

JJ: We just did this record called “Charge”, which is a six song…I’d tell you it was an EP, but it’s fucking forty minutes long or something. It’s me, my drummer Steve Drizos and Bret Mosley. It’s just coming out now, so the Arizona shows are him and me and Steve.

DB: Are you on acoustic?

JJ: Yeah, acoustic and sometimes I play electric with Steve. We’re never really sure. All the shit’s set up, but this material lends itself better to acoustic. That’s kind of what I’m into right now…as I’m standing in the fucking projects in Harlem right now.

DB: Are you packing heat?

JJ: I should be in this neighborhood. I don’t because— it’s that old adage, “If you’ve got it, you’ll use it.” But I’m in a pretty hardcore neighborhood right now.

DB: What brought you to Harlem?

JJ: My wife’s a teacher in the Bronx, and it’s affordable from Manhattan. I’ve been here about three years. Now my world’s kind of south of 14th Street. I’m lovin’ the B train— I’m there in ten minutes.

DB: Has it affected your songwriting, the new digs?

JJ: Yeah, maybe. I tend to reference stuff that’s around me quite a bit. The title song of this record, Bret and I wrote after election night. I was up here in Harlem, on about 125th —it was pretty fucking radical. And he was in Brooklyn, and we got together the next day and wrote this song addressing what we were thinking was happening here. It a pretty amazing night standing next to old women who couldn’t drink out of the same fucking drinking fountain as white people when they were little, watching a black man win the election. It was pretty intense.

DB: At this stage of your career, going forward, what direction are you headed in? How do the Jackmormons fit in? How much stuff are you going to do on your own? How far do you plan to go with this trio format?

JJ: Well, we recorded this record in the fall. It was really last minute. Up at this place called Old Souls Studios, which is where my hero, this guy Chris Whitley— he was my friend— recorded his last record. It’s kind of a weird fucking town, Catskill, New York, with this awesome analog studio. We kind of threw it together really fast and I like it, but the Jackmormons just did our New Year’s run here in the city and I like that… and I also play in Stockholm Syndrome. We go in the studio in the beginning of February. Sometimes I like that… so I don’t know what’s going to happen for me. I just feel fortunate when I can work.

DB: How’s Wally (Stockholm Syndrome’s original drummer) doing, by the way?

JJ: The last text I got from him, he was in New Zealand with Sheryl Crow, so he’s doing great.

DB: He was having health problems…

JJ: Yeah, I know— he’s on the High Profile Cancer Survivor Tour.

DB: I interviewed him when I wrote up Stockholm Syndrome, when you played here. He’s a kick.

JJ: Did we play in Flagstaff?

DB: Yeah, at the Orpheum Theater.

JJ: Huh.

DB: It’s all a blur…

JJ: I must be a lot more sober than I was. Some people talk to me, and I’m like, “I’ve never been to fuckin’ Assfuck, South Carolina. And they’re like, “Yeah! You were here for a week!”

DB: You have a lot of irons in the fire.

JJ: Well, I’m old. Even if I am rakish and wiley.

(Reference to my email to his publicist, Patrice.)

DB: Word gets around, doesn’t it?

JJ: I guess that’s the point— when you get older, you do have more irons in the fire. I don’t know what the opposite of that would be. Maybe you’d be totally focused and only do one thing. Last year, I put a lot of effort into this duo, The Denmark Veseys. Steve and myself with Dave Barbe, who did some Jack Mormons stuff, and Drive By Truckers. It was an acoustic duo, but it’s a lot different than The Black Keys or The White Stripes. Some people really like it and some people really hated it. I think that’s kind of a lot of my career. It’s funny, I always think the thing that people like a lot is the acoustic thing, but the promoters always get really sketched about it. I think as far as songwriting, it serves the songs best sometimes. You gotta check out Bret Mosley’s website. His shit is great. Hank Williams meets The Ohio Players. You know, you jam two songwriters in a room and see what comes out. We did a Modest Mouse cover and a couple of his songs and couple of my songs and this song, “Charge.” It started me on this process of wanting to do a lot of covers.

DB: I saw you do “Sweet Emotion” with Little Women.

JJ: I think back in the reggae days we did more covers, because it was fun to do. Lately with the Jack Mormons, we’ve been playing Sun Kil Moon and Will Oldham songs.

DB: You said the promoters weren’t happy about the acoustic thing, but you can rock just as hard on an acoustic, if you really know what you’re doing.

JJ: I think so. Also, it’s important that I didn’t mean those promoters in Flagstaff. You just get a lot of things like, “Where’s the fuckin’ bass?” It’s two-thousand fuckin’ nine. It’s funny how people hold on to what they’re idea of what a fucking band is.

DB: You could go up onstage and say, “I’M the band.”

JJ: Yeah, but that wouldn’t do anything for my “Jerry’s an egotistical little fuckin’ demon” reputation.

DB: You mentioned that you’re getting older. Are you mellowing with age, or are you just winding up?

JJ: I’m hoping that I’m just winding up. My health is a lot better than it’s been in the last few years. At least as far as the shit I put in my body, so I’ve got a lot of energy. But I’ve also got a lot of unfiltered rage. (Laughter) So, hopefully I can channel it through the music. I’m still able to write songs. I still like playing. And I don’t make enough fucking money that I can say I’m going to go sit in an ashram for nine months. There’s really not much choice.

DB: You’re a blue collar musician, really.

JJ: From La Jolla. And Manhattan. Me and all my La Jolla/ Manhattan blue collar brothers are all hanging out.

DB: You’ve got a posse.

JJ: It’s very different here in Harlem.

DB: You just got back from running, so you’re on something of a health kick. Do you smoke while you’re running?

JJ: (Chuckles) Yeah… a hookah. I strap a hookah to my back and smoke fuckin’ black tar heroin next to Turkish tobacco. It’s awesome.

DB: That’s your regime.

JJ: I sure am in a good mood when I’m running.

DB: Are you more of a fitness nut now?

JJ: I was always kind of a runner. Keeps me from smashing shit. I find in New York, if I don’t get out every day, it can get kind of constraining feeling. I’ve had Volkswagens that were bigger than my apartment.

DB: Do you play in your neighborhood at all?

JJ: It’s hard. The hipper the club, the smaller the tip jar. I’ve never been a big “play for tips” guy, so I’m learning.

DB: Where do you do the best?

JJ: In America? The Rockies, the North West, the South East, Chicago. Most of the North East is really a struggle. I do alright in the cities, and a couple of small towns, but try to get a fucking gig in Rochester to pay you anything and it’s ridiculous. I’m old enough to know that just because I sold out Atlanta three nights, doesn’t mean I’m going to do it next time.

DB: The resort towns in the west are a good circuit.

JJ: Yeah, we still go there. It depends. Telluride and Crested Butte. Again, my fortunes rise and fall with the… who fuckin’ knows? The popularity of little bald Arab men.

DB: This could be the year of little bald Arab men.

JJ: Fuck yeah, man. They love me in my Hamas scarf. Every time I take the stage here in the Upper West Side. (Pause) …no…they don’t… (Laughter) Yeah, this could be the year for little bald Arab men.

DB: It’s all about the marketing.

JJ: Soon as I start shooting rockets down into Midtown, we’ll see how it goes.

January 2, 2009
6:00 pm	to	9:00 pm

I’ll be playing acoustically at Dave Grandon’s Gallery this Friday,January 2nd. So, brave the cold and come artgawk.

December 5, 2008
7:00 pm	to	10:00 pm
December 6, 2008
7:00 pm	to	10:00 pm

I’ll be performing solo at Altitudes Bar & Grill on Friday and Saturday, December 5th and 6th, from 7pm until 10pm.

Altitudes is a great room to play, and the chicken tenders are sehr gut! Fantastisch!

Here’s what I’ve not been able to get enough of this week, as I fight my election year angst:

Same song, live in Italy:

Two nights ago, the lovely Tasha and I had our first practice session since our deranged drummer disappeared on April 27th, 2007, the evening of Buddha Witha Gun’s CD release party at Flag Brewing Company. We’ve been laying low in the wake of Matty Keebler’s flight into madness. His tailspin into the Void was just another weird chapter in the BWG story. Now, we’re ready to write a new one.

If you’re a drummer, or know a drummer in town who might be interested and qualified, please contact us. He/she has to have own equipment, transport and time to work on this project. No psychos or meth addicts need apply. We play rock, firmly rooted in blues-based ’70’s four-on-the-floor, with bits of New Wave and psychedelia. Our biggest influences are The Pixies, The Toadies and KISS.

(left: Matty “Thunder Roach” Keebler, right: Tasha Zarathustra)

Tasha and I went out to the Orpheum on Thursday night to see Meat Puppets and Built to Spill. Some band from Portland (?) opening up— they reminded us of Dinosaur Jr. We hadn’t seen Meat Puppets since the first time they played in Flagstaff, about 18 years ago, at the Monsoons (back when Jake owned it, before Steve bought the place and later dismantled it as a music club). Curt wasn’t as lively as he’d been then, but Cris certainly was. We thought that his head was going to fly off. At one point, he leaned into the microphone and said, “So, we meet again!” in a villainous voice. They opened with “Sam,” which by itself was well worth the price of admission. I was surprised to see Curt wielding a Seafoam green Stratocaster instead of his trademark Les Paul, and playing into a Fender amp instead of a Marshall stack. A sign of the End Times? Perhaps. Still sounded amazing and for all the snobs out there, exactly like him regardless.

Built to Spill was great, but we left halfway through.

A note on the sound. I’ve heard frequent complaints about the mix at the Orpheum, and at the risk of again making politically disastrous comments (though honest and usually dead-on accurate), I’d have to say that this night of banjo-less music was marred by sub-par mixing. Having played on the Orpheum stage with Buckethead and Major Lingo, I can speak from experience about what it’s like from the musician’s perspective. From having seen a wide variety of acts at the Orpheum since it opened, I canoffer a sound engineer/ audience member’s perspective. The main vocal mix was tinny, distorted and buried in the mix, especially for Built to Spill. During the Puppets set and BTS, the bass was WAY too loud and muddy, effectively drowning most everything else out. The Orpheum is acoustically prone to huge bass loading, and I’ve seen too many shows where this wasn’t taken into account. This was one of those nights. Other than that, it was awesome to see the Meat Puppets together again, and Cris looked terrific and supercharged. All the usual suspects were in the audience, and a surprising number of people left after the Puppets ended their set.