terror, trauma, turmoil, and the will to stay alive

Amy Greenhouse and I went to see Rasputina last night. The show was wonderful, of course. Rasputina is without question one of my all-time favorite bands. But the music is not why I'm blogging. I've seen Rasputina a bunch of times, so I pretty much knew what to expect. In case you haven't picked up on it yet, I'm a judgmental asshole. I'm not completely okay with it. I try to be nice. I have a good amount of control over what comes out of my mouth, but devil-thoughts do sometimes sneak in my head. If you can believe it I'm actually a lot better than I used to be. Having said that, I warned Amy before the show that Rasputina tends to draw the Top Hat Crowd, if you know what I mean.

In all fairness, I used to belong to the Top Hat Crowd. I don't feel like I do any longer...and haven't for over a decade BUT I feel as though I owe my loyal readers full disclosure regarding my former goth lifestyle lest I seem like one of those creepy self-hating gays on television talking about how Jesus saved them so they're not gay anymore but I suspect hormone treatments/genital mutilation/good old fashioned lying. I may not dress the part any longer but goth stuff still has a special place in my heart. It's towards the back, right next to my tentacle fetish. And, for the record, most of the people there probably wouldn't be considered goth anyway. Just weird, dark, and sloppy. There's a difference. Also: is goth even still a thing? It seems like it kind of merged with emo but now I'm feeling old and out of touch so this tangent ENDS HERE.

Back to the show.

So, like I was saying, Amy and I accidentally got there wicked early. I wanted to wait to leave and play Left 4 Dead 2 so we wouldn't have to sit through the opening band (which turned out to be Geena Davis) but Greenhouse forced me out the door (half true) and we scampered over to some place in Somerville. As soon as we got there and realized it was an all-ages show I knew we were in for big time carnage. I don't want to judge all-ages shows, I really don't. But I do. I hate them. Because children are awful. I justify this belief by assuming Lydia Lunch would feel the same way, thereby making it an acceptable opinion.

Before the opening band, which was really just Geena Davis from 1993 or whatever year A League of Their Own came out, started I noticed that luckily Amy and I were not the oldest people in the room. There was a 60 year old man with a t-shirt that said something about morphine staring shamelessly at Amy and I. This staring continued throughout the entire show, leading Amy and I to assume that he was going to inject us with morphine and then human traffic us. I think the only reason it didn't happen is because there were two of us and we looked like we'd fight back. Safety in numbers, etc. although I hope the victims he found were at least willing.

As the clock ticked it became more and more apparent that we were in that teenage wasteland the Who are always going on about. There was a young woman with all these blue ribbon things stuck to her head. Like the kind you buy that has a sticky on the bottom so you can attach it to birthday presents or whatever. She was also wearing a MooMoo in various shades of blue but with some yellow and orange thrown in so your eyes could be killed with German efficiency. On top of the MooMoo she had a corset/waist cincher thing that was black and yellow. Amy and I kept referring to her as MooMooDusa, in part because we're a dynamic mix of dickhead and genius, but also because we felt strongly that she was amazingly gifted in something (probably art or singing...maybe dance) and hoped to high heaven she'd overhear us and take our drag-motherly advice and adopt MooMooDusa as her stage name. MooMooDusa and the Blue Lagoon would be an awesome band name. I'll sell it to you.

So next up we had Purple Warrior. She was dressed head to toe in the most raggedy, hippie-ish shade of purple you can imagine. I don't know enough about fabrics to accurately describe what her clothing was made out of but I'd guess muslin or something similar. Her outfit was divided into two parts: skirt and top. The skirt was just a skirt but the top looked like a random piece of fabric she tossed on as an afterthought. Like "Time to go to Rasputina! Ooops! I'm topless! I'll just staple the scraps from this skirt I just hand sewed directly to my buxom bosom." Purple Warrior was there with her lover, who we called Bronze Beauty because of the Bronze...shirt(?) she was wearing. I don't know how to describe it. It reminded me of a metallic skeleton. Purple Warrior was carrying Bronze Beauty around the place in what I can only assume was some show of Amazonian aggression. I was worried I might be witnessing domestic abuse but they both seemed to be laughing so I didn't refer Bronze Beauty to a hotline.

Next we had a girl who insisted on reading while the opening band (Geena Davis) played. Now, I know it was my intention to show up late and not see the opening band at all, but that's different because it's something I was going to do. AND when we did get to the show at least Amy and I had the respect to listen to them play. Clap and all that. They weren't even that bad. But no. This bitch just sat there reading. To quote the great war hero Stephanie Tanner: How Rude! But then later Amy and I realized she must have been reading the Neverending Story and so she was reading along to everything that was happening around her. It makes sense considering all the Purple Warriors and morphine criminals running around. It would have been much less eye murderish to read about the creatures instead of actually having to see them. Can't blame her for using the resources at her disposal I suppose.

There was also a girl we called L.T.H. It stands for "Literal Top Hat" because she was literally wearing a top hat, just as I predicted. Not much else to say about her except she had a very round and red face.

And then there were the worst people of all. Heteronormative Couple. They thought they were so edgy making out and being in love and blocking our view of Rasputina by sitting directly in front of us. NOT ON MY WATCH. I was really loudly and openly mean to them regarding their PDA. They stopped. I'd like to think I destroyed their relationship. I coughed on them on purpose in order to hopefully infect them with gay. Another Secular Gay Fascist victory!

There were a couple of other monsters...CONVO ME if you want to hear about Crunchy-Orange-Gay, Fingerfoot, and possibly others. It really was a good show. Musically. But, as I said repeatedly to Amy, "I can't process my environment right now." That sums it up