15th & Market

When I first thought of the title I wanted to thing of something cool, instead I went with the address, not nearly as cool as "53rd and 3rd" which is a song by the Ramones (a crazy song at that) has anyone seen this documentary on them? It's terrific. And a little dark. Notice how after Joey Ramone dies and after Joe Strummer of the Clash dies...all of these boy bands in hot topic clothes started calling themselves punk rockers (cough cough Good Charlotte cough cough stop stealing from Chris Rock's stand up and putting it in your songs) I think they all waited til these 2 pioneers passed on so they wouldn't get smacked.

So anyway I used to do this pretty neat job, where I got to go on the Mountain Dew Tour...drive their tricked out hummer and attend extreme sports events, concerts, beaches etc...I got to see stuff like this regularly..

So after the tour ended I lucked out and got to work for 2 days on a film with Jim Carrey...so things were definitely looking up...then I get a phone call from the marketing person from the DEW TOUR saying "we need you, we have something cool going on in Philadelphia can you be at 15th and market at 3:30?" Since I'd just finished a great 4 month tour with them, I hung up and was at 15th and Market at 3:15.  This is when the story stops being fun.The marketing peron was there and gave me a shirt and a box of samples. For PEPTO BISMOL. My job was to sit there at 15th and Market and where a pink shirt that said "pepto bismol" and I'm pretty sure the word "diarrhea" was written on the shirt on the back and I had to hand out samples til about 6:30 that night. Not that bad? Try standing on a crowded city street during rush hour and seeing everyone you know (a guy I'd known from High School was like "what? I thought you were doing well, why do you have the wordDiarhrea written on your shirt?") and strangely, even someone from the Jim Carrey film was there (which was weird being we shot that in NYC) not only that, anyone who'd stop by wouldn't just take a sample and move on, no, they'd sit there, and tell me all their stomach "problems" they'd been having. The things I heard that day, things I never want to think about again. There's no more humbling experience than having to hear about people's bathroom problems for 3 hours. To top it all off, some conservative christian person stood next to me for 15 minutes and called me a drug pusher and that I was going to hell. Eventually she went away to go and yell at someone else. So that was my day...I felt pretty good waking up that morning, but in the course of those 3 hours, I wore a pink shirt that had the word "diarrhea" on it, been embarassed by having to explain why I'm giving away free samples of pepto, heard about everyone's poop, and to top off which was probably the most pride swallowing afternoon of my life, I was called a sinner. The moral to my story? When you get offered a job, holey moley don't accept it until you ask what it is.

Now for a cd to check out:

MY MORNING JACKET: Z

I have a feeling I may have already recommended this one, I was introduced to this band after I'd heard "OFF THE RECORD"which was one of my favorite songs last year. This cd...it just sounds like these guys are from another planet...it's got a really neat mellow sound, where you just want to hear which direction each song will travel, after it's over you sort of want to play it again, just to see where it takes you. It's a fun cd, definitely check it out.

Also: Tim Armstrong of Operation Ivy/Rancid/ The Transplants etc etc...he's giving away a free solo cd online. You can find the first song over at the Rancid  site. it's a good tune.