John Sharkey is the singer and guitarist for Clockcleaner, the band that singlehandedly caused us to rethink music from Philadelphia, new bands on Load Records, and the whole AmRep approach to turning every performance into a single churning mass of sweat and fighting. This is the diary he kept for most of the stops on Clockcleaner’s Fall 2007 tour. As he told us when he handed it over, “No. I am not a fat secretary. I skipped the cities that were boring, hence the gaps. Deal.”
October 27: Now That’s Class, Cleveland, OH
I arrived at the club early to drink with old friends who didn’t show up until about the time the clown did. It was my 26th birthday and my asshole friend Deber thought it would be bafo to order me—instead of a donkey show—a fucking clown named Jingles. “Yeah, I’m looking for John Sharkey, he’s five years old?” “That’s me, asshole.” Bwuuh. Not all was lost though. He made penis hats for everyone!
The show was good. Homostupids were total “Look at me, I’m CRAZY” bullshit. Nice blog, dudes. Some lesbian named Julia threw a pumpkin at us during the set. Afterward we drank more with old cretins and a Narnia dork named JoJo.
October 29: Waffle House, Somewhere in Arkansas
We made a vow never to play the South again. Simply put, everyone down here is a genius and we feel out-matched. I mean, how can we as northerners possibly be expected to hold our own against a total ’neck who sits down at the counter and orders DIET COFFEE. I feel small.
November 1: Beerland, Austin, TX
Here is every conversation you will ever hear in Austin: “Blah blah blah, COCAINE, blah blah blah, GARAGE ROCK, blah blah blah BULLET BELTS, blah blah blah BREAKFAST BURRITOS.” This show was cool because it featured the best front row I have ever played in front of. From right to left: two fat pigs grinding their hams into me, one attractive but slightly underage piece—I’d sat 5 to 10—and then SPOT… and then King Coffey. If you don’t know who the last two are, you probably spent high school having sex and being carefree.
We played with some band that sounded like NOFX and then played a gig on a pedestrian bridge. Jay Reatard was supposed to play with us, but was busy hiding coke bags in his guitar pedals.
November 4: 6th Street Warehouse, Los Angeles, CA
Shot a video today for “Vomiting Mirrors” with the true king of West-Coast sex, Monty Buckles. Boy, I have never felt like a bigger dick-duster in my life. “John, put this green makeup all over your face and then mouth the words to the song while these little border-jumpers mock you from off-camera.” Just like kindergarten.
We played with Mont’s band the Lamps, who are probably the best band in America next to the Bosstones and my girls Mika Miko. For some reason the bartender of this joint kept walking up onstage and into me during the entire set. She looked so peaceful on the floor after I threw her on it. Like an infant on its back. It’s almost like she was sleeping. We cleared the room but got paid good. Thanks, LA!
November 6: Hemlock Tavern, San Francisco, CA
All right show. Some drunk cunt decked me in the face during the set. I managed to drag her onstage in a headlock and ask her what her SAT score was. Her answer: “BLAAAARGHH PANTIES!!!” Then her boyfriend bought me shots for the rest of the night both because he hates her and he read that I slagged Dr. Dog. Two men alone in the night, drunk and bonding over our mutual hatred of five girls with beards that play shitty music. Then I threw up on Ry from the Clockjeans’s lawn.
Met Andytai from the internet the next day. She was a babe.
November 8: Backspace, Portland, OR
This show was pretty uneventful. Two dudes in toques drove 150 miles to look at Karen. Afterward we stopped at another bar and I heard what from outside sounded like 14-year-old girls whose parents just bought them wah-wah pedals. It turns out I wasn’t too far off. It was The Ponys.
November 9: Funhouse, Seattle, WA
This was probably the worst/best show on the entire tour. We arrived too early at the club so we were left to fend for ourselves in the softest city in the country. What a total cunthole Seattle is. Every bar is required to pretend Mother Love Bone were actually worth a smear. The jukeboxes don’t lie. After loading in and playing pool with a local meth mouth, we got greeted by the booker. This bearded, Baby Huey fuckmouth gives us two drink tickets and a stamp for 15 percent off drinks when our stockpile runs out. Yeah, like the physics major with the facial lesions and PBR belt buckle behind the bar is going to be able to do that math. We started paying to a full room and by the third song had cleared the entire bar except for the kid in Catatonic Youth. The set ended with me jamming my tongue in some nancy’s mouth. She didn’t seem to mind. We took the headlining band’s beer to a Motel 6 after the set, hoping that the girls from Lozen would bust in and rape us. Instead we just cried ourselves to sleep.
November 10: Old School Pizzeria, Olympia, WA
I always thought I would want to burn this town to the ground the second I stepped foot in it. but you know what? I was kind of digging all the lesbian Women’s Agriculture majors and bloggers. We played a fucking KILLER show with Sex Vid and Thrones at a pizza joint that Adrock’s sister works at. We all tried to fuck her. Sex Vid actually blew me the fuck away. I also got blown away as I watched RJ from SV jack-off a chihuahua to completion later that evening. I knew Olympia knew how to party!
November 12: Tracy’s house, Boise, ID
We have a couple days off to drive through nuclear testing areas and Bob Ross landscapes. Tonight we drove to Boise to see an old friend of ours who took us to see Neil Hamburger. It was Monday night… in Boise. Neil was bummed. I got his dopey ass to debase me for maybe 10 minutes straight. Then we all stared at a group of unfuckables who were knitting at the bar. Boise.
November 14: Triple Rock Social Club, Minneapolis, MN
Everyone in Minneapolis is fat. That’s cool. We played with Joan Jett and the Blackhearts (or at least it seemed that way considering all the leathery broad-bands that were on the bill). This show was pretty whack ’cept for talking about drugs and how Chris form Reptilian Records is a grown man that calls himself a Satanist with Paddy from D4.
November 16: Chill and Mingle Bar, Detroit, MI
Most violent gig of tour. The SECOND we started fights broke out. We have a couple degenerate friends from Detroit who put on our first show there and always come out to start shit whenever we’re in town. After about the fourth or fifth fight the entire crowd forced one of these assholes outside. The bar was seriously empty for at least three minutes.
Right before the last song this bozo started screaming at me from the back of the bar to “Go back to Nebraska!” He then came at us like a girl in art school with no direction or confidence. I booted him in the chest and he fell back into the crowd, only to bounce right back up and kick my guitar. Richie dove over the drums and tackled him, but it got broken up when the dude started yelling” IT”S A JOKE!!! WHATEVS!!! LOAD RECORDS!!! WTF, BRB, LOL!!!” Turns out it was Timmy from Human Eye. Strobe lights, dude.
November 17: The Note, Chicago, IL
This show was bunk except for the fact that I got to tell the story of how I lost my virginity in between songs. I will share it with you now.
I had my first girlfriend in the basement of her house and we started fucking on a sofa. I was cramming away like a champ but she didn’t want to watch my penis going into her vagina for some reason. Maybe loss of innocence or some American Pie nonsense. I kept putting my dick into her pussy but she had on this enormous white sweater which she had pulled up to cover her eyes. She just absolutely would not look at my dick going in. Weird, right? Especially for a guy’s first time. Then I came and she got pissed because I came inside her (even though I was wearing a condom) and wouldn’t look at me at all. That was the only thing in the set that got a response from the crowd.
The next night we played the Subterranean to a much smarter audience.
November 19: Carabar, Columbus, OH
Before we left Chicago we visited our buddy Stephen at Electrical Audio. He showed us the studio’s lounge area and Albini’s chair, which he sniffs during masturbation. In Columbus we played with my favorite new 16-year-old hardcore band, Vegetative State. During the set tonight I kicked the mic stand while still holding the top and sent the base of it flying right into VS’s bass player’s eye. I honestly thought I took his eye out. He disappeared for 30 seconds and then came back with a towel to sop up the gush and continued to headbang. Trooper. After the show I told him I was bummed that I’d fucked up his face, but then his buddy grabbed me with the vigor of a chronic masturbator and yelled “Dude, Shark—fuck him! He’s going to brag about this at school for the rest of the year. He should be thanking you!”
I gave him a free shirt and a sporting locker-room jab in the ass, then hopped in the van and drove the eight hours home to an alternating soundtrack of Karen’s egregious log-sawing and Freaks, Faggots, Drunks, and Junkies playing dimly from the back seat.
JOHN SHARKEY III
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