Last night at the Southpaw, Clockcleaner opened for the reunited Negative Approach to the general enjoyment of the 10 or 12 Clockcleaner fans in attendance and the general disdain of several hundred or so rotund Negative Approach fans huddling around the back of the bar. This morning, John Sharkey sent us a pair of tracks from the band's new live EP culled from the performance and a little personal account of what happened. Enjoy!NYHC Documentary QuotesReady to FightThere are some offers in life that you just cannot refuse: the blowjob from the immanently acne-scarred social hazard that rides the school bus with you sophomore year, your first tattoo referencing a Stars And Stripes song or first one-hitter filled with what you think is weed but know is cocaine. At first it sounds like a grand time and in the end you know you're going to feel like mid-80s Richard Pryor, but you'd regret not taking the foolish bull by the dick. So when Clockcleaner got the offer to open for the once mighty, now fallen (read: reunited) Negative Approach, naturally we dove on the grenade! Anyways, could be worse. We could've been asked to open for Qui again.
We arrived at the show to find the usual crop of retarded mohawked office workers and left-over skinhead from Jersey waiting feverishly to gain entrance to the venue. At the front of the line was probably the largest mohawk-mania chud baby I'd ever seen in my life. Not fat, but built to the point that it looked like he'd have a hard time wiping his own ass. Of course when I walked within earshot of the conversation he was having it sounded like High-Pitch Erik from the Stern show.Dustheads from BK opened the gig with a set of very enjoyable fast then slow songs. The singer's shirt was tucked in at the beginning of the set, then it was untucked at the end. They played well and some dorks seemed to know their words. I like the Dustheads.
Then we had to play. I swear, same shit everytime. The drummer from Dustdicks got me with a full beer can right in the face during my warm-up exercises. It was a really good shot. This was to be our last US show for sometime seeing as I am leaving for Australia in two weeks, so we wanted to give our adoring fans something special. We sailed through three shitty cleaner tunes and one X cover. Good X--not pompadour X. Then came the zenith of my musical career. We plowed into a grueling 15-minute version of the headliners' classic anthem "Ready To Fight," much to the chagrin of NA's singer John Brannon and half the geniuses watching us. At one point during the song, an overstuffed fan started to mosh in what I believe to be a protest of our ode to John and the boys. I stood within reaching distance of him for a good five minutes, but nothing happened. He could've easily eaten me and and a Denny's menu with out batting a chin. We ended to rampant applause as usual.
Finally Negative Approach took the stage. They blasted through a good number of their old tunes at a furious pace. I must admit, it was nice to hear these these songs live after years of jerking-off to them as a younger, tubbier Sharkey. Between a pair of these tunes somebody called out for "Ready to Fight". Probably a fan of theirs. Furrowing his brow and looking for all the world like that one guy from Upright Citizens Brigade, Brannon shot back, "Talk to the opening band, they already did it for twenty minutes." Then they played it two songs later.
Although it was nice to see these songs played live, I couldn't help but think how sad it was that a band from 25 years ago was getting back together to play on a Wednesday night. If I ever get on a stage at 45 and try to play cleaner songs for upwards to two-thousand dollars you can take me out back and teach me about heaven.
As we were packing out gear up the drummer from Negative Approach told me that he actually liked our cover. "Yeah, Brannon was pissed, but who cares. That was great! It was better than Flipper could ever do back in tha day.They never pissed off people that bad!" Some old people are still smart.JOHN A. SHARKEY III
Minutes roughly 10 through 13 of "Ready to Fight" (with mosh interruption)
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We arrived at the show to find the usual crop of retarded mohawked office workers and left-over skinhead from Jersey waiting feverishly to gain entrance to the venue. At the front of the line was probably the largest mohawk-mania chud baby I'd ever seen in my life. Not fat, but built to the point that it looked like he'd have a hard time wiping his own ass. Of course when I walked within earshot of the conversation he was having it sounded like High-Pitch Erik from the Stern show.Dustheads from BK opened the gig with a set of very enjoyable fast then slow songs. The singer's shirt was tucked in at the beginning of the set, then it was untucked at the end. They played well and some dorks seemed to know their words. I like the Dustheads.
Then we had to play. I swear, same shit everytime. The drummer from Dustdicks got me with a full beer can right in the face during my warm-up exercises. It was a really good shot. This was to be our last US show for sometime seeing as I am leaving for Australia in two weeks, so we wanted to give our adoring fans something special. We sailed through three shitty cleaner tunes and one X cover. Good X--not pompadour X. Then came the zenith of my musical career. We plowed into a grueling 15-minute version of the headliners' classic anthem "Ready To Fight," much to the chagrin of NA's singer John Brannon and half the geniuses watching us. At one point during the song, an overstuffed fan started to mosh in what I believe to be a protest of our ode to John and the boys. I stood within reaching distance of him for a good five minutes, but nothing happened. He could've easily eaten me and and a Denny's menu with out batting a chin. We ended to rampant applause as usual.
Finally Negative Approach took the stage. They blasted through a good number of their old tunes at a furious pace. I must admit, it was nice to hear these these songs live after years of jerking-off to them as a younger, tubbier Sharkey. Between a pair of these tunes somebody called out for "Ready to Fight". Probably a fan of theirs. Furrowing his brow and looking for all the world like that one guy from Upright Citizens Brigade, Brannon shot back, "Talk to the opening band, they already did it for twenty minutes." Then they played it two songs later.
Although it was nice to see these songs played live, I couldn't help but think how sad it was that a band from 25 years ago was getting back together to play on a Wednesday night. If I ever get on a stage at 45 and try to play cleaner songs for upwards to two-thousand dollars you can take me out back and teach me about heaven.
As we were packing out gear up the drummer from Negative Approach told me that he actually liked our cover. "Yeah, Brannon was pissed, but who cares. That was great! It was better than Flipper could ever do back in tha day.They never pissed off people that bad!" Some old people are still smart.JOHN A. SHARKEY III
Minutes roughly 10 through 13 of "Ready to Fight" (with mosh interruption)