jayryan wrote:our roadie fooled around with the young woman who had invited us back to the place, which earned him the name "shitshack" from some of the folks on the tour.I earned the nickname "MC Trash Can", after admitting I was attracted to the woman who let us stay at her place in Philly. One of the filthiest houses I've ever slept in. Cat piss and beer cans all over the floor, piles of dirty laundry everywhere, and a severe lack of furniture aside from stained couches and mattresses. Don't know how a female could live in such filth, but I found it quite admirable. She got a little flirty with me before I was going to bed, but no fooling around. Would, though.

we played at a shitty, shitty bar in Napier. there was a front bar, and a back area where the bands played. there were no lights in the front bar - someone said they'd been repossessed. there was one guy acting as barman and bouncer. I think he was more of a bouncer by trade, because he was massive, and when my girlfriend asked for a g&t she got a drink that tasted of sausages.anyway, we'd been promised accommodation. accommodation is the upstairs of the bar, which was also long closed and didn't have light fixtures. the place is huge and full of pool tables and bar decor that's been sitting there for years. turns out, it's used as a brothel by day. so there are a couple of stained mattresses on the floor, and some assorted sex paraphernalia, jars of lube etc. that's the accommodation. a few uncovered, richly semen-stained mattresses, under a pool table, in an abandoned bar. the place burned down in mysterious circumstances a few months later.

I have so many of these stories. So many.Finding out the guitar player from the other band, the only guy who offered us a place to stay, is the coke dealer. Getting to his house to find him and his four buddies playing cards (in that fucked up weasel dust way. Y'know, PLAYING FUCKING CARDS, MAN, LIKE, DEAL THOSE CARDS ALREADY, GODDAMN) while another half dozen people sort of milled around and pretended to be at a party whilst desperately trying to figure out how to get another bump without paying.Everyone was talking in normal conversational tones while Iron Maiden BLASTED out of the stereo. Didn't matter, they weren't listening to each other anyways.We unrolled our bedrolls right in the middle of the action, as far into the corner as we could tuck ourselves, but still right in the middle of everything. I put my wallet underneath me with the keys to van and slept with my boots on. I'd been asleep about five minutes or so, I'd guess, when I awoke to some COMPLETE STRANGER leaning down to ask me if he could borrow ten or fifteen bucks. I offered to stab him in the face if he didn't leave me alone.fuck, what a scene that was.The kid in Norfolk who offered us a place to stay. Turns out he still lived with his folks. Dad was a cop. House was a complete shitsty. It looked like bears had moved in and taken over. Garbage everywhere, dirty laundry everywhere, half-eaten sandwiches in every room and human hair like tumbleweeds. Filth. Fucking fat cop and his fat wife were only seen in silhouette the whole time we were there, framed by the white/blue light from the television, stapled to the couch, stupefied by whatever the fuck had happened to them. The vibe in that house was that eventually something was going to happen to break the stasis, and it was going to be spectacular and horrible. The guy in Nashville with no heat. He'd lost his front door key and had to climb up the outside of the building then come down to let us in. It was 40 º in his apartment, but this didn't stop the puppy and the kitten from fighting on top of my head all night. We all slept around a space heater, like spokes on a bicycle wheel. Dude was a 24 year old veteran of Gulf War I. Sweet guy. Insane.Insane middle-aged women living alone in a fog of cat shit stink? Too many to count. I've tried to forget most of these. They're still in there. I remember them suddenly and wake up from a sound sleep, so glad to find myself in my own bed.

Austin during SXSW, '95 maybe?The house was being heated by the burners on the stove.The woman "cleaned up" by scooping up cat vomit in her bare hand.There was a poet with open sores who insisted that we watch "Mommie Dearest" at 3AM while he recited all the dialogue.Probably not the strangest, but it's one of the most memorable...

after a show in wilkes barre, pa we went to a party one of the local bands invited us to and said we'd be welcome to crash at. it was on the third floor of this huge old house that had been divided into apartments. the guy who lived there (along with his heinously, unfortunately ugly skinhead girlfriend) greeted us at the door wearing nothing but a blue thong. he looked vaguely like benicio del toro in fear and loathing, complete with huge hairy gut, and was COVERED with what looked like infected cigarette burns, the frequency of which was greatest around his crotch, the space between them growing larger as they fanned toward his chest and down his thighs. the greeting went something like, hello. welcome. my name is name. please... enter. the party consisted of four or five greasy hick/punks sitting around the kitchen table. as soon as he let us in, he retreated to his bedroom. the skinhead girlfriend then offered us her handle of evan williams and followed him. they proceeded to have VERY loud and VERY violent sex with some little blonde girl who walked out naked at some point to use the bathroom. name had been taking a break from the orgy/beating every once in a while to tell us everyone needs to shut the fuck up! now!! the neighbors are calling and complaining about the noise! what the fuck!! we were starting to get a little sketched out because he was very angry we were all just sitting quietly around the table drinking while they were screaming yeah! fuck her! take it bitch! at the tops of their lungs.things got really interesting after the blonde girl returned from the bathroom. she must have told the skinhead that we were drinking her evan williams (the same evan williams she so hospitably offered us), because she (the skinhead) stormed out of the bedroom and started screaming who took it?! which one of you fuckers thinks your slick?! in our faces. then yelled name! these fucking faggots stole my whiskey! name proceeded to come out of the bedroom (still in blue thong) with a baseball bat shouting you wanna steal from us? out! get the fuck out! and then smashed everything on his kitchen counter with the bat. we made a quick exit while one of the guys from the local band tried to calm name down. always a fun time in wilkes barre.

another time, i believe in oklahoma city, we stayed with a guy who had attended the show and came up to the merch table afterwards offering his couch and floor. we could tell he was quite a character. bleach-blonde hair with a few inches of roots; really really bad acne; impossibly skinny with bad posture and an overall look that shouted either acid casualty or sex offender. he had been drinking cisco (the mad dog-type drink known as liquid crack in some circles) and handing out condoms for the duration of the show. he and his girlfriend got into the van with us and said, i don't live in town, but it's not too far. i'm really glad you guys are staying with us. i don't have my car so i don't know how i would have got home otherwise.we got back to his place. it was pretty much a shack in the middle of nowhere. the most notable things about the place were: 1 - the guinness-worthy collection of board games stacked floor to ceiling in the living room. 2 - the 9 or 10 cats that were his pets. the place reeked of cat piss. overflowing litter-boxes. shit and vomit all over the place. he gave us various planned parenthood type pamphlets about STDs and said, you should really read these. i didn't know much about STDs until my girlfriend gave me herpes. that shit is with you for life. i assume he meant the girlfriend that was standing right next to him. they shamelessly and lewdly made out in front of us for a while, pausing to ask questions about what it's like to be in a band, then retired to their bedroom. when we realized that the cat under the rocking chair in the corner was in fact dead, some of us decided to sleep in the van. he came out of his room about 3:30 in the morning and woke us up to say, i've gotta go to work now. i deliver the newspaper. but help yourselves to whatever is in the fridge if i'm not back before you wake up. we left before he ever came back, but left a note saying, thanks for the place to crash. i think one of your cats is sick.

Leeds England 2002. The house we stayed at was next door to the scene of either a rape or a murder the day before. As a result, the forensic team was doing a sweep of the street soon after we arrived. They were all wearing what looked like clean room outfits. They got in a long line and walked down the street together looking for evidence. We sat inside watching out the window. This was before the show and the presence of 20-30 cops did not stop the locals from getting high in the front living room.After the show the house was the scene of a big party. Everyone at the party (except us and the Italian band, Zu we were touring with) was on extacy. They also had a basement filled to the brim with beer (it looked like the storage room for a bar) but alas we were offered neither extacy nor beer. We sat there completely sober well into the morning while the party happened around us.One benefit of the crime next door was that the cops left a plain closed officer in a car parked on the street all night in case the attacker returned. This meant we could safely leave our gear in the van overnight.In retrospect I guess the people weren't that strange at all, but it was a strange night. The guy we stayed with turned out to be super nice and actually stayed at my house this summer while on tour with a French ban. Unfortunately I had neither a murder scene or extacy to offer him.

ah yes, forgot that one. what jason forgot to mention haoppened between his first and second paragraphs. i'm looking out the front window of the flat at the dozens of cops in the front yard, about 30 feet away, with one of the house residents. he's twitching, sweating, vibrating. looks like he's about to cry. I FUCKING HATE COPS. WHAT THE FUCK ARE THEY DOING HERE. I FUCKING... OH, MAN...i look at him, and i just of rhetorically, casually, say it's cool, man. it's going to be fine.however, he thinks i'm talking about something specific.WHAT IS COOL? WHICH THING? WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT? WHAT IS FINE? HOW?i smiled and walked away without turning my back on him.---later in the evening, during the party, i sat against a wall, next to a big stuffed chair. casually, i slipped sideways, until i was laying on the floor, behind the chair, sleeping while this party went on. people were drinking some sort of cheap liquor out of plastic 2 liter bottles, like how you buy diet pepsi here in the states.jason was trying to sleep, but a woman was sitting in a bar chair near him, gently (oh so gently) kicking him over and over in the head as he tried to pass out. this woman was called something by the band zu, something like the reptilian.

j\_harvey wrote: the Italian band, Zu we were touring withGood for you. Zu is fantastic.EDIT: Oh right, you're in Dianogah. You too are fantastic.

Sock OR Muffin? wrote:feelitclosingin wrote: i think one of your cats is sick."So great.This was also the punchline of an elaborate practical joke that involved shitting in a catbox when the owner was at work.Trying to remember all the details and where I heard it- but what I sort of remember is that one roommate often beat the other one home, went ahead and scooped the cat box out of courtesy. One day, he heard his roommate on the phone with someone saying "Oh, I dunno.... it's just that [cat's name] isn't pooping in the box. He's not allowed outside. I can't find any poop anywhere. I think there's something wrong with him."The next day, the first roommate home scooped the box, then laid a GIANT turd of his own creation in there. Second Roommate comes home.feelitclosingin wrote: i think your cat is sick.Second Roommate says "OH MY GOD" like thirty times while staring at this massive turd and holding the tiny cat poop scoop, baffled.Ah, life.