The last few concerts I have attended, or have attempted to attend, were rough experiences for me. Broken down cars, sold out shows for bands that never sell out, even death. Needless to say, I was a bit nervous going to see Sleepytime Gorilla Museum in concert for the third time. But undeterred, I hopped on the bus at six in theafternoon and arrived at the venue ninety minutes early - enough time to wander up to the nearest park, roll around in the grass for awhile and come back to wait for the remaining hour, sitting next to people who spoke in Bill Hicks quotes before ripping into the local paper for comparing the headlining band to Disturbed, of all bands.

Eight P.M. rolls around and the doors open, the first time in my life when a venue actually opened at its scheduled time. I'm horrified to see that The Aladdin Theater is mostly comprised of theater chairs (a mainstay as it originally was a vaudeville theater, then a pornographic theater, then a music hall) and a small bit of standing room next to the stage - and everyone is sitting down in a surprisingly efficient and polite manner. This of course makes me very nervous, as this is a fucking metal show, for chrissakes. Okay, silly art metal, but that doesn't stop people from starting a pit during the louder segments of the show.

I sit in the front row, shortly then joined by a goth woman in her mid-to-late 40's who admits to being kicked out of a screening of Deep Throat when she was a teenager. Already out-of-her-mind drunk and tormenting her quiet husband, she leaves the room to get a beer and comes back with two, flinging it into her husband's hand and announcing "If you don't like it, drink it and go fuck yourself." They carry on well into the opening act, Pleaseeasaur. Later, she would leave her seat, and the manager would come out of the woodwork to personally tell the husband that his wife was cut off from the bar. “Does it look like I fucking care?” she asks.

Pleaseeasaur has a hip energy that is similar to Dane Cook, which is why I initially roll my eyes and hate him. But his goofy shtick and use of the Small Wonder television show graphics win me over fairly quickly - his entire shtick is singing jingles for fake companies, costume changes for nearly every song and overhead projectors andcheap animation courtesy of his bandmate behind the screens. I look to my left and there's Nils Frykdahl, singer and guitarist of Sleepytime Gorilla Museum rocking out to "Warning: These Cobras are Totally Awesome."

It's really hard to hate someone who sings a theme song for a non-existent film called “L.A. Nights 2: Even Hotter” where the lyrics contain the passage "She goes undercover as a stripper 'cause her sister was kiiiiiiiiilllllllllllllllled!" Pleaseeasaur's set finishes up with the awesomely groantastic "and please remember to visit our Pleaseea-store on the way out!" While I’m sure the music wouldn’t translate at all without the multimedia live show, I am enchanted by this man and his polar bear costume.

SubArachnoid Space is the second opener and finally makes an impression on the audience, which slowly starts getting up and running for the stage,including myself. The music is 25 minutes of sheer droning power, the kind youneed to get in your skull because you're at a show and you want to feel the inside of your brains rattling around a bit. Why else would you go to a show?

It's finally time for Sleepytime Gorilla Museum to hit the stage, and more people are starting to flood the standing room area. It's at about this time that the girl next to me starts to talk, and what comes out of her mouth doesn't make sense. I turn my head and it hits me, holy shit, a Catholic schoolgirl! At least, what in my mind resembles a Catholic Schoolgirl, pigtails and all. She's startlingly drunk and she wants to talk it up with me. She moves in for the kill.

"You know, I'd like you to do it if you'd like it 'cause I'd like it because."

No, she didn't trail off.

Her sentence ended at "because."

She's rubbing my back and making her intentions very, very clear - but she's still trying to set the entire thing up. Getting to know each other, you know. I have to pick up the pieces of her broken language barrier

"Oh? Yeah. Uh huh. So have you seen them before?"
"issschwaa dem whiss sekwet cheefs thee."
"Oh! Secret Chiefs Three…. Yeah... I tried to see them in Hollywood, but they had sold out the venue..."

At this point she utters the words "You're so good." My self-esteem is non-existent and I never expect these things to happen, so I have to honestly ask her why she think's I'm so good.

"Yerrrrrr sooooo gooooooooooooooooooooooooooood"

As if in slow motion, I see her grabbing at me from the corner of my eye. She turns my head forty-five degrees to meet hers and she leaps on me, shoving her tongue into my mouth. The one thought that enters my mind during this exchange of bodily fluids (which I don't reciprocate) is a revelation: Boy, for being a typical fantasy of many men throughout the country, if not the world, making out with a schoolgirl sure does feel wrong. It doesn't help that she isn't a very good kisser - she uses her tongue like a battering ram at first, and then changes her technique to "oh, just flop it down like a wet sponge and see what happens from there." The typical apathy of a drunken maker-outer. I’ve been on the receiving end of this situation many times before, and I’m sure I’ll experience it again in the future.

This goes on for fifteen, twenty seconds. At first I try to get into it, but no. Wrong, wrong it's so very wrong. Okay, maybe if I had downed a few drinks myself I would have been more open to the gesture, but no, wrong. I turn my head, and the girl continues to tongue my cheek. I wonder if she even notices the difference. Suddenly a hand reaches out and grabs the girl by the shoulder. She turns her head to notice a young man, probably around her age, wearing the fashion of today; jet-black dyed hair, thick black glasses, the works. Might be a boyfriend, might be a brother, who knows. She lets out a shriek and runs up the aisle in a panic, as I'm shouting to the young guy, "Hey, do you know her? Is she yours?" He runs away without explanation or apology from me.

It's Sleepytime Gorilla Museum's set now, and after setting-up their home-made instruments (which include such items as the sledgehammer dulcimer, percussion guitar and electric pancreas), Nils and the rest of the band are now decked out in what seem to be canvas dresses covered in scribblings detailing the coming apocalypse. Frykdahl addresses the now packed and anticipating audience:

"We'd like to play a song for you, but we won't. We can't. We want to play a song for all of those that didn't show up. For those uninterested, who didn't know it was happening, for those who had nothing better to do, but stayed at home anyway. These are your friends. Give them a sandwich." 

The band commences their performance with "The Companions," the opening of their new album (featuring multi-instrumentalist Michael Mellender switching back and forth from trumpet, guitar and literally pots-and-pans percussion), followed by... Track two of the new album In Glorious Times (in fact, later in the set, the band would apologize for lifting most of the performance from the new album, and not playing "the old hits") “Helpless Corpses Enactment,” a harsh, violent song filled with lyrics compliments of James Joyce's Finnegan's Wake. In fact, the band makes an announcement before playing.

“We actually made a movie… Film… Thing for this song. And you can see it on television. Well, not television. You can probably get it on the Internet. I’m pretty sure it’s up on Youtube, so watch it there.”

Before plowing through to the next track, Nils announces that the band has forgotten a piece of equipment that's been left in the tour bus. Carlia Khilstedt, who handles co-singing with Frykdahl in addition to violin and percussion guitar duties, can’t help but laugh at the mention of molassass that comes from the audience. Halfway through the set, I get curious and look behind me, wondering how big the crowd was, when I notice her. Drunk Schoolgirl is now making her way towards me and is now getting in an argument with the first drunk goth woman about how Drunk Schoolgirl needs to stand by me. Drunk Schoolgirl stomps off after not getting her wish.

A few more extended songs from the new album and some distorted stage banter that I can't understand due to the speakers overpowering my head, and the band start to wrap up. "We can play, like, five more minutes, so what do you wanna hear?" A voice from the crowd shouts "Baby Doctor," a 13-minute epic. I request "Every album you've made in chronological order," which is immediately shot down with a chuckle. Sleepytime Gorilla Museum finish their set with the opening of their second album, Of Natural History by playing the ethereal opener  "A Hymn to the Morning Star,”followed by the pure metal of "The Donkey-Headed Advisary of Humanity Opens the Discussion."

The song and the show ends, and as soon as the lights go out I quickly snatch the setlist lying by Bassist Dan Rathburn’s feet. At every show of theirs I’ve attended, I’ve managed to steal the setlist for myself, and for some reason it’s always Dan’s. Also at every show of theirs I’ve been to, Dan manages to fling a bit of spit onto me during the performance. Coincidence?

Not having any money to buy merchandise, I leave the venue hoping to avoid any run-ins with the drunken women that have occupied my night. Why do I need merch? I’ve got a setlist – another one to add to my growing collection. Not having money for bus fare, I walk the three-and-a-half miles back home in silent awe, checking my pocket every few minutes to make sure the slip of paper is still there.