Do you like Reggae Music?

I get real nervous whenever anyone asks me this question. And it's only because i'm going to say "yes I do" and then their gonna come back with something like..."me too I love Bob Marley, Shabba Ranks and Shaggy....I love that Oh Carolina Song.." and then I'll have to smack them for speaking Bobs name in the same breath as those other dance hall crashers...and don't even get me started on Reggaeton!

You see I do love reggae music and my definition of Reggae is Bob Marley, Peter Tosh, Jimmy Cliff the original rude boys who created a new form of music when they took to Wailing in protest of the horrors and the oppression they were living in. It's an anger music a rebel music. It is not what is has been marketed to become lately. So you see i get real nervous when someone asks me "do you like reggae music"

But my nerves were calm as a fuck tonight as i cruised over to Vinny's on the South East side of town, where two proven local bands were getting ready to throw down. And even though the Flyer said "Reggae" the music of The Dub Seeds and The Silence Club is far to progressive to be stuck with just one label. It's Roots, it's punk, it's rock-steady, it's rock n Espanol. It's all that and a dime sack.

Another thing I love about these bands is how serious they take themselves. I love that The Silence Club is also down with Hectic Films lending music to their projects over and over. Class acts both of them. I had a great time watching some amazing local talent tonight.

These links might be usefull

The Silence Club
The Dub Seeds
Hectic Films



...and the rest of the pics....

I don't know, was I a Jerk?

So I'm feeling really 'take America backish' or something this week what with Obama be sworn in and all. I'm feeling really proud of my country and I feel we all have to do our part to make America great again. Or something idk, but here's what I did today. You decide for yourself was I a jerk?

So I'm driving home from a fairly rough day at work and it's been a long ass week and I was feeling like I needed a drink. I stopped at the local mini mart down the street from my house you know those little mom and pop mini marts where they sell everything way above suggested retail value. You hate to shop there cause it's so expensive but it's just more convenient to go there. I grabbed a couple of Monsters to make my self a Jager Bomb on the rocks when I got home and took them up to the counter.

"How you doing?" the guy behind the counter says to me.

"I'm good" I reply back as he rings up my Monsters, I glance 1 foot away from me down the counter and see a rack of Porno Mags sitting right there 10 inches away from the Blow Pops. I know this is his store and he's here to make money but come on does he need to throw Porno Mags in the faces of everyone who is making any type of purchase? Sure the faces of the mags were covered by a sign that read "Adult XXX" but I still though this was just wrong.

So I ask the guy "you make a lot of money on those?"

He answers "no not really".

Then I say "why don't you just get rid of them then, since they're not making you any money anyways?"

Suddenly his English got really bad and he pretended to not understand what I was saying. "Come on little kids buy candy right here for crying out loud you have them right next to the blow pops!"

He remembered English again as he told me how much I owed for the Monsters. I gave him my cash and asked again "why don't you just get rid of the Porno Mags you said yourself they didn't make any money"

Suddenly his English was mumbled again and he pretended to not understand me. I took my change thanked him and told him to have a wonderful evening.

I just don't like the idea of these little stores selling Porno Mags and putting them right on the counter right next to the candy. Why do they even sell them if they aren't making any money this is just bad business.

NAMM 2009-The Fans View

First off thanks to Chris Richards and California Keyboards for getting this music fanatic into NAMM!

Now I am neither a musician nor a vendor I'm just a huge fan of music so I just walked around star struck all day long not minding the long lines for the chance to snap a pic and get an autograph some one of the many musicians doing the NAMM thing. From what I hear the NAMM show lasts all week however I was only there on Saturday and he's how my day went. It might seem boring to some but it was a day I'll never forget!!

We get there and I feel like a kid in a candy store I was just walking around like I said in awe of the massive scene that is NAMM. There are vendor booths all around with list of names and times that their artists will be signing autographs. The first booth that caught my eye was Remo's booth that listed an 11:30 signing time for Stephen Perkins!!! Wholly shit Stephen Perkins drummer for Jane's Addiction and how perfect was this I had just watched the 3 Days DVD about the 1987 Relapse Tour so Jane's was still fresh on my mind.

We got in line early there were only two people ahead of us and they were a couple of super fans who had way cooler Jane stories then us so they deserved to be first in line. Stephen was way cool and signed a Remo Drum Head for me. After he signed it I mentioned to him how much I loved his bands musis and he said to me "it's all coming back too, this time with Eric Avery". Yes the Jane's Addiction reunion rumors are true, Stephen Perkins himself confirmed them for me!

After my Stephen encounter we walked and galked some more and I spotted my next autograph opportunity Sheila E and the entire Escovedo clan were signing at 2:00 on one corner and Jerry Cantrell of Alice in Chains was signing at 3:00 just 15 feet away. Awe this is perfect I said to U2 Chick "you go wander around, I'm staying right here" I said. Sheila E is as hot as ever and her dad and brothers are class acts. Here's something weird though Sheila E wrote my name backwards she wrote: 'To susej' how weird is that..wtf?

After the Sheila E line I walked over to the booth where Jerry Cantrel was going to sign just to verify with the dude that he was going to show, he is a rock star you know? After inquiring I was informed that he would show but he was running late. Oh well I thought I found me a quiet little corner with a chair and took a load off for a quick breather. I happened to have sat down in a little tiny Lee Oskar booth. It wasn't much of a booth just a picture of him on the wall a display case with a bunch of nice harmonica's and TV screen that was playing a short 3 minute Lee Oskar infomercial. I sat there for about 20 minutes just people watching having a chill time waiting for Jerry Cantrel. Then this little older dude shows up and starts setting up a amp and a mic. "I'm I in your way sir" I asked the dude. "No your okay" he replied back and then it hit me....wholly that that's Lee Oskar. I turned red "let me get out of your way Mr Oskar" I said to him. He just smiled and kept setting up.

Turns out he had an interview scheduled and I stood 3 feet away watched him perform for the journalist (some young British looking kid) and do the interview. Afterwards he was nice enough to pose with me for a pic.

So now it was Jerry Cantrell time! The line went by pretty quick and before I knew it there I stood in front of the man who was once one half of some of the most beautiful heavy metal harmonies I've ever heard alongside the now departed Layne Staley. "I saw you guys on Lollipolloza 93 at the Shoreline...Layne had a cast?" I asked. I have often tried to remember If Layne Staley had a cast on when I saw Alice In Chains or not but my memory isn't quite what it once was. "Yeah he had a cast on his foot, he broke some bones messing around on Ozzy's ATV" Jerry answered. Ah at long last I foggy memory was cleared up by none other then Jerry Cantrell himself.

"Los Lobos are performing at 5" U2 Chick informed after I posed for my pic with Cantrell. We split up for awhile but all made it back to the Fender area to get in line for Los Lobos around 4:30ish. The line wasn't too long when we got there but was way long by 5:00 and it's a good thing we go there when we did because they only let in 100 people!! Los Lobos were amazing! I've seen them several time before but never in such a lose intimate setting. They laughed and joked with the crowd they even gave a fan a hard time when they requested La Bamba. "Ah not La Bamba" Davis Hidalgo joked "I hear that song in my sleep" he joked. They did play That Train Don't Stop Here Anymore featuring J. R. Lozano of the 44s on drums the set finished with a blistering version of Don't Worry Baby.


We left the Fender stage walking on air. How could we not be we had just been treated to and amazing free show by one of L.A's all time great bands. There's more pics on my Myspace go check em out!!

Merry Christmas!

It's Christmas Eve I opted to take Christmas Eve off and work Christmas day. It just worked out better for everyone this way and I'm really enjoying just chillin here at home waiting for the insanity that will ensue as soon as all the kiddies get here.

I really need to get my ass to Target to buy some headphones for the Ipod we got my niece but I'm just chillin to hard righnt now.

Okay so let me tell you what else I've done. I transferred all the old blog posts from my very first blog onto this one. Everyone was always telling me how they used to just love to go online and read those old posts but I stopped paying for the domain name a couple of years ago so those old posts were lost in some kind of blog limbo but I found them and they are here. The text is all there but the pics didnt seem to come over as willingly so there's a bunch of boxes with red x's where the pics used to be sorry bout that. Okay well so that's it for now peace ese'

Vecar 3 Song Demo

I don't know if it has an Official name but my boy Vecar is handing out 3 Song Demo's at his shows and asking for a small donation. If you see him, take a demo and give him a couple of bucks. Support the arts yo!!

One Small Step for Bakotopia

one Giant Leap for the Bakersfield Music Scene!!!

The Bakotopia CD Release show (the first of 3!) was a huge success from what I saw over at the Bakestage last Saturday Night.

A family Bar B Q kept me away from the show until about 8:30. When U2 Chick and I arrived the first sign it was a huge success was we had to park about a block away. Nice, I thought getting more and more excited with every step we took towards the venue. We walked in handed over our 5.00 bucks then stood in the packed venue holding in our hands the first ever Bakotopia Compilation CD. 16 tracks for just 5.00 bucks! Dang that's just 31.25 cents a song, what a bargain!!!!

Like I said the place was packed, everyon was there. The dancin' was great. The floor erupted when Mento took the stage. A circle of Bakotopians bouncin joyfully in unison with the music. Bouncin along in beat with the skank. It was beautiful, I thought about jumpin in myself, maybe next time.

Like NL and Matt mention in an interview posted on Bakotopia and on NL's site. The Bakersfield Music Scene is currently going through a resurgence the likes of which we haven't seen in the scene in a long long time.

Me personally I love it!!! I actually left the Bakotopia CD show a little early and headed down to the SilverFox to catch Vecar. I'm telling ya the scene is red hot right now you gotta plan your weekends carefully or you'll miss out. The Vecar show was ill, The drunk dancing was quit intertaining. All in all another great weekend on the scene. Hope you can keep up. JR

I Think I Died A Little...

The day Rage Against The Machine tickets went on-sale and souled out before I could get some for the upcoming Coachella Arts and Music Festival. I felt so out of touch I wasn't able to obtain a ticket for one of the greatest come back shows of all time. Well I'm not even sure if it should be called a comeback' show I mean who's to say they're actually coming back? So far they have only confirmed this one show. So who knows?


The show sold out and I couldn't get a ticket I was not going to be at Coachella with the thousands of other people watching Rage. I felt like I wasn't cool anymore I wasn't 'down' I didn't score a ticket fot the show. All the other people were faster then me and they were going to go see Rage they will be coming to California from all over the USA, Canada even!!. Somehow they deserved it more then. They were bigger fans then me, they were going to make history I was just entitled to my old glory day stories..."oh I saw Rage way back when"...."oh really old man? well I'm gonna see Rage in April and your not" Yeah so i guess I'm still pissed about the whole Rage thing.

I've been in this funk and I can't seem to break out of it. I sit at the key bored try to type but nothing comes. I have stories I'm dying to tell but just not write now I guess? It'll be soon though I can feel it.

I went to a Dirty Spanglish show tonight. Just to get out and see my friends NL and Matildakay. It's always good talking to them when I haven't written in a while they're always good at encouraging me. But anyways Dirty Spanglish...what can I say about these guys that isn't going to be said about them in the future. They were a breath of fresh air on this chilly night in downtown Bako that's for sure. Young and full of enthusiasm they looked like they were just having so much fun up there. Rocking out to Filthies covers, Johnny Cash cover and and a few originals too. Landen played a few scorching solo's on the guitar and they're bass player, what a char actor!! The sound was balanced well between the 4 of them. They were great

They were a lot of fun is all I have to say. Musically I know they're still growing. I mean they're only 15!! I really hope they keep playing I'd love to hear what they're gonna have to offer in the future.

Okay, I'm gonna try and go write on my Diet Blog now. Later JR

JR-Pissed

So on ticketmaster.com I cannot buy a single day ticket for Coachellla Sunday April 29th. I can however buy a three day pass. I don't want to go all three days I only want to go on Sunday. I was online at 10:00 am and at 10:01 am ticketmaster told me there were no more Sunday Tix available.

To further add to my pissed off state of mind. I just went on to Ebay and there is no shortage of supply for Single Day Sunday April 29th tix available at twice the cost of course.

I have no choice but to save my hard earned money and pay the scalpers so I can go see my favorite band in the world. Rage Against The Machine.

So after all these years and all these artists and all this time and efffort artists used to fight against Napster we see just where it's all gotten us. Ticketmaster and the promoters still have us all right where they want us. It's all about supply and demand. Supply the scalpers with all the tix they need. Then let them demand as much money as they wish from the fans who want to see the bands.

The Shitty thing is, I'm gonna do it. I will pay the scalpers. I must see this show. RATM are you kidding me. They were one of the greatest bands of all time. What they did to Rock N Roll will go down in history. Not that other bands havent set the world on fire before or since....(well has anyone really done what they've done since?) but it's just they were our band you know what I mean. We listened to this shit and it fired us up. Now I'm fired up and I will be there someway somehow. I just hope it doesnt end up costing me an arm and a leg to get there. JR-Pissed!