Petty Cash

Dear Labor Day weekend: THANK YOU!!!!

I'm continuing to hash out the 70 or so demos and work on a whole batch of new songs. Here's my list of favorites so far:

Fairfield Transfer
Sammy Satan
Textbook Answers
Hornet
Record players in every room
I said I’d start a revolution
Square One Stomp
Mary and Bobby
Hard time reading
Surrender
You leave each fall
My Teeth
Decent Social Commentary
Who wants breakfast?
For Walter
St. Califa
For all the functioning addicts
Collisito
Sunday Fun
Turncoat Radiator
Mark’s red flag monologues
Pennies

It's a great feeling to have a bunch of songs that you love and then having the "task" or "burden" of having to pick the best one's. And I don't mean external appeal, but just my own taste. I want this record to be a lot of things. I want it to be a genre killer. I want it to be a throwback. I want it to be progressive. I want it to be now. I want it to be wow!

It occurred to me that maybe the reason I'm wanting to call it "Keeping Warm in the Nighttime" is symbolic of the state of the band. When Mikey and I started playing together we would skate in my driveway and listen to 7 inch records a lot. We had a Lookout Records catalog and would just pick random bands and order them. We discovered some of our favorite bands this way, even til this day; Fifteen, Crimpshrine, Pinhead Gunpowder, Operation Ivy, etc. When we played in Five-O-Five we named our first record after a term found in the liner notes of Pinhead's classic "Carry The Banner". They had this glossary of terms coined in the East Bay area. We idolized that record, band, and scene and wanted to pay homage. We named it "Skatin on Uppers" which meant: "Walking on shoes from which heels and soles are worn" and scared our mothers very much, and rightly so.

So now after playing together for 15 or so years, we're back to the beginning. Back to basics. It was initially a scary thing to face, but we both quickly realized it was ultimately something to embrace. So I went ahead and wrote a song called "Square One Stomp" which I hope ends up being track #1 on the album that negates the need for all pharmaceuticals in the future. Where will all the suits and pill pushers work you ask? Well we need people to work our merch booth and help us carry gear into the club of course. Fret not. There's room for everyone. All is not lost.

My weekend came to a beautiful ending last night as Mikey, Joe the Kid, and myself journeyed out to the Key Club to see "Petty Cash" a cover band that only plays Tom Petty and Johnny Cash songs. It was a blast. It turned out to be a few of the guys from H20, another band we grew up on. Is this all really happening? I feel like any minute I'm going to wake up in Biology class in a pool of drool and still be 16, not 26. And it'd be weird cause I weighed about 25 more pounds then, thanks to Bud Light and Dunkin Donuts and endless meals from Jody Jody. Now I'm out in LA eating Duct Tape Soup and creating something I believe in. I would now ask you all to hug the person next to you, even if it's your enemy. Danny