this one goes to eleven

for all intents and purposes, valentine had dropped off the face of the earth.

actually, to tell the truth, he had dropped off the face of the continent. the last thing we had heard from him was five years ago when he set off to australia to work for borland, sydney and be with his girlfriend. no forwarding address, no email, no telephone number. nothing. it was very weird. every now and then, someone would ask if anyone has heard from valentine and we'd all shrug and mumble something about australia. it was like he had been jettisoned out into space, never to be heard from again.

fast forward five years. check my email.

whoa. valentine is in town for javaone and wouldn't you know it, he has tickets to see spinal tap! it was a crazy exclusive party at the masonic hall for some dotcom bash and for reasons that i still can't understand, spinal tap was their special guest! spinal tap! valentine! it was almost too much for me to even comprehend.

"i had to stand in line four separate times to get these tickets," he said as he handed out the laminated cards affixed to the lanyards. "they would only issue one ticket a time - so i would get to the head of the line, pick up my ticket, and then get back to the end of the line." it made me think of russia. it made me think that i love my friends.

unfortunately, nobody wanted to stand up front with me because it was too loud. i, on the other hand, felt that making one's eardrums bleed at a spinal tap concert was intrinsic and necessary to the experience. hell, i really don't go to shows that often anymore, and when i do, they're not really that loud. when i practice with my band, i'm always super conscious about wearing my earplugs, so i figured what the hell, a little bit of ear damage was probably ok. denial can be a very calming river sometimes.

the idea of having spinal tap play a concert for a dotcom whose name i can't even remember seems to be only fitting. if documentation of their fictional lives were to continue, this would probably be a pretty funny part of the movie. nerdly boys dressed to the nines in their best t-shirts gawked at the pole dancers above the bar. free liquor and food was aplenty and spinal tap blasted out their music at volumes much louder than seemed necessary. of course they had to play this loud. they're spinal tap.

it amazes me that these three guys can keep this charade up for so long. i love the fact that they're doing it primarily because they think it's a funny thing. michael mckean, christopher guest and harry shearer are all super-successful in their own right, they don't have to tour the band around to promote their name. they don't have to impress their record label. they do it because they think it's fun. you can tell by seeing them up on stage, hamming it up, playing their instruments surprisingly well, speaking in their ridiculous british accents. it's all quite loverly if you ask me.

i'm not sure which part of the show i enjoyed the most. i loved it when the teeny, tiny, stonehenge prop descended onto the stage from wires - and instead of having dwarves dance around for the solo, someone back stage jerked on the wires and made the prop itself dance a little jig in its own clumsy, half-hearted way. there were other classic moments of the show; christopher guest enthusiastically made noises with a digiridoo, proving to one and all that he has no idea how the thing works. when he decided to give up on that instrument, he picked up a double-necked guitar and blasted out a few chords to satiate his raving drunk fans.

oddly enough, it took the ten year old guitar player to help make the show as surreal as it could be. i would have never have imagined, but there the kid was, looking out at all the thrashing bodies reaching out to him as he wailed on his axe. to be honest, he looked a bit bewildered, but it looked like he was having a great time. the second encore involved a harem of pole dancers strutting about on stage to the tune of big bottom and what more can i tell you? it was everything i could have expected a spinal tap show to be, but with more free booze than i anticipated.

the show closed on the best note when harry shearer looked out at his adoring san franciscan audience and raised his fist up high in the air.

"THANK YOU SAN LEANDRO!" he hollered to his cheering crowd.

<06.12.01>

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