More Basement Treasure

During the recent basement purge at the Graham residence, many music related artifacts were brought to light. There was the handheld karaoke machine that was used as a guitar amplifier on Abe Lincoln’s Father’s Boss. There was a box of rusty drum hardware. There were over one hundred 4-track master tapes, filled with my dubious musical legacy.

And then there was the box of video cassettes – dusty reminders of pre-digital life. Their bulky presence seemed to lend a degree of comfort to one’s living room, and those big, fat spines certainly made it easy to locate that copy of Mrs. Doubtfire on a Saturday evening. Some of these VHS tapes went directly to the St. Vincent de Paul bag (Bob the Builder), and others were slightly harder to part with (adieu, Ren & Stimpy!). But here also were several tapes of -gulp- me. Or, rather, tapes of two of my old bands, Fluid Drive and Howl, captured on stage, in the recording studio, and on television.

I had never really sat down and watched these tapes. Rather than subject myself to the humiliation of seeing my dorky self perform (and maybe learn what not to do the next time), I had simply thrown these tapes in a box and carried on. What I found (when I finally located a VHS machine) was that my stage presence wasn’t (quite) as geeky as I remember, and that the old songs still rock. The video technology may be hopelessly dated, but the music is (mostly) not.

I used to have bands, and they were good.

As soon as I capture and edit this archival footage, I’ll be uploading some of the least-horrific bits to YouTube. Or maybe I’ll just go for the shock value. Be warned, you won’t be able to un-see

• The world’s most psychedelic cable access show!
• The Devo cover that time forgot!
• Proof that Brad once had hair!
• Circus Peanuts laced with LSD!
• Brad’s legendary student film!

I can smell the popcorn.