Friday, June 22, 2007

in that random way my life works, i was settling into an evening of making myself dinner and doing some chess tutorials solo (wife was out of town), when i got a call from my friend taylor hawkins. he told me the foos were playing a little show at a small club in the valley. so an hour or two later i was standing in the crowd of a small club. it was very cool. its always special to see a band that has been touring and is battle hardened play a small club gig. it really gives a sense of scale to both their success and their ability. to see them in a little spot, where we all started, is to see an uncontainable force trying to be restricted into a tiny space; stuffing lightning into a shoebox. that tension makes for a perfect rock show. rock music should be difficult to contain. so little of it is these days it seems.

28 comments:

Anonymous said...

Booooom-
Lucky SOB-
I can't stop listening to that song "skin and bones". dave and taylor rock it.
ryan

Anonymous said...

Thats what janes was... an uncontainable force trying to be restricted into a tiny space; stuffing lightning into a shoebox. that tension makes for a perfect rock show

Anonymous said...

i hate the fact i never had a chance to see the real jane's in a small venue. Ive been to alot of the small clubs on the east coast jane's played in, all i can do is imagine the brillance. Even polar bear for that matter. This reminds me, I would greatly appreciate to see you relive a little magic when your solo project comes out. The east coast needs their e.a fix.

Brian Smith McCallum said...

EA,

Must be cool to have musical friends! Sounds like an awesome FF show. Hope I get the chance to see them. I assume you've met other FF band members through Taylor? Dave Grohl seems as if he's a down-to-earth, hilarious fellow. What was your take on Nirvana? Seems as if they took off soon after demise of original Jane's . . . some even say that JA opened the floodgates!

Unknown said...

Eric, was there a club that was a favorite to play back in the early days? My favorite place to see bands was First Ave in Minneapolis. I have seen many very cool bands go through there. I missed seeing Janes there because tickets were tough to get as it was sold out before I could even get my wallet out! Hope I can catch you out on tour in Minnesota soon!

andy said...

Going to small venues with small-time acts is sometimes just more enjoyable then a big sellout arena show.

sometimes not thoo :D

Anonymous said...

I have never been a fan of the foo fighters, except there very very first album, i like.

But i heard a good saying i unno where i read it or heard it but it was like Janes Addiction found the key and opened the door a crack and nirvana put its foot threw it. Might of been the book whores actually....

I got my DECONSTRUCTION CD and i must say its fucking amazing, i cant stop listening to it! I love the song Single, i have a similar idea for a song. But instead of reading personnal ads its just a conversation about something, but when i heard the personnal ads i was like shit, ive already been outdone. But i alread wrote that song so its in the bag.

I saw Garbages Soundstage performance with you in it on PBS. They have some good songs, pretty cool.

But that is one hell of a big stage.

Anyways..

So are you going to be putting polar bear up for download< I hope so i really wanna hear that,m i love the music you guys created, its unbelievable.

Peace

Chris Cassidy said...

damn sounds like a great show. i was just fortunate to catch the White Stripes secret show @ the Fillmore East (formerly Irving Plaza) now, i now this isn't a tiny club, but it was still intimate and quite incredible. what do you think of them e? well really, what do you think of jack white. i think he is amazing talent. and a monster on guitar. there is nothing like those special little shows. btw, last time i saw you onstage was irving plaza a few years back when peter murphy did two nights. i went both to check out you and distefano. great shows e. must have been fun touring with peter and peter and if i recall, jay haskins on drums?
last thing, i know you dig TVOTR, check this clip out, gives me the chills.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bZYjHsbSQpY

matt volpe said...

Eric,
That's awesome. Spontaneous and just amazing sounding. I couldn't agree more how a great rock band can be force as great as the ocean in a small club. I honestly feel that adds to the danger of a great rock band. Without that element of danger, where the audience almost feels a literal sense of fear of what will happen next, a rock band cannot be a great rock band. This is exactly I feel when it comes to Jane's. Back in the day seeing you guys on stage was both exhilarating and scary at the same time. An awesome combination of feelings to experience an amazing band. How's Help Wanted coming along? Are you in the mixing stages now? Still recording? Hope all is well otherwise... Matt

Anonymous said...

4 kids later - 2 marriages - still finding solace in eclectic music, paramahansa, Chess, cold ocean water and Ice cream. maybe the coffee house on broadway and 18th for a game and a cup of coffee?

Anonymous said...

eric
i recently discovered the flower quartet myspace! oh man i fuckin love the song "transitive times". it mustve been so cool for you as a high schooler to go into radio tokyo and record these great songs back in 83 rite? where did you meet jack gould? did he go to yer h.s.? well eric these 2 songs really inspire me to form a band. they rock!

and yer blog about the foo's. is that how you really like to perform? like w/ jane's did you like places like the scream or the JAF?

well eric heres the FQ myspace url:

http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendID=136426676

ddz said...

last time i saw jane's it was in the backyard of someone's house at Halloween in Los Angeles; they played with the chilis.

I remember running toward the front of the pit where a friend was waiting with open hands to launch me into the air. I remember being flung head over heals and my ass landing on the stage monitor with a thump.

my feet came over my head and landed squarely on eric's bass as he played.

he never missed a beat.

fk'n jedi.

much love from Maui, e.

Anonymous said...

oh eric my bad forgot to leave my name. the message about the FQ myspace is from me.
ALEC

helicine said...

On a tangent relating to the old days, was Jane's early guitarist Ed's last name "Dobrydnio"? Not sure if you knew or even remember, but I thought it was worth a shot. Thanks!

erik

-ea. said...

ryan- believe me ryan, the 'lucky sob' aspect of my life is very rarely unappreciated by me. there is no good reason for the extraordinary amount of good fortune in my life.

-ea. said...

c. brian- yes. i consider all those guys friends. grohl is actually the only guy ive never hung with socially. he is a great guy though. the whole foos family actually is great. their crew too. that often speaks well of those in charge.

ive heard the janes precursor thing before. it was an unusual signing at the time. our booking agent also handled all the grunge bands. there is always a perfect storm of influences that produce phenomena like nirvanas success and legacy. but at the end of the day, i think the biggest reasons nirvana took off were because of the powerful charm of their music and the powerful charisma of cobain.

-ea. said...

ekimrayd- i would have to choose the scream club in downtown la. it was in the basement of a old hotel (name escapes me right now). it was a club that grew in symbiosis with janes. it was a real scene. i had always had a thing for the scene around warhols factory and the scream scene was about as close as i ever got to that vibe.

-ea. said...

george d- i was always particularly fond of 'single' as well.

i want to make polarbear available for download. ive been trying to put a snocap module on the polarbear myspace site, to do that, but i cant seem to get that company to return an email. i will persevere though.

-ea. said...

chris- it was fun touring with kevin (not jay) haskins and the peters. that was where i learned that i could tour as a hired gun and enjoy that process. i didnt think that was possible previously because of how uncomfortable i always was on the road with janes.

-ea. said...

sr- i have only recently re-discovered my interest in chess. there are many sites for chess, obviously. i like going through java applets of other peoples games at chessgames.com, amongst many others. they have the chess games of the artist marcel duchamp. pretty cool.

-ea. said...

matt volpe- yes. spontaneity is good. rare as we get older. heard a great quote the other day,"trade your comfort for vitality."

'help wanted' is finished but it has had an unfortunate set back. the label is now going to wait until january of next year to release it. im bummed but i understand why they want to do it.

-ea. said...

seanniemac- is that you? do you mean that little piece of the mid-seventies just east of 17th? i wont give you much of a fight on the chessboard but im down.

-ea. said...

jack gould was a classmate of mine at uni high school and a huge influence on me musically. he first played me joy division and the like. he wrote really interesting lyrics back then too, like transitive times. i really did not write good lyrics yet (cringe). as an aside, my friend chris brinkman (the little known early janes guitarist) played with us a little later and we wrote a song called 'womb bomb' that later became the bass line for the janes song 'idiots rule'.

-ea. said...

i forgot. that last post was to you alec.

-ea. said...

dominic- i remember that utter chaos on stage at that point was expected. folks were always flying all over the place. we were always getting knocked around so at some point you just stop noticing.

-ea. said...

erik (helicine)- eds last name. eesh. that sounds close but i really cant remember. i do, though, remember that he came out to the garage where perry and i were playing and he and his girlfriend had had a scrap. we all lived together at that point. but ed was a little concerned because during their scrap they had broken the glass of his terarium and his six-foot boa constrictor was gone. needless to say, it was a little off putting, for a few days, knowing that a boa was loose somewhere in your house.

matt volpe said...

Hi Eric,

I'm sorry to hear that Help Wanted's release date will be pushed back to January 08. I imagine the record company's got their reasons, but I could understand being bummed by it. The industry works in weird ways. Keep your chin up amigo, I and everyone else here will be there in January of 08 at the table ready to ingest a hearty plate of Help Wanted! Later on, Matt

JM said...

Well, here seems to be a nice place to post my "thanks".

My favorite album, ever, is Deconstruction. I just love every piece of it, from the bass lines to the millions of guitar tracks. It's a beauty. It's like a soundtrack of something, but I don't know what.
I'd like to congratulate you specially for "America". Outstanding bass line and general groove, they went great with your voice.

And also, just a general praise for Jane's Addiction. Jane's' bass lines have been a huge influence for my playing, in every instrument. I think it's funny how your bass lines influenced my drumming and Perk's drumming influenced my bass playing.

If I could say thanks, congratulations and everything in just a couple of words...

"clap, clap"

Thanks, Eric.
Take care

JM