languid

on the floor for motorhead 04.08.05

@ the warfield. a block and a half from home... one of the very few reasons it kicks ass to live in the ghetto.

fuck yea.

i forgot when you buy your tickets at the fillmore, on the sunday morning sctick, you don't pay a service charge. that is so fucking refreshing. that fucking seven to ten dollar chump charge just kills me. fuck ticket master.

so i think it is time to consider the 500 club. a moment of reverence please....



ok thatz enough.

i first went to the 500 club back in january of '93. i had been here a couple for days and it was just over the hill from 22nd & guerrero where i was crashing with some friends, flat on the hardwood floor. i was way bewildered in my first days here. so unlike mau'i was the city that i had no idea to flow. it was cold, my lips were chapped and i got lost a lot. no trees and everythig was grey. there was nothing for me to do but love it and learn. so my friends started dragging me there. i learned about things like redhook. they didn't have much of a beer selelction in hawai'i. on the way home i got to learn about buying pints of tequilla or whiskey for the rest of the night. they never had those small ghetto bottles back in hawai'i either.

if i recall the 500 club was the only bar i lost my cookies in. when i was done i crawled out of the stall this guy looks at me and said, "the beer will wash the taste out of your mouth and that will help you feel a lot better." i smiled and did what he said. all my friends were three sheets to the wind and didn't even miss me. so i ordered another and got on with my evening.

there was one time when there was a bridge and tunnel couple sitting ing a booth. so we joined them because the bar was packed. two to a side. six in the booth now and all of us in rare form. they were quite put out that we were now reaching over them, moving their drinks out of out way and introducing ourselves in a fever pitch. by the time their round was mostly gone so were they and the booth was ours.

there used to to be a bartender that had the name of joe. he was freaked out most of the time and way off the deep end. he was an older white guy and was very bewildered due to whatever toxic substances kept him up all night and stumbling around behind the bar. i used to rolll in there and shout, "hey joe, long time no see, you know i can't remember the last time you bought me a beer!" so he would. he was a freak, he eventually got fired or they moved him to the albion and then he came back but i think i saw him driving a cab now...

he used to wear these pink polo shirts, looking very rumpled and bleary yet WIDE eyed. such good times. i think it still opens at six am. one bartender told me how around five am, when he would roll in, the tweakers would start beating on the door to get him to let them in. generally at six it would swarm with some kind of crowd reserved for the dark places of the city. fucking weirdoes.

i do remember tho, cocktails, where asiaSF is now. they would open on thursday night and close tuesday afternoon. i might have been found ordering a martini or two at six am back then, in '93. i think the 500 culb opened at noon then. the pit was a place underneath cocktails. that place was quite sleazy and degenerate. i guess the many raids closed it down.

so back to the 500 club. i should go more. i almost moved in down the way into a studio when i was shopping for a new spot but tho the neighbors were sweet this place looked more appealing for the quality of old building.

maybe part of the appeal is it is a special little meeting when i go so the rarity makes the taste sweeter.

m'k

nuff rambled.



aloha,
j