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Monday, Jul. 25, 2011 - 3:21 p.m.

Trooper Plays Hooterville
**************************

Fossil Rockers 70's band " Trooper "
played outside in a lovingly restored
British Empire era Military fort
in my tiny town last night

$30 to get in
there was no way
I would pay
that kind of money to see
balding guys pushing 60
playing B music from
35 years ago.
I hung out in the dark parking lot
with the drunken sons of peach farmers
and bored graceless daughters
of the gift shop merchants
who knew enough to
drink in the base metal vibes
without spending money
for the nebulous honour
of standing in front
of the plywood stage
and watching ankles

I talked to several of the rented
off duty uniformed
gun weieding city Police
working as bouncers at the gates
and they let slide
in an unguarded comment
the show operators
had no idea at all
what they were doing
the youngish cops
played laser sword
at each other with their
official flash lites

the promoters lost their shirts
and most of their laundry
on that show
in spite of the
mild pleasant weekend weather
that followed on the heels
of an oppressive heat wave
that hammered at us all last week
the sharpened wooden palisades
that had kept marauding Americans
out for the last 200 years
could not contain
the lack lustre falsetto
satanic screams
of the band

you could hear the show
all over town

if you liked 70s hits
and i don't
and were not overwhelmed
with the AC fan
which i wasn't
it would have been somewhat fun
but it wasn't

the band frontman
chatted meaningless
showbiz trashtalk
to the gathered rock pleebs
waaaaaay too long
way way waaaaaaay too long
it was just annoying
nobody recognized
long dead obscure guitar players
he mentioned as if they were
topping options for a large pizza
you were never gonna taste
at a party you were not invited to

after that disjointed intro
the band sipped
from their canteen of
tapwater hits..
none of which i recognised

some solid silver
a lot of bronze
all aluminum towards the end

pretty much
an audience malfunction
who resisted every prompt to
get involved when the band
called out " all right !! "
- and then no response followed
none at all
that was somewhat discouraging

even enthusiastically
referring to Hooterville here
as their favourite tour date
got no response-
and good reason too

that band had never played here before
so they were obviously lying

it's one thing
to forget something
and quite another
to remember something
that never happened

the fans who came to see
a band who peaked
35 years ago
a full two decades before the internet
reminded me of the kinds of audience
who still loved Elvis
after he got fat and redundant
or still attended Grateful Dead shows
many years after Jerry Garcia
had passed away

old school rockers
who's microwave clocks
have blinked 12:00
since the 90's
waiting for the Rolling Stones
to tour again
but they can't fit into
their beloved
classic rock T shirts
no matter
how hard
they try

 

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