NTMF: NO TALENT, MUCH FUSS 

Our bass player sent in an application for a showcase, just because he had some extra postage stamps laying about the house and there was nothing good on TV. We were surprised to find that we had this gig coming, since no one else in the band knew we had applied for it. Our good friend at Diabolical Productions, Davit Souders, had been talking with the organizers of the event about getting a contingent on Tulsa bands on the roster (the organizers had to have a few out of state bands on the bill, so that the conference’s true identity as a self-congratulating circle jerk would be slightly obscured). BJW and 3 or 4 other Tulsa bands, who will not be named so that they are not associated with our harsh condemnation of the event, were sprinkled across various venues and nights.

We were informed several weeks before the event that we would be playing at Red, a small dance lounge in the Club Clearview entertainment complex. I was happy to be playing the room; I like small rooms and small stages. We had played Clearview many times in the past, until the fraternity-rock agency United Entertainment took over booking the room and the new owners fired all the cool employees. The room had since taken on the air of a club run by adolescent-minded coke freaks obsessed with hiding in offices behind walls of voice mail, radio-toting security goons, and employees so high on the chicness of their work environment that they tend to forget that they’re still in a sorry-assed cow town that only thinks it’s Paris.

Upon showing up at Red for our NTMF show on Sat, Oct. 17, we started getting the blank states, evasive answers, and aren’t-we-hip attitudes that are the signatures of a poorly planned showcase at a narcissistic venue. When the lines of ignorance and bullshit from doorman to soundman to laminate-wearing toadie had finally been scoured, the facts were thus: we were the only band to play in the only room at the conference charging a cover charge, even though the 5-band show going on across the hall at Clearview, which owns Red, was free. Usually there is unhindered traffic between the multiple rooms in the Clearview complex- not so tonight. The only people who would pay to get in were people who wanted to get into Red, which is usually a bass-pumping techno-hole, if DJ Big Tex’s mix was any indication of the usual flava. After finally finding the biggest of the laminate wearing toadies to express our concerns to, he announced that anyone who was there for NTMF would be granted access to our room free of charge if they knew to ask. Oh cool, so if Mr. Big Waddie from Sackaduckshit Records got our postcard and half-gram of payola, he can get in free to see us play in front of a bunch of pissed off ravesters if he knows the secret word. I don’t know why I was so worried!

Confronted by such a daunting wall of obstacles, BJW did what they usually do when faced by adversity: they turned the amps to 11 and rocked like hell! Davit, a few badge wearing folks, and some fans who claimed they traveled from Kansas to se us remained throughout the sonic assault, as did a couple in their fifties who we still haven’t figured out. Dustin very nearly lunged over his traps to bitchslap some Dockers-sporting wuss who was trying to convince Manson that the band was too loud. Manson was informing Khaki Boy that the whole band had just installed volume knobs with ratchets that only let them turn up, when Manson glanced over his shoulder and saw Dusty on his feet and ready to swing into action like Johnny Weismuller on PCP. After the gig, Manson thanked Dusty for watching his back but informed him that it was beneath the collective BJW standard to fight with khaki boys; it’s much more fun to play so loud that they can’t flirt with the bartender and let them go home & beat themselves up(or off).