Femme(s) Fatale

As I mentioned in my previous post, the Violent Femmes were in town on Friday. They played Thursday night at the Catalyst in Santa Cruz and Friday at the Fillmore. My old friend from Milwaukee Brian is their sound guy. Typically when the boys come in town Brian puts me on the list plus one.

I talked to him on Friday and he said the show had been sold out for months and most of the band had friends in SF so he wasn't sure he could even get me on the list. No biggie. I'm not friends with him so he can get me into shows. So I told him to just call me after the show and we'd get together for drinks. He called me later that afternoon and managed to get me on the list plus two.

After Belly Dance class Scrummy and I grabbed some dinner and then my friend Jodi met up with us and we went to the show. He not only got us tickets, he got us after party passes. Cool! We had already missed the opening band and about the first 10 minutes of their show when we got there. Found Brian and ended up watching the whole show from the sound "booth". Really the sound area I suppose, but you get the idea. As always, the Femmes put on a great show. Plus we were right by the bar so we could get drinks whenever we wanted and, as Jodi pointed out, had a great place to scope out guys as they came to the bar. It was great!

After, we went upstairs for the after party. Now, when you think band after party, you picture some crazy party with sex, drugs and rock and roll right? Well, not at the Fillmore, which really is even more surprising considering the history of that place. It was a rather tame affaire with no alcohol and people just hanging out chatting. It did turn into a great people watching opportunity. Eventually Brian came to get us and we headed off to the Miyako where they were staying. We ended up hopping on the tour bus and just partying there as they had recently stocked the liquor cabinet. I think it was my other buddy Jeff who helps out the Femmes as well who made the comment of us being "Bus Babes". We must officially be the only 'bus babes' who didn't sleep with the band...as far as any of you know.

It was great to see Bri and Jeff again. We hung out with the other guys drinking and for some reason watching the Led Zeplin Anthology. I never thought it was possible to overdose on LZ, but trust me, it is possible! About 2am Jodi was the smart one and headed home. Scrummy and I stayed. Around 4am I decided since I was sick I really needed to go home. Jeff and the sax player whose name I can't remember walked us to my car. I gave them a ride back and somehow we ended up at the Japan Town Denny's. Trust me, NEVER eat there. The place is just scary. It was a pretty funny meal though. After, I dropped off Scrummy and headed home.

I got to bed about 5:45am. At 9am my neighbor started his circular saw for the construction project of the day. Kill me now! Could explain the fever I had on Sunday and why I've stayed home to work the past two days. As much as I love those guys, hanging out with them sometimes kills me. Note that won't stop me from doing it again in the future. :-)

Long live the Femmes!

Sorry, this should be a much funnier story, but I've been sick for days and have lost most of my sense of humor.

This moment of being a groupie was brought to you by the letter G and the number 5.