Eat Shit and Live

Yeah it's been a while. What can I say.

I'm so fucking pissed I can't see straight!

I mean you can't just meditate shit like this away. You can't ba-ba-ba, wooo-eeee-oooo, write a little song about it and amaze the few fucking real friends you have left. In short, you can't do jack shit.

But then again, you are not me. And you only have yourself and God to blame for that.

What is it, Mr. Love? you ask. Why so out-of-sorts? What happened?

SHIT happened, that's what happened. Shit happened, and Stamos is DEAD to me! Well, was dead to me--I'll get to that in a minute. But he's on fucking notice, you can take that to the bank and smoke it!

Fucking Johnny boy. He was my golden child, my protege, my go-to guy. The techno-gizmo wizard renaissance man of So Cal. With the world at his feet! I mean this guy was to bongos what Michaelangelo was to ceilings. What that beautiful bastard can do with sweaty palms and rawhide should really be illegal (actually it is, now, in Wyoming and Rhode Island; hey, thanks, fucking Jardine !).

Guess that isn't enough. Guess number one hit singles aren't enough. I guess a supporting role to the Greatest Talent of His Generation in the Greatest Band of All Time is Not Enough.

I mean, ER? Seriously? Did Brando do ER? Does DeNiro do E fucking R?

Backstory:

So I'm in L.A. last week going 'stealth macro' at Chaya, and who walks in but Triple "G"--the Great Grinning Greek himself. If you recall from my last post, this cocksmoker's grin is legend. Put it this way: Stamos plays for keeps. Anything short of victory is unacceptable. See, when your game is good it makes you smile. When your game is great, you grin. He actually reminds me of me (in a semi-, less-talented way). Hence, the Stamosian Grin; hence, why I "Love" him.

Correction: "Loved." Like I said--on fucking notice.

"What's up?" I ask hopefully. "Did another 'original' die? Jardine? Johnston? He Who Shall Remain Nameless? Is it finally payday?" Not that I would wish ill on anybody; it's just that, when someone's been through, like, hardships, suffered for so long, dot dot dot....Plus, dying--while tragic--would inevitably bring a spike in sales, which of course would help the family of the deceased, especially when the deceased doesn't want to make that money honestly by taking the bull by the big pointy things and touring with me, so they get their lawyers involved, etc. Let me tell you: it's a fucking mess. Anyway. "What's the good word, O King of the Bongo?"

"I got it! I got the part!" He's grabbing my forearms like we're girlfriends at junior prom. Fucking guy is so bubbly it's embarrassing--and here we are standing near the orchids in a vegan bistro. I'm wearing a pink/yellow/black silk Hawaiian; his greasy groping feta tubthumpers are making me wish I wore long sleeves.

I'm less than thrilled. "Settle down, settle down. Part? What part? I thought we talked about this! I thought you were taking a break."

"Yeah but this is ER," he gushes, saying the show's name like he's a Hasid whispering the secret name of Yahweh to some lamb on the chopping block.

I'm like, "So? What about the band?"

"This is national tv, man! Prestige show. 'Must-see-TV,' all that! My agent is stoked. I mean this is where Clooney got his start!"

I set him straight: "Clooney 'got his start' because his aunt was famous, his dad was on TV, somebody-blew-somebody, presto, he's on TV. What. About. The. Band?"

"Come on, man! Things have been so up and down for me since my show went off the air. I mean I've had a few good projects since that fell through, but--"

"Yeah, and you know why they fell through, John? Do you? Do you really want to know why Jake in Progress didn't hit? Huh? I'll tell you why: You took your eye off the ball."

I leaned in closer. "You forgot about the music, man."

Somewhere a widdle bitty balloon popped, a clown cried, and a tear rolled down a kitten's cheek. Now Stamos is all flustered. "What? What are you talking about? Look, this is about my life, man. My career. My choices. This is what I do. This isn't about the music, or the band, or--"

"Ohhh, it's NOT about the music? NOT about the band?" Heads are definitely turning, and not just because two of the most famous people in L.A. are going toe-to-toe. "Are you hearing yourself? I mean, is this you? 'Cause I'm not even sure I know who I'm talking to here!"

"Mike, listen--"

"'Not about the band. Not about the music.' Well. I mean what the fuck, man. How could you even...Hey, you know what?"

"Mike, come on, it's just--"

"No. You know what?"

"What?"

"Who the fuck do you think you are? Who the fuck do you think you are? Do you know who you are fucking with?"

Now he's stopped his lame-ass pleading and he's only trying to calm me down, but I'm just getting started. "No, no, no. I listened to you, fucking prancing around with glee after stabbing me in the back; now you listen to me, asshole. Before your mom shat you out of her stinking gyros-hole, I was on the road singing number one hits in front of millions of people. I put in the time. I worked it! I gave my blood for it. And guess what? I'm still out there singing number one hits, only now it's in front of billions of people! And it's 'NOT about the band'? 'NOT' about the music? Well, fuck you, man. You want to talk about exposure? You want to talk about prestige? You want to talk about the fucking millions of dollars I pull in? It's called "Kokomo," bitch!!! And you--of ALL people--should know that."

There was a pause; he tried again. "'Kokomo' was great, but--"

"Don't you say its name! Don't you even say it's fucking name!" I spit. "I will sue that name right the fuck out of your mouth!"

People--potential ticket buyers--are starting to look a little nervous. I dial it back two notches.

"So basically as far as I'm concerned, you'll be hearing from my lawyers tomorrow morning. Oh, and congratulations on the big ER part! I hope you don't let all that, er, 'prestige' go to your head."

I pull out a few c-notes, toss them at the hostess. "This prick's lunch is on me," I tell her. "Hell--it always was 'on me'--wasn't it, Johnnyboy?" Put on my shades and jet downtown to the law offices.

I get around, motherfucker. Better believe it.

Fast forward to the present: My people talk to his people, a deal is reached. This is Hollywood, they speak the language of the liquid asset. Nothing more liquid than cash, the only thing of which I have in more abundance is talent. So you see where this is leading. Too bad, so sad, no full season showcase for Stamos! He gets just two shows during sweeps week, I get Bona-fide Bongo Backup in perpetuity.

How did he take it? Listen, actors will kill their own mothers to get face time in prime time, even if it's on a show that's jumped the shark so often there's a colonoscope crammed up Noah Wyle's ass looking for the Fonz. So you know Stamos is loving it, but really, who cares what he's loving? He's on fucking notice with Mr. Love. That is all ye know on earth, and all ye need to know. Trust me, he fucking knows it.

That's "Love," baby. You brought it on yourself.

A Very Special Sept. 11 Post

All of us have a memory of that morning. We remember where we were, what we were doing, who we were with. It's just that some of us were in more important places doing more important things with more important people than others. And that's what makes America great.

Damn the terrorists. Damn them for what they've done to the world. Damn them for what they've done to our country. And damn them for ruining a day that by rights should have counted as a personal triumph for Yours Truly.

The sun was just beginning to rise on a clear So. Cal day, and so was I. Many of you are aware that I practice Transcendental Meditation. I was sitting on a beautiful straw mat monogrammed for me by the wonderfully tiny fingers of the renowned Tibetan mat weavers. Or maybe they were Indian. Or Chinese? Whatever, I mail-ordered it.

At any rate, I had already reached an advanced state of consciousness within 5 minutes (I still believe this is a record for any Western Hemisphere native) and began to levitate off my mat. Maybe something was in the air that day, because I was able to get about three feet in the air. If you've ever achieved Total Levitation, you know that after you get 8-10 inches off the ground it's hard to keep ascending vertically and you begin to drift. Well, I'm 3 feet in the fucking air, just meditating my ass off, and I start veering left a bit, then right. I'm trying not to blow it and I'm doing mantras double-time trying to get over to the chaise next to the pool, where the kitchen help leaves my decaf/biscotti. Sure enough, I get myself heading in that direction. Michael you magnificent bastard, you're really cookin' now! I say to myself. You better fucking believe "I Get Around!"

Fucking doorbell rings.

End of meditation.

I'm in a monogrammed silk kimono (that cost $850 by the way), lotus position, and I'd overshot the chaise. I drop ass-first on the edge of my swimming pool, one leg in, one out, bruise my ass, rack my balls, and get chlorine all over my custom kimono. No doubt the Jap rag is gonna bleach out. The silk is shot for sure. Well fuck me, huh?

Who, you may ask, in the living fuck is ringing my doorbell at 6 fucking AM on Tuesday?

John Ants-in-his-Pants Stamos. That's who.

I'm thinking Christ on a crutch...Can't he ever call at a civilized hour? I'm thinking If this fucking gyros monkey's wife wasn't so easy on the eyes I might have put Saget on the fucking congas and said the hell with it! So I'm just about to put my size 11 shoeless joe up his goofy greek ass, but I can tell he's got a bee in his bonnet abourt something. "Have you heard the news?"

"What happened?"

He stops antsing around and just gives me that patented sly shit-eating Stamos grin. Then it starts to sink in.

"Oh FUCK yeah!!"

Stamos puts his bongo whackers in the air and we connect for a thundering "high ten" so vigorous that for a second I'm hoping I didn't hurt those marvelous moneymaking manhandlers of his.

You see, Stamos and I had been bidding all summer on all the leftover Smile bootlegs online. Been a fucking cottage industry since the mid-90s when every piece of shit wannabe "indie" band and their press toadies were claiming to be "influenced" by The Worst Record The (Old) Beach Boys Ever Made. The same group of rabid dickweeds had been selling them to even bigger dickweeds for ridiculous prices. First of all, that's a lot of fucking dinero not making it into a certain Voice of a Generation's wallet. I'd been bitching about this to the new boys and Stamos says, "Check out eBay," and the rest is history. Or should have been. I mean we're still riding the lip of the Big Kahuna known as "Kokomo" and these fucknuts are swooning to some stupid "Parks Van Dykes" piece of garbage "album" from the old group that didn't get released for a damn good reason: it sucks.

At any rate it wasn't even making me any richer, that's for fucking sure.

On the morning of Sept. 11, with the help of a Voracious Group of Barracudas called "L.A. attorneys" and a Virtuoso Greek on Bongos called "La Stamos," Yours Truly, Mr. Love, had succeeded in acquiring the last extant copy of the Smile bootleg not already on some fat fuck's cheap-ass memorex cassette!

At last--I had won! Now the public clamoring for the Beach Boys would have to deal with the new Beach Boys, on my terms. Fuck that old shit, once and for all! Man, I was so psyched I almost huffed some loukaniko right then and there.

And then the terrorists came and pissed all over my parade. So much for my little celebration!

What have we learned since that day, as a people, as a nation?

Obviously, as far as I'm concerned, not a fucking thing.

FUCK does the New Shit beat the Old Shit!

So I was listening to some of our new shit the other day--even before it had undergone the analog conversion process. Yep, that's right--did the old fucking Beach Boys ever even THINK about recording at a bit rate depth of more than .0000000000000000001/khz? No fucking way. Not a fucking chance in hell. Totally "caveman" back in those days. Which is one reason that old stuff sounds like shit.

Anyway, I'm listening to this primo new track, still pristine in its digital domain, with me singing and Stamos doing this killer bongo overdub, and I'm wetting myself. Weeping. Shitting myself. I'm fucking leaking out of every fucking organ's orifice I've still got--it's THAT good.

And I says to myself, Mikey old boy, let's have a little contest, shall we? Let's put this New Shit back-to-back, mano y mano, face-to-face with some of the old shit. Let's "A/B" this shit right the fuck now and be done with it. Hmmm, let's see, what does EVERYBODY fucking LOVE SOOOO MUCH? Oooooh, I don't know--howzabout a little "God Only Knows" from the Superlative Pet Droppings Fucking Whoopdedoo Masterpiece?

Heh heh.

So I fucking have to go to the garage, get out the step ladder--nearly break my back doing this--climb up into the garage "attic," step gingerly around the fiberglass between the joists to a pile of old boxes where I keep all the shit I should have thrown out, oh, say, 40 years ago? After some digging I finally find it. Ah, here it is! The Holy Grail. Music As it Had Never Been Heard Before. The Unparalleled Aural Phenomenon of Sonic Ecstacy.The Greatest Album Ever Made. The Teenage Symphonies to God!

I almost faint. Not because I'm so overwhelmed by the "auditory majesty" on the Brian-Wilson-Shit-on-a-Shingle in my hand but because, hello, it's fucking hot as fuck in a garage crawl space in So Cal in late August. Plus I shouldn't have stood up so fast but I was in a hurry big time to get this little old vs. new "shoot-out" happening.

Ah, Pet Droppings , you don't even know what's coming, do you? Helpless as the little lamb on the cover (cha, that nearly fucking gave me rabies when I tried to shoo it away from my new candystriped shirt). It felt a little like flying over Hiroshima in early August 1945. (No, asshole, I did not do that (I wish!); I'm old but not that old! It's a fucking metaphor. Turn off the fucking Smile reissue for a second, crack a book, and be somebody for once in your life.)

Did I call this a "contest?" More like an "ambush."

I head back to my media room, put on the fucking song, and let me just say this: God Only Knows why anyone listens to this shit. At all. Hell, God only knows why He allows shit like this to exist in the first place. Part of His "plan," and all that? OK, whatever (I say this as a Christian .)

After about 2 seconds of boring myself to tears with "God Only Knows" my shoe involuntarily lifts from the floor, and faster than I can move to stop it, kicks the CD player right off the component shelf. Fucking Jap piece-of-shit breaks into like 100 pieces. Back in the 50s I used to have an old U.S.-made turntable that kept playing during some 7.4 on-the-Richter, city-levelling shit. This namby pamby rice burner can't even handle a little "tapshoe?"

Oh well. I'm rich.*

Anyway I have to go to another room to find a working CD player. There is none. Yes, I, multi-gazillionaire musician and voice of a generation, only have one CD player in my house. Fuck.

So, I'm sulking in the kitchen for a bit, since I can't continue the contest, when I suddenly remember: DVD players can play CDs, too! (actually Stamos showed me this. That guy's always up on all the latest "gadgets.") So I charge back into my media room, open the DVD player, take out whatever was in there and pop in The New Shit.

Guess what?

The New Shit beat the Old Shit, hands-motherfucking-down. No question. Nolo contendre, amigo. And guess what else? I sat there and listened to it 50 more times, just to be sure. I only stopped for bathroom breaks and to eat an energy bar.

*Also my stock response when some asshole/nobody/"fan" tells me he "liked our set but really loved us back in the day."