“[Gays] offend God just by existing.”
“I don't support same-sex marriage. It's lowering the bar to what kids have to live up to. If that perversion is worth the rights of a married couple, well, what about pedophiles? That's an even sicker perversion, but should we give them a tax break, too?”
“Look at the history of any gay person and trace it back far enough, and you're going to find a problem. I'm not saying everyone was sexually molested, but there was something that wasn't quite right. Maybe the mother was domineering and bossy, and maybe the father was feminine-acting.”
So says country-music crooner Collin Raye, who at least one gay publication has branded “Nashville's newest homophobe” and who will conveniently appear Thursday, May 10, at the House of Blues—the House of Blues that's on queer-friendly Disney property, mind you. But this girlfriend ain't so outspoken that he won't trouble himself with finding some other venue —not when there's money to be made. LowBallAssChatter just couldn't let Raye slip into our fair county without comment, so we'll just return his idiotic stereotypes by noting that since Raye loves country music so much, then obviously he must be one trailer-park-livin', front-tooth-missin', white-hood-wearin', cross-burnin', KKK-lovin', wife-swappin', sister-impregnatin', pig-screwin', shower-avoidin', Confederate-flag-wavin', shit-kickin', redneck-sportin', funny-talkin', negro-hangin' cowboy! Yeee-hawr! Welcome to OC, Collie darlin'. Y'all shore got a purty mouth. (Rich Kane)
CLUB CHAOS (PART 1)
The assault on Long Beach nightlife continues. On Tuesday, April 24, the Long Beach City Council passed a resolution severely limiting the operating hours of the Mark diPiazza-booked Lava Lounge, which is attached to the Java Lanes bowling alley on Pacific Coast Highway. On Friday and Saturday nights, bands must cease playing at midnight; every other evening, the curfew is a Nebraska-style 9 p.m. DiPiazza says he's not sure what will become of his much-loved club, suggesting that the clampdown has come about partially because of the punk and hardcore bands he sometimes booked. “I just had to cancel the Angry Samoans,” says diPiazza. “I can still book shows till midnight on weekends, but what takes the heart out is that I can't book bands like the Dickies and the Bredrin Daddys. They're saying it's the hardcore people who stay in the parking lot and drink and smoke pot after hours, but they could just as easily be bowlers. The neighbors want the style of music that draws certain kinds of people to go away. It's just not fair.” DiPiazza says the Lava Lounge has never had an excessive number of police calls, and he is somewhat baffled that neighbors who have made formal complaints to the City Council never made much of an effort to talk to him. “They should have given us a chance to take care of their problems, but they didn't. We weren't aware that things were this bad with the neighbors until just recently,” he says. DiPiazza can't really picture the Lava Lounge under the new rules. “We're gonna start having a Lawrence Welk tribute band in here during the week,” he says facetiously. “I think I can draw about 30 to 40 senior citizens.” (RK)
CLUB CHAOS (PART 2)
The yellow sign pasted on Club Mesa's opaque window proclaims that the venerable fixture of the OC punk scene is being sold to something called “the Detroit Project.” At this writing, it's difficult to say exactly what that means. According to promoter Craig McGeahey, “They're either going to keep it as it is, or they're going to turn it into a jazz club.” Shocking? Depressing? Maybe. But really, turning the old dive into a jazz club has a certain appeal—OC certainly has a deficit of them and no real shortage of places to have a steel-toed Doc Martin planted on your face while moshing wildly to a series of badly played chords. So it's not really the possible loss to the music scene that's disconcerting, but rather, if the jazz-club notion pans out, our sympathies will go to the club's regulars: the tattooed and taciturn pool-shooters, the perpetually stoned denizens of the weekly Wednesday late-night poetry readings, and, most of all, the six guys who are inevitably at the bar at any and all times. Honestly, what's to become of these people? No matter who was playing, they were there. Bandini Mountain? They were there. Midget Handjob? They were there. One imagines that a change of genre would do little to drinking habits of more than a decade. How will they deal with their loss? Several scenarios come to mind:
Denial. A week or so goes by, and the beer-fortified regulars fail to notice anything's changed.
Anger. In a rare epiphany, a Club Mesa patron notices that he's surrounded by brandy-sipping jazz sophisticates. “Hey!”he shouts, “This ain't no rock & roll!!! What are you—a bunch of fairies?” He then starts a fight with a thin man of delicate constitution.
Bargaining. “Aw, maaan! I'll buy you a beer if you play some Doors! C'mon! Play 'Crystal Ship'!”
Depression. Enabled by good ol' American beer.
Acceptance. A fiftysomething heckler enters the dance floor, swaying to the rhythm of horns. For a moment, he's the picture of grace and style, until at last, he collapses and is dragged outside, where a bouncer positions him so he won't choke on his own vomit.
Oh, well. We'll be happy if the new owners only do something about that smoking room. (Victor D. Infante)
