Gig Archives: 1995


(Disclaimer: this may be incomplete or inaccurate)

Friday, July 21st, 1995
with Dreamland:
First gig with a more pared-down lineup (me, Jenya, Mantra, Dan, Michael, and Ginny), headlining at the Stork Club with our pals NC-17 opening up. Fairly decent gig despite sketchy soundcheck and being too full of Cambodian food eaten right before performing. Dan took a 10-minute sax solo at the head of "Wet Dagger." I played "Subtraction" on guitar with the E tuned down to B to cover the bass parts during the verse so Dan could play sax on it.
Sunday, July 23rd, 1995
with JOB:
The unofficial first JOB gig, and the first of many to take place at the wonderful Chameleon, located within the kind and loving Mission district of San Francisco. This was sort of a preliminary meeting, as Jai Young was unable to attend. Mark and Matt performed as Hemi-JOB, making noise with guitar, bass, drums, and that out-of-tune and inaudible piano that people are afraid to remove lest there actually be space to move around on the Chameleon stage.
Sunday, August 6th, 1995
with JOB:
The real first JOB show, once again at the Chameleon in San Francisco. Many attendees. Matt succeeds in stabbing himself with his bass drum during load-in. Late in the set Dan Plonsey sat in on saxophone and even joined Matt in a scat singing duet. Other than all that, this show can be considered "uneventful," as far as first official gigs our concerned
Friday, August 11th, 1995
with Dreamland:
Played at the Nightbreak in SF, opening up for both Idiot Flesh and Eskimo. It was a pretty awesome night of music, with good attendance of course. Only one bummer: some cop gave me and Jenya a ticket for parking illegally while we were unloading our gear. So much for making any money that evening. Dreamland is still rearranging songs left and right as members keep coming and going.
Sunday, August 13th, 1995
with JOB:
The second JOB event, also at the Chameleon. The noise generated went unrecorded, which is just as well since some geezer wandered into the club and was hooting and hollering throughout the set. "Hoop! Hoop! Hoop!" he'd yell, in time with the plentiful grooves. Then he kind of just sulked and seethed when the music turned arhythmic, springing back to life again once there was a recognizable pulse, yelping "Hoop! Hoop! Hoop!"
Sunday, September 3rd, 1995
with JOB:
Another "unofficial" JOB performance, as Mark was absent from this one, and it was held in conjuction with members of two other bands, those being Sparklecock and Dreamland. All told, this ensemble consisted of Matt (on electric bass), Jai Young (on keyboards and violin), Jenya Chernoff (on drums), Oran Canfield (on drums), Eli Crews (on upright bass), Dan Plonsey (on saxes), and Steve Mays (on saxes). Matt actually utilized Jai Young's violin during one improv, much to Jai Young's chagrin. This madness, alas, went unrecorded. And yes, this was at the Chameleon.
Tuesday, September 12th, 1995
with Dreamland:
We played at the regular Tuesday improv series that Gino put together at the Hotel Utah in SF, so it wasn't our "normal" set. Mantra began with a solo voice improv over prerecorded tape. Then we launched into a long improv conducted by Mantra. Had a good loud bass solo. And then we started doing the instructed jams, one of which called for me to simply be boorish and fuck with other peoples equipment. So I put my bass down and sternly tampered with Mantra's microphone, dismantled Jen's drumkit piece by piece, detuned Michael's guitar, poked Dan's sax, and for the coup I stormed off stage and returned wielding toilet paper which I streamed around Michael and Jen. I think we lost the audience after that. We did some more silly things that were more indulgent than entertaining, but still, fun. Ended with another tape, which we all ambiently played on top of.
Sunday, September 24th, 1995
with JOB:
The official third JOB show. Guess where this was held? Wrong! It was at the Chameleon in San Francisco, silly. This event was recorded to DAT as well as video tape. Upon viewing the video tape, all members of JOB decide action must be taken in improving stage performance as well as in wearing long pants. Features what will later become known by the devoted fans as the "Astral Voyager" jam.
Friday, October 6th, 1995
with Dreamland:
Pre-tour warm up gig of sorts at the Nightbreak in SF. It was kind of anti-climactic as we were forced to go on first at the last minute, nobody was there, then we had to cut our last epic off mid song as time was running out. We were joined by Paul and Laura for the first time on this short set - good practice as they'll be playing with us the first two shows on the tour. I have no recollection of the other bands playing that night as we left right after we were done. Fuck 'em.
Thursday, October 12th, 1995
with Dreamland:
On Tour: Dreamland Pacific Northwest 1995
Juanita's, Chico, CA w/ Silicone Milk, Idiot Flesh
Friday, October 13th, 1995
with Dreamland:
On Tour: Dreamland Pacific Northwest 1995
Arcata, CA w/ Idiot Flesh
Saturday, October 14th, 1995
with Dreamland:
On Tour: Dreamland Pacific Northwest 1995
Salem, OR w/ Raised by Yaks
Wednesday, October 18th, 1995
with Dreamland:
On Tour: Dreamland Pacific Northwest 1995
Laurel Thirst, Portland, OR w/ Francis Farmer Gals
Thursday, October 19th, 1995
with Dreamland:
On Tour: Dreamland Pacific Northwest 1995
Eastside Tavern, Bremerton, WA w/ some local rock bands
Friday, October 20th, 1995
with Dreamland:
On Tour: Dreamland Pacific Northwest 1995
Paris Theatre, Portland, OR w/ Tales Untold
Saturday, October 21st, 1995
with Dreamland:
On Tour: Dreamland Pacific Northwest 1995
New Music Showcase, Portland, OR w/ Land of the Blind
Sunday, October 22nd, 1995
with Dreamland:
On Tour: Dreamland Pacific Northwest 1995
John Henry's, Eugene, OR
Wednesday, November 1st, 1995
Dan threw together an ensemble of local heroes to perform his "Bootless Ragpicker" piece. This included me (not so much a hero) on bass, John Schott, Steve Adams, Laura Carmichael, Jenny Schienman, Carla Kihlstedt, Matt Brubeck.. and anybody else? Oh, and Dan of course. Otherwise I don't remember. It was a wacky, fun mini-epic - just like all of Dan's stuff, and performed at Beanbender's.
Thursday, November 2nd, 1995
with Dreamland:
We shlepped all the way down to Fresno in Jenya's giant Volvo which fit all of us and whatever gear we needed that we weren't borrowing from Idiot Flesh who was headlining the evening at Club Fred. Also performing that night were E is for Elephant. First time I saw them play live. It was a fun night of random prog rock though not really great attendance down there in Fresno. Dan accidentally tore the gearshift out of the socket while borrowing the car earlier to get dinner. It was reattached, albeit loosely, so the long ride home afterward was made less fun due to all the rattling. Stopped in Los Banos at 3:30am for gas and a chocolate chip ice cream sandwich, and was home in Oakland by 6am. I actually thought I was going to make it to work after that, but I failed.
Sunday, November 5th, 1995
with JOB:
The last of the original Chameleon shows, and by far the best of the lot. Short and to the point. The noise was recorded, thank the heavens, parts of which ended up becoming "Dead Stop Traffic in the Middle of the Afternoon" (as heard on our Kafka-esque production K.) and "Clear" (on Let's Talk about God and Party at Ilan's). Also created was the cult classic "The North American Man-Boy Love Association."

(At this point it should be noted that most of the Chameleon shows JOB played before, after, or with various members of Sparklecock, a group containing Oran Canfield, Eli Crews, Johnny "Donuts" Finkbeiner, and JOB's own Mark Schifferli.)


Saturday, November 25th, 1995
The first official Mumble & Peg show, and a historic gig in general - a classic Stork Club moment. Opening the show was indie rock band Munk, then we went on. But it wasn't me and Chunk backing up Erik strumming and singing his tunes. Instead we perfomed one tune: Brian Eno's "Driving me Backwards" - for almost a whole hour. The "extended" version with each section stretched out forever. Plus we had guests - Jenya, Wes, and Dave Cooper on drums and Nils on percussion guitar. All of the drummers lined up in back, standing and only playing bass drum and floor tom in unison (boom... bap bap...). All of us had black clothes and black stocking on our heads. And a strobe light flickered on us the whole hour we were up there. It was audience abuse to the nth degree, and poor Monopause had to follow all that. Anyway, we went back to playing Erik's tunes as a trio at future gigs.
Saturday, December 2nd, 1995
with Dreamland:
Another gig at the Stork club for me. Despite continual instrument/member flux within the band this was a fun, good sounding set. The band was once again augmented by Paul and Laura on violin and voice. Jenya rocked it as she was accidentally locked out of her house all afternoon so she had nothing to do but warm up in her rehearsal space. Headlining was Charming Hostess. Classic Stork Club kind of a night.

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