dislocated Part 5

The fifth and final installment of my first band’s story is here. We’d sacked our drummer and gotten a new one at the end of Part 4. We spent some time with Rob learning all of our material. Our first gig with him behind the skins was a gig at B & L Pizza with the Red Jelly Mambos and See 7 States. We would debut all of new material we had been working on with Tim including our acoustic song sarcastically dubbed “Hippie Bus” that I wrote with Mark. “Our hair’s blowing out the window as we drive across the land. Safe inside the hippie bus everybody join hands and sing along.” The show started off with some promise as we opened with the thrash of “Whatcha’ Thinkin’” and a bunch of kids started slamming, but the fun was cut short when the sound guy not affiliated with us, Mark Praytor, told the kids to watch the monitors. They thought he meant “no slamming” so for the rest of our set they just stood against the back wall which really brought our enthusiasm down a notch. We still put on a good show playing more originals and just a few covers. Shrub was awesome on bass in his first live show with us so it was a shame that the ride was almost over. We must have played another show at B & L because Shrub swears we did, but I don’t remember it. We kept rehearsing, but things weren’t the same without Tim in the band. Mike had acquired a steady girlfriend by then so he started missing practices. Mark had starting dating his future wife so his free time for the band was getting slimmer and slimmer. We started playing over at Rob’s house and the family feeling the group used to have lost. In retrospect, I should have taken charge of the group, but I was clueless to any power I had. I was just the guy who had barged my way into a band and I never considered the group truly mine even when they were doing covers I suggested, when I was writing the lyrics, or when I even came up with the name of the band. We were definitely ahead of our time for 1988-89 doing the Descendents covers and writing pop punk – metal originals. The group drifted through a few months of fruitless rehearsal – I remember painfully trying to pull off a cover version of Tommy Tutone’s “Jenny, Jenny (8675309)” over several afternoons without Mike there – until somebody pulled the plug. I don’t specifically recall how it went down, but the Dislocated just quietly expired one day. So what happened to us? Tim married Darlene who had taken him away from us, but later got a divorce and came back to music. He has played in a string of Murfreesboro cover acts and has also played with the famous Cajun Manuel family who I knew from the days back when my father ran Jimmy C. Newman’s ranch (two of the Manuels played in his band Cajun Country). Mark Taylor married Jenny and now has two children. He still plays music every now and then (including one show with one of my future bands), but he’s developed a greater love for computer technology - http://markeydave.stumbleupon.com/ - which has become his career. Mike Taylor also played one show with my band Michael Landon’s Ghost/Pipebomb before joining up with Brian Hickman in the Reverbians - http://www.angelfire.com/clone/thereverbians/ - a few years ago. He left them before they split up and I don’t know what’s he up to music wise, but I hope I catch him playing on stage again as he really is one of the most talented guitarists I’ve ever heard. Once the group disbanded I lost touch with Rob. Shrub moved to Texas where he started playing in a band called Cool Fork that was full on Green Day sounding pop punk. The guitarist and singer Jaret has since gone on to mega one hit wonder fame after his group, Bowling For Soup, hit it big last year with “1985”. Shrub could have become a superstar, but he went on to play in the more challenging artistic act Wiring Prank - http://www.qualityparkrecords.com/artists/wp.html - http://www.pyramid-scheme.com/merchandise2.html - http://www.hipinion.com/review.php?aid=99 - who were inspired by acts like Slint and Tortoise. After that ended he started his own website devoted to horror www.goblinhaus.com which is always fun to visit. I went on to form full on punk band Michael Landon’s Ghost/Pipebomb and after that came garage act Dragula - http://www.goblinhaus.com/dragula.htm - which I’ve documented before. Currently I’m busy with a wife and two kids of my own with another one on the way. I record songs to a four track and hope to one day play in front of an audience again, knowing that I’ll have a blast, but that nothing can ever top that first nervous show at Jabbs with the Dislocated. There’s no discography for the Dislocated since we only recorded our songs on a boom box. But here’s the list of our originals: Work Sucks written by Mike and Wally, This One’s For Paul written by The Dislocated, Mosh and Slam written by The Dislocated, Complications written by Mike and Wally, Perfect Girl written by Mike and Wally, 3 Groovy Chix written by The Dislocated, Whatcha’ Thinkin’ written by Mark and Wally, Same Circumstance written by Mark and Wally, What Do You Want From Me written by Wally, and Hippie Bus written by Mark and Wally.