Exhumed, Season of Sorrow, and Mitochondrion @ Lucky bar Nov 1

"HEY who let all you longhairs in here? This is the eighties can't you afford a fuckin hair cut!" these where old words from a punk named Lee Ving from the band FEAR. For some reason as I was standing in the Lucky bar on this night that words popped into my head... But it isn't the eighties and these longhairs aren't hippies they are full on metal heads and head bangers. This was a gathering of die hard fans that came to see the gore metal band Exhumed! This was the day after Halloween and although the bar wasn't filled the turn out was expectable.

The first band to take to the stage was Mitochondrion. This band has a force that bounces from waves of total heavy riffs to a sudden burst of speed that leaves you breathless. The lead singer growls out lyrics that make you think you are in the war scene of the Lord of the Rings movies. I gotta say this band is the reason I showed up on that night and they more than satisfied my hunger for some metal.

Seasons of Sorrow began to set up for their set and set up they did.... they must have used up half their time on stage just setting up. This band consisted of seven members including a violin and an operatic female that is not seen in many bands. The group came on stage dressed in robes and under each robe was concealed a sword or a daggar. They started to play and each song was a long drawn out procedure of speed noise and heavy down beats. Talented musicians… but the over ten minute long songs lost me. The female vocalist wasn’t utilized to her fullest and looked way to bored standing on the stage. The lead singer certainly looked evil enough. Like I said the band defiantly had talent musically but maybe they’re
just in that developmental stage of their live show.

The grungy guys called Exhumed took to the stage and presented a speed metal that I remember from the late eighties. They label themselves as gore metal… so I was kinda waiting for some sort of blood and guts but it ever came. The dancefloor was a mob of bullet belt clad folks banging and raising their talons to the mach 5 riffs that Exhumed where executing. Like most speed metal bands if you’re familiar with their songs you have an advantage over someone who is not. I was one of those guys who were not familiar so after about six bursts of songs they started to sound the same. It was nice to see an out of town band but like I said earlier my hunger had been filled. Having to work in 6 hours I made for the door without seeing Exhumed finish their set. If you want a taste of old school speed metal Exhumed are your men. Even if you are a freakin hippy!

-ricky jak

code 19 Grey Army, Friday night murder, Shivs @ Logans pub Oct 1 2005

You like the punk a rocka maybe the hardcore? Code 19... fast and to the point, hardcore with a back flip! i didn't get close to the stage to see this band but the crowd approved and what i heard was quick and chattery. Like a squirrell running across a five lane highway at rush hour. Hope to check em out again soon.Grey Army... these guys sounded good in this venue and there was a moment when i sorta thought i was listening to DeKruezen from years gone by. This band has energy and they feel the music they play. Friday Night Murder... in the past i have found seeing a great band for a seccond time usually isn't as good as the first time. FNM proved this ain't true. Now i grew up on hardcore with out the chicka chicka riff that metalica introduced into the music world. So now we have hardcore with metal in it...... and FNM have taken it and done it right. I stood on the sideline and shook my head in awe. Just when the speedy noise of the hardcore sound floods in FNM changes the riff at the right time so it's like a slap in the head of crossover metal power. all i can say about this band is HOLY CRAP! This is MAN music! somebody record this band so i can bring them home!... ahh i mean bring thier music home.Shivs... blind drunk? YES! this band has played some epic shows over thier exhistance. Tonight is another one that can be added to that count. There is probably no other blind human on this planet who gets on stage and belts out the blues like Blark. To see this punk is a test on your emotions. You laugh, you cringe, you pick up the broken glass so no one gets seriously hurt... At the end of it all he falls down a few times, spills a few drinks, has a double gin and tonic, knocks over the drum kit, has a couple beers, bombs a hippie, has another double... make it a quadruple and then for a last request will someone please make Blind Marc a fuckin sandwich! Look for the new Shivs CD out in a month or so on some obscure European label.-rickylong jak

Rod Iron Haulers, Switchblade Valentines, Slim Jim @ Logans Oct 14 2005

I arrive to a sidewalk full of supporters. I spot Big B and wander over for some chit chat and while he has a smoke I have a dip of my fave Copenhagen (the stuff that has made grown men projectile vomit for years). Another group of grease heads show up, one of those FOoLS Car Club guys named Butcher and his mainland friend Bad Pat. Bad Pat comes over to say hi and my Girl Coen JaK quickly backed me up incase it got bad..... who knows with a name like Bad Pat! I had it under control because I already had my mini-shiv exposed for him to see. He backs away and says he's come to the Island just for the women. We shake hands and he carries on. I spot my TeaM (Jaks) and skip over to hang, Blind Marc had been drinking since 1982 so he was pretty much half in the bag along with the other handful of serious skateboard team members. I finally made it to the door to go in and the doorman asks me if I had been in before? I told him I had been here lots of times. He then told me he meant tonight... because they are sold out! WOW.... what to do now? I located the lead singer for the Valentines and asked him if he had any pull and could smuggle me and a few fiends in? He winked and put us on the guest list. Thanks Mr. R.P. Fogerty... but we still had to wait till someone left before we got in... WOW. Just then another street tribe known as the SHOV showed up and got in the line up..... huhhh a team of skateboard clowns and a group of skinheads waiting outside to get into Logans. For a moment I thought maybe Logans just didn't want us ugly lot in the bar.... but that wasn't the case the show was rightfully SOLD OUT and maximum capacity!

Some old grey hairs left and we where in half way through the Haulers set. I snaked through the crowded dance floor to see the Haulers in full throttle action. Holy Shit these guys just seem to get better every time i see them. I saw them some 5-10 years ago at Urge and back then they must have been burning regular gas because they kind of just stood there not really moving while they played their rock. Now they have built a high performance, goose bump raising, drag rock machine that after every song leaves you waiting for the next green light and the next song to leave the line. These guys kick ass and it's refreshing to hear such powerful rock-n-roll! This band is defiantly burning nitrous in their engine and man oh man they might not be racing in these little nightclubs for long! They are just gonna need a bigger track! Move over Kenny Bernstien here comes the Rod Iron Haulers!

The next up to the lights were the Switchblade Valentines. Again this band blew me away. The town of Victoria has been starving for an act like this and the Valentines slap out a rock-a-psyco-a-croonin-a-billy that brings the girls swooning to the front of the stage.... i haven't seen that many beautiful girls on the dance floor since..... never! Yes girls, but every odd song would incite a man or two to start shaking his leg and begin crashing around to the sheer twanging speed of the music. I hope we will be seeing more shows and with the right tour van they will be leaving their music across this country to nothing but rave reviews! They will be big so you better get there early because the shows just might be SOLD OUT. Just like this show!

Sorry to Slim Sandy.... I was standing outside while you where inside, i got nothing on ya.

-ricky jak

Jaks Team 20th annual sk8 comp.

Every second Saturday in September for the last twenty years the Vancouver div of the Jaks puts on a skate comp. This competition is nothing like Slam City Jam and the winners don't qualify for the DC shoes finals. This contest is for real skateboarders of the East Van variety.... even a few snotnose Vic West kids showed up. These are real skateboarders’ not fancy kids! The city has proposed a reconstruction of this China Creek skatepark so there is a chance this will be the last in this historic and oldest Canadian skatepark. The park contains a tea cup shaped copingless bowl and a lumpy bathtub type bowl with a handfull of homemade rails and a sliver infested wooden halfpipe.

I imagine as the sun was rising Simon Snotface left the tent he was sleeping in and smelled the full garbage can sitting right beside the park because it smelled better than his colors. This was going to a good day and even thought the day was a day of memorial for a lost Jak friend, TA, this skatepark would soon be filled with the majority of the Vancouver and Victoria Jaks Team. I arrived about 11:00 with my vanload of kids including Dustin Jak as well as a cooler full of pop, two loafs of bread and a jar of peanut butter and jam. We hung around as the kids started to show up and skate around this lumpy old park. High noon Doug Donut showed up and though it would be fun to dive onto Simons tent causing Simon to kick into beat up mode, for a moment I thought I should remove my kids from this park while this act of violence was going to take place. Simon moments later hugged Donut and I think later Donut went and changed his diaper. No, wait it's Beaverhead who wears the dipes. Anyway more kids and more people start to show and in Jak fashion the comp slowly gets put together. A table is found and some sound system is put into place. The prizes are laid out.... Here's where we would like to thank: PD's Hot Shop, Push Skateboard Shop, Pacific Boarder, Four Star Dist, Tree of Life, Bloodstone Press, Lonsdale Skate Company, Absolute Skateboards, Ole Nicks Emporium, Coastline, HTO, Pair o Dice Tattoos, Urge Tattoos, Sitka Surfboards, Champions of Hell, and last but not least The Hoosegow & AWT. It’s amazing how when all the little people contribute it turns out to be an amazing prize table of swag… then to top it all off Sluttie slips in a box of Trophies for the top three in each category. Make sure you support the above companies!

Now the organization of the comp always seems to fall into place. The kids line up and give out their names for beginners, intermediate, advanced and girls. The park is an insane anthill of wheels flying in and out of the bowls and every once and awhile a near collision that makes the spectators cringe. This is also a big part of the comp is the mass socialization on the out skirts of the park. Old and new friends get together for a drink or one of Slutties fine hot dogs. The park ranger shows up and politely walks around asking people to make it so he can’t see the open alcohol they are drinking. No cops this year and best of all no ambulances! This contest is back to basic… no permits, no St Johns ambulance attendants, no liquor license….. Just Jaks, local folks, punks, China Creek Maniacs kids skateboarding and good times!

Old MC bearded Ferris JaK takes the mic and belts out a few orders on how the contest is done….. Respect for each skaters run, you have a set amount of time to trick the park and when the music is off yous done. The judges take their place and the first category takes the park. The microphones are then handed over to the young MC Lill Buddy JaK and another mic is in the possession of our San Francisco guest Timmy JaK. These two clowns belt out the contest like a couple of wrestling ring announcers, bantering back and forth about the sick trick that was just displayed or the fine hairstyle of the skater. Then when the music was good Lill Buddy would dance and get the crowd clapping. Of coarse the most of the music played for the skaters was punk… although some classic hop was mixed in.

The beginner’s category is always my favorite with tiny nosepickers ollieing and flipping in and out of the bowls. These dudes are what will keep the spirit of skateing alive and prizes should be handed out to each one in this category. The next round is intermediate and again the teen skate aggression is shown with just a little more skill with some big airs, precise railslides, and kick flippin. This year’s comp had a female section and I was quite surprised at the number of girls that entered! Young and old girls carve and display the same but a somewhat more elegant style of riding the park. The advanced category as usual is doubled up to try to finish up the comp at a reasonable time. The advanced gets down to the hardest and fastest skaters and lots of bowl antics are displayed. The comp comes to an end and now the judges who are still somewhat coherent tally up their scores. (Timmy helps the judges make a decision San Fran Style) The trophies are handed out and the swag is divided up to all the skaters. Then it boils down to the ever popular bowl toss. The bowl is filled with kids and the last bit of swag is tossed in. The violence reaches epic proportions in the bowl as a handful of stickers fall in like rain. Then founding JaK member, Sporty, holds up his old vest o colors as yells out to the crowd that “he who gets this vest shall be a JaK..” It was a tug and rip fest and I honestly thought there would be just shreds of the vest left. Then out of the bowl walked a shakey greasey drunk skater who was now known as Dols Jak. He was welcomed and then the comp was over. A good clean-up was then done and that garbage can that Simon smelled earlier was now overflowing and then some with trash even Simons tent was destroyed and in there. It was another great day, no rain and no injuries. Just the odd kid and adult walking around with a Jiffy Marker mustache or beard!

Epilog: Later that evening those that survived, attended an evening of Absolute Music in the deep Vancouver streets at the Asbalt. The line up was Friday Night Murder who have now taken the top position on the Hardcore band to see list! They ripped and make sure you bring the sing a pack of throat lozenges when you see em. Next up was Dustin JaKs band the Keg Killers, my wifes favorite punk band and I never bore of seeing this band. Finishing up the night was Shadley Jak, Jono Jak, Jamie Jak and a savior sit in drummer that allowed the Excessives to play the night through. Somehow Doug Donut, the real drummer, hurt his arm in a bizarre masturbating accident just before the show so he couldn’t drum… or so Blind Marc thinks. The Blind JaK says he could hear a lot of swearing and throwing stuff around followed by some heavy grunting… so who knows what Donut was doin.

I was sitting on the pool table and Dave Dols Jak comes up and offers to buy me a beer. I tell him it’s ok, I don’t drink beer. He comes back with a beer and I tell him again I don’t drink beer. He looks at me strange and says “If you don’t drink beer. What do you do?”
I reply “I chew tobacco.” Then I pull my tin out of my pocket and offer him a dip. He looks at me strange again and then takes a pinch and puts it in his mouth. I recon he has never chewed tobacco before and his face contorts with a slight look of shock and indecision on what to do. He spits a little bit out on the floor then starts shaking his head at me, he is about to tell me something and his face makes an even wilder look and then a perfect column of projectile vomit hits the carpet of the bar. He shakes his head at me again and then leaves with out saying a word…. Welcome to the Team.

-ricky JaK