Hey everyone, as promised here is this week's sample! Please stay tuned for more samples before the big release. And stay up to date with all my music and literature releases at my Facebook page: www.facebook.com/mikenajarian!
It is not often that you get to talk about Kurt Cobain with someone who knew him, especially if that someone was Mike Mills of REM. Yeah, you read it right, Mike Mills of REM. As you can imagine it was a pretty spectacular night. It all started kind of randomly. I have a friend in Athens, Georgia who gave me a call when we rolled into town and asked if I needed a place to unwind during the day, as being on a tour bus for an extended period of time can get pretty stifling. She had an apartment right near the venue we were playing, which was a really cool club in Athens called the 40 Watt. The big allure of the club was that it was allegedly where REM got their start from. REM are local heroes in the little college town of Athens, GA and as you know they are world renown rock stars as well. They pretty much put the charm into the town, especially for touring bands like ourselves.
Regardless of REM, who can resist a little down time in a nicely furnished apartment, away from the crowded stinky tour bus. So when we got to Athens, my great friend Justin (our sound engineer at the time) and I went over to my friend’s house to take a load off and relax. As we were lounging around we mentioned how cool the 40 Watt was and how it was cool REM got their start there. “I actually know Mike Mills,” my friend said, “should I invite him to the show?”. “Um, wait, let me think a minute, YES!”. “Alright, I’ll shoot him a text.”. “Okay, cool, tell him we’ll put him on the guestlist, let’s really sweeten this deal!”. So she sent him a text. I wasn’t quite sure how well she knew him, and I definitely didn’t think he would be into coming out to a State Radio show. But it was worth a try. He was clearly a music lover and he probably held the 40 Watt close to his heart.
After the alleged text we hung out for an hour or two longer and then went to the Calling All Crows service project that we did in Athens that day. The project was an Amnesty International sponsored event about the death penalty, and involved Troy Davis, who was recently executed in Georgia despite a shoddy trial and 7 of 9 witnesses recanting their original testimony. Quite disturbing. For those of you that don’t know about Calling All Crows, it is a State Radio founded humanitarian organization that champions public service and women’s rights. You can look it up at www.callingallcrows.org. Get involved! Also, if you haven’t looked into Amnesty International, you should. And look up Troy Davis, he had a pretty unjust time in our justice system.
After the service project we made our way back to the venue to do our sound check. By this time, our friend had allegedly been in contact with Mike Mills and she said he was thinking about coming to the show. We told her we would put him plus 2 on the guestlist in case he wanted to come, but there was no pressure. Just giving the man an option, that’s all! So that’s where it was left with my friend and Mike Mills when we took the stage that evening. I had no idea if he was going to show up. Honestly, I was 99% certain he wasn’t going to show up. It was such a last minute invite and he seemed unsure, which in my experience usually means a no go. And on top of that I thought that he might not want to be around loud music when he was off tour. No matter how much you love music, if you are around loud music all the time its not the #1 thing to do for your ears when its not necessary. As a musician your ears are your greatest asset and you have to protect them against overuse. I wear earplugs everywhere I go that is sort of loud at this point. They look kind of funny, and you often get mistaken for being deaf (people think they are hearing aids), but they are necessary. So on many levels I wasn’t super optimistic about hanging with Mike Mills on this particular night. In addition, I’m sure he gets invited to a million shows by a million aspiring bands. Maybe 99.5% sure he wasn’t going to show up.
But low and behold the show ends and there he is, chilling at the bar. Mike Mills, one of his friends, my friend, and one of her friends. A fearsome foursome! Cool. I guess he showed up. When we went over to say what’s up, Mike was very complimentary of the band. He really appreciated how we changed styles and were original sounding, he said he was pleasantly surprised. My friend later told me that he wasn’t expecting us to be very good but was actually impressed and had a good time watching us. Good enough for me, I’ll take it. Anyway, I invited them back to the bus for a few drinks and a few tequilla shots (as Justin and I had just picked some up recently). They accepted our invitation and came back to the bus. As we were all hanging on the bus there was a funny happening…
To begin, on the way back to the bus I saw Chuck and Jess outside having a little bit of a lover’s quarrel, aka fighting about something really stupid. In case you don’t know, Chuck is the State Radio bass player and Jessica is his wife. I know that Jessica was quite infuriated and Chuck for one of the only times up to that date had raised his voice to her and told her to “shut up”. Now if I told my girlfriend at that time to “shut up” she would have gone ballistic. In fact, she talked so much that I probably wouldn’t be able to ever shut her up long enough to tell her to shut up. Little Italian firecrackers I tell you. Anyway, I don’t think that Jess reacted too well to it that night either. Later, she did admit that Chuck telling her to shut up was well warranted, but that night I think she was fit to be tied. Either way, when Chuck and Jess came on the bus I don’t think they were ready yet for some Najarian and Baumann tequila antics with Mike Mills and friends. In fact, I am quite sure they weren’t.
About 20 minutes after they re-emerged onto the scene I get tracked down by Sybil (Chad of State Radio’s wife and our tour manager) in the back lounge. She asks me to come with her and she takes me outside. She looks at me real stern. “Would it be possible that Mike Mills’s friend just shit on the bus?”.
:) Ready for more....
ReplyDelete