Bulls On Parade

As most of you out there know by now, I work in a casino. In that casino we get live entertainment each and every weekend. I say "live entertainment," but trust me when I say that entertainment isn't always what you get. The bands we get are a mixed bag. Some are actually pretty good and others are pretty bad.

How do you cope with having to remain in that place when a bad band is booked to play?

Good question, internalized voice.

Well, quite often the bands we get play mostly covers. Many of the songs that the bands cover are the same. That is to say, they're from a rather short list of songs that have been known to be crowd-pleasers. Off the top of my head I can think of songs like "Stuck In The Middle With You" or "We're Here For A Good Time" or even "Margaritaville." That kind of music. So if a band is particularly bad one trick I do is to simply try to remember how the original recorded version of that song sounds and play that over in my head while the cover/butchered version is being pounded out on stage. Pretty simple.

Or...

And this one is a lot trickier, but definitely my go-to method of coping with the horrible music. I try to imagine the band getting up on stage and just going right into "Bulls On Parade" by Rage Against The Machine. And being almost surgically identical to the original version of the song. Why that song, you ask? Well, I think it's because it has the ballsiest guitar riff in the world. I liken it to an atomic bomb loaded with a payload of rusty chainsaws and angry yellowjackets. I imagine people running, actually running away in fear of the monstrous sound. I think one day I would like to see that happen.

I wonder who does the booking for the bands for our casino and if they've ever tabled and offer to Rage Against The Machine.

They should get in touch if they haven't done so yet.