Thax

[magazine called sunset]

Anyone know what happened between Wilco and Thax? I saw him at Lolla introducing several bands, but didn't show his face for Wilco...

[TimRoss]

Anyone know what happened between Wilco and Thax? I saw him at Lolla introducing several bands, but didn't show his face for Wilco...

 

I seem to remember him posting on here for the reasons why he would no longer be reading before Wilco. Pretty long thread, too.

[TimRoss]

Here's the Thax post from last year:

 

I don't know who "xahtsalguod" is, but I want to get this off my chest. Then I can tell people to go this site and read it cause I'm sick of telling the story-I mean, nobody asks me why i don't read for Lying In States anymore, and when i decide to, I'm sure they'll be gracious enough to let me.

Anyway, this is a long self-indulgent post. I've been doing these poems forbands since 1997. I knew Jeff as Sue Miller's husband, and to be honest at the time considered Wilco to be a dreadfully bland Matchbox 20 type band. Nevertheless when Jeff came up to me after a Handsome Family poem and asked me to do one for him, and said that what I was doing was important I was immensely flattered. I went on to do a flurry of poems those last 2 weeks at Lounge Ax and really haven't looked back since.And I went to some solo Jeff shows where he was doing YHF material, easily his best. So it seemd natural, especially after 9/11, to start reading for Wilco.

It's only in the last year that I read for them just a little too much and got just a little too associated for comfort with the band. Jeff said to me the last time I read for Wilco in Kalamazoo, that "I was part of the family"- but with all due respect, I don't want to be part of anyone's family-that reflects the backstage uneasiness that I was tired of, with Jeff as the Ding Dong school unstably nice teacher and the band members as the nervous kids looking out of the corner of their eyes as they played nervously in the corners-was it that bad? No, but there was always a sense of see, it could be like this but it's not. I actually consider myself an independent star in my own right and prefer to be known as "the poetry guy" that reads for many many rock bands without being identified with any one band too much. I am grateful that bands allow me to read and it's an honor, but honor's a two way street -what I'm trying to say is that I'm one of those people who will always be a star, at least in his own mind, and that I feel like I have something good to share with bands and audiences that involves them intimately-I'm not just a goofball that

splashes any old stuff down and then toodles on stage cause bands feel sorry for me or admire my chutzpah, but an artist who has found his aesthetic satisfaction- a satisfaction many never find-and bands and audiences realize the satisfaction and take part in it. Bands and people are complicated creatures, and what i do is take a tangled complex abstract impression of a band, a song, or an aspect of the band musically as well as how it reverbrates in people's minds-and translate that impression into a brief poem-which when read gives that impression back to the band and the fans as faithfully as a phonograph needle But when there's nothing left to record you can't expect the phonograph needle to try and sound like an orchestra., altho it could be grabbed and tortured into screaming by a sound artist at 6Odum, which is not what I do. . So I can run out of things to say about an experience after which it becomes a job, and not an aesthetic delight, and becomes the opposite of discovery and the discovery gets worn out, and it's no fun, no matter who's filming or what stadium it's in, or whatever. I mean when Wilco becomes another Dead Phish and tours stadiums for a million years-maybe if I played my cards right, I could have kept faking it for years and maybe even gotten paid for it, but I would not be happy. And well in the YHF years Wilco would ususally play new songs to warm up-AGIB songs in very different versions, but this last year there've been no new songs backstage. So there was this exellent lineup playing great songs- but there was sense of stagnation, not helped that saw them out of town a few times as well. I knew I was going to stop reading for Wilco on Halloween night 2004 for 2 reasons. One is that I saw Jeff hugging Dan Koretzky, head of Drag City records and my archenemy in Chicago.

Dan is symbolic of everything that's wrong with Chicago IMHO-in 1991 I had the misfortune of recording a record with Steve Albini-the man who has somehow convinced the world that Chicago means Tortoise and Shellac instead of the Smashing Pumpkins, Urge Overkill, Material Issue and Liz Phair-in other words, great pop music-somehow Steve set up an atmosphere that it was cool to throw piss in Jim Ellison's face or to pass out an anti-Urge Overkill newspaper called the Stalker-the trouble with this is that a mandarin culture of snobbery and gossip has gradually supplanted music, and an indie rock establishment has evolved that stifles creativity-you cant be creative when you live in an atmosphere of fear of offending the "wrong people"-so now when people move to Chicago they come not to show what they have done, but they come like any trembling office worker, scared but confident in his ability in the fine art of corporate ass kissing-the Chicago scene has become an office like any other. So you have a music scene that takes sustenance in giggling and snorting and gossiping about anyone outside the well-oiled machine of clubs, publiciists, booking agents , journalists,and -oh, yeah, "fans" (smirk, giggle)-

My role in this scene has always been one of the assclown/outsider-for one thing, I'm a poet who considered myself part of the poetry scene, not the music scene, for many years, so I could laugh at its self-importance with impunity-in the grunge years all these labels popped up and had showcases and "secret shows" and of course there's a huge class peoblem in indie rock-way too many of the creatures come from comfortable backgrounds, at odds with rock's working class origins. So I had a fake record lablel called Lottery Records that had a mock showcase-the shtick was I had won the lottery and was starting a label. It was supposed to be a joke, but self-important people can't laugh at themselves, only at those outside the gossip machine. So they didn't get it-I think they thought I was some loser who tried to start a label going and couldn't get it together. The NY Times wanted to pick up the story but I told them it was a joke-maybe I was wrong, but a hoax and a joke are two different things, but a joke is something shared between equals-a hoax is aggressive and cruel. And I did a record at steve Albini's hoiuse in 1991 and didn't pay for it for almost 2 years-a fact I'm not proud of-but he was gracious when I finally did pay him. However, in the meantime I was badmouthed a fair amount and the garbage machine was already set in motion-I mean Steve famously said,Give people only the amount of respect they deserve, but to the shallow goosegirls of indie rock this was just an excuse for cheerleader snobbery-along with "what? what makes you think we'd bother gossiping about you!?" sneer which is the classic denying the victim his victimhood and I could name you a lot of victims who have left Chicago way before me-they were smart. Anyway, creatures like koretzky when the enter the scene and see who they should suck up to and who to despise realize that I'm the guy who stiffed albini and so is not only undeserving of respect but wants to make a game of it(this game consists mostly of humiliating victims, I mean "fans"(giggle} by saying basically who do you think you are talking to a star like me cause basically there are no stars and you the "fan" smirk is shallow for thinking of me as a star and I can tell you there's no such thing as a star there's just me and I can say that cause I'm a star and what I say matters otherwise you wouldn't come up to me but don't come up to me,etc,etc. I was oblivious to most of this in the 90s but in '99

I lived with-let's put it this way if you are supposed to be honorable about someone's private life, why would that person not only refuse to talk to you, but try to creatye an atmosphere that a lot of people in the room wouldn't talk to you? Not to mention that when out of town artists came to live in town for awhile,when i first met them they would talk to me genuinely and take me seriously as an artist, but the next time they'd see me they would be aloof, hostile-or at leats have that guarded "you seem Ok so i wthold judgement" attitude-so i know some nasty shite has been said about me-but what -and by whom? My guesses are either the Koretzky posse or the albini posse-these posses aren't a unified front-for example the albini posse despises the empty bottle posse, another bit of social nastiness-so at this point I don't go to Drag city shows or read for bands on that label-this hurts in the case of US maple, a favorite band of mine-but I can't be around Kreepetzky anymore . But there's too many Drag City-Wilco connections- Kotche, O'Rourke, jorgensen. The other reason is my photo in the Wilco book-normally a thrill-but there was barb in the thrill-the caption,"Thax-a Chicago poet-we have a roadcase for him". I can see how you can appreciate the mysteriousness of a one-named poet's picture in fans-only book, but WTF-Rick Moody has an essay in the book-there's not a photo -"Rick, a New york writer-we have a roadcase for him"-they could have a puppy in that photo-"Spot-we have a roadcase for him"(I'm still not exactly sure what a roadcase is)-you see what I mean? I was not taken seriously as an artist-it was like, we're so cool we have this goofy homeless guy come up and babble before our shows-wink,wink-sort of in that ugly 90s way-look at the homeless guy in our video-see, we rich rock stars really care! ( I was only" homeless"-couch-surfing is the genteel term- for 4 months in 2001 but I look the part) -But there was an ugly whiff of condescension in Jeff's attitude toward me-it was like "Gosh, look at me I'm some kind of hero, but in my heart I'm just a poverty-stricken pure waif like my friend Thax"-maybe some fans would like to be that waif-but to me it was like the liberal CEO at a board meeting asking the janitor, "Say what do you think?"-It just got to me after a while. So I decided to do my last poem in New York since I was getting a ride form the documentary people. Jeff had changed his number so I just showed up-and I was made to feel like a pest, not a friend-I was lucky I got to get in to see the show.

Now this irritated me-here I was going to do my last poem and I was getting Jeff telling me, "This is the biggest show of my life, and you have a sense of entitlement that rubs some people the worng way"( I thanked him for his honesty, but c'mon)-Oh great, here I thought I could get away from Wilco before koretzky could do his damage and it looks like I was too late. And it made me wince when people in town would say, I hear Wilco flew you out to new york to read for them, when I wasn't allowed backstage or at soundcheck-I wanted to bow out gracefully but now it was going to be difficult. Plus please forgive me, but some of Wilco's hardcore fans, cause of the photo in the book started thinking of me as part of Wilco more than I liked-it was flattering and I liked them as people but I was getting way too enmeshed in one band just when I wanted to take a break! Then my very good friends the detholz went on a tour with W.,(not thru me but thru Steve Albini's girlfriend-there's someone you take seriously!)- so I had to see one of those shows-then the fans were nice enough to ask me to read for a private living room show-the novelty made me say yes-and then finally i did the last 2 tweedy shows at the Vic and I felt trapped-when Tweedy ended the March 5 show with I shall be released I was thinking When will I be released? And the final straw was when a certain Wilco fan put some speed in my Coke after a non-wilco showand I was awake for 48 hours and was afraid I'd have to go the ER which I can't afford. the other final thing was that since 2001 Jeff had been talking about being a benefactor or patron of mine and doing some kind of benefit show for me-he would bring it up every few months-and -well recently i called him and said if you're going to do it do it now, cause I won't be around to much longer-I didn't come right out and say I won't be reading for your brand for a long time. I did not want to do those DVD shows cause I knw I would not be on it-that would mean money, being taken seriously,etc.-that nasty business that is so below us pure saintly poets-so I just didn't want to do it-but everyone I talked to said, what do you mean you have to do it-I was trapped-I think I even told jeff i didn't want to do it-but I felt such pressure i showed up anyway on may 4th-everyone was running around like crazy and i went to the catering area and drank coffee and a couple of hours later Vic security-very respectfully asked me to leave, and I was relieved but also sad-I feel like I've broken up with a girlfriend. sad but it had to be done. And somehow it's fitting that Sam Jones is involved-that movie is terrible and makes Wilco look bad, diitching Jay Bennett like a bunch of sixth graders-or is it "indie rockers"? No wonder Jay was babbling like a fool after his experience. All I got was a taste.

 

This post has been edited by thaxdouglas: May 27 2005, 07:47 AM

[Tweedy's Gurl]

oh god...why did you post that? i was hoping this was all behind us....and we still don't know if that's for real or not.

[mpolak21]

Regardless of whether or not this actually was Thax, I do enjoy his poems on the bootlegs I have with him introducing Wilco or Jeff or the Minus 5 and would love to see him read for them again.

 

--Mike

[sean Patrick]

thax = baby.

honestly, i dont know any of these people, but it seems like he was kind of pulling the whole "im a poet, therefore im mellowdramatic"

 

 

hmm.

[j4lackey]

When they introduced him at Lollapalooza this weekend (before the Redwalls, maybe?), they said he was moving to New York.

[Kicking_Television]

sheesh

[Dreamin']

mellowdramatic

[billyman]

Thax??? I thought that was "Strongsad" from Homestar Runner!!

"

-wm

[IamJacksName]

Oh wow . . . I forgot about this.

 

I don't post much, but I do want to say this - I never liked his poems. Don't think I said anything last go round.

[a.miller]

Good God. I was not around when this "went down." That was quite the read. For a writer I would have expected more periods than hyphens. Sounds like it was pretty messy.

[welch79]

I wish I had the 10 minutes or so of my life back that it took me to read through that post...

[bjorn_skurj]

Good God. I was not around when this "went down." That was quite the read. For a writer I would have expected more periods than hyphens. Sounds like it was pretty messy.

He's a poet, not a writer. Poets have "license" to punctuate any way they please.

[a.miller]

I can appreciate a poet's license. I didn't mean to come across negatively, it was just often a difficult passage for me to follow due to the use, or lack of use, of punctuation. Kind of one tangent on top of another. I got his point though. I wonder how many other "involved" people have had similiar issues/feelings to his.

[Spawn's dad]

not sure that there is a 'his point of view.' no one ever determined if that was or wasn't thax. i think that thread ended up being 400 pages. search the archives...it would probably make a better read....the original usually does.

[Mr. Heartbreak]

He could have condensed it all quite nicely by just giving us this part:

My role in this scene has always been one of the assclown/outsider

[dazzler]

He's a poet, not a writer. Poets have "license" to punctuate any way they please.

 

 

HA;::,! So True.

 

I found that post humorous, insightful, petty, and thoreauxly believed by the person who wrote it. Those indie kids can be real mean.

[sam]

wow, that was self indulgent.

[LouieB]

Why does anyone care???....Thax is hardly a poet, he is an automatic writer in fact and if you like that he is fine. I hear he is moving to NYC....have fun with him there.

 

LouieB

[bjorn_skurj]

Yes, just what Gotham was crying out for - another street poet.

[LouieB]

Yes, just what Gotham was crying out for - another street poet.

You are welcome...enjoy him....

 

LouieB

[Gobias Industries]

I ; am .?!

a -,;./ poet.!~?.:"

Fear (.my./:") punctuation.,:"[]()

[bjorn_skurj]

You are welcome...enjoy him....

 

LouieB

New York City survival skill No. 1: Ignore crazy people.

[LouieB]

Thax's MO here in Chicago has been to get his name and work out as part of the opening of shows. I doubt that the NYC venues will be as open to him walking right in free of charge to read a short and unconnected piece of work prior to the musicians playing. NYC has tons of would be poets looking for ways to get their work to the public.

 

LouieB