I’ve been feeling kind of nostalgic for Orange County lately, which is a problem about which I could say more, but I was sitting here thinking about an old friend of mine and all the adventures we used to have, many of which I wrote about in the OC Weekly, and something made me remember the night we nearly missed our plans because, well, you’ll see. Anyway, I went back to see if I could find the column. I found it. Hooray! (for you, of course)
This was from 2001 I think:
CAPTAIN INDIGESTION!
Goldenboy
Din Din at the Bamboo Terrace
Saturday, Feb. 24
Saturday night was heap-loads of fun! It got off to a rousing start when, instead of going out and having a good time as was the original plan, I instead sat around my friend’s house while he repeatedly emptied, into the toilet, the contents of a nutritious meal that didn’t agree with him. Correction—nutritious meals. I don’t know how many he ate, but based on the lengthy duration of his bathroom furlough, it had to have been more than just dinner that was starring, for a limited time, in his toilet. “You know what I wish?” he queried through the bathroom door. “I wish you were a guy because then I could show you what just came out of me!”
“Darn!” I yelled back, gagging. And that, if you must know, is why we were late arriving at Bamboo Terrace, having missed Lo-Fi Champion, who were dressed as Jehovah’s Witnesses. I mean, they weren’t really, but I defy you to tell the difference between the band members, who looked jaunty in white shirts and narrow blue ties, and Soldiers of Christ, who also look jaunty in white shirts and narrow blue ties.
My Weak-Stomached Pal (who has forbidden me to use his name, which is weird to me since he was more than ready to show me the contents of his colon; whence springs this sudden coyness?) and I got there in time to see an entire set by Goldenboy. The three-piece Diamond Bar band features the excellent Shon Sullivan (nicknamed “Goldenboy”), who plays cello, guitar and piano in Elliot Smith’s touring band, on vocals, guitar and keys. Before he got the Smith gig, he played in a melodic psychedelic-ish band I used to really like called Moonwash. Before that he played in melodic psych-edelic-ish band Moonwash Symphony, who performed at my college, so as far as I’m concerned, Sullivan and I go way back. We’re practically family. I think he felt the same way, after I reminded him who I was.
Goldenboy began to play one of their plaintive melodic numbers, made more soothing, plaintive and melodic by Sullivan’s gentle baritone. Actually, I’m not sure he’s a baritone, and sometimes he sings in a falsetto, but it’s all quite soft and syrupy in a good singer-songwriter way. He should do lullabies!
“They’re really soothing,” remarked Captain Indigestion. “I think I’m beginning to feel better.” At this point it gets confusing because I think I said, “Yeah, they make music for your butt,” but Captain Indigestion claims Roberto from Lo-Fi Champion said it and Roberto claims the Captain said it, which is stupid because I’m the one who said it. Regardless, I got all sorts of grief for the rest of the night from Baron Von Light-A-Match-Please for, according to him, trying to take credit for someone else’s phrase. Bite me, Toilet Boy!
Three songs in, Sullivan put down his guitar and began playing electric piano on a song called “Baby Doll,” which, at the beginning, sounds a tiny bit like the theme song from Cheers, which I actually, at the time, said, but Roberto and Toilet Duck probably want to take credit for that one, too.
At some point, Goldenboy played “Savior Pill,” a Moonwash song I remember from their album, which I used to own although I can’t find it or remember what it was called, but I was overjoyed to hear the song as, for a time, it made me forget my troubles with the Duke of Crappy Pants, so for that, I’m eternally grateful. (Alison M. Rosen)
