Brown Bags, Bandaged Arms And Microphone Thumpings

It was just by serendipity that, choosing to watch a video on Youtube entitled: "Sid Vicious, The Final 24 Hours" made me think of the line in a Neil Young song about Johnny Rotten.

The Sex Pistols reminded me of a group of buskers I had seen on my way home from busking, the previous night. Their "singer" sang a lot like Johnny Rotten, and I would say that they were very drunk, except I didn't know this to be a fact; maybe I could amend that to: "Well, they were on something!" but again; I didn't know this to be a fact. I'm careful about making assumptions, these days.

Sid Vicious the bass "player" for that iconic punk rock band, actually had a bandage wrapped around his arm, right at the elbow, which happens to be a popular spot used by heroin addicts to find a vein. That is as much a dead giveaway that he had been shooting up, as a black bag being held by a person coming out of a sex shop is that he has something naughty in his possession.

For The Sake Of The Children

I remember that, in Texas, when I was there in 1982, you could drink beer in public, but it had to be in a brown paper bag. Someone said that this was so it wouldn't look like there were a bunch of people walking around drinking in public. Seeing people walking around with the easily recognized Budweiser can in their hands would make the city look bad, the person had speculated, as to what the reason was for the bags.

But, the state made the mistake of not requiring every canned beverage to be in a brown paper bag, which would have created a double-blind situation, whereby, nobody would know how many people were actually getting drunk in public, because they might all be drinking soda. 

But the paper bags were such a dead giveaway, that I concluded it must have been done for the sake of the children, who would be too naive to be able to assume that someone standing on the sidewalk swilling down a can of something in a brown bag was most likely drinking beer, and this would do what for the children? Shield them from the harsh reality that x amount of the citizens of their city are drinkers?

Heroin stories maybe just vicious rumors...

So, there was Sid Vicious, up on stage under the bright lights, shirtless and with a bandage wrapped around one of his arms at the elbow. And, maybe the bandage was there to hide a heroin addiction from the impressionable youths in the audience, by hiding the evidence of such. Doing as good a job of it as the black plastic bag in the hand of some guy walking out of the Hustler Store does...

There can be no doubt that Sid really shot up to fame in the late 1970's, though...

States like Texas should make every business send the merchandise they sell out the door in black plastic bags. To allow the citizens to immerse themselves in the wistful illusion that nobody drinks in public nor owns a dildo.

Or, to the cynical; that everybody does. 

But, do it for the children!

Seeing Johnny Rotten reminded me of the Neil Young song, "Hey, Hey, My, My," that makes mention of him, which I appended to the list of "songs that I know, but might have forgotten about" and gave me the idea to Google Neil, and I was soon watching that legend playing the acoustic guitar and harmonica, just like I do, and I was able to see how he had his microphones set up to capture both his vocals and harmonica.

I''m surprised that I hadn't thought of Googling him already, given that I have been trying to solve my microphone problem. It took some serendipity and a circuitous course to get there. Maybe Sid Vicious didn't die in vain (excuse the pun) when he overdosed on heroin, as depicted in the documentary. 

Sid Vicious, and the girl who turned him on.

 To shooting up Heroin.

The story surrounding the incident was salacious enough to be deemed video-worthy, which ultimately led to me gaining some insight into how to set up my microphone; that has to count for something...so, the world is a better place because Sid Vicious lived.

I was amused to hear, in the Neil Young video, a thump or two, in spots where, despite his professional gear, the microphone banged on something when he was jamming really hard on a song; just like mine does, at times.I'll bet most of the audience didn't even notice it, but I did, because the same exact sound is one of the banes of my existence.