guero
interscope

lets get the formalities out of the way, im not here to make any friends.

friends is what you get when you go on a date and there isnt a love connection and you try to make something happen and maybe some of it happens and maybe shes really good at head and has a hot tattoo or a tounge ring or a shitload of weed or has the sexiest voice and loves to talk dirty or is super kinky as in whoa or has the cutest barest pussy that you just want to stare at it because from every angle its just fucking perfect as in its an oddity as in you want to take a picture but you cant just tell some new ho damn can i take a picture of that shit

but the sum doesnt equal the whole or something and it doesnt work out even if you try to change or start shaving more or stop buying clothes at target or quit eating taco bell every day. what you have is a failed good thing and now you have a nothing bu you want to keep it on the backburner just incase hell does freeze over so you have a friend.

friends are people who will help you move like no problem. friends are who you give your keys to water the plants to when youre going to aruba. friends are who you buy three dollar liscense plates for while in aruba while baked and drunk and bored so you figure let me find something here that no way in hell they can find here in america, something better than a hard rock cafe aruba visor, something better than a cowboy hat with a bandana tied around it that says aruba in cursive, something less illegal than a nervous iguana stowed away in your baggage.

i have enough friends.

a friend is someone who offers to take you across town on a sunday afternoon to get your directv tivo fixed even though it means that shes gotta drive uptown first to get your busriding black ass.

a friend is someone who makes you salmon steaks as youre doing laundry at their place.

a friend remembers that you really like beck and while shopping for garters with her girlfriend because theyre iswear going to have a girls night garter party buys you the new beck cd.

a friend remembers you after you hooked him up with a great stock deal and cuts you a generous slice after he cashes some of it out.

and heres what else a friend does, a friend calls bullshit on your last few records for being whiny and glum and cheerless and olde. a friend says if i wanted gordon lightfoot i would have dug his ass out of the dirt and got me some gordon lightfood. a friend says this new record of yours is a step in the right direction (“scarecrow”) but not a full step (“rental car”), a half step.

a friend says someones half stepping me and crosses his arms and furrows his brows (“missing”) and whispers bitch and goes back to chewing on his toothpick.

a good friend might even say this sounds like all the leftovers from odelay which wouldnta been bad leftovers if they werent thirteen years old and whereas some things age gracefully some things just stink after theyve turned.

word is the dustbrothers got dug up and their dirty bones were mushed together and their vaults were plundered and beck snuck out of there with some of the junk that hes been looking for (“Que’ Onda Guero”) over all these years and there are some layers in here that are promising. tom waits meets pearl jam (“farewell ride”) and didnt i tell you parts of it stink? but the last few slices were pearl jam meets pearl jam and if i put my name on that id be depressed too.

i barely treat the friends that i have good why should i come here to try to make new ones, my only job if you can call it that is call em like i see em and if im gonna call it not earthshattering not impressive not inspiring not fabulous not roadtrip worthy not better than even the donnas last record then thats what im gonna do

and some people would be all hell man why dont you use your blogger influence to be more positive why you gotta kick a man when hes down and im all shaddup. im all why do you come here if not to have a time out from the blahblahblah bullshit that everyone else seems to love to sing along to?

hey i know the dudes down, i can read!

from “scarecrow”
Walking to the other side / With the devil trying to take my mind
And my soul’s just a silhouette / On the ashes of a cigarette

from “black tambourine”
My baby runs to me / She lives in broken-down buildings
Can’t pay the rent again / These spider webs are my home now
And when the sun is down / We’ll shake and rattle our bodies
To keep it warm at night/ My tambourine is still shaking

because im a friend ive played the guero drinking game where you take a shot every time he mentions bones or death or the devil or dust or being buryied and im still fucking wasted

so i know what sort of shape he must be in and is and what an accomplishment it is to have hit rock bottom, find the scrapbook of past grandeur which is doubling as a treasure map out but to use it you have to put on a silly hat and try not to be embarrassing and dirivitive so good luck

and its nice to see that guero isnt either of those things.

this is a record from a friend to a friend

at christmas

if you were gonna get them three cds and a scarf.

and one day we’ll get a whole cd of this:

from “go it alone”

I’m coming over
See me down at the station
By the lane
With my hands in my pocket
Jingling a wish coin
That I stole from a fountain
That was drownin’

All the cares in the world
When I get older
Climbing up on the back porch fence
Just to see the dogs runnin’
With a ring and a question
And my shivering voice is singing
Through a crack in the window

oak park mastermind + muscle68 + streetcar blog + sk smith deserved better + lindsays ass