One-Eyed Doll, and an encounter with the law

Austin being billed as the live music capitol of the world, I really should get out and see more actual live music. Last night, Ginny and I went with our friends Azzurra and Jerry to see a band in concert called One-Eyed Doll. Ginny's been a fan of this group for a while now, I have heard them by proxy and liked what I saw.

I don't drink much, so I made myself designated driver by default... however, I started out the evening with a rum and coke, followed by a Heineken, then cut myself off completely (three hours before we would leave).

One-Eyed Doll gave a great performance. There were only two people in the band, a lead singer/guitarist named Kimberly, and a drummer named "Number Three." Kimberly dresses up like a very weird doll, with frilly and stripy clothes, pigtails, some wacky face paint, and enormous boots. Number Three wore a suit and black tie and a porkpie hat. Kimberly likes to leap off stage and crawl around on the floor a lot. She also interrupted the music several times for "story time," which was hilarious.

The music is kind of punk/thrash combined with some very satirical themes in the lyrics. For instance, "Suicidal Serenade" goes:

Happy, happy, happy, happy,
happy, happy, happy, happy,
happy, happy, happy America!
WE THE PEOPLE
FALLING IN MASSES TO OUR GRAVES
DRINK THE POISON
SUICIDAL SERENADE

-- the first part being sung in this cute, innocent little girl voice, while the second part is shouted and played with heavy guitar crunch.

Ginny is working on ingratiating herself with this band, and we spent a while chatting up the two members before they started. They are fun people. We crowded up front to the stage while the preceding band was playing, about 30 minutes before OED started. We got a great view of everything, including her frequent audience dives.

Ginny and Azzurra also got to go up on stage with four other girls and a guy during one song. Kimberly gave them all silly hats (Ginny had a bicycle helmet) and they all moshed around on stage.

By far my favorite part of the concert was when we got to play the finale ourselves. See, as the last song was wrapping up, Kimberly passed her guitar around the audience, where it wound up in Ginny's hands. Ginny did some random picking... which you would think sounded bad, but the amp was crunching the sound anyway, and the drummer had the beat going, so it sounded like passable music. Then I hit a high note to make it sound like an actual song ending. It was pretty cool.

Anyway, after the show the other three in my group all had another drink, and I politely abstained. It was voted that we go get some food, and I got behind the wheel... immediately proceeding to make some incredibly dumb mistakes. Jerry was giving me directions to an unfamiliar location, and I forgot to turn on my headlights for several minutes. Then I got on a street that I assumed was one-way, and in the dark, crossed over the yellow line for a few seconds before correcting my mistake. And, of course, I was being quietly followed by a cop the whole time.

So to make a long story short, I got pulled over for drunk driving. Two cops spent fifty minutes (as timed by Azzurra) trying desperately to prove that I was drunk (rather than merely an idiot) before deciding to let me go. During that time, I was incredibly, ridiculously polite. I mean, I was heroic. I think "Grace Under Pressure" by Rush should be my new official album.

Anyway, they interrogated me to try and catch an inconsistency. They waved lights in my eyes. For a very long time. They made me stand on one foot, and walk a line in a parking lot. They REALLY wanted me to be drunk, but seriously... I wasn't.

So that was my first sobriety test ever. Meanwhile, Ginny was talking to a third cop the whole time. (There were two cars on us!) She said "Look at this guy, you can see he's not drunk! He hardly even drinks at all! And he's a huge nerd!" Well, something to that effect... I have to fill in parts of the conversation with my imagination.

It was nerve wracking and embarrassing, but I came through it unscathed, and we got our food, then ate while hanging out with our friends for another hour or two. Ultimately we got home a little after 5 AM. So if I sound tired today on The Non-Prophets, you know I have a good excuse.