Band Practice

Some blank verse about my days as a metalhead.

We’d form an oval in the corner of

that diesel-dank garage, the five of us,

and melt each other’s faces off with such

distortions as could make Van Halen cry.



Van Halen is for wimps. The metal bands

we sought to emulate went by more fearsome

names: Meshuggah. Darkest Hour. This

Or The Apocalypse. I played a sleek

black seven-string guitar, tuned down to drop

G#, but seldom touched strings one through four.

Our drummer had a double bass drum pedal,

for pounding out belabored breakdown grooves

of indeterminate time signature(s).

We found no virtue in simplicity.



For his part, “Gutz” would yell into the mic

while leaping like an ape around the room,

producing from his camo cargo shorts,

at intervals, a gleaming bowie knife

as the other guys stood banging heads beside

enormous amplifiers, pausing mid-

song to dial in some reverb knob

or take a bite from a granola bar.



Our music wanted for finesse, it’s true.

We broke more rules than those we meant to break.

Our parents, being parents, thought it all

a diabolical embarrassment

and waste of brains. I guess they had a point.

But brains are overrated. We had a band.