Blue Meanies

A dark ska band that kicks it live.

I saw them on the Ska Against Racism tour. They had a song about smoking that got everyone involved. I'm pretty sure the lyrics we were screaming were "Pave, pave the world"; everybody in the place lit up and chanted like a tightly packed mass of monks.

The blue meanies are the bad guys in the 1968 cartoon the Yellow Submarine. The meanies have declared war on all that is good, especially music. So they attacked Pepperland and made it blueish.

During their attack, the meanies used a weapon called glove which flies after and crushes anyone or anything that is not blueish. They also like to bonk people on the heads with giant green apples and turn them into stone.

The meanies leader is a female (I am not sure of her name). During the meanies takeover of Pepperland, she cries out, "A thing of beauty...destroy it forever!" She is not a very nice meanie. Her sidekick is Max, he's the plucky comic relief, "Max, Max. It's no longer a blue world, Max. Where shall we go?"

Max replies, "Argentina!"

8:00 PM, December 6, 2000, in a small Los Angeles bar:

The lights go down, or rather they don't, because they've been that way all night. Seven middle-aged but vibrant musicians take the cramped, cluttered stage. The whole vibe reminds me of the Foxfire.

The opening strains of Chemicals fill the air. A cigarette dangles from Billy's lips. His voice, their demeanor... Seems so aloof, but there's... something.

Electricity. TENSION.

It's like some musical incarnation of beat poetry. I'm hooked. I find my head bobbing, foot tapping. Silent, reserved recognition of the art happening a few bare feet before my eyes.

"Pave pave pave the world, pave pave the world."

The final, bizarre notes of Mamma Getting High on Chardonnay echo in my brain. I applaud. I smile.

"What a show," I think to myself. This is what music is all about.