Social Distortion singing "Prison Bound" about five years ago. Brent Harding, the bass player and band member I gave my drawing to, is on the far left. There's a close-up of him at 1:23.
In my ten years of being more-or-less trapped in central North Carolina, Social Distortion, and most of the bands I'd like to see live, never came close to where I was. I realized one of the things I missed most about Southern California was the incredible amount of live music available to see there.
About a week and a half ago, walking down super trendy Cary Street here in Richmond, I saw a Social Distortion poster in a window. My favorite band for about 30 years was coming here, and I was broke, homeless, and struggling to re-establish myself and get the Sharpie art making money in a new city. Bad luck due to bad timing.
I had started a drawing of Mike Ness/Social Distortion for myself many months ago, and it was in the back of my big sketch pad that I carry everywhere these days. I took the opportunity to finish the drawing. But I couldn't find the original photo I worked from online, and I couldn't get the tattoos on Mike's arms, or his right hand, to look just right. I improvised, and to be honest, I wasn't totally happy with how the drawing ended up. But I loved the background to it, it's the favorite of the 70-80 drawings I've done over the last couple of years. I thought I could give the drawing to the band, but that sounded cheesy for a 52-year-old guy to do. Here's the finished drawing.
So I decided to take the drawing down to the National Theater before the show and see if I could find a hardcore Social Distortion fan who wanted to buy it. Then I could get a room and a decent, non-McDonald's meal, take a long ass hot shower, and chill for a day and get a decent night's sleep. I know that selling a drawing of a band in front of the show is lame. But living on the streets is more lame. So I posted myself in front of the small, early crowd, right in front of the box office, and held the drawing up. I didn't say a word, just waited for someone to comment on it.
What blew me away was that not a single person did. I could see a couple of crew people eyeing it from a distance. Eventually, a man came out from the venue, and said I needed to leave the "line of site," I couldn't be selling knockoff band posters in front of the venue. Fair enough. I told him it was an original drawing, which he didn't realize.
So I walked around the corner, past the tour buses and band equipment truck, down to the next corner by the parking garage. There was a bus bench there, so I sat down, wondering what to do. I could try to find a buyer coming out of the parking garage, but I generally sell my drawings for $120 to $160, which is a lot, but not when you know they take 30-40+ hours each to draw. No one would have that much cash on them, and I can't do Paypal or VenMo at the moment. Hmmmmm.
As I was pondering what to do, a guy walked around the corner closest to me. I instantly recognized him as the bass player of Social Distortion, though I didn't know his name. I held up the drawing as he walked towards me and asked, "Could you give this to Mike (Ness)?" He was cool, and replied, "I can put it on the bus." Perfect. It was totally random, so I figured giving the drawing to the band was meant to be. I realized I never signed the back, like I normally do, because I originally planned to keep it for myself. I turned around, wrote my name, signed, and dated it, and handed it to him.
I told him I didn't now his name, he said, "Brent," and we shook hands. He was totally cool. As he walked towards the tour bus, another guy talked to him for a minute, a guy who I think knew I'd been trying to sell the drawing out front. Brent told him I gave him the drawing. The guy walked over and offered me a ticket to the show. That hadn't even occurred to me. Seriously, it didn't. I told him I totally wanted to go, but I pointed to the bags I carry everywhere and my sketch pad, "I don't know where to put my stuff. He didn't either. So I thanked him for the offer, and he walked off. I'm homeless, and everything I own is in those bags, my "office" (laptop), and my "art studio," my sketch pad and box of Sharpies and art supplies. I can't lose that stuff.
I didn't know what else to do, so I pulled my journal notebook out of my pack, and wrote about what just happened. I first saw Social Distortion at Scream in L.A., in 1988, when BMX freestyle friend, and punk rock walking encyclopedia, Mike Sarrail, took me to the show. He was trying to introduce me to the alternative/punk music world. When I heard Social Distortion play Johnny Cash's "Ring of Fire," I thought "Hell yeah, I dig these guys." I grew up with my mom playing 70's country on the radio, all day, every day, and Johnny Cash was always a favorite of mine. I've been a fan of Social Distortion ever since. But I never met any of them. Until last night.
So I didn't make it into the show, but I met Brent the bass player, and gave them a drawing of mine. I may have pissed off my favorite band by trying to sell the drawing out front, or maybe they'll actually dig it. Who knows. Anyhow, it was a cool night either way.
As I put my notebook back into my pack, I realized I had a couple of the small Johnny Cash drawing prints I did. So I left one on the ground, outside the tour bus, with a note on the back thanking the band for their music helping me through a lot of tough times in 30 years. I don't know if they found it.
OK, back to the BMX blog about my 1990 video, The Ultimate Weekend, tonight or tomorrow. Now, play some Social Distortion on your computer and get back to pretending like you're working readers.
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