Every Saturday, we’ll be posting a new illustration by David Lester. The Mecca Normal guitarist is visually documenting people, places and events from his band’s 29-year run, with text by vocalist Jean Smith.
“What is souse?”
“The feet,” he says, watching my face. “And the ears.” He gently pulls on his ears, both ears. I shake my head.
“And the chicken souse. You already know what souse is,” he says, and I’m thinking, chickens don’t have fucking ears.
I shake my head. “Don’t do it to me, man,” I say.
He sort of chuckles. Maybe it was just a smile, but something softened.
“I’ll come back later,” I say and walk outside where another guy, also older, is tending whatever is on the BBQ unit.
“Smells good,” I tell him as I walk past.
“Tastes even better,” he says, closing the lid and a thought drifts through my mind, a feeling that I was just refused service in a not exactly deliberate way, but one that I recognize from interacting with the general public, when someone inappropriate wanders in and you’re just not up for it; it’s easier not to proceed. It just goes that way. Slow and wary responses, hoping they’ll just go away if you let them know they aren’t going to get what they want. You know it, but they don’t know it yet and you don’t really want to step out of how you perform your job, so you let them know some other way. And they get it.
Like Roky says, “You don’t love me yet.”
Maybe I’ll go back up there and try again today.
Later, at the studio, Gavin Perry of Holly Hunt said, “They probably thought you were from the health department.”
“Trapped Inside Your Heart,” from Sitting On Snaps (Matador, 1995; Smarten UP!, 2009) (download):
