The Strange Ones

Gaz Coombes is turning thirty next month. It's funny becauseI've been in love with him since I was fifteen. I remember thinking that seven years really isn't that big of an age difference.

With their new album, Road to Rouen, the band I was a kid with has grown up. Somehow it makes perfect sense-- at this point in both our lives, we've grown to a more complex and mature sound. Granted, I'm now out of college and living on my own far away from the small Oklahoma town in which I grew up and Supergrass are now married with children, it seems like we both deserve that new adult sound.

We all loved their catchy and bright "Sun Hits the Sky," and everyone seems to know "Moving" and "Pumping on Your Stereo" from their popular X-ray album-- but it was when Gaz and Mick sang their first single (1994's "Caught by the Fuzz") that I realized I might have been part of a different crowd. I was so excited to sing "fuzz"-- which Gaz wrote when he was 18 or so-- that I didn't care that there were very few people in the audience under thirty that knew the words. Maybe they did, but it was me at 15 again singing a song about weed that I had never smoked.

---

There's a place where the strange ones go, where nobody here could know... Walking down U street in Northwest Washington late on a Sunday night with a girl I had barely met, I was excited. I was going to see a band I had been following for eight years for the first time. The ice crunched under my feet and I wondered, Would Gaz look the same? What about Danny and Mick? Would Mick wear his glasses? He really doesn't look very good in them...I hope he's not. My date and I joked about how all rockstars are hot-- even the ugly ones-- and if they're British, well, then they become infinitely hotter. Supergrass is a band of three (well, four since 2002 when Gaz's brother Rob joined) unattractive men from Oxford. And damn, if they weren't sexy.

In line to get my hand stamped, the usual 9:30 Club staff is hanging out: The girl with the pale blue eyes and blonde-blonde hair that I can't tell is dyed or not, the huge bald and tatooed man with ear plugs the size of my fist. Yeah, we're here. I show Liv around the club since she's never been: Here's the floor, the stage, the two bars down here, what, you're not 21? I knew that, it's cool, no worries.

We head back towards the entrance and hang a right to get up the stairs. There aren't many people on the balcony, but there aren't many people here in general. We take my usual spot, where the balcony curves from parallel to perpendicular. This is my spot, on stage right. I like seeing. Leaning over the wrought iron railing, I look around and know that I'm totally OK with using a vacation day for this. No Monday at the office for me.

The opener did just that and opened. Pilotdrift-- and they did live up to their name. I couldn't quite grasp their sound- every song sounded like a different band-- Spiritualized, Starsailor, God Speed-- we could pin every song to a band we'd already heard. But they did like the key-tar. So much so that it was passed around to three of the five of them. Their drummer was good. He didn't play the key-tar.

It was getting closer, my Strange Ones on stage. Wait a sec, is that Danny on the balcony with us? Oh my God, it is.

And then it's quiet. My heart's beating faster. Liv and I are people-watching and thanking God that the creepy guy dancing sporadically behind us has left. Grasping the iron railing again, and thankful for the return of my personal space, I look backstage, Where's my Gaz? The lights go down, Liv and I look at eachother, giddy, of course, and turn back to the stage. There he is, standing on a dark stage, his microphone is the only thing lit. He walks up, singing beautifully, "St. Petersburg" from the new album.

Leave town for pity's sake you know
It's time to make a move on
Cos in three days I'll be out of here
And it's not a day too soon
Yeah, three days I'll be out of here
And it's not a day too soon

Gaz is just as I knew he would be- shaggy hair, cut like so many other British rockers; long, long sideburns (his trademark); thick yet sharp eyebrows. He wears a black sport coat and black dress shirt-- blue jeans and white socks-- walking around in his stocking feet; Gaz isn't the tallest of men. Mick comes out with another acoustic guitar- jeans and another dress shirt, too. It looks pink from up here. His round face framed by unkempt black hair. It was "Caught By the Fuzz."

Gaz, Danny, Mick, and Rob play all my favorites and the crowd's favorites, too. A guy my age, maybe a couple years older, leans in with his elbow, a beer in one hand, his cell phone in the other. He gestures with his elbow since both his hands are busy. This guy, telling me how much he loves Supergrass, is on the phone. We've found the concert ass-hole again.

I see kids walking around and talking-- waiting for the song that I know they all love the most. The one everybody knows. And then it hits. By this time, the concert ass-hole is on the floor, close enough to the stage to try to touch Gaz, right next to the red-headed head-banger we didn't quite understand. The sound stalls. I know it's coming, the crowd knows it's coming. Gaz's voice is hovering over the crowd. It's time to dance. "Moving" is much like The Jam's "Town Called Malice"-- You have to dance or clap or move or do something-- in which ever ridiculous way necessary. Danny brings in the drums, his black t-shirt soaked. He looks ready for bed.

Getting home early Monday morning, I couldn't help but think that, you know, we're all right. I'm all right. I don't have to be 22 going on 40. And it's Supergrass that have helped all along the way, for a third of my life and some. It'd be better if we were alright, instead though.


We are young, we run green
Keep our teeth nice and clean
See out friends, see the sights
Feel alright!

We wake up, we go out
Smoke a fag, put it out
See out friends, see the sights
Feel alright!

Are we like you?
I can’t be sure
After seeing as she turns
We are strange in our worlds
But we are young
We get by
Can’t go mad, ’aint got time
Sleep around if we like
But we’re all right

Got some cash, bought some wheels
Took it out, ’cross some fields
Lost control, hit a wall
But we’re alright

Are we like you?
I can’t be sure
On the scene as she turns
We are strange in our worlds

But we are young, we’ve gone green
We’ve got teeth nice and clean
See out friends, see the sights
Feel alright!


It's Monday, July 9, 2007 and this post is getting published for the first time. I was told my writing sucked, and I believed it. No more.