Dying Batteries is: Eric Broers: synths, echo pedal Miqual Corley: guitar, synth, pedals, mixing
Recorded late winter 2004 @ Cigarettes on the Treadmill Studio - Chicago, IL
"For my birthday I got a humidifier and a de-humidifier... I put them in the same room and let them fight it out." -Steven Wright
The Kmart Debutante straight gafflin people's drinks at a young age. Future Bukowski-like aspirations should not have come as a surprise.
April 15, 1783 - The Bottle Opener was invented
The day of my birth is shared with the day the device to open beer bottles was invented. Not only were teeth saved, but future generations of hipsters were inspired to proclaim their love of the brew by proudly displaying bottle openers on their wallet chains and key clips. But then again, I myself didn't need one. I drank whiskey. And thought listening to Palace Brothers records made me an urban fucking cowboy.
April 15, 1973 - I'm born. Hinsdale Hospital, IL
The Pittsburgh Pirates win. The Chicago Bulls lose. the_immaculatedeception is born. The Walt Disney Store opens. I guess that makes me 2/4 right from the start.
April 15, 1975 - The San Diego Chicken makes his first appearance at a Padres baseball game.
The San Diego Chicken character was originally created by Brian Narelle as a character for an animated TV commercial for KGB-FM radio in San Diego. Brian Narelle also stared in the 1974 cult classic science fiction film Dark Star, the film that inspired the name of the band Pinback, and samples of the film are featured on their first album "This is a Pinback CD". The actual character in the suit that went on to be famous was played by Ted Giannoulas, who after a dispute with the network and suing for the rights to continue appearing in the costume, relaunched the character in what many called the greatest sports promotion in history, The Great Hatching. Giannoulas as The Chicken later went on to not only star in one of my favorite childhood TV shows, The Baseball Bunch, but he also made a cameo in one of my favorite pre-teen movies too, Attack of the Killer Tomatoes.
April 15, 1994 - 21st Birthday - Spitboy show -
Milwaukee, Wisconsin
For my 21st birthday, I drove up from Chicago with a handful of fellow young, emotive punk rockers to see Spitboy play a show in Milwaukee, WI. During their set, there was a moment where Todd the drummer tells a story that describes a very personal incident in her life, and some drunk punk kid yelled out some super offensive bullshit while she was talking. The crowd self-policed the incident and threw the kid down a long staircase and out of the show. Turned out the kid actually used to be in Old Skull, the pre-teen punk band, and was now all fucked up. Afterward in typical mid-90's hardcore fashion, we all sat around in circles drinking coffee and discussing the incident. Ended up staying at the same house with Spitboy that night and the next morning there was a fat community breakfast thrown down. Sure did beat the alternative 21st bash many of my peers which was getting drunk in an Irish themed suburban bar listening to "Whoop There it Is" followed by getting in a fight in a Taco Bell parking lot. (Video from a show put on by theCabbage Collective in Philadelphia, PA in 1993". In your Face" was one of my favorite Spitboy songs.)
April 15, 2002 - 29th Birthday Recording Session: Michael Corley is....10 High - "You are not Mine / Canadian Clubbed in the Head"
Recorded in the early morning by Bort (Martin Schneider) in the kitchen of our Palmer Square apartment in Chicago. A few candles.. a microphone..a guitar.. some bottles.. a hangover..red painted kitchen walls... candle-wax repaired bong.... Songs about her.
Canadian Clubbed in the Head by Miqual Corley - 2002 matchbook / typewriter text / burnt paper / pencil on chipboard
April 15, 2003 - 30th Birthday - Rush Presbyterian St. Luke's Hospital Psych Ward - Chicago, IL
In July of 1992, Maximum RocknRoll #110 was released entitled "Punks Over 30 And Still Giving a Shit". I remember thinking how old that seemed to me at the time. When it came to be my turn at that game, I spent my 30th birthday in a mental hospital eating store bought cake with my family in the lunchroom area during visiting hours, followed by playing over-medicated Scrabble before bed with a few of the other patients. I never thought I'd live past 28 anyway so fuck it. Makes for a good story now. Post-rehab times were wicked. Really would have been much cooler if the Cramps had played my mental institution like they did the Napa State Mental Hospital on June 13, 1978.
April 15, 2011 - Squaw Valley U$A Ski Area, California
Ditched work and hopped on the proletariat ski-punk vehicle of choice, the Bay Area Ski Bus, for a dual birthday Spring ski session with Turx at the homebase of the UnofficialSquaw.com bastards. Wet snow/rain/mist on most of the mountain made for super rippable fun. Just the kind of day the Moment Belafonte's were made to destroy. Silverado was a ghost town and it's own little micro-climate, and we spent the day skiing repeated laps in what has forever been dubbed the "Birthday Chute". Ranks up there even with the deepest pow days as one of the best ever. As well as tops for birthdays.
Tebowing for Christ in the morning...Pagan eggin' in the afternoon.. and a god damn American sugar indulgence all the time...join me as the_immaculatedeception celebrates Eostre.
Ivan DeJesus played for several teams in the Majors from 1974-1988. He is best known not only for his deft play at Shortstop, but for also as being a part of the 1982 trade that brought Ryne Sandberg and Larry Boa to the Cubs, forever cursing my childhood to the sounds of Harry Caray's Budweiser-riddled attempts to slur out the word "Ryno". I have fond memories of purposely mis-pronouncing his name, and in looking back now, these moments may have been the initial beginnings of the sarcastic wordplay and unrelenting attacks towards the JC that I've spun into the_immaculatedeceptionconcept I now creatively wank-off under.
Teenage Jesus & The Jerks - S/T(1979)
The Post-WWII policies that created the Christian White Suburban Utopias and the safe clean culture within them at the expense of American cities and their residents, can be directly tied to creating the environment that led Hip Hop music and the cultural explosion that's come from it. But they can also be tied to Punk, No Wave, and all the other amazing progressive art, music, and film that came out of New York in the late 70's to early 80's, due to the burn-out, cheap landscape that made work almost unnecessary, and allowed people like Lydia Lunch and James Chance to immerse themselves into a minimalist, creativity-driven lifestyle that has become the template for generation after generation of artsy,fartsy white youth that have come since then. Thank you Christian Socialism and Racism! And you know for damn sure the CIA wasn't supporting Fab Five Freddy like they were Jackson Pollock. Plus all those 70's crime and action movies wouldn't have looked so damn cool if New York wasn't such a dark, dingy, burnt out shit hole at the time.
My parent's were not one's to motivate with incentives, but instead taught me the value of doing a good job for the sake of doing it. That being said, the one time I do remember them dangling the carrot in front of me to get me to do what they wanted was by the use of M & M's to potty train me and entice me to step up to the big-boy way of doing my business.
Jesus Lizard - Puss (1993)
"Give me something to stop the bleeding!!" Recorded by Steve Albini and released as split-single with Nirvana featuring their song "Oh, the Guilt!". Albini and Nirvana would later go onto have the beautiful bro-mance that became knows as the In Utero sessions. "R.E.M. with a fuzz box" is what Mr. Albooby was quoted as calling them, and then took the gig and the money. But enough about Nirvana. At a Jesus Lizard show in Chicago once, I saw a man who was a dead ringer forMichael McKean of Spinal Tap fame smoke 3 joints in a row and then stand catatonic in one spot the whole show as the Lizard pit swirled around him. A crowd surfer who fell onto the stage ended up face-first in Yow's ass crack as Yow grabbed him and jumped into the crowd with him in a 69-position too. JESUS CHRIST!
As a small child, we had a neighbor who watched me from time to time who had a habit of tossing around the famous shout to JC whenever something would go wrong. When my mother went into the hospital to give birth to my brother, my Dad took me to McDonald's for a bit to go play in the kid's play area they had. While we were there I slipped and fell off the rung of a ladder, and in repeating what I had learned from our neighbor, I let rip in my loudest 2 1/2 year voice a "JESUS CHRIST!!" that had all the mothers in the play area glaring at my father with a look saying he was going to hell. I disagree with them though, as the man is a Saint to keep cheering for the Pittsburgh Pirates the way he does despite year after year of misery.
Eggman Scene from Pink Flamingo's(1972)
Edith Massey in a bra in a playpen in an egg frenzy, indecent exposure with Kielbasa sausages, a contortionist making his asshole pucker to "Bird is the Word, and Devine eating dog-shit. It must be said again.... JESUS CHRIST!
