How Do You Spell Fiasco?

Because I spell it E-M-E-R-G-E-N-Z-A. Funny, because that's also how I spell torture and waste-o-time. Battles of the bands are always bull$#!+, but when you have to pay to actually compete, it makes it even worse...especially when you purchase tickets out of your own pocket for anyone who wants them and you can't even give them away. Seriously? Are we that terrible? We can't even score more votes than the band before us that was completely out of tune? Or the band who's every song sounded the same (oh wait, that was all of them...)? See, these so-called battles of the bands are never about who's a better band. They're about who brings more people to the show and that's it. If a panel of judges were to have sat back and objectively criticized the bands, I have no doubt that we would have moved on. Not to sound arrogant, but we were really tight tonight. We sounded better than I think we ever have (which is really amazing to me...), but only garnered a meager 14 votes from the crowd who didn't know us from Adam. Bloody Thorn, however, blew us out of the water with their legions of devoted metal heads. So that's the lesson to take away from here - it's not about skill, creativity, or originality, kids. It's all about numbers...and that's something Almost Eliot simply doesn't have.

Honestly, I was against competing in Emergenza from day one. I turned them down last year and I'm not quite sure what possessed me to get on board this year. Well, I wasn't certain until later this evening anyway. God has a real funny way of working things out. We were getting ready to go on when I hear someone calling out my name. I think to myself, "that's odd...did someone I know actually come to see us...?" Turns out, no, they did not come to see us exactly, but someone I knew was there. An old acquaintance from WAY back in the day. I look up to see Paul (can't remember his last name for the life of me...Curtis Elam's step-brother). Of all the people to meet at all the places in this very small world! I expressed my surprise and delight to learn that he'd been living out here in LA for the past 2 years (just like yours truly). Maybe this Emergenza fiasco was God's way of aligning the stars so that the paths of Paul and I would cross once more. I don't have any other explanation why I would have agreed to pay to play (something I'm adamantly against) a battle of the bands (something I hate). Of course, Almost Eliot didn't advance (and the band Paul had come to see did). The good Lord can't let too many good things happen in a day, right?

I'm actually glad we didn't advance. I wanted to put this whole Emergenza thing behind us from day one, so blah, I wash my filthy hands of the mess. Now all we need to do is get ready for the Guitar Center Battle of the Bands on October 21st...and guess who lives not but a few miles from the club this show will be taking place at? Yep. Paul. How strangely coincidental. Maybe we'll win this time. If not, whatever. I'm just glad to have been put in the right place at the right time to maybe have the right kind of influence on a life that desperately needs it. All I've ever wanted is to be used by God. So I'm grateful for the chance, even if it's not in quite the way I thought it would be.