WHAT FOLLOWS IS A WORK OF FICTION (DAMMIT)
[this is a reprint of memo 187_03.31.04]
Obtund Mess: (1968-1972) Formed spontaneously on an acid trip gone somewhat awry in early 1968, the band became quickly famous for their impenetrably loopy psychedelic music.
On February 29, 1968, in Normal, Illinois, Bob Navigablly, Earl Fundy, Arin Zaddick and Saul Vent all bought LSD from the same dealer, a man known only as Stoned Bums. The four men did not know each other at the time, and although the story is apocryphal, it is believed that at exactly 4:22 p.m., all four men ingested five hits of acid each, and that at exactly 9:37 p.m., they all found themselves at the intersection of Locust and Fell: Navigablly at the northwest corner, Fundy at the northeast, Zaddick at the southeast, and Vent at the southwest. According to the story, they all looked at each other and simultaneously said, “Do you hear that music, man?”
And so the band was formed. It took them most of their brief career to come up with a name for themselves (they went through Bunted Moss, Mounts Debs, Dumbo’s Nets, Dumb Stones, Numbest Sod, Best Mounds, and Modest Snub before, in December of 1971, deciding upon Obtund Mess), but what was clear from the moment of the band’s inception was how they would sound-with Navigablly singing lead and playing guitar, Fundy on another guitar, Zaddick on bass, and Vent on drums, they each attempted to play the music they were hearing on the night they met. The music was, of course, different for every member.
Success quickly followed, and after playing three or four abortive shows at local college bars, the band was signed to a major label (who, for legal reasons, has asked to remain unnamed in this book). They recorded their first album in about five hours, and called it A Gnome Catches 5.14. Several more albums followed in rapid succession, the most famous of which was 1970′s Nott a Geotechnic Nth Unit, which featured the hit single, “Harvesting Mimsy Powns,” a song which was described by at least one critic (who has also requested to remain unnamed) as “very likely the last song played by the dance band on the Titanic.”
Sometime in late 1971, each band member (under the supposed influence of his favorite groupie) began insisting that the music he heard in his head was the one true music the band should play. Fights broke out and were duly recorded (see the 1985 release: Crzyshaxarcsh!). Death threats were typed up and never mailed. Stoned Bums was called in to negotiate, but to no avail. Things went downhill just as quickly as they had gone up, and on February 29, 1972, the four members of Obtund Mess returned to the intersection of Locust and Fell in Normal, Illinois, went to their respective corners, each dropped five hits of Stoned Bums’ acid, and forgot the whole thing had
ever happened.
vs.
[this is not]
Hair today, gone tomorrow. In the spirit of the occasion, which shall remain unnamed, we hereby proclaim, this fleeting moment—no, this fleeting moment—to be National Cosmetologists’ Attention Span Moment! Shampoo gets in your ears and makes it difficult. Ads in trade weeklies pull at you and pull at you and pull at you.
More later, once we’ve figured out how to work this. Or perhaps you’d like to show us, provide us with a little explanation, organize a symposium? Less action and more talk—that’s our motto. Undetectable particles float into the ear canal and lodge themselves against the drum. Digital reverberations are not enough to dislodge them or deter them from their course, of course. Effects on the side may or may not include the following: the feeling of having shampoo in one’s ear; the sensation that this fleeting moment—no, this fleeting moment—is the fleeting moment you were waiting for that one time, but which never quite came; a twitching of the sensationless skin over the elbow; a desire to matriculate-sorry, make that micturate-sorry, no, matriculate was correct; loathsomeness. Of course, of course, of course we do! Which one do you mean? There are several, naturally-naturally, of course there are. Are you aware that if you buy 17 now, you can get a really quite amazing six to ten percent discount on your eighteenth through thirty-seventh purchases? More are being added even as we speak. Every single one of them is equipped with the most modern of the modern modernities and amenities—including, but not limited to the modern amenities you’ve come to expect from products of this caliber. Day-to-day operations are handled by a crack team of hair experts who know their jobs from root to split end, why do you ask?
