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Welcome to Friday Night Bug Juice, a Metro Detroit bar review site. We're here to give you a look into the dive bars of the Detroit area, so you can hopefully spend your cash wisely, and get a little insight into the lives of a couple of hapless irish louts.

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Welcome to the section of our site where you can learn everything you ever wanted to know and way too much more about the gang that works hard ruining their livers to bring you all you need to know about the dive bars of the Metro Detroit area!

THE HIVES

   Getting amped for a rock and roll show in the middle of the week can be a tough sell.  Especially one that is taking place at Clutch Cargo’s in Pontiac, a good forty-five minute drive from home.
   But that was the task at hand for Anthony and I a couple of weeks ago when The Hives came to town toward the end of their North American tour.
   Complicating matters somewhat was the baggage that each of us brought to the evening.
   For Tony, it was his upcoming vacation.  He and Miss Beth would be leaving to visit good friend and former Michigander Jim T (not sure if he wants his entire name mentioned in this ribald forum).  Mind you, they were leaving five days from the show date, but those who know Tony and Beth understand that this is really not a long time for them to pack all of their gear and sharpen their vacation focus.
   I had informed Tony earlier in the week that I had corralled my son Jackson as his replacement, in case the burden of getting ready for a week of debauchery proved too demanding and he did not wish to go.  In fact, Jack had turned me down flat, citing his hate of all things rock and all things crowd.  I did not let Tony in on that little secret.  If he did not want to attend, I would fly solo.
   The day before the show, Little Brother was still undecided.  I told him in the parking lot at work that I could not wait for what was sure to be a fantastic evening of garage rock, Swedish style.  I punctuated my love of the Hives with a Howlin’ Pelle (lead singer of the Hives) kick.
   The next day, Tony told me he was in.  Obviously, my kick had done the trick.
   My baggage involved a rare headache.  I used to suffer from migraines back in the day but have not had one in years due to the wonder drug Proprananol.  The night of the concert came at the end of a stressful work day (is there any other kind?), coupled with unrelenting heat and humidity.  I was not suffering from one of my debilitating migraines, but definitely felt pressure at the top of my bald dome.
   Much to my surprise, Tony did not have his bag of tricks with him that evening.  A bag that includes a veritable pharmacy, clothes for every occasion and weather situation, and random zit cover up.  We instead stopped at the Sav-On Pharmacy in Birmingham and I purchased a bottle of Sav-On Aspirin.  My Bro was appalled at my choice, calling it rot gut aspirin and making stomach growling sounds to indicate what he felt would be the result of my taking the off brand.  I told him that I would accompany the aspirin with a healthy dose of booze and he seemed satisfied with my plan of attack.
   Pontiac in general, and Clutch Cargos specifically, is a shithole.  
   Though you could shoot a cannon off in largely abandoned downtown Pontiac on a Wednesday evening and not hit a soul, I had a hard time parking my car.  Finally, an old guy with eyebrows wilder than mine motioned me to a spot half in his lot and half on the sidewalk.  I took it.
   Clutch Cargos was smaller than I remembered.  It was dingier than I remembered.  It was more rickety than I remembered.  In short, it was the perfect place to see a rock concert.
   The horseshoe shaped balcony was roped off, not a great sign for The Hives.  The crowd looked to be about five hundred.  A lot of guys, a few alt rock chicks and strangely, a few families with very young children in tow.
   After a pair of forgettable warm up bands ( I really have forgotten their names and see no reason to look it up), The Hives hit the stage looking fantastic.  As any fan of the band knows, these guys always wear a uniform of sorts.  On this tour, in support of the album Lex Hives (lex is latin for law, get it, the Hives are law), the band is sporting top hats and tails.  Like professional wrestlers, these guys understand that image means a lot.
   Also like professional wrestlers, The Hives have unique handles.  The aforementioned Howlin’ Pelle on vocals, Chris Dangerous on drums, Dr. Matt Destruction on bass, Nicholaus Arson on lead and Vigilante Carlstroem on rhythm.
   Final wrestling comparison, I promise.  The Hives give you a lot to look at.  Pelle is the ring leader. Constant motion, kicking, jumping off the stage to mingle with the crowd, standing on the bass drum, telling you how great The Hives are and how lucky you are to see them.  Arson is second in command.  Equal parts spitting and sweating, almost as much time spent in the crowd as on the stage.  The rhythm section does not move as much, but anchor things with an upright ferocity.  Finally, the big man, Vigilante.  I have always maintained that people love a big man (John Candy, Chris Farley, Refrigerator Perry) and they really love a big man who gives it his all.  People love Vigilante.  He sweats, he sings back up with vigor and he leans against the wall when it all gets too much.
   There is a lot of image, a lot to look at with The Hives.
   But it wouldn’t mean shit if they weren’t such a great garage band.
   What you won’t get at a Hives show:  Self indulgent instrumental soloing, acoustic sets with the band sitting on stools, ignoring past hits for the new album.
   What you will get:  Seventeen songs running three to four minutes each, an electric onslaught played with insane vigor, a generous mix of old Hives and new Hives (they open with Come On and toss in Go Right Ahead toward the end, both from the new CD and both certain to remain in their set for years to come).  
   Are these guys great virtuosos?  Probably not.  But sometimes, effort and attitude conquer all.  I saw Jeff Beck in concert back in the day.  No doubt a better guitar technician than Arson.  Yet I pick Arson.  While Beck dripped contempt for the crowd, Arson jumped into the deep end and mixed it up.  The Hives win!
   Tony and I were content to stand stage right for the first quarter of the show, but found ourselves migrating toward the mosh pit center stage as the evening progressed.  After mixing it up there for a bit, Tony marched to the front of the stage and I saw him hanging on to the barrier front row center for the second half of the show.  As a member of the Friday Night Bug Juice press corps, he felt it was his duty to witness the evening within spitting distance of the band (literally).
   When the concert ended, fueled by booze and punk rock, Tony began referring to himself as “The Baby Bull”.  I understand that this continued throughout the night, including some rants aimed at his wife Beth, who was desperately clinging to sleep.
   Tony felt that the show was top three all time.  I can’t go quite that far, but his vantage point was a bit different than mine, which could account for some of the disparity.
   I will say that each work week would be a hell of a lot better if it was interrupted with The Hives in concert.
   Lex Hives!
Cheers!  JIm
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THE GRASS IS ALWAYS TALLER

   We had been talking about it twice a week for a couple of months.
   The grass in the large lot next to the vacant house at the end of our block had grown to three feet in height.  What had once been meticulously manicured now swayed in the breeze, housed rabbits and flourished in the summer heat.
   My son Jackson and I walked past this lot twice weekly, pulling a little wagon filled with News Herald papers.  I watched the growth and complained about the uncertainty of an unkempt empty house and adjoining second lot at the end of the block on which I live.  
   “This looks terrible,” I would complain.  “If the house is vacant, why isn’t there a for sale sign and why doesn’t the realtor make it look better?  Or why doesn’t the city do something about it, like cut the grass?”
   “Why don’t we come down here and cut the grass?”  
   Leave it to a sixteen year old kid to go put up or shut up on his old man.  He had heard me complain for years about people who wait for government to take care of issues that they could take care of themselves.  As example, I had long ago added sweeping up the street in front of our corner house to our yard chores.
   “If Allen Park can’t or won’t take care of the street, we will.”  Sweeping up leaves and debris along our curb and into the street became part of our weekly ritual, like edging or mowing.  In the end, I would always point out to my son the advantages to this extra care.
   “Our little yellow brick house may not be much,” I would say, “but we make the most of it and I am proud to live here.”  Trite, but true.
   Now, the kid had taken my own words and thrown them in my face.  He did this with no malice.  He really wanted to make the street look better and was not daunted by the task at hand.  
   The task at hand would be big.  This was a large extra lot and the height of the grass meant that it would need take more than the conventional lawn mower in my garage could provide.  I had recently purchased a new weed whacker and that would help.  Still, I went to ACO first thing on a toasty Sunday morning and went old school by purchasing a hand held scythe.
   While I was out, my wife woke up the sleeping teen a good three hours before his normal breakfast foraging.  When she told him that I was out getting supplies for the job he had suggested the day before, he got fired up.  By the time I got back from ACO, Jack was dressed, fed (no quick feat), and ready to go.
   We loaded up my car with the necessary gear and a lot of water, drove down to the end of the block and got ready to do battle.  Before the cord on the mower could be pulled, a neighbor directly across the street came over.
   “What are you doing?”
   It seemed obvious to me, so I understood that this was not the literal what are you doing, but the bigger what are you doing.  She seemed at least a little bit irritated by our presence.
   I answered in the literal.  “We are going to cut the grass in the lot.”
   “We called the police yesterday and showed them that this lot needs cutting.  They are going to get it taken care of,” she responded.
   “Judging by how things get done in Allen Park, I don’t think we should wait.  Jack and I are just going to do it.”
   She turned around and headed back across the street to her house.  
   Once she had left, a car pulled to the curb with two of my favorite neighbors inside.  They expressed surprise at our goal and I told them we did not want our neighborhood to look like the neglected ones in Detroit.
   “We both grew up in Detroit,” he answered.  Didn’t know how to reply to that.  “Sorry” didn’t seem right.  My response was to slip on the work gloves and mumble something about getting started.
   No more neighbors.  Time to get to work.  We divided up the lawn in ten yard increments.  I would swing the scythe into the tall grass and make it mower ready and Jack would follow behind with the mower.  This proved to be much harder than imagined and the convicts in the movie Cool Hand Luke came readily to mind.  “Taking it off over here boss,” I yelled into the morning air.  Jack just stared, never having seen the movie.
   By the time I finished the first ten yard swatch, I understood that this was going to be a bear.  I also understood that our intentions had been seen and verbalized and that quitting was not an option.  It is also not in my character to walk away from hard work because it is hard.  This lot would not beat me or,as it turned out, The Kid.
   I was pleased to see that Jackson shared my determination.  After the second swatch was cut, with many more swatches swaying in the breeze, I suggested that my son take a little break.  He bristled at this and fired up the mower.  He would keep busy and match me sweat for sweat.
   Like all good workers, we adapted to the task at hand.  The hand scythe would not work. Each swing met with so much resistance that my shoulder was quickly dying (how did Paul Newman and George Kennedy do it?).  I would use my new weed whacker to get the grass to mower height.  This meant starting high on the grass stalks and working your way down.  It also meant jamming and stalling the whacker about two thousand times.  Sigh!
   My wife Andrea stopped by and was surprised by our progress.  We got a thumbs up at just the right time to keep us motivated.
   It was hard work.  But, three hours after we arrived, we had beaten the overgrown lot.  It was not pretty.  The grass did not have a fairway appearance and some grass clumps littered the lot.  But the ugliness and neglect of the lot was gone.  The house might remain vacant, but there was no reason to stare it it and wonder if it portended something worse, a neighborhood eroding.
   I felt great and so did Jack.  I was proud of my son. It was his idea and he had responded big time.  He worked his ass off, matched his old man and made our block a better place to live.
   Two interesting results of this grass cutting:
 1. Jack and I noticed that the lot looked even better a week or so later, like someone had tweaked our efforts by recutting.  We found out that this was exactly what had happened, as a neighbor living in the middle of our block had wheeled his mower to the end of the block and made the vacant house look even better.  It remains tended to this day.  I understand that the recent extreme heat is a factor, but I like to think it is the efforts of people that keep it so.
 2. Everyone has an opinion on this, and have no problem sharing it.  Some think it was a good thing, some think it was misguided and not needed, some think we did it only to be looked at and congratulated.      
    Well?
Cheers!  Jim
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