LOOK AT LIFE / COCO HAMES

Kings Of Pain: Running afoul of der Golem and der Kings of Leon's psycho handlers, with your friendly, neighborhood Ettes. Whose frontwoman, of course, is actually... SATAN!

By Coco Hames

I have never had much luck with authority figures.  Anyone can tell you.  Whether it's my first grade teacher or the man checking my passport at the Swiss border: they just don't like my face.  I'm aware of it going in, and I try to compose myself, but it's very frustrating, and sometimes I blow my stack.  Once, at an airport in Berlin, the ticket agent didn't like my face.  He looked at our previously-approved gear and said, casually, just because he felt like it, "That will be 300 Euros."  It was really early in the morning and I was hungover, which works to my advantage sometimes, because I'm too tired and nauseous to fight.  But it didn't cost 300 Euros and anyway, I didn't have 300 Euros.  And I informed him of as much.  Well, one thing led to another, which led to me kneeling on the concrete floor, tearing apart all of our luggage, screaming about fascism as police officers closed in on me.

 
The point is, I have a real, visceral problem with people who abuse their authority.  I understand the need for order, I sympathize with the necessity of certain social constructs, I respect the people who help maintain the structure of our seemingly functional matrix, I wave at crossing guards, I do.  What I cannot accept is the wicked impulse that invariably takes hold of a person in a position of authority.  Whether it is a temporary glitch, corrected as soon as the person realizes their folly (like Boromir handing it over in Lord of the Rings) or a cognizant, ongoing, coked out desire to gain and abuse power... either way, it's bad news. 

And I'm not sure which form took hold of the manager of the Kings of Leon while the Ettes were on tour with the band earlier this year in Copenhagen, but it Really.  Was.  Something.

 
Backstage at our first show together, everyone was very nice and spirits were high: the King boys had just won a Grammy, and were soon to attend the Brit Awards, for which they all (correctly) had great expectations.  Everyone was in a good mood, everyone was nice.  I'd noticed the red plastic football helmet fastened to the drummer's kit and asked, "Who's the Sooner?"  They said they all were.  Gulp, right?  (I'm a Gator, the Florida Gators beat the Oklahoma Sooners last year in the National Championship, and the band had even attended the game, owitch!)  But no, everyone was friendly and we got off to a great start.  The show was sold out and we had a blast, and afterward, the boys invited us out for drinks.

 
This was all very pleasant; it was really fun to be at a posh hotel bar in Denmark chatting about pleasant things like where we go to drink in Nashville, where we all live.  The juxtaposition of a 6,000 capacity sold out show and chit-chat about local traffic amuses me to no end, truly.  It's what I love most about what I do, the absurdity, I just love the absurd.  Roald Dahl, Hunter S. Thompson, Dali, politics, names of crayon colors, you name it.

 
Now, either we got too close too fast and their manager didn't like it, or they actually did think we stole that bottle of champagne, but something happened.  Everything was fine, everyone was drinking and talking and having a nice time.  Caleb asked if I wanted any champagne, since the label had sent over four bottles in congratulations to the four boys for their Grammy.  I demurred, since I actually don't care for champagne, but he left the bottle all the same.

 
Presently, the boys departed, and by the time we were heading out of the bar, a British friend asked about the bottle.  Oh, I said.  That was theirs, from the label.  I waved my hand dismissively, as if to say, take it if you want.  Poni went to the restroom, I stepped outside with a couple friends to get them a taxi, and as I was headed back to the bar, I saw Poni in full run with fury on her face.  I looked to where she was going, and there were Jem, our British friend, and a couple of guys I didn't know, in full brawl.  One of the strangers threw my British friend up against the wall.  Not okay.

 
I remember yelling, "Whoa, whoa, whoa!" as I ran into the melee, prising bodies apart alongside Poni.  The strangers were yelling, howling, at Jem, "You know what you did!  Now you're going to get a kicking!"  Jem looked bewildered, and Poni and I were foaming mad; as Poe says, no one insults me [or my band] with impunity.  I can imagine, it must be really annoying to have two tiny girls fly up into your face, spitting and cursing, and this is in public, mind you, so I'm sure we weren't afraid of much.  These guys looked at us imperious, slackjawed, like they could not believe we had the audacity to yell what we were yelling (which was remarkably colorful, to say the very least).  One of them sneered derisively, "First night of tour, good job."  Poni tossed them a final comment (she can be so inspired sometimes) and we gathered our friends and left the bar.

 
Once outside, we got the lowdown:  Our British friend had taken the forsaken bottle of champagne and was walking out with it, when two guys blew raging into his face.  Our friend said, oh, I didn't think it was a big deal, and put the bottle down.  But these men said, no, he'd already taken it, the damage was already done.  Our friend, being British (and did I mention, a rocker?) said with charm, "Okay, fuck off then."  And I believe that began the rustle Poni and I fell upon a few minutes later.

 
"Who the hell were they, though?  What did they care?" I asked, totally hassled.  We were standing outside the hotel, smoking and waiting for a taxi.  Jem said, "They said they were the Kings of Leon's management."  I widened my eyes and laughed, "Yeah, right!  What a bunch of psychos, no manager would behave like that, you'd get arrested with shit like that in the States, what a bunch of lying weirdos, God!"  This incredulous laughter and bashing of the pugalistic lunatics we'd left upstairs continued until our taxi arrived and took us to our hotel.

 
The next day in the van, we had chalked it up as just another night and forgotten about it, when we got a phone call from our booking agent.  He asked to speak to me.  I said, oh hello!  He said, "What is this about a bottle of champagne?"  My jaw dropped.  I started laughing, and asked "Why?"  Our booker then proceeded to read me an e-mail the Kings of Leon's manager and tour manager had written to him, evidently just after the incident, which had occurred around 4am.  The post-incident ranting (chock full of insults and interesting theories) against the dubious character of these strange men?  Oh, that took place conveniently right under their hotel room window.  Sound travels so clearly in the cold Copenhagen night air... Certainly I won't make any criminal accusations, but gosh, I wish I was able to stay up all night after an international flight and a very busy concert, you know, starting fistfights, spying on people and furiously typing scathing (and untrue) tattletales, you know, without having employed any egomaniacally rage-inducing powdery chemical enhancement...

(pictured above: Kings of Leon w/tour crew and management, circa 2009)

 
So.  We were in big trouble.  It is indeed a marvel that we weren't kicked off the tour right then and there, I suppose.  It seems someone stood up for us, though I still don't know the magnanimous who.  But as the wheel turns, neither were these men to be insulted with impunity, and it was time to take our medicine. 

 
They took away our rider.  They took away our guest list.  They took away our sound check.  No one was allowed to speak to us, and no one did.  Gone was the cajoling, open and energetic atmosphere of the first night, replaced by drone-solemn performance of duties and many tightly closed doors.  It was of course a bit embarrassing, and a bit of a hassle, but what could we do?  We stood by what we did, and we'd do it again.  All Poni and I saw were guys going after our friend and bass player.  Any such action would spur us to the same equal and opposite reaction, anytime, anywhere, no matter who you think you are, or who you work for.

 
If they didn't know then, they know now, that we are a punk band; as used to smuggling booze as a bootlegger; as accustomed to solitude as monks; as comfortable as, well, a punk band, to not having sound check.  Infuriatingly to the management, of course, their punishments made no impact.  And it was of course only our pleasure to display it.  We played by all the rules, kicked ass at every show, and got the crowds crazy amped.  The management avoided us like the plague, and we saw neither hide nor hair of them for most of the tour.  Our punishment was finally lifted in Paris, where it was clearly in the air what had happened, but everyone was kind of over it.  We played ping pong with the boys (don't let Jem's long pants fool you, bit of trivia: he went to the Junior Olympics for table tennis) and talked about Michael Pollan, dismemberment, the Beatles.  We walked into the tour manager's office and he so generously welcomed us: "Hello, sober people!" and we hugged and laughed.  Oh you silly, we are never sober...

  
Thus far, nothing has been mentioned of this incident, and I've wondered whether I should put it out there.  Should it just go undocumented?  Should I just keep quiet and resume lurking in the shadows, pretending it didn't happen?  Should I keep my head down, yes sir, no sir, what do I do, sir, where do I go sir, what do I say?  It would be par for the course with my polite southern upbringing, not wanting to cause a fuss.  It is expected that I would keep quiet. 

Because, you know, the greatest trick I ever pulled was convincing the world I didn't exist.

***

Blurt "co-co-editor" Coco Hames fronts The Ettes - Hames on guitar, Jem Cohen on bass and Poni Silver on drums - whose album Look At Life Again Soon and EP, Danger Is, were released by Take Root. Their new Greg Cartwright-produced album Do You Want Power hits stores Sept. 29, and you bet we're gonna have a big feature on the band in our next issue. Check out the band's MySpace page for music and tour dates.