this thursday i am going to see Mike Doughty here in syracuse. i’ve seen mike a handful of times, sometimes with friends i drag along, sometimes by myself, and once when i won tickets to see his band soul coughing.

i don’t recall how i won the tickets to see soul coughing play at Syracuse University in 1998. They had just released Circles, I dragged WZ with me to the show, it was so intimate and mesmerizing, it’s the concert by which i compare all others to. honestly i don’t think i’ll ever attend a show that great again.

this is a video from the tour i went to, he’s even playing the green guitar.

it was in the gymnasium, mike doughty (m. doughty at the time) wore black geek glasses, he was a skinny guy (as heroin addicts typically are) that played a few different guitars, but most notably this green guitar. he wore a white tshirt and some shell toed sneakers, he smoked cigarettes the whole show. his glasses slid down his nose and he peered over them while he sang.

another great thing about the show was the sampling that went on. one guy in the band was a sampler.. so he played clips from other songs and even some dialog from the smurfs during the songs.. someone in the crowd had made a sign that read “donna martin graduates”. it was a reference to the online journal/blog that mike doughty used to keep about 90210.

after the show WZ and i had to drive back up to oswego, but we hung around out back for a few minutes and talked (WZ did) some of the band members. they invited us to an after hours on euclid somewhere.. we didn’t go.

the last time i saw them was in MA with KW, JBP and DE. it was the “question jar show” where the audience members put their questions in a jar that was on the stage, and between songs, mike read them and answered them.

i kind of hope there is another question jar at this show…