Rancid
Indestructible
Released: August 19, 2003
Produced: Brett Gurewitz
Hellcat Records

Tim Armstrong – vocals, guitar
Lars Frederiksen – vocals, guitar
Matt Freeman – vocals, bass
Brett Reed – drums

1. Indestructible
2. Fall Back Down
3. Red Hot Moon
4. David Courtney
5. Start Now
6. Out of Control
7. Django
8. Arrested in Shanghai
9. Travis Bickle
10. Memphis
11. Spirit of ’87
12. Ghost Band
13. Tropical London
14. Roadblock
15. Born Frustrated
16. Back Up Against the Wall
17. Ivory Coast
18. Stand Your Ground
19. Otherside

I dig this album. Unlike so many other bands in this genre, Rancid can maintain an edge to them, but forget to give their listeners a great chorus. Regardless of your opinion of Rancid, you can’t deny Armstrong’s writing abilities.

Indestructible was the most personal album the band ever recorded, it covered personal issues including Armstrong’s divorce from ex-wife Brody Dalle. The other emotional part of the album was the album’s last track “Otherside”, which Frederiksen wrote and dedicated to his brother Robert who died in 2001.

Fall Back Down and Arrested In Shanghai are my favorite cuts from the album.

If you get the chance to get a copy of this, go get it.

Rating: *** Three out of three stars.

On to the story . . .

Part Two

Believe it or not, in June of 1999, I came back with about five or ten guys and had part of my bachelor party there. And in the middle of the night a LaToya Jackson look-a-like grabbed my head, pulled it to her chest, and beat me with her bosom. She winked and promptly walked away. No neck-brace was needed.

About five years later it closed down. I can’t tell you exactly what the women looked like, besides LaToya, but the events that took place there I’ll never forget.

The truly funniest parts of the night, or were there three or four, were when two of my future wife’s cousins got trashed and decided to have a go at the strippers.

First, cousin number one, a real tall straight-laced looking guy. He goes back to a private room, pays for a lap dance, the stripper offers him a bit more than a dance, but first asks if he’s a cop, he says, “No,” she says, “Prove it, pull your dick out.” He does.

The whole night I stand over to the side with my wife’s brother and her cousins trying to show absolutely no signs of enjoying myself.

Twenty minutes into the night a very pretty half-black, half-white stripper asks my future brother-in-law for his number. I shook my head, doesn’t this only happen in movies. He said he lived with his folks and couldn’t give his number out. She walked over to the bar, got a cocktail napkin and wrote her number down, and said, “Call me tomorrow.” He didn’t.

Now, cousin number two. All night we see him run from the private room to the bar, fiddle with some machine, then back to the private room. I thought he was playing an ongoing game of video poker. I’m curious, so I walk over to check it out, it’s an ATM machine. Turns out that he dug this one particular stripper so much that he emptied his account with lap dances and whatever bonuses she threw at him that he went broke that night.

All things considered it was an entertaining evening; if I had to do it again I’d just kick back with my brother and have a beer.

LAST ONE TO DIE is officially out: Order at: https://www.createspace.com/3669330.