Catfish Courtesy

That, my friends, there in the center is Nick Empey as I first met him.  A long haired, bracelet wearing, strolling in Vans the size of your head, rock-star.  That was a previously unimpressive mix to me.  But, if you’ve met Nick, you know he’s charming.  And he charmed his lopsided punk grin right into my heart.  Out went my notions of the typical clean cut, white shirt & cargo short wearing, ever ready to go hiking colorado boys of my high school days and in came a romantic and creative crooner.

But this isn’t a sappy blog post about Nick.  This is to tell you about the genius of one of his old band mates, Tom Kenning.   Tom recently put together a fantastically well done Oral Documentary of Nick’s high school punk band, Catfish Courtesy.

I’m telling you, it is worth the half-hour of your life, and I don’t just think I’m saying that because Nick wooed me. 

Let me be real up-front and honest about my views on Catfish Courtesy’s body of works.  It goes like this:  Nick and I are still dating at this point and we’re driving from Muncie to Valparaiso, Indiana -- it’s a three hour drive that feels like four.  I’m driving the old Colorado Sunset Purple Neon and Nick is happily working his way through all his old punk rock CDs, carefully placing them in and taking them out of the CD player.  He takes out The Get Up Kids and slides in a CD that, unlike the others, he does not announce who is playing. And I hear: …  Noise.  Mindless Chanting….   That’s what it is, (and that is what Tom calls it in his documentary). 

“What is this?”  I say half laughing and he half laughingly responds “one of my old high school bands.”  Yes. More and more clear that Nick and I wouldn’t have worked out in high-school.  I hate to say it, but I may have made fun of Nick if I had known him in high school – but I wasn’t my nicest back then.    I’ve repented.  I’ve changed my ways.  Now I know everybody is cool.

Anyway,  back to me in the car listening to the band and I don’t think I lasted too long before I asked if we could maybe like, listen to Debussy for a moment?  and began fumbling amongst my own stash of CDs (all classical except for Ace of Base, oh hah hah ha).  But don’t worry, those two kids in the car still got married in the end.

So, there you have my feelings about Nick’s basement punk band.  BUT, as I said before, this is about Tom Kenning’s genius, and if you take the time to listen to his oral documentary you will know what I am talking about. You’ll feel like you’re listening to This American Life. I finished feeling like I had listened to something really important.  This oral history is for artists of any sort.  I wish now that I had known Nick in high school and he could have taught me a thing or two about how to say goodbye to my inhibitions.  

So, listen to it and let’s chat.  What does it say to you and what are you waiting for?  Permission?