The Hek-Atomic Cherries
The Millsaps Tapes
Set 1
Blitzkrieg Bop (by the Ramones)
Growth Spurt
Take On Me (by A-Ha)
Hippy Cheese
Concrete Slab
Pig Latin Song
Fall [early title of Shut Up]
The Sofa That Ate My Brother
La Bamba (by Richie Valens)
Kwickee Mart
Kwickee Mart
I Don't Wanna Be Hit On The Head By No Lead Pipe
Wicker Frisbee
Phalanx Of Cucumbers
Anyone
Set 2
It's A Shame About Ray (by the Lemonheads)
Trail Of The Loathsome Kine
What's Best
Different Beans
Pillow
Song About A Girl
Buttlint (by Three Guys Plumbing)
Bimbo Gumbo
We Like To Bathe And Dip Cats
Pickle [early title of Appeditee]
Trains
Bunkie Lip
Stationary
I Want To Hold Your Hand (by the Beatles)
Giggles The Cow Goes Scouting
Set 3
Hey You Wild Animals, Put Down That Meat
Pinochle Trauma
Take On Me (by A-Ha)
Blitzkrieg Bop (by the Ramones)
What's Best
Anyone
Pickle [early title of Appeditte]
Take On Me (by A-Ha)
Message In A Bottle (by the Police)
King Me, Bitch
Dragon Wagon
Not more than one week after the expulsion of Jay Burton, the Hek-Atomic Cherries played what should have been our best gig up to that point. That couldn't be farther from what actually happened. Both of Charles' older siblings were in attendance at Millsaps College in Jackson, Mississippi. Charles' brother had been a member of the local chapter of Lambda Chi Alpha fraternity, but had left for personal reasons. He still, however, was always talking to his former frat brothers. Late in the spring of 1994, the Millsaps chapter of Lambda Chi Alpha was having a party and word got to them that the Hek-Atomic Cherries would be more than happy to provide the musical entertainment for the party. We wholeheartedly accepted the invitation to play and the "great expectation" was born. All three of us assumed that the Millsaps gig would be out best and most exciting ever.
When we arrived in Jackson, however, we found that the "big" party had been scheduled on the same night as three sorority formals. Since the school is so small, a great majority of the students were at the formals, which left the dregs of the student body at the Lamda Chi Alpha house. We tried not to let the situation phase us however. We began playing promptly in order to fulfill our musical contract. The night did not improve though. In all honesty, we played like shit, we sounded like shit, and Charles was drunk and almost incoherent. In my opinion, the show was a disaster. Don't get me wrong, I had a great time, but it was far from what any of us consider a good performance. After the first set, we had all loosened up, and the second set became more of a practice that we were being paid for. No one was listening, so we could have done anything we wanted, and no one would have been bothered. During the break between the second and third set, Charles disappeared for a few minutes. When he reappeared, he seemed very disoriented. We were a few songs into the last set before Charles told Stephen and I that he had been drinking shots of Jagermiester when he had disappeared. It was really affecting his motor skills and his consciousness. He had in a few seconds, sealed the fate of the third set. Not that I can really blame him. We were young and away from home with the band. It was the first time in his life he could try out the "rock and role lifestyle." Needless to say, the third set wasn't much better than the previous two. The fact still remains that we had a hell of good time fucking around in the Lamda Chi Alpha house. We were basically being paid to practice in front of a few people that, with a little stretch of the imagination, could be considered an audience .
The whole evening wasn't without any truely positive experiences. In one of those rare moments of serindipitus discovery that most scientific and technological advances are made, we were jamming with a character by the name of Forrest Nesbit, when the fabulous masterpiece "Dodgin' Flak" was born. Of course such a magnificent piece of work could not be completely conjured up in one brief moment in time, however, the embryonic form of the song was present and very recognizable. Forrest simply began rapping and we were at a loss for anything else to do but back him up. After a few rocky seconds, Charles, Stephen, and myself were playing the now famous chorus of the song. Suddenly, Forrest uttered the now infamous line, "I'm an angry brown man my name is Tyrone / Don't fuck with me or I'll crush you like styrofoam."
It is said that hindsight is 20/20, but I never really understood that until shortly after the Millsaps debacle. We were driving around one night, listening to the Millsaps Tapes like a football team would watch game tapes; we wanted to try and understand what our problem was that night. During a lull in the first set, the Forrest Nesbit/Hek-Atomic Cherries jam occured, and listening to it then, we all knew what must come of that session.
Although there are bountiful Millsaps stories that are very funny to the three of us, I know that trying to translate them into words here, something would be lost. Rather than waste your time and mine, I will leave those anecdotes for another day when you should happen to run into one of us on the street.
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