April 17, 1999.   The Chatham REA Coffeehouse Show, as explained by Agent Dr. Rex M. Valence:   We, The Joysticks Battle the Scan Feed Relay to Your Skull, were invited by Ailecia of the Chatham REA Coffeehouse to play at their scheduled “high school band night." We were informed that we would be playing with like-minded bands, but we weren’t sure if the organizers of the show actually knew what kind of band The Joysticks are, as we were described as “nerd rock” in one particular show listing. Alienation is always a goal of OOBS, though, so we decided this would be an excellent show to solely play handheld tape recorders while we destroyed electronics and machines. We were also planning to keep our performance under the 10 minute mark, which is always a sign of a “good show.” A few days prior to the performance, when we were told that the other three bands playing were “pop-punk,” “hard-core,” and “rock” music, we knew that alienation was a likely product. Upon arriving at the Chatham venue, which was really a basement rather than a coffeehouse, we immediately had the upper hand over the other performers as we mesmerized them with the massive amounts of unbelievable equipment that we were hauling out of the back of our two vehicles. Various equipment included: Nintendos, turntables, electronic science kits, a robot arm and televisions. After the first band, La Crema Batida, concluded their "rock" set, we began the Joysticks' stage setup. Various audience “punks” and “hard-core kids” stared in confusion at our electronics and costumes. Our setup took little time: plug in amplifiers, run tape recorders into amplifiers, put machinery on stage to destroy. The other bands were instructed to remove their equipment from the stage area to prevent damage. Gravity's Revenge's microphones were relocated to an adjacent room, and I instructed the "punk" onlookers (you could tell they were punk from their spiky hair and patches) to provide vocal noises during our performance. When setup was complete, we were ready to initiate the intended Joysticks intro. Intros have become an infamous part of the Joysticks performance, as we've introduced ourselves as Aerosmith, jumped out of the crowd, and played crowd tape recordings through the PA. This was going to be just as good as the others, for I had a smooth Bel Biv Devoe "Poison" sample prepared. Due to technical difficulties, though, we all decided to just press play simultaneously, leading to an ambiguous opening. My tape was in the incorrect position and began playing some MIDI file or recorded NES game, Richard’s played electronic noise sounds, and Joe’s played our Spice Girls’ cover, which is basically the song “Wannabe” played directly from the compact disc with us doing noise over top. As we were preparing to begin our performance, however, a member of the Pittsburgh police force entered the room and took a seat right up front. The look shared between myself, Richard, and Joe, at this moment was absolutely priceless. Illegal fireworks (marked in our "NOT FIREWORKS" box) covered the stage and concert area, and we were hoping that these would go unnoticed. We were even more worried about the performance alterations that would now have to be made. Thus we avoided the early pyrotechnics and partook in hard-core turntable, clock radio, VCR, computer printer, compact disc, and audio cassette destruction. The crowd was in utter shock. At points within our set, it was simply us throwing around machines while the Spice Girls’ “Wannabe” played in the background. We concluded our set after approximately 5 minutes. While the crowd was deciding what they thought of us and pondering the sanity of us all, we decided to do a small encore which consisted of three numbers. We kicked off our encore with everyone’s favorite Salt N’ Pepa hit single, “Push It.” Richard went over and grabbed one of the aforementioned Gravity's Revenge microphones in order to provide the vocal provisions. He ultimately got blood all over the microphone, for his hand was brutally gashed from prior circuit board trashing. I, in turn, manned the Yamaha PSS-177, and operated the beats and keyboard tones. Richard and I got really into the emotional feeling behind this number, and by the end of it Richard was screaming, "Ah! Eeh! Ha! PUSH IT! Fuckin' push it real good!!!" This was followed by the slamming of GR's mic right into the floor. The next number was led into by Richard's questioning, "Did the police leave?" When various crowd members replied, "Yeah," we "played" "Light Off A Bottle Rocket." This was followed by the enchanting “Light Off A Tank Firework And Toss It Into The Middle Of The Crowd.” Total time performed = 7.5 minutes = success! The aftermath of blood, electronics, and unbelievable reactions, signified this success to a tee. Joe had to exit the show following our performance, but Richard and I stayed after to have a good time with Halfcast and Gravity’s Revenge. During Halfcast, the hard-core band of the evening, we took it upon ourselves to jump onto the empty dance floor in the center of the room and show off our dancing abilities. Richard and I both gave the audience intense versions of the running-man as well as the robot. The crowd was amazed on how well we could adapt our hip-hop based dance maneuvers to fit the stylings of a band such as Halfcast. Dr. Spanglestein, from the O.R.I. Sound Team, made an appearance during this portion of the show too. Following Halfcast Richard and I, then, decided to mock the “pop-punk” band, Gravity’s Revenge. Just into the second song, Richard jumped on stage with a toy PlaySkool guitar and began to do a dueling guitars with one of the players in the band. Following this, Richard stood in the middle of the room with the PlaySkool guitar, and he directly mocked the band by mimicking the guitars and vocals. Very humorous. Dr. Spanglestein, Richard, and I caused unfathomable chaos throughout the rest of the set too, as we used a whole roll of tape to stick cups, plates, and napkins to the ceiling, and setup various traps across door frames. After Gravity's Revenge concluded their performance, Richard and I gave our second and third performances of the evening to honor Dr. Spanglestein’s attendance. We utilized the still activated microphones to play another handheld tape recorder show, and then ended our evening with the final performance outdoors entitled, “Light A Roman Candle In The Middle Of A College Campus With Plenty Of Security Around And Run Away.” Truly, a classic Joysticks’ performance.     Questions? Comments. OOBS