What a difference a month makes, huh? Thirty-one days ago, an insane revved-up zombie mob, instructed by the insane revved-up zombie king, had not yet attacked the Capitol of the United States, causing the violent death of several people and injuring hundreds. Once again, we had no idea what was coming. Well, actually, I had a pretty good idea and, leading up to January 6th, was nervously concerned that something bad would happen, just not on the scale of which we are now all too familiar. The non-stop images and videos were both horrific to most, yet inspiring to some. But, there’s no need to fill you in on the details. You know as much as I do and you can easily get all of the freshest news anytime you want.

So, I’ll move on, but before I do, I want to let everyone know that I don’t care who you voted for in the recent election rumble. If your candidates won, congratulations. If your candidates lost, but you’re cool to go with the flow, because this is a democracy, rock on! I hope to see all of you at the next Brave Combo bash, whenever and wherever that might be. I just wanted to make that clear. All well-intentioned Democrats, Republicans, and Independents are invited. You know, music is universal and all that stuff, so let’s party! With that said, continue reading.

I figured something out. But I started figuring it out a long time ago; just before Brave Combo was born. I want to share an important part of it with you. But, as I lead up to explaining the meaning and purpose of this seemingly futile rat-race we call life, I must say this first. If you believe our recent presidential election was stolen and you, to even the tiniest degree imaginable, agree with the actions of those who stormed our seat of government on that now historically infamous day, I respectfully ask that you stop paying attention to Brave Combo and move on without us. Please ask to be removed from any BC list on which you now reside. Come on, do yourself a favor and say goodbye. It’s time to break up. Besides, we should mean nothing to you. Think about it. The whole point of Brave Combo has been about inclusion and celebrating the best part of all people and cultures; to make the world more equal for everyone. So, by definition, certain things just don’t mix with Brave Combo. Above all, hate and racism. We play the music of immigrants and we dig it! And this is the way we’ve been from the very beginning, exploring the constantly evolving world of music, literally. You get it, right? And we chose a genre, as a cornerstone, which happened to be the most kicked-around AND misunderstood, in this vast universe of popular music. We were inexplicably driven to free polka from the prejudices which had kept it chained to the novelty/joke corner of the room for way too long. But, you know why Brave Combo was initially drawn to it? Because, surprise, a lot of the music was simply amazingly fantastic! Who knew? Anyway, I’ll stop there with the band bio. So, if you find yourself proudly in-sync with the boys who are proud, you might want to check out what YOUR good book says about pride (it’s sort of a big deal), get confused and pissed off, and then let us know what scums we are as you leave the building. Okay, stop fuming and wishing me harm, for a second. I sincerely hope you have a fulfilling existence with minimal heartbreak and that you find peace. I mean it! It would be safer for everyone if you did. Besides, I am about to explain the whole damn reason we, as individuals, are here, on this planet and I don’t want to share it with anyone who puts hate before love. You wouldn’t get it, anyway. So, it’s time to eject yourself from the Brave Combo sphere of influence. Thank you for going away. I want your letter of resignation on my desk by morning!

GOOD NEWS FOR MODERN MAN (AND WOMAN AND ETC.). Did I get your attention? I hope so. That was the point. I definitely don’t know everything, but I absolutely, positively unraveled a key part of the mystery for myself, which ultimately led to Brave Combo and I try to let that bit of revelation guide me to this day. It involves an exercise which is very simple, in concept, but quite difficult, if you take it seriously and really want it to work. And it will work, but your desire and persistence will make all the difference. Unfortunately, it demands that you are honest with yourself, especially about your intentions in life. Okay, that’s my teaser, for now. And let me be perfectly clear about something. I ain’t nothing special! I just think I figured out a critical piece of the puzzle and the proof of that has been revealed to me over and over and over, as we’ve maneuvered Brave Combo through several wild and wooly decades of weird shit, creating our own version of insanity; the insanity of obsessively searching for understanding. I guess our next order of business is deciding what we should call our new study group. Here’s an idea. CULT of CARL. Or, perhaps, CARL’S CULT. Both sound good to me and I promise I won’t start asking for money for a couple of weeks, at least, but I do plan to start writing little books with great big type, immediately! And maybe some buckets of survival food which will be good for 100 years.

Whew! That’s enough drama for now. The images of actual gigs are starting to fade in, as we look to a bright future, which will be upon us before we know it. In the meantime, avoid the virus, like the plague, including all of its adorable mutations, and, of course, watch out for those pesky domestic terrorists. In keeping with the theme of the times, we might decide to do something musically crazy at any moment, without much warning. And we have the technology to pull it off. So pay attention to your Brave Combo information conduit. That’s good advice, even in the best of times!

2020 is coming to a close!  I generally don’t like year-end wrap-ups.  They always seem like just easy ways for the media to fill time and get away with being lazy.  But this year I’ll make an exception and do a wrap-up.  2020 sucked!  Yeah, some bad things led to some good things and a few actual good things did happen (Biden won), but I can’t tell you something you don’t already know.  2020 sucked!  That’s my wrap-up!

HOW I’VE SPENT MY COVID VACATION, SO FAR.  I have spent most of the time asking myself the following question, referring to almost everything around me.  How do we make this work or how do we make this better?  Trying to answer that has actually led to some workable solutions for myriad issues and situations.  With all live gigs disappearing, every band on the planet has wondered what to do now and how to do it.  The logical solution for most performers has been to continue the show virtually, with varying degrees of success, from both an artistic and audience-response point-of-view.  Some performers are sorta okay with it and some hate the whole situation; not what they signed on for.  For whatever reasons, I, personally, think I have found a new comfort zone.  And I’m not just resigned to the challenge, I’m entertained by it and motivated like crazy to create.  I taught myself a bunch of new video skills (very low level, but good enough for now) and am pretty fired-up to have new tools I can manipulate by myself.  I have no idea if any of my bandmates have similar feelings or if they’re thinking along these lines at all.  All I know is that my brain is exploding with fireworks AND flowers.  But my life has also been dominated, of course, by the struggles of animal management.  I’ll say this.  Not all cats get along all of the time.  I’ll also say I am constantly amazed at how well things do go, generally, but you gotta be smart and you can’t let your guard down.  When the pandemic first started I heard a doctor say “To be safe, one’s only reaction should be an over-reaction.”  I thought that was good advice and decided to apply it to everything.  You know, be diligent.  Don’t leave BoBo, the cat, near the dangling wire of a charging cell phone, or the wire of anything.  And don’t leave our 15-year-old dog, Bobby, near the food of our blind 18-year-old cat while she’s eating.  Bobby won’t hurt her, he’ll swipe her food.  She’s an easy target and dogs LOVE cat food.  Most of you know exactly what I mean.  The very best dog food in the world doesn’t hold a candle to the very worst cat food, as far as Bobby and, his twin sister, Foxey, are concerned.  But, to Bobby and Foxey, the very best food in the world comes right out of the cat’s litter boxes.  Again, I’m sure a lot of you are hip to that delightful problem.  I wish dogs could actually live and thrive on cat poop.  Wouldn’t that great?  Oh well, we can all dream.

I wrote in the November MACHINE’S PUMP about all of the yellow jacket nests which we allowed to stay around the house this year.  It was extremely interesting and not too scary.  They are all gone now.  But we also had one decent-sized wasp nest.  The wasps (paper wasps) seemed a little more focused than the yellow jackets and definitely kept to themselves more.  That nest also emptied out, even before the yellow jackets gave it up.  Well, I decided to bring that one abandoned wasp nest onto the back porch, to check it out, and set it on a shelf.  The next morning a baby wasp was sitting on it.  Just sitting there.  We think the warm back porch caused it to hatch.  Whatever, here was a baby wasp with no nest outside now.  Its fate was now our responsibility.  So we named it Wally, bought it a little aquarium and that’s where he’s been for about three weeks.  Sadly, we discovered one of his wings is broken or didn’t form correctly.  Early on we tried to get him to fly away, after putting his nest back outside, in a warm spot, near its original location, but he just hung around and we noticed his left wing was split.  He wasn’t even trying to fly.  Then we were really committed.  He’s almost reached his maximum life span (about 22 days) but we’re going to see what happens.  He loves and prefers to eat sugar, which is the basic diet for wasps at the end of the season.  So he has fruit and hunks of brown sugar all over his house.  I gave him some water today and he lapped it up.  This experience deepens my feelings about the importance of all life.  I know that sounds cliché, but without our intervention, Wally wouldn’t have lived at all.  The temperature in Denton dropped below freezing the night he was in his nest on our warm back porch.  When we found him I initially wished I’d left the nest alone and nature could have done its thing, but I inserted myself, right or wrong, and now had a unique opportunity to expand my sphere of understanding.  And when we discovered Wally’s left wing wasn’t working, well, of course, for people like us, it was fate and there was only one thing to do; become Wally’s family.  Don’t bother telling me I’m crazy.  Yeah, crazy like a wasp!  By the way, check out Wally’s new music video.

Hey, peace on Earth and everything, but I’ve been working on a new song about some wonderful people we should all love, I suppose, because we’re all human beings who share this fantastic planet.  And, I’m always trying to expand my sphere of understanding (see above paragraph), as you know.  Anyway, it’s called, “Slime Ball.”

Okay, folks, time to say goodbye to one train wreck and hello to a brand new one.  Hopefully, 2021 won’t be as debilitating and disheartening as 2020, but stay healthy, vigilant, and smart-headed.  Also, check our itinerary occasionally or wherever you follow our shenanigans.  We might do something super cool or super stupid with little warning.  Don’t forget, music is a special language and it’s my goal to get you on your feet and/or keep you on your toes!  HAPPY NEW, NEW, NEW YEAR!!!!!