Me & Josh Caterer

“Hey man, Duvall’s playin’ in Chicago next week, you wanna’ go?” Tom said to me on the phone one winter day in Ohio circa 2002. I fucking love the Smoking Popes! I thought in my head. Since I will never see them live because they had to go and break up before I got into them, Duvall will be the closest thing to that. “Yes! I am there!” I responded. Tom then told me that we could stay with Chris from Showoff, because they will be opening up for them at this show. Awesome. Little did Tom know that Chris would rip him off 900 dollaz in a couple months, for a friendly gesture gone wrong. But that’s a whole different story all together and end’s with us prank phone calling his ex-rock-star-ass in Bum Fuck, Missouri at his delightful Domino’s pizza job.

We set off that next weekend and drove to Chris’ in “Chicago”. I use “ “ because when we ended up at his house it was nowhere near Chicago. That suburban shit town of Joliet, Illinois was where we ended up staying. I set my frustration aside from not being in the city I wanted to visit so much, and tried to enjoy myself. We got the girl drink drunk on at his apartment and went to bed.

The next day we saddled up with the rest of the band from Showoff and headed to what I thought would be CHICAGO! Fucking wrong again. Goddamn middle of nowhere Illinois. Next stop DeKalb, Illinois! Looks exactly like JJJJoliet! A friggin’ Elks Lodge is where the show was. I couldn’t believe it. Shut up Aaron. You get to see three of the original members of the Smoking Popes play their new Christian inspired rock. It will be sweet. Repeat in head. Again. Again. Okay, this is gonna’ be awesome.

Showoff was fun to watch, I think we snuck some booze in and did that shit and all. The drummer, Mike Felumlee, of Duvall/Smoking Popes was walking around and I approached him. He used to drum for the Alkaline Trio, another one of ma’ favzz. I was friggdiggity nervous, but managed to utter a couple words that I cannot even remember and had him sign his solo cd that I just purchased from his wife at the merchandise table.

That done, Tom and I saw Eli Caterer and approached him. Tom befriended him, and still talks to him to this day in random parts of the country at shows. I got his autograph on my Duvall ep that he didn’t even play on. He was cool, but I felt he wasn’t used to fans approaching him like that.

It was showtime! Duvall started to play as I filmed it on my shite camera on some tape that sits in a box in my closet. The show was great. They played there ep songs and a couple covers. They ended with a Smoking Popes song, Josh Caterer’s favorite, “ I Know You Love Me” acoustic style. Fun, fun, fun. Yes it was. But there was something missing, oh yeah…..rocking!!!! I believe that Josh had lost a little bit of that rock n' roll jimmy jammz, and he didn’t want to show it, but I could feel it. I could see behind his eyes that he felt it too. Maybe it’s just my opinion, but I feel he wanted something more from what he was doing, but it was gonna’ take a couple years for it to kick in.

I felt a connection to him. I saw Duvall a handful of times in the next couple of years at random spots. There were rumors that Smoking Popes where gonna’ go at it again. I said fuck that, it ain’t gonna’ happen. Josh would never let me see him play “Pretty Pathetic” live, that’s not how my life works.

I kind of lost interest in keeping up with the bands news, but still bought their records. Then in the fall of 2005, something happened. Josh got his shit together and was doing a reunion show at the Metro in Chicago. I found out about it a little too late and couldn’t attend, but quickly purchased the cd/dvd from the show when it was released. Coincidently, I can’t find it on my shelf anymore. Maybe Zach has it in Cleveland?

Anyways, a tour started and I eventually saw them at the Grog Shop in the fall of '06 with Tom, Danielle, and Zach. It was a scarce crowd, I guess Ohio had given up on them too, but that didn’t stop my own posse from lovin’ every second of it. The rumors of a new album where running through the crowd, but not until last night (a year and a half later) did it actually come into my possession at their record release show at the Metro Chicago. I am listening to it, and am quite pleased. The show was packed and Sundowner opened. Yes, it did happen, on 6.07.08. They got back together and now they are doing it again. Something that I thought would just not happen, but kind of did.

I know I’ll never see Nirvana or The Clash play again, for obvious reasons, but I kind of always knew way deep inside (that’s a pun on a song title if you listen to this shit). I felt it in DeKalb when I saw Josh sing that one Smoking Popes song acoustic, that this was only a temporary thing. The real Josh will be back, and yes, he has returned. Whatever personal things he had going on in his life in the last ten years, I respect that, but goddamn, thanks for getting over that shit. It really means a lot. I guess that the moral/theme of this quick piece is that my teenage self developed immensely from his songwriting and inspired a lot of what I am today. I give him that. It was a period of about 6-7 years that this took place for me personally, and that’s a brief story of me and Josh Caterer. I think Tommy Sproles would enjoy this. And….I’m done.

-Aaron H. Baker