Geoff Remembers

The Splat

Many of you know what a “splat” is. My very first Wednesday night at the Moon back in ’97— Kenny and I walk in the front door and find some place to settle in, and this really big boisterous guy with a haircut that would make Joseph’s coat of many colors weep out of jealousy voices up “JaWohl! Another Tall guy! Mach Schnell!” He proceeded to get naked and some assistants busted out some paint and, well, painted his crotchial areas the colors of the German Flag. He laid down on a rolled out thermarest, and if my memory serves me David Gross, Gregorio Cortez and I and some other willing muscle splatted him up on the ceiling. For many years after I could look up and see the colors of the flag there and always LOL’d a bit. If walls and ceilings could speak… 😉

The Y2K Rave

Reading through my journal this week a few other great memories re-surfaced. 1999. We decided to throw the infamous Y2K NYE Rave at the Moon in the courtyard. Bails of Hay to act as furniture and some sound proofing, sound system from Vibe Alive, my decks, and lots of glow— Around 10pm the first DJ dropped their vinyl.

SLO PD rolled up around 10:10, not even 2 records into the evening. Blah Blah Blah Noise complaint but it’s SLO and NYE so we knew there would be many keggers and Frat parties that would be needing SLOPD’s attention that night so we begged it off. 10:45 SLOPD is back. They give us a written warning— and I think $100 fine? Then they zoom off to go interrupt another real loud party nearby. But at 11 or so they are back— come on let us get to Midnight at least right? Everyone dancing and even the Normls were out to say hi and get a tour of the sound system. Same cops. I’m talking, Bill E is helping me interact with them— and Rob rolls up. I “Gulp” inside and…

…Rob proceeds to ask “well how much for lets say 3 or 4 more noise violations? Can we just pay for these in full in advance now?” (I mean, if there was an Efficiency argument to be made, he nailed it). For some reason the cops got really bothered that someone was insinuating that we could creatively finance our way through the evening. They immediately threatened confiscation of the sound system and detention or arrest if we didn’t turn off the sound and disband!

But hey— power and sound off, and Greg and Rob to the rescue “everybody help carry the equipment up into Sputnik” (forgive me if I got the apartment name wrong, but this is where the pirate FM radio station lived). In a jiffy we were back up and at ’em, albeit at a lower volume, but this time broadcasting on 91.7 FM Dark Side of the Moon and ushered in the New Years that way— I believe Orbital “Halcyon & On & On” was the 99–00 transition track. I think SLOPD really missed out on a way to creatively finance their slush fund that night! Thanks for the efficient and brash idea Rob, and hey Diablo didn’t go critical that night right? Win Win.

Xing Technology

I also was privileged to work with Rob when a handful of us were at Xing, aka Xing Technology Corp, aka XTC. You can’t make this shit up right? XTC? Lol. I was in sales (I know it’s hard to believe!) and Rob was a software developer. I was always impressed with his technical chops but equally impressed by his ability to argue through technical issues in a constructive manner— sometimes loud, sometimes assertive— but always with PLUR as was the rage those days. We loved the original CEO Howard together and equally despised the VC installed replacement. Rob and I often cheered to the fact that under his watch the DRM protecting against ripping DVDs got out into the wild— somehow— when engineering was pressed to work faster with less resources… and all of Hollywood sued and Mr CEO got to eat that humble pie.

The Graffiti Wall

When XTC got all growns up and moved from Los Osos to Broad Street, during move in and before folks were really around most days— a GIANT 40’? long wall inside on the 2nd floor that faced engineering was, well, just white base coat. I know Dave was primary instigator of this but I seem to recall Rob being part of the thought leadership behind this as well… one weekend someone let a current couch crasher at the Moon in and he tagged the whole wall beautifully with “Xing” and other tagging art— No damage to the office itself, everything was pro-taped and clean.

Come Monday it was the talk of the town. Even Someone at Real Networks heard about it and asked me about it! At first we were going to just deny and be quiet about it but this tall German guy in Engineering kept blabbing on loudly about it ALL DAY LONG so that it was unavoidable to NOT talk about it. Many interviews were had, corporate sounding emails were sent out— threatening mild criminal response to fines and that someone would have to white wash it again. No one talked. It was still there by the time I left and moved to the Bay Area. If anyone has any pics please do share!

German Insults & Sonic Warfare

Rob and I often traded loving insults in German— me with a German last name and some OTJ training in middle school and he with a far better command of the language. I have emails from him which were responses to heartfelt notes I’d sent about something or other in the scene or Stargaze and the entire email would be “you spelled these German words incorrectly”! Hah!

Another memory— at one point after he left the Moon he had some neighbors that were complaining about his sound and music levels. I think we were at some party where Rob regaled me with this whopper of a story. He said at first he was very responsive with watching his levels (scientifically with a decibel meter) and observing quiet hours etc. But they kept complaining. So he went total Rob on them— found some electronic devices that were directional and only emitted sound in the very high frequency ranges— outside of us young adults but the young kids and I believe toddler in the neighbors house could definitely hear it and were the targets. I guess he just declared sonic warfare on them, and in the end, they did move out and he was, again, victorious through superior engineering.

The Generator Confession

2005 was my first Burn and we were invited to camp with Fandango much to our relief and delight! We rolled up in our newbie RV, and set about setting up camp— and by sunset were mostly set, and throughout the day Rob and Jack et al had been setting up the small mesh network of Honda EU2000 Gennies in parallel. Me— definitely not having an engineering degree— didn’t realize how power and wattage and amps worked. Absolutely didn’t realize how much power an AC requires. But as Cal Poly says— “Learn By Doing!” right? I wanted to run the AC in the RV, but didn’t want to burn our own gas. Heck there was a Gennie right there right! So I uncoiled the power cord and plugged it into the running EU2000— no immediate sparks or anything… then proceeded to turn on the AC. For some reason at the exact same time ALL the generators died! And our AC didn’t turn on… hmmmmgh.

I quickly ran out and unplugged it and tried to look innocent as Rob made the rounds to inspect WTF happened. I didn’t cop to it— ever— he even asked me about it a couple times in the years to come. IT WAS ME BRO. IT WAS ME. But I did feel hella guilty for the rest of that Burn and from then on I became the Bacon Ambassador of Fandango at every burn we attended— and always made sure to heap his plate full to make up for my karmic debt. So yeah that’s why I’m such a Bacon gifter out on the Playa.

Through Heavy Shit

When Greg died I took solace in Rob spearheading the Temple of Gregario out at Burning Man while I went to organize sound and DJ at Greg’s Service in Hanford. We divided and conquered often throughout the years— sometimes with heavy shit, and most of the time with delightful results. He gave me gentle hugs after my Geoff vs the Honda accident and was a strength to rely on in those early days after Greg’s loss and especially while we were getting Celebrate Greg together. We were able to burn the lantern together in Pozo. We all know past the sometimes brash exterior a big gooey heart the size of, well, the German Flag is in there 😉