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Okay, so it took me a decade to add my remembrances for this gig here, but better late than never, no? I actually worked at Max's at the time, as the house DJ, and my good friend Mark "The Brunoman" Dixon was the general manager, and booked most of the bands. Max's still exists, in the quaint wharf area of Fells Point in Baltimore. Back then Max's was a mecca for solid indie rock, with inviting coolers full of choice bottled imported beer, and a killer soundsystem (as mentioned in the notes for this gig); now it's just a smelly cigar sports bar with 52 satellite channels worth of college bowling tournaments pumped in round the clock. We had been rabid, drooling JBC fans for a few years already at that point in '92, during which time Mark had been not-so-subtly exalting the virtues of The Butcher to his brother Steve, who worked for Sky Records in Atlanta, the label that, as kismet would have it, eventually released "Condition Blue". Needless to say, we were ecstatic, and when the tour was announced, we made damn sure that Max's was on the tour schedule, eagerly anticipating the date like kiddies awaiting Christmas. The gig itself was fantastic, and the JBC brilliant, but the week itself was tempered with sadness when two members of Atlanta's The Jody Grind passed away in a horrific car accident. They had played a number of times at Max's in the year before, and were originally slated to play double-bill on this gig, if I remember correctly. The Jody Grind's "One Man's Trash Is Another Man's Treasure" is an outstanding release (if you can find one), and sits right next to "Condition Blue" on my shelf, a gentle reminder of a bittersweet year.
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