I was with 7Seconds in Chapel Hill, North Carolina many years ago, probably around 1993 or something. We were playing at the Cat’s Cradle and had just finished our soundcheck there. We had a few hours to kill before the show started so I went next door to a record/t-shirt shop and had a look around. I looked at a bunch of music and found a used cassette of Billy Bragg’s ‘Talking With The Taxman About Poetry’ for $2.99. I started looking at the rack of t-shirts they had and found a white Boss Hog tee with the design from their first record: big purple letters that read ‘Boss Hog’ and a full-frontal nude shot of singer Christina wearing nothing but these thigh-high leather boots. I pulled it ut of the bunch and held it up to look at it and at that very moment, some dude walks up and asks, “Kevin Seconds, right?”.
I was mildly embarrassed and lowered the t-shirt but the kid had already seen it.
“Yeah man. That’s me. How’s it going?”, I replied sheepishly.
“I’m stoked to see you guys. It’s my first time seeing you”, he said.
“Heh. Cool man. We’re stoked to be playing Chapel Hill again”, i sad, mostly truthfully.
“Hey, I’ve always wanted to ask you….are you guys still straight edge?”, he asked.
“Um….well, I don’t drink or do drugs but I don’t think we consider ourselves a straight edge band or anything”, I answered.
He looked visibly disappointed but I didn’t know what else to say. That was the truth. At least it was MY truth.
The kid just sorta stood there and look at me. I’m sure I didn’t come off overly friendly or anything but honestly, I couldn’t really think of anything interesting or clever to share with this guy, a fan, who had walked in on me oogling a naked girl on a t-shirt and was maybe hoping I’d go on a tear about how great it was to be living drug-free or whatever.
I felt pretty lame.
He continued eyeing me and I just kept the t-shirt down, hoping that he’d forget it was me clutching it in my stupid hands.
I started to panic.
“Well cool, bro. I’m going to keep looking around. I hope you enjoy the show tonight. I’ll see you over there in a little while”, i said, not wanting to be rude but just wanting the conversation to be over.
He smiled weakly and said, “ok, cool man” and out the store, he walked.
I paid for the Billy Bragg tape and Boss Hog shirt and went to find something to eat.
A little while later, I was on some Internet punk rock message board or Usenet newsgroup and I saw a thread about 7Seconds and stupidly started reading it. For the most part, it was just kids talking about having seen us at some gig or another but somewhere deep in the middle of all the posts, there was one from a kid who had met me at a record shop in Chapel Hill and said that I acted like a total stuck up rock star and blew him off because I was too busy looking at a t-shirt with some naked chick on the front.
I was furious.
I quickly went through my closet, dug out the Boss Hog shirt, gave it one last glance, thought about jerking off while looking at it (but didn’t), doused it in some gasoline I had sitting in an old mayo jar near my space heater and then I lit the fucker on fire while cursing out myself, that kid, the band Boss Hog, nudity, thigh-high black leather boots and the entire population of Chapel Hill, North Carolina.
“This WON’T happen EVER again!”, I loudly promised myself, and up in flames the shirt went.
I cleaned up the charred bits and flushed them down the toilet. I then went downstairs and ate dinner and I remember thinking that mashed potatoes and veggie corn dogs never tasted so good as they did that night.
As far as I know, Boss Hog is no longer a band and no longer goes around, spreading their nakedness.
I am a better and cleaner man because of that.