Well, my dear friends, we've made it a full decade. Ten years ago today, on July 2, 2015, this blog was officially inaugurated with a post about my one and only trip to Max's Kansas City, just months before it closed. In the process I shared the first of what would be well over fifty chapters of what was to become my online memoirs. The truth of the matter, though, is that I was also relaunching a blog I'd already started a full decade earlier, in 2005. That was the year Myspace launched the social media craze, at a time when I was looking to it for ways to connect with much-needed new friends in my new home of central Florida. Along with each account came a free blog, which I wasted no time in exploiting, having also becme curious about blogs at that time.
This first version of the Brazenblog was quite a bit different from the one you all know today. It was a lot more free form, a fact which was reflected in its original subtitle "Random babblings from the racing brain of Ray Brazen" (those last five words also being the name of my then-current CD release). As such, I just posted whatever I felt like writing back then. I blogged about the local music scene I'd found in Orlando, posted poetry I'd written on occasion, and made it into the exclusive online source for updates on the health battles of my friend and fellow music freak Billy Syndrome, who'd had a stroke in late summer '05 (sadly, this coverage would end with a eulogy here in early 2017). After awhile I sort of fell out of it for a spell, but then I woke up one morning with a new idea and logged onto Myspace only to find that my blog had mysteriously vanished without warning. To say I was pissed at seeing my work up to that point go down the crapper is an understatement, and my association with Myspace ended right then and there.
After a couple of years off, I decided I was going to start the Brazenblog all over again from scratch. this time on the far more reliable Blogspot platform. All I knew at first was that I wanted this blog to go in a different direction than the first. But where?
I didn't have to wait long or look far for the answer, for it was arond this time that I was invited to appear on a local podcast in Orlando run by my friends Jeff Ilgenfritz and Dirt McCoy. They were brothers and second-generation Misfits fans who had heard me talk about growing up in that band's shadow, and were curious to get the full scoop. Along the way I also told other tales of growing up punk, and as I related them I saw the looks of awe and envy on their faces. The reactions were priceless, and immediately afterward the answer struck me -- make the new blog a memoir! After all, I had many more stories where those came from that would make rock fans and historians swoon, and never enough time on any podcast to tell 'em all in full. And so I commenced to writing and posting once again, and the new improved Brazenblog 2.0 was born. It was an instant hit which has since blossomed into one of my proudest and most successful projects, thanks in no small part to my wonderful readers.
In these last ten years I've shared many memorable eyewitness accounts of seeing (and sometimes meeting) many legendary names in punk and classic rock, including the Misfits, the Ramones, the Ventures, Dead Kennedys, Motorhead, Wreckless Eric, the Beach Boys, Steve Miller, Sun Ra, the Godz, the Minutemen, Butthole Surfers, Adrenalin OD, the Dickies, Frightwig, Silver Apples, Uncle Floyd, and of course those Mexican rock gods I've championed throughout my entire 28 years on the internet, Los Dug Dug's. I've also written about my experiences living and performing in Williamsburg in its pre-gentrification days (which earned this blog recognition in the New York Times!), related my own personal musical history (which got the attention of a professor at Harvard!), and paid tribute to some fallen friends including my personal heroes William Berger and Billy Syndrome. And yes, there's even a cameo appearance from GG Allin in there!
It's been a blast reliving it all in my head, and I've always written with great care. Some of you may notice that I only blog a few times each year. This is because I take a lot of time to complete a post to my full satisfaction, working on and off and making sure I've remembered every detail I want to include in each story I tell. As this is an historical blog and not an online diary, I will work on a post only when true inspiration strikes, because I know I'm going to write a much better piece when I'm in the proper headspace for it. Aesop once said "It's quality that counts, not quantity," but it's all added up either way and many of you seem to agree, all over the world, as I've got readers from not only here in the USA where this blog is based, but also in Canada, all over Europe and even in countries like Vietnam and Singapore! You all know who you are, I'm sure, even if you are anonymous to me. It boggles my mind to think of my work going worldwide, but my blog stats say it's true, and I'm deeply appreciative of that fact. I may not have made even one penny from all this, but your moral support is worth far more to me anyway.
And so, here's to ten years of this Brazenblog and twenty since I started the first one. And I'm still not done with this thing yet, so get ready for more! Happy anniversary to me... and to all of you. Thanks so much to everyone who has ever read even just this post here for your support and comments and all the other love you've shown, for it inspires me greatly, time and time again. Keep reading, all of you.
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