For the first four dates of our second tour 2000, we were joined by James’s Charlottesville buddies, the Happy Flowers, their first shows in a decade. The run ended March 25 in Atlanta. The night before in Chapel Hill, Mr. Horribly Charred Infant and Mr. Anus had sat in on our cover of Blondie’s “Dreaming,” but there would be no repeat performance in Atlanta–I’m afraid we were distracted. Less than three months earlier, Atlanta Braves’ numbskull/closer John Rocker had popped off to Sports Illustrated, confirming his role as the face of the Mets-Braves rivalry. As we pulled up to the Cotton Club that afternoon, I noticed a ticker on the nearby CNN Building advertising Braves souvenirs. I had a few minutes to kill, so I went over to price John Rocker merchandise. It wasn’t cheap. Now if you know me, you know I’m an anything-for-a-joke kind of guy, but that doesn’t mean anything. I returned to the Cotton Club empty-handed, and that’s when Joe Puleo went to work. He discovered the Braves’ store had a no-questions-asked 30-day money-back policy. One thing led to another and before our encore, all three of us changed into John Rocker jerseys and Braves hats, price tags waving proudly, and charged back on stage, flipping off the audience and each other before launching into the Randoms’ “Let’s Get Rid of New York.” We’re not taking full credit, but a little more than a year later, Rocker was traded to Cleveland.
