In college I played keyboards for a band called the Space Pigs. The Space Pigs were the brainchild of one of UT Arlington’s most notable music graduates, Dave Desrochers, aka “The Space Pig.” The band was basically a rotating cast of musicians that Dave employed to inflict his huge collection of jazz-rock songs on the unsuspecting public. Dave wrote lots of good songs. My personal favorites were “It’s A Man’s World,” a touching story of lesbian love, and “Friction Addiction,” an ode to every straight guy’s favorite pasttime. Dave taught me more about music than anyone else, and for that I’ll always be in his debt. There is more than a touch of the Space Pig in the chord voicings I used in the x-eleven songs. Beyond his great musical talent, Dave was a fascinating character. It’s not every day you meet someone willing to walk down Elm street wearing a pig mask. The Space Pigs eventually faded into obscurity, and I was proud to continue that tradition with x-eleven. Drummers are at the low end of the food chain. They are the most primal of all band queers. Drummers like to beat on things. When the crowd is rocking, and no one is paying attention to the drummer, he usually beats faster and harder to get noticed. It generally does not work, and consequently, drummers mate less frequently than singers or guitar players. Therefore, by the process of natural selection, the percentage of the population that likes to beat on things is dwindling. Singers are people who can not play a musical instrument even though many singers like to fondle a guitar on stage because it looks cool and phallic. Singers do half the work the rest of the band queers do but get twice the attention. The bass player is usually the guy who got conned into it because there were too many guitar players already (guitar players mate often.) The bass player is usually the nice guy who everybody takes advantage of. Guitar players live for the “solo” and hot sex after the gig. Guitar players believe that the way they make their instrument go “dweedy dweedy dwee, weedy weedy weedle weedily weedily wank wank,” is what gets them laid all the time, but it’s really the hair that does it. Keyboard players like to stay up late at night and play with computers. Keyboard players are the most intellectual of all band queers. They fantasize about how to make their digital machines sound like a guitar, but they can’t strap a keyboard to their body like a guitar and squirm around. Keyboard players seldom get laid, but instead bore everyone with philosophical technical shit. Dave Desrochers, aka “The Space Pig”