Mullet Onslaught -- Jay

One question I get asked a lot during Q&A sessions with teens is, "What were you like in high school?" I have a hard time with that question because I still haven't decided on whether or not I enjoyed high school. For some reason, that's made it hard to figure out what I was like. So I end up talking about what interested me in high school. And other than girls...it was music.

Yep. I wanted to be a rock star.

And I recently let it slip that there's a photo in my sophomore yearbook of the very first band I played in. Then someone dared me to put that photo up on my blog. If you've been following this blog for a while, you know that I never pass up a good dare.

So here ya go...


This is Mental Onslaught, featuring Mike on bass, Javier on drums, me on guitar, and my mullet on vocals (hey, it was 1991). Before we formed this band, none of us knew how to play a single instrument. So we basically played rock-paper-scissors to divide up the instrumental duties and then we each immediately signed up for lessons. But we still needed a singer. Unfortunately, everyone was too embarrassed to sing in front of each other...so I was nominated to that position simply because my dad used to sing in a bunch of bands.

C'mon...I'm sure a lot of famous bands started this way!

The deadline for the yearbook was fast approaching, so we snapped this photo and turned it in. (What you can't see are the handcuffs attached to each of our belt loops!) Unfortunately, Mental Onslaught soon disbanded...without ever learning to play an entire song together. But we each bounced from band to band throughout the rest of high school. In fact, after graduating, Mike and Javier joined a punk bad which toured and recorded a couple C.D.s.

But I'm the one getting paid to revisit and explore my teen years again and again. And maybe, eventually, that'll help me figure out whether or not I enjoyed being a teen.

Rock on!

- Jay


P.S. For those about to rock...me and my mullet salute you!!!