![]() It’s that thing when people are doing something stupid and laughing and someone says, ‘Uh, we should probably not be doing this.’ And then it brings people to their senses.” ![]() “Not that she was square in any way, but the all-guy dynamic can get wild, so things like stealing someone’s purse didn’t happen often. Had it not been for Sara, “I’d venture to say the band might have self-destructed faster,” Justin said. And then he just keeps talking as Dustin and I egged him on.” Dustin was like, ‘Let’s pick him up!’ So we pull over and open the side door and the guy, in this bum voice, is all, ‘Thanks for the ride, man!’ And everybody starts waking up to this stinky drunk dude plopping down on the bench seat. “One time we had been driving all night and everybody but me and Dustin were asleep and we drove by this gnarly looking hitchhiker. “Our humor was definitely more twisted and delirious than most bands I met,” Justin said. “Something they’d really hate, and it’s a really stupid thing to do,” he said, “but when they would wake up in the morning, I would tend to stand up on the driver’s seat and drive like I was on a surfboard.” Dirty also had a particular stunt he liked to pull on overnight drives. That same night, prior to the staple gun incident, Dirty had revealed to Sara that he had stolen someone’s purse at the show, which she promptly made him return. We wrapped it up and iced it, and he was kinda bummin’ for the next few days. Boom! It comes out, his left hand has swollen up really big, and of course he plays bass, so he needs that. “Instantly it’s swelling up,” Dirty recalled, “and we’re like, fuck, dude, what are you doing?! And he grabs a butter knife and starts trying to get the staple out. And he said, ‘It doesn’t hurt-watch!’ And put it right up against his arm and shot it.” And Vern had this staple gun he was shooting at me and other people and I was trying to tell him to stop because it was clearly dangerous. “I think we were staying at the apartment of someone from the Supreme Dicks. “The first crazy, borderline-scary thing I ever saw Vern do was in Northampton,” Sara remembered. Not that Vern, still just 20 years old, had suddenly become the picture of maturity. “And I’d be like, ‘I don’t know-wanna have a beer?’ And then I’d sit and chat with them.” “People would come up to me and be like, ‘I wanna meet Justin, why is he so unapproachable?,’” Vern said. ![]() “It’s funny, because I was always half-inebriated, but I was really good with the books,” he said, “Handling the money, making sure the van was taken care of, getting our asses on the road so we got to shows on time.” And in part because Justin was notoriously moody, Vern, formerly Unwound’s most elusive member, emerged as its ambassador. That started to change on the Fake Train tour, as Vern gradually assumed the role of tour manager. Talk to anyone who met the band in those days and more often than not, their one memory of Vern will be that he wasn’t around much. “Making sure we could get from point A to point B.” Booking tours, dealing with labels, lining up studio time, networking-those were Justin’s responsibilities.
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