Tabula Rasa? I don’t think so… This Slate might be dim but he’s not blank. He’s a stranger in this town. Where are all the good times? Who's gonna show this stranger around?

Ok, we understand that we have been hinting at Slate’s development as a character in the second half of this season… Hmmm? Could it have anything to do with your haphazard story arcs that pop into your head at the last minute or your attempt to create a fictional explanation for how the band’s songs came to be writte/recorded? Perhaps it’s the annoying voice in italics that keeps trying to undermine my narration. Don’t try to blame it on me. I’m part of you. You’re arguing with yourself. What? That’s what we call a ‘plot-twist’. I know what a plot twist is, but is that really true? Maybe. It’s also foreshadowing. I repeat: Four-Shadow-ING. Whoa! Sometimes I even impress myself. What does all of this even mean? I guess they’ll just have to keep reading to find out, won’t they? Uh….Oh! I see what you did there…clever. You know you’re just congratulating yourself at this point, right? Oh yeah. My mind is blown. Wanna know something scarier? I don’t know. Do I? Yes. OK. You are..we are…totally SOBER! AHHHH!!!!!! You ok? Maybe, I don’t know. You want to continue the story? What story?  You know, the whole point of the blog. MFUJSF: the adventures of the world’s worst rock band. You were talking about Slate. Oh yeah. I remember now. You may want to start a new paragraph. Right.

G Mod’s return to manage MFUJ had drastic consequences for all of the members of MFUJ. Brick began losing what little self confidence he had and even burned the novel he had spent two years writing. Shadow was feeling pangs of guilt for deceiving his fellow band members about the extent of his connection to G Mod (Stay tuned for a Shadow-centric entry sometime soon. Four-Shadow-ING!!). Tigerman had to endure a slew of insults for his lingering longing for a woman whose interest he failed to hold, usually in the form of a jingle or limerick. Of course one member of the band actually benefitted from G Mod’s return, Slate.

Yes, the dim-witted, libidinous beard fanatic that sings on the band’s albums like a pig under… *The following was censored because it contained graphic imagery not suitable for blog readers* … actually reaped the benefits of having a chauvinistic relic of 80’s AOR radio as a manager. At last Slate was given the recognition that he so desperately craved but did not necessarily deserve. With G Mod’s master PR skills, he became a bullet-proof rock and roll cliché. Even the Package-gate scandal did nothing to diminish his status within the band. Some would say that was because the band was a non-entity in the commercial, Indie or any other rock markets that might exist but that would be too logical for Slate to comprehend.

This status proved to be like catnip to Slate. He began to indulge in every clichéd form of self-indulgence that every rising rock star feels entitled to: free booze, loose women and the inalienable right to do some guerilla redecorating to any hotel suite that the band was picking up the tab for, if only in his own one-dimensional imagination. Some experts began to classify him as pure Id, to which Slate would reply that no nerds could come to his after-parties, no matter what their fake driver’s licenses said.

Life has been good for MFUJ’s bad-boy. He gets to confront Brick as often as he likes. Not in the all-out-war way like he sang about in the song Slate MAn from the first album (which featured his best guitar playing btw). No, this has been the pettiest of all battles. He trips him, steals his cold beverages, snickers behind his back as he spreads rumors about him on the band website, etc. Poor Brick, so sullen by his feelings of ineptitude and obsolescence, doesn’t even put up a fight. Slate even went so far as to write a review of Brick’s novel calling it “Way too damn long”, complaining that it “made my head hurt” and finishing off by saying that “it’s the worst crime to happen to fiction since the lame-ass vampire fad of the 2000’s”.

What is the cruel dude up to now? Out on the streets prowling for some sweet ‘tang. Um, are we going to get into trouble with the censors over this? Not if we qualify it by saying we meant a fruit-flavored breakfast drink. Did we? I uhhh… What’s this? A video?