ThE bendable monkey,or how i came upon a pink ape. extract noise bumholes ipswich manhole louse stain there i was. a cold saturday night in the city, drink- ing a pintof snowgoose once again dba doesn't have the requisite sierra nevada. the third time in row. as i settle down for this an imperfect but delectable substitute, the bartender... yes the bartender...something about a stain on her sweater. round the nipple area. embarrasment. loud screams in my ears. the cackles of an hyena. well, not quite. i couldn't think with all that noise, shrieks. a foreshadowing of what's to come later in the night. how convenient! the headless barbies aren't the sort of band you can just fall in love with. they thundered in with the epynomous, or is it the post-post-punk self-refential, "i'm a head- less barbie".a fine tune all together, truly typifying the h.b. sound. sound rhythm, wild, wailing keyboards, and a screamer. obscured by the din was the one-two notes playing of the lead guitarist. a true find. unselfconciously devoesque, and scared as shit. scream a little here, throw in a scary ballad there, and a round of applause. a damn-good show. off to the bar around the corner. not really a barbie one pint after that and we were off. off to see the headless barbies at the spiral.haven't been to that dive in a while, and a dive it is. improvement. they finally got around to installing a tap-system. bass on tap. spoiled. skip- ped it and w ent straight to the musical entertainment. this place used to be the downtown lounge, before that the 1st and A bar, and before that street level. now i'm not sure, but it's named after a character in reservoir dogs. a college hang-out now. no bands and more people. the bartender looks underaged, the customers obviously don't tip, and the beer was not so good. thirty minutes later and back to the spiral. there i was. closing on two in the morning. funky monkey banana junky about to make their ignonimous return to the spiral. few people were there at the start- and fewer at the end. too bad, for amid the groove and funk came flying a few dozen pink and orange bendable monkeys,individually wrapped and ready. i took one home.