Tough Customer // Wire

Maus Haus

Maus Haus live

I did not have what most people would consider a normal high school experience. And by “most people” I mean the actors I’ve seen playing high school students in big budget Hollywood films. From what I’ve seen on screen - and, by extension, what I can only assume is an accurate representation of everybody’s experience - most high schools are filled with middle class white kids who have to tackle tough decisions like what college to go to or where to park their convertible. The one exception to this rule is the occasional inner city high school filled with troubled Black/Hispanic/Asian kids who are in desperate need of an obstinate, jive-talking teacher to inspire them to greatness. But I digress.

From what I understand, in high school students separate themselves into groups or cliques, each of which has its own code of conduct. Throughout their high school career, students must navigate a complicated social maze of cool kids, jocks, and awkward sexual experiences. There are big dances, football games, and important parties that one is either invited to or not. There is one girl who is usually considered the hottest of all the girls, although her friends are likely to be almost as attractive. As a result, they wield a disproportionate amount of social power and are admired and/or feared by the other students. Also, if my facts are correct, they should all be named Heather.

Sadly, this does not even remotely describe my time in high school. My school was rough. We had race riots that twice shut the entire school down for a week. The Asian Mafia once started a war with the Samoans that ended with a S.W.A.T. team pulling a bunch of machine guns from a windowless van in the parking lot. Our first and only dance was cut short when somebody fired a gun through the roof of the gym. Our basketball team was so gangster that a rival gang once came to a game, chained the doors shut, shut off all the lights, and then beat everybody with cro-bars and baseball bats. Also, my P.E. teacher was an alcoholic, my locker frequently got set on fire, and I once saw a girl stab a guy in the neck with a pair of oversize scissors.

Needless to say, I kept a pretty low profile. I ate my lunch in the car and spent most of my free time with the jazz band. I took honors classes with more or less the same 30 kids in every class and generally kept to myself. I had a girlfriend and played in a rock band, but I never thought of myself as anything but one of the kids who went to school every day hopping that he wouldn’t get robbed or shot. Forget about parties, or cliques, or hot girls. I was just trying to survive.

So imagine my surprise when I found out that I was one of the cool kids. I recently got back in touch with an old classmate, who now works with my sister. She told my little sister that she didn’t spend much time with me in high school because I was part of the popular crowd. Really? Wow. I did not know that. Guess I misinterpreted that sense of impending dread I used to feel each day as I left for school.

Anyway, it turns out this former classmate is also a wealth of music knowledge, and she turned me onto a local band that I didn’t even know about. They rock the moniker Maus Haus and play what I would describe as freaked out electro post-rock. Pop melodies and monkish chants float around heavy synthesizers and distorted guitars. The rhythms shift from fusion-like jazz funk beats to the type of wild outsider rock that people are now stealing from Captain Beefheart. It’s the kind of music that pulls you in and then immediately spits you out when the song is over.

If you’re keeping track, that’s three more things you can add the list of things I did not know. To summarize: 1) There is an awesome post-rock band from San Francisco called Maus Haus, 2) I was, as it turns out, one of the popular kids high school, and 3) Being popular is not at all like it is in the movies.

MP3: ‘Rigid Breakfast’

MP3: ‘Reaction’