met Jaime in January of 06, the day I moved to Los angeles. I had lived there a couple of times before, the last time being the year 2000. I had taken the California Shuttle Bus down from San Francisco. I planned to meet a Drummer. We were hanging out at his place, and then he said,
"I met this guy who plays rockabilly. He wants me to be his drummer, but i don't really like his kind of music. He's pretty cool though, want to come with us to a bar?" I figured why not. Soon the dude arrived.
"Hey, my name's Jaime. Jaime Sol Black."
"Jaime so what?" I remember thinking. He definitely wasn't shy. He grabbed my guitar and started singing one of his songs. Then he looked up and said-
"on this part, i want some girls to sing backup vocals."
Who is this guy? I thought. Bit of a maniac. He was funny though. He couldn't stop talking about PBR and his punk rock friends from back in New York. He liked my Operation Ivy shirt and asked me if I wanted to play Bass for his band.
"Well, I want to start my own band."
"You can do that too. You can play in my band and start your own band."
He seemed pretty adventurous and I liked that, like he'd be ready to go tour to Europe at the drop of a hat. He had a pirate's instinct. He was also the brokest person I knew besides yours truly, so I knew he couldn't judge me for my impencunious lifestyle.
So we all ended up over at Obriens, which funny enough, 2 years later, we were playing there all the time. There was a band called Saucy Monky fronted by a really hot chick who claimed to be an ex stripper. She also somehow had finagled her way onto U2's jetplane. Jaime kept telling her she sounded like Karen O from the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. I didn't think so but I assume she took it as a compliment.
We soon made our way over to Jaime's to watch some movie with the Grateful Dead and Janis Joplin. I thought it was cool that Jaime wasn't a one dimensional punk rocker, that he had eclectic taste and was a bit of a beatnik as well.