Olly goes on a Burger Quest

Following his adventures buying weed in LA, Oliver Heath goes in search of the perfect burger: 

The only food at the whiskey bar was peanuts. Hungry, and on our way to get the kind of burger that only a drunk should eat, we stopped at an amateur art show looking for cheese. My friend Ben spotted a cake, and no sooner had he taken a bite, a girl howled, "whhyyyeeeeee?!" Confused and still chewing, he was too distracted by the audible crunch of the cake to pay much heed to the girl. "Wwhhhyyyyyyyyyeee??!!" the girl screamed again.

Now decidedly disgusted by his mouthful, Ben spat out the cake and looked at the girl, "What?" ”You're such an arsehole!" and she picked up the cake and stormed off, teary. Next to where the cake had sat there was a little card that I read out: “Bran, Shellac, and found objects". Like some kind of accidental art vampire, Ben Frost had just eaten some young hopeful's artwork. "That cake barely touched the sides, lets get a burger."

The burger chain across the road was host to drunkards, munters, and the occasional homeless person. This night, it included the dregs of a nearby nightclub could that easily be called Emo if that was still a thing. Too mallrat to be goth, they looked like they were about to audition for Idol "just for the publicity for their band." The burgers there were generally barely warm and rubbery, but I liked this joint because they hired immigrants rather than spotty teens, so there is less chance of having your burger spat in.

Ben was busily snapping photos of the consumer kitsch rows of burgers and fries while we waited for our meals. The tiny lady manager snatched the phone from him - "No photos. Get out." Clearly it was crazy day. "Give me my phone!" "Give me my burger!" we said in unison. We got our burgers and the phone back and the tiny woman escorted us out of the store. Sitting in the park, I wondered 'why are we eating these shitty burgers?' Were we being punished for eating the art? Or was eating the art also part of a greater punishment for an earlier crime? All I knew is that when I ate a good burger, I’d know we were back on the good path. There must be somewhere -a burger Shangri la- where your food is hot, affordable, spit free, and you don't get robbed of your personal effects by management. Harmony must be restored. A burger quest was in order.

I had heard that such a place, the best burger place, was In-N-Out Burger in Los Angeles. It was mysterious due to the (not so) secret custom menu. I ordered a cheese burger 'animal style', a 50/50 shake and fries. I was able to take as many snaps as I pleased while I was waiting. The burger was wrapped cutely and unlike other places the whole tray looked like the perfect food in TV ads. I took a bite and realised my mistake, I had been hoping for the best burger, and it was good burger and perhaps the best fastfood burger I have ever had, but it was still a fastfood burger. It wouldn't make sense for it to be as good as a burger 4x the price, but in a land of $1 tacos it was not going to become a staple for me.

The next part of my quest took me to the other hyped LA fast food burger, Astros. I went through the Drive-Thru with my mate Lee who swore by the place - “you can get avocado, avocado is good for you”. I took my cue from him and ordered a burger with avocado, zucchini fries and an iced tea. The burger was good, not great, miles ahead of the big chains, but still a fast food burger. The zucchini fries were too oily. I'd rather go to In-N-Out and get a perfect fast food burger, and although Astro's may be a step toward healthier, it's still so far in fast food territory that it just seemed like a less perfect example. But both definitely good burgers.

Still hoping for a perfect burger I sought out a more expensive food chain with table service. Drawn by the 50s dinner styling I went to Johnny Rockets. The sloppy combination of bread, meat and cheese they served me was honestly some of the worst food I've eaten in my life. I took one bite and gave up, revolted. I stayed and got as many iced tea refills as possible to maximise value/keep from vomiting. The staff was the same age as the high school students that made up half the clientele, the other half were senior citizens. I couldn't help but think of Beavis and Butthead and all the horrible stuff they do in their burger joint kitchen and started to wish that I'd opted for vomiting after all. I got another refill and put some money in the little jukebox. I selected Here Comes the Sun, the fitting mixture of static and deranged clipped verse that came out from the malfunctioning unit caused me to laugh so hard at the complete shithouseness of this place that any iced tea that didn't get snorted up my nose wound up spat all over my plate. "Cheque please."

Not willing to admit defeat, I went upmarket and sought a restaurant. Because of its proximity to New Image Gallery where Anthony Lister was showing, I went to a WeHo BBQ place called Baby Blues. I ordered the sliders so I could sample a few of their many kinds of burgers (I love sliders) and a happy hour beer to wash it down. The staff were awesome, I’m pretty sure I fell in love with one of them, and they were playing great music. I got a mini version of their regular burger, a pulled pork slider and one with tri-tip steak. On the side I had a mixture of sweet potato and regular fries. The burger was the best I'd had in a while, the pulled pork was good, but the tri-tip was the best piece of meat I had ever tasted in bread. I place it up there with my best steak experiences full stop. There was some serious mojo happening in that BBQ flavour. My journey was complete.

Like any quest there was a lesson: I was reminded that I like street food and restaurants but can do without most of the stuff in-between. If you have a hankering for some fast food, get a taco from a cart; if you're fixed on a burger get In-N-Out, it's perfect fast food. But if you want the best burger you need to fork out more cash or make your own. I had thought the In-N-Out experience hadn't left much impression on me until many months later I awoke hungover craving it. Bizarre - like having a sex dream about a woman I didn’t realise I was attracted to.

Words and pictures by Oliver Heath

Olly goes to the Weed Shop

Oliver Heath gets his smoke on:

I assumed a medical marijauna prescription was difficult to get in LA, a token gesture to avoid the bad press of incarcerating the cancer ward that had no impact on the availability of weed for everyone else. When a friend that worked in a dispensary told me it was much looser than this in the wild west, I figured she was exaggerating. I was wrong.

LA is rife with pot. From a distance you can’t tell if you’re smelling ‘skunk’ or skunks anymore. It’s everywhere. There are billboards advertising doctors who specialise in marijuana medicine; it’s gotten to the point where the competition is so fierce that there are policies of price matching for consultations. Capitalism is a strange beast -you can go to a hospital in LA, wind up with a bandaid on your finger and a bill for $600, but you can get a pot prescription for less than $40.  The long list of things it can be prescribed for range from Cancer and AIDS to Anxiety and Insomnia. The dispensaries you buy your medicine from vary from heavily barricaded medical white to places that have a yuppie chill vibe like day spas.

Smoking bongs in my teens, I realised that being spaced out drooling on the couch wasn’t a good time, and gave it up. I’ve since wondered if my negative reaction might have had as much to do with dosage as anything else. I read a while back that in some countries there was pressure to reclassify chronic as class A, as it now has 27x the concentration in THC as the 70s bush weed that the hippies smoked. All I can remember of varieties was that there was bud/not bud, getting catnipped, and the stuff it was widely considered bikers had sprayed with bug spray and peppered with amphetamines. My curiosity was tempted when my friend mentioned that, beyond these categories based on strength and the honesty of your hookup, there were different sub-species; Indicas and Sativas, hybrids bred from the two, at a limitless variety of strengths and flavours. I began to wonder if I could get prescribed weed.

I was assured that there were doctors on the street at Venice beach that handed out prescriptions like they were stripper club flyers but this seemed like a likely way to wind up with issues with the law. Anyway I was in LA not Bangkok and unless it’s a taco I don’t want the street vendor experience.  I sought the advice of a couple that would surely be in the know, one a bartending babe the other a musician about to go on a 38-stop USA tour. In unison they insisted I go see the “sexy doctor!”

“The sexy doctor?”

“The sexy doctor from the billboards”.

The doctor’s waiting room was red and draped in velvet, behind gilt caged windows two babes took care of reception. I was handed a clipboard to fill in my medical history. There was a snack vending machine, Mission Impossible 3 playing on repeat, and a sign advertising a 420 love match service. My friend insisted that this was a cover for a dealer referring service, I disagreed: 1) because all the weed you want can be bought from shops, 2) call me romantic but stoners deserve love too... and don’t get off the couch as much as they should and 3) the doc had an Indian name and online dating is crazy popular in India.

“Oliver Heath” was called, and I walked around the corner to be greeted by the doctor herself. I hope my jaw didn’t drop, she’s was alarmingly good looking, even for LA. She led me into a small consultation room that had a combination of furniture and wallpaper that could only be described as boudoir. I’d normally feel like a pervert for writing about how a doctor looked but seriously the whole thing was visual overload. As far as I can remember she was wearing some kind of dress that, for a less elegant woman, might have been evening-wear and a white lab coat. I say as far as I can remember because I was lost in her eyes. Aesthetics aside, the interview was entirely professional. I was asked my medical history, the ailment I was seeking treatment for, and the contact details for my regular GP. At its conclusion I felt like I was on set at LAs ‘other video industry’ when she asked “is there anything else I can help you with?” In response I simply giggled. Not my most manly moment. She probably thought I was stoned.

I went to the counter and told them I also wanted the optional patient ID card to “assist with law enforcement issues,” and paid my $60. The prescription itself looked like a merit certificate from special needs school - complete with gold seal. The weed card had my photo on it, a patient number, and my doctor’s details. The card doesn’t carry any official legal weight itself but the idea is that they have the info to call your doctor and confirm your prescription. But strangest of all, even larger than my photo was a photo of the Dr What-a-Babe.  I’ll have to get her to autograph it for me next time.

From what I’ve gathered the prescription empowers you to grow a limited number of your own plants. When you go into a pot shop you’re essentially empowering a co-op to grow on your behalf, but beyond that technicality it's like any other retail experience. LA is full of weed shops. Most with white walls and green medical crosses that become quickly as recognisable as golden arches, a strange mix of a heavily barricaded pawn shop and a chemist. I wasn’t keen on the violent institutional vibe of these stores... the security cages scream crimescene and with the liberal Californian gun laws that’s a risk I’d rather avoid. There had to be something deluxe. I heard that a shop in WeHo was the place.

In contrast to the sterile barricaded paranoia of the run-of-the-mill co-ops, this place had that day spa vibe. Glad someone remembered what Cali is all about. After a quick new client interview where I provided my credentials I was given a sticker to identify me as a new customer and handed a menu. I sat waiting to be ushered into the backroom overwhelmed by the scores of choices before me.

When it was my turn, the weed shop dude was very helpful. He explained that the positive vibe inside the co-op was important and echoed my thoughts about the other shops - maybe they are weed Shangri-La inside but it’s nice to go somewhere that looks welcoming. He pointed out that while pot shops are the target of robberies, so are gas stations and jewellery stores and they still have windows. Maybe it’s a stigma/privacy thing for some but I don’t care about that, and this place is nice, still batshit-you’re-buying-weed-in-a-shop bizarre, but nice.

The menu was no help, but that was my fault - it takes me five minutes to select a brand of toilet paper in my local supermarket. I told the dude that I like that mellow 70s bush but he didn’t seem amused. He said “we have the strong medicine here.” I said I like mellow smoke. He happily played weed Willy Wonka and showed me a variety of Indica, Sativa, Hybrids covered in crystals, edibles, hash, lollipops and sodas, practically singing the virtues of each. He looked at me like I was missing the point when I asked if there was any herbal chop to mull it up with. I left with grams of God’s Gift Indica, Pineapple Kush Sativa, some O.G. hash and a vegan chocolate pyramid. I stayed clear of the hybrid because I was already confused enough, and was hoping that I’d get a gauge of what all this different stuff was like. He put it into a brown paper bag along with a glass medicine jar, and a glass pipe that looked more like it was for crack.

I stopped by a service station for some snacks and sat down at home to begin my experiment in earnest. I had guessed that I would like the Sativa upper weed the more than the Indica downer stuff, the hash most of all and the chocolate varying on strength. I’ve found edibles in the past to either be chill like a Nimbin cookie or heinous like a friend’s mum’s home made mountain brownie that left me worried that I’d forget to beat my heart.

To my surprise I liked the the Indica downer weed better. The Sativa upper stuff brought on the horrible skin itching and morbid thoughts that’s been another contributing factor to my dislike of weed. The hash didn’t get enough attention because after I discovered a friends Volcano Vaporizer I was huffing weed bags like nobody's business. Totally managed my insomnia and pains with my natural medicine. Like a boss.

Vaporizers use dry heat to extract the THC from the weed without burning it and being the deluxe model rather than a hookah like pipe the volcano has a bag. At up to $1000 it’d want to be pretty sick, and it is. It’s a totally different weed experience, I don’t smoke tobacco so it was a welcome difference for me. Highly recommend. On a side note, the current version of catnipping someone is selling already ‘vaped’ weed. My glass ‘crack pipe’ was useless but I got a small ceramic one that looked like a cigarette and was a popular discrete way to take your medicine in LA. The chocolate was fun for a while but ultimately left me stupid and feeling like I was wrapped in cotton wool, couldn’t wait for it to end. The feeling finally passed when I had a dump so I guess you absorb it all the way down your digestive tract.

So what did I end up thinking about it all? In effect, it’s legal in LA and that seems civilised to me. It’s still not something I’d personally seek out, but it’s good that others can. I met many people that smoke regularly and were hard working, law-abiding citizens and it’s good that they weren’t criminalised, stigmatised, or funding violent criminal organisations.  The medical applications aside (look up glaucoma treatment and/or appetite stimulation if you’re interested), I don’t see how recreationally it’s any worse than alcohol. Some would try and argue that it’s better, especially with vaped weed taking the smoking factor out. You can point to cases of THC use triggering pre-existing mental conditions, or heavy misuse being demotivational but it’s undeniable alcoholism has all those kinds of problems and more. We need to be able to moderate our own use.

LA seemed much more peaceful to me than it was in the 90s with all of its gangs and riots. I couldn’t help but wonder if the aggression had gone up in smoke, all the Gs turning their AKs into gangster bongs and their 9s into pipes. Hard to do a drive-by when you’re balls deep in a scooby-doo marathon. I also wonder if I might have gotten this article finished quicker if I hadn’t smoked so much weed.

Words and pictures by Oliver Heath. 

Mr Little Jeans - Runaway

Runaway is the latest single from LA-via-Norway artist Mr Little Jeans (otherwise known as Monica Birkenes). If she sounds familiar, that's because you probably remember her widely-acclaimed cover of Arcade Fire's The Suburbs.

This track is causing quite the buzz at the moment. Last week it reached #1 on Hype Machine and has had heaps of love from the likes of Stereogum, Fader, Spin, etc. So, we thought we'd share it with you too, so that you can see what all the fuss is about. Whaddaya reckon?

Getting To Know... CruelToBeKind

Fresh-faced scamps, CruelToBeKind, have a chat to Bobbysix.com about winning the Red Bull Bedroom Jam and heading to LA: 

CruelToBeKind are a five piece rock band from the eastern suburbs of Melbourne who love their music and just want to play as much of it as possible. We were formed in around May this year, and have been trying our best to play as many gigs, record some songs and write as many songs as we can.

We take inspiration from bands such as All Time Low, Powderfinger, Go Radio, The Maine, Tonight Alive and The Getaway Plan. All of these bands have really solid and catchy music that we love and we hope to achieve the same with our sound.

Winning the Red Bull Bedroom Jam was an amazing experience and a complete shock to us, as all of the bands competing were incredibly talented and each had as much chance to win as we did. All of us are totally stoked and cannot wait to hit the studio.

Going to LA will be an unbelievable experience and will provide such a great opportunity for us to put our songs out on record. It will also be a huge learning experience for all of us. Not only will we get the chance to record our EP but we will also get the opportunity to return home to do a tour with a established Australian act.

It might surprise people to learn that our bass player Tim has three incredibly attractive sisters.

In the future we hope to keep playing music together as much as possible, writing and recording as much as we can and playing as many gigs as we can.

Find out more about CruelToBeKind at their facebook page.
Interview by Bobby Townsend