Heavily inspired by the work of punk legends Rancid, Washington County-based band Monongahela Meatsticks refuses to write a song about anything other than the borough of California, PA, appreciative but otherwise irritated sources reported.
“The state is almost 6,600 times bigger than this place, and I was already sick of hearing Tim and Lars go on about it,” said fan Johnny Stumbaugh. “So why the Meatsticks feel the need to write yet another track based on that Subway on 3rd Street where [lead singer and bassist] Ralphie worked for, like, two months is beyond me. I hear the podcast they’re doing on the town is somehow supposed to be even worse.”
Although locals appreciated the band highlighting the area, they tended to agree that the quantity of material approached excess.
“I was so happy when they made a song about McMonagles,” said long-time resident Billy Sarver of the Irish pub. “I listened to that thing on repeat for months. But when they released an entire album dedicated to it, even I had had enough, and that was before the three follow-up EPs, that entire hat collection, and their ‘McMonagles Pub Tour 2016,’ where they busked outside the bar every night for a week until somebody finally gave them $10 to get gas for their ‘next stop’ in Charleroi.”
Some people familiar with the band found it more troubling how the punk trio seemed to misrepresent the area intentionally to fabricate comparisons to the populous western state and its cities.
“If they want to sing and play about their roots, I get that,” said California University junior Haley Wilson. “But I don’t think there’s any need to suggest that this place is so big that it has to be broken up into sectors by cardinal direction. When I first heard the line ‘Billy said he’d be OK, born and raised in west California, PA,’ I almost smashed my phone on the ground in rage.”
As of press time, the Meatsticks were reportedly mastering their latest full-length album dedicated to the Monongahela River, although the band allegedly insists on calling it the “Bay area.”
(Original photo credit to Rocky Dennis Face and Crawfo Productions.)
