The only thing I truly remember from college...

is the Drei Kaiser Bund.

I learned it in history class at Fordham Lincoln Center. This term has stuck with me more than anything from all my schooling and I've no idea why or what I was doing at the time I learned about it that has caused this decade+ fixation. It's quite strange.

Around that time, circa 1996, I was definitely scribbling down ideas for the name of my bands first album as we were being courted by a few labels. Maybe I was interrupted from my back page of the marble notebook brainstorming sesh by a rousing lecture on these three kaisers? I need to see a psychiatrist so they can somehow figure this out and why this one random historical tidbit has stuck with me for so long.

So allow me to school you on the one thing I learned in school for I am the worlds foremost Drei Kaiser Bund expert. I've been all over the world teaching lads about this event and only this even when Kaiser Wilhelm II, Mehmed V, Franz Joseph were the 3 tenors emperors of the Central Powers in World War I, and together they formed a Voltron of sorts naming it the "Drei Kaiser Bund".

France recovered very rapidly from the terrible blow dealt her by Germany during WWI. The French worked hard and saved their money. In less than 2 years, France had paid off the last cent of the one billion dollar indemnity, and the German troops were obliged to go home.

France had adopted the same military system that Germany had, and required all young men to serve 2 years in the army and be ready at a moment's notice to rush to arms. France also began to build up a strong navy, and to spread colonies in Africa and other parts of the world.

This rapid recovery of France surprised and disturbed Bismarck, who thought that never again, after the war of 1870, would France become a strong power.

Otto von Bismarck had tried to renew the old "Holy Alliance" between Germany, Russia, and Austria with the idea of preventing the spread of republics. These were the 3 nations which gave their people very few rights, and which stood for the "divine right of kings" and for the crushing of all republics.

Eddie Van Bismarck called this new combination the "Drei-kaiser-bund" or three-emperor-bond. Bismarck himself says that the proposed alliance fell to pieces because of the lies and treachery of Prince Gortchakoff, the Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs. Mad aged beef.

And that's what I learned in college. After that I went to The College of Staten Island a.k.a 13th Grade where dudes bought peanut M&M's in vending machines to get their protein for the day before going for a tan. Somehow, I turned out allright.