There used to be a guy who fancied himself as a “street musician” who would set up across the street from my apartment every night and blare obnoxious guitar riffs through a pocket amp.  He had, what seemed like, no more than a rotating 3-song setlist.  He mostly just played Jimi Hendrix covers, using the muddled distortion and the fact that he was a black man with a guitar in Seattle to his favor.  The drunken frat boys and under-dressed skanks, clopping around like clydesdales ate that shit up.  Then again, they only caught about 12 seconds of it as they wandered by in a drunken stupor.  Try putting that 12 seconds on repeat for hours.  It was a smooth move for the “guitarist” and he marketed himself wisely.  Who’s gonna talk shit to this guy around here?  Nevermind the fact that the one thing that he produced was obnoxious and that he wasn’t actually Hendrix.  This Seattle; that would be sacrilege.

Today I witnessed a video of a man who I actually would have appreciated having perform in my neighborhood.  This footage isn’t devoid of gimmicks [he's a one-man-band playing a Wu-Tang song, for chrissakes] but something about it still holds genuine.  It’s actually pretty awesome and, although this particular footage is of the musician performing a cover, he is much more than a one-note.  In fact, through my research, I’ve discovered that he’s much more than a street performer, or even a musician, but that’s not important for now.  We’ll get back to that more after the video. (more…)

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NEIL HAMBURGER

The High Dive

Seattle, Wa

July, 9th 2010

When I saw Neil Hamburger perform for the first time, I had no idea what I was attending.  Mac Dawg was opening the show with his old Judas Priest cover band, Hell Bent For Aids Research, so I was mostly there to check that out.  This was easily 9 or 10 years ago and the show was held at an Olympia, Wa staple known as Le Voyeur.  In essence, the place is a grimy-ass dive bar that used to pay us with nothing but a 5 dollar bar tab (per band member).  It’s the the type of joint that, more times than not, involved traveling acts passing an empty beer pitcher around and relying on donations for gas money, just to get to the next town.  This event was slightly bigger, so I’m sure that there was probably a slight door charge but, whatever it cost, it was entirely worth it.

That whole show was actually pretty crazy.  First, Mac Dawg‘s group knocked out their set, which featured no less than 5 covers of “Hell Bent for Leather” and a moment of excessive live nudity.  Next was the hairy, Canadian duo of Canned Hamm, who serenaded us with crowd favorites like “Karaoke Lady“, while wearing little more than ascots and briefs.  When the headliner finally took the mic, he was fully clothed in his trademark tux.  Hamburger‘s aesthetic also involves a greasy comb-over, large eyeglasses, and an armload of mixed drinks that spill and tumble to the floor around him, as he staggers through his generally painful sets.  His disheveled appearance is standard and his “anti-comedy” often staggers and lurches between clever, biting wit and intentionally terrible, popsicle-stick-caliber puns and riddles.  Through creating his alter-ego of “the world’s ‘worst’ stand-up comedian“, Gregg Turkington manages to confuse the lines between audience and subject… brilliance and stupidity… comedy and… severe discomfort.  We’ve written about Neil before and should have an interview posted with “America’s Funny Man” soon enough, so I won’t go too deep into his back-story for now.  What I will say, however, is that the best parts of his routines come from the uncomfortable dynamic created between the character and his unsuspecting audiences.  I’ll never be able to fully relive the experience of watching his work unfold for that very first time, but, based on what I’ve witnessed from his current tour, the magic has definitely not been lost. (more…)

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I started hearing about Harmony Korine‘s new film, Trash Humpers sometime last year.  Slowly more info and video clips would pop up, but my main focus was to find out when I would actually be able to see it.  When that information finally arrived, it was coming from an unlikely source, Drag City records.  Drag City is a record label and, as far as I am aware, this is their first attempt at film distribution.  Aside from that fact, there are actually a few reasons that make the connection between the label and the filmmaker slightly less surprising.  At the end of 2008, Drag City released a collection of Harmony Korine‘s old fanzine work and, earlier that year, they put out the soundtrack to his last film, Mister Lonely, which featured original music by J. Spaceman and the Sun City Girls.  Harmony also has connections to other Drag City artists like Bonnie “Prince” Billy, of whom he has directed a video and even appeared on recordings, while the musician made a cameo in Korine‘s Julien Donkey Boy.  When I found out that Trash Humpers would be screening on June 18th at the NW Film Forum here in Seattle, this was great news because, not only would the director be in attendance, but we have a bit of a connection with Drag City as well.

Harmony Korine is an individual that I’ve been interested in interviewing for quite some time and I had hoped that this might finally be an opportunity to make that happen.  Unfortunately, two issues got in the way of making this a reality.  The first was that I didn’t want to request an interview through our connection at the label until we had already had the last interview with Drag City artist, Baby Dee posted.  Once that was handled, I sent my last-minute request at the worst possible time.  Our contact was traveling out of town, as well as working tirelessly to promote the project, so we were dealing with auto reply emails and missed connections.  We got an encouraging email stating that there was a possibility that the  interview could definitely go down, but never a confirmation that it definitely would.  Thanks to a nearly 1/2 hour Q&A and a flip cam, however, I was able to discover some interesting information and am now able to share the footage with all of you pleasant bastards. (more…)

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When KIDS was released in 1995, there was a lot of “controversy” behind it’s explicit content involving teens, drugs, and violence.  I remember all of the hype clearly; I was 16 at the time.  The film’s writer, Harmony Korine was 22, however, he was only about 19 when he wrote it [wikipedia claims "18" Korine has guessed "20"].  I watched KIDS and thought that it was a solid film, but it didn’t change my fucking life like the nightly news had claimed that it would.  Then again, I think that any lack of shock value for me may actually be a testament to the reality that had been infused within it.  While KIDS jump started the careers of first time actors like Rosario Dawson and Chloe Sevigney, Korine didn’t quite live up to the “promise” that many had expected for him.  That’s not to say that he didn’t continue to produce amazing pieces of work or to move forward in his career, it’s just that he never seemed harnessed into the limitations and ideas that had been placed on him by others.  One way to put it would be that the “promise” that the golden boy had placed on him wasn’t a promise that he had actually ever “made” himself.  In ways, his story is Pecker-esque and, as quickly as upper class socialites might take in a troubled youth for their own self-righteous ego boost, they will toss his ass out and turn their backs on him once he lives up to his inherent nature by intentionally smashing their Fabergé eggs, getting their daughters drunk, and stealing their cars. (more…)

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The Coleman 2-person had turned into an EZ-Bake and I woke up cooking again.  My face felt like sand had been dumped in to shrink it and I had a crazy bump on the middle knuckle on my right hand.  No big deal… but Kim was convinced that it was some sort of bug bite that needed to be tended to, so I let her whip out her little first-aid kit and try to sanitize it or whatever she wanted to do.  I was in this same campground 12 years ago, high on acid, and eating marinated chicken out of the same silver cooking bowl as a Rottweiler, so I’m clearly not as concerned about shit like Purel and antiseptics.  I had a positive outlook about the final day and a really simple game plan: “Enjoy Myself.”  No more drama.  No more bullshit.  I felt like I was adjusted to the format and the pacing of everything by this point and the lineup for the day was solid.  Tonight would be the WEEN set and I was so happy drinking my coffee and thinking about it, that I hadn’t even noticed when Kim squeezed some crazy 1/2 inch stinger out of my knuckle. (more…)

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GIVEAWAY HAS ENDED!

We love Frank Zappa… a lot. This also means that we take it seriously when someone decides to cover his music. We are sure that his son Dweezil loves him too… a lot, but that doesn’t mean that he’s capable of covering his father’s work and doing it justice. When I heard about the Zappa Play Zappa project that Dweezil has embarked on, in which he tours with a group of hand picked musicians to cover his father’s music live, I was incredibly skeptical.  However, after speaking to some of the biggest, most hard-assed, and critical Zappa fans that I know, every response that I’ve heard has been incredibly positive.   It sound like this kid has taken this project as seriously as anyone could have ever hoped and that the resulting effort is beyond what could have ever been expected.  When Zappa Plays Zappa makes it’s way to Seattle on Monday June 14th with a performance at the Moore Theater, it will be our first opportunity to catch this critically acclaimed tour for ourselves and see if it lives up to the hype. T he good news for you is that, we’ve teamed up with the Seattle Theatre Group yet again, to offer that same opportunity to some of our readers, for free!

Our friends at STG Presents have offered us 20 pairs of tickets to give away!   Yep, that’s 40 total, and were’ not fucking around.  This is no joke my friends.  In fact, it looks like we will probably have even more than that, when it’s all said and done, so pay attention to the rules and act quick if you’re interested.   If you do this right the first time we shouldn’t have any problems.

HOW TO ENTER

We’re doing this shit real simple like. (more…)

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