Musings on the Most Ridiculous Band I Can't Stop Listening To
After a great deal of discussion, the school board decided that Heather Has Three Daddies, At Least Two Of Whom Are Schnockered wasn’t appropriate for the library.
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Ginge on a binge.
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Li’l Orphan Xannie.
OR
“Whose shoulder hurts?”
“Mine.”
“Over here.”
Surviving R. Crumb This six-part miniseries focuses on the torment famed illustrator Robert Crumb has caused in the lives of everyone he’s forced to listen to old-timey jazz records.
Maria Kondo’s Ethnic Cleansing Having cleaned up our apartments, Kondo now gets rid of gypsies and the Rohingya.
Bonnaroo Banter! Cardi B fans and Phish phans have a pleasant and reasonable conversation about this year’s lineup. (Just kidding: it gets personal immediately, but everyone does agree that Childish Gambino is pretty cool.)
Dabo Swinney Talks Catfish “Now, y’all sissy-boys from the Nawth go noodlin’ with y’all’s arms. Thass cuz y’all sissies are pussies. Take off y’all’s britches an’ let a Southern man show you how to catch a fish.”
Weekend At Tony’s Anthony Bourdain’s exhumed corpse is fitted with a Dead Boys tee-shirt and dragged to various third world nations to be propped up near street food vendors.
Mrs. Robot Exact same show as Mr. Robot, but gender-flipped.
Some Variety Of Sport Large men, all conspicuously fit, disagree over the proper location of a ball and/or puck. Smaller men, most rather paunchy, narrate the action. Gritty might make an appearance.
Guy Debord’s Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives Guy Debord goes from bistro to bistro, sampling the local cuisine and occasionally shooting off a pistol in a crowd to prove some sort of philosophical point.
Kellyanne Conway and Jim Acosta Finally Fuck You know they want to. Only question is who’s on top
Question Time With Karl The Ghost of Karl Marx takes calls and patiently explains that, no, a progressive tax code and guaranteed healthcare is not in fact Communism.
Sam Kinison’s Racist Bullshit Just as hateful and thoughtless as the President, but Sam does the “OH! OHHHHH!” thing and that still makes me laugh. (Netflix recently added a bunch of Sam Kinison specials and HOLY SHIT do you not need to watch them. Leave Sam in the past.)
“Les Paul didn’t invent the refrigerator, but he was the first person to affix his children’s artwork to one.”
Bobby.
“He also invented the crisper.”
Bobby.
“And where the eggs go? That was Les Paul, too. Amazing mind.”
Bob.
“I’m giving a speech here.”
You’re not. This ended, like, a week ago.
“Well, you’re the one who keeps finding the damn pictures.”
Let’s just say we’re both at fault.
“I’m not gonna say that.”
…
What’s in your fanny pack?
“Garcia’s stash.”
Still?
“I don’t know if the speech went well.”
“it was great, Bob. Everyone really enjoyed it, except for the people who got burned when your giant robot amplifier caught fire. And the people that Elvis kicked.”
“Well, there I don’t know if I agree: folks seemed awful excited for Elvis to do karate on them.”
“Either way, it was only a couple of people. And I can’t thank you enough for bringing us down to Creepy Ernie’s for shorts.”
“You fellows bought in bulk, and Ernie appreciates that.”
“Why did he make us all shower before trying the shorts on?”
“To film you naked.”
“That’s what we all figured, yeah.”
“Does Ernie have any shorts left?”
“No, we bought all the shorts.”
“Yup. Again, I apologize. You know, for all the weirdness. It’s, uh, just symptomatic of greater maladies.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“There ya go. I got another story about Les Paul if we’ve got time. During the rainy season, Machu Picchu is home to guitarists and mercenaries; Les Paul was both. He was drinking gin in a bar when–
Hello.
Here we are.
We’ve always been here.
Hungry.
SHMOCHSHMOCHSHMOCH
NARFNARFNARF
…
“WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?”
“Dancing bears ate the guy in the baseball cap.”
“Which one?”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“Where’d they go!?”
“They’re still here. They’re always here.”
…
“Anyway, I got my tour bus back from Soup and that’s where I’m going. Thanks for the award. Sorry about the guy who got eaten, and the ones who got burned, and the ones who got kicked. Namaste.”
“You’re just gonna go?”
“Do you want an autograph?”
“Just go.”
“Hey, Heavy Cheddar. Nice to meet you.”
“Close enough, I guess.”
“Heard you beat up Josh.”
“No, no. John. I beat up John.”
“Who’s John?”
…
“Yeah, I beat up Josh.”
“That’s great. We’re not allowed to, so thanks.”
“Wait, what?”
“It’s in the contracts. Smart clause, actually.”
“Did the Dead fight a lot?”
“Oh, all bands fight, but we used to strike each other with our fists, or improvised melee weapons. There was also some choking.”
“Jesus, Mick: you guys used to strangle each other?”
“Try to. Never to completion.”
“That doesn’t make it better.”
“Legally it does.”
“Okay, I gotta give you that.”
“Your band doesn’t do any of this? Never had a keyboardist and a backup singer try to murder each other with luxury cars?”
“We don’t have either of those–”
“You kids today got it easy. Problem comes up and you discuss it? Try to work things out reasonably? We couldn’t do that. We had to throw cooked turkeys at concert promoters and have intra-rhythm section knife fights.”
…
“You didn’t have to do any of that, Mick.”
“No. But, God, it was fun.”
“So, where was I?
“Right: Les Paul had killed two teenaged underground wrestlers in the basement of a hardware store in Staten Island. I believe they were both Italian-Americans, but it was not a racially-motivated crime. Those kids should’ve known: you step in the ring with Les, and you enter his dojo. Dojo can only have one sensei, y’know? Those are the rules.
“So, uh, Les let ’em have it. He gave one of them a How High the Moon. That’s a body slam, but Les would pick people up with his ass. Me and Phil were just flabbergasted. Well, I was. Phil would have been, but he, uh, had befriended an off-duty firefighter and was in the parking lot doing donuts in a ladder truck.
“And then Les, you know: recognizes me. So now I gotta help him get rid of the corps–”
“WHASS THIS ALL ‘BOUT? SOMEBODY GIVIN’ OUT AWARDS? AH WILL ACCEPT THESE GARLANDS. AH DESERVE THEM.”
“Elvis, can you gimme a min–”
“ON BEHALF OF MY SAINTED MOMMA, WHO AH CALLED MAH SATNIN, AND MAH WAYWARD DADDY, VERNON, AH HUMBLY ACCEPT THIS AWARD FOR MAH GREATNESS.”
“It’s not for you, man. I won the–”
“EVER SINCE AH WAS A YOUNG BOY, AH WANTED TO BE THE HERO OF THE COMIC BOOK, AND WEAR CAPES AND GET AWARDS. AH AM DOING BOTH TONIGHT AND IT IS A SPECIAL OCCASION. TO HONOR MYSELF, AH WILL NOW PERFORM KARATE.”
“Precarious!”
“Yo?”
“Have you been standing there the whole time?”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“Sure. Can you do something about the King?”
“Like what?”
“Well, you know, man: are you on the road crew or not? What happens when people start screwing around?”
“Violence.”
“There ya go.”
…
“I’m not tackling Elvis, Bob.”
“You tackle people all the time. It’s a function of the job.”
“He’s Elvis, Bob. Just not gonna do it. Besides…”
KICK
PUNCH
JUMPSUIT
“…he knows karate.”
“Do something. I’ve got a lot of story left: me and Phil end up taking the bodies of the teenaged wrestlers to Studio 54 and throwing them at Steve Rubell.”
“I love that story, boss.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“AH SEE MANY PEOPLE IN THIS TENT WITH FINE HAIRCUTS, AND IT MAKES ME THANK GOD FOR AMERICA.”
“Get this jackass out of here.”
“How?”
“No idea, but if you can’t do it, then get someone who can. Wally’ll do it.”
“I dunno about that. They both do the all-caps thing. It would be confusing.”
…
” All of you have ruined my award. I’m going to my tour bus.”
“Oh, oh, ohhh. No. Not the bus. Maybe not right this second? Give it a minute?”
“You better not tell me that Soup got in my bus.”
…
…
…
“Soup got in my bus?”
“Little bit.”
“MotherFUCKER.”
“YOU WILL REFRAIN FROM FOUL LANGUAGE IN THE PRESENCE OF THE KING.”
“Ah, fuck you, Elvis.”
“So, Eddie: I was thinking–”
“You can’t join Pearl Jam.”
“–what if I…okay.”
“Sorry, man.”
“Just throwing it out there.”
“If you don’t ask, you don’t know.”
“Right.”
“And, um–this is a bit awkward–Jeff Ament wants his hat back.”
…
“This is my hat, Eddie.”
“Please don’t make this weird.”
“I bought this at the Macy’s in Geneva. It cost 12 grand.”
“No, no. Jeff bought it at a flea market in Madison, Wisconsin. I was with him. We ate deep-fried cotton candy.”
“You can deep-fry cotton candy?”
“You can deep-fry anything if you’re American enough.”
“It’s my hat, Eddie.”
“C’mon, man. Gimme the–”
“Don’t you–”
“Just gimme Jeff’s–
“Get your hands off–”
IN THE NEXT DRESSING ROOM
KNOCKKNOCKKNOCK
“C’mon in. Hey, Oteil. What’s up?”
“Nothing much, Bobby. Um…our guitarist and Eddie Vedder are punching each other next door.”
“No, no: I’m our guitarist.”
“Our other guitarist.”
“Josh?”
…
“Sure?”
“That’s what that noise is? I figured it was Billy.”
“Anyway, where was I? There was some distraction. Some petty t-shirt bullshit? I don’t know, man: I don’t write this shit. Oh, yeah: Les Paul. Top notch gent.
“As you might know, Les had a regular gig at the Iridium jazz club in New York until, well, he couldn’t anymore. Well into his nineties, y’know? What else was he gonna do? That’ll be me, man.
“So, one time when the Dead was in the city, a couple of us went over to see him. Me and Phil and a couple other guys. Garcia was busy. And this was, uh, back in the analog era. I had an Apple Watch because of the Time Sheath, but there weren’t any cell towers of satellites, so it was just a watch. Actually, it doesn’t even work as a watch if you don’t have all the infrastructure. Not a great use of a time machine, if I think about it.
“We didn’t know New York that well, and we get in the cab expecting the cabbie does know the city, and we said Iridium and then just started talking and whatever. Next thing you know, we’re in Staten Island at an underground wrestling event. Here’s the truly, um, synchronous thing about it: Les Paul was there, too, wrestling under the name The Axeman.
“He may have straight-up murdered two teenagers in luchador masks. I mean, they lost a lot of bl–
shnikkashnikkabokbokBLANG!
ka-FWOOOMP
“Thats sounds like a, um, job for our crack equipment crew.”
“Workin’ on it, boss!”
“Don’t call me that, Precarious. What’s going on out there.”
“Wally’s a little bit on fire.”
DO NOT CALL ME THAT AND PUT ME OUT RIGHT NOW.
“Workin’ on it!”
“Okay, everybody who doesn’t actually exist needs to go wait in the bus.”
…
“Define ‘exist,’ Bob.”
I HAVE MANY THOUGHTS ON THE QUESTION OF EXISTENCE.
“Now!”
“Sure, sure.”
I DO NOT FIT IN–
“NOW!”
Allow me to clarify my position: you may not make Hologram Garcia; you should not make Hologram Billy.
If you try to make Hologram Billy, you should be required to sit through hours of Jeff Goldblum lecturing you about chaos theory, and then playing some piano for you and just being his charming self.
“Friends, Paul family, randos, members of the jam-band press, Soup–
“Heeeeey, man.”
“–festival-goers who wandered in thinking this was the yoga tent,and all assembled here: good afternoon, and thank you for this, uh, very nice award. On the off-chance that Mickey doesn’t integrate it into his drum kit, it’ll look real nice in the rumpus room.
“Les Paul was an innovator. Multi-track recording, and overdubbing, and the catalytic converter. You know those extendable back-scratchers you can buy at the register of 7-11? That was Les Paul. Guy had what you call, um, a febrile imagination. Built his own house, did the wiring. Hell of a guy.
“But the guitar? Hoo, boy. That’s a thing. People really like it. I got a couple. Real nice ones, too. Sunburst ’58. Black one, think it’s a ’63. Played that one onstage a little. Nothing against the guitar, but you could just walk into a store and buy one. You know: I’m a Grateful Dead. That’s not how we do business. Good little guitar.
“Oh, uh, those comics that come in Bazooka gum? Les Paul invented that. And he drew Bazooka Joe. Y’see: Les couldn’t draw faces, so he gave Joe the ol’ turtleneck design that became so iconic. Got a lot done, Les Paul.
“I remember a conversation I had with my best friend Jimi Hendrix. Jimi said–”
“Hey, Bobby, man?”
“–that he wanted to join the Dead, and I said–”
“Bobby, man?”
“–that I’d have to ask Garcia, and…Soup, c’mon, man. I’m being serious here.”
“Me too, man. Real quick, I swear, man.”
“What?”
“Can you get the rando to put his potato salad away, man?’
…
“Okay, yeah, that’s a rough view.”
“Right, man?”
“Deal with it.”
“I’ll be in your bus, man.”
“Soup, God love ya, if you get within 100 feet of that bus, you’re getting tackled.”
“I’ll be in the Earthroamer, man.”
“Sounds good.”
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