Wildwater Kingdoms and the Ukes of Earl
Friday, June 13, 2008 at 10:00PM How's everyone?
Wanted to share a bit of my last week or so....
Took in a show by "The Ukes of Earl". As I drove out to catch the show...I drove by the old headquarters, where PEPSI almost had me wacked. Sopranos style. Let me track that old crusty blog and share that story. Anyway so I get to the show...and, it's the UKES. Dave Perillo and Brendan Carr...they're jamming into their first set. Now the band is all Ukelele based....but the Ukes of Earl, they do it their way.
Kneel before Zod. Or the Ukes.
There was a great moment while they covered Simple Minds' "Don't You Forget About Me" and had a lively musical debate with one another about the finer points of "The Breakfast Club"....after the first warmup set....we were treated to something I'd never ever seen before....
...a gentleman named "Mr. Deadguy". Mr. DG came out dressed in a sharp suit, wing tip shoes....oh, and he had a pretty elaborate Skull mask on.
He started off with that "knee bone's connected to the thigh bone" song and his set even included puppets. It was amazing. I then got word, that Mr. Deadguy designed the "Buddy Christ" statue from Kevin Smith's "DOGMA".
I hope Mr. Deadguy has a my space page, I don't think I can do justice to this performance. Trust me it was good times. (he does have a my space! right here http://www.myspace.com/mrdeadguy )
Following that....was MOVABLE TYPE, some plugged in Ukelele rock. I was impressed....the sounds the lead singer (who sort of looked like ROACH from Point Break) pounded out of that ukelele was amazing.
Then it was time for the Ukes of Earl to turn it up...they pounded through some great songs including a slamming version of the Clash's POLICE ON MY BACK (Actually the Clash covered it, but their version is more well known from their record SANDINISTA).
This was an insanely orginal and inspiring show....if they tour again, catch this show. You absolutely will not be let down.
Also, I finally sat down to watch the documentary "Kurt Cobain: About a Son".
It's sort of this artsy documentary being narrated by Kurt Cobain of Nirvana. It was just a ton of his interviews that were strung together into a cohesive narration. Sort of like the TUPAC: Resurrection documentary. I was surprised at how candid Kurt was about his inner demons and depression. It's strange when I remember how shocked I was when Kurt took his own life. Watching this documentary, it was as if Kurt pretty much was telling the world EXACTLY how he was going to leave it. It's tragic on a lot of levels....for me, aside from leaving his little girl without a dad, it left his fans with only 3 or 4 cd's to listen to. I always felt like Kurt's best days and his best music were ahead of him.
Speaking of 90's musicians I'd listen to. I've stumbled across Juliana Hatfield's blog. As a 15 year old, I always thought Juliana was the perfect gal, she was cute, she rocked, and well, as a 15 year old, that's pretty much all I really needed to call a girl "perfect".
You may have heard her song "Spin the Bottle" "My Sister" or my personal favorite "Universal Heartbeat". Juliana has a pretty honest blog where she incorporates her life and stories behind each of her songs. It makes for a pretty interesting read, and makes that 15 year old in us love her all over again. http://julianahatfield.com/blog/
To continue the blast from the past theme. Got lots of great e-mails from folks who caught me on a MEDICAL DETECTIVES re run...and then on the same day, got e-mails from folks to let me know, they DIDN'T see me in the infamous "Dorney Park"commercial. I'd done a commercial for them a very very very long time ago, and they've continued to use my footage in all of their commercials for the better part of 8 years. There's a funny story behind that commercial though...
We filmed the Dorney Park spot in Allentown, Pennsylvania (go ahead and sing a bar from Billy Joel's "Allentown", I always do) my buddy Jay let me borrow the keys to his house he had up there....so I got there a day early so I wouldn't have to rush (if only I was that punctual all the time). I get to the set of the commercial, it was just me...I had no entourage. I still need to put an entourage together actually. And the director sees me and loses his mind. He hated all the shirts that wardrobe had chosen for me. He was really really mad. He yelled a lot. Then we started filming. The whole commercial shoot, was me on this amusment ride and making some goofy ass faces. The actress next to me, looked just like Minnie Driver, and I kept making her quote GOOD WILL HUNTING, but the only line I could remember Minnie doing in Good Will Hunting was "Hook, Hook!"
The director, after about 10 takes, hated my white shirt so much, he was going to make me wear his shirt, off his back. In the middle of this awkward situation, an extra, who'd been on the amusment park ride for 10 takes....walked over to the director, and vomited all over him. So now I didn't have to wear the directors vomit covered shirt. Funny how that situation worked itself out.
After that, the vomit covered director actually became pretty cool, and Minnie Driver Looking Actress started talking about how she really really wanted to do some wild things to Rob Thomas of Matchbox 20. Minnie Driver Looking Actress was pretty funny. I hope she's still working in showbiz.
Hey Rob, Minnie Looking actress likes you. A LOT.
On the way home, pretty much convinced the director hated me, I was accepting of the fact I was likely going to be edited out of the commercial...
I was wrong...this spot ended up being used in a million different commercials in an 8 year period. To this day, I can't believed they paid me to ride amusment park rides all day. Even though it was vomit covered.....It was one of those days where you think "is this really even work?"
take care and be good.
hook hook,
TIM