Friday, February 29, 2008

HENRY ROLLINS ;Spoken worD

I saw Henry Rollins spoken word show last night at club Warsaw, home of polish food, in Brooklyn. Doors open at 7 , show started at 8 and we missed the exit at 7pm, and got stock in ridiculous traffic for 45 minutes going one exit just so we could turn around. You have no idea how mad i was. I cant explain it, maybe i thought i was going to be late or even worse miss the whole show, but i was fuming, the profanity swirling around in my head. I usually don't show my anger, and if i am really quite for awhile, and don't respond to people, good chance is I'm mad.



So in the end it payed off getting their late, sorta. We parked at 7:50, one block away, we found two lonesome seats ( me and my sister), in the front row, and waited 4 minutes before Henry came out. So the Universe made it happen in our favor.



A few months ago me and the sister and brother went to see Michael showalter at the music hall of williamsburg, and we got there 6:45 for a 7 pm doors opening thing, and than we sat for over and hour waiting for the show, but that show had people standing all around the edges, while Rollins was not even sold out. sidebar, sorta, michael showalter is so f--in funny. So natural. No planned segments, no jokes, just stuff i did this week and what i thought and what i thought they thought.



He does a funny segment ( OK so i lied about the segments), where he plays a song and acts out a scene from a movie. Not a real movie, a made up one, his thinking is if this song were to be in a movie what type of scene would it be made for. The first one was hysterical, he starts the scene

" i don't want to be like you dad, i have my water colors, I'm not jimmy, i will never be, we all miss jimmy". So first, you can I'm sure, assume, that the next three scenes were almost exactly the same but to different music, they all started, " i don't want to be like you dad i have my ______ blank, just to different songs. So now me and my sister are forever playing a game of filling in a sillier and silly er (not sure which one is right) blank. I suggest u try, its fun, i don't want to be like you dad , i have my lanyards, i have my matchbox cars, i have my chia pets.



The other item we adopted in our everyday life from the michael showalter show, is showing off while brushing it off as no big deal, for us at least. Let me explain. Another segment showalter did was to start off a story with, "so i was wearing my ray bands", and then goes on to tell us how expensive they were, and how many he has, but its no big deal for him. Now some brag in arrogant way and its annoying i know, Not showalter, his face, and body expressions are amazing, the way he sells the joke. Its priceless. so i suggest you try to find a clip of this on you tube because if you don't pull off the "its no big deal " body language , its gonna suck.



So Henry Rollins show was great, basically critiques life and talks about the experiences he has and his philosophy on life. Great story teller, funny, and he has had some awesome experiences. Just in Case you don't know his full bio he is the front man for two famous bands in the punk world, black flag, and the Rollins band, he writes poetry, has acted in 36 movies\TV episodes (according to imdb) including heat, he has his own interview show on ifc, which i love because so many interviewers suck today and are always cutting off their interviewee, but Henry has yet to interrupt or cut anyone of them off, which is very respectfull. and he currently tours the world doing spoken word events.



His work philosophy is to work 365 days a year, so he never falls into the habit of laying around and watching TV. He doesnt like war and is horrified at the current bush administration. He thinks the reason bush is able to do what he does is because Americans dont know the world, and the people of the world, so we should get out more and meet the world and its people. So he just gets on a plane and travels because he can, to Pakistan, Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Africa. As soon as he arrives at the hotel he drops his stuff off, grabs a water bottle and goes for a walk. To meet people he simply walks up to them and says hello , i am Henry , lets be friends.

He also talked about the time he met Iggy pop, diamond David lee Roth, and when he played with the rants for their last show ever. I highly recommend his show to people of all ages and people with all political affiliations.