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Posted by Bee K
on 2/23/2009, 8:43 am
Hey, everyone! It's me! Know what I'm doing? I'm listening to the new Crabs on Banjo CD! It's a TRIPLE RECORD! It's called Song Swan Sycle! 40 songs! I think it's great. Some people think they are massagonistic and have potty mouths. But see, I LIKE massages! And I crap my pants ALL THE TIME! Crabs on Banjo is BABY MUSIC!! My daddy is playing his last show EVER with CRABS on BANJO this Wednesday, February 25 at the SiDEwaLk CAFE!!!!!! YOU HAVE GOT TO BE THERE!!! Look who's playing!?!?!
Manson Famly Picnic - 7:00 - Their name is the BEST!
Alex P - 7:30 - He is so cute he's my BOYFRIEND!
Andy Junk - 8:00 - HislastshowbeforehemovesbacktoChicagoIAMSOSAD!!!!!
Grey Revell - 8:30 - Daddy says he's an ANNIEFOLK LESION!!!
The Telethons - 9:00 - YOU'RE GONNA DIE!!! YAY!!!
Outlines - 9:30 - Casey is in TEN THOUSAND BANDS!!!!!!
Elastic No-No Band - NononoNonOnoNonoNonoNO NO NO NO NO NO NO!!!!!
Shilpa Ray - 11:30 - She is almost as loud as me but not QUITE!
Crabs on Banjo CD Release & Farewell Show - 12:30 - YAAAAAAAY!
Read Brook Pridemore's liner notes below! Brook said I can puke on him ANY TIME! I LOVE BROOK PRIDEMOREOHMYGOSH!*#&$(*@#$!!!!!!!!!!
I LOVE YOU ALL!!! - Marcella Thunderbolt Krieger
Last Words on Crabs on Banjo, or How I Learned to Stop Relying on Practice and Trust My Gut.
by Brook Pridemore
When I walked into Sidewalk Cafe that fateful Wednesday evening in July 2008, I was there to cover a couple of local artists for a theme night Ben Krieger had put together. I didn't know I was going to witness the future of rock n' roll.
I had heard about this new, improvisational rock band that Krieger had put together with local favorite Brian Speaker and hotshot new kid Ariel "Slower Hand" Bitran on guitar. Having seen egos grow dangerously tumor-esque during my stint in an improv comedy troupe in Michigan, I wrote Crabs on Banjo off as another example of blustery, self-involved dudes wallowing contentedly in a barrel of mutual masturbation, and never bothered to stop by for a set. Plus, I worked Thursday mornings and needed my five hours a night.
If more people had seen what I saw that night in July, Crabs on Banjo would have been the most beloved band in New York. As it happened, the audience consisted of me, the ever-present Debe Dalton, soundman Nick Nace, retired poet Bernard King and Jaymay, a popular folksinger who transcended the scene years ago, but still comes around from time to time to relive the good old days. C.O.B. improvised their set based on enthusiastic suggestions from the five of us. Between Speaker's off-kilter sense of humor and willingness to experiment with different instruments and microphone textures, Krieger's taste for prog rhythms and vintage synth explorations and Bitran's ability to switch between modes and genres at the drop of a hat, I could tell that this was no typical ego-centric improv group.
I left that night, shaken and inspired. When I was thrown from the coil of the working world a few months later, I did not hesitate to get my biscuit down to Sidewalk on Wednesday nights, willing and able to pound the holy #### out of the house's kit. Not to put myself on a pedestal, but several highlights from Song Swan Cycle are from the first night I joined the group. You don't believe me? Listen to Krieger's joyous exclamation on the C.O.B. theme: "WE'VE GOT DRUMS!"
From the intro, the only planned number of any set, Crabs on Banjo is a noisy, unpolished cacophony, made all the more cacophonous by the wall of sound bouncing off the walls of the almost always completely empty room. Numerous times, I have heard something gloriously under-produced, under-rehearsed, blaring out of Sidewalk's sound system and approached Ben, asking, "What Guided By Voices record is this?" only to find out it's last night's Crabs set, being pored over for highlights. Melody, lyrics and chord progressions are often indecipherable from my vantage point behind the drums: Crabs on Banjo songs, to me, are all energy, excitement. Ben, giddy with the prospect of working a 5/4 beat into a 4/4 song, most resembles a Borshct belt comic impersonating a Japanese tourist zealously photographing everything he sees on his first vacation to New York. Brian Speaker, usually content to rock the microphone and bang occasionally on the piano, is Flavor Flav to Ben's Chuck D, if Chuck D were "Weird Al" Yankovic in an aggressive mood, and Flavor Flav wore a cardigan instead of a clock. Ariel Bitran, despite always being too loud, is the glue that holds C.O.B. together: as a textural player, Bitran picks Krieger and Speaker's ideas and runs with them, taking the poop life gives him and making poop juice.
And the drummer? Like my man Eazy-E said, "Don't quote me boy, I ain't said shit." Brook Pridemore has always been along for the ride.
Crabs on Banjo could never exist in any other environment than Sidewalk Cafe: the glory of Song Swan Cycle, what got C.O.B. over the sophomore slump, is the guests. The circumstances leading this band to collaborate with area luminaries like Duck, Isaac Gillespie, The Candy Apples, and Three G Crew's Igor (a tune that, sadly, got left on the floor of the room where they do the cutting) are uneventful. The typical Wednesday scramble for audience participation involved imploring the 11 o'clock act to stick around and check out what we were about. Then, we would press the suckers (i mean "fans") for song title after song title. They who perservered, either out of sympathy or excitement (I can never tell) shouted what they could come up with. We ended up with titles that ranged from good ("Tube Sock Revival") to bad ("The City Won't Beat Me"-??? why not just call it, "I Dig Music?") to ugly ("Freddy Mercury Moustache") to circumstantial (I am certain the title "#### Me With Your Feedback" stemmed from someone's ear canals being raped by too loud guitar and too loud drums) to topical ("Out of Work In NYC"). One night, in a scramble to try something new, C.O.B. picked their song titles (I was on tour) from the setlist left behind by the Manson Family Picnic ("Ten Dead Horses"). Sometimes, on particularly slow nights, whoever was onstage called out song titles themselves. Sadly, these songs were all too awesome to be documented on Song Swan Cycle. Too bad you weren't there.
And why wasn't anyone there? Is Wednesday not the weekend anymore? Everyone's staying home, taping reruns of M.A.S.H.? Whatever. Some nights, it felt like Paul Simon could have been onstage with us, that's how pumped we were. And yet, even if Paul Simon and Bono were there, we would have still been playing to an empty room.
Actually, Bono wouldn't ever have been onstage with Crabs on Banjo. Bono is a ####ing pussy.
Where did that fire go, that energy? Ask any of the core four of us, and they'd probably each point a finger at another member. Amos, the regular Wednesday night sound guy, typically spent the Crabs hour at the bar, giving the ears a well-needed rest. Debe Dalton, an unofficial fifth member (something like a "permanent substitute," if you will) wants the world to know that she broke up the band. Like the burglary that rendered half of Sonic Youth's catalog unplayable, Crabs was dealt a painful blow when, in a moment of inspiration, Krieger smashed his vintage Casiotone. Maybe blame lies on the upstairs neighbors, who's constant noise complaints might have got the best of us in the end.
Then, when I think about it, our short life makes perfect sense. Listen: The Band played together for nine years, releasing seven studio albums in their original era. Crabs on Banjo were together a scant nine months, but in that time, we/they recorded OVER FORTY albums, each one unique, each one completely-nay, GLORIOUSLY-unrehearsed. In our brief lifetime, Crabs on Banjo wrote and recorded more songs than The Who and The Replacements, combined. I cannot say that I wrote "Jumpin' Jack Flash," but I can say that I wrote "Ode to Greeter @ Wal-Mart," and I think that's just as good. Crabs on Banjo sounded like many different bands in that nine months. We were a little bit country, a little bit rock and roll, a little bit disco, a little bit blue-eyed soul. A little bit prog, a little bit pop. I am proudest, though, to say that Crabs on Banjo never sounded like Bright Eyes.
Conor Oberst is also a ####ing pussy.
Crabs on Banjo were a secret band. We were a band too good to be popular. In terms of on-paper accessibility, Crabs on Banjo were like The Residents meets Tortoise meets Melt-Banana meets the Sun City Girls. If you can put that combination together, you know the kind of band I'm talking about. If you haven't a clue what "The Residents meets Tortoise meets Melt-Banana meets the Sun City Girls" means, well, that's kind of my point.
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