Hi there. I hope I am not disturbing your dinner. This is Arnold Landis, calling to discuss a most crucial choice you’re going to have to make this upcoming November. You know what’s meant a lot to me? All of those times we attended each other’s birthday parties, back-yard barbecues, and watching each other’s kids play soccer on Saturday mornings. What memories! And while my marriage is ending, our friendship has only just begun. This November, when the Landis divorce is finalized, do the right thing. Choose Arnold Landis as your friend for the future. Paid for by Arnold Landis.

Hello. This is Maxine Landis, and I want to talk to you about something very valuable to me. Loyalty. Through the years, I have enjoyed the friendship of just so many honest, hard-working people. People like Walter and Marie Pollard, who have welcomed me into their wonderful monthly canasta nights. People like Lester and Susan Fenner, who, in 2006, helped me organize a block-wide sidewalk sale, only to see it blossom into an annual and much cherished tradition in our development. I believe that these bonds were forged and strengthened thanks to one simple thing: loyalty. This November, stay loyal. Stay friends with Maxine. Paid for by Maxine Landis.

Hello, friend. This is Arnold Landis calling. Maxine Landis has been speaking a lot about loyalty of late. I’ve seen firsthand how easily such “loyalty” can be tested. I’ve seen Maxine Landis coldly cut off friends over something as minor as an unreturned serving dish. I’ve seen names get crossed off Maxine’s invite list as retribution for a perceived snub at the supermarket. I’ve seen Maxine Landis refuse to attend holiday parties in protest against what she considered a garish Christmas-light display. If loyalty comes easily to Maxine Landis, disloyalty comes even easier. Don’t get stuck with a backstabber. Choose Arnold Landis as the friend you keep this November.

This is Maxine Landis. I wasn’t alarmed by Arnold Landis’s recent turn toward name-calling, since I’ve heard Arnold Landis call his so-called friends much, much worse. People like Martin Powter, whom he once referred to as Captain Baldspot. People like Elisabeth Tandy, whom Arnold nicknamed The One With the Alcoholic’s Nose. People like the Blitsteins, whom Arnold called The Shitsteins. Do you want to remain constantly on guard, wondering what horrible names you’ll soon be called behind your back? Of course not. Go with Maxine.

Hi there. This is Kevin Joyce, the actor. I had the high honor of playing the role of Fagin at the most recent Rockville Dinner Theatre production of “Oliver!” I have also played the lead in “Barnum.” But today, I’m calling on behalf of my good friend Arnold Landis. I’ve spent many evenings with Arnold, and I can tell you that he is bold, creative, and willing to take phone calls from friends at all hours, as opposed to Maxine, who is never willing to speak on the phone after 9 P.M. She literally refuses to pick up the phone. I mean, who does that? She’s probably not even listening to this 2 A.M. robocall! That’s rude. When Arnold and Maxine split up this November, I’m sticking with Arnold. Know why? He’s a friend who doesn’t keep one eye on the clock.

Hello, this is Amanda Joyce, good friend of Maxine Landis and wife of Kevin Joyce. Maxine and I have known each other for years. She’s helped me through some really tough times with grace and kindness. Never once did she blame me when I told her that Arnold Landis had made a subtle but unmistakable pass at me at the Conaways’ Labor Day cookout in 2008. This November, remember: if you want a friend who isn’t going to ruin a perfectly innocent garden party with unwanted groping, Maxine’s the friend for you.

Hi, this is Kevin Joyce again. The actor. I’d like to stress that I am well aware of what took place at the 2008 cookout. I remember things a bit differently. I remember a lot of exposed cleavage, and a desperate, almost pathological yearning to appear a hell of a lot younger. And a good friend who was clearly way too mortified and embarrassed to ever consider making a pass. Hey, Amanda! Everyone found your behavior pathetic; even the godforsaken Shitsteins! Arnold is—and shall forever remain—my good friend. Take it from the guy who played Fagin. And P. T. Barnum. You can trust me.

Hiya. Arnie Landis here. Before you ask, yeah, I’ve had a few. And, yes, I know it’s midnight on a Tuesday. Is it Tuesday? Here’s a message for the world. Know what you got. Just know what you got. Before you let it go. Yeah, yeah. I’ve said some things. I don’t know. I’m very tired. It’s just that, well, life is an odd thing, isn’t it? I’m going to hang up now, because the room is starting to spin, but before I do, I just want to state that you are all my friends, regardless of whom you decide to pick this November. I better hang up this thing—am I still recording? I miss her smell. Bye.

Hey, it’s me. Maxine. Apologies if I’m disrupting your Memorial Day festivities. Last night, I found myself—totally by accident—driving past the condo where Arnold is currently living. Things looked pretty sad. Not politically sad, just … sad. His lights were off, but I noticed that he was using a cheap shower curtain as drapes, just as he did when we first met in off-campus housing at University of Maryland. Man, the things we did to each other behind those shower curtains! Hard to believe we’re even the same people. If anyone has seen or heard from Arnold, please tell him to contact me. I want to talk.

Arnold Landis calling again. Please tell Maxine I’m fine. That wasn’t a shower curtain, just a drop cloth that I used the other night when I painted my television black before I threw up out my window. Maxine, damn it, this is asinine. Won’t you give me another chance? There. I said it.

Ahoy, friends! Maxine Landis calling. I’ve given you the facts, now I want to hear from you. I’m embarking on a listening tour over the next few days, and I want your valuable input on a deceptively simple question: Should I accept Arnold Landis back into my life and heart? Anyone who can explain what in the hell an old gal like me is supposed to do with her heart will receive a free “Maxine the Machine” campaign button!

Hey, hey, hey!!! We do so hope that we’re not interrupting your dinner. This is Arnold and Maxine Landis calling, and we want to invite you to the best renewal ceremony ever thrown. Arnold and Maxine are back on the same ticket, and we are pounding the pavement to get you to join us as we renew our vows this Tuesday, in Ballroom C of the Holiday Inn on Route 28. We appreciate the momentum our supporters have lent to our respective campaigns. With this in mind, we’d like to harness all that energy by throwing our remaining funds into determining who will remain friends with the divorcing Amanda and Kevin Joyce. First, Arnold will make the case for Kevin, and then Maxine will do the same for Amanda. Who will be your choice for Joyce? If we could just have twenty-five minutes of your most precious time…

–Co-written with Bob Powers

#1.

Big Blind Ben’s “Back to the Land Bluegrass & Old-Timey Festival,” Staples Parking Lot, Poolesville, Maryland, August 10-12 (3-day pass, $225 / VIP pass, $495)

This will be the fourth exciting year for the annual Big Blind Ben’s “Back to the Land Bluegrass & Old-Time Festival.” Three days of music and fun! Enter a world completely removed from the hassles of modern-day living! Dance your way to all 24 stages, all the while soaking up hours upon hours of authentic down-homey music just like your grandmammy used to hoe-down to before she moved to Boston to die.

Thumb-fiddlin’ Acts:

The Bareback Mountain Wrasslin’ Fellas, Jack and His Fleshy Beanstock (with Fly-Swattin’ Pooch, Rosco), the Toe-Cuttin’ Whittlers, the Rustic Racisms, the Jug Blowin’ Recycled-Bottle Blowers, Easy Pete & His Banjo-Strummin’ Mother in Law, the Yale University Whiffenpoofs (performing classic Negro spirituals), the Bearded Rich Gents from Brooklyn, Hickory Johnson’s Toe-Tappin’ Nose Pickers, and a Very Special Appearance by Klippy the Kountry Klown, 98 years old, and still making strange, spastic faces for spare change, although it’s no longer a job.

Country cookin’ at its finest! Fried neck bones! Blackened Louisiana pelican and chitterlings! Hog maws and country-fried Steak-Umms! All-you-can-drink sweet tea served by the actor who played the One-Toothed Backwoods Anal Rapist in Deliverance, who will also be signing his new book, America’s Hidden Government (FreePressPublishing).

If you splurge for the VIP 3-Day Ticket, you will be provided with FREE access to the Exclusive Masters Club that features shade and special restroom facilities. You will also receive VIP Napkins (limited). Hey, y’all! C’mon back again this year! Y’hear?!

Special Events:

World-Famous Professional Spitter “Railroad Ronny” attempts to break his own long-distance spittin’ record (the length of four First Aid tents)!!!

Spastic Ol’ Style Yodeling Jams (Beginners to Advanced!)

Nude Taffee Pullin’ with Sunbonnet Sue!!!

Water Slidin’ with Big Bill & His Semi-Retarded Brethren!!!!

Dyspeptic Jonni’s All-Day Jew’s Harp Jam!!! (Sorry, Advanced Only!)

Big Blind Old Ben, Himself! As Played By a Recent Graduate of the Baltimore School of Performing Arts!!!

About Blind Ben, Our Festival’s Mascot

Big Blind Ben is a character that was created in 2009 by Kraft Foods to help promote its Wild Beans & Okra spice mix, and then licensed to the festival for a small fee and the responsibility to pay for all monetary settlements in which Kraft Foods is sued in any case related to racism or crimes against humanity. Never seen him? Big Blind Ben’s real easy to picture: think of Mr. Wendal from the 1990s rap group Arrested Development, but with a far sunnier outlook and with a penchant for handing out half-off coupons! He’s also the first and only product mascot with an unsightly harelip.

Directions:

Beltway to Rt. 28. Take the service road leading to the Staples north-west parking lot (adjacent to the Rockville Hospice Center). Look for the middle-aged attendants dressed in old-timey overalls and floppy caps, and using
Motorola Lightweight Headsets. Park next to the rented goats and styrofoam bales of hay.

#2.

The Freak-Your-$hit Horrorcore ClownDown (formerly the Soul Sounds by the Sea Shore Waterfront Doo-Wop Fest), Mystic, Connecticut, July 23rd-26th (BETA-ASS CHUMP Pass $75, NINJA DICK Pass $150)

After an incident in which four 80-year-old members of doo-wop group The Elegants broke their hips simultaneously during a choreographed spin to “Earth Angel,” the long-running Soul Sounds By The Sea Shore festival pulled up stakes and disappeared In the Still of the Night! But this year, regional concert promoters Dickcheez Productions have stepped in to fill the void.

Featuring 398 hardcore “in yo’ face and out yo’ ass” clown-painted murder rappers not quite slick enough to make the cut for the official Insane Clown Posse Gathering of the Juggalos, the four-day ClownDown promises to be some “twisted-dick bullshit,” all against the backdrop of a classic New England port town!

Ever had the urge to “drop anchor” on one of Mystic’s famous tall ships? You’re in luck, ‘cuz that’s where they put the Port-A-Johns! Get high on kush bud and wander Olde Mistick Village (Est. 1654!), where you can visit Colonial Pewter Miniatures and touch a lot of little metal shit! Or you can just watch lonely, elderly women in 17th-century attire dip long candles that look a whole lot like donkey dicks! (You’ll see—they do!)

Confirmed acts include PROLAPZED REKTUM, THE HIGH-AS-FUCK DUCKSHIT TWINS, DOS WHISKEY DIX, DA TAINT MUNKZ, POOP SHY MANIAX, LI’L LYLE THE MIDGET WITH CROHN’S DISEASE, formerly racist South African “Zef” crew AFRIKAANUS, and RETARDED DOUGLAS.

And good news, Ninjas: the festival is scheduled entirely on weeknights to make attendance easier for the unemployed!

Special Events:

Canine fuckfest featuring hundreds of the town’s horniest dogs dropped into the same 15′ by 15′ playpen!

A real-life Congolese war criminal gettin’ smoked-up and talkin’ CRAZY shit about his genocides!

A caricature artist high on bath salts who can draw your picture all freaky, and who works free for boob flashes or sample packs of his preferred eczema cream!

A morbidly obese man named Dillballs who swallows and regurgitates a hermit crab!

Eight camp chairs to be shared amongst attendees in any way they see fit!

And if all goes according to plan, the entire Mystic seaport will be made bright orange using 100,000 gallons of new Faygo brand Pineapple/Watermelon flavored Party Pop Pop!

Camping information:

Waterfront benches and the flatbeds of strangers’ pick-up trucks are first-come, first-served.

Directions:

Attendees are advised to take the charter buses departing every 10 minutes from behind the public library downtown – the one with the good bathroom and the librarians who don’t hassle you if you use the free internet to watch your stroke flicks!

#3.

“FAR OUT DESERT PLANET FUZZ FEST,” Wyoming Basin shrub steppe, Wyoming, August 14-16 ($150 or one ounce of high-grade marijuana from a medical dispensary)

Come experience the best brain-frying riffage this side of memory loss, as we bring you an amazing line-up of STONER, DOOM, PSYCH, SLUDGE, ULTRA-SLUDGE, CHAOTIC FUNK, DRUID CORE, MIND GRIND, PLOSIVE HUM, RIFF HUMP, AND NEGATIVE SWING. Sonic delights, straight from left field, that will absolutely decimate the boundaries of music!

All the fuzzed out sounds your baked ears can handle! Three sun-drenched days in the riff-filled Wyoming desert will leave you panting for more heavy sound, as you take in all five stages of brain-stomping guitar-fuzzed desert rock. The final night of the festival will culminate with a tonal symphony under the canopy of a full moon as the best-of-the-best Riff Monsters gather on the main stage for an alternate tuning “drone jam” built on a single E string. You’re gonna wanna grab the hand of YOUR FRIEND MARY JANE and take a ride into space for this one!

Check out this ear-splitting line up (AND THIS IS JUST THE MAIN STAGE): LUMP, DIRTY FIZZ, TENTACLE, ROLDEN GOAD, HARVEY’S VISIBLE, PLOP, DUDDITS, INJURY PROM, CAP’N MILLER’S BOY, SNAIL TRAFFIC, FOOT-LONG EAR, GONAD, and SQUINT.

Scattered throughout the festival grounds will be a number of “Hemp Hogans,” traditional Navajo wood and mud structures you can “chill” in and receive the highest quality medical marijuana available with a prescription. DoKtors™ will be on hand at each Hogan to “diagnose and prescribe” for those that forgot their prescription at home! SWEET!

Special Events:

Beard Weaving by “Lightning Bug”: When he’s not touring with guitar desert warriors, SLOW DJINN FIST, “Lightning Bug” gets down with some serious facial braid artistry. Choose from a number of original designs from Bug’s famous “Beard Book,” and sit back and let his gentle, nimble fingers get to work in your chin’s basement! Whether it’s a simple Sikh-style Roll you want, or one of LB’s specialties like “Chin Rows” or “Cub Hiding Behind Mother,” Lightning Bug will be on hand all day to make it happen for you! IT AIN’T WEIRD TO PAMPER YOUR BEARD!

Mama Hedgehog’s Super-Sweet “Fudge Sludge” Tent: Mama Hedgehog’s been roaming the cracked desert earth for years. No one knows how old she is, and her gender has never officially been confirmed, but one thing’s for sure: her sweet treats are a stoner’s delight! Instead of shuffling through the parking lot with her ramshackle wicker cart of edibles, this year Mama H. will be propped behind a table, wearing her signature sun-bleached Richard Nixon mask, in her very own tent! Come enjoy her newest batch of Fudge Sludge for 2012. Fermented for three months in an authentic Native American canoe, and containing a secret ingredient Mama affectionately refers to as “Jummy,” this year’s batch of Fudge Sludge is the best yet! Wash it down with a cup of freshly brewed room-temperature “Goose Juice,” or any one of Mama’s other homemade delights, such as a “Kooky Cooky” or a sticky handful of her famous “Froot.” And remember, in the words of Mama Hedgehog herself: “High-O Pet, eff ya cawn make it through a cup, your day is lookin’ up!”

Watch Rats Eat Paper: Cory Blastoff, drummer for Dowsing Rod, brings his infamous, exotic rat collection for the world to gaze at. Cory’s rat menagerie has been featured on Slink TV’s Wild Stuff Caged and Ellen, and was voted “most fun to watch” by Bongbomb magazine. Come watch these tiny munchers devour reams of paper, and get a load of Cory’s two big stars, Cisco and Keenan, giant Gambian pouched rats that have a combined weight of more than fifteen pounds! This is a spectacle you will not want to miss.

Even More Special Events!

Chukka boot painting by the LOST BOYS OF SUDAN!

Large banners of Marty Feldman’s face that you can stop and stare at!

Tusken Raider hologram shreds a Marshall Stack!

SAM KRABB (aka, “Black Sabbath’s Pete Best”) debuts a nine-hour drum solo!

Visors!

Directions

Talk to Scotty, or the Grinch at Basko’s. They’ll hook you up.

#4.

“Show Me Your Light You Glorious Wallflower Music Experiensation” — August 17-19, beneath the dappled sunlight in a painstakingly restored cider barn, Lawrence, KS (Limited tickets available, $135 or barter)

Hug yourself and sway rhythmlessly for three days straight, as your gentle frame is awash in the harmonious tones of indie rock’s most precious artists. Hear voices soar and strain, miles away from potential confrontations with bullies and overly friendly cashiers. And what’s that sound? A tremulous harp strumming against samples from a vintage farmyard animal Speak’n’Spell? Pure bliss.

This year’s festival features over 30 acts representing every style of twee, including Toy Rock, Sweater Step, Wink, Flutterfly, Shamblecore, Wisp-Hop, and Sob.

Headlining the mainstage, in no particular order because who are we to say who deserves to go first?: Your Favourite Jumper; The Unbearable Strain of Shyness; Fear of Touch; The Weeps; The Lingering Smell of You; Less is Amour; Gentle, Please Gentle; Thin Wrists and Pure Hearts; I’m Not the Droid You’re Looking for; Thankful for Rain; Ethan & Ethan; Softest Dungarees; and Hoobastank.

Sponsor Highlight: Olde Jim’s Honest Artisanal Shoe Reflectors

It’s a simple fact: Sustained eye contact can be unbearable, a torture worse than death. But now you can enjoy an evening of quiet strums without ever having to take your eyes off the floor, thanks to these artisanal shoe reflectors. Each reflector is hand-crafted from barber shop mirrors and scrap metal from molasses barrel hoops, with straps designed to fit over any size chukka boot. They’re also a great way to meet cute!

Check out some of the weekend’s special events:

- Wes Anderson Cosplay
- Sign up at one of our sweater stretching tables
- Touch Brandon Routh’s hair
- Sidle up to our unpasteurized dairy bar
- Free dental night guard cleanings
- Scream your feelings into one of our vintage pickling jars
- Late night corduroy rubbings
- Contribute to our “sob quilt”
- See if you can make Stephin Merritt smile!

Directions

Run away from home, then meander through the pear orchard off Old County Road 4, making sure not to frighten the rabbits. When you reach the old dead tree where lovers scrawl their names, read quietly from your dog-eared copy of Salinger’s Nine Stories until you fall asleep in the moon’s soft glow. When you awaken, you’ll be standing in front of our security bag check.

#5.

99.5 ZJAMz and Walmart present the “SUNSET ON THE VERIZON MIDNIGHT SUMMER JAM! Brought To You By Weight Watchers, Skechers, and Pizza Hut,” Gillette Stadium, Foxborough, Massachusetts, October 4-6 ($500, VIP pass, $750 [includes free on-site Wi-Fi, and $15 Applebee’s gift card])

ARE YOU READY TO JAM AND GRIND TO THE HOTTEST SMASH TUNES AND UNFORGETABLE POP ANTHEMS?! 99.5 ZJAMz and Walmart© are packing three fun-filled stages with your favorite top-40 artists!

You won’t believe your eyes™ or your ears, at the LensCrafters© Stage where you’ll rock out to: BUCK 9, MC CHEETOS© & DJ ORANGE, MUCKA FLINTZ, KREWD, LADY LAD, SARONG, SEXKEN, KID NUGGETZ, and SSOAP.

Then step on over to the Payless© “Stomp Zone” and get down to some of the slickest acts to pump the urban beat: MUNE CREW FEATURING H.H. SMOKEZ, THE HORNEE BOYZ, SUFFA ISTUHKATED, YUNG BABY BUNTING, CORDWOOD DIESEL & BITCH HEAD, GLORY HO, and SKRATCHEEZEY.

Finally, it’s our “New Axe Stage” sponsored by Axe Body Spray©, featuring some of the hottest up-and-coming artists EVER!!!

TAKE A LOOK AT JUST A FEW:

Lil’ Shenanigans: A runner-up on America Has Things, this four-year-old rapper spits the hottest rhymes with the help of his hand puppet, Stinky Lion. These two are not afraid to tell it like it is, as evidenced in Shenanigan’s latest chart topper, “Old Lady I Smellin’ U Butt.” Go, Lil’ Shen Shen, Go!!!

Therese: A protégé of Katy Perry, Therese was discovered huddled in a Forever 21© changing room during one of Katy Perry’s after-hours closed-door shopping sprees at Cleveland’s SouthPark Mall. With perfect pitch, and a vocal range akin to a damaged roller coaster, Therese is fast on her way to pop stardom with such hits as “Gang Mouth” and “I’m In Your Kitten’s Stomach Now (Be Kind).”

Stratton Dees: After surviving a horrific chimp attack on the set of his hit show My Snow Globe Summer, Stratton endured a total of nineteen reconstructive surgeries and has nothing more to show for it than a face that resembles a rotting peach. The good news is that the damage to his vocal cords miraculously left him with the voice of an angel, and the horrible ordeal gave him lots of painful memories to draw on for lyrics! Thanks to a lightweight and very realistic-looking plastic facemask provided by Dow Chemical©, Stratton is able to perform without scaring too many of the pre-teens who flock to his concerts! Look for him to sing his hit single, “My Tongue Still Work, Bitch.”

Special Events:

Record a virtual duet with a dead relative at the Sony© Holograndmatorium™!

Buy a pair of Mario Batali Meal Crocs™ and gain entrance to the snack tent sponsored by Tim Hortons© and Long John Silver’s©!

Free unlimited bathroom visits, thanks to Charmin© and the Neville Brothers™!

Enter for a chance to win a day’s supply of meals from Carl’s Jr.©* (*a charge of $5 per entry will be applied)!

Directions:

Type the code “Walmart95ZJAMzVerizonPHutSkechersFest@GiletteTimHorton” into your GARMIN© GPS, find your listed zip code, then enter: “CheetohsBataliCrocCarlsJrBurgerRDeliciousWeightWatchersGoodIdea” and follow the directions. If you do not own a GARMIN© GPS you will not be allowed entry to the festival.

#6.

“The Electric Gravy Boom-Boom Psytrancival,” unused portion of Rikers Island, New York, New York, September 1-3 ($250, or free for anyone wearing butterfly wings)

The Second Annual Electric Gravy Boom-Boom Psytrancival is an inter-generational event built on love, energy, and a sacred pledge that all men over 40 not wear any inner or outer garments with the slightest hint of Day Glo.

More than SIX Earth-Shattering, Energy-Infused Staged Areas, all complete with separate state-of-the-art sound systems, each borrowed just for the weekend from the Promise Keepers Ministry in Dallas!

“Groovy Anagalactic Beach”: LASERS! SMOKE MACHINES! Slinky mimes! Liquid ice! Powdered clowns! Used sock-puppets! Colorful streamers! NON-SANCTIONED TRAPEZE ARTISTS WITH ZERO HEALTH INSURANCE! A group of gay men in Dr. Seuss hats feeding each other tapioca pudding with sustainable paper sporks! Chill factor: Very.

“The UpsideDown Freeqy Garden”: Foamy fun! Glow sticks! Go-go dancers! ONE STONED MAN WAVING A HANNUKAH CANDLE! Anything can happen at the UpsideDown Freeqy Garden, as evidenced by the Great Tent Fire of 2011!!! Chill factor: Not much.

“The Sunken Crystal Nocturnal Rainbow Emission”: Join world-famous DJ “Infected Mushroom” as he spins his own unique brand of “Edgy Trance,” all the while riding a mechanical bulldyke. Chill factor: Zero.

“Licorice Convergence II”: Watch Miss Dubstep 2012 as she sucks on a nitrous oxide canister and goes “wee wee” in a box filled with sand shipped over from Ibiza! OBSERVE AN EXHAUSTED CRISPIAN MILLS OF KULA SHAKER AND A BEWILDERED JAY KAY FROM JAMIROQUAI SWAYIN’ SIDE BY SIDE! Chill factor: the Highest.

Special Events:

Seminars on How to Make Your Own Organic Trade-Free Coffee Enemas!

Midnight Bubble Orgy!

Post-Orgy-Cleanup and Smoked-Fish Deli Spread!

Observe Moby Beating a Man to Death for Attempting to Initiate a Country Line-Dance!

Special Apps to Hone in on Disease-Free Genitalia!

Directions:

2,3,4, B,Q, F or G trains to Riker’s Island front gate. Take prison jitney to concert site. Follow the miserable off-duty guards holding glow sticks and wearing neon wigs. Enter the Zone. Leave behind your inhibitions. Lock and load your libido. No bottles, no food, no job, no interest in what the rest of the world might call “acting normal and grown up.”

#7.

The Totally Rad, Totally Awesome ’80s Food, Fun & Music Throwback Festival: Grant Park, Chicago, August 4-5 (sold-out)

On August 4th and 5th 2012, Chicago’s historic Grant park will transform into a retro ’80s orgy of kick-ass tubular synth-rockin’ sounds and delicious phantasma-gaseous smells!

When was the last time you put on your Members Only jacket and danced the Safety Dance? Does Every Step You Take, and Every Breath You Take, remind You of How You Used to Be? When was the last time you blasted your awesome teenage toonage on your jumbo boombox? Not lately? Well, then, it’s morris-day-and-the-time to hop in your magical DeLorean and make your way back to 1986 . . . because Sweet Dreams are made of this two-day Festival!

HEADLINING: Tommy Shaw from STYX, performing a solo, acoustic version of the Kilroy Was Here rock opera, in its four-hour entirety! You might as well just . . . Jump!

OTHER ACTS, ALL HASTILY REFORMED JUST FOR THIS FESTIVAL, WITH AT LEAST ONE ORIGINAL MEMBER: Man at Work, Katrina and the Wave, Edie Brickel & Bohemian, The Romantic, Simple Mind, The Bangle, Duran, and the World’s Number One Middle-Earth-Themed Transvestite U2 cover band, The Unforgettable Shire (with a brand-new Bonaux!).

FOOD TENTS GALORE! Sweet Burgers O’Mine, Total Eclipse of This Hot Dog Cart, Don’t Stop Eatin’ Fudge, Every Corn Has Its Butter, Sweet Dreams (Are Made of Fried Ice Cream), John Hinckley’s Spaced Frittered Invaders, Explode-in-Ya-Challenger Curly Fries, Oliver North’s Hot Nuckin’ Futs, Sun City Segregated Chipwiches, and many, many more!

Special Events:

Matt Frewer, the creator and voice behind Max Headroom, r-r-r-r-reads Bright Lights, Big City!

Group sing-a-long to 1985’s Shoah!

Symposium and Q&A with the Now-Retired Schoolteacher Who Moaned Over and Over on “Hungry Like the Wolf”!

Michael Winslow Makes the “Whocka Whocka Whocka” Pac-Man Sounds!

Air-Guitar Contest in GG Allin Tent!

Morganna “The Kissing Bandit” Attempts to Solve the Rubik’s Cube with Her Breasts!

The New Filipino Singer from Journey Talks About His Love for All Things Cabbage Patch!

Directions:

Follow the scent of failed hopes and dreams. See you soon! Fur shure! Fur shure!

#8.

Skull Valley Music and Arts Festival, Skull Valley, California, July 27-29 (3-DAY PASS $250, VIP PASS WITH HYDRATING SALINE DRIP $300)

Most of the year Skull Valley is nothing but a vast desert, hostile to life and relentlessly raped by the sun, but come every summer it’s also home to the biggest, funnest music fest in California! Expect an estimated 80,000 attendees, 73,500 of whom will successfully make it through the 2-mile hike from the parking lot to the festival entrance without experiencing heat stroke!

About that hike: SAVOR it! The dusty trail leading from Lot 47D wends its way through security checkpoints (where a teenager in a floppy hat will administer a brusque pat-down of your cargo shorts or bikini bottoms – grin and groove with it!), past a SPRAWLING TENT CITY alive with the moans of music fans coupling after their third Coors Light of the morning, and onwards toward the distant sounds of air horns, bowel-pounding bass, and co-eds shrieking because they saw a scorpion!

Stay hydrated! Wet stuff comes at a premium in the high desert, and fans not interested in paying an arm and a leg for bottled water are strongly encouraged to dig their own CANTEEN-REPLENISHING IRRIGATION DITCH from one of the nearby date palm orchards! Bring a shovel, a sweat towel, and 10 or 12 of your most jacked-up ditchin’ buddies!

But that’s not the only way to stay WET! Stationed at the foot of every stage is a friendly Skull Valley staffer, on hand to spray the crowd with NON-POTABLE WATER FROM A HIGH-PRESSURE HOSE otherwise used to ward off the tweaking desert dwellers who scrounge through band gear for copper wire!

With hundreds of world-class musical acts performing on 17 stages—everyone from a reunited UGLY KID JOE to a Serbian synth duo who only have half of a song but plenty of BLOG BUZZ—expect to do PLENTY of trekking between sets. Be sure to rest at one of the several corporate-sponsored “OASIS TENTS.” We’re partial to the Beats by Dre-sponsored “BEANBAGS BY DRE,” WHERE YOU CAN SINK INTO A BAG MADE SLICK ‘N’ SICK BY SUNBLOCK, JÄGERMEISTER SWEAT, AND PIZZA RUN-OFF left behind by your fellow desert rats!

Directions:

Up to you, but pay special attention to burrowing under the sands at night to avoid perishing in the startling cold.

#9.

Toffifay® Presents “SUMMER UNCOVERED: THE ALL-TRIBUTE BAND GRAND SLAM (MAN-MADE) LAKE JAM,” Lipton Lake County Park (formerly Lipton Saltpeter Quarry), East Otis, NY. (7-Day Festival Tickets $145/Special “Leave Early” passes, $195)

Imagine ALL of your FAVORITE musical artists gathered in ONE landscaped picnic area for a weeklong ROCKSTRAVAGANZA! Well, this is kind of like that. You’ll bear witness to over 250 of the world’s greatest tribute bands, cover artists, sound-alikes, concept acts, and budget-friendly “in-the-style-of” musicians. Squint your eyes and press soft bread into your ears and you’d swear it’s the real deal—however, on the advice of our legal counsel and an unfortunate precedent established by the landmark copyright infringement case, Fabulous Thunderbirds vs. Fab Buelless and the Thunderbergs, we are obligated to remind you that this is not the real deal.

This year’s maestros of mimicry include:

Steel Dirigible (Led Zeppelin cover band); Eruption (Van Halen); Earth, Wings & Fire (Wings); Dave Navarro’s Beard Trimmings (Jane’s Addiction); Second Gunman (Dead Kennedys); SNIX (INXS); Hard to Explain (The Strokes); The Strokes (Billy Squier); Mr. & Mrs. Brownstone (Husband and wife Guns ‘n’ Roses cover band); Crème (France’s #3 Cream cover act); Hal & Oates (featuring John Oates); and the Spanish and Cantonese language shoegaze music tribute band, The Jésus & Mary Chang.

MORE Means MORE!

For the first time at this festival, we’ve assembled select members from several different tribute acts to form incredible SuperCoverBandGroups™.

Slip on your aquasocks (required, due to our lake’s recent razor clam problem) and swim out to our floating stage, where you’ll be rewarded with a one-time-only concert by Traveling Wilburies tribute act, The Wavering Tarbellies—featuring Jerome Hunt of ELO tribute act, Mr. Blue Sky; Dr. Ron Glassman of the Bob Dylan tribute act, Blonde on Ron; and three-time Masters Tournament Champion Phil Mickelson of the Beatles cover band, The Fab Fore.

Plus . . . a COMMAND PERFORMANCE by all five David Bowie tribute acts who, together, cover Bowie’s entire catalogue: LAUGHING GNOME; MAJOR TIM; THE THIN WHITE DUDES; LODGER; AND CRAPPY BOWIE.

Groove With a View

If you don’t have a pre-existing heart condition or experience an adverse reaction to difficult odors, you should scale the old saltpeter dunes for a MOUNTAINTOP MUSIC MARATHON at our “Shape Up Stage,” sponsored by Reebork® brand affordable athletic footwear. Enjoy the cream of the crop of one-man cover bands, including: Ron DMC; Brad Company; Leonard Skynyrd; The Village Person; Biv; and Peter, Paul & Mary Minus Peter and Mary and also Paul Plus Howard Schlemmer, CPA.

Get Your Snack On!

We’ve completely taken over the old mineral silo where that boy died in ’02, and turned it into the multi-level TASTY TOWER, where festival attendees can chow down on sweet and savory treats from some of the leading off-brand snack food companies and casual dining franchises. Crunch a bunch of Riffles™ brand potato snaps, sample a finger-lickin’ feast from Kennedy Fried Chicken, or cool off with a warm carob sundae from Blisskin-Ribbons 2 Flavors.

Special Event: a Live Reading

Fresh off her virtual book tour, the legendary tribute rock groupie, known only as “Available Annie”, will join us for a live reading of her tell-all memoir, Wait…I Just Fucked Who?

She’s done ‘em all, and now you’ll get to find out which world-famous cover artist had the most impressive hog. Was it Alan Stock of Huey Lewis cover band, Alan Stock & the New Drugs? Or Jerry Gorley, lead singer of the Smashing Pumpkins cover band, The Pumping Smashkins? Only Annie knows!

Directions:

See that clearing in the distance? With the people milling about, looking uncomfortable? No, this way. Yes. Just keep walking. Don’t look back. We said keep walking.

Andy Warhol’s Bowel Movement – This is a good one and ultra, ultra rare. In 1967, Andy Warhol filmed himself sitting on the toilet for an entire year. He ate, slept and, yes, went to the bathroom on the toilet. The film is shot in real time and will take you an entire year to watch, but there’s an abbreviated version that runs about four months. I don’t recommend that version, as you’d be missing out on some really key plot points. The movie was shot on 8-mm, in black and white, with a soundtrack by the amazing 1960s band Young Man with a Flower, featuring a very, very young Phil Collins. Good luck finding the soundtrack, though, which is worth about $50! If you’re not doing anything for a year, and need a fun way to pass the time, you could definitely do a hell of a lot worse.

Styx: Live at the Capitol Center, September 5, 1989 – This bootleg was shot on a VHS camera by a man from Potomac, Maryland. The man’s name is lost to history, but we can thank him for preserving the last Styx tour before Dennis DeYoung caught a rare Amazonian virus (from fishing nude in Brazil) and left the group to start a boutique candle business.

Everyone knows that Styx is best remembered for their amazing and fully-realized 1983 concept album “Kilroy Was Here.” But what everyone does not realize is that Styx released another rock opera, this one in 1989, that was also about robots. In this case, the robots take over an ice cream shop in Atlanta. They refuse to serve vanilla or chocolate ice cream for political reasons, and the locals go insane. Dennis DeYoung plays Stuey, an assistant manager who appeals to the community through song and gentle hand movements.

In the beginning of this 1989 concert, Dennis is wearing an orange and brown smock, and he is holding an ice cream scooper. He then launches into the album’s biggest hit, “Bathroom’s Only for Lovers.” At the end of the concert, Dennis is wearing a rubber suit, and is singing “Flavor of the Day: Happiness.” It’s a fantastic concert and ultra, ultra, ULTRA rare. Known to sell on eBay for as high as $45.

Dennis DeYoung died a few years ago. He packed a ton of love into those 72 years.

M. Night Shyamalan’s Unnamed Third, Fifth and Seventh Projects – Shyamalan is a genius, I don’t think there’s much argument about that fact. Surprisingly, he wrote, directed and released three projects that were NEVER released.

The Fateful Night of the Rainbow Catcher (2001)

Intergalactic Hugs (2011)

The last movie ends with a dimwitted poolboy named Benji getting eaten by a pack of wild dingoes. But there’s a twist: The dingoes are aliens …. but Benji was, too! The aliens ate their own! I still get chills when I think about it.

I pray that all of these will one day be released. Shyamalan is a brilliant auteur, very humble, and he deserves a lot more respect and recognition.

Jerry Lewis’s The Day the Clown Went to Rwanda – For the entire decade of the ’90s, Jerry Lewis was hooked on methadone. Because of that, he has no memory making this movie that he wrote, directed and starred in. The movie is called The Day the Clown Went to Rwanda, and that’s basically the entire plot. Jerry, playing an unemployed clown called Wolfgart, travels to Rwanda to cheer up the poor orphans who will soon face their own grisly deaths. Wolfgart performs magic tricks, walks a tightrope (only a few feet off the ground) and sprays water out of his fake bowtie and into the mud. The kids really laugh. Three people have seen this movie, including a former reviewer for The Washington Post, Anthony Hoagland, who wrote: “Like watching a snuff film but without the laughs.”

I think that’s way, way too harsh, but having never seen this movie, I can’t really prove otherwise. I do know that it was all shot in Jerry’s backyard in Las Vegas and features no one of color. Worth a fortune.

Pluckett & Farley – Burt Reynolds is amazingly prolific. He has starred in over 300 movies and about 200 TV shows. He never stops. Burt was especially in his prime in the mid-’70s, but even his biggest fans never seemed to have watched Pluckett & Farley, even though it’s now available on BurtReynolds.com streaming. I do know that the movie was shown once at an Alabama drive-in theater in ’76 and never seen again. The rumor is that the guy who owned the drive-in traded the movie for enough money to keep the drive-in going for another month, at which time it then went out of business for good (about a month later).

I’m a sucker for any movie that features intelligent orangutans doing human things, like giving a thumbs up, blowing a raspberry or just mouthing off to racist cops.

This movie has none of that, but it does feature a really beautiful orangutan named Farley who was rescued somewhere in Africa and then purchased by Burt for $200 at a Kentucky Derby party.

Whenever Farley gets mad or scared, he attacks everything in sight and rips off limbs. If that doesn’t sound funny, rest assured that it’s hilarious on the screen.

In one scene, Burt (who plays Pluckett) tells Farley to fetch him a beer. Farley goes the fridge, but comes back with a soda. Burt curses and kicks Farley out of the house. Farley then goes on a rampage, attempting to kill anyone who tries to stop him, including a redneck sheriff and an uppity woman who hates alcohol. Both die … but it’s okay, as both weren’t very nice. (It’s interesting … in the novelization to this film, the orangutan is played by a donkey. Not sure why they changed it.)

The movie ends with Farley being put down by a zoo-keeper in a helicopter, as Burt stands before a gorgeous sunset and weeps. There was no sequel.

Folks, that’s it for this month! If you’re feeling generous, please donate! Unearthing these gems ain’t free.

Yours,

Bootleg Mike
(RARESHITBOOTS@yahoo.com)

JACKSON BENNECK, “Welcome to My Paisley Reality” (1972) – An absolutely AWESOME album by one of the lead harmonica players from Ireland’s Toot Toot Tootlers. (They were supposed to perform at Woodstock, but they weren’t asked. Sha Na Na performed instead.) It’s crazy, far-out, psychedelic harmonica, but really well done. Standout: “Little Old Ladies with Painted Breasts.” REALLY hard to find! Look for the album cover that features a unicorn reading the Kama Sutra. The unicorn is wearing bifocals. This one’s especially valuable! (estimated: $4,000)

EDGAR WINTER, “The Hoagie Jams” (1973) – This album is KILLER! In the late 70s, a delivery man in LA delivered a tuna sandwich to Edgar Winter’s house, and stumbled across an impromptu bluegrass jam featuring Winter and a mysterious-looking banjo player. It turned out that the banjo player was Jerry Garcia! On the drums was Edgar Winter’s girlfriend-at-the-time, Cindy Williams, who later became famous for playing Shirley on Laverne & Shirley. The music is terrible, perhaps the worst I’ve ever heard, but the between-song banter is AMAZING! At one point, Garcia cries out that he needs a stain-removal stick. Williams tells him to shut his huge “yapper.” Supposedly there’s also a sex tape, but I haven’t been able to find it. Email my hotmail (RARESHITBOOTS@yahoo.com) if ya got it. (estimated: $2,000)

NEU!, “Seasons of a Woman’s Cycle” (1978) – Klaus Dinger and Michael Rother were German visionaries, which definitely explains why they decided to record a themed album based on a woman’s menstrual cycle. “Day 25” is my favorite song, but “Day 27” is INCREDIBLE, too. I love the tympani solo. On the German pressing, Klaus and Michael assume a frontiersman pose. On the UK pressing, Klaus and Michael are hugging a yellow plastic wizard’s hat. There’s also a 55 rpm version, but it’s impossible to play. (estimated: $1,500)

STEPHEN, “I’m in Love with Smiles” (1989) – Stephen was a 15-year-old kid from Kansas or somewhere who had locked-in syndrome. He couldn’t speak or hear or talk. But with the help of a very patient male nurse, he recorded this UNBELIEVABLE album. It took him a year. Only two were made. I have one and Stephen’s family has the other. I’m trying to get that one also, so I’d own all of the copies in the entire world. INCREDIBLY RARE!!! I think it’s worth a TON! It’s my makeout album of choice. Stephen died. (estimated: ?)

CHET BAKER, “In a Midnight Dreary” (1977) – I’m not a fan of jazz at all, but I like this album a lot. Chet Baker was a heroin addict. He recorded this album in Rome, in a guy’s hotel, for a spaghetti dinner. He does all of the American jazz classics. My favorite is the one where he just says “Thirsty” in a high-pitched voice over and over. He also does an amazing song called “The Saga of Johnny Eagle” about an Indian who could see into the future but not the past. There’s a see-through orange colored vinyl version that is beautiful, but I don’t have it. Some LPs also come with a life-size poster of Chet Baker conked out on a couch, eating a container of raspberry Go-Gurt. Would love to hang that one in my bedroom. (estimated: $6,000)

GUTTER CRUNCH, “Steady Diet of Pancakes,” (1989) – This was Ian Mackaye of Fugazi’s third band, just before he joined Bladder Wars, StarLung, Happy Go Lickys, One-Thumbed Circus Gimps, A Sack of Upset, Stank Toes, and Artificial Piece. This recording comes from an all-ages live show held in July 1989 in the basement of an Arlington, Virginia International House of Pancakes. During the performance, straight-edger Mackaye requests that no one sneeze, cough or clap in an aggressive manner. The set opens with “Racism UnRaveled” and ends midway through the song just as the IHOP’s manager kicks out the entire band and audience for not having “permission” to be there. Each 8-inch LP is signed by Mackaye with a “FUCK” spelled out with tiny little peace-signs. That’s pretty cool. (estimated: impossible to tell, practically priceless. But around $200)

That’s all for now. More to come later this month. Email me with suggestions!!!!

Bootleg Mike

Condo President-for-Life

It is with bottomless grief and unquenchable sorrow that I announce the following:

My dear father, the noble Mr. Anthony Walsh, beloved president of this condominium building for more than twenty-five years, friend to all, savior to many, has passed away while attending to the matters and needs of the denizens who populate his adored Ansonia Court—namely, suffering a heart attack while changing a light bulb in the mailbox area.

Regrettably, yet unavoidably, I was vacationing at San Diego Comic-Con, as part of a Groupon package I was forced to use prior to its expiration.

My father’s death comes as a horrific shock to those familiar with his otherworldly strength and ferocious power, even taking into account his previous six heart attacks—all sustained in various light-bulb-changing endeavors.

And so, with untrammeled pride and enormous privilege, I publicly announce that I, Marc Walsh, the great leader’s favored son and heir and now sole resident of 6A, in my dynamic prime at thirty-nine years of age, shall immediately assume the role of condo president-for-life, in a peaceful transition of power of which I am certain Ansonia’s late patriarch would approve, had he known about it.

As a symbol of my capacity to step into my father’s gargantuan size-eight Rockport Pro Walkers, I have commissioned a twelve-by-fifteen-foot trompe l’oeil oil painting of myself in the lobby. Yes, I am riding a stallion. Yes, it is a rental. And, yes, that is Katie Forden from 7B sitting behind me, hands clasped around my waist. Although we have not yet spoken, and she may or may not be aware of my existence, I hope that this will be an irresistible first step.

In the spirit of my father’s valiant leadership, I propose the following resolutions:

First: Starting tomorrow, each and every occupant of Ansonia Court will be issued a hat for our new softball squad, the Ansonia Marcs, featuring a photorealistic profile of me, President-for-Life Marc Walsh, to be worn at all times, including enforced 9 P.M. ablutions. I will not attend games, but will preside as general manager of the team, due to my allergy to sunshine. An aggressive demonstration of our unity shall take form this Sunday at noon in a massive march across the street in front of the eyesore that is our adversary, Gibson Estates Condominiums. Also, at the same hour and within my apartment, I shall require a large contingent of residents to reorganize my massive library of anime books, Matrix novelizations, and fantasy-board-game manuals.

Second: Someone has to change the front, back, and basement entrance locks so that public enemy number one, my erratic, unstable, younger brother Keith, may never, ever cross the “Twelfth Street parallel” demarcating Ansonia Court from the rest of Brooklyn. If you have not heard of this ostracized family pariah, it is for a good reason, as the craven black sheep moved out of the building seventeen years ago to become a periodontist in Scarsdale and only returns once a year with his wife and three daughters, on Thanksgiving, to boast about his hollow achievements.

For details of my own superior accomplishments, including my wondrous conception that took place in Atlantic City beneath a double rainbow and my birth under an immense waterfall in Brooklyn, please check out my impressive C.V. framed in the lobby, now posted to the Sign of Eternal Truth (formerly the babysitting bulletin board).

Third: All FreshDirect deliveries shall be sent directly to me for my inspection of contraband injurious to residents. Items that risk confiscation include but are not limited to: spirits; sugar cereals; and Flamin’ Hot Cheetos. Any such items found in apartments will likewise be confiscated by the Department of Foodstuff Security (ten-year-old twins Tim and Fred from 3D). And let’s finally find someone to fix that finicky buzzer, lest the FreshDirect deliveryman be grievously denied entry.

Fourth: I think we can all agree that dogs should be perpetually leashed on our sacred premises. And I think we can further agree that each of the building’s fifty-eight female residents shall rotate weekly as members of my presidential harem, with Katie Forden from 7B occupying the position of “first helpmeet.”

Fifth: Mandatory group yoga exercise across from my former workplace, Reel Life Video Store, on Eighth Avenue, every afternoon at two o’clock, to a chant of my new nickname, “Dear Condo Leader.” The purpose of this will be to prove, once and for all, that I did not deserve to be fired in May 2004 for “having an attitude” and “stealing from the adult section.”

Sixth: My father currently lies in state in 10A. I would like to thank Walter and Lily Kalin for their much-appreciated patience in this terrible time of mourning. I would only ask that the Kalins not turn on their air-conditioner to combat the July heat, as the condensation drops are spattering my balcony and preventing me from enjoying my midday microwavable-pancakes-and-mojitos breakfast. Furthermore, I apologize for my confused, grief-stricken state, which often causes me to barge into the Kalins’ neighboring apartments, such as Katie Forden’s in 7B, during 9 P.M. ablutions.

This has been your condo president-for-life, whose voice emanates from your newly installed Information Speakers. We will now switch to audio output of my World of Warcraft gameplay, regularly occurring between the hours of 11 P.M. to 5 A.M. Long live Ansonia Court! Long live Condo President-for-Life Marc Walsh!
Oh, and the mailbox-area light bulb still needs to be changed.

–Co-written with Teddy Wayne

Occupy the North Pole: Stand Athwart the Jolly One Percent!

I did everything a diminutive mythical creature was supposed to do. I grew up in a suburban forest in a modest but clean two-limb tree. I was raised by my mother, a wood sprite and former model for the original D&D board game, and by my father, a Keebler clock-puncher for more than 30 years (Fudge Shoppe division). My parents wanted a better elf life for me than the one they had. So they scrimped and they saved, eventually sending me to the best post-secondary toy-making school they could.

Still, I had to take out significant student loans to attend Middle-Earth Community College. I majored in the practical field of conjoining blocks, with a minor in jacks. After writing a thesis titled “Leg(g)o My Lego: The Architectonic Ethic in 20th-Century Children’s Recreational Objects,” I graduated summa cum laude, and eagerly entered the workforce—only to find all the toy-making jobs had vanished, thanks to the newly digitized economy.

As the interest on my loans piled up like Lincoln Logs, I hoped to put my skills to use in expressing my impish creativity. I wanted to be the next Fisher, or perhaps Price. Instead, I had to make do with an unpaid internship at Baby Einstein. After months of toiling, one day I heard about an opening at Santa’s Workshop. The listing was for a senior wooden-toy-maker—all in all, my dream job. My wife, Nancy, and I relocated, deciding that since we’d be out there for the long haul, it made sense to buy a brand-new igloo rather than rent. This was 2006. It was the height of the igloo-market bubble.

On my very first day at the gig, management had news for me. I was told the Workshop was restructuring, and that I would no longer be providing design input on the new line of wooden toys. Instead, I’d be an assembly-line toy-maker. I was devastated—but I took it, as Nancy was 24 days’ pregnant, ready to burst at any moment. My “job” was—and is, five years later—inserting a dowel into whatever wooden toy we’re cranking out that week. Let me tell you, it’s real stimulating stuff. We routinely put in 14-hour days, and are permitted only one bed-of-hay break. My hands have crippling arthritis from the nonstop demand, at the age of nine; I hate to think what they’ll be like when I’m in my teens. Attempts to join the Tinkerers’ Union have been met with threats of being “naughty”-listed. To top it off, we’re all forced to wear demeaning green outfits, with ugly red safety goggles, and standard-issue, extremely narrow-toed work booties that painfully pinch our taloned feet. If we complain to management, they simply mince around and mock our high-pitched voices.

Having now been here a while, I can report that the Workshop is not like what you read about in the fables. Had I known this beforehand, I never would have moved out of that quaint, paid-off coniferous shrub in a leafy neighborhood. I feel trapped, destined to stay forever in our McIgloo located on half a million acres of property. I could go on—about how the security on our ice-floe development does nothing concerning the ever-present threat of polar bears, the lack of health insurance in a climate where I get pneumonia constantly, my 401(k) that’s been virtually wiped out by the carelessly overhung stockings market.

But the Scrooge here is the one percent.

While I’m barely able to put gingerbread on the table for my family, my C.E.O. is happily obese from ham and candy canes—some might even say jolly. Each morning, I squeeze into a crowded commuter snowmobile, while my boss, usually blotto from spiked eggnog, swans around in a nine-reindeer sports sled with a booming mega-jingle sound system. I get 18 days off a year, none during the holidays. He works for one night. In 1960, he made about 10 times the salary of the average Workshop elf, and now it’s 475 times the amount—not including milk-and-cookie bonuses related to toys delivered. Or, you know, not delivered. Doesn’t matter anymore. Because of his bookkeeping records, opaque as chimney soot, he’s known around the office as “Secret Santa.”

I’m not asking for much: just an igloo that’s worth more than its weight in shaved ice, and an occupation that takes advantage of my artisanal training—not belittles it. Does a hardworking, two-foot-tall ethereal being dressed from head to toe in Yuletide colors no longer command respect in today’s world? Must a quasi-magical entity of proud Norse heritage take on a mortifying second job dressing up for kids’ parties as Crackle? Or moonlighting at Vegas conventions as “Elvish” Presley? I demand answers.

And so, as I bang on this toy drum day and night, I ask you to think about me every time your child squeals with delight from his brand-new wooden plaything that contains a dowel—bought for $79.95, of which I see but chocolate coins. I am an elf, and I’m just a very small part of the 99 percent. Keep heading north and you’ll find me. I’ll be the one chained in protest to this plastic evergreen, fighting for myself—and for all the other little guys.

–Co-written with Teddy Wayne

Mike Sacks’ one-man war against the zeitgeist: The American humourist doesn’t bother with predictable targets like Palin or hicks. He prefers gerbils, the Holocaust, girls’ lockerrooms…

By Tim Black

Is it funny to mock sad-sack thirtysomething writers who desperately try to write like the kidz? Is it funny to imagine Anne Frank trying to get a film deal and being told that her diaries could be a PG-13 action movie if she just threw in a few shower scenes? And in a list of Worst Places to Die, is it really so humdingingly hilarious to write: ‘Crouched in the rafters above the high-school girls’ locker room, your janitorial uniform bunched around your ankles’? Come on, is that funny?

Well yes, I think it probably is. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that Your Wildest Dreams Within Reason, a collection of American humourist Mike Sacks’ assorted writings, is one of the funniest books I’ve read in a long time. And that includes Wikileaks: Inside Julian Assange’s War On Secrecy.

What is remarkable is the sheer range of the man. The pastiche, the parody, the absurd vignette, the comic list – Sacks can do it all. To praise it as the Perfect Toilet Book, as some reviewers have, is to do an injustice to Sack’s wordsmithery, his ability to subvert, invert and juxtapose at will and in a variety of forms. All of which serves his simple comedic objective – to have you guffawing.

This is one of the most refreshing aspects of Sacks’ pieces. His sole criteria, it seems, is what will make you laugh; what, with a sudden twist of phrase, a shocking reversal, will draw you up short, snorting approval. He’s not interested in saying the right things or flaying the right targets. He doesn’t massage his audience’s prejudices, as too many comics do today; he just ignores your prejudices. He doesn’t subscribe to the Approved List of Things It Is Right to Mock: Sarah Palin, the Tea Party, hicks, the working classes (white), Big Pharma, Big Oil, bankers, people who don’t recycle… He just mocks everything and anyone, whether it’s retired porn stars, possessed dogs or the guidelines for a very difficult man’s bachelor party: ‘You might not want to ask my brother about the bride, Mary. Even if he does answer, he offers very few details other than “she’s a good speller”, and “It’s hard to tell from a photo, but she seems to be about my height and girth”.’

Sacks’ take on old writers trying to write young – ‘A Short Story Geared to College Students, Written by a Thirtysomething Author’ – illustrates his talent for writing so well that he knows how to write badly. The tone is hilariously jarring, complete with a decidedly thirtysomething interest in Bose HiFi equipment erupting into desperately hip-hopped dialogue. Or while peppering his prose with try-hard slang and ‘motherfucking’ expletives, he splices it with wholly inappropriate phrases like ‘The Internet’ or ‘The World Wide Web’ – no 19-year-old outside of the Amish community uses phrases like that.

Take this paragraph: ‘Larry and Charles had been best buds for three years now. And Charles knew absolutely everything about Larry, including Larry’s intense hunger for “vagina”.’ Everything about those two sentences is almost spot-on. The wannabe with-it authorial voice is almost convincing right down to ‘best buds’. And then, that final word. It should probably be ‘pussy’ or something suitably porno-ese. But no, Sacks uses the one word which no one would use in that context apart from an achingly unhip oldster who, try as they might, sounds like nothing so much as a rather creepy gynaecologist.

Writers are often the object of Sacks’ disdain especially when recurring character Rhon Penny (silent h) writes one of his letters to a famous literary figure. So in the course of suggesting some ideas for a novel that could be written under the John Updike brand, Rhon Penny (silent h) makes a suggestion: ‘Has anyone written – I mean really written – about the Holocaust? Oh, sure, there have been books and movies and perhaps even a rap song, but has anyone penned a thought-provoking book about the subject? My answer: I’m not sure. Here’s my idea: a novel set in Nazi Germany, about an adorable, wisecracking gerbil who lives inside a Jewish person’s skull-cap (without that Jewish person’s knowledge or consent). The gerbil’s name will be Rosco.’

If anything is ripe (perhaps even overripe) for satire, it’s the unrelenting tide of novels and movies about the Holocaust. That Sacks satirises this trend through the deluded, pompous, and ironising voice of Rhon Penny (silent h), only adds to the gentle humiliation of a wreathed and laurelled literary genius like Martin Amis who decided with Time’s Arrow to use the Holocaust as a subject for a time-travelling romp.

Like a conceptual Turner Prize-winning artist who can ‘do hands’, Sacks can do jokes, too, as he showcases in ‘FW: Loved The Following Jokes And Thought You’d Love Them As Well!!! (Pass Them On)’. At first, his attempts do read like those interminable forwarded emails crammed full of timeless classics guaranteed to leave your sides unsplit. For example, a young boy spies his grandpa sitting out on the porch with no trousers on and asks him why. ‘Without missing a beat, the old man retorts: “Well last week I sat out here with no shirt on and I got a stiff neck. So, this is your grandma’s idea!”’

Ha. Boom. Tsch. Lol. Etc. But Sacks doesn’t leave it at the punchline. He continues: ‘The air is still, and in the distance, a car horn can be heard. The boy, not saying anything, just stares at his grandfather’s aged, sickeningly white penis. After a few moments, the boy takes a bite out of his peanut-butter sandwich, waves goodbye, and leaves for his friend Jeffrey’s house.’ There Sacks was, a perfect joke to be forwarded to all and sundry on his hands, and he has to go and turn it into something interesting with a solemn, mock-poignant epilogue.

There are no all-too-recognisable sallies against the same old targets here, no mocking of stupid Americans or Daily Mail readers or climate-change deniers to please the ears of right-thinking liberals. Instead, Sacks is happy to plough his own list-filled, satire-driven, parody-pulled furrow. And he does so with aplomb.

I can utter no higher praise that this: I have loved every one of the 786 minutes I have so far spent on the toilet reading it.

Wow! I love me some Kanye West! All right, ladies and gentlemen, right about now, I need all of you on the dance floor. I know every single one of you has a booty, which means every single one of you has got something you can shake. Come on now, there must be two hundred of you out there and plenty of nasty moves to go around. I know I’m new at this, I know my voice has a rodent-like quality to it, but that’s absolutely no reason for you to leave these grooves hanging!

I’m not making crazy demands here. All I ask is that you give my beats the benefit of the doubt. It’s that simple.

I realize this place is right on the pier and that the briny smell is a little overwhelming and that most of you arrived here straight from our bottomless crab cake bar. I’m not at all trying to be critical. It’s just a bit unusual that you’re all crowded around the perimeter of the dance floor the way you are, especially since much of the stimulation—the speakers, the LED stuff—is focused on the very area you’re not occupying. And most of you have been drinking for hours. I guess I’m a little surprised that your inhibitions are as intact as they seem to be.

All it’s gonna take is just one of you, a single party person, to make that first move. Others will rush to follow, I guarantee it. They will fill that funky vacuum. You did come here to dance, correct? How are you all contending with the cognitive dissonance? I promise you, the dance floor is definitely not quicksand. None of you will drown.

Drown. Jesus, there’s a word you should never hear out of a DJ’s mouth. Honestly, how do you people think I’m doing so far? Is it just a matter of experience, of which I have little? Or is it a lack of charisma, which one either has or doesn’t have? I don’t think it’s that. These are just natural growing pains. I bet it’d be pretty weird if I wasn’t this unsure of myself, right?

Okay. Starting over: LET’S DO IT! Throw your hands up in the air, and wave ’em like you just don’t care!

Like I’m really going to get you moving with a line out of the Stone Age like that! Sorry. I’ll try to do better. Besides, I know you all do care, very deeply. If you didn’t, you wouldn’t be here tonight! This is Ocean City, Maryland, for crying out loud! Partytown, U.S.A.! Look, I swear to God that nothing harmful will occur if you come forward. I just want you to give me a chance. Help me to help you shake that ass.

All right, I’m gonna take the tempo down, down, down. That’s it. Yeeeeeah. If Usher’s not doing it for you then you just don’t know what sex is. Nice and eeeeeasy. Holy Toledo! I haven’t heard this tune since I was working as a busboy at Benny’s Crab Shack on 23rd. Put your hands up if you’ve eaten there! Now let me see your hands if you were hospitalized by the bisque. Can you see my hand? I should’ve sued that place.

Folks, this is not Guantanamo Bay, and this is no way an interrogation. This is Saturday night at Seacrets! This is your once-a-week escape! From the bills! From the hassles! From your boss and your horrible blue-collar job where you might get your fingers sheared off at any moment.

I’m sorry! I have all the respect in the world for the blue-collar types and their hard-working families. Workplace accidents are never a fun thing.

Hold up, I just got handed a note. Beth Williamson’s turning 21 years old tonight! And what do her friends do but throw her a kickin’ party at Seacrets! Is there anything better! All right, I want every one of you on that dance floor, especially Beth and her gals! If you won’t do it for me, that’s fine, I accept that. But whatever you think of the job I’m doing tonight, would you just please put it aside for the moment? And move your body for Beth’s sake? I thank you.

Okay, I have an idea. What do you say that we just start afresh? As if we’ve never met before, as if you’re walking into the club and seeing me up here for the first time. In other words, it is my job to entertain, and it is your job to get freaky. You wanna have fun, you wanna get lucky. But is hooking up really getting lucky? What are the chances you’re really meeting the “one”? Statistically, you’re nothing more than two desperate souls clutching at each other, as you head over the metaphorical falls together. There ain’t nothing lucky about that, is my thinking.

And since it’s well past midnight, let’s think of this as a new day, a new beginning, for all of us. I’m gonna slow things down again with a personal favorite of mine, “Cat’s in the Cradle” by the late Harry Chapin—a man who never saw the success he deserved, a man who died an unbearably needless death in a fiery car accident. Not his fault! So young.

C’mon, y’all! Last funky time, I promise! . . .

–With Jason Roeder