Mr. Vanderslice, photographed by Peter Ellenby; courtesy of Dead Oceans.

The Bygone Bureau: So are you finally on a break from touring?

John Vanderslice: I am, but there’s always that thing where you can’t stop moving around because you’re used to moving around. Like I can’t stop doing errands. I try not to do all the errands at once because I know two hours will pass — I’m kind of stuck in front of my computer right now which I deeply resent because I’m just doing web stuff and I just have too much restless energy just from being on tour.

When does that usually subside?

The unfortunate thing is that it subsides right before you go on tour. I’m leaving for tour in less than a month, and probably in two weeks, I’ll be like super ultra domestic and will not want to leave the house. But I’m kind of spinning the cycle to the negative. On and off tour is generally really good. It’s really healthy for me. I have a very restless side and I’m, like, super domestic. I mean, I have a lot plants that I tend to when I’m home so it’s not like I’m just resenting being here.

I’ve listened to Romanian Names, and overall it seems to have a very different sound than Emerald City. Just more upbeat. There are a lot of songs about love and relationships. Is that what was on your mind when you were writing this album?

Well, when I was home I was here with my wife for nine months, and that’s what my life was — domestic politics. I live in a neighborhood where I’m really good friends with my neighbors and they’re kind of doing their thing. They’re married and they have kids and, I began to think about this world and reading a lot of John Cheever.

I live basically in the suburbs of San Francisco. I’m up on a hill and far away from the lowlands, which is a really different part of the city, and the concerns up here are totally different. And I was really surrounded by it for nine months. Sometimes it seems like a minefield, like being with one other person, and other times it seems like the most natural and heavenly place you can be. I’m sure you would agree.

It seems like you had a little bit of a difficult transition into it, or it just seems like you thought it was weird at first living the suburban life.

Oh, absolutely. It’s really weird because I lived for a long time in the Mission and Noe Valley and I walked everywhere and best friends of mine lived on my street. It was a much more community-based life. You know, it’s expensive to live down there, so we kind of moved far away. I have a home studio in my basement, and you kind of have to move away if you’re going to be in San Francisco and have any kind of space to do anything at all. You either have to put iron gates up on every single opening to your house because you’re going to be ransacked one day. Like, you’re going to be in a terrible neighborhood or you have to move out.

I guess I felt very lonely on a certain level. I can really be very isolated from people if I don’t see people. I’ll just stay on my own. My life changed.

Was it a way different process for you to record in your basement opposed to being around a lot more people?

It was really different. The one thing that happens is that you can work faster and sketch out things and throw things away because you’re safe. You’re in a free zone. There’s a freedom to recording on your own and writing and arranging completely outside of a band and a studio environment. You really do have pure freedom.

I would say it was very different. You feel very free to throw away stuff. I threw away a lot of songs that I don’t think I would have thrown away in the past. I would have felt more pressure to help them, like, grow up semi-normal. Freedom — I think that’s why people revert back to home recording when they can.

Well, that sounds like a really positive experience. Were there any downsides that you found?

Yeah, like my wife went back to France for a while, and I was alone in the house for probably six weeks. Yeah, you can make yourself crazy being alone for six weeks. I don’t really like to go out very much. I’m probably just like anyone who gets off tour — you just don’t want to go to see shows. It’s like punching the clock. And that’s where my friends are. That’s what my friends do, and that’s my social interaction. And, I don’t know, I guess I got a little kooky at home. I don’t think that’s a bad thing, but it’s not a pleasant thing to go through for six weeks.

You had the first mp3 blog, right?

I had one a long time ago. Probably wasn’t the first one because things move so fast on the internet. Man, you’re the first person who’s brought that up in a long time. I loved that blog. I had stuff on there that was super rare. There wasn’t BitTorrent and as much peer-to-peer trading going on then, so it was really important to have stuff on a hard drive. Yeah, I really miss that thing. There was a lot of super interesting — there was some early Spoon on there and some rare Spoon. There was some live Jeremy Enigk and some rare Of Montreal.

Do you still have all those files?

I do, but the through-put cost — it was at a time when it was much more expensive to have server space and there was so much traffic on the blog that it was really expensive. Also at that time it was way more contentious. Mp3s were still gray area. And even though I was friends with the bands, that’s why I had the material, the labels were still very proprietary. Even if they actually didn’t release the music in question, I would still get letters or emails from the labels. I wouldn’t say they were livid, but they were definitely really worried about what was happening with music. So it started getting a little tiring.

It seems like labels have actually stopped trying to end file sharing because there’s really nothing they can do about it. There’s the argument that file sharing is what ruined the music business and that’s why artists are suffering. Do you think there’s any validity to that argument or should labels just go with the flow?

Well, I mean I think that there’s a metaphor with drugs that’s really interesting. I don’t do drugs, but the idea that if I stood up at a conference about drug use and said, “I really think drugs are a bad thing and we have to stop people from doing drugs,” it wouldn’t be a very productive statement, right?

First off, it’s biologically necessary. If you look back over the past 20,000 years, it doesn’t matter — if you’re in jail you make pruno, if you live in Arkansas you cook methamphetamine, if you live in the Great Plains in the 1700s you eat peyote. It is a constant.

I think that the hunger, that unquenchable desire for art is such a beautiful and sacred thing that when it comes to peer-to-peer stuff, people are going to do what the technology allows them to do. And without embedding a Social Security number in every single packet of information that crosses the internet — you better embrace it. If you don’t embrace it, you’re anti-life because it’s part of life. So, I have a nuanced view of it, and I have a very simplistic view of it. And that’s my simplistic view.

Well, it looks like you’ve embraced it pretty well. Didn’t “Fetal Horses” premiere on Stereogum?

Yes, it did.

So, have you found that mp3 blogs have been helpful with promoting yourself?

Oh yeah, blogs are great. Blogs are like an extension of word-of-mouth. And let’s call them motivated people. They’re highly motivated and extremely passionate about what they’re talking about. If I had a blog I’d have a gardening blog or a blog about films because that’s what I’m obsessed with. God bless people who care about music, man, I think that’s what really makes the world go round.

One important thing about peer-to-peer stuff, and this is what makes me insane about people estimating how much money is lost from file sharing, you know Hollywood floats numbers out there that are like hundreds of millions of dollars that they lose because of BitTorrented stuff. The thing about digital media is that it’s infinite.

Let’s say someone downloads the Wolverine movie that the dude from Fox News got fired for. If someone downloads that, it doesn’t cost the studio any money. It’s a digital copy. It’s infinite. It’s not a fixed resource, in other words. And you have to really be very certain that that person would have bought a full-priced ticket. There are a lot of people who share a lot of stuff that they wouldn’t pay for. I guess that’s what I’m saying.

So, do you think old media such as radio and magazines is completely worthless? Is there no point to trying to get singles on college or commercial radio or get your ad in a magazine opposed to putting it on Pitchfork?

Well, I think that potentially anything has real profound value. Like The New York Review of Books or The Believer. Just because something is printed doesn’t mean it’s worthless, but I would say that when it comes to media that even has even a whiff of cartel or oligopoly stuff like commercial radio, I mean, that stuff makes me livid. I can’t stand all these stations, I cannot stand Clear Channel, and I cannot stand the consolidation of media.

It’s the Telecom Act of ’96, and it was the beginning of the end of all this stuff. I think that if media is open — like print media is wide open other than the cost of printing and transporting, that’s the only barrier to entry. But with something like the FM radio bandwidth, where it’s fixed and it’s regulated by the government, I think that’s totally in trouble.

You think it’ll just go downhill then or that it’ll stay in its place with no help to musicians?

I think it’ll whither, but it won’t die — unless they grab that bandwidth from stations. Wouldn’t it be beautiful if they took all that FM stuff and really allowed micro-broadcasting? I mean, we own the airwaves. It would just be amazing if that stuff was basically handed over to non-profits. I mean, internet radio is fantastic. And I don’t know if satellite radio will hold on or not but that’s also super interesting. This should be a shared resource really.

You know what’s amazing? The Public Radio Tuner app on the iPhone, which I use more than anything else. You can listen to KEXP, FMU, you can listen to amazing college stations and small stations around the country, and any NPR affiliate at any time on your iPhone. I listen to that stuff on tour all day long. It’s incredible.

I actually just started following you on Twitter. How do you like this microblogging thing? Do you think it’s just a trend that people will forget about in six months or is this going to last?

It’s so amazing that, even if they forget about it in six months, it’s fine. It’s just a thrilling time, and I think in some ways it’s more profound because it is microblogging and people can be incredibly casual and blasé and there doesn’t have to be a grand point in what people say in 140 characters. I think tour diaries and blogging are fantastic, and some of that stuff is more suited to certain people.

I found that with my attention span, what I’m inspired to do is use Twitter. It’s situational. If I think about writing a blog on my website, it has to do with a release like, “Hey, the Mountain Goats/JV split is out now. We’ll have it at these shows.” It’s more huckster stuff. It’s like, otherwise who really cares about what movie I just saw, you know?

But on Twitter, it’s completely voluntary. If you sign up to follow me, you know you’re in for some pretty trite shit. Which is fantastic! There’s nothing wrong with that. Sometimes that’s more interesting. I follow a lot of people, and I laugh everyday reading people’s shit on Twitter. I think it’s great.

You stopped doing print ads for albums a while ago. Did Emerald City sell really well without doing print ads or did you notice a difference?

No, it did really well, and we didn’t really notice a difference. I think the reason is that there are so many outlets and places to concentrate. We really concentrated on blogs on Emerald City, and if we would have gone the print ad route, I think we would have paid less attention to the blogs. I think that you just have to choose where to go. There are people that heavily concentrate on college radio. You kind of have to go in a certain direction — it’s not just money, but energy and time.

I’m not sure what we’re going to do for this record because it’s our first record on Dead Oceans, and we’re going to respect how they want to do it. We just want to plug into the system over there and not, like, demand that we don’t run any print ads. If that’s something they really feel is effective, that’s fine. We did a whole blog tour last record, where we recorded every song live and gave it to each blog that we really like and pay attention to, and that really helped us, I think.

Promoting yourself on blogs and online seems so obvious, but not that many people are doing it.

And it’s very immediate. You read about a band on a blog, and there’s a video link and an audio link and you can pretty much be immersed in what that band is doing in ten seconds.

Do you think it goes too fast sometimes, though?

Oh, everything goes too fast. The way I see it, I’m super zen about it. I’m going to keep touring and making records. I don’t care if I come into someone’s view and then leave their view. I mean, I think that’s great. Certainly a lot of things come into my view and then leave so I think that’s the way the world and media is moving — it’s extremely fast now.

So you’re lucky to be able to put out three or four or five records and get a stable fan base. It’s not as easy now as it probably was ten years ago when I started making music. I think it’s extremely difficult to string along year after year because of that. There’s just an unbelievable volume. But in some ways, if we look at why, I think it’s kind of exciting. I mean, there’s an incredible amount of really good music coming out all the time and it’s not because people aren’t paying attention, it’s because there’s stuff to supplant you. And I think that’s beautiful. I mean, we’re all going to get old and die, and there’s going to be people to take our place. And the world isn’t really going to miss us that much. I don’t think that’s a bad thing. I think that’s a healthy thing.

How have you been successful in keeping your fan base?

I think one thing I’ve tried to do for a while is bring out good bands, and that’s difficult because I’m often playing with a lot of people who are in a lot of different bands. We’re taking out a quintet for the next tour; in Europe, we’ll probably take a quartet or a quintet, and it can be really expensive. You’re not really sharing costs; you have to hire people ahead of time. So, I think that paying attention to the live show and trying to change. I’ve done shows with a thirty piece orchestra and cellist Erik Friedlander and with all kinds of different configurations. I did two tours as a duo. I just did a tour playing solo.

I think that changing up all those things all the time helps a little bit because it’s not as stable, it’s not as staid. The thing is, the reason why you’re there is to make records. So hopefully, if I can keep making good records, I won’t lose anybody.

John Vanderslice’s most recent album Romanian Names is out May 19 on Dead Oceans. Check out his official website for mp3s and tour dates, and of course, you can follow him on Twitter.

• “Fetal Horses”
• “Too Much Time”

After studying Queer Cinema in class, I’ve been thinking about how audiences view gays and lesbians in movies, which portrayals straight people are comfortable seeing and which make them squirm.

Apparently Hollywood isn’t as liberal as folks think. While there has been great progress in mainstream films featuring gay relationships, movies still keep to heterosexual norms. Mainstream audiences don’t like to see explicit gay relationships (like kissing), or see gay relationships succeed over a straight lifestyle.

Brokeback Mountain was a groundbreaking mainstream film because straight actors played gay lovers. Jake Gyllenhaal and Heath Ledger made out and made love, and straight people watched it. Brokeback was not so progressive, though, because in the end the gay couple could not stay together. Ennis and Jack’s relationship is steeped in secrecy, embarrassment, and tragedy. They have to split up in because Ennis wants to be “normal.” His marriage ends in divorce, and Jack is beaten to death by gay-bashers. It’s a great movie and a wonderful love story, but that story had to be tragic to be broadly accepted.

In other films, the gay man is always the “token queer,” only there to add comic relief, or he’s the faghag’s best friend who teaches her how to attract straight men. Think Father of the Bride, Mrs. Doubtfire, or As Good as It Gets. In these movies, the gay man is stereotypically swishy and has a flare for fashion. Aside from snarky remarks about sexual encounters, the gay man in these movies is essentially asexual. He has great one-liners, but the audience doesn’t experience his supposedly perverted lifestyle.

As far as lesbian portrayals go in mainstream film, only Boys Don’t Cry comes to mind, which is actually about a transgendered man. Any other depiction of a “lesbian” character is always the hot bisexual girl that straight men fantasize about.

Surprisingly, cross-dressing is okay — but only for laughs. This means men in dresses, not women in tuxedos, because women in drag just aren’t funny. Oh, and the guy’s “real” sex has to be revealed at the end so he can hook up with a straight woman. Besides those restrictions, cross-dressing is perfectly acceptable.

In Some Like It Hot, from 1959, Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon pretend they’re “Josephine” and “Daphne” to join an all-girls band and escape the mob. While Tony Curtis’s character, Josephine, often takes off his dress to hit on Sugar (Marilyn Monroe), Daphne takes a liking to being a woman and the attention “she” receives from an old millionaire.

Everyone has a good laugh seeing Curtis and Lemmon try to walk in heels and pass for women, but in the end, they have to reveal their true biological sex to everyone they’ve fooled in the movie. “Daphne” gets caught up in the fun of being engaged to a millionaire, but reminds herself that it won’t work out since she’s actually a man. As Curtis says in the film, “Why would a guy wanna’ marry a guy?”

Cross-dressing for a laugh also appears a lot in sketch comedy shows. In Monty Python’s Flying Circus and The Kids in the Hall, the all-male groups usually found themselves in drag. The Pythons, however, always had Carol Cleveland play the sexy female roles if the character was supposed to be attractive, had to kiss anyone, or show her boobs. The Pythons always played old, ugly women who had terrible falsettos.

The Kids, a little more progressive in this area, cross-dressed differently. While the show was still comedic, the drag usually wasn’t the butt of the joke. It seems the Kids wore dresses simply out of necessity because they had no women in their cast. They played ugly ladies, attractive ladies, and Chicken Ladies. There are many sketches in which the straight Kids kiss each other on the lips or the gay Kid, Scott Thompson, makes out with a male extra, and no one seems to mind the difference.

While I don’t want to argue that a guy in a dress can’t be hilarious, portraying gays and lesbians accurately in film may be a healthy step toward seeing gays and lesbians accurately in real life — as normal people who deserve the same respect and rights as heterosexuals. A gay relationship shouldn’t have to end in tragedy, and an effeminate man shouldn’t always be the butt of a joke. We should be comfortable watching happy, successful, sexually active gays in film. Sure, gender-bending might threaten the “moral” fabric of our society, but only because it will show people that the hetero-normative lifestyle is overrated.

I’ve been an SNL fan ever since I was ten years old. I’d watch reruns on Comedy Central, and soon began sneaking into the living room to watch new episodes on Saturday nights. My sister and I would repeat entire “Coffee Talk” and “Pumping Up with Hans and Franz” sketches. When I was eleven, I revealed my aspiration to be an SNL cast member to my mother, which was a shift from my earlier dreams to be a pediatrician or an author of mystery novels, and she expressed great disappointment. Lucky for her, I grew up too shy, practical, and cocaine-free to be a successful comedian.

My dream of SNL stardom has diminished since my tween years, but staying home Saturday nights for the show and watching endless sketches on Hulu.com is evidence that my love for SNL has not entirely disappeared. I would still jump at the chance to see SNL stars up close.

On a visit to New York, I met up with one of my friends who was living in the city. She had a friend who was involved in the comedy circuit and the Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre and had another friend who worked in the NBC page program.

After having dinner with them, I learned that one girl had recently dated a featured member on SNL and, through her connections with the UCB Theatre, knew Amy Poehler. Apparently it was a standard Saturday night for the NBC page to text the SNL after-party password to a select group of friends, and they would all hang out with the cast members. They mentioned knowing Will Forte, Amy Poehler and her beau Will Arnett, and Seth Meyers. One had been hit on by Chevy Chase, and another was on a first-name basis with 30 Rock’s Jack McBrayer. I figured some of these were tall tales, but everyone exaggerates a little when it comes to stories involving famous people. Some of it had to be true. They did live in New York and work at NBC and the UCB Theatre; of course they might end up rubbing elbows with some famous people.

This was the plan: we would hang out at one of their apartments, watch the show, and wait for the password. I was warned that it would be a late night, and we probably wouldn’t get to the party until 2:00 a.m.

We hung around the apartment until 2:30. Some were drinking wine to keep their excitement up. I had an energy drink and felt like I would crash if nothing happened soon. On the wall was a framed thank you note from Amy Poehler. Why would you frame a note from a person you knew well? If they ever came over to your home and saw it, they’d think you were some kind of sycophantic weirdo. My confidence in their connections was beginning to wane.

But we finally got the password. It was “swordfish.” This was too ridiculous not to be true.

We soon left the apartment to visit a bar and collect more people before heading to what I finally learned was the SNL after after-party, which wouldn’t begin until four o’clock in the morning. I was beginning to feel rather drunk with tiredness, and I didn’t believe the solution to that would be more beer, despite the encouragement of the group.

Finally, we got in a cab and arrived at the back entrance of a closed club. “Swordfish,” we all said in succession as we entered the club. The bouncer was wearing a suit and had a radio earpiece, and I’m sure our insistence on using the password made it obvious that we didn’t belong.

We walked into the basement, and I tried to scan the area surreptitiously for a glimpse of a famous face. It was almost empty. We found the party upstairs. The place was packed, but it was just full of people like us—SNL groupies trying to blend in among famous people.

Waiting in a booth in the basement, the party finally picked up, and we saw a few cast members. Unfortunately, none of the cast that my group “knew” seemed to be in attendance. I did see Andy Samberg and sort of bumped into him by accident, then watched my friend try to hit on him. We soon made another sweep upstairs and found Kenan Thompson wearing sunglasses in a dark booth, smoking pot. No one was surprised.

The highlight of my evening was seeing Jason Sudeikis, one of my favorites. Instead of meeting him, though, I just stared at him for too long until he noticed and gave me the ol’ “please stop staring at me, you’re creeping me out” look. Par for the course.

Even with all the excitement, I was having trouble keeping my eyes open when 5:00 a.m. rolled around. My friend hailed me a cab, and we said goodbye. I watched her go back inside as the taxi drove away, no doubt saying “swordfish” on the way in.

In the future, I think I’ll be a little more wary of acquaintances who claim to hang out with famous people. I stayed up late enough to feel sick and gawk at three cast members. After a good night of sleep, however, I reconsidered the experience and figured I should enjoy it for what it’s worth. After all, I stayed up all night in New York City and used the password “swordfish” to get into a private party with Saturday Night Live cast members. Saying it like that makes me sound pretty damn cool.

The next time a pair of Mormons comes to your door, take a moment to imagine them naked before you slam the door in their face. You might discover that these men, wearing nice ties and bike helmets, are not holier-than-thou underneath, but people like you who just happen to be on a mission.

That’s what Chad Hardy and Fred Brodsky want you to think when you gaze upon the twelve bare-chested beaus in their 2009 Mormons Exposed: Men on a Mission calendar. Each month features two photos of a Mormon missionary. One shows the clean-shaven missionary, complete with combed, parted hair and a nametag, while the other reveals the model flexing, with bedhead hair and a steamy gaze.

File under “Mormons you could not beat in arm wrestling”; courtesy of Mormons Exposed.

The calendar is well produced, the pictures are tasteful, and the guys are hot, but it still evokes a burst of laughter and initial disbelief when people see it. Holy Mormons, legalistic Mormons, polite Mormons—these are easy concepts to grasp. But sexy Mormons? That pill’s a little harder to swallow.

Contradicting the assumption that “sexy Mormon” is an oxymoron was one of Hardy’s motivations for producing the calendar. He wanted to break the barrier of faith and show that Mormon missionaries aren’t holy outsiders that regular folks can’t relate to. They’re just regular young men practicing what they believe, and apparently, some of them are hot.

The creators of the calendar admit that the project is a little tongue-in-cheek, but Hardy believes that there is a serious side to Mormons Exposed. He sees the calendar as a way to generate interest and start a discussion about Mormonism and the negative stereotypes that non-believers hold. Hardy believes that Mormons aren’t really that different from non-Mormons, and he wants to prove that you can be spiritual and sexy at the same time.

That belief got him excommunicated from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS).

Hardy said the church accused him of a variety of wrongdoings, but he knew their grudge stemmed from Men on a Mission. They let him go for having a “moral defect.” Hardy had already earned a degree from Brigham Young University in Communications Studies, but they took back his diploma. If that sounds vaguely illegal, Hardy agrees. He’s currently in the appeals process to get his degree back. (You can read more about it on his personal site.)

Even though the calendar invited considerable backlash, Hardy assured me that the project has been worth it. He succeeded in challenging the status quo, and while he still gets nasty emails and phone calls, there are also some Mormons who support the project and think the church’s reaction was out of line.

Hardy didn’t even seem particularly upset about being excommunicated. He’s a sixth-generation Mormon who went on his mission to San Diego, but says he hasn’t connected with the LDS community in years. He still considers himself Mormon and is grateful for the values and lifestyle that a religious upbringing taught him, but Hardy is appalled by the hypocritical nature of the LDS Church. He says Mormons are basically conditioned to lie so that they can continue the façade of a perfect lifestyle. Hardy believes that, Mormon or not, he has the right to express himself the way he sees fit, and if that expression takes the form of a racy male calendar, then so be it.

Calendar photo shoot; courtesy of Mormons Exposed.

The Men on a Mission calendar has also served as an outlet of expression for the models involved. Some of the men were attracted to the project because of its charity contributions (a portion of the profits would be donated to the charity of each model’s choice), but others saw an opportunity to express their own sexuality. Two of the men from the 2009 calendar and half the models for the slated 2010 calendar are gay. And you only have to remember back to California’s Proposition 8 to know how the LDS Church feels about homosexuality.

Surprisingly, Hardy revealed that gay Mormons are not automatically excommunicated if they come out, but the church’s reaction generally depends on local church leaders. If they remain in the church, gay Mormons must remain celibate.

Hardy did not divulge whether he himself was gay, but he is a strong ally of gay Mormons. He said that gay Mormons are trying to have a voice and they deserve to be loved, to be human. While posing half-naked for a calendar may not seem like a demand for respect, it’s definitely a way to get noticed.

Ironically, Hardy received some negative reactions from his supporters for the Mormon Church’s involvement in Prop 8. Hardy didn’t take a stance on Prop 8, only saying that there were so many feelings on both sides of the issue. UPDATE: Hardy donated to the No On 8 fund.

While Mormons Exposed doesn’t make oodles of money (Hardy has a day job), the company is planning 2010′s Men on a Mission calendar, as well as a new calendar called Mormon Muffins: A Taste of Motherhood. This calendar will feature a new Mormon MILF each month, ages 24 to 52, along with a muffin recipe. Hardy is convinced that this calendar, with its hot moms and cooking tips, will reach a wider demographic than Men on a Mission.

The company also plans to expand its website to include cooking webisodes. Currently, their website has information about Men on a Mission, model profiles, and cheeky t-shirts that come in such colors as “Hill Cumorah Green,” “Polygamy Pink,” and “We Don’t Drink Coffee Brown.”

Hardy is certainly passionate about Mormons Exposed and serious about sparking a discussion regarding negative Mormon stereotypes, but Men on a Mission is still a half-nudey calendar featuring missionary beefcakes. At a glance, the calendar doesn’t arouse a deep discussion on negative labeling or the hardships that gay Mormons must face. However, if sex does indeed continue to sell, Chad Hardy won’t have too much trouble converting a few more believers to the Mormons Exposed way of thought.

No, we’re not watching a horror flick, but the new Ricky Gervais comedy, Ghost Town. The recoiling and ear-plugging is not induced by the fear of seeing a victim cut to bits by a chainsaw, but rather terror in the form of inappropriate conversation and awkward pauses—our generation’s sense of humor.

While there are two streams of cringe comedy, scatological humor and the humor that arises from an awkward situation, the former is being eclipsed by comedy series like Curb Your Enthusiasm, Arrested Development, The Office, and Extras. These shows do include a few “gross out” jokes, but the episodes revolve around one embarrassing situation or misunderstanding that escalates throughout the show.

An American audience usually needs its jokes presented more explicitly (just compare the two versions of The Office), but the subtlety of cringe comedy has received a welcome reception from Stateside youth. Part of its success might have to do with its universal accessibility. These comedies are very much a caricature of real life. We experience awkward situations everyday, whether it’s a result of another person’s behavior or the consequence of our own. Everyone knows that guy who makes inappropriate comments in class. Everyone has waved hello to someone only to realize that someone was greeting the person behind you.

Instead of pretending these moments don’t exist, we gasp, “awkward!”, and proceed to share the anecdote with our friends. By laughing at these instances, revealing them, and agreeing that everyone has had a similar experience, the need to feel embarrassed effectively goes away.

Ghost Town begins similarly to the comedies mentioned above. Gervais plays the socially awkward (surprise) Bertram Pincus, D.D.S. Through his daily life, Pincus makes every interaction almost unbearable to watch because he is either cruel or entirely inappropriate. After waking up from a surgery, Pincus finds that he died for seven minutes while on the table and can now see ghosts. One ghost, Frank (Greg Kinnear), keeps bothering him to break up his widow’s new engagement. This type of fantasy is never present in the normalcy of cringe comedy, but it was forgiven for the time being.

Halfway through the movie, however, I became confused. Suddenly the movie had turned into a romantic comedy with Gervais seeking the affection of Frank’s widow, played by Tea Leoni. Up to this point, any kind of canned storyline (speaking to ghosts, for example) could be excused because I was seeing the Gervais humor I had come to see. But the romantic genre had somehow snuck its way into my comedy, and I was stuck watching the lame clichés seen in every Tom Hanks/Meg Ryan movie.

How did my favorite style of comedy get crushed together with a romantic story fit for the likes of Lifetime? Like so many things, I blame Judd Apatow.

The 40-Year-Old Virgin and Knocked Up unfortunately altered the look of romantic comedies so that Colin Firth could be replaced with a pudgy, average guy who would stumble his way out of silly situations and into the heart of a hot chick who had it all.

When Apatow blurred the lines between cringe comedy and romantic comedy, he ruined the genre. Now, romantic comedies have their place, usually in front of a couch with a pint of ice cream, but let’s get one thing straight: normal fat guys are not romantic and being nice isn’t funny. Romantic comedies shouldn’t be allowed to steal genuinely funny actors and make them less humorous by stuffing them into a formulaic love story.

In all fairness to Ricky Gervais, he didn’t write Ghost Town, and perhaps I shouldn’t have expected it to be like all of his other work just because he was in it. My only request is that romance gets out of my comedies. It’s making them soft.

And, if it’s not too much trouble, Mr. Apatow should make a film with a genuinely awkward, pudgy, average girl who gets the hot guy in the end. No, not one of those She’s All That jobs where an attractive girl just stops wearing glasses and baggy clothes to become more attractive. I want a real uggo to win over her handsome counterpart by her charm and authenticity alone. Not to say my dating life hasn’t been accurately represented in romantic comedies before, but if life truly mimics art, this kind of movie would definitely up my chances.

Sounds like love to me.

Regardless, I decided to quit the stuff because, every day, I experienced a mid-afternoon crash of stellar proportions, and no matter how much coffee I consumed, it no longer blocked the accursed adenosine.

At first, I toyed with the idea of a full-blown detox diet. But after perusing websites geared toward “body cleanses” (and learning that a coworker’s nickname for the Master Cleanse was the “butt-pee diet”) I realized these diets were just an excuse to be anorexic for ten days and drop a quick five pounds. I bookmarked them for later.

My focus this time around was just caffeine–coffee, specifically. Despite grave warnings from websites on caffeine withdrawal and from everyone I talked to, I quit cold turkey for ten days.

I had envisioned writing about my experiences each day in the fashion of a journal entry, but discovered that I was far too depressed and tired to give a shit. The following is a summary of my decaffeinated ten days composed from my foggy memory.

Courtesy of the American Memory Project

Day 1
I feel disgusting. My body aches and I feel like I’m going to throw up every time I stand up.

I was awake for three hours in the morning, then napped until 4:00 p.m., then went to bed for good at 8:00 p.m. This CBS News article describes a study that recommends making caffeine withdrawal a psychiatric disorder. At this point I realized I might be in big trouble.

Day 2
Opened the cafe at 4:45 a.m. Tried chai in lieu of coffee. Its sweet and spicy flavor was not at all soothing, and I feel sick from consuming a cup full of milk and sugar before the sun has even come up.

I was crabby. Very, very crabby.

Day 3, 4, and 5
I have a headache.

I spoke to no one I didn’t have to for 72 hours and watched episode after episode of The Kids in the Hall while I sulked.

Day 6 and 7
I felt great this morning. Finally, no headache and no excessive grogginess upon waking. No longer does the morning bring suicidal thoughts. This is a new sensation!

I became extremely tired once the afternoon rolled around, especially on days when I had to open the cafe. I became something of a morning person, and an old man, retiring by 9:00 p.m.

Day 8
Berated and embarrassed by another cafe owner today for ordering a decaf Americano. “We don’t sell anything decaf because it tastes like crap,” he told me, as though I was some kind of coffee novice who didn’t know better.

Fellow Bureau writer Kevin Nguyen came to my rescue, explaining the detox. The owner recommended some iced rooibos, which turned out to be refreshing, but not really my cup o’ tea.

Day 9 and 10
I feel great. Seriously. I’ve had energy throughout both days and adapted to an “early to bed, early to rise” schedule. No headaches and no problem getting up in the morning. I still miss coffee, however. A lot.

I avoided visiting cafes other than my workplace, and secretly made decaf Americanos for myself when no one was looking.

Courtesy of the American Memory Project

I stopped consuming caffeine for ten days and lived to tell the tale. In fact, I thrived without caffeine toward the end of my crusade. However, I wasn’t prepared to become one of those “healthy” persons/idiots who shun coffee. I happen to like what caffeine does to my body. Feeling jittery and a bit on edge keeps me on my toes at work and helps me finish countless papers due the next day.

Coffee also serves as a social activity. “Let’s get a cup of coffee” always prefaces quality time with a friend or an opportunity to chat with someone new. What am I to do now? Take people out for a cup of rooibos?

From this experiment, I learned that I don’t want to quit caffeine because I don’t see the point. Yes, I needed to cut my dosage so I can function when coffee is not readily available, but there is no need for me to quit the stuff altogether. Caffeine isn’t crack; I can quit when I want to.

Since the detox ended, I’ve been conscious of my caffeine consumption and am careful not to overdo it, so I can avoid relapsing into afternoon crashes. It’s true that absence makes the heart grow fonder, but I’ve successfully kept my love at a safe distance, either enjoying one cup of my home brew in the morning or indulging in a sixteen-ounce Americano in the afternoon.

There may be some good personal or health reasons for avoiding caffeine, but as far as I’m concerned, adenosine can suck it. I’m going to continue to let coffee make my heart flutter.

I was once in denial about watching these “real-life” dramas, thinking it was only a social habit, so I pretended I didn’t know what ANTM stood for.

Now that I’ve accepted my guilty pleasure (and admitted it’s not going away anytime soon), I decided to logically deconstruct why reality television is so appealing in order to defend my poor taste.

There are a variety of sub-genres within the reality show category. Generally a show’s premise falls loosely into one of the following categories: the physical challenge (Survivor), finding love (The Bachelor), talent show (Last Comic Standing), sticking one-dimensional caricatures of dissimilar people together and watching them fight (The Real World), and the unabashedly trashy (Tila Tequila).

These reality TV shows are attractive for many different reasons:

Little Commitment

More viewer loyalty is needed to understand The Wheel of Fortune than a reality show. Every episode opens with a fifteen-minute recap. You know who’s been eliminated, who’s beefing with whom, and who’s hooking up. A viewer can pick up any reality show even if s/he has missed one or all previous episodes.

Self-Esteem Boost

Reality television is life-affirming on two levels. First, it shows that average (and below average) people can be on television. Since television is America’s Nirvana, reality programming gives us hope that we, too, can someday make a fool of ourselves while strangers watch from their living rooms.

Second, these people are desperate and idiotic. Apologies to anyone who may have been on a “respectable” reality show, but networks don’t award prize money to people who don’t entertain. Sadly, sane and non-slutty people just aren’t fun to watch. These reality show characters provide self-affirmation because, well, you are not them.

It’s Fixed

If you haven’t noticed the edited plotlines and scripted behavior on many reality television shows, then you must be a WWE fan. If reality TV was actually realistic, it would be no good. For one, the premise is almost always insane. Why would you fight with eleven other bachelorettes for the attention of one mediocre-looking dude (unless he’s rich, of course)? That’s just pathetic and irrational. Go for the cameraman! At least he has a job.

Of course the contestants are vying for the single man or woman, or trying to stay on the island or whatever, in order to win the prize money. But viewers are often duped into believing that there is real love, chemistry, and camaraderie among these contestants. We viewers love this stuff because it’s completely unrealistic, but like to think it is because these shows are often just as boring and poorly acted as real life.

It’s a Freak Show

Watching Vern Troyer ride around nude on his scooter and pee in corners and seeing people eat humongous live spiders are disgusting spectacles. But it’s outrageous and therefore entertaining. People watch reality TV for the same reason they rubberneck at car accidents. We just can’t help ourselves.

With this assessment, my goal is not to defend reality shows or condone watching them. In fact, I’ll probably deny that I even wrote this article, but I’d like to submit that it’s human nature to enjoy watching other people make asses out of themselves. And for this reason, we should not be so surprised that this is what entertainment has become. Appalling? Sure it is, but that’s just why I’ll keep watching it.

I was warned that once I got into the Golden State I wouldn’t be able to find gas for under $4.20 a gallon.

“That’s an exaggeration,” I thought. “There are always those stations that aren’t Chevron. They’ll save me.”

They didn’t. The cheapest gas I found was in Redding for $3.99 9/10. Once I reached my home in the Central Valley, I had to wait in line for thirty minutes to pump the coveted $4.09 a gallon gas at Arco. It cost $4.30 almost everywhere else.

This week, I didn’t even buy a full tank because I wasn’t sure if my debit card could handle the $50+ charge after a recent trip to the grocery store.

Driving – and buying gas – has never seemed like much of a problem to me. My hometown has a bus system and a free trolley that operates in the downtown area, but I grew up in the country about five miles outside of town. It was a trek to the nearest bus stop, and even then, my parents probably wouldn’t have let me take the bus by myself. North Visalia isn’t the safest of places, and it wouldn’t be wise to hang around a bus stop – especially after dark.

To add to the stigma of public transportation, a Visalia bus was hijacked and its driver raped at knifepoint in 2000.

Because of the inconvenient Visalia bus system, a fear of people who ride the bus, and living outside of the city, I was given a car when I turned sixteen. I had a great time, but this experience also led me to be completely unfamiliar with – and even a little scared of – public transportation.

This changed somewhat during my freshman year of college when I left my car in California. I was forced to ride the bus now and again, but I still relied on rides from friends when I needed to get somewhere that wasn’t in walking distance.

This summer, however, everyone is adapting to new methods of transportation in light of high gas prices. I thought I’d jump on the bandwagon. The bus is a great way to get around Pierce County, Washington, but there are limitations to using the bus as my sole mode of transit.

Courtesy of the Library of Congress

One of my jobs is in a nearby town, a fifteen minute drive, and requires that I be there in the wee morning hours. There is no bus service at 4:00 a.m. If I have an afternoon shift, the bus can take up to 45 minutes to arrive, and I’m often on a tight schedule. To get to work on time, there is a 25-minute period of downtime during which I simply have to wait.

Many routes have buses that run every fifteen minutes, which is incredibly convenient, but the bus rarely shows up on schedule. If it’s supposed to arrive at 8:45 and 9:00, but doesn’t appear until 8:52, does that mean it’s early or late? When I decide to take the bus, I’ve noticed that my day moves slower and requires a lot more patience.

Riding the bus a few days per week saves me some gas money, but it also makes me feel good about myself in a way that I don’t really deserve. Taking public transportation makes me think I’m doing my part to reduce emissions and, in the process, that I’m becoming a savvy urbanite.

But I’m a pseudo-bus rider. I still take my car whenever I feel like it, I’m hardly helping the environment, and since I frequently get lost when trips require multiple transfers, I’m not really becoming savvy either.

When my housemates and I get together after the workday, we occasionally swap stories about our bus experiences that day. These might include the crazy guy talking about Satan, the woman who insisted on introducing herself to everyone, or the baby who made the bus smell like poop. These accounts are always told in a way that could be prefaced with “listen to what I survived today,” like it was some great feat to sit in a crowded bus instead of driving our empty cars with the temperature and music set to our liking.

Courtesy of the Library of Congress

I’ve enjoyed the new experience of relying on public transportation to get around, as have my friends. But it has unearthed a nebulous and touchy brand of classism.

It’s not that I think I’m better than other bus riders, but that I’m painfully aware that I am different. I can afford a bus pass and a car. I choose to ride the bus when it’s convenient, and then feel like a good person for having done so. If I’m running late or have a cumbersome load of groceries, I can drive. Perhaps I shouldn’t beat myself up over it, but accepting compliments and feeling vaguely noble for choosing public transportation when plenty of other people do it everyday without a second choice (and then complaining about how fellow riders made me less comfortable than I would’ve been in my own car) makes me somewhat of a fraud.

I’m pleased that rising gas prices have forced me and others to rethink our habits, but there needs to be some social improvement. Perhaps it will require higher gas prices still or cities that are more conducive to walkers, bicyclists, and public transportation, but people need to rely less on their cars. Attitudes about public transportation need to be adjusted. I like to complain about being too cold and being surrounded by crying babies, but I have also experienced positive changes through taking the bus. I don’t have to worry about parking, I get a lot more reading done, and slowing down my day is not necessarily a bad thing.

I enjoy getting around Tacoma without a personal vehicle and hope more people decide to quell their driving habits, but I’m still not ready to sacrifice the convenience of having a car. I expect that someday I’ll be forced to give up this luxury, and I might even find I’m better off without it.

Since I’m out of town at the moment, and since I believe that if something can’t be done on the internet it’s not really worth doing, I have begun my job search online.

Beverage Servers
$100 A Day or more possible for Pierce County’s number one gentlemen’s club. 18+ no experience necessary. Mon – Sat 10am – 7pm

After briefly perusing Careerbuilder.com and only finding this post, I’ve decided to rely on Craigslist.

When I began my search, I had much resolve concerning what I would not do for money. These things included wearing a stupid costume or hat, standing outside holding a sign, working entirely on commission, and being a server at the establishment described above. After only finding two part-time barista and receptionist positions, my inflexibility began to waver.

I began to question my first requirement of no-costume-wearing when I saw this post:

Story Teller and Birthday Party Character
We are in need of a weekly storytime characater for a local childrens booutique, and birthday party artist to take on parties booked weekends in surrounding areas. You: are responsible, full of energy, have drama or theater backround, love and have experience working with children, love playing dress-up and entertaining, are organized, have transportation, are available weekends and once a week mid morning for story hour.

Compensation for story hour and parties is $20.00 an hour sub contracted. Training compensation will be $9.00 an hour.

My eyes quickly skipped over the blaring typos and the phrase “love playing dress-up” to the $20 per hour wage. Then I saw that the contact email had “fairy” in the name, shuddered, and came back to my senses. I’m quite happy not being suicidal and would like to stay that way.

The other posts I found were heavily geared toward high school and college students on their summer breaks.

$12 Per Hour+++ Great Summer Job!
$12.00 Per Hour plus attractive bonuses and incentives. 

20-25 hours per week. Paid Weekly! Clean-cut, professional appearance and outgoing personality required. A multi-million dollar Food Company is looking for clean-cut people with outgoing personalities to join a health conscience team of individuals passing out all natural, healthy food sample to potential customers. Immediate Openings!! Call Mr. Green for an appointment

Of course it was a sham. I saw the same description under every job category, the company isn’t mentioned, the job isn’t mentioned, and “Mr. Green”? C’mon. But as my job search yielded few prospects, I began to wonder if this post was for a genuine position. Even if it involves selling crack, $12 sure beats minimum wage, and the refusal to participate in illicit activities was never on my list of standards to begin with. Still, there was no email address, and I’d have to give this Mr. Green a call. Too much non-internet effort.

Goat Milker, Full Time Split shift or part time evening
Feed hay, milk using machines, strip out by hand, clean equipment and feed babies – 4 hour shift 6 a.m. to 10 a.m., 6 p.m. to 10 p.m.

Housing might be available to non-smoker who qualifies.

Long term job.

Pay for the full-time position ….
For first two months: $320/week plus room
After two months: $400/week plus room

Pay for the part-time position….
For first two months: $32/shift
After the first two months: $40/shift
Room optional.

There was a flicker of hesitation in the passing of this opportunity when I recalled that I do, in fact, have job experience using farm equipment and feeding farm animals, but I decided that I’d be much happier this summer if I kept looking.

Hopefully, by the end of the week, I will have applied to the few decent jobs I came across, and perhaps find tolerable work after all. With my standards at an all-time low (did I mention I used to sing for tips?), I’ll be happy just as long as I don’t end up working at children’s birthdays, selling drugs, or milking goats.

You can listen to the entire interview at KUPS 90.1FM The Sound.

Boeckner and Perry of the Handsome Furs looking, uh, handsome; courtesy of Sub Pop Records.

The Bygone Bureau: Dan, you’re a member of Wolf Parade also. Do you have any other projects you’re a part of?

Dan: No, I’m always talking with friends about starting up some bands, but for now they’re just pipe dreams.

And Alexei, you’re a short story writer?

Alexei: Yeah, I write a lot of stories, and I write some poetry as well. And some short little anecdotal things.

Do you have any books published?

Alexei: I self-publish them and then sell them on tour.

You have one album out, Plague Park. And that’s a real place?

Alexei: That is. It’s Huerto Puisto in Helsinki, where a bunch of plague victims were buried. It sort of started as a place that was outside of Helsinki, but then Helsinki sort of grew around it. Now it’s the one green, beautiful area in the very cubic, sort of Soviet façade of the rest of Helsinki. It’s where all these kids go and drink and have good life and stuff. And it’s just weird that it’s about all these dead people

A lot of your songs on the album talk about living both in a big city and in rural towns. Is there one you prefer over the other?

Alexei: There isn’t. That’s sort of the thing is that I don’t think we’ve come to any conclusions about which is better. They’re both really hard–and good. But hard. I mean, whenever I’m in the city I miss being where insects are, and whenever I’m in a small town, I miss the culture that is in metropolises. Metropoli?

(laughs)

Dan: Metropoli!

Which city are you referring to, if any in particular, on the track “Handsome Furs Hate This City”?

Alexei: We can’t tell you. No, it’s different every night. We just like to mess around with it.

Dan: We wrote it in Los Angeles, but it’s not really about any particular city. I had a couple cities in mind when we were writing it. Like, it was kind of a conflation of Vancouver, L.A., Toronto, and even Montreal, you know, but it’s not particularly one city. But it’s fun to pretend like it is about a city when you’re in other towns. It really gets people fucking riled up.

Alexei: Right. When we were in San Francisco we were like “This is about L.A.!” and everyone was like, “Woo!”. And we were like, “Really? I didn’t know there was this rivalry going on. Sweet. Now we know how to get you!”.

(laughs)

I read that the point of your sound is to make it as sparse and repetitive as possible. What is it about that sound that appeals to you?

Alexei: It’s just interesting. It’s just a challenge to do that. With a two-piece, we wanted to have a lot going on where there wasn’t a lot going on because then it forces different things from the listener to fill in certain blanks. And I think our sound has actually changed quite a lot.

Dan: Now we’re repetitive and really obnoxiously loud.

Alexei: But also more danceable now.

Dan: To answer this question totally honestly, I really believe–and this is just personal artistic taste–that a lot of underground music kind of holds itself above, say, the pop medium, the standard. I think one kind of really fucking disappointing trend in “indie rock” music is giant, enormous baroque arrangements with esoteric instruments. But everybody has the same esoteric instruments! Everybody has a fucking xylophone. For a while when the Neutral Milk Hotel record came out–and they did it beautifully–there was an accordion musical saw, and then all of a sudden, all these bands have an accordion music saw.

And now [there are] these giant, bloated progressive rock arrangements. I think that shit is dead. It’s a dead end. That was proved in the ‘70s when, like “Tarkus” came out, you know? It’s basically progressive rock, right? And there’s some great progressive rock, obviously, and there are some people doing amazing things in that format. But for me, writing these songs with Lex in this band was born out of frustration and a reaction against that. And I know this isn’t going to win me any of whatever today’s version of punk points are. Internet points? Fucking Xiu Xiu points or whatever, you know?

(laughs)

You can see it any era of music: Something becomes popular, a certain sound becomes popular. And I think it’s time for indie rock to just stop doing that. Even my other band is an offender in that. But I really respect bands like No Age, who are also on Sub Pop Records. They’re great. No Age are just drums, guitar, and electronics. That works for them, and it’s very direct and immediate.

But yeah, unicorns, crystal goblets, castles, fucking whatever. Phantoms? Just that fairy-tale imagery has become the new lexicon. It’s as boring and standard as 1977 punk, or like crust punks, or “fuck the man.” It’s totally predictable. If I’m sitting here and listening to a song, I don’t want to puzzle over something someone wrote just off the top of their head last minute in the studio.

Alexei: I want it to be sexy and cool.

When did you two meet and start working together?

Alexei: We met while we were working in a really shitty telemarketing office in Montreal. We were both working on various projects and they ended up colliding. A few years ago. About two years ago, right?

Dan: We met, like, three or four years ago.

Alexei: Yeah, but I mean two years of working?

Dan: Yeah, two years of togetherness.

So you’re working on a new album for 2008. And you’re working on the title Face Control.

Alexei: Yeah, face control is a door policy in Moscow that they use in these really fancy clubs where people are paying five to ten grand just to reserve tables at these places. But even those people who have paid that money are still subject to face control. So they can arrive at the door and the bouncer can be like (in Russian accent), “I don’t think so.” I don’t like what you’re wearing kind of thing. And there’s one dude whose nickname has become Face Control because he has denied Russia’s top super model three times. And if she’s not getting in, who the fuck is? It’s so bizarre.

Dan: It’s a verb too. You can be like, “Dude, I’m super bummed; I got face controlled.” It’s totally Russian, though. The vibe there is nothing is sugarcoated. It’s not politically correct. You are literally face controlled.

Alexei: At least it’s upfront. There’s something interesting about that

Dan: Those two words sound great together, though.

When do you think the new album will come out?

Dan: It depends on Sub Pop. It’ll depend on what they do with the Wolf Parade record.

Alexei: It’ll get out some point this year. We’ll be done by mid-June.

Is it much different than Plague Park?

Alexei: It is. I think it’s quite a bit faster and maybe a bit rock, too.

Dan: It’s a lot louder, that’s for sure.

The Handsome Furs’ latest release, Plague Park, is out now on Sub Pop Records.

Handsome Furs website
Handsome Furs MySpace