Don't ever accept a Tequila shot from Fat Mike

March 25, 2010 8:55 AM

Don't ever accept a Tequila shot from Fat Mike While performing as Cokie The Clown at SXSW this year, Fat Mike of NOFX made a lot of folks uncomfortable telling stories of his fucked up childhood, his mother's death, and of other crazy shit he allegedly witnessed and did throughout his life. The biggest "gag" of the evening involved Tequila. I imagine they would have been even more uncomfortable at one of these shows.
posted by snottydick (120 comments total)

Mike seems troubled.
posted by verb at 9:06 AM on March 25, 2010 [5 favorites]

Obligatory: "The aristocrats!"
posted by raysmj at 9:08 AM on March 25, 2010 [5 favorites]

Man, I am so sick of reading about juggalos.
posted by (Arsenio) Hall and (Warren) Oates at 9:08 AM on March 25, 2010 [9 favorites]

This seems to confirm my previously-held belief that Fat Mike is an asshole.
posted by burnmp3s at 9:10 AM on March 25, 2010 [3 favorites]

It's not the tunes, it's the live show, and all the people you get to meet.
posted by spikeleemajortomdickandharryconnickjrmints at 9:12 AM on March 25, 2010 [2 favorites]

The link is b0rked, so I'll let you know what happened: snottydick pissed in his post before serving it to us on MetaFilter.
posted by KokuRyu at 9:14 AM on March 25, 2010

Regarding the Allin footage, seeing him with the nudity pixelated and the curse words bleeped made me chuckle for some reason.

Yeah people do pretty messed up stuff and then use drugs to deal with it and then do even more messed up stuff with the help of the drugs. The Cokie The Clown performance should have had a Nancy Reagan "Just Say No" cameo at the end.
posted by idiopath at 9:14 AM on March 25, 2010 [1 favorite]

I think Fat Mike is opening a bar in my neighborhood? A restaurant. Apparently I live somewhere "anodyne."
posted by grobstein at 9:15 AM on March 25, 2010

Yeah, guy seems like an utter prat. I wonder if that's the sentiment he was trying to illicit?
posted by dazed_one at 9:18 AM on March 25, 2010

Make sure to ask for "clean food" when ordering.
posted by photoslob at 9:18 AM on March 25, 2010 [2 favorites]

Wow. I was thinking before I read this "oh, that's just his/NOFX's twisted humor, it couldn't have been that bad" - no. Fat Mike is fucked up and needs help.
posted by DecemberBoy at 9:19 AM on March 25, 2010

Someone give me some context. Is this Mike trying to prove that he's still cool? A reaction against the posthumous popularity of GG Allin and the like? I used to kind of like NOFX, but I never really associated them with This Sort of Thing.
posted by roll truck roll at 9:20 AM on March 25, 2010

Christ, what an asshole.

Why are the people smiling when they discovered they drank his pee?
I'd've expected more anger. I bet he did as well.

Whither the therapy for this fool? Is this what a mid-punk life crisis looks like?

I was never a big NoFX fan, but many of my friends were.
To me, they were just bin hogs at the record store, when I was looking for some NoMeansNo.
posted by Busithoth at 9:23 AM on March 25, 2010 [4 favorites]

Rock and Roll: we piss in your drink, and you cheer
posted by idiopath at 9:25 AM on March 25, 2010

I'm not sure anyone knows what the hell he's trying to accomplish with this but him, frankly. The only context I can give you is NOFX's latest release is also titled "Cokie The Clown", and this is an alter ego he's doing in conjunction with the record.
posted by DecemberBoy at 9:27 AM on March 25, 2010

Yeah people do pretty messed up stuff and then use drugs to deal with it and then do even more messed up stuff with the help of the drugs. The Cokie The Clown performance should have had a Nancy Reagan "Just Say No" cameo at the end.

Just to be clear, Fat Mike is not insane like GG Allin was or otherwise not in control of his actions. He founded and runs one of the biggest independent punk labels, has a wife and kids, etc.
posted by burnmp3s at 9:29 AM on March 25, 2010 [1 favorite]

If any one of those stories he told is true, he should be beaten within an inch of his life on general principle. I mean, he should be beaten on general principal for the whole pissing in the tequila thing, too, but seriously.
posted by dortmunder at 9:30 AM on March 25, 2010

Weird coincidence, but youtube has a new video up on why you SHOULD accept a tequila shot from Bill Murray.
posted by Telf at 9:31 AM on March 25, 2010 [2 favorites]

I feel like this post is eponysterical, but I don't really want to dwell on why.
posted by shakespeherian at 9:31 AM on March 25, 2010

Performance, cry for help, or otherwise, I'm glad it was a one-time-only show.
posted by Doug Stewart at 9:35 AM on March 25, 2010

I had never heard of G.G. Allin before. Now I wish I'd stayed that way.
posted by The Winsome Parker Lewis at 9:35 AM on March 25, 2010

I like how I got principle right in the first sentence of my comment and then used the wrong one in the second sentence. That's pretty great.
posted by dortmunder at 9:35 AM on March 25, 2010

That's what you get for listening to NOFX. They're still around? Jesus.

I was recently shocked fo find that ICP is still around too.
posted by cmoj at 9:36 AM on March 25, 2010 [1 favorite]

I don't care how uncool it makes me for saying it, "White Trash Two Heebs And A Bean" is a great fucking record. "Punk In Drublic" still holds up pretty good too.
posted by DecemberBoy at 9:37 AM on March 25, 2010 [11 favorites]

burnmp3s: "Fat Mike is not insane like GG Allin was"

Yeah, piss in shot glasses is much more tactful than feces sprayed by a leafblower, they got to choose whether to partake, even if the choice was uninformed. It's part of the same continuum though. Hell even the amplitude of the rock sound system is pathological, well above the level needed to cause permanent physical damage to one's ears. But hey, that's rock and roll.
posted by idiopath at 9:39 AM on March 25, 2010

First link is NSFW.
posted by martin10bones at 9:40 AM on March 25, 2010

This seems to confirm my previously-held belief that Fat Mike is an asshole.

I pretty much blame fat Mike on my giving up on being punk rock.

I was sixteen and went with my friends to see NOFX play Irving Plaza. A friend told me that one of her teachers in middle school worked sound there--she had his email, dropped him a line, and he got us backstage passes. The show itself was terrible. Fat Mike was visibly drunk and insulted the audience more than once and musically, they just plain sucked. I felt skeptical about meeting them after that, but my friends were pretty eager. We went backstage and said hello and told them how much we liked their music. To which they rolled their eyes and sneered at us and hardly said hello. I mean, sure, we were dorky 16-year-olds, but still, they were just nasty, in the same way that, say, the jock kids in high school were to us. Ick.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 9:42 AM on March 25, 2010 [2 favorites]

Christ, what an asshole.

"There, Mike was with his clearly visible naked dick filling a bottle of Patron Anejo, that started about 5/8 full to mask the taste, with piss. Without cutting away, the camera tracked with Mike, in full Cokie the Clown garb, as he corked the bottle, walked into the venue, and served it to the very crowd that now looked on in amazement."

posted by ericb at 9:42 AM on March 25, 2010

Attention whore galore.
posted by ericb at 9:42 AM on March 25, 2010

Why are people even talking about GG Allin? Because of the piss? There's nothing in common between this stunt and what GG Allin did besides bodily excretions. GG's shows were never this controlled, he never would have orchestrated a stunt like this or orchestrated anything at all for that matter. GG was a psychopathic ball of pure violence, and his shows usually got shut down after two or three songs when he would start attacking the audience.
posted by DecemberBoy at 9:44 AM on March 25, 2010 [4 favorites]

I don't care how uncool it makes me for saying it, "White Trash Two Heebs And A Bean" is a great fucking record. "Punk In Drublic" still holds up pretty good too.

What are you talking about? Who the fuck would disagree with that statement?
posted by spikeleemajortomdickandharryconnickjrmints at 9:44 AM on March 25, 2010 [2 favorites]

I think Fat Mike is opening a bar in my neighborhood? A restaurant.

Where every entree comes with spit and/or feces blended in.
posted by ericb at 9:44 AM on March 25, 2010

I saw them, I think, last year. They were playing a show with Bad Religion in Tokyo, and I was kind of shocked to find out that Bad Religion was actually opening for NOFX. I didn't know, well, any of their recent songs (on later review, Wolves in Wolves Clothing has some pretty damn good songs) but it was pretty clear that Fat Mike was trashed beyond belief. How someone can drink that much, and do whatever he was on, and still managed to play, say, 90% of the right notes, I'll never know.

He was much, much more lucid than Tim Armstrong at the Rancid show I saw later in the year though. When you're too fucked up to even fake like you're playing guitar, maybe it's time to have a bit of a rest.
posted by Ghidorah at 9:45 AM on March 25, 2010

A good way to remember it is "a principal is your pal."
posted by chococat at 9:46 AM on March 25, 2010 [1 favorite]

Well, I think this is one of the best things Fat Mike's ever done. It's certainly the most artistically pure. I salute him for communicating his uncompromised sense of the world to an audience, something that NOFX is usually too jokey and distanced and fun-loving to do. I'd love to see a video of this. Oh, and all of you calling him an asshole? Isn't that the entire point, that he's a more fucked-up and flawed asshole than anyone, even his close friends, suspected him of being? And if I had some of this stuff on my conscience, I can only imagine how cathartic it would be to get it all out of my system (well, in more ways than one).
posted by naju at 9:48 AM on March 25, 2010 [3 favorites]

However, since it was mentioned, I should point out (although it doesn't detract from the point that Mike is nothing like GG, which I agree with) that GG Allin had a wife and daughter when he was with The Jabbers and even held down jobs to a degree. However, his wife left him and took his kid when she got sick of him coming home cut up and bleeding from rolling around in broken glass after every show, and that's when he became the feces-throwing GG most people know (The Jabbers were violent, but no more so than The Germs or Black Flag or The Stooges).
posted by DecemberBoy at 9:49 AM on March 25, 2010 [1 favorite]

I don't care how uncool it makes me for saying it, "White Trash Two Heebs And A Bean" is a great fucking record. "Punk In Drublic" still holds up pretty good too.

What are you talking about? Who the fuck would disagree with that statement?

Me. Only because it doesn't include "Ribbed."
posted by eyeballkid at 9:49 AM on March 25, 2010 [1 favorite]

What are you talking about? Who the fuck would disagree with that statement?

The dude immediately before me that said "people still listen to NOFX?".
posted by DecemberBoy at 9:50 AM on March 25, 2010

Well, I think this is one of the best things Fat Mike's ever done. It's certainly the most artistically pure.

You can't see it, but I'm dismissing this with a jerking-off motion.
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 9:52 AM on March 25, 2010 [20 favorites]

The sheer tonnage of the testosterone this requires would crush a full size SUV.

The only thing about this story that doesn't make sense is that Mike didn't finish the set by facing the audience, pulling a pistol out, and shooting himself in the head. 'Cause that's how it reads; a farewell, fuck-you-all, life-sucks, public suicide note like Bud Dwyer's press conference, except a lot longer.
posted by Clay201 at 9:55 AM on March 25, 2010 [1 favorite]

Me. Only because it doesn't include "Ribbed."

"Ribbed" was good too, but that was kind of the point where they had just started taking things more seriously (they were kind of a joke band for years) and they were still pretty rough. I think El Jefe joined right after they recorded that, right? I'd say it's "good" but not "great", but that's just my opinion.
posted by DecemberBoy at 9:57 AM on March 25, 2010

I wasn't quite comparing this to GG Allin, but I do think there's this new crowd of people who like punk for all the wrong things about punk. People who just like violence and stories of people hurting themselves and peeing on the audience. People who were jocks when they were the right age to actually listen to this music, so instead they just kind of talk about it and watch movies about it. And Allin seems to be a big part of that right now.

I hadn't thought of Fat Mike as being a part of that at all, and I wondered if this was sort of his way of saying "fuck you" to an audience that would come to this show hoping to see something they could Twitter about.

But I dunno.
posted by roll truck roll at 9:59 AM on March 25, 2010 [1 favorite]

I'm kind of in shock. But a bit of awe, too.

Shock and awe, one might say.
posted by Theta States at 9:59 AM on March 25, 2010

People who were jocks when they were the right age to actually listen to this music, so instead they just kind of talk about it and watch movies about it. And Allin seems to be a big part of that right now.

Heh, sounds a lot like what an anonymous commenter said on the OP: "I wonder if fat mike got that urine trick from my frat brothers? They’re always tricking me into drinking urine. It’s really fucking punk."
posted by PhoBWanKenobi at 10:00 AM on March 25, 2010 [1 favorite]

idiopath: "Hell even the amplitude of the rock sound system is pathological, well above the level needed to cause permanent physical damage to one's ears. But hey, that's rock and roll."

I find myself oddly agreeing with you. I read this great interview with Billy Childish where he said that's his biggest complaint about punk venues. He resorted to essentially not using the venues' sound systems at all, just relying on the sound he could get from his amplifier.

But hey, it's okay to wear earplugs. In fact, it can help you hear the music better.
posted by roll truck roll at 10:03 AM on March 25, 2010

but I do think there's this new crowd of people who like punk for all the wrong things about punk. People who just like violence and stories of people hurting themselves and peeing on the audience.

I was actually just thinking about this when I was outside smoking, but my contention is that those people have ALWAYS been around. Read stories about what Black Flag shows in LA in the late 70s-early 80s were like, or just even in my own experience going to shows since the early 90s, there have always been those scary, violent people around punk rock mixed in with outre nerds like me. They come BECAUSE there might be fights, or to start them, or to harass women, or whatever. The fuck-authority attitude of punk rock means they can get away with a lot of negative crap in the subculture that they couldn't in the larger mainstream world.
posted by DecemberBoy at 10:04 AM on March 25, 2010 [5 favorites]

Don't ever accept a Tequila shot from Fat Mike

Don't call him "white," either

(Represents everything he hates...)
posted by ZenMasterThis at 10:04 AM on March 25, 2010 [2 favorites]

I can't even handle your username. I'm definitely not following those links.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 10:05 AM on March 25, 2010

Two points. I didn't mention Allin by way of comparison in terms of what he or Mike do/did. I was simply highlighting the audience reaction aspect.

Also, G.G. Allin was many things, but insane was not one of them. He had a fucked up world view and practiced a fucked up artistic vision, but he was absolutely in control of his actions (except, of course, when under the influence). Much of his thing was a very deliberate and calculated act. When not in character or on drugs, he was coherent, rational, and not unfriendly. The folks who G.G. did business with have a much different perspective on his sanity than do the rubes in his audience.
posted by snottydick at 10:06 AM on March 25, 2010

Isn't that the entire point, that he's a more fucked-up and flawed asshole than anyone, even his close friends, suspected him of being?

His close friends already knew. His fans probably already did, too. But there's an unwritten agreement, generally, between a performer and an audience. It includes a sense of trust of even very messed up and disturbing performers. Every once in a while, a performer comes along and violates that trust; that implicit agreement. When that happens, some people get mad and some people call him a genius or an artist or whatever.

But the fact is, those performers are neither uniquely artistic nor shockingly offensive.

The audience should not be surprised when that fourth wall is broken through every once in a while, and should be especially wary of any part of a performance that does so. Taking a drink offered by a stage performer is frought with peril, and the audience should know that. I don't care if the performer offering the beverage is Fat Mike, G.G. Allin, or Andy Williams. Taking the drink is agreeing to be part of what, for all you know, could be a terrible and regrettable performance.

By the same token, breaking through the fourth wall and doing something harmful to the audience is not particularly artistic, in my opinion. It's cheap. It makes me think of John Lennon's anecdote about seeing Yoko's art for the first time, described on Wikipedia thus: "The viewer is invited to climb a white ladder, where at the top a magnifying glass, attached by a chain, hangs from a frame on the ceiling. The viewer uses the reading glass to discover a block letter 'instruction' beneath the framed sheet of glass - it says 'Y E S.'" I don't even like Yoko Ono. But that exhibit is artistic and brilliant. Why? Because the block letter instruction beneath the framed sheet of glass doesn't say the F word, which would have been stupid, obvious, and facile.

Fat Mike's performance here is the equivalent of replacing "YES" with the F word and calling it art. Pissing in the drink you give to the audience? Facile. Obvious. Stupid.
posted by The World Famous at 10:07 AM on March 25, 2010 [3 favorites]

Fat Wreck Chords is to punk rock as Taco Bell is to Mexican food. HTH.
posted by entropicamericana at 10:10 AM on March 25, 2010 [4 favorites]

I used to frequent Eric Melvin's coffee shop when I lived in West Hollywood. I hope this whole peeing in drinks thing wasn't common with the other members of his band.

I think I'm more shocked that these older punk guys have made fortunes from their music careers.
posted by cazoo at 10:12 AM on March 25, 2010

Also, G.G. Allin was many things, but insane was not one of them.

I really don't want to derail this into a discussion of GG Allin, but: I see where you're coming from with this, I never met him or anything but I know people who have and have read interviews with him where he's completely normal and lucid, and yeah, obviously he wasn't throwing feces and attacking people all the time, and he did have an at least internally coherent plan (make rock n' roll dangerous, etc.). That said, however, I don't think you can call him "not insane" - I mean, Charles Manson had an internally coherent plan and can have normal conversations too.
posted by DecemberBoy at 10:13 AM on March 25, 2010

I barely remember this band. Am I right in my understanding that this person hasn't had to work a real job in almost thirty years? That's remarkable.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 10:14 AM on March 25, 2010 [3 favorites]

Pissing in the drink you give to the audience? Facile. Obvious. Stupid.

Maybe, and I don't want to justify it or anything, but I took the action as a pretty simple statement: "All this time, by buying my records, going to my shows, buying my merchandise, holding me up as some kind of icon or hero, you've been swallowing my piss. This show represents who I really am. Now you're aware on more than some abstract level."
posted by naju at 10:15 AM on March 25, 2010 [5 favorites]

I don't know who Fat Mike is. I was disheartened to find out he played bass for Me First and the Gimme Gimmes.

Is this something he could be arrested or sued for?
posted by MegoSteve at 10:16 AM on March 25, 2010

Man, I am so sick of reading about juggalos.

Video is the better medium.
posted by The Straightener at 10:19 AM on March 25, 2010

On preview, I'm deleting what I was typing and just entirely agreeing with naju.
posted by Theta States at 10:20 AM on March 25, 2010

Wow

There's a whole lot of things I could giva a living shit about. Fat Mike just made right to the top of the list.
posted by timsteil at 10:27 AM on March 25, 2010

my contention is that those people have ALWAYS been around

And you're 100% right, DecemberBoy. The punk scene was always split between the assholes who were drawn by the violence and the cool people who just wanted something other than MTV crap. Luckily the assholes tend to cycle through, while the cool ones stick around. Pretty much everyone I know who has been into punk for years is good people.

It's pretty easy to tell from his lyrics that Fat Mike is an asshole who doesn't think things through very well. Their move to more political stuff killed NOFX for me, he doen't have the mind for it.
posted by InfidelZombie at 10:29 AM on March 25, 2010 [1 favorite]

Say what you will about the merits of Fat Wreck Chords, NOFX, and whatever other projects Fat Mike has been working on, Kittens for Breakfast....

(Me? Not a big fan)

But running a record label and playing in a band in a capacity where you are supporting yourself, your family, AND your employees is a pretty real fucking job, where he probably puts in a lot more time than your average nine-to-fiver.

I don't think that playing in a band = real job, or running a small record label = real job, necessarily, because they are things that can be done as a hobby, or as a weekend warrior type of thing, but when it's sustaining you for years, it's a hard job.
posted by elr at 10:39 AM on March 25, 2010 [7 favorites]

huh. I guess I'm the only one who thinks the prank is funny. If you're gonna accept a free drink from a guy called Cokie the Crown, what do you expect?

The link didn't work ofcourse, so I'm just guessing there wasn't something worse than pee in your drink (pee is sterile, right? or is that only your own pee?).

Re: Cokie the Clown, it's been done. The dolphins are in the jacuzzi.
posted by mrgrimm at 10:44 AM on March 25, 2010

Read stories about what Black Flag shows in LA in the late 70s-early 80s were like

This page of memories from Black Flag shows should provide several examples.
posted by Pope Guilty at 10:46 AM on March 25, 2010 [1 favorite]

I think the site is crashing from too many hits or something. It was working and now it's not.
posted by snottydick at 10:46 AM on March 25, 2010

It's pretty easy to tell from his lyrics that Fat Mike is an asshole who doesn't think things through very well. Their move to more political stuff killed NOFX for me, he doen't have the mind for it.

I don't know if I'd put it that harshly, but I sort of agree with you - he's really not good at writing political lyrics, but then you can't write songs about the kind of goofy stuff he used to write about forever, even if they were better lyrics.
posted by DecemberBoy at 10:48 AM on March 25, 2010

Hey, I don't know anything about that guy, elr. I don't think I ever knew the name of anyone in NOFX until today. I'm genuinely impressed that someone who (as far as I can tell) isn't really all that popular anymore, if he ever was, can make a living tricking people into drinking his pee and occasionally making a record or something. If he can also afford to pay some college girl eight bucks an hour to stuff NOFX t-shirts into envelopes and stuff, that's awesome, good for him. He's a real American entrepreneur.
posted by kittens for breakfast at 10:54 AM on March 25, 2010

I really don't want to derail this into a discussion of GG Allin, but...however, I don't think you can call him "not insane"

I live with his former bass player. GG's performance was, done literally, for shits and giggles. The fact he got a following with folks coming to his shows begging to get kicked in the face and pissed on was a big of shock to him as it is to any other rational being. It was his popularity that warped his mind more than anything else, and ultimately led to his downfall.
posted by MiltonRandKalman at 10:56 AM on March 25, 2010 [5 favorites]

Eh, Bobcat Goldthwait did it better.

Wow, not a sentence I ever thought I'd type.
posted by Ufez Jones at 10:57 AM on March 25, 2010 [1 favorite]

This show represents who I really am. Now you're aware on more than some abstract level.

I was disheartened to find out he played bass for Me First and the Gimme Gimmes.

I'm sick and tired of people just piling on artists because they have a fucked up life, and that in some way taints every piece of art they produced. The art stands alone. Any criticisms of music in this thread? No, just a lot of 'Fat Mike is an asshole, music I used to love is just crap, now that I know.'

Look at what Borges said about Pablo Neruda:

"I think of him as a very fine poet, a very fine poet. I don't admire him as a man, I think of him as a very mean man."

Yeah, maybe because he had a handicapped child that he abandoned along with the mother. Here Neruda writes all these beautiful love poems that people read at weddings, but he was a failed husband and father. The art persists. NOFX is hardly timeless but the point is that I love some of their records, bad behavior be damned.

I see this all the time. Friends who say 'my hero died.' When you learn enough about someone they become human in all their failings, and their pedestal is crushed. Why? Because your expectations were completely unrealistic! Nothing about Neruda's poetry changed! Nothing. The only thing that changed is you. Take your judgements and stick them in your eye.
posted by infinitefloatingbrains at 10:58 AM on March 25, 2010 [7 favorites]

I would bet that's the only time in history Neruda and Fat Mike have been mentioned in the same few paragraphs. God willing, it will also be the last time.
posted by Astro Zombie at 11:02 AM on March 25, 2010 [8 favorites]

Link is messed up, so I only have an inkling of what Fat Mike did, but for the record, I saw NOFX play Thee Parkside a year ago in SF. Tiny place that maybe holds 200, they jammed 300 in there. The entire place was a slam pit, the ceiling was raining from all the sweat, I was getting elbowed in the head by Blag from the Dwarves. Oh, and I've never heard a single one of their songs.

BEST SHOW EVAR
posted by MiltonRandKalman at 11:06 AM on March 25, 2010

on the other hand infinitefloatingbrains, once you discover something odious about an artist it is a little problematic supporting them financially. Orson Scott Card's annoying politics, Beck's cult affiliation, and (at the extreme) Roman Polanskis yeeeccchh mean that while I won't stop admiring their work and admitting that it is great, I wont be buying a record anytime soon.

That said, Fat Mike is not exactly a great artist in any medium. Tho I do admire his thoughtful and crafty running of his label for all these years, his kind of pop-punk is what killed the genre for me, even before the Good Charlottes and the emo kids totally peed on its grave.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 11:06 AM on March 25, 2010 [2 favorites]

When you learn enough about someone they become human in all their failings, and their pedestal is crushed. Why? Because your expectations were completely unrealistic!

Uh, there is a difference between being "human in all their failings" and being an utter dick. I don't think there's anything wrong with wanting the people whose music you admire to not be total jerkfucks. I mean, there are plenty of people making good art who are perfectly nice folks.
posted by adamdschneider at 11:07 AM on March 25, 2010 [1 favorite]

Weird coincidence, but youtube has a new video up on why you SHOULD accept a tequila shot from Bill Murray.
posted by Telf

this should be an FPP
posted by Potomac Avenue at 11:11 AM on March 25, 2010

That is the kind of poetry we should be after, poetry worn away as if by acid by the labor of hands, impregnated with sweat and smoke, smelling of lilies and of urine, splashed by the variety of what we do, legally or illegally. -Pablo Neruda
posted by infinitefloatingbrains at 11:19 AM on March 25, 2010 [1 favorite]

pinpointmusic.com is pretty much down for the count. Not even getting a "server is busy" error, getting a "cannot find the server" error.
posted by hippybear at 11:20 AM on March 25, 2010

Fat Mike is a pretty wise businessman. I don't know how many folks there were in the pop punk scene but homeboy has probably signed more bands and made more tours possible than David Geffen and Jimmy Iovine combined. He's a weird dude but he knows exactly what he's doing and should probably not be written off as an immature, impolite has-been.
posted by christhelongtimelurker at 11:41 AM on March 25, 2010 [2 favorites]

this should be an FPP

The Coffee & Cigarettes clip is better.
posted by mrgrimm at 11:44 AM on March 25, 2010

He's a weird dude but he knows exactly what he's doing and should probably not be written off as an immature, impolite has-been.

Apparently he should be written off as an immature, piss-in-your-shot-of-tequilla asshole. I'd rather be written off as an impolite has-been, to be honest.
posted by hippybear at 12:04 PM on March 25, 2010

Bad Religion was actually opening for NOFX

Holy crap, that is by far the most disturbing thing in this thread.
posted by JoanArkham at 12:17 PM on March 25, 2010 [2 favorites]

I get so sick of it when people reference something that kinda sorta reminds them of the act, and then dismiss it simply with "It's been done."

I don't mind so much when people say "Xxx did it better", but please qualify WHAT they did that was better.

/aside
posted by Theta States at 12:17 PM on March 25, 2010 [1 favorite]

I get so sick of it when people reference something that kinda sorta reminds them of the act, and then dismiss it simply with "It's been done."

It's not so much that it has been done previously as it is that it is an obvious trope that has been beaten to death and that was never artistic to begin with. Saying that someone else has done it "better" is pointless, just like it would be pointless when pointing out that Fantasy Island and The Love Boat are the same show to also say that one is "better" than the other.
posted by The World Famous at 12:29 PM on March 25, 2010

the emptiness was vacuous.

This line bothered me more than the entire 'peeing in tequila' thing.
posted by Think_Long at 12:29 PM on March 25, 2010 [6 favorites]

When he handed out the tequila at the beginning, I was sure that there would be something in it. I guessed LSD, not urine. I fail.
posted by battleshipkropotkin at 12:40 PM on March 25, 2010

This sounds utterly amazing. I hope the tape gets out there... if it was indeed what it was presented as, and not a work on the audience. Either way this sounds like it was a powerful, emotional, and transgressive performance, no matter if the tequila really had been peed in or not, or how true the stories were.
posted by jtron at 1:25 PM on March 25, 2010

I wonder who got the worm.
posted by Dick Laurent is Dead at 1:33 PM on March 25, 2010

LOLFX
posted by turgid dahlia at 1:37 PM on March 25, 2010

Not as funny as Dr. Rockzo, The Rock 'N Roll Clown.
posted by ErikaB at 1:42 PM on March 25, 2010

Fat Wreck Chords is to punk rock as Taco Bell is to Mexican food. HTH.

Hey there! Hard to see you from all the way back in 1995 but how ya doing? Did you know that people actually kept making punk music after 1985? It's true! Dillinger Four, The Lawrence Arms, Teenage Bottlerocket, The Flatliners, The Swingin Utters, Smoke or Fire Dead to Me, Against Me!, Avail, The Epoxies, None More Black, Frenzal Rhomb, Propagandhi (this one's fraught, I know), The Soviettes, Randy, The Star Fucking Hipsters, The Real McKenzies, these are all punk rock bands that have been touring their asses off in the past decade and have also put out albums on Fat. When was the last time you actually went to a punk rock show?
posted by Doublewhiskeycokenoice at 1:51 PM on March 25, 2010 [10 favorites]

Damn you snottydick, you ruined the surprise by making it totally obvious what was going to happen at the end.
posted by w0mbat at 2:21 PM on March 25, 2010

You know, insulting a punk by saying they only listen to old music just isn't going to work.
posted by JoanArkham at 2:31 PM on March 25, 2010

doublewhiskeycokenoice: I don't know; it must have been right around the last time I took an autogyre to Siam.
posted by entropicamericana at 2:34 PM on March 25, 2010

>Hey there! Hard to see you from all the way back in 1995 but how ya doing? Did you know that people actually kept making punk music after 1985? It's true! Dillinger Four, The Lawrence Arms, Teenage Bottlerocket, The Flatliners, The Swingin Utters, Smoke or Fire Dead to Me, Against Me!, Avail, The Epoxies, None More Black, Frenzal Rhomb, Propagandhi (this one's fraught, I know), The Soviettes, Randy, The Star Fucking Hipsters, The Real McKenzies, these are all punk rock bands that have been touring their asses off in the past decade and have also put out albums on Fat. When was the last time you actually went to a punk rock show?

Worth it.

Thanks for the link(s), snottydick.
posted by fook at 2:35 PM on March 25, 2010

You know, insulting a punk by saying they only listen to old music just isn't going to work.

It's not the music so much as the joke that that was old.
posted by Doublewhiskeycokenoice at 2:45 PM on March 25, 2010

I don't think it's very interesting when people need an audience to feel sorry for themselves and call it an "artistic statement," or shit on their audience for liking them. It's more narcissistic and indulgent than creative. If pissing in the tequila was supposed to be symbolic or clever, this guy is pathetic. GG Allin was nihilism in action, and you knew what you were in for.

Yeah, it's no secret that punk attracts some pretty dysfunctional characters, but this emo crap is tiresome. We're all suffering, dude - why do you think we're here? I was into punk before NOFX and the emo wave came through, so am probably biased that way.
posted by krinklyfig at 3:03 PM on March 25, 2010

It's weird. If it was, say, Andres Serrano doing something like this, I would consider it to be the ultimate in elite masturbatory pure-shock-value bullshit. But because it's Fat Mike, I can't actually feel that negative about it, in contrast to most people in this thread. In terms of the "life story" he described, I doubt the kind of experiences he spoke about with brutal honesty are unique to him; these things don't make him a psycho, they probably make him fairly normal but unusually brave to admit to them. In terms of the beverage; well, there's no such thing as a free drink.
posted by Jimbob at 3:07 PM on March 25, 2010

Double whiskey coke, no ice, nothing else.
posted by Wolfdog at 3:08 PM on March 25, 2010

these things don't make him a psycho, they probably make him fairly normal but unusually brave to admit to them.

Yeah, but this seems more like his version of group therapy than a punk show. So, we've all been through fucked up shit. Admitting it is brave, but it's not unusual. Question is, what are you going to do about it?
posted by krinklyfig at 3:24 PM on March 25, 2010

Double whiskey coke, no ice, nothing else.

Whoa. For some reason it never occurred to me to parse that username as "Double whiskey coke no ice". I always read it as "Double whiskey coke noice," because a double whiskey coke would, indeed, be noice.
posted by adamdschneider at 3:24 PM on March 25, 2010 [1 favorite]

So...these were the best stories the dude could come up with?
posted by Ouisch at 3:29 PM on March 25, 2010

adamdchneider: I was going to say the exact same thing, but I didn't know there was a UD def. of 'noice', so I had no idea how to explain it.
posted by Think_Long at 3:36 PM on March 25, 2010

The Straightener: Video is the better medium.

I'm not sure if this is the greatest, dumbest, or saddest thing I've ever seen. I'm perplexed in the same way whenever I think about juggalos in general.
posted by joedan at 4:07 PM on March 25, 2010

I love the definition and example sentence #2 for noice.
posted by roll truck roll at 4:32 PM on March 25, 2010

doing something harmful to the audience

Putting some pee in someone's tequila isn't actually harmful, unless you've got a disease that can survive the alcohol.
posted by Jimmy Havok at 4:35 PM on March 25, 2010

Putting some pee in someone's tequila isn't actually harmful, unless you've got a disease that can survive the alcohol.

Intentionally feeding someone human excrement without their knowledge or consent is harmful on several levels - no matter how much alcohol is mixed in.
posted by The World Famous at 4:37 PM on March 25, 2010 [1 favorite]

The World Famous, as you yourself aptly said above, this is basically a textbook example of assumed risk.
posted by roll truck roll at 5:59 PM on March 25, 2010 [1 favorite]

Fun NOFX fact: the original title of "White Trash..." was "White Trash, Two Kikes and a Spic", but Eric Melvin's grandmother made him feel really bad about it and they changed the name. I love that story.
posted by DecemberBoy at 6:04 PM on March 25, 2010

assumed risk that the liquid coming out of a tequila bottle may not be tequila? seems a stretch to me
posted by idiopath at 6:20 PM on March 25, 2010

The World Famous, as you yourself aptly said above, this is basically a textbook example of assumed risk.

In terms of legal analysis, I wouldn't call it a "textbook example" at all. I wouldn't drink the shot. But I suspect that a jury would have no trouble finding liability.
posted by The World Famous at 6:37 PM on March 25, 2010

Mixing NOFX and emo seems like you need to rethink your filter a bit. Unless you're going with the old idea of Fugazi as emo, that sort of stuff. Pop punk does not equal emo. For that matter, punk played by talented musicians who can sing? It's not the end of the world, folks. (Not claiming NOFX can sing.) Music doesn't have to sound like shit to be punk.

And yeah, the Bad Religion concert thing. There was no word as to who would be headlining until the band took the stage. I was kind of let down, but it was still a good show. Towards the end of the NOFX set, various members of BR came back, and they played several old, old (80-85 era) Bad Religion songs.

Plus, NOFX has the best ending to a live show ever: A pantomime to Avenue Q's Everyone's a little bit racist.
posted by Ghidorah at 7:16 PM on March 25, 2010

"Mike and Eric Melvin had witnessed a girl being forcefully carried down the stairs of a club on her way to being raped. As it goes, they both stood there watching slack jawed as she stared at them helplessly, then she grabbed onto both of them and yelled, “Help me!”. The men told Mike and Eric not to say a word. They did exactly that and went upstairs to watch the Vandals perform."

Mike has trouble speaking up despite seeing things he knows to be wrong.

Mike’s mother was in the hospital with a terminal diagnosis. As Mike sat by his barely-alive mother on her death bed, he told her stories about women he used to have “fucked up kinky sex” with. He said it brought a small smile to his mothers face; letting him know she was still alive. After a short while his mother got up enough strength to ask Mike to help end her life. Mike felt it was his obligation, as her son, to oblige her final requests. After talking with the nurses Mike was entrusted with what was believed to be a lethal amount of prescription narcotics to administer to his mother (for those who haven’t been there – being entrusted to administer an overdose of pills while the hospital effectively turns a blind eye is pretty commonplace in these situations). As Mike put it, her brain wanted to go but her heart was too strong. The pills didn’t kill her. After telling the rest of his family to exit the room, the nurse gave Mike a lethal dose of insulin to administer to his Mother. Mike injected her with the insulin and then proceeded to gently hold a pillow over his Mothers face until she ceased to breathe.

Mike recounts his "fucked-up kinky sex stories" to his dying mother; after hearing her final requests, he then smothers her.

Then he poisons his audience by serving them his own urine disguised as "tequila."

I know it's not my place to judge, but I'd appreciate an email when it is...
posted by Graygorey at 11:02 PM on March 25, 2010

...I guess what I'm trying to say is that my sympathy button's kind of stuck if he's aware of what he's continuing to do. Please don't e-mail me. I nummerstand.
posted by Graygorey at 11:48 PM on March 25, 2010

Emo's the latter-day bastard child of the 90's punk scene. I wouldn't mind it so much if it weren't rapidly absorbing the cultural stereotypes that used to be attributed to goth. (I actually saw somebody talking about how vampires were an old school emo obsession dating back the 80's and had to go lie down for a bit.)
posted by Pope Guilty at 12:31 AM on March 26, 2010

Pee isn't poison. Yeah, it's disgusting, but it isn't actually harmful so long as it's fresh and the source is in good health.
posted by Jimmy Havok at 1:54 AM on March 26, 2010

The story about milking that lady just seems like a good ol' kinky, mutually agreeable kick. Kinda sticks out among the rest of the stories because nobody's getting hurt or dying.
posted by stinkycheese at 4:37 AM on March 26, 2010 [2 favorites]

I realize Big Mike may seem like a perfectly trustworthy individual, but I think we all may want to consider the remote possibility that these stories are bullshit part of a performance piece (that includes other people drinking his pee).
posted by kittens for breakfast at 7:35 AM on March 26, 2010 [3 favorites]

Yet another reason to avoid Austin in March.
posted by VicNebulous at 8:48 AM on March 26, 2010

I thought that too, stinkycheese. Assuming there were stories that didn't make it into the review, I wonder if they were more of that variety.
posted by roll truck roll at 10:17 AM on March 26, 2010

I have a friend who was served up a poison as Vodka when he was working on a Russian fishing vessel. When the paralysis finally wore off and he regained the use of his body he didn't really come around to the idea that it was an "assumed risk". I'm not saying that's the same thing as serving up pee, but I've heard it's assault in some areas to actually spit on someone. I think giving someone piss to drink probably lands somewhere between offering random substances (what if he did spike it with a non-hurtful drug?) as drink X and forcibly offering innocuous bodily fluids.
posted by P.o.B. at 5:15 PM on March 26, 2010

An unapologetic Fat Mike explains himself.
posted by mattdidthat at 11:47 AM on April 15, 2010