This is the last article Strapping wrote before things turned sour. If you want to learn more, please read The Trials of Elk Undercarriage.

Sock it to Me
Strapping Danforth Meets His Maker

SD:  Let's talk about Sparky the Dog Records. Once upon a time, record labels had to be real.  Nowadays, any loser with a computer and a microphone can start one.  Take you, for instance. Your CDs are homemade. Your stuff is available exclusively through your website.  None of the artists on STD even perform live.  Sounds like a vanity-powered ego trip made possible by modern technology.  Why should anyone take you seriously?

SA:  What you're implying is that only a signed band, on a label, with a manager and lawyers working for them, has any legitimacy. That's stupid.   You can't judge the quality of the product simply by the degree to which it's been legitimized by institutions...Within our crowd, we don't all need validation from anyone else and we don't all feel compelled to seek it.  Now, I hate to keep using you, Dan, as my example...

SD:  Oh, hell, don't worry about it...

SA:  You work for a prominent music rag don't you? Rolling Stone , Spin , I forget what you said, "Rip"?

SD:  Er, well,  I used to write for Riff.  

SA: Ok --

SD:  [interrupting]  I was a victim. 

SA:  Uh-huh--

SD:  The paper went under. 

SA:  R--

SD:  Due to a lawsuit. 

SA:  N--

SD:  Something I said about Nina Storey. 

SA:  None of --

SD:  That shrew.

SA:  None of that really matters.  Basically what I'm saying is, the column you write is the same quality if you work for Riff, or you just write it yourself.  I'm not saying it's of high quality. But it's the same quality.

SD:  But come on, Soapdish, some of these "artists" on your label couldn't even clap along to a square dance much less perform a song.  Like this bespeckled guy here [I hold up one of STD's CD releases] "Bubbles in My Pants"?  What is this crap?  The guy sings the blues like he's giving birth to a sperm whale.    

SA:  He's special.  He's not a good example.  I mean, Dan, [whispers] he is special.

SD:  Oh?  Well, then, in that case, that's pretty darn good guitar for a mongoloid. 

SA:  See, Dan, it all depends on your perspective.

SD:  Give me some perspective on this: I noticed that your very own wife recorded an EP for Sparky the Dog--

SA:  Yes, it's called “Maux's Eleven Minutes”.  A masterpiece of brutishness.

SD:  In a world teeming with musicians, how did you see it fit to record her rather than, say, someone with talent?

SA:  She sleeps with me. Plus her record is actually pretty good, considering she'd never played guitar or written a song before we started recording it. Plus it really strikes a chord. There are days when I just have to listen to "Grandma Smells Like Beef".

Think about how most people listen to music. Your average schlub wants to hear music that suits their mood -- something which equates whatever they're experiencing in their life at the moment.  Some moments in life are pivotal or epiphanic, but most moments are not.  

SD:  [phlegmatic cough] So I've noticed.

SA:  An album like [Matt] Shupe's The Combined Effects of Caffeine and Alcohol , would be the equivalent of the long shower you take after you've been stood up for a date the third time in a row.  That's a I-want-to-feel-tragic-even-though-there's-not-really-a-tragedy-kind-of record.

Maux's Eleven Minutes is on par with finding in your mailbox a funny postcard from your favorite aunt.  It's a smile-and-laugh-at-the-joke-I'm-so-glad-I-know-someone-like-that-kind of record.

SD:  And your record, Sycamore, what is that?

SA:  Well, that would be the rock-masterpiece-of-the-decade-kind-of record.

SD:  I've heard Sycamore so I know you're kidding.

SA: Are we almost done?

SD: I get the feeling that you're trying to accomplish more than you admit.  In addition to music, your website features art and writing by what I assume to be a coterie of your friends.  Is it money?  Is it fame?  Is it for the greater—and by that I mean delusional—purpose of the advancement of creativity?

SA:  Some people thought Christopher Columbus was delusional.  And he discovered America, and named it India.  Some people thought the Brian Wilson was delusional.  He gained 250 pounds and didn't get out of bed for ten years.  Some people thought George Bush was delusional for thinking Iraq was a serious threat to the security of the United States. See what I'm saying?

SD:  No. What's next for STD?

SA:  We just finished our second STD the Holidays compilation, Halloweiner Dog.   The next one will come out in July with a “Summer Dance Party” theme. Starving Magpie, the publication Lucas Richard describes as the sister city to STD, is about to publish the final two episodes of the Captain Missiletoe decahology as well as a comprehensive field guide to monsters. Brett Duesing, the mongoloid, and Matt Shupe, the genius, are collaborating on a zine called Sparky the Dog Magazine. And that's just the beginning.

SD:  [groans]  Oh, Jesus.

SA:   After that, there's two additional solo projects coming down the aquaduct:  Brett Duesing's mongoloid rock follow-up EP, "The Anthology of Misunderstandings,” will feature an epic 11 minute tune wherein every line ends with a word that rhymes with Tuscaloosa. And my third solo album is almost done, tentatively dubbed, "Honey Bucket."

SD:  [painfully gripping abdomen] Oh, for fucksake...

SA:  Yeah, I know.  It's gonna be that good.  And best of all, Matt Shupe, myself, and Shawn Sandler, have teamed with Chi Chi Pantera to perform live, that's right, Dan, live, in a new band, Six Months to Live.

SD:  [coughing hideously]  Six Months--

SA:  Six Months to Live .  Listen Dan, if you're gonna cough up all that blood, do it away from Maux's lampshape.  She made that herself.  Heh -- don't.  Listen, you want a hankie? [reaches in pocket]

SD: [inaudible, followed by thud]

SA:  You ok, Strappin'?  Can you get up?  Dan?

[ed. note:  end of recorded transcript]

--Strapping Danforth, January, 2005

Strapping's adventures continue in the Trials of Elk Undercarriage

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.
Content of this page Copyright (C) 2005 Sparky The Dog
Contact Sparky the Dog
FAQ