The Country Teasers
Destroy All Human Life (Fat Possum)
A summarized interview with singer Ben Waller
by Jon Sarre
Bad week for me: too much drink and too little sleep makes Johnny a dullard. Trying to “work,” that’s, well, trying. After a whirlwind East Coast jaunt, I arrived back in suspiciously hot’n’humid Portland, Oregon with only a couplea days to rustle up some interest in this Country Teasers/Compulsive Gamblers (the latter, if ya don’t already know, are members of the late and lamented (?) Oblivians) double bill I was supposed to be promoting (and had money up for, blah, blah, blah).
In my absence, I’d been assured that pain-in-the-ass and questionably necessary details like fliering and press liaisons would be handled. Needless to say, I wasn’t surprised to see that not a single poster had been added to the myriad layers that decorated the telephone poles in this city (in Portland, US West’s poles are sometimes about double the normal width due to reams of 11X17 show advertisements stapled to ’em). So much for DIY promotion…
By the day of the show, things were looking suitably hopeless enough. One press write-up was garnered with which to overcome the lack of instant name recognition of the Scottish/English wanna-be-twangy-Fall-fans-meet Dolly Parton Teasers and garage-rock veteran Gamblers. I could already picture myself digging into the cushions of the couch for spare change to help pay off the guarantee at the end of the night, whilst the two local opening bands (a couple of the finest outfits this town has to offer, the Prime Evils and Coco Cobra And The Killers) bitched at me about having to play for free. Not like this would be a new experience (and despite their threats to the contrary, I’m sure they’ll work with me again), but you really do wanna pay people sometimes. Really.
Professional that I am, I decided the best thing to do would be to get to the club early and start drinking. The Country Teasers rolled in around 6:00 and heartily agreed to a few pints of Pabst Blue Ribbon. America, they said, had been pretty good to them so far. At the same time, they expressed some concern at the fact that their tourmates, the Compulsive Gamblers, had gone missing a few nights earlier and hadn’t been heard from since. This was back in Wisconsin, mind you. As for the probability that the erstwhile Gamblers would show up, the boys assured me that, in their words, it was “not bloody likely” (Ah, DIY promoting part II).
Trying to remain cool about the whole thing, I slammed the brakes on all the “fun” we were having by digging out the tape recorder I had stashed and reminded the Teasers about the interview I had set up with Fat Possum, their current label, some time before. Any jocularity that was present upon getting the hell out of the van and receiving free food and booze soon evaporated like spilt whiskey on hot asphalt. Frontman Ben Waller’s original “sure, let’s talk” front turned into sleeve-addressed mumblings as he pondered his gyro (and like the title implies, I lost the tape somewhere anyway… Destiny?).
Ben oughtta be a press secretary. His evasions of each and every question were that skillful. Pointed queries turned into non-committal non-denials with any and all elaboration absorbed into the feta cheese which garnished the unholy lamb/beef mix that makes up “gyro meat.” Oddly enough, anything said not regarding his band or songwriting was met with a succinct and detailed answer. Once we got into “what’s it like to be the Hitlers of comedy?” (as Waller claims on “It Is My Duty” off the Teasers 1996 Crypt release Satan Is Real Again or Feeling Good About Bad Thoughts), however, he went back to talking to his sandwich.
We broke off the “interview” long after it had gone far past nowhere. The band had finished eating. As it was still relatively early, we all treked over to the closest nudie bar (something Portland has per square mile like other cities have 7-11s). We drank whiskey and shelled out bucks to Miss Coco Cobra, who, trooper that she is, was squeezing in a shift before opening for the Country Teasers. Ben talked a little while about his musical inspirations (which are basically early Fall records and Tammy Wynette). Coco kicked off her panties to a selection off the latest Teasers disc, Destroy All Human Life. The foreigners were impressed to see a naked woman shaking it to one of their songs and I wished this magazine gave me an expense account.
After another round, Miss Cobra accompanied us back to the club, where the Compulsive Gamblers, true to all predictions, still had not arrived. Mick Collins, ex-Red Aunt Terri Wahl and the rest of the Screws, however, had (they were playing Portland the following night and stopped by to catch up with the brothers Oblivian). Mick appeared to be concerned about the absence of the Gamblers, as if there was an off-chance they were dead or enrolled in a graduate program at the University of Wisconsin or something. I figured there was nothing we could do about it, but order a coupla beers.
The show, as it’s been said, went on, and while not a total disaster, certainly suffered from a lack of interested parties with seven bucks to blow. Hell, their loss, they missed one of the best newer bands in dumbass indierockdumb. The Country Teasers played a good long while, Ben’s gruff monotone rose up above their sparse 6am with a sunrise hangover lazy trebly sound. The set and two encores later, they still had more and Coco Cobra joined the boys for an impromptu finale of “Stand By Your Man.” More whiskey flowed and things got woozier later for the one-eye shut ride home, but the band left with a few hundred bucks and a bottle of Jack Daniels. I never did find that tape, though. I think I lost it two nights later at 4am after seeing T Model Ford. Them Fat Possum guys’ll kill ya.
(PO Box 1923 Oxford, MS 38655)
