Boss Hog
White Out (In the Red)
An interview with Jon Spencer and Cristina Martinez
by Jon Sarre
Never underestimate the power of the othersmallworldyness. Case in point, cool rock chick Viva Las Vegas blows into town after a lengthy EuroVaca (via New York, where das Blues Explosion’s Russell Simins’ apartment reportedly turned into a whirlin’ boozy funhouse, complete with, natch, real vomit, same goes for a couplea cabs and the Holiday Bar, where they sometimes give ya as many free drinks as ya can handle, providin’ yer not too discriminatin’). Thing is, she’s stuck for a feature story on somekinda hip pop culture (couture?) combo for the skin mag she writes for. Her promised Mike D excluso had fallen thru, cuz the knuckle draggin’ New York Knickerbockers hadta play some stupid basketball game and the erstwhile Beastie somehow felt his attendance was mandatory (hell, somebody’s gotta high-five wee Spike Lee when Ewing makes a free-throw, right?). So, anyway, the scene at my house is onea frenzied desperation with lotsa Parisian-bought footwear strewn about and Miss Viva frantically lookin’ thru the pap’s for “somekinda fuckin’ story.”
PayDirt (pork?) was finally hit in the form of Boss Hog. Nah, not the Sorrell Booth TV character (cuz he’s dead), but, rather, the infamous Jon Spencer/Cristina Martinez vehicle, which just so happened to be rollin’ thru these parts. A quick call to their management company supposedly rendered an interview deal signed, sealed and delivered and yers truly was drafted to “sit in” as rock’n’roll consultant, cuz someone needed to dot the clefs’n’ work the brawny loonytunes side o’ the story as Viv’s angle usually pertains to sexual footgear and “what color panties are you wearing and how long have you been wearing them?”
Interview saved, we grabbed a bottle and hopped into the car, stoppin’ only for beer (and a couple pesky red lites). Upon our arrival, we immediately spied Cristina, clad in clingy black, runnin’ her hand all over… uh, turned out she was only marinatin’ some pork loin. We go out back and there’s Spencer, chasin’ their rugrat ’round the yard, admonishin’ the lad not to fill up on tortilla chips (jeez, rockstars!). Drummer Hollis Queens is spearin’ shrimp or tossin’ salad or somethin’ (so domestic, these Boss Hoggers). Me and Viva joined bassist Jens Jergensen, keyboard plinker Mark Boyce, In the Red CEO Larry Hardy (he put out the new Boss Hog disc, White Out), the Countdowns’ Brian Waters and tech dude Rob or Sean or, sorry, I forget yer name, at the patio table. Viva cracked open the CrownRoyal and the rest of us cracked beers and… uh… this is really weird!
For example:
Me: Hey Jon, y’ever gonna re-release [the cassette-only version — lonnngggg outta print — of Pussy Galore’s] Exile on Main Street?
Jon: No.
Me: How come?
Jon: Cuz we did it and that’s it.
or:
Me: Hey Jon, ya really ever eat “raw macaroni” [like he says on Boss Hog’s “I Dig You” — this was a side question to a Cristina reference to the same song]?
Jon: Narrrrarggghhhhh!
Me: Uh… okay.
Cristina: Oh, Jon.
Me: Yeah, same spelling [I motion towards that other Jon,
y’know, Spencer]
Cristina: What’s yer last name?
Me: [hopin’ she hadn’t seen tear sheets of their last record] Sarre.
Cristina: S-A-A-R?
Viva: No, S-A-R-R-E. Same thing, but the French spelling.
Cristina: You look French, whatever that’s supposed to mean.
Miss Las Vegas ran the show with her repertoire of “What’s the sexiest…” questions, but Cristina answered ’em all, even the non-sequitur ones Viva threw in. Jon and Larry regaled a member of the opening band, the Need, with some Danzig stories (she publishes a fanzine called, unsurprisingly, “The Day I Met Glen Danzig” and Jon related this second-hand yarn where the ex-Misfit was spotted bustin’ little boys t-shirts with his muskles at a K-Mart in NewfuckingJersey). I think I got off about two-point-two-five minutes of Q&A, but, by then the story was already writ (and you just read it, chumpski), but just for the record, Jon’n’Cristina’s little un likes Spencer’s sis’s band better than either the Blues Explosion or Boss Hog and the answer to the “what color panties are you wearing” question was “Hmmm, oops, I forgot to put any on tonite.”
(www.intheredrecords.com)