Midget Handjob

Midnight Snack Break at the Poodle Factory (Epitaph)
by Scott Hefflon

Don’t Panic!

No, it isn’t going to get any better if you keep reading, so if you’re hoping it’ll all make sense, well, you’re on your own…

I’m just thankful more people don’t try this. King Missile/John Hall/Dogbowl in New York and Midget Handjob in Los Angeles are plenty, thanks. No “Jewel now writes poetry too!” horseshit, this is the kinda stream-of-consciousness “spoken word” with noisy avant-jazz/anal probing that only famous lunatics can get away with. Keith Morris was the frontman of a couple little bands called Black Flag and the Circle Jerks, and the rest of the band consists of Jon Wahl and Chris Bagarozzi from Clawhammer, Quasar from Lutefisk, Kevin Fitzgerald from the Geraldine Fibbers, Tony Malone from Detox and John LeBear from France. I may’ve just copied that from the bio, but I know enough to be suitably impressed by the names I do recognize…

The, um, “songs” here range from sitting next to “the weird, talkative guy” at a freeform jazz joint when Apocalypse Now is playing very loudly on the TV behind the bar, to standing rooted to the spot in fear in the Best Buy after someone accidently turns on every TV set to a different station at top volume and your friend keeps right on talking about the dream he had last night about animals copulating and throwing food at him, and then there are the strange songs. Describing spoken word is like explaining Fluff to small, blindfolded child who speaks another language, so I’m going to quit while I’m, um, here. “Jackhammer Floral Arrangement” has a beat you can dance to, perhaps (the closest thing to a single on this mindbender), but my fave is the 11-minute stroll, “Hurricane Morris,” telling the tale of a Fear and Loathing-esque drunken freak-out at an FBI convention and generally going on a wildly funny (for him, not his bandmates) rampage before, during and after a show.
(2798 Sunset Blvd Los Angeles, CA 90026)