GET BENT!

Column: Pouring the Red Whine

Eric Davidson’s back with a nifty two-part, Bruise Cruise-themed edition of Pouring the Red Whine. Today it’s an interview with King Khan and the Shrines. Look for Eric’s interview with comedian Neil Hamburger tomorrow!

By Eric Davidson

So thanks to such obtrusive, apparently “more important news” as the Grammys, the death of a famous singer, and “Linsanity,” my all-important pre-Bruise Cruise interview with King Khan and Neil Hamburger got bumped from another publication. So as I hate to see hilarity like this get tossed into history’s dustbin, I have implored the fine folks at GET BENT to post it, post haste. Dive in, as the boat’s already safely docked!

For King Khan, traversing the globe and playing music in unorthodox venues or locations is not novel. Born in some outpost in Canada, currently living in Berlin, but mostly found checking his bags at some airport or groggily shuffling out the back door of a dive in some southern college town, Khan is a trash-rock troubadour. Via his infinite number of projects (King Khan & BBQ Show, Tandoori Knights, King Khan & the Shrines, Black Jaspers, etc.), it seems that, musically and geographically, wherever he lays his hat/turbin/nose-bone is his home. But even for King Khan, playing a four-day cruise is something special, and he’s pleased as spiked punch to have had him and his Shrines invited on this year’s Bruise Cruise – a rarefied gig, but one seemingly perfect for the rollicking rough-shod R&B revue that is King Khan & the Shrines.

You don’t get sea sick, do you?

Never been seasick or sick of the sea.

What’s the worst sickness you ever got on tour?

Back in the Spaceshits (Khan’s teen-years garage-punk band) days we all got scabies because we stayed on a hippie pot farm in Vancouver for a few days. We tried the lotion, but we kept infecting each other for more than a month afterwards. It was awful. We spread scabies all over America!

So on the Bruise Cruise, are you going to play shuffleboard and shit?

I am not the GG Allin of shuffleboard. I never went on a cruise like this before, and I am truly relieved that Kid Rock or Weezer are not involved.

I was chatting with a pal about how most fans of the bands and the kinds of music on the Bruise Cruise are either broke, unemployed, or perpetually asking for guest list action. So who is the audience on the Bruise Cruise? I mean, it ain’t cheap, right? Are there really THAT many trust fund kids?

I thought they were all actors hired by a casting agency. Broke and unemployed! Maybe they are going test some kind of STD vaccines on us. Better keep my dick out of the mashed potatoes.

Who are you most excited to see, of the bands, pals attending, etc.?

I can never get enough of Mr. Quintron and Ms. Pussycat, they are a part of my family, and I hope that we will all be able to finally return to Atlantis where we belong. Jello Biafra performed with the Shrines years ago, and we covered “Rebel Rebel,” so maybe we can learn “Nazi Punks Fuck Off” and get everyone goosestepping into the hot tub.

If you could rent a helicopter to fly over the boat and send down three people to make the party that much nuttier, who would they be?

Sean from the Spits, and Jack and Julie from the K-holes.

Name your three favorite seafaring songs:

“Marianne” - The German version of “16 tons,” the lyrics are all about a ship named Marianne travelling around the Hudson Bay.

“Sea of Love” by Phil Phillips – I’ve loved that song since I was a kid.

“The Raging Sea” - Gene Maltais

Three favorite movies with boats as a major theme:

Fitzcarraldo, The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, and whatever this is:

Have you been shopping for that perfect Speedo? And please tell me you’re forcing the rest of the Shrines to dress in incredibly uncomfortable, hot, three-piece suits for the duration of the cruise.

I am digging the idea of those paint-on suits for all the Shrines. And maybe I still have time to get us a Mankini sponsorship.

Are you and Jello Biafra going to stage an impromptu political debate?

Actually Noam Chomsky will be judging the wet t-shirt contest while me and Jello mud wrestle.