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Drakkar Sauna "There’s Not Enough Tits On A Wolf"

Monday, September 4, 2006

Friday night was spent at the Art Hospital south of town, taking in a show from Lawrence, Kansas’ Drakkar Sauna strictly on the recommendation of marathonpacks contributor Jason Groth in one of his MEC tour diary entries (this one). Simultaneously, there was an art exhibit (literally) surrounding the performance, and showcasing the work of Illinois artist Garrett Brown (Google-proof, I’m afraid), who also donates album art for Drakkar’s CDs. His work is humorous and intense, incorporating much of the popular mythology from his youth (I’m assuming), most interestingly professional wrestling. The innards of Jabraham Lincoln features Harley Race recontextualized as a colonial/Biblical myth—in a roundabout way, Brown treats pro wrestlers similarly to how Vincent Valdez works with boxers—as larger-than-life works of religious fiction and boyish imaginations—but with the intricate folk-art playfulness of Howard Finster or Henry Darger. This unique sort of artistic lens makes for interesting music as well, as Drakkar themselves demonstrate.

Guitarist and singer Wallace Cochran is tall, thin, and handlebar mustachioed (taking the torch from Greg Norton), and he started Drakkar’s set with a trivia question. He asked the crowd to name one of the supporting actors from the seedy Al Pacino prostitution flick Cruising a girl eventually nailed it (Powers Boothe) and won a CD. It was an engaging and fun way to start a show, and similar in spirit to Brown’s drawings: they both challenge representations of sexuality in fun and playful ways, putting Drakkar in league with the cult band the Frogs and Canadian contemporaries the Hidden Cameras. Jeff Stolz completes the duo, and plays the bass drum, tambourine, and this cool thing called a harmophone, which comes in a suitcase and sounds sort of like an accordion, but played upright like an organ. More specifically, Stolz plays the bass drum with his right foot, the tambourine is tied to his left foot, which he stomps. If this all sounds like a pre-rock gimmick, it sort of is, but thankfully it’s all in service of some great songs. Cochran and Stolz also take obvious pride in their vocal harmonies, and when they worked their upper registers they managed to channel the Everly Brothers on a few occasions, no small feat. Groth joined them onstage (sitting behind/between them) to assist with the vocal duties on “There’s Not Enough Tits On A Wolf” (mp3), a fable that incorproates the tale of Romulus and Remus as a singalong allegory for brotherhood, power struggles, and perhaps a love triangle that ended rather horribly (that last part’s from my head). Remus, as we all know, had to die for the city of Rome to come into existence, but the lesson learned from Drakkar’s tale is a combination of interpersonal pragmatism and romantic cynicism: “it’s best to be alone.”

Jabraham Lincoln is available for purchase from (the Google-proof) Marriage Records—I bought my copy at the show (along with this shirt) which you can do too if you’re in the mid-South or south-South this week. Sauna’s website and Myspace.

ELSEWHERE: I know it’s inevitable that this turd will end up everywhere bloggish, but perhaps I can preemptively lessen its ubiquity by saying that it’s really lame.

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