Dan Fishback Dot Com http://www.danfishback.com/ en Copyright 2010 Thu, 11 Mar 2010 14:43:41 -0500 http://www.sixapart.com/movabletype/ http://www.rssboard.org/rss-specification We've Talked About It In Letters, We've Talked About It On The Phone...
FFISHBACK_300CMYK4x6.Rotated.270.Thumbnail.jpg BFISHBACK_BACK_300CMYK4x6.Rotated.270.Thumbnail.jpg
...fun-time design by Ardi Kuhn
]]> http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2010/03/weve-talked-about-it-in-letter.html http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2010/03/weve-talked-about-it-in-letter.html Thu, 11 Mar 2010 14:43:41 -0500 Take Me Out.
My California adventure with Cheese On Bread has reminded me how much I miss music.  I've been making so much theater in the past few years that my musical projects have taken a back seat, some gracefully and some angrily. In 2009, I only played three solo music shows, after having played upwards of 20 in previous years. I miss it so much, and I wish I could clone myself so I could go back to playing songs for you all the time, at all hours of the night.  But alas, these days, it cannot be.  Still, the way I see it, when something decreases in quantity, it's just an opportunity to increase in quality.  This is all just to say: I'm going upscale, folks.

I'm playing a show at Joe's Pub.



DAN FISHBACK & MAX VERNON
Joe's Pub (425 Lafayette Street)
Monday, April 5, 7pm, $12 tickets available HERE.



I know what you're saying: "Joe's Pub?  I have to actually BUY A TICKET to go there!"  And it's true, it's all true!  There's no hat to be passed, no tip jar, and I'm pretty sure PBR isn't on the menu.  (Yes, there's a menu.)  This might seem scary at first, I know.  But I so rarely get to sing you songs anymore, and so I want this night to be special.  I wanna see you wearing something nice, your faces all lit up by candles and flaming martinis.  Basically, I want you to take me on a date. 

Joining us on this date will be the ravishingly talented Max Vernon, one of my favorite songwriters in New York.  We're sharing the bill and I cannot wait to hear his death-defying songs in that gorgeous room.

For my own set of very old songs and very new songs, I've assembled a band of young ruffians, including, on drums, Daoud Tyler-Ameen from Art Sorority For Girls, on keyboards, Matt Katz from The Bloodsugars, and, on lead guitar, the ubiquitous Dibs from every band ever.  Our show will feature guest appearances by Sammy Tunis of The Lisps and a choir of anti-folk superstars. 

So put a carnation in your lapel, dust off your funeral shoes, and meet me at Joe's for an evening of songs I've tenderly awaited for a long, long time.

Lovingly Yours
Dan
]]> http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2010/03/take-me-out.html http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2010/03/take-me-out.html Wed, 03 Mar 2010 12:41:42 -0500 Up Hill, Down Hill, Jam Francisco!
I'm in Los Angeles now, far away from east coast blizzard woes.  The Cheese On Bread compound in Highland Park is a hotbed of nonsense, with rehearsals, muddy bales of hay, and a massive camera crew demolishing the front lawn for a home renovation TV show.  Los Angeles, right? 

But tonight is the first night of CHEESE ON BREAD WEST COAST MINI-TOUR 2009.  We start out in San Francisco, so tell all your radical queer bike messenger wiccan raw foodist friends to come hug us! 

February 11: SAN FRANCISCO: Dolores Park Cafe (501 Dolores Street, 7:30-10pm) with Malcolm Rollick & Pablo Das!
February 16: LOS ANGELES: Echo Curio (1519 Sunset Blvd, 9pm)
February 20: PHOENIX, AZ: Trunkspace (1506 Grand Avenue, 8pm)
Feburary 25: LOS ANGELES: The Silverlake Lounge (2906 W. Sunset Blvd, 8pm)

See you Jam Francisco, weirdos!
Love
Dan

ps: You'll be hearing from me very soon about my JOE'S PUB DEBUT with Max Vernon on April 5th!  BUY TICKETS BEFORE THIS MOTHER SELLS OUT. ]]> http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2010/02/up-hill-down-hill-jam-francisc.html http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2010/02/up-hill-down-hill-jam-francisc.html Thu, 11 Feb 2010 10:52:42 -0500 Still, Pretty Good Year.
***

Hello Dearest Mailing List,

2009 has been a satisfying but insensitive lover.  It never listened to my safe-word.  It brought me presents, but promptly broke most of them.  We had some great laughs, but it's time to move on!  And so.  I've decided to break up with 2009.  Just in time for 2010. 

Thanks for sticking with me these past 12 months, dear readers and friends and audience members.  In April, after two years of development, we finally produced "You Will Experience Silence."  People liked it.  Over the summer, I started developing new plays at The MacDowell Colony where I met many amazing people.  This fall, we skeered up a reading for my new musical, "The Material World," a prequel to "You Will Experience Silence." 

Meanwhile, the Cheese On Bread album "The Search for Colonel Mustard" was released in Japan by Moor Works Records.  My own song "Some Boys Are Bullies" was featured in the film "Hollywood, Je'Taime."  And my band Old Hat started its own religion.

2010 is promising to be no less bizarre.  Here's a sneak peak at what's gonna happen...


January: THIRTYNOTHING
I'll be reading new work as part of Dixon Place's "QT (Queer Text) Reading Series," along with my soul sister Max Steele.  My piece will include fragments and notes from my new work-in-progress, thirtynothing, a solo show about growing up in the shadow of the AIDS epidemic. 

That's: Tuesday, January 26th, Dixon Place (161 Chrystie Street), 8pm, $6, QT: Dan Fishback & Max Steele


February: CHEESE ON BREAD
My band Cheese On Bread will be reuniting on the West Coast for a month of songwriting and performing.  You can catch us....

February 11: SAN FRANCISCO: Dolores Park Cafe (501 Dolores Street) with Malcolm Rollick & Pablo Das!
February 13: SANTA BARBARA: Biko Garage (6612 Sueno Road, Isla VIsta)
February 16: LOS ANGELES: Echo Curio (1519 Sunset Blvd)
February 20: PHOENIX, AZ: Trunkspace (1506 Grand Avenue)
Feburary 25: LOS ANGELES: The Silverlake Lounge (2906 W. Sunset Blvd)


April/May: YADDO
For the spring, I'll be tucked away at the Yaddo Artists Colony in Saratoga Springs to continue writing "The Material World!"


Summer: THE MATERIAL WORLD
My time at Yaddo better be productive, because this summer "The Material World" goes into workshop.  It'll be just like "Guys & Dolls," except it's about Jewish socialists, gay porn and Madonna.


Somewhere between those things, I'll be releasing my third solo album, "Mammal" - a record Casey Holford and I started recording in 2005.

I won't be doing much performing in the next year, but if you crave my presence, you can order cds by me or Cheese On Bread at Olive Juice Music Distribution: http://www.olivejuicemusic.com/ojstore.html.  Or, if you're feeling financially secure and wanna sneak in another tax write-off before the year is over, you can donate to the ongoing project that is me at Fractured Atlas*: https://www.fracturedatlas.org/donate/1311.

It's a privilege making things for you.  Let's all have a beautiful new year, no?
Much Love
Dan

http://www.danfishback.com


*Dan Fishback is a sponsored project of Fractured Atlas, a non-profit arts service organization. Contributions in behalf of Dan Fishback may be made payable to Fractured Atlas and are tax-deductible to the extent permitted by law. ]]> http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/12/still-pretty-good-year.html http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/12/still-pretty-good-year.html Tue, 22 Dec 2009 09:42:00 -0500 That's How You Win That Game Max Steele (who you may have seen in my play or on television) is pretty much the best.  Today he was generous enough to put his gorgeous solo show "Lover, Ferocious" on YouTube, in its entirety.  Listen: this is sort of required reading.  If you want me to think you're cool, you should memorize this:







I know, right?
Love
Dan
]]> http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/12/thats-how-you-win-that-game.html http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/12/thats-how-you-win-that-game.html Wed, 16 Dec 2009 12:29:34 -0500 Parents Children Children Parents really upsetting anti-gay legislation happening in Uganda?  I was particularly struck by this interview she did with "ex-gay" leader Richard Cohen - a man I've been familiar with ever since my dad started doing LGBT activism in our home town.   Check out the interview here: 

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy


Yeesh!  After that interview aired, my mother noticed something totally weird - namely, that Cohen's book, "Gay Children, Straight Parents," bore a remarkable surface resemblance to a book she read when I first came out - "Straight Parents, Gay Children."  While the latter helped my mom come to terms with my sexuality, and eventually to become an activist in her own right, the former is totally bogus "ex-gay" propaganda, denounced by every major medical and psychiatric institution in the country.  Check out the covers:


Weird, right?  When you google the good one, the bad one comes up second!  I hope no one makes a terrible mistake and accidentally buys the bad one for their parents!   

Happy Chanukah.
Love
Dan
]]> http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/12/parents-children-children-pare.html http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/12/parents-children-children-pare.html Tue, 15 Dec 2009 20:15:57 -0500 I'm Here For Your Entertainment/Liberation/Education/Consternation/Revelation

Last night my dad and I watched my friend Jeffery on The Joy Behar Show for a segment on gay issues.  He sat between Kevin Meaney and Judy Gold and the three exchanged coming out stories.  This felt significant not just because Jeffery is decades younger than Kevin and Judy, and came out in high school (The others came out much later.), but because Kevin Meaney, now in his 50s, has been closeted, to himself and to the public, until relatively recently. 


For the record, I was mildly obsessed with Kevin Meaney as a kid.  (Am I the only person in the world who can say that?)  Though I no longer remember his routines, he was one of the comics (along with Bill Hicks, Sandra Bernhard, Margaret Cho, Brett Butler...) who captivated me in the early 90s, back when Comedy Central was the MTV of stand-up comedy, running 3-minute blurbs of comedy specials in rotation like music videos.  Those people were rock-stars to me just as much as Kurt Cobain or Tori Amos.  They were dangerous, violent and direct.  Someone gave them microphones, and they were allowed to talk.  Just talk.  To me.  The really transcendent ones, like Bill Hicks, seemed to realize that their occupation was sacred.  He realized he was a preacher.  He realized that talking in front of large groups of people is a holy, erotic act.


I am not a stand-up comedian, but, 10 years after high school, I do talk in front of groups of people for a living.  "Performance artist," in my case, just means that not everything I say on stage is meant to make people laugh.  It's odd - the labels we use to describe what we do, the existing structures through which we act out this simple, basic impulse: to talk in front of people.  That's what I find inspiring about Jeffery and Cole - that they have funneled that impulse into the medium that, in 2009, reaches people in the most direct way:


In the early 90s, during the stand-up boom (I can't believe there was one.), people with this impulse went to clubs specifically designed for them to talk.  Now, there's no middle-man.  You just sit at home.  Like this beautiful creature:


I am thinking about these things in a house in suburban Maryland, where I was raised by my parents and my television, where I first fantasized about writing and performing, where I first imagined that queerness in America could change through art.  Since I was a teenager, all of my performance fantasies were highly politicized.  I wanted to perform in front of people so that I could do so As A Queer Person.  My queerness, and the way I articulated that queerness, was, I imagined, my contribution to society.  It was what I had to offer.  It stood to reason that if Scott Thompson could make me feel that my life was worth living, then I could do the same thing for the next generation.


That felt like a pipe dream until I started getting emails from younger gay men, thanking me for the solace they took in my work.  That kind of activism could succeed, where my other efforts failed.  And that's all I can think about when people in my community catapult to a bigger pulpits and louder megaphones, when I realize how many young queer kids can watch Jeffery & Cole Casserole and feel empowered to be just as deranged as the people they see on TV.

This is all a very roundabout way to say: Adam Lambert!  Now that I'm in a house with cable, I can hear a thousand people's opinions on his recent award show performance, in which he kissed a male member of his band - a kiss which has been blacked-out in subsequent airings.  Watch this interview and notice that they DON'T black out a similar same-sex kiss between Madonna and Britney Spears:


Like it or not, we now live in a world where Adam Lambert is the Most Famous Queer Performance Artist In The World.  Unlike other famous artists who are queer (Michael Stipe comes to mind), Adam Lambert's queerness is an integral part of his performances.  This "controversial" production number is, arguably, all about his sexuality - and not just because he kisses a man.  Every time he touches one of his female dancers (AND IT HAPPENS A LOT), he is messing with his audience - an audience that is well aware of his actual sexuality.  It's a burlesque of sorts - eroticizing something by concealing it, accentuating his queerness by reminding us how dangerous and forbidden it is.

Maybe this all sounds like bullshit, but I am duly intrigued, and feel like it's my responsibility as a queer artist (and, often, a queer pop singer) to acknowledge that the game has changed.  We finally have a viable gay male mass-market pop star who is, no doubt, seriously changing the way young queer people feel about themselves and their voices.

And so, since it's Thanksgiving, I'm feeling thankful for all the queer performers who have been turning it out over the past 10 years, making life easier for the current versions of the kids we once were... 

Actually, screw it - the kids we still are.  Time makes no sense at all.  You never stop being the people you were. 

I think the reason I get so emotional watching these performances is because part of me is still 13, still, petrified, still convinced that the whole world is out to get me.  Maybe that's the same reason any of us watch or make art - to comfort the sad faggots who survived to become the magnificent warriors we are today.

Love
Dan
]]> http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/11/im-here-for-your-entertainment.html http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/11/im-here-for-your-entertainment.html Wed, 25 Nov 2009 15:54:40 -0500 Some Boys Kiss Me, Some Boys Hug Me, I Think They're Okay...
TMW JCC ad.jpg

I should probably clarify that tickets are $10, not $20.  Also, that's an old synopsis (there are no longer peasant girls (only communists from the 1920s)), and it's a reading, not a staged play.  Other than that, wow, a fancy ad!!! 

I'm pasting the real, up-to-date info below.  We've added so many amazing performers to the cast!  I laughed so hard at the table reading, I almost barfed on our director.  Since then, we've roped in Micah Bucey of The Gay Agenda!  I enjoy him so much!  He will be playing Ian Fleishman, the character I played in "You Will Experience Silence."  (Did I mention this is a sequel?) 

Anyway!  Please come!  It's gonna be ridiculous!

**********************************

The JCC Manhattan Presents

THE MATERIAL WORLD: a musical work in progress

written by Dan Fishback, directed by Stephen Brackett
starring Erin Markey, Eleanor Reissa, Audrey Lynn Weston, Matt Katz,
Micah Bucey, Mary Wiseman, Ben Beckley and Lynne Rosenberg
musical accompaniment by Matt Katz and Dibson Hoffweiler

334 Amsterdam Avenue, NYC, Tickets: $10, Reading starts at 8:30pm

The time is 1921. The place is the Bronx. The Fenster family is contemplating a return to Russia, years after escaping the Tsar. As Mama and Papa fight about socialism and communism, their daughter Gittel hangs out with Madonna, Britney Spears, and an amateur gay webcam pornographer. Everyone breaks out in song.  "The Material World" is the sequel to Fishback's "You Will Experience Silence," which ran at Dixon Place in Spring 2009.

This reading is being presented by Nehirim, as part of their Queer Shabbaton New York "urban retreat." For more information on a whole weekend of events, visit http://www.nehirim.org/qsny.

http://www.jccmanhattan.org
http://www.nehirim.org
http://www.danfishback.com
]]> http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/10/some-boys-kiss-me-some-boys-hu.html http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/10/some-boys-kiss-me-some-boys-hu.html Mon, 26 Oct 2009 10:46:46 -0500 Music Makes The People Come Together
Halloween is a time for scary things, and I can think of nothing scarier than this: I AM WRITING A MUSICAL.  The folks at Nehirim and the JCC have kindly invited me to do a reading of my new work-in-progress on October 31st, as part of their Queer Shabbaton New York weekend.  Feel free to come in costume!  I will be going as "Person Who is Barfing All Over Himself," because that's how nervous I am to put this thing on stage. 

Scroll down for the synopsis.  I needn't say more.
Perhaps I'll see you there? 
Much Love
Dan

************************

Saturday, October 31
THE MATERIAL WORLD: a musical work-in-progress
The JCC Manhattan (334 Amsterdam Ave at 76th Street, NYC)
Tickets: $10, Reading starts at 8:30pm

written by Dan Fishback, directed by Stephen Brackett
starring Erin Markey as Madonna, rest of cast TBA
musical accompaniment by Matt Katz and Dibson Hoffweiler

The time is 1921.  The place is the Bronx.  The Fenster family is contemplating a return to Russia, years after escaping the Tsar.  As Mama and Papa fight about socialism and communism, their daughter Gittel hangs out with Madonna, Britney Spears, and an amateur gay webcam pornographer.  Everyone breaks out in song.

This reading is being presented by Nehirim, as part of their Queer Shabbaton New York "urban retreat."  For more information on a whole weekend of events, visit http://www.nehirim.org/qsny.

http://www.jccmanhattan.org
http://www.nehirim.org
http://www.danfishback.com ]]> http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/10/music-makes-the-people-come-to.html http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/10/music-makes-the-people-come-to.html Wed, 07 Oct 2009 10:42:37 -0500 "With Thousands Dying / Thousands Lacking Homes / I Sit and Labor / With My Trivial Poems" [jur-nl]).  The 20-year-old New York City postman made observations on global politics and city events, with the occasional personal anecdote.  He also wrote humorous verse.  I'd like to share a few highlights, as I peruse the archive...

***


December 12, 1938

Left Wing Hollywood and Broadway gave their all for Spain at Mecca Temple last Sunday night.  Gypsy Rose Lee did a superlative bit in her striptease satire.  It was a striptease with a social significance.  Remarking to the audience that she no longer can do that which made her famous, she said, "but for Spain," she would "strip everything."  (And strip she did, way down to three tiny patches covering no man's land (but all men's paradise).)  When she lifted her skirt, exposing an exciting pair of gartered bestockinged legs, she said, "Now if only we could lift the Spanish embargo!"  Gypsy's take-off brought down the house.


February 5, 1939

"Words Words Words!"

You've talked with the girl for weeks
And you know your minds are compatible
Ne'er at a loss for something to say
Your topics for gab are indefagitable

Before you met her your voice was strong
But now it's down to a whisper
Tell me, my talkative topic tickler:
When - Oh - when will you kiss her?


November 15, 1938

...The Jews must go to that country where there are "livings" for all and where the Jews are not looked upon as an undesirable minority  because of their race.  That country, where the Jews could go, unfortunately does not allow them to enter.  The Soviet Union has fought for twenty years to rid its people of religious and commercial ways of thought.  Hence that nation finds that it would be dangerous to allow in to its lands a group, the Jews, famous for their religious steadfastness and their commercial cliverness.  What is more, Trotsky was a Jew, and the Jews might be harboring a few more Trotskys.  What then prevents the Jews from finding a homeland in Russia?  Their religion and their business talents.  Two eternal millstones around the Jewish neck.  Again I say, Jews must cease being Jews.  Jews must cease being capitalists or tradesmen.  ...Russia now can't forget that Trotsky was a Jew.  Perhaps Russia will remember that Karl Marz was also a Jew.  Perhaps the new Russian film "Professor Memlock" (portraying Nazi persecution of the Jews) will be followed by a Soviet offer of haven for the Jews.  Prestige lost by the recent purges can be regained by such a gesture.  Of course, the Soviet offer cannot be an unconditional one.  Any Jew who settles in Russia must forget his prayer book and his account ledger.  He must become a "godless" worker.  He must forget that past of his heritage, his religion that has brought him much more sorrow than joy.  How many Jews, if offered a place where they can live and work unmolested, will accept the offer?  How many only want a place to pray?  I feel that most Jews, especially the young ones, would take the Soviet offer, conditional (and at the present time, conceptual) as it is.


February 4, 1939

"Know Thyself (Superficial Fishback)"

Superficial Sam Fishback
(Pseudonym is Poisson Lac)
Never can let pass a crack
For puns his brain he loves to rack

Why does Fishback have few friends
Though often backwards he does bend
Won't someone him this message send:
"Words are Means and never Ends."


***

Maybe I'll share more later.
Love
Dan
 ]]> http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/09/with-thousands-dying-thousands.html http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/09/with-thousands-dying-thousands.html Tue, 22 Sep 2009 19:47:42 -0500 Cha Cha Cha




I have a good feeling about the year 5770!!!
Love,
Dan
]]> http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/09/cha-cha-cha.html http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/09/cha-cha-cha.html Sun, 20 Sep 2009 02:22:24 -0500 The Way Things Look
orientation.

The urge usually takes me to Washington Square, but F.I.T. presents a more dramatic scene.  Hundreds of 17 or 18-year-olds, all wearing their fiercest, bitchiest, craziest shit, all trying to impress the pants (literally) off of each other.  Their limbs flail, their bags swing every which way.  The most tender buffoons.  They're rehearsing to become New Yorkers.

I couldn't stop thinking, this time, ten years after my own freshman orientation, what a different world (from mine) these kids have known.  What a different experience of being a teenager.  The World Trade Center collapsed when they were, what, 10?  It's been such a depressing decade.  And yet, as the Pitchfork Greatest 500 Songs of the 00s reminds (those of) us (who decide to pay attention), the soundtrack to all this misery has been, relentlessly, pop. 

(Odd: that the soundtrack to the comparatively mild 90s was so melancholy.  Or: actually/really: is that like the least odd thing ever?)

What a funny time to be a freshman at F.I.T.  If I was one, I imagine I would feel very important.
Love
Dan
]]> http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/09/the-way-things-look.html http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/09/the-way-things-look.html Thu, 10 Sep 2009 18:15:53 -0500 He's The One Who Gives His Body



















Now that I've crossed "vacation" off my list, I will proceed to work myself into the ground.  It's been nice knowin' ya!

Love
Dan]]> http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/09/hes-the-one-who-gives-his-body.html http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/09/hes-the-one-who-gives-his-body.html Wed, 09 Sep 2009 14:40:09 -0500 Singing Songs Sitting Down
Tomorrow night, I'll be playing songs at my old stomping grounds, The Sidewalk Cafe.  Except I won't be doing much stomping.  I will be sitting down.  I guess this isn't such exciting news, but, for a singer-songwriter, the decision to sit down always feels calculated and significant.  Anyway, I will only be singing songs I've written in 2009, so much of my set, if not all of it, will be new to you.  I'd love for you to hear.

I'd also love for you to hear all of my wonderful friends on the bill.  Dibs' new songs are totally insane.  Susie Asado, Sibsi and Horror Me have come all the way from Berlin.  Andrew Tipton is about to release a new album.  Etcetera, no?  It should be a warm and magical evening.

Much Love
Dan

Thursday, September 3rd
The Sidewalk Cafe (94 Avenue A, NYC)
7:30 Dibs, 8:00 Dan Fishback, 8:30 Susie Asado, 9:30 Andrew Phillip Tipton, 10:00 Nan Turner, 10:30 Horror Me, 11:00 Kat Burns, 11:30 Toby Goodshank, 12:00 Sibsi.  No cover, two drink minimum, as always.
 ]]> http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/09/singing-songs-sitting-down.html http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/09/singing-songs-sitting-down.html Wed, 02 Sep 2009 11:34:24 -0500 Public Option! Clap, Clap! Clap-Clap-Clap!


This is what some other signs looked like:



But what's with the signs that say "THANK YOU"???



Anyone know?
Love
Dan]]> http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/08/public-option-clap-clap-clapcl.html http://www.danfishback.com/archive/2009/08/public-option-clap-clap-clapcl.html Sat, 29 Aug 2009 23:04:22 -0500