You might be a fan of Henry Rollins, and not just from his role in Johnny Mnemonic.

You might be a fan of kingfox, jenniever, and/or petemagyar.

You might have the Independent Film Channel.

If any of this is ringing true, you should probably watch Henry Rollins: Uncut From NYC on IFC tomorrow at 10 PM. Read the guy in charge of IFC's take about it on his blog (scroll down to the Henry Rollins section and fuck him for not using anchors). Read jenniever's recap of it here. Depending on how they cut it, you might see a lot of us laughing at Rollins. They filmed us a lot, we were in the front row, and I could have licked the guy if I had wanted to, as I touched upon earlier.

So how did this happen? Me putting off getting tickets until late in the game, and some good fortune. I've been meaning to see Henry Rollins for ages. Back in the day, some older schoolmates introduced me to the guy's music, and I was hooked. Being a huge fan of monologues (err, just call them rants), I've been fascinated with the funny angry man's stage show ever since the first VHS I borrowed. Throughout my life, I keep on running into people who have volumes of his spoken word. The crazy UC hobo who was a Pub manager with me when I was a student, a good portion of the populace on Cybersphere that I felt closest to, a large percentage of my homosexual friends, the people I spent time with after dropping out of college, it seems like I was destined to run into fans of him just as I was bound to live with Stern fans.

When I was a student at drewuniversity, something came up and I missed finally seeing him in Morristown when he was on tour. Every time since, I've either been busy or found out too late about his local gigs. One time I was working at a retail place, having to stand under a television reminding me of the show I wouldn't be able to see every half hour (when he did the voice for Mace Griffin). A co-worker of mine who made it to that Morristown show let me know about his new IFC show, where he reviewed movies. It was marvelous, as I expected no less. His tirades were awesome, though one tirade pissed petemagyar off a bit. But he agreed to go see him with me the next time he was in town...

Months ago, one of my act alert spams let me know Rollins would be doing a show in Times Square. Invited jenniever and petemagyar (and a bunch of you people who turned me down - HAH), and kept on forgetting to nab tickets. When I had dinner and hung out with Jessie (from Jessie's 1337 goods in cybersphere), he mentioned that he'd be going to the show which reminded me to order the tickets. Finally did, soon before the show, and ended up getting some crappy up on the balcony and off to the left seats. Day of the act, jenniever and petemagyar made it in there well before the start of the gig, and stood outside for a while. Turns out it was a gig not only sponsored by IFC, but being filmed by IFC. So they were in front of the cameras a lot for the "milling Rollins-hungry gang" shots. Made it there just before the show, wolfed down some cheap sushi and crazy Japanese drink jenniever nabbed for me from the store next to her office, and ran in to find our seats. strawberrygal, her husband, friends of hers, haasthecynic, his girlfriend, and Jessie were also in the audience. I'd be shocked if I didn't know more people in the crowd, everyone came out of the woodwork for this one.

The people blocked by the camera crane were taken away to be given better seats, and we were joking around that we couldn't see and should get pulled up as well. Because it was being taped, we figured they were moving people down to the first level to make the place look more packed (not that there were many empty seats anyway). IFC fearless leader who wrote the recap I linked to earlier came out, tried to act like Rollins and pump the crowd up, and got a lukewarm reaction. He's no Rollins. He knew why they were there, and wasn't going to get far with them. After a while, some suit asked us if we wanted to get moved up. We agreed enthusiastically, and were brought down the stairs with the couple next to us. "You guys big fans of Rollins?" Fuck yeah! "Ok, we might use you guys for some reaction shots, is that okay with you?" Fuck yeah! "So really try to play it up, and react to what he's saying." Not a problem, thanks! As he was bringing us down the center aisle, he asked if we wanted the front. Of course! So we ended up at the very front row, right in front of Rollins, resting our feet on the stage wall.

So Rollins came out, and put on a hell of a show. We laughed, we cried, it was better than Cats! They took tons of shots of us, it seemed like the crowd camera was often pointing at us from the corner of my eye as we cracked up at him. Beyond the current administration, the war, and other current events he did tons of shit about Wal*Mart, red state life, country music, Ted Nugent, the Trans-Siberian railway, vomit, himself, and all the random tangents he'll fork off to and wrap around back to. He's a masterful orator, a musclebound modern Mark Twain. Serious moments, powerful moments, hilarious moments, and painful moments all within the same extended rant. Watching him work in person was like watching an artist carve an amazing sculpture out of a hunk of wood. This short built angry aging punk with his Maoist attire barking into the microphone and reducing us all to tears of laughter... what a show.

After he was over I ran into a bunch of the people in the audience I knew, and darted back to the_boke.

I'll be curious to see what's cut and what gets kept. Yes, the IFC dictator made a rant about free speech and I don't think the "Black Lesbian President" bit will get cut, but I wonder what will get chopped for time or flow.

Anyway, he put on a hell of a show, the guy's amazing, and you should watch it or break into a house with IFC if you don't have a friend who has it. And not just because there's a good chance of you seeing me assuming I wasn't one of the things left on the cutting room floor.

Feeling: happy
Listening to: Fear Factory, Slave Labor