You have no choice but to surrender to White Cowbell
“...We have this alcoholic effect whenever we play, and people can't help but take off their clothes and drink as much booze as they possibly can.”
By the time this article is published, White Cowbell Oklahoma will have already unleashed one half of their assault on Fanshawe. The eight or nine member armada (as they liked to be referred to as) provide more than just a rock show, it's an experience. I had the chance to speak to Clem from the band over the phone about what Fanshawe should expect from their live show, which involves four lead guitarists, and a chainsaw, needless to say.
TK: You guys are playing a matinee here...
Clem: We are indeed.
TK: Are they making you tone it down for a college show?
C: They have asked us to, but we will NOT. We are driving all the way from Lansing, Michigan straight to London, Ontario, Canada to perform for you without any sleep and thus, we think the people - the students, the academic types at Fanshawe College in London, Ontario deserve the best... The whole campus is gonna explode into a neutron bomb of rock and roll right there in the afternoon at noon o' clock, and then the next night White Cowbell Oklahoma will return...
For every tick there's a tock, and we think, and if you go too far in the brainy direction you need something to balance it out, which is why White Cowbell Oklahoma, we are here to kill your brain cells, not to enhance them.
TK: I've gotta ask though, Fanshawe's a huge student population, and you guys are playing at noon. Is it acceptable to drink in the afternoon before classes?
C: It is absolutely acceptable to drink before noon before class. I implore it and I encourage it. We're doing it right now, and we don't even have class! So I mean, you might as well make it interesting on your professors. I mean, they're getting paid top dollar, so make it a little difficult on them; throw them a curveball. Show up at a lecture and throw up, you know? What the hell, vomit on your professor. We implore you! ... Show up there at probably 11 o' clock when the bar opens, start drinking - that Rickard's Red or whatever you fellas drink - as much as you can, and then show up at the auditorium, or the cafetorium or whatever you call it at noon...
We're going to tear your ass [awkward pause] wait, we're not going to tear your asshole nothing. We're going to tear your campus a new asshole... we're not going to tear your asshole a new campus... I don't want to use these terrible military analogies, but the first nooner is going to be like Hiroshima, and the Out Back is going to be like Nagasaki. It's gonna be a twin assault on Fanshawe College and you're gonna have no other choice but to surrender to White Cowbell Oklahoma, and surrender your women, your money, your possessions, everything. So you know, we are going to be the new overlords, the deans of the campus so to speak, and you'll see some changes - some positive changes in the way the campus is run. We actually already purchased it, but you know, we just want to make it all official this week, with a proper coup.
TK: Who's generally more responsive to your music, the younger audience, or the older guys who grew up on bands like ZZ Top?
C: Well, I'll tell ya, it's kinda amazing, we're kinda like a cult, we're open to everybody, and White Cowbell Oklahoma plays all ages shows, we play in metal festivals in Europe where there are people who are 14 to 45 or something. We are one of those blessed entertainment entities where anybody and everybody digs us and buys our records and comes to the shows.
TK: Speaking of metal festivals, though, you guys played with Iron Maiden. How did that come about?
C: Well, it just happened that we have fingers in every fanny and we're industrious men. We've actually purchased Iron Maiden for our own employ, so they had no choice but to put us on the bill under instructions from us... We have a new record called Casa Diablo, which is out right now, it just came out in Canada, it's been out in Europe for a little while now. It's critically acclaimed, unanimously by the critics, and loved by all, worshipped by all. It is like the missing tablet from the 10 commandments, it's kind of like five more that you've never even heard of before. We dug it up and turned it into a sound recording. It's strange, but true. And it's got the blessing of several deities, so that is why we pull off such feats of wondrousness and rock and roll.
TK: So how do you go about putting all the energy of that live show onto record, though?
C: Well, we used the best Balkan druids, and Bolivian soothsayers, and a little bit of our own kind of spyro-gyro magic... We try to keep everything as high octane and 110 per cent as we can, so the records are just as exciting as the live show, which are unprecedented in this world, or any other. I don't know if you've heard about the White Cowbell Oklahoma, boogie-woogie rock and roll rhythm and blues show, but it is an eight or nine-man assault, four lead guitars, chainsaw, and it is the neutron bomb of rock going off.
TK: What's the key to a good performance?
C: The key to a good performance is obviously White Cowbell Oklahoma being the band performing, because we are key to everything; we are the key to the universe. Also... we have this alcoholic effect whenever we play and people can't help but take off their clothes and drink as much booze as they possibly can. They empty their wallets in an orgy of inebriation... and they usually wake up with someone... In your case, they'll probably wake up somewhere in Jackson, Michigan, or perhaps Toledo, Ohio and they won't remember how they got there. They won't have their wallet or half their clothes, and there'll be some guy named Sasquatch lying beside there, or Mrs. Sasquatch, or maybe both, if it was a real kinky evening... That's just what happens when you come to the White Cowbell Oklahoma show... and you will have no choice, no recourse but to join the cult of White Cowbell, and come to every subsequent show that ever happens.
TK: I've heard so much about the White Cowbell Oklahoma shows, in that everyone just lets loose. Have you actually figured out what it is, scientifically, that makes that happen?
C: We don't understand ourselves; we've done scientific studies. You know, deep in laboratories underneath the Andes are people right now trying it figure out, trying to synthesize what makes White Cowbell Oklahoma so powerful, and they just can't. There's something magical, there's something from the 4th dimension of quantum space that's causing all this, and we are just like testosterone cannons. We've been trying to create clones [so that] then we can just sit back in our deck chairs in Florida with our favourite clone pornographic actresses, and we'd just send them out like a franchise squad, but we can't. So now we gotta hit the road everyday and every night providing redemption and Sasquatch-lovin for everybody.
White Cowbell Oklahoma will be playing Friday, November 9 at 9 p.m. at The Out Back Shack with The Hoolie Snatch and The Wild Birds.
By the time this article is published, White Cowbell Oklahoma will have already unleashed one half of their assault on Fanshawe. The eight or nine member armada (as they liked to be referred to as) provide more than just a rock show, it's an experience. I had the chance to speak to Clem from the band over the phone about what Fanshawe should expect from their live show, which involves four lead guitarists, and a chainsaw, needless to say.
TK: You guys are playing a matinee here...
Clem: We are indeed.
TK: Are they making you tone it down for a college show?
C: They have asked us to, but we will NOT. We are driving all the way from Lansing, Michigan straight to London, Ontario, Canada to perform for you without any sleep and thus, we think the people - the students, the academic types at Fanshawe College in London, Ontario deserve the best... The whole campus is gonna explode into a neutron bomb of rock and roll right there in the afternoon at noon o' clock, and then the next night White Cowbell Oklahoma will return...
For every tick there's a tock, and we think, and if you go too far in the brainy direction you need something to balance it out, which is why White Cowbell Oklahoma, we are here to kill your brain cells, not to enhance them.
TK: I've gotta ask though, Fanshawe's a huge student population, and you guys are playing at noon. Is it acceptable to drink in the afternoon before classes?
C: It is absolutely acceptable to drink before noon before class. I implore it and I encourage it. We're doing it right now, and we don't even have class! So I mean, you might as well make it interesting on your professors. I mean, they're getting paid top dollar, so make it a little difficult on them; throw them a curveball. Show up at a lecture and throw up, you know? What the hell, vomit on your professor. We implore you! ... Show up there at probably 11 o' clock when the bar opens, start drinking - that Rickard's Red or whatever you fellas drink - as much as you can, and then show up at the auditorium, or the cafetorium or whatever you call it at noon...
We're going to tear your ass [awkward pause] wait, we're not going to tear your asshole nothing. We're going to tear your campus a new asshole... we're not going to tear your asshole a new campus... I don't want to use these terrible military analogies, but the first nooner is going to be like Hiroshima, and the Out Back is going to be like Nagasaki. It's gonna be a twin assault on Fanshawe College and you're gonna have no other choice but to surrender to White Cowbell Oklahoma, and surrender your women, your money, your possessions, everything. So you know, we are going to be the new overlords, the deans of the campus so to speak, and you'll see some changes - some positive changes in the way the campus is run. We actually already purchased it, but you know, we just want to make it all official this week, with a proper coup.
TK: Who's generally more responsive to your music, the younger audience, or the older guys who grew up on bands like ZZ Top?
C: Well, I'll tell ya, it's kinda amazing, we're kinda like a cult, we're open to everybody, and White Cowbell Oklahoma plays all ages shows, we play in metal festivals in Europe where there are people who are 14 to 45 or something. We are one of those blessed entertainment entities where anybody and everybody digs us and buys our records and comes to the shows.
TK: Speaking of metal festivals, though, you guys played with Iron Maiden. How did that come about?
C: Well, it just happened that we have fingers in every fanny and we're industrious men. We've actually purchased Iron Maiden for our own employ, so they had no choice but to put us on the bill under instructions from us... We have a new record called Casa Diablo, which is out right now, it just came out in Canada, it's been out in Europe for a little while now. It's critically acclaimed, unanimously by the critics, and loved by all, worshipped by all. It is like the missing tablet from the 10 commandments, it's kind of like five more that you've never even heard of before. We dug it up and turned it into a sound recording. It's strange, but true. And it's got the blessing of several deities, so that is why we pull off such feats of wondrousness and rock and roll.
TK: So how do you go about putting all the energy of that live show onto record, though?
C: Well, we used the best Balkan druids, and Bolivian soothsayers, and a little bit of our own kind of spyro-gyro magic... We try to keep everything as high octane and 110 per cent as we can, so the records are just as exciting as the live show, which are unprecedented in this world, or any other. I don't know if you've heard about the White Cowbell Oklahoma, boogie-woogie rock and roll rhythm and blues show, but it is an eight or nine-man assault, four lead guitars, chainsaw, and it is the neutron bomb of rock going off.
TK: What's the key to a good performance?
C: The key to a good performance is obviously White Cowbell Oklahoma being the band performing, because we are key to everything; we are the key to the universe. Also... we have this alcoholic effect whenever we play and people can't help but take off their clothes and drink as much booze as they possibly can. They empty their wallets in an orgy of inebriation... and they usually wake up with someone... In your case, they'll probably wake up somewhere in Jackson, Michigan, or perhaps Toledo, Ohio and they won't remember how they got there. They won't have their wallet or half their clothes, and there'll be some guy named Sasquatch lying beside there, or Mrs. Sasquatch, or maybe both, if it was a real kinky evening... That's just what happens when you come to the White Cowbell Oklahoma show... and you will have no choice, no recourse but to join the cult of White Cowbell, and come to every subsequent show that ever happens.
TK: I've heard so much about the White Cowbell Oklahoma shows, in that everyone just lets loose. Have you actually figured out what it is, scientifically, that makes that happen?
C: We don't understand ourselves; we've done scientific studies. You know, deep in laboratories underneath the Andes are people right now trying it figure out, trying to synthesize what makes White Cowbell Oklahoma so powerful, and they just can't. There's something magical, there's something from the 4th dimension of quantum space that's causing all this, and we are just like testosterone cannons. We've been trying to create clones [so that] then we can just sit back in our deck chairs in Florida with our favourite clone pornographic actresses, and we'd just send them out like a franchise squad, but we can't. So now we gotta hit the road everyday and every night providing redemption and Sasquatch-lovin for everybody.
White Cowbell Oklahoma will be playing Friday, November 9 at 9 p.m. at The Out Back Shack with The Hoolie Snatch and The Wild Birds.
