"Featured Artist: Bionic Finger" Tacowagon Online Radio, interview by Crazy Pablo, January 2001
Bionic Finger is more than a rock band...they are an addiction. Crazy Pablo left
Buffalo to be closer to them. Well, not really...but it was a happy coincidence. Often
found on NYC's Lower East Side, they change up the "who plays what" duties on a
song-by-song basis, untraditionally letting the music drive the instrument
assignments. With a tasty combination of aggressive and emotional melodies,
harmonies, and lyrics, Bionic Finger takes you on an aural road trip with each song.
The Wagon's playing the hell out of them this month, and Pablo spent some pre-gig
quality time with them in NYC. So tune in, give 'em a listen, and give Pablo's literary
mastery a read.
The Interview:
It's Thursday, December 21st, the first night of Hanukkah, the festival of lights. In
approximately one hour, Matt Orphan (from the Microwave Orphans) and I will be
interviewing Bionic Finger for the Taco Wagon...hopefully. The LIRR is not on our side
however, as we missed a 6:30 train into NYC by a scant few minutes because I had
to stop at Taco Hell for a not-so-quick burrito to go. So we drove another 30 minutes
to catch a train that left 20 minutes sooner than the next train from the station we
were already at. Yesterday, I locked my keys in the car when I got to work, on my day
off, mind you. Also, I was supposed to get a tape for my microcassette recorder, but I
was so busy trying to break into my car that I forgot. We are supposed to meet Bionic
Finger at 8:30. I hope we make it somewhere near then. And I only have two pictures
left in the camera. Oy vey.
The train arrives at 8:30-ish to Penn Station. A ride on the F Train gets us to 2nd
Ave. and Houston Street. We walk the remaining few blocks to the Sidewalk Cafe and
get there at 9:05, only 35 minutes late, but just in time to catch guitarist/bassist/
singer Nan Turner en route to the Ladies' Room. We proceed downstairs, where the rest
of the Fingers are waiting patiently for us, wondering if we're actually showing up or
not.
At this point, we are introduced to Josh and Phil (?), who want to be groupies, but
must agree to the understanding that there will be NO sex. They disappear after Nan
berates them because they won't stop flirting. Some guys just don't get it. There will
be no spankings for them tonight. As for birthday boy Jon Berger, well, that's another
story.
Everyone is nervous and jumpy. It's good to feel such energy after being asleep on
the train trying to ease the stress of working retail during the holiday shopping
season. Writing everything down would have been a real pain, so it was a stroke of
luck that Nan's boyfriend gave her a tape recorder (with a pop-up microphone, no less)
the night before. She lets us use her recorder and her tape (hopefully the
destined-to-be-classic "Rusty Nail" will not be lost to the ravages of time, as we
tape over it, instead of the Depeche Mode song that starts out side B).
Thanks to Matt Orphan (aka Tork S. Ruttager) for being chauffeur, traveling
companion, co-pilot and tape-recorder-holder-guy. What follows is an interview as
can only be conducted by Crazy Pablo himself. Thanks again to Nan, Pam, Alina &
Christine for being so cool about this.
Crazy Pablo: I have just a bunch of dumb random questions to ask you.
Pam Weis: We love dumb random questions.
CP: What are your top 5 influences or inspirations?
Nan Turner: Sleater-Kinney. I fucking love them! Sleater-Kinney, Sleater-Kinney
[goes off on a wild Sleater-Kinney tangent], my dance teacher from college and the
Riot Grrl scene in London. That was what actually made me start a band, but we'll get
to that later. [We didn't get to it later - Ed]
PW: Gloria Steinem, Joni Mitchell, Neil Peart, Sleater-Kinney now, because Nan
sucked me in, and I'd have to say The Leader has been a big inspiration lately.
Alina Moscovitz: Jill Sobule - I actually got to meet her at the Rockrgrl
conference in Washington and I almost fainted. She hugged Pam, but she didn't hug
me. Liz Phair, and people say my bass playing is very 80's New Wave like New Order
and The Cure.
NT: We did a radio show in college where the first half was like 80's music and
the second half would be like Girl Hour and I would show up after dance class and
Depeche Mode would be playing.
CP: Yeah, I did a college radio show, too, and that's where the Taco Wagon came
about originally.
NT: I love that name.
PW: Yeah, I read that bio-thingy on your website.
CP: Jismo would occasionally show up. He was like "Can I be on your show? Can I
be on your show?" And, like he stopped showing up. And I was like, "Are you coming?"
and he was always like "Maybe."
PW: So he's your partner in crime?
CP: Kinda. He's in Boston now. [Pablo, ever trying to impress, ever understating...
-Ed. Jismo] We hadn't seen each other in a few years and then he started the Taco
Wagon around the time I moved to Buffalo. [to Christine] Your turn now.
Christine Murray: PJ Harvey, Jill Sobule, Liz Phair, Indigo Girls.
AM: [to the other Fingers] What was your top overplayed album in high school?
I'm going to interview you now.
NT: Edie Brickell.
PW: Which one did we each overplay?
CM: The Smiths.
NT: New Order, The Cure
PW: I'm the oddball here. Poison "Look What the Cat Dragged In." [laughs]
CP: [misheard Pam and thought she said "Open Up & Say Ahh"] I had that one once.
Once.
PW: I was big into glam rock.
AM: My three albums were Melissa Etheridge - the first one.
PW: I didn't discover that until I was 20.
AM: I was like "Jealousy Songs! Yeah!"
NT: Indigo Girls, the very first one, where they're in black on the cover. Oh my God,
their songs were so bluesy and spare and beautiful, and then they...I don't know what
happened. It's like when they got happier. They lost the...
PW: I love "Rites of Passage", though. They had like four albums in a row, but after
that...
[Nan relates a story about an Indigo Girls show where Amy Ray introduced the
electric guitar into the mix (kind of like Dylan in '66) and the crowd was all mad and
shouted at the opening band to get off the stage. So Pablo relates a story about how in
Seattle, Vonda "Ally McBeal songstress" Shepard opened up for them and how horrible
it was. (They share Sony as a label.) All of Bionic Finger nearly vomit in disgust and
blame it on major label crassness.]
CP: What are your favorite 80's movies?
Tom Weis: [Pam's brother, band photographer] "Breakfast Club."
AM: You're not in the band!
[Tom shuts up and disappears. I bump into him in the bathroom later.]
NT: I loved "The Breakfast Club" and "Pretty In Pink" because I liked Molly Ringwald
because she was quirky.
AM: "Say Anything" and "Some Kind of Wonderful."
[At this point Pablo nearly explodes, as these are two of his favorite movies of all
time. He is now in love and feels he needs to hide, like now.]
PW: All of the Brat Pack movies and oooh yeah "Some Kind of Wonderful"...Hubba.
NT: Oh, Mary Stuart [Masterson], ahhh...so beautiful.
PW: I so wanted to be her, I can't tell you. "Dirty Dancing", which I was obsessed
with.
NT: "Flashdance". I'm a maniac, maniac! [She taps her feet like a maniac.]
CM: "Ferris Bueller."
AM: "Ferris Bueller." "Repo Man."
NT: Yeah, "Repo Man." I love that soundtrack!
PW: I still haven't seen "Repo Man."
[Lots of chatting and giggling ensues due to performance ongoing upstairs. Talk
then turns to "Sixteen Candles" and how frustrated Pam was by Molly Ringwald's
character not just telling her parents that it was her birthday and that they forgot it,
but she loved foreign exchange student Long Duck Dong played by Gedde Watanabe.]
AM: Oh yeah, "The Goonies." I love that movie.
[At this point, Matt Orphan wets his pants, as "The Goonies" is one of his favorite
movies ever.]
CP: I like any movie with John Cusack in it.
AM: "Hiding Out" with Jon Cryer.
Matt Orphan: Wow!
[He wets his pants some more. If she had mentioned "Morgan Stewart's Coming
Home", we would have drowned that night.]
CP: That is such an under-rated movie.
AM: I loved that movie, I saw it like three times.
[Background discussion on plot of movie takes place. Pam hasn't ever seen it, but
did read about it in Bust magazine.]PW: "Better Off Dead." Oh my god, I love that movie.
CP: One of my all-time favorites. [Movie discussion ends.]
CP: Which of you has the dirtiest mind and why?
[Everyone laughs and points at Alina, who acts surprised.]
AM: What?
PW: I don't think that's necessarily true, she's just the most vocal about it.
NT: She's just very frank about sex, which most people are not in our society. So
it can seem, like, initially "Oh my god, what are you talking about?" but ultimately,
it's a really great thing, because it's really forced the rest of us to be more open.
That's great.
PW: We like to talk about clitorises a lot.
NT: We engage in dialog about sexuality, feminism, everything. It's good.
CP: That's a good thing.
CM: Don't forget about the burping.
PW: Oh yeah, we're pretty gross, too.
AM: Christine made me learn how to burp.
PW: I've increased my gaseous emissions since hanging out with Christine.
[laughs] Plus I live with her, so we're very burpy.
AM: This band is like my family now. It's so weird.
NT: They are, they really are. It's great.
PW: We see each other about three times a week.
NT: Sometimes we snip and snap at each other.
AM: But it's okay. Because we can.
NT: Exactly. But we have band meetings sometimes where we hash it out. It's good
to get it out.
PW: We're just rambling now, so ask another question. [laughs]
CP: This is my Barbara Walters question. If you could be any animal, what kind of
animal would you be?
[The band laughs gleefully.]
NT: Oh no, I love that question.
PW: That is a good one, though.
NT: [to Pam] You go first.
PW: I'd be a cat.
AM: Pam and I are cats.
PW: It's true, we've discussed this before.
NT: What are you Christine? Oh wait, you're a dog.
CM: But do I want to be a dog? Not necessarily.
NT: [to Christine] Maybe a parrot.
CM: I don't want to be a parrot. Maybe one of those pampered little rich dogs.
NT: My sister told me I was a monkey.
PW: [to Christine] Well, what animal would you want to be, though?
CM: A cat! Or maybe a flying squirrel.
NT: You and Matt [from Schwervon, Major Matt Mason USA] are both flying squirrels!
PW: How about an eagle?
CM: I don't want to be an eagle...
NT: YOU'RE A FLYING SQUIRREL!!!!
CM: I wanna be cute.
AM: Furry yet flying. The two "F"s. [much laughter ensues]
PW: Alright, a flying squirrel it is!
CP: Have you guys had any offers from any labels yet?
NT: No!! [laughs heartily]
AM: We've sent the cd out.
PW: We haven't tried that hard.
AM: We've sent it to like five labels, three of which don't accept any unsolicited
material.
PW: And they're all indie labels, so a lot of them are like "We can't afford to." You
know.
AM: Although, if Moxie's label 28 Days can get funding, we're definitely the first on
the list to get added to their roster.
PW: Do you know Moxie?
CP: He [Matt] knows Moxie. I was out of the loop for a while.
MO: Yeah, and my friend Bob. You probably know him. Bob Blank.
PW: Oh, Bobby!
MO: I've known him for years.
PW: Oh wow. Isn't that funny?
CP: Have any of you met your idol, only to find out he or she was a complete
asshole? [Lots of laughter]
NT: Well, I met Courtney Love. Well, I didn't meet her. I heard her talk. She's not
really my idol.
PW: We brushed against Carrie Brownstein from Sleater-Kinney.
AM: Nan was disappointed.
NT: We haven't really met anyone. [I was disappointed because I didn't have the
guts to actually talk to her. I was a complete dork! But no, we haven't really met that
many idols... -NT]
PW: Yeah, Jill was probably the closest. [to Alina] Though she's mostly your idol,
but I love her, too.
NT: I've never really met any of my real...or talked to them, I mean, too much
shyness.
AM: It's not even that for me. It's just like they're a person, so what's meeting
them really gonna do? "Oh, I've met them. I can say that now." You know. But you can't
really gain their talent through osmosis.
PW: Unless you become like their best friend or something and it's probably going
to be a letdown, so...
CP: Favorite comedy troupe?
NT: Muckafurgason!
PW: Monty Python.
NT: Monty Python.
CM: Kids in the Hall.
AM: Kids in the Hall.
CP: Worst experience at a gig?
[Lots of laughter]
AM: Forgetting our equipment.
PW: Having to build the drumset from scratch.
NT: I think like, when you get really self-conscious. I think that's my thing. I
don't like it when I get so self-conscious and I'm concentrating on every note.
Because it's not like I don't know how to play the songs, I know how to, but my
nerves just take over...
AM: And it's like a domino effect...
NT: It is, because if one of us does, then everybody else is like... [screams in mock
horror]
AM: And everything just starts breaking down.
PW: That Meow Mix gig that was a Blue Stockings Benefit, and Joan Jett was
there, and she's one of my idols, and their drum set is worse than horrible, just
awful, and I had to create stuff and put stuff together. So, anyway, I was stressed
out to begin with, and she [Joan Jett] was there, and that just made it worse. That
was my most awful gig experience.
AM: I think one of the worst ones was a few years ago, when we forgot the
cymbals, and I got into this huge fight with the car service guy, and he almost
stopped the car before he went onto the bridge and almost left us by the side of the
road, and something else happened...
[Pam then relates the story of their first gig where she was borrowing drums from
a friend and the cab broke down halfway and they had to switch cabs in the middle of
the street.]
CP: Best experience at a gig?
NT: People throwing their shoes onstage and lying down in front of the stage
worshipping us.
PW: [to Nan] When you painted Jon Berger's fingernails...
AM: Yeah. That was a great gig. And I made him lean down and kiss my toes,
because he heckled us. I was like "You! Come here!"
NT: When we've felt a good rapport with the audience. We've been giving, they've
been giving, it's very mutual.
[We pause for a moment as the performer upstairs mentions something about not
being gangbanged before resuming laughter.]
CP: Love or money?
PW: Love or money?
NT: Love, dude, love. You can always make money, but you can't always make love.
[laughs maniacally]
PW: That's true, Nan, that is so true. Go Nan! [claps]
CM: How about love AND money.
[followed by too many voices for me to discern anything other than the sound of
yodeling]
CP: Coffee, tea, cigarettes or Manischewitz?
PW, NT: [in unison] Coffee.
AM: Tea.
CM: Cigarettes.
[more laughter]
AM: Manischewitz?
CP: Yeah.
CM: Cigarettes AND Manischewitz.
AM: Actually, the first time I ever got drunk, I was eleven years old...
PW: Oh my god!
AM: ...and I went to this wedding, and my friend's sister's boyfriend...
NT: You were eleven?
AM: Yes, you don't know this story?
NT: No.
AM: ...he kept giving us Manischewitz, and we were like "This is really good juice!"
PW: Oh my god!
AM: And we had maybe three cups, and we were tiny, so we were throwing up in
the bathroom during the vows and stuff. [laughs]
NT: Bad girl!
AM: We didn't know!
CP: Favorite band of the moment, besides Sleater-Kinney?
[laughter erupts]
NT: You guys go first, I have to think.
AM: Old 97's. They're awesome.
PW: I guess The Leader. That's what I've been listening to obsessively.
CM: Schwervon.
PW: Schwervon is pretty darn close. That's her [Nan's] side project.
CP: Yeah, we saw the show with King Missile [where Bionic Finger and
Schwervon both played as well].
NT: Oh yeah [vaguely recollecting].
PW: Oh wow, did you guys stay til the end?
CP: No, we had to catch a train back to lame Long Island.
AM: You didn't miss anything from what I heard. I wasn't there.
NT: Yeah, it wasn't great...all the leadup and everything...
CP: Was that Toiletmouth?
Bionic Finger: Toiletmouth.
PW: It was a good idea.
CM: There were like four people...
NT: That's why it was so difficult, and there were too many people in it. [It had
started out as a smallish thing and then more people got involved which was great,
but I don't think we had enough time to get it all together (John S. Hall is such a good
toilet mouth!) -NT]
PW: There were more people onstage than in the audience.
NT: [Getting back to the question] Randi Russo. She plays here [Sidewalk Cafe] a lot.
She just released something. I saw her play a couple weeks ago and she was really
amazing. That's my favorite right now.
CP: Who is your least favorite Beatle? If not Ringo, why?
CM: [laughing] But I like Ringo...
PW: Me, too. I'm going to have to say George is my least favorite, and it's more
based on his solo career than as a Beatle.
AM: I'll have to second that.
NT: What was that song he sang in the 80's?
[All start singing "I Got My Mind Set On You"]
CP: What's funny is that he had been waiting twenty years to cover that song.
NT: Really? Oh George...
PW: That's sad.
CP: He said that he had wanted to cover that since he was in The Beatles.
CM: I dont have a least favorite Beatle.
CP: That's okay, that answer is perfectly acceptable. It was a trick question.
[At this point, the performance upstairs is getting too loud for me to hear
everyone on the tape, so we will assume there were three votes for George Harrison
and one abstention.]
CP: All I have left is "Horoscopes - Believe It or Not?" Or does it depend on the day,
because for me, it depends on the day.
NT: Believe.
AM: I kind of do. I think I believe in the general, not necessarily on a daily basis,
but I'm a Leo and I'm very much a Leo, so I think the description kind of fits...
CP: Yeah, I'm a complete Virgo myself.
NT: No way? I mean, I'm Virgo, but I'm half Aries and half Virgo. I've got this weird
mixture...
MO: The cusp?
NT: The cusp. I don't know, I've got a bit of fire and Virgos are earth.
CM: I don't know. I'm a Sagitarius, but I don't really know about Sagitarius.
NT: They like to travel alot, and do macramé.
CM: That's all I know. [laughs]
AM: And do macramé.
MO: [Sagitarius] Then how come I've never left?
PW: I don't believe it, but I don't not believe it, either. I'm kind of skeptical.
CP: That's basically all the questions I have.
NT: I'm so afraid...last time we did a vocal interview, I sounded idiotic.
PW: That's okay, we have to warm up pretty soon.
CP: Don't worry, there will be an editing process...
PW: I know I, uh, I tend to ramble and, umm...and to not be articulate.
[Alina imitates MushMouth from "Fat Albert & the Cosby Kids"]
NT: Plus I'm really giddy and hyper, so I don't know what I'm talking about.
CM: And tomorrow you'll be like "Oh man, what did I say?"
PW: Me, too.
AM: Note to self - Don't drink before interviews.
[All laugh]
NT: I only had one, too, which is the funny part.
[End of interview. Photo session starts. Unfortunately, much of what was taken
was too spicy to be shown on this site, as family-oriented as it is. -Ed]