(Yes, I took that picture)

"Beck and Al Hansen-Playing With Matches"
Art Exhibition Preview, Thread Waxing Space
"Happening" Fluxus Performance @ The Roxy
New York, NY
September 15, 1998 


if this review is too small, 
go to the identicalSlo-Jam Central version



My sister and I drove down to New York from Maine which surprisingly 
took a very short amount of time. We got there, checked into our hotel, 
and everything was going swell. We went down into Times Square which was 
about a block away from our hotel and got something to eat. This was 
September 15th, the day of the art preview and the Fluxus performance. 
We were really looking forward to it, so after we looked around in some 
stores (Marilyn Manson was signing books at Virgin Records but we didn't 
see him) we decided to get back to the hotel and get ready for the show, 
mind you it was about 4:00 in the afternoon. We were walking by the MTV 
studios watching people request videos for MTV's TOTAL REQUEST LIVE and 
we saw JESSE. Got a picture with him and an autograph and moved on, we 
had more important things to do, I mean come on... this was BECK we were 
going to go see.
We got back to the hotel and changed into our spiffy clothes as we got 
more and more excited. We left the hotel at about 4:45 to go meet up 
with a friend and go to the preview after. Blah, Blah, Blah... Anyway, 
we caught a cab to THREAD WAXING SPACE, where the preview was to be 
held. It was getting dark outside and it was really warm (to set the 
mood). We walked inside and they found our names on the guest list and 
gave us these sparkly bracelets to wear so we could get into the Roxy 
for the performance later. We went upstairs and picked up the copies of 
our books (Beck and Al Hansen: Playing With Matches) which you can find 
a link to buy at TRUCK's Beck site.
This was not what I expected... it was a huge stuffy room. The walls 
were covered in the fantastic art of Beck and Al...sculptures of the 
human body made out of cigarette butts, pictures of people and guns made 
out of Hersheys candy wrappers, everything
you could imagine, it was amazing artwork. You can see all of these 
things in the book. We started mingling and walked over to the bar and 
got some wine spritzers and a beer and caught a glimpse (it was kind of 
hard to miss her) of VAGINAL DAVIS. For a mental image: Picture a 250 
pound black man with a wig on preaching about how (s)he loves everyone, 
and talking about penises.
My sister leaned over and whispered to me that Beck was standing about 
15 feet away from us talking to some friends. I didn't know what to 
think, my mind went completely blank... I freaked out but kept my cool 
so I wouldn't get thrown out by any security guards. I couldn't keep my 
eyes off him... he is amazing. Mental Image: Beck (standing about my 
height, about 5'6") wearing a skin-tight blue/black/gray camouflage 
style shirt, wearing teeny little black tight pants, and gray high-top 
Vans. He had his sunglasses in his back pocket and his hair was short 
and of course a little greasy.
Beck did a few interviews for the cameras and I didn't hear much of them 
because it was so loud, so we walked by Bibbe who was doing an interview 
and went into the back part of the room where it was dark and they were 
showing a video compilation of the making of the New Pollution, 
Jack-Ass, Where It's At, and Loser videos and incorporating videos of Al 
playing an interesting game of checkers with a friend and Beck when he 
was about 6 years old looking like he was peeing. (it was really only a 
hose, but they did it for fun.) and the video was accompanied by live 
versions of "High 5" and some other strange music.
I really wanted to talk to Beck, considering he is my idol, and I also 
wanted to get his autograph because at the book signing the next day he 
would only sign copies of the book bought at the Rizzoli bookstore where 
it was held. (of course mine was bought at the preview exhibition).
Beck walked by me after an interview and I called him, and told him that 
I was sorry to bother him and that I was a big fan. I had my book out 
with a permanent marker. He said, "really? Cool." He dug that I like his 
stuff. He asked me if I wanted him to sign my book and me being in awe 
sputtered out "That would be awesome... I'm not going to be able to come 
to the book signing tomorrow (because it was only books bought there 
like I said before) and he took the marker and signed my book... I have 
never been that shaky before in my life. I thanked him and I told him it 
was an honor to meet him and shook his hand and we looked at each other 
in the eyes (not to sound too sappy, but hell...I haven't ever met an 
idol before...).
I walked around after and found a roll of wrapped-up toilet paper on the 
floor that Beck had because someone gave it to him during an interview 
as a joke. The sticker on it says: 
HANSEN
Specializing in 20th century
fine arts and toiletries
So I picked up the toilet paper... it is a kick-ass souvenir. I walked 
by LEIGH a few times, she is very skinny but she is awesome. Then BIBBE 
walked by me. I told her that I thought her show at the Roxy was going 
to be awesome. (She put on the performance). She said thanks, and that 
now it would probably suck because I told her that. She gave me an 
autograph on the book like BECK did and she asked me what my name is. I 
told her and she said, "Didn't you write me?" I had, and I was amazed at 
her memory... I think Bibbe has ESP. She is a VERY cool person. Pretty 
much everyone was leaving, and as we left we saw GWENYTH PALTROW going 
in. (Liv Tyler was there too but we didn't see her)
We caught a cab over to the ROXY where the performance was. When we got 
there, we thought we would have to wait in line for a while because 
there was such a crowd there, but they were all people who hadn't paid 
for tickets, so we walked right in with our bracelets.We got in there 
and there were lots of tables and all the tablecloths were TWISTER 
boards. We got to keep one at the end. The ROXY had colored lights all 
over the walls and 2 huge bars at either end of the room. There were big 
comfy leather chairs and people were passing around Fluxus-type cards 
that said to do things like "pass the card on to the person next to you 
and shake the hand of the person who gave this card to you" and "fold 
this card up as little as possible and hand it to the person next to 
you".
There was this stoned guy fighting with a plant... he was hitting it and 
knocking it over and picking it up and punching it and turning it upside 
down so all the dirt would fall out... It was funny. There was another 
guy walking around with a little plastic tape recorder whistling into 
it. When VAGINAL DAVIS finally told everyone to take their seats she was 
backstage and there was music playing. She started singing "I'm cuckoo 
for Caucasian cock" over and over.
The set list of performances went like this:
Welcoming Remarks:
Timothy U. Nye
Ellen F. Salpeter
They didn't really say much. Just a welcome.

Emcee Dr. Vaginal Davis:
VAGINAL came out in a dress claiming she was from Germany-Africa (a new 
country) and she had a few volunteers who were from there as well. These 
were 2 about 17 year old guys and she got them up on stage and took 
their shoes off. She called their bare feet their "shrimp" and she 
poured maple syrup and maraschino cherries and whip cream all over them 
and sucked it off their feet... it was weird. Then she sung a song 
called "Cherries in the Wind". It was OK... Kind of strange...
Cat Power:
They were a pretty bad band and their music wasn't very good.
Rebecca Moore
(With Stephen Vitiello, Ursula Wiskoski
and Brian Geltner):
there wasn't anything special here.
Hans Hermann T:
nothing special again.
Foot-In-Fluxus
(Thurston Moore, Don Fleming, and Jim Dunbar):
These guys were cool... The took instruments like Thurston's guitar and 
scraped it on the amp and had like a 15 minute jam session of noise. 
Just like Beck's bonus noise on Stereopathetic Soulmanure.
Larry Miller:
This guy brought out a ladder, climbed up and touched the ceiling and 
then came down and left the stage.
J. Mascis:
Larry Miller kept walking around him from side to side telling him what 
to say in small segments and he would yell these things at the top of 
his lungs. It was really funny.
Beck Hansen:
I was expecting Beck to do some kind of performance, but he simply 
thanked people for coming to his grandfather's tribute and talked for a 
minute about his grandfather and some weird video he did (not the Odelay 
video) it was a video he made and was projected as we came in. Then he 
introduced Marianne Faithfull. When VAGINAL introduced him it was 
hilarious... she said something to the extent of "This is my beautiful 
Godson Beck Hansen, he has the longest white penis I have ever seen!" It 
was awesome... got a picture.
Marianne Faithfull:
She was cool, she did about 3 songs.
Elegy for the Fluxus Dead
(Al and Channing Hansen):
Channing Hansen (Beck's 1/2 brother) and a projection of Al behind him 
both completely taped their heads up with masking tape and after their 
heads were completely wrapped up they did a weird motion as if they were 
saying "Thank You". Then They ripped the tape off their heads (mind you 
it was only a video of Al but Channing was really doing this). That was 
really cool.
Then everyone left the stage and people started leaving, but there was 
no way I was leaving yet. I got some pictures of Marilyn Manson's band 
who showed up about 3/4's through the show. When the place was almost 
empty (expect for maybe 15 people) everyone came out again and they 
sprayed silly string everywhere and broke wine bottles into a little 
pile of shattered glass, they turned on these weird little plastic toys, 
BECK was under the keyboard with a microphone and a little plastic tape 
recorder laying on the stage on his back talking into them... I got a 
few pictures.
It was awesome, very cool. I got a bunch of souvenirs...A picture of 
Bibbe, of the stage, of Vaginal Davis, I got a few cans of empty silly 
string, some papers that said stuff about the exhibit, a bag that had 
printed stuff all over it that they gave out, (a reproduction of Al's 
autograph) the TWISTER table cloth, a lot.
As we were leaving they gave us parting-bags of stuff... we were almost 
the last ones out of there so my sister and I each got two. The things 
that were in the bags were:
病n Aerosmith CD 
病 Banana Republic compilation CD
病 book about THREAD WAXING SPACE
病 little adfor Thread Waxing Space
病 Marianne Faithfull poster
柊LTOIDS!
病 little piece of chocolate
病 book of Matches that said the name of the exhibit and the date,
病n issue of "Details" magazine with Pamela Anderson on the cover,

and I think that's it.
It was one of the coolest experiences of my life, meeting Beck was so 
awesome. I got some pictures, I am going to send some to Deborah at 
Slo-Jam and see if she wants to scan them... If you want more details 
E-Mail me...I think I covered all the bases. It was definitely worth the 
money (and it was a lot of money). Seeing Beck was the coolest thing 
ever... really. It was something I will never forget.
Regards,
Adam 
Beck-Odelay@worldnet.att.net