Fred Armisen leads punk rock museum tour in Vegas
Comedy icon Fred Armisen will lead two tours of the Punk Rock Museum in Las Vegas next month. but why?
Well, before Armisen achieved legendary status on "Saturday Night Live" and "Portlandia," he was the drummer for the band Trenchmouth. In 1988, he formed a punk rock band with singer Damon Locks after dropping out of the School of Visual Arts in Armisen's native New York and moving to Chicago.
Windy City, a five-piece band, released four albums before disbanding in 1996, including one on a major label.
Armisen, 56, has always been a funny guy, but he hadn't even thought about pursuing comedy as a career until his short film "Fred Armisen's Guide to Music and South by Southwest" (presented to Austin's annual independent music festival Tribute) became a hit and was released in 1998 to rave reviews.
Four years later, he joined the cast of "SNL."
punklandia
It was their shared punk roots that initially connected Armisen and his future "Portlandia" costar Kelly Brownstein. They met in 2003 when Bronstein's band, Sleater-Kinney, attended an SNL afterparty. Soon after, the two began collaborating on sketches that eventually became part of the 2011-2018 Emmy-nominated IFC comedy series that lampooned Oregon’s hipster haven.
Armisen maintained a punk perspective throughout his career. On "Saturday Night Live," he played a Johnny Rotten-esque punk singer named Ian Rubbish who takes on the police and the Queen, but has a crush on Margaret ·Thatcher was surprisingly fond of it.
“I’ve been rehearsing this sketch since I was 15,” Armisen told Rolling Stone in 2013. "I really love the music of that era. I'm a big fan of all these bands - the Sex Pistols, The Clash, The Stranglers, The Damned."
Several of his Portlandia characters were based on community scenes. He also appeared in two punk documentaries: 2014's Salad Days: A Decade of Punk in Washington, D.C. (1980-1990) and 2015's Damn: Don't You Wanna Die?
Arimson maintains his musical skills to this day as the bandleader and regular drummer for Seth Meyers' house band Late Night.
The Punk Rock Museum is the world's first museum dedicated to the history, culture and absurdity of rock's asshole stepsons. Located between downtown and the Las Vegas Strip, it houses artifacts and memorabilia from punk scenes around the world, such as handwritten lyrics, instruments, clothing, photos, flyers, and artwork, as well as bars, wedding/walking bands, and tattoos living room.
The museum has come up with the novel idea of hiring former punk rock musicians as tour guides for its collections. So far, members of The Ramones, Social Distortion and The Germs have accepted the offer.
Armisen will visit the Punk Rock Museum on Sunday, July 23 at 2 p.m. Tickets are $100 at 5 p.m. For more information, visit thepunkrockmuseum.com.
Read also:
- Games Industry Research: Carbon Emissions of Top Video Games
- U.S. cities with the most Swifties per capita
- Blackjack Casino Advantage: How to Beat the Odds
- Football 101: What is relegation in football?
Source: www.casino.org
