7#k     ..\\\\ f ppx\ A*k A2AAkAAAAAAAstro Noise Space Oddities Man or Astroman? bring you yesterdays technology tomorrow! Who: Man Or Astroman? w/ The Quadrajets When: Sat., Aug. 19, 10 p.m. Where: Mercury Theatre How Much: $5 by Coury Turczyn Its 1:10 a.m. EST, and the interstellar, transdimensional, extraterrestrial invasion force that is Man or Astroman? has just conquered a 7-11 in the Silverlake area of Los Angeles. Reenergizing themselves before their next gig at the nearby (and aptly named) Spaceland, the alien marauders have commandeered the convenience marts crude telecommunications device (read: the telephone) to give fair warning to the Earthlings of East Tennessee. Beware of the Astroman, declares spooky spokesalien Birdstuff, because the earth is our laboratory, and you are our lab rats! Can it be true? Is all of humankind at the mercy of four nerdy-looking alien castaways who play surf guitar music and subsist entirely on Little Debbie snack cakes? Well, whether you know it or not, we are being invaded. Our mission, of course, is to conquer the world, proclaims Birdstuff, who also drums for the band in his spare time. Right now, our biggest dilemma is deciding if were gonna give it back or not. My vote is to destroy it. But the other guys havent been quite as hip to the cause. Whether or not the great masses of humanity can be conquered through the performance of surf rock remains to be seen. But if any group of alien creatures can do it, it would certainly be Man or Astroman?. The four musicians (including Starcrunch, Dexter X and Coco the Electronic Monkey Wizard) have been forging their own unique brand of surf since they crash-landed in Auburn, Alabama three and a half years ago. Taking the classic Dick Dale sonic guitar jangle of the early 60s, Man or Astroman? have fused it with a modern punk sensibility, creating instrumental twang-rock that ejects you right out of 007s Aston Martin and onto the grimy floor of your favorite beer hall. But thats not all. Man or Astroman? deliver their atonal rumblings within a pop-culture framework of 50s science fiction and futurism. Their shows are multimedia smorgasbords of obscure visuals, wild electronic sounds and dead media, as Birdstuff describes it. Meanwhile, their records are adorned with classic science fiction artwork (such as their debut LP, illustrated by Richard Powers ghostly, abstract aliens) and have snippets of dialogue from long-lost psychotronic movies wedged in between the songs. Some would say all this is just inspired shtick, but there is an actual connection here if you look hard enough. Birdstuff sees surf music as hearkening back to a time when people looked forward to the future. People were thinking so futuristically back then, he says. We had all this tremendous technology from World War II, the A-bomb, and television, and it led people to think towards the future. Nowadays, people just see right ahead in front of their faces, like a dog being led around the track or a donkey being led by a carrot. Its like theres not anywhere to really go except whats immediateand back then, people were thinking about colonizing Mars. That isnt to say these celestial crusaders want to lay a message out there (which is, after all, the antithesis of rock n roll). No, audiences at their renowned live shows should expect one thingsurf-based chaos. We just give them the direct neural experience and let em splice out or decipher whatever they willwe dont try to get too, too heavy with our Earth subjects, explains Birdstuff, perhaps lamenting Earthlings inability to fully comprehend the many levels of Man or Astroman?. Mainly, we just try to put on a cyber-kinetic punk rock show and let everybody have a good time. Thankfully, Man or Astroman? have also avoided the historical downfall of surf rock instrumentaliststhe one that led to Jimi Hendrixs famous vow, You will never hear surf music again. That is the notion that after three songs, it all starts sounding the same. In other words, surf rock can get really dull really fast. Fortunately, Man or Astroman? has been smart enough to warp this classic formto the point of including audible human vocals on their latest LP on Estrus, Project Infinity. We never set out to be recreationistswe were futurists from the start, says Birdstuff. Sometimes it gets retrospective from looking back to look ahead, but weve never wanted to be recreationists. Were kind of musical mad scientists. We snip and paste whatever we want to. If we want to get really traditional and do a lot of straight surf, well do that. But if we want to bring in things that sound like buzzes off the surface of some unknown planet, then well do that too. Weve never wanted to just completely regurgitate something for people thats easily swallowable. Finally, as his bandmates/fellow invaders head back to the club for their next show, Birdstuff is forced to sign off. Soon, theyll be rocketing into their own alternate reality onstage, backed by timewarping video devices. But it'll be only a small piece of what Birdstuff wishes the world was really like. I think one of the most interesting things is yesterdays futures, he says, what people in the late 50s or 60s thought the future was going to be like. It was definitely different than how it is now. But maybe in a different, strange realityif those futures would have come about and everybody was popping around in a jet car somewherethen maybe itd be cooler. If things had kind of gone different, I think the world wouldve been a lot wilder uSpecialtiesHNSpeclSpectrumSpeedmSpeedyB0SpenceSpgSpicy'smSpielvogelSpiritSpiritsTSplash#SplatSpoiledSpoonSportSport'sSportingKSportsN2kmr$T#Sportsman's w ~ Q U @@  XY X1  P@;P   HHZU(l1d)X,'d=/R@H-:LaserWriter 8 New YorkEEP