"shoot the horse, ride the cowboy"

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Andy, in the tradition of Andy Warhol, Andy Kaufman, and Mahatma Andi, read & rapped his poetry to the sonorous sounds of a contrabass and various accompanying instruments, including electric guitar, flute, and vocal percussion.

Given the fact that Andy and The Androids deliver their art in Flemish, my interpretation is based upon the one in a thousand words I understood: periodic English terms dotted throughout, and/or phrases that my mind could hear as English, even if it wasn't! I gleaned some things by the tenor of the music and the interplay of syncopation among/between instruments (including Andy's voice) and the trio of artists.

The flavor I captured was dark and humourous: at turns optimistic (and-or-but activist optimism doesn't seem to matter?), engaged with/against violence (superspastic, illustrated by the pro- and anti-taser brigades), or calling out the Serial Thing to Kill or was it the need for Serial Pain Killers? I enjoyed watching my friends laugh, yet also noticed disparate effects on the audience-as-a-whole. At times a laugh would ripple throughout in a spontaneous wave, other times the audience was carved into thirds: those attempting to suppress their amusement, those with quizzical expressions - apparently puzzled or processing, and those whose stiff blank visages suggested a deep unease or even disassociation. Countering the bursts of laughter, silence often echoed in the cozy, filled lobby of the cultuurcentra Antwerpen (Berchem).

I enjoyed the challenge of applying my closure skills: that particular leap of faith interpreters make as their best guess as to the meaning being attempted by a particular message right now. Andy jumps from one non-sequitur to the next; how else can Albania, the ozone layer, "lesbes in El Dorado," "Income Walker," kanker zo hip, and "nipples" appear in such close linguistic proximity?

Why has the burghermeister gone underground?

Who is wearing moonboots?

What is the title of the song of Stevie Ray Vaughn's that was emulated? (I recognized the melody but my musical recall is pure lousy.) :-/

The moan of disappointment that shot through the crowd when Andy announced the last number, after the guitarist had just amended his earlier superspastic claim to a psychopathic fascination with degrading fruitcake sex with every girl, testified to the coherence of his unlikely combinations.

I am not sure if the last rap about Caesar referenced the political hate group here or some larger human entity (groups and/or institutions) seeking control, but what Andy is doing with language proves how supple, creative, empowering and membering our ways of speaking can be.

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