Mike Birbiglia
“Sleepwalk with Me (Live)”
(Comedy Central)

Though he’s a comedian by trade, Mike Birbiglia’s knack at storytelling has been a good launching point to allow him to transcend from doing bits to a fully realized oratorical essayist, so much so that not only has he performed stand up on the late night TV circuit, but he’s also been the sitting-on-the-couch guest, as well as a featured entity on NPR shows like This American Life and Selected Shorts.

“Sleepwalk with Me” is the recorded version of his live show of the same name, which he toured on last year, as well as the companion to his book of the same title.

Compared to the actual live performance, the audio recording is an abridged version, though for someone who hasn’t seen the show, the spirit of “Sleepwalk” is contextually sound. Unlike his previous recording, “My Secret Public Journal,” Birbiglia’s hour-plus story has several dramatic moments of self-realization and poignancy, though they’re executed in a way that highlights the humorous and absurd viewpoints that he sees them in.

“Sleepwalk with Me” is a solid enough recording to use as an introductory piece for someone who hasn’t heard Birbiglia before, and who knows? You might even get a simultaneous tear and chuckle out of that person.

— Ryan Pangilinan

Sib-mple Times: Totally Crushed Out v. Joe Sib
by Ryan Pangilinan

Unless you were born super late into the game, Californian Joe Sib has fronted awesome bands like Wax and, one of my favorite pop-punk groups, 22 Jacks. In addition to contributing actual danceable jams, Sib is also the co-founder of SideOneDummy Records, which has had a more than respectable output of records from the likes of The Gaslight Anthem, Broadway Calls, Suicide Machines, Bedouin Soundclash, The Sounds, Piebald, and tons more.

Sib has recently gotten back out on stage performing his one-man show “California Calling,” in which he describes the day he discovered punk rock within a 70-minute block. It’s also complete with a dance number set to the “Jesus Christ Superstar” soundtrack and do-not-miss story about The Ramones.

Before the show, Sib sat down with TCO to talk about show’s origins and the benefits of being a punk rock dad.

Totally Crushed Out: So you were in 22 Jacks and Wax and now you’re doing this show, where you’re telling humorous stories. What was the impetus of doing that?

Joe Sib: I wanted to get back on stage. I hadn’t been on stage since 22 Jacks and I missed being out on the road. Obviously with SideOneDummy [and] I have two kids – a six year old and a nine year old – and I got a wife, at 43 years old, I just can’t hop in a van with four guys and take it out on the road. I just missed getting on stage. I was like, “Man, how can I figure out a way to get back up there?” Because being in a band is just not in the cards for me, in the sense of I love the music, but I can’t get that many people together, and it’s a lot of responsibility and a lot of effort. I always had an idea of doing a show with photographs for years, for 10 years.

In 2010, I actually started writing some ideas down, I made this CD called “True Stories, Bad Ideas” that I was just giving to bands that stopped by SideOne and would hang out. That CD started circulating around and it had about four or five stories on there and people were asking “Are you ever gonna do these live? I would love to see you do it live.” And I was like, “You know what? This might be the chance to do this.”

I saw some of the videos online earlier. Rollins has been doing the punk-spoken word thing, but this is not like that at all. The best part of it, from the clips that I saw, is that you don’t leave feeling bummed out at all.

Thank you. I’ve always come from the positive. It’s that PMA that HR and the Bad Brains taught me all about. Rollins and Jello Biafra are two artists and musicians that I have so much respect for. When I started doing this show, there was going to be this comparison, not that I’m even in that league at all as those two guys, but I am from the punk rock community and the thing I always tell people is that my story and what “California Calling” is all about is what Henry Rollins and Jello Biafra did it. They were on stage, they were breaking ground. I was a kid, I grew up in the suburbs of Northern California and I just happened to be in the right place at the right time when punk rock hit the suburbs and I was on the frontline, watching it all.

My whole show is about getting the chance to experience punk rock in that second generation and getting to see guys like Henry Rollins and the Dead Kennedys. Even though my show isn’t about Black Flag and the Dead Kennedys, it’s about growing up in a particular time when punk rock hit the suburbs….

You’re doing it in a format that’s cool. I’ve felt that SideOneDummy has been ahead of the curve, especially when compared to other labels. You did “The Show” 10 years ago and it was weird because it had all my favorite bands and at the time, I would only hear those bands on skate videos, in the background.

I loved doing “The Show.”

But I wished back then that there were more people doing video zines and now, it’s the norm. SideOneDummy preceded that by at least a decade.

When we started SideOneDummy, Bill and I never dreamed that we would never work with the bands that we have AND be around for 16 years. If you would have said that to us then, that we would be working with bands like Flogging Molly, Gaslight Anthem, Bedouin Soundclash, Chuck Ragan, 7 Seconds, The Sounds, we would’ve been like, “How is that even possible?”

Now to look back on all of that, I feel so grateful and doing this show, out on the road, and talking about those experiences make know how lucky I am, how grateful I am, to be doing all of this and it comes back to this one particular moment in time….

Doing “California Calling” – a one-man show — it’s obviously slightly easier than trying to tour with a band and run a label and have a family.

I would say that doing the show is way harder than being in a band. Setting it up is way easier. I was always used to running on stage with four other guys, when I first started doing this, I was like “Whoa, I don’t have a band with me.” Then I realized that the photographs I have in the show, kind of end up being the band and I lean on those photographs. When I first started doing the show I had, like, 40 photographs. Tonight, I have 67.

The show definitely has a theme, do you know how you want to follow this up?

Yeah, with “California Calling” it’s definitely the first installment…. In the future, to do this kind of show, you have to live and experience life, you have to keep traveling and experience new things. The next thing I’d like to do as a show is based on how I’ve been with my wife for 21 years and I’m the father of two children and I want to go from “California Calling,” where that ends, to being on the road, never going off the road, gonna tour for the rest of my life – having that turn into “Wow, now I’m a guy with a mortgage and I’m 43 years old.” How do you not turn off that switch in your head? How do you sit on a flight with other people your age and not have anything in common with them? Because they don’t want to talk about the first release from Code of Honor or how they saw Flogging Molly.

I’m doing the same thing that I did in my twenties, but I’m not drinking and partying like I did, but I’m 43 and at a show. There’s this weird thing when you’re talking to other men and women that are 43 years old and you’re like “Wow, these people sound really, really old.” Like I met someone on a flight and he was like 39, 38 and he looked like he was 50 years old and what he was interested in and what we were talking about was just so foreign to me, I was like, “I’m so lucky that I love what I do” because if I was selling insurance or doing accounting, I would be so miserable and that would show on my face.

California Calling: Joe Sib from Ethan H. Minsker on Vimeo.

You can check out more info on the show on the California Calling website.

DEAR RYAN: My partner and I are vegetarians. Occasionally we eat fish, but neither of us has had pork, beef or fowl for more than 10 years.

We were at a barbecue at a good friend’s house a short time ago and our gracious hosts kindly prepared veggie burgers especially for us. Another guest at the party asked me if I’d be as good-natured as our hosts if I were to have a get-together at my house. (In other words, would I serve meat to our carnivorous guests.) I told him no, to which he (jokingly?) replied that I was “selfish.”

Ryan, the idea of eating meat is gross to me now. The reason I stopped eating it in the first place is my ethical opposition to how it’s produced, and I would not want to compromise my ideals simply in the name of being a good hostess.

Am I “selfish”? Should I offer my friends meat if that is what they prefer? I’d appreciate your input. — WHERE’S THE BEEF? IN HOUSTON

DEAR WHERE’Z DA BEEF: As a fellow vegetarian (and one who doesn’t eat fish), I’d be stoked that your friends even offered you the alternative. Do you know how many family dinners I’ve been to where people seem to forget that I don’t eat meat? Many. And it’s been fucking 14 years. Damn, yo.

Anyway, good manners dictate that your guests shouldn’t really complain. I agree, the idea of eating and preparing meat is fucking disgusting [1], particularly if you haven’t eaten it in many years. Bottom line, your friends can easily go an evening without eating some flesh. Take care and good luck!

DEAR RYAN: Last year for Thanksgiving, I made a special effort to get the entire family together for the traditional meal. All 13 of us met at my mother’s home and everyone was to bring a dish or two to share.

One of my brothers has two college-age daughters. Both are vegan, and he insisted that all the dishes we brought be vegan! I did it, but I resented it because I felt that two out of 13 people should not decide the menu. If they wanted vegan dishes, they should bring something for themselves, while the rest of us brought what we wanted.

My brother and nieces are now asking what we’re doing this year for Thanksgiving. Frankly, I don’t want to go through that again. Am I wrong in thinking everyone should not bend over backward for the vegan meal? I don’t mind some of the menu accommodating them, but I don’t think the whole dinner should be altered. — TURKEY EATER IN TEXAS

TURKEY EATER: Okay, I understand that it is Thanksgiving and you’re right, everybody else shouldn’t bend over backwards for two lone vegans, but I think it would be a NICE gesture to bring them something that they could eat. I think what your brother was trying to do was NOT leave his kids out in the cold with nothing to eat, which is understandable. He was being a good dad and a solid man.

That being said, preparing vegan meals (even ones that carnivores will eat) isn’t all that difficult (seriously, there are some great vegan books out there), so maybe baking them some vegan rice krispie treats while they bring their own tofurkey wouldn’t hurt, you bastard. Thanks for writing!

[1] I don’t think meat is all that disgusting. Sometimes I do, like when people get super rare meat and the blood comes out. That shit grosses me out, but by and large, I don’t really care what you eat, just keep it off my plate and we’ll be solid.

For more terrible advice (especially with the holidays coming up) write to Ryan at totallycrushedoutmag[at]gmail[dot]com.

Mike Birbiglia
“Sleepwalk with Me and Other Painfully True Stories”
(Simon and Schuster)

Whenever comedians write books, I’m always a little leery to read them. Back in high school, I read Chris Rock’s “Rock This” and was disappointed when the entire book was pretty much his act from “Bring the Pain.” Of course, I was 14 and probably didn’t know much better in the way that comics process humor.

Mike Birbiglia, a comic I knew through the media osmosis that is This American Life, has a narrative style that lends itself well to the written form. Birbiglia’s book “Sleepwalk with Me and Other Painfully True Stories” (Simon & Schuster) has culled stories that have appeared on his album “My Secret Public Journal” as well as his various appearances on This American Life, and yet in book form, they’ve certainly taken on a life of their own.

This is particularly fortuitous for fans of Birbiglia who are so familiar with his work because there are details in the book that aren’t mentioned their broadcast versions.

While “Sleepwalk” certainly has its many funny moments, there’s a particularly heartwarming and heartbreaking chapter about Birbiglia’s relationship with late comic, Mitch Hedberg. I won’t spoil it for you, but it’s probably one of my favorite stories in the book.

Unlike most collections of essays and even most memoirs, “Sleepwalk with Me,” is organized very well, though it doesn’t seem so at first. By the time you get to the end, the story as a whole makes a lot more sense and probably moreso when you hear Birbiglia’s voice as you make your way through the tome. After reading this book, I re-read “Rock This” with a different set of eyes and definitely made me appreciate comic’s book artform a little bit more.

— Ryan Pangilinan

I Don’t Care About Yr Interview: Totally Crushed Out vs. Julie Klausner
By Ryan Pangilinan

For most people, the road to romance is often filled with heartbreak, drunken epiphanies and escapades that would make your parents blush. Author and comedienne, Julie Klausner has taken her experiences and organized them in the hilarious memoir, “I Don’t Care About Your Band: What I Learned From Indie Rockers, Trust Funders, Pornographers, Faux-Sensitive Hipsters, Felons and Other Guys I’ve Dated (Gotham Books)” The book is, at times, caustic as it is funny, particularly for a male reader, but it doesn’t make it any less honest.

“I don’t think my book is about the guys I write about. It’s about me, I’m the one on the cover, I’m the one using my real name — the [exes] all have changed names — and the bread and butter of the whole piece comes along with my observations on my experiences,” said Klausner.

“I think there’s a double standard when it comes to female memoirists. How often are men who write about their sex lives asked whether they heard from the women in their books? I don’t think they are; not as much, anyway, because it’s THEIR sex lives.”

Throughout “Band,” Klausner takes a look at her core values and upbringing. In a specific bit, she recalls her early understanding of romance through Miss Piggy’s relationship with Kermit.

Another poignant moment in the earlier chapters of the book is when Klausner reconnects with an old crush and finds a division in her current life and this gentleman’s – a moment that is relatable to anyone who’s miles away from who they once were.

“I felt like the experience I had that I wrote about was a little deflating only because we didn’t really connect in the way I remember connecting to him when we were pen pals and I was 15. When we got together in person, I saw him for who he was — a stranger,” she said.

When pressed about whether someone could embody both the core of suburban ideals and be a pop culture junkie [an idea presented in said chapter], Klausner offered this little truth bomb: “It depends on what your priorities are and if you’re curious enough and whether you have a high speed internet connection or not, and what your job is, and also, if you’re one of those shitty ‘I’m going to put my kid in a punk rock t-shirt!’ kind of ‘hip’ parents, in which case, stop reading this and take your own life before I have to interact with you socially.”

As candid and inspiring as Klausner’s tome is, it can no doubt spurn ire from some of the more visible hipster archetypes who may feel like their traits are featured in, at times, a not-so-likeable light.

“[It’s] hard to take something as a personal shot when you don’t know somebody personally, and you’re reacting to an archetype or an overall piece that hits a little too close to home,” she said.

Still, Klausner says that she hasn’t received any negative comments about “I Don’t Care About Your Band” and it’s still making the rounds as a favorite amongst bloggers, comedians, readers and anybody who has a general interest in reading about relationships. 

“I’m pretty confident that my resulting observations are all grounded in reality, and therefore, hopefully, have some veracity to them. The feedback I’ve gotten speaks to that, which, again, is a nice surprise.”

Klausner’s upcoming projects and past work can be seen on her official website, while “I Don’t Care About Your Band” is available now.

[Photos taken from Julie Klausner’s site and Amazon and were photographed by Conrad Ventur]