Up to my nipples in Cheeseheads

Last weekend's outing was to Chippewa Falls, WI for Oktoberfest. Good German food, watery American beer and one of the funniest bands I've ever seen, The Happy Schnapps Combo. Meine Freunden auf Chicago (aka the Chicago Contingent) booked a bunch of rooms stumbling distance from the Fairgrounds where the Fest was held.

It was a good plan, but no stumbling happened. You see, your humble narrator has developed an immunity to mass-produced American lagers, so basically after a session of this, I just burp and pee a lot and the potato dumplings with gravy and the spaetzle with gravy were just backup. Mmmmm, gravy. But we did have fun singing songs like "I Don't Wanna Do Dat," "The Bears Still Suck Polka" and "Dis Ain't My Toilet:"

Dis ain't my toilet
It's got a funny seat,
The paper's on the left
It should be on the right
so I won't sleep here tonight

I was also surprised to find out that the good people of the Norske Nook have gone into the homebrew business and now have a brewpub in Eau Claire. The beer was better than Leinies' (no big surprise there) and they the have the fantastic pies that they're known for. Beer and pie...

A loverly weekend, indeed. This would have been perfect, but I had a chance to see a psychedelic belly-dance band from Turkey last night at the Cedar Cultural Center to cap it off. A true multi-media presentation; a belly dancer of incredible beauty and skill, a sketch artist rocked a Macbook with an ever-changing drawing in time with the music and a trio of musicians that were so tight they squeaked. Percussion, percussion and samples and an electrified long necked lute called a Saz.

Yo, check it:


This one is "The dance of the Adultress," a piece they wrote to celebrate the overturning of a new Turkish law that would punish a married woman for adultery (there was no equivalent penalty for men). This gives a pretty good example of the evening and what you missed.

Partly, it's my fault, so I'll tell you some of the good shows at the Cedar that are coming up ahead of time to avoid this in the future. Also, I have added the Cedar's music blog since they are better writers and have a deeper knowledge of what's coming than I can hope to scratch into the interweb's electrons. Read it, learn it and, most importantly, go to the shows. You need some culturin'.