Popination Fascination
A series of unhinged personal essays disguised as pub reviews. Today: Colorado Sake Co. ...or maybe it's Dreamgirls? Or, a Very Special and Ripe Jacket?
I whipped the knife out and flipped it open. Though matte black, it still shone in the stage lights, mainly because the audience absolutely was not expecting to see it, even though they’d just seen me smack myself with a leather flogger mere seconds ago. But it was a big knife, and black, and obviously quite sharp. So all their eyes and their energized attention immediately snapped to it.
I waved it across the space in perfect time with the music, then placed it on my leg and drew the honed wedge shaped blade through both layers of fishnets: the flesh-colored and the black thigh-highs. They made a corrugated sound as they gave way, popping open to reveal my tattoo on one side and an old bruise on the other. The audience cheered and threw dollar bills; half turned on, half afraid.
Wait. I should back up a little.
Colorado Sake Company is a lovely little fine cut diamond of a sushi counter located in the tough and crunchy RiNo neighborhood of Denver. It’s right near a very active nightclub that has really good goth nights for dancing, and in fact often hosts Denver’s Goth Prom itself. But this little sake company is tiny, sunny, and yes, they brew their own sake there. Wait, is it brewing when it’s sake, not vinting or distilling? Yeah I think it’s brewing that you do to sake. Anyway.
I had a lovely little jar full of a delicious basic cold sake called American Standard, to accompany my stellar salmon sashimi and delectable avocado and cucumber roll. They do all small plates at CO Sake co. and so I had enough to please me very much without weighing me down for my burlesque act.
Yes, that’s what I was doing with all the stocking cutting nonsense—the show was with a little local troupe called Dreamgirls Burlesque, and I was called in to fill in for a dropped act last minute. I think that the director had seen my Mal act in the Firefly show you’ve heard me write about before, and thought I might have a good idea for a piece that would fit in with her Villains theme. I told her I had a bloody vampire and an angry blade-wielding punk act that she could choose from, and she chose the latter.
When I had finished my snack, they led me into the back, past the bright and cheerful lunch counter and through a winding, dark hallway covered in astroturf and labeled in neon cursive, saying ‘Drink more sake.’ Don’t mind if I do…
Behind the turf-covered door there appeared a surprising sight: A beautifully lit, cabaret-tabled little theatre space, with some strange birch-looking trees lining the small stage, and a loop of gifs and images playing on the screen behind, to rest the eyes on as the audience waits for the show. I was showed back into the wee dressing room, and then found myself a seat in the very back, where I admired the space and sipped my second sake.
Apparently, along with the Dreamgirls, they often have comedy nights and even yoga classes back here, which sounds like quite a fun time. Sip-sake-asana? I’m in.
The angry punk piece is one that I’d done before, and it’s a favorite, not only because of the surprising and fun way that I’ve made it end, but that the song choice is perfect–just begs for stripping to. Called “Boom-Swagger-Boom” by the Murder City Devils, it’s a joyfully yelling song just barely over two and a half minutes long, which makes for a perfect burlesque act. The costume has evolved over the past few iterations of performing it, and I believe I perfected it for my Dreamgirls debut.
See, choreographing a burlesque act isn’t exactly the same process as other kinds of choreography. Though I do still start with the ‘story’ of the song and often align my movements with the lyrics. But a burlesque act is all about the series of reveals (stripping moments), which need to build in tension to a dramatic climax; often a twirling of tassels on jiggling breasts, or in my case, a shredding of fishnet stockings. And so choosing the costume for an act can be more than half the choreography right there. It certainly was in my Boom Swagger act.
It’s funny, though: the most important costume piece of that act, the article that the whole piece centered around, I barely wear—in fact, I take it off almost immediately after I’ve strode onstage through the audience, flipping everyone off, yanking the steel chopsticks out of my hair and flinging them aside. It’s an ancient leather jacket, and I carefully remove it, smell it, stroke it, show it off to the audience, let them worship it, and then gently place it on the back of the chair that’s been set for me center stage. That’s when the happy and positive violence begins, from dropping my cutoff-jean miniskirt down to my ankles, to tearing my white tank top undershirt in two (revealing a harness made of chains), to unhooking a leather flogger from my old sword belt and whipping my own thighs with it. And then, of course, the climax of the narrative: flourishing and snapping open that big black blade, and cutting through my stockings with it.
But the old leather jacket remains a focus for the whole short narrative of this act, and the Emcee introduces it so, with this text composed for me by my partner, whose jacket it is.
"The co-star of this piece is the jacket worn by Valkyrie Rose. This jacket was present at the show where the song in this piece was first performed, and even then it was already old. It is older than many members of Blue Dime Cabaret. Two generations of punk rockers have fought in it, fucked in it, sweated in it, even slept in it. Up close, it smells like it. And two generations of punk rockers have grown too old to wear it, yet it lives on. With each passing decade it only grows more powerful, just like the one who wears it tonight.”
I don’t honestly smell all of this when I wear the jacket; I smell good old leather only. But it fits me perfectly. It’s one of those classic biker cuts of jacket, and it’s got faded spots of paint (wait is that dried blood?) where old punk slogans and logos no doubt were etched some day long in the past. Buckles and good broad shoulders and sleeves that are actually long enough for me, the lining of the latter of which has worn threads and a couple of organic holes for thumbs to go through. I haven’t worn it anywhere but for this act, onstage, though—that history is all my partner’s rough past, not mine. But it does have a presence to it, a power all its own, that you can feel when close to it. Especially when wearing it. The story goes that my partner bought it way back in the day, from a used clothing store, so it was already old when he then took it over and wore his own story into it (as the Emcee blurb says above).
Wearing that jacket does add quite a bit more Boom as well as Swagger into my step, and a good thing too. But all that fishnet-slicing made me thirsty, so I better go get another glass of sake before last call.
(Are you waiting for a picture from my act? Yeah no you don’t get one this time—they all turned out a bit too ribald for this publication. But you can always find Valkyrie Rose on the socials if you’re curious. Just know that, as with all forms of live theatre, pictures and even video don’t ever do a performance justice. Here’s the song, though, to mollify you and spark your imagination. Boom.)
My understanding is that Clive understood a bit more about Boom and Swagger than your typical cultural critic! I never saw him dance, but I read that he did.