We Want the Flunk.

The 70s seemed like they were a great time. I'm sorry I missed them...completely. In fact, there's only a very small chance I was even CONCEIVED in the 70s - so, yeah, I wasn't around for them. Which is sad. A freewheeling decade of drugs and sex and hotpants and disco sounds okay to me.

So, last night, when Liza dragged asked me if I wanted to go see George Clinton perform at the Florida Room, I was coerced into going readily agreed. Of course, George Clinton is of Parliament and Funkadelic from the 70s.

Here is my review: I saw George Clinton. He looked like a crazy, crackhead, homeless guy, sweating through his t-shirt, emphatically croaking into a microphone, monotonically. And I have never seen so many young, rich white people go positively cuckoo-bananas. I pretended (badly) that I was going apeshit also, but...I just couldn't get into it. He opened with his hit, "We Want the Funk!" and then he segued into "Sh*t! Goddamn! Get off your ass and jam!" and after that, I'm not really sure what he was singing. Or doing. He was a spectacle - from his sad tennis shoes and khakis, all the way up to his bushy, grey beard, and the red weave up-do in his dreadlocks that made him sort of look like a combination of Tina Turner, Bob Marley and Sitting Bull in a headdress. I can also report that if you're within a foot-and-a-half radius of him, he doesn't smell - even though he looks like he should.

It was sort of amazing being in sweating distance of a musical legend - and I did have a good time...but it was surreal. And George Clinton should probably leave his 70s repertoire alone, so that we can all remember what "We Want the Funk" sounded like, as sung from a voice not fried by crack.

Oh, one more nugget: before George started singing, he drew graffiti all over a canvas behind him, and then rubbed mustard on it. After the show Liza wanted the canvas. We asked around, and finally found a guy from the Florida Room who could quote the price - she asked how much the canvas was, and he said, "fifty," at which she and I said "Fifty bucks? Deal!"

And then the guy said, "No, $50,000.00 - the canvas alone costs $50.00," at which point we burst out laughing in the guy's face. Seriously? 50K? We watched it get scrawled on. In 10 minutes. There was mustard on it - a lot of mustard. And we're in the middle of a recession.

Get real.

So, I've seen George Clinton perform, which may or may not be a big deal. And I can say that if he opened his eyes during his performance (I'm not sure he did...) that George Clinton looked squarely at me, and sang to me.

Weekend begun.