Dungeons and Vaginas
There were faux French accents and made-up songs about electric vaginas. There were a pair of skateboards kicked around, butthey had to stay in the shot, so they had to be kicked around again. Then someone with a Mohawk grabbed the camera and shouted into the lens. There was aninstrument too. The keyboard was only a metaphor, right?
This is a shoot night for toby Dick and Toby Dick, the duo aptly named Toby Dick. There filming somewhere in the industrial part of L.A. for their song “Rockstar.” There’s an iPod jacked into the PA system and Lee, the Toby with the Mohawk, begins what will become an all night pantomime, trying to dance and sing to the track.
Lyrics include caviar, scat and being a rock star, with a happy piano layered on top.
“I originally wrote the song for a car commercial,” says the other Toby, Arlen, who’s sporting a thin piece of face furniture (a ‘stache) and a pair of glasses that are worn at night. He wrote the piano, not the scat lyrics.
Something about the hair and the clothes and the glasses and all the talk about electric vag, well the two remind that the 80s are not dead. This is what SNL would be if it was a channel that was scrambled and you swear you could see a boob, but it might just be someone’s arm.
The moniker of duo follows the two, but they’re individuals in their own right. Arlen can play Snoop Dogg and Outkast songs on his grand piano and Lee is a graphic artist with a throwback to 70s high class art found in rooms with shag carpeting and Afros.
Claiming to have descended to this realm of existence on dragons, Toby Dick capture a bit of improv meeting Vaudeville, where they kick-flip on skateboards and fingers dance on piano keys.
Toby Dick reside in the Bay Area of Northern California, but they’ll find a place in all the hearts of those who enjoy the occasional song about dragons and the energy only found from 10 caffeinated drinks. Their album, “It’s Whatever…” will be coming out sometime later this year. |
