ketchup & boo boo

"ketchup" & "boo boo" are the nicknames of two clowns here on the show, and good friends of me and my neighbor, John Fulkerson - resident Greatest Trombone Player on Earth.


Their real names, of course, are NOT "ketchup" and "boo boo." They are Akosh and Gabor, respectively, and are just two normal twenty-something guys who also happen to be clowns. We still CALL them boo boo and ketchup though, i rarely hear anyone call them by their real names except each other. their real names are Hungarian, because that is where they are from, Hungary.

now, boo boo has been here since november of 2003, i believe, and ketchup started his life as a ringling clown in december of 2006. their story is a lot like performers from other troupes in that they knew each other back home, trained together, and,though not in boo boo and ketchups case, performed together. they learned and studied their circus skills together at the Hungarian State Circus Academy.


i didn't even know there were circus schools until i got here ... i mean, i it makes sense and all, i wouldn't think there WEREN'T circus schools ... that sort of thing just didn't occur to me back in the "normal" world. here, we've got from left to right: ketchup, boo boo, sandor (pronounced SHAWN-dor who also went to the school with boo boo and ketchup) and ben, who's from america. (which, one finds out is just kinda bland after a while out here ... American's, that is.)

these 4 guys do an old school muscleman routine for pre-show. all they need are some handlebar mustaches and dumbbells that say ACME and it'd be complete.

they're just regular guys though, that's the thing about everyone out here - sure, there's a couple of eccentric people, but most are just people doing a job .... that happens to be in a circus. boo boo is really interested in hand balancing and practices that and his hat tossing and catching it on his head all the time. he also loves music and has started taking piano lessons from me. we meet on sundays in between shows and he's got some skittles already.

now, ketchup is more of the party guy. he's the guy yelling down the hallways, with his sideways speech. he'll just knock on your door and stick a cup in front of your face when he's ready to socialize and it's hard to ignore a ketchup when one's in the room. and, true to his clown nature, he's ALWAYS laughing. this guy just loves life, good food, and good friends. i recently flew home to visit my girlfriend, and he gave me ten bucks for the cab ride to the airport... "just in case." well, as fate would have it, i would've been about 10 bucks short! he's a good guy, and we both thank you, kecthup!
his background is mostly in russian bar where he was a catcher.

here's ketchup performing with his old troupe in 2006

on the first and every other trick, ketchup is the one facing the woman.

as you can see, it takes quite a bit of strength to do this. and, as you can see, ketchup's a bulldog. he's basically a hungarian wrecking ball who also happens to be a clown. now he's never one to pick a fight, but he's a good buddy to have walking back home to a train yard from downtown at 3 in the morning, i'll tell ya that much.

so, that's ketchup and boo boo. two of my neighbors, and two of my friends.

getting through a six-pack

so, a few cities ago during a six pack - that's 3 shows on saturday and 3 on sunday - me and Mullen, the greatest saxophone player on Earth, made a video.

see, a six pack can be a mind numbing monotonous experience - or it can be done before you knew what happened . either way it involves being at the arena from 9 ish in the morning until 10, 11 ish at night.

it's mostly mentally hard, just psyching yourself up for each show, trying to put fresh energy and attention into something that by now, we've done, EASILY over TWO HUNDRED times! this year.

on a sidenote - we had an absolutely HORRIBLE 1st show the other saturday .... i think - (after a while they kind of all run together) or maybe it was the 2nd show of the day, can't quite remember now .... anyway, the point IS that is was HORRID.

we, the band were all Over the place, people looked tired and dis engaged. the clowns looked ragged and bored. star clown at a slow pace. animals missing tricks. motorcycles not working - awkward transitions as a result of ... my point is, to all those at that show or any like it ... we're SORRY, we do this DAY in and DAY out, and although we're usually pretty good about showin' up for the big dance with our A-Game each and every time .... sometimes.... it just ain't in the cards ... it's not you , it's us.

ANYWAY

in between shows we get about an hour or so off in which people eat ... practice .... nap ... internet ... music ... tetris.

all of these are favorites of we blue unit band members - except for the Practice one. (that was a little joke, see? :)


Mullen likes to play around on GarageBand a lot - he really gets into it collecting jam packs with different instruments and whatnot. so we're there sitting, eating and he's going through this new pack of Orchestra Samples and plays this Orchestra Hit sound ... you know, like M.C. Hammer used to overuse back in the day or one that accompanies the sudden scare "Boo" in a horror flick.



well, Obviously and ACTUALLY, this would LITERALLY get my attention and make Mullen and I roll over laughing and do this video . . . and get me asking why "Da Hammer" didn't cross over into horror movies.




In the film Mullen is pretending to look for me to tell me i'm late for the show and should hurry here Mullen plays this Great "spooky movie, low cello" sample that worked out really well.- i dismiss him at first, (or ... pretend to, really - i'm not REALLY talking on the phone with anybody) but then the sudden jolt of realizing what's going on HITS, i mean .... it just hit me - exhausting, really. :/ Mullen did the narrating, camera work, AND sound effect all himself, and i'd just like to take this chance to say what i great job i think he did. Great Job, there Mullen!

it's somewhere around 2 in the morning, i think.... i am in philadelphia. (i JUST checked my dvd copy of the Movie philadelphia starring tom hanks and denzel washington to check my spelling of the city's name) i just got to my room from load out. since i've been here i've tried to make it a point NOT to call my room "home" when referring to it. i didn't just get HOME, i got back to my ROOM. but, earlier i told a friend i'd call ... "after i got home." i find recently more and more THAT'S what i say.
we are connected back up (the train had been spotted/parked in two "cuts" for this yard) are are awaiting rolling on. this is one of the most exciting times of our week - a train run.

anyway, i'm sitting here ..... right now....
on a train

i live on a train. this is where i live. a train is what i live on.




my room, my things, my self and my soap .... are on .... a ...... train.

living is a thing that i do ...
and i'm doing that thing on .... a train. on a circus train.

this is real. i am in the circus and i live on a train . there's a clown 2 doors down! that is a true thing

that tom hanks movie , that we discussed earlier, .....

is on this train here .... with me ..... where i'm ... doing my living



me.

i live ...

LIVE




on a train

pie

birthdays here on the circus are a fun event - there's a tradition, i've found out, for the clowns to "pie" you on your birthday. as you might imagine, when it's your birthday it's in all of your friends and co-workers best interest for you to get pied. so, of course, they're all in cahoots with the clowns.
now, if your hush hush about it, then it can lie under the radar, but that's difficult because the Clowns have spies and people on the payroll that you may not even KNOW about.
and since everyone knows about it, of course they're on guard so it's quite an occasion when it gets off successfully.


it was right after a show, i think on a 3 show day, and right as i came off of the bandstand Amber (prop, now lights) walks right up to me and strikes up some convo. This was new, but i stood there, and i slowly realized that she wasn't talking about ANYthing. a change in the wind, a quick glance, but too late. Right from behind, Squeak the Clown pied me. He pied me good, he pied me hard. good thing i had glasses on.




most times, if it done right, it's a complete surprise, i, at least, realized what was going on a split second before. not poor Wages. Cricket the Clown got right as we lured him out of the dressing room. As his bandmates, it's our responsibility to ensure a public pie.

touring 101

i'm constantly amazed at how this show runs. i'm speaking specifically about loading in and loading out. setting up and tearing down all of our things, putting it on the train and moving to the next town to do it all over again.. to come in on opening day and see the whole thing set up is easy to take for granted. we finish our last show for a city on a sunday night around 10:00 and sound check in the next town is usually around 2:00 pm on that very wednesday.



now, load out usually takes anywhere from 6 to 10 hours depending on how easy or hard the building is to get out of. (where the loading docks are and how many there are is usually the biggest factor) so a load out will finish in the wee small hours of a monday morning, then we drag ourselves back to the train for a much earned shower and sleep and a wonderful train run. load in will be in that tuesday starting in the morning - around 6 or 7 and last into the night.






now, there's a small crew that doesn't do the train run, but instead do what's called an "overland" which just means that they go by bus to the next city, ahead of the train. (we realize that both train AND bus do indeed go OVER land, but that's just what we call it, so there)

the purpose of this is to do what's known as Pre-Rig. department heads and whoever signs up to help or is needed (i'm not entirely sure the exact personnel, i think it rotates week to week...) all go on the overland for pre-rig which leaves right after load out.





6 am - finish load out
9:15 - bus from New York to Philadelphia (where i'm at now)
3:00 pm - pre-rig in Philly.

so, essentially, anyone crew member doing an overland is almost working/up for 2 days straight just about every week! :/
that's a little nuts - they are put up in hotels (since the train isn't there) and i think, they're given a meal allowance.

still - crazy.

finally get some sleep on monday night, get up to load in for usually 12 or more hours on tuesday.

simply nuts

itchy

the odd thing about living on a train is that, from time to time, it moves. it's a mobile home in all senses of the word. even more so than what we're used to knowing as mobile homes. i've actually lived in mobile home a couple of times in my life - interesting times, great stories, but it Didn't move, not once.

now, the interesting thing about living on a train for an extended period of time is that, if it Doesn't move, it feels .... well..... weird.

we played East Rutherford, NJ, then NYC, and today we're loading into East Rutherford ... again. The train has been spotted in Seacaucus, NJ which is a 10 minute amtrak ride into NYC and a 15 minute bus ride from our engagement in East Rutherford.


so, we've had no reason to move for the past 3 weeks or so, and we're going to be moving until this upcoming Sunday night/Monday morning.

now, if a train doesn't move, then it's just like any other place that people live in and doesn't move - and really, considering the sizes of our quarters and general change in living conditions, the MOVING is the coolest thing aBOUT this place.

no train runs apparently manifest itself in humdrum, agitated, weary circus folk.
guess i've gotten used to to those weekly rides and wonderful sleep. maybe i could suggest that just once a week in those cities where we play this long - they could just take us out for a quick lap ... you know, just so we can keep our heads on straight.

New York City

so, now we're here in NYC and it's a pretty exciting thing to be playing in Madison Square Garden. we just loaded in today and despite the rain and a little cold - i'm pretty pumped. this looks to be a hectic schedule and there'll be all eyes on us because NY is our biggest market for the tour.

the Times is supposed to reviews us, and from what i'm told, that's a big barometer for how the rest of the tour will go.
a crazy piece of trivia, is that, as of the middle of March we've already done ONE HUNDRED shows !! that's crazy to think, but it's true. so, the difficulty now is that the show is starting to run on auto - speaking for myself i suppose and no one else, but i imagine it might be similar for others. the show is definately running more smoothly now, and people are hitting their cues right on - and it's that exciting part of a production where the show kind of starts to become what it's going to become.

all these things are great, but it's part of the job to make the repitition sound fresh i suppose. i'm excited about the city - gotta see some broadway shows and i'd like to go to the Met. the empire of course, but i've noticed that the statue isn't that high up on my wish list - i suppose if there's time sure ... we'll see - either way i'm sure it'll involve as little sleep as possible.