To STANG: Any L.A. devivals upcoming?

From: bgfitz001@aol.com (bgfitz001)
Newsgroups: alt.slack
Date: Mon, Aug 5, 2002 12:15 AM

Hi, Rev. Stang.

Post 9/11, early twenty-first century, as I'm sure you are well
aware, America is scrambling into a major religious revival,
perhaps the greatest this continent's experienced since The
Great Awakening of the mid-18th century, when imaginative
entrepreneurs like George Whitefield made a comfortable
living and garnered much slack by setting up collapsible
field pulpits in public parks and letting it rip.

While whittling my own lightweight, portable, sermon mount
from which to lead instant slackorgies here in the City of
Angles, it occurs to me that this town is ripe for plucking.
Hell's bells, if Scientology can get props every time the Con
media does a story on Tom Cruise or John Travolta, imagine
the possibilities for an honest cult like ours!!!

There's profit to be made here, Stang. I'm a twenty-eight year
old college graduate with a wife and impending daughter, and I
fell for "Bob." There's a reason mine is called Generation X,
you know. There are no coincidences with "Bob," just happy,
lucrative mistakes. And as easy as it is to separate my
age-peers and me from our wallets, it's so much easier with
the kids today. Look at Britney, Eminem, Jack Black, Grant
Morrison, those South Park twits with their construction paper
and safety scissors!

Getting back to the point, Los Angeles is choking to death,
it's so full of rich Pinks with sheeplike willingness to hand
money over to anyone who can silence the whining of Biff, Jr.
and little Buffy for ten seconds. And I believe a Subgenius
with a good rant can stun these kids into such confused
jaw-dropping that Mom'll be putting her SUV into hock in
order to pay for just a little more.

Now, I'm gonna ride this steed as far as it'll take me, with or
without The Subgenius Foundation.
However, I do believe there's plenty of buck to go around, and
I'd be lying if I said my present course of slaction wasn't
inspired by all that tasty "Bob" paraphenalia I've acquired in
the last couple of years, so I feel it's a good idea to inquire
about and maybe encourage a higher profile for The Church
of the Subgenius in the L.A./SoCal region.

So, any L.A. devivals any time soon?

Fucking 'em if they can't take a joke,

Reverend Fitz (the Paler),
Subgenius,
Legally Ordained Minister [the Pinks just eat this shit up! You
were so dead-on!], and
Complex Messiah of The Knights of the Holy Balls

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From: Two Beans <twobeans@godhatesyou.com>

On 05 Aug 2002 04:15:41 GMT, bgfitz001@aol.com (bgfitz001) wrote:

>
>So, any L.A. devivals any time soon?
>

Pay him $2000 and find other weird acts that Subs'll dig. Find a club
that'll host it. Advertise.

There's your LA devival starring Stang.

Now, pay my $200 fee for event and logistics planning.

-2B

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From: "ICEKNIFE" <icNOekSPAMnife@lmi.net>

"bgfitz001" <bgfitz001@aol.com> wrote in message
news:20020805001541.12833.00001546@mb-fz.aol.com...

TESTIFY!

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From: "ICEKNIFE" <icNOekSPAMnife@lmi.net>

> Reverend Fitz (the Paler),
> Subgenius,
> Legally Ordained Minister [the Pinks just eat this shit up! You
> were so dead-on!], and
> Complex Messiah of The Knights of the Holy Balls

some practical thoughts:

ok, uh, you did a smartish thing, that holy ball thing.

it's a great sales hook, because it leads to sales of bao-ding health
balls (those chinese chime ball things), superballs, beachballs,
etc... in the Dobbshead motif.

The superball and red rubber balls remind one of the merry pranksters
and what they did with them. Also, if you check subsite, I recall
there's something there about superballs and parking lot security
drills. Venice, Zuma, anywhere there's a net, a Dobbshead Volleyball
can be used. Develop appropriate rants for different BALL events.

Get a domain name and make a website, and stop using an AOL mailbox.

Invite the South Park crowd (that's South Park in SD, not the damn
cartoon, I mean the SPM subjeemer guys) up often, they're a lot of fun
and have big guns.

Develop a canon of EXTRA SPECIAL BENEFITS for weirdcelebs who join
your clench. The task before you is gargantuan, so keep an eye on the
philosophical aspects. Ask yourself, what would (insert name of
appropriate giant japanese movie monster here) do? Tell celebs
outright that they get special treatment in exchange for being
exploited, because we exceed the clammies in most areas but their
celebs are way more active than ours, so we need three times as many.
Shamelessly exploit them, and never EVER lie about it. Hey, Asner used
his fame as a bully pulpit, fine, why not, but instead of political
rhetoric, or Shirley McClain being lambasted for her tame ideas, let's
see some FIRE BREATING SHIT-SPRAYING TOTAL WACKADO SUBGENIUS
BRAINFUCKING come out of a celeb, now THAT would make "Bob" smile, I
bet. Of course, by special benefits I mean things like Eternal
Salvation or QUADRUPLE their money back, TWO footglands, etc.

Every asshole in LA thinks he can be in a rock band, this includes
celebs, and we have a long standing tradition of anti-music and
HARDNOISE. Invite Beanu's band to play a party. Find every celeb band,
and keep 'em away from each other, but get them into the church via
devivals.

Most important things? Start with a venue list, it's one of your most
important assests. Right up there with your clench members, unless you
happen to have 12 arms and are able to manifest in at least 4 places
at once. The better the venue and less you have to pay for it, the
better off you are. Remember that a big house is a PARTY venue, and
those can be just as useful for recruiting, if not as lucrative as
shows.

VISUAL AIDS: You need a LOT of props. At least 30 times more crap
than they can possibly look at in one evening. Like the books, like
subsite. STUN them. Can't leave them wanting more unless they know
there's more to want!

SINGLE MOST IMPORTANT ASSET: Your Paranormal SubGenius Personality!
Your Trance-Rant Ability! Your willingness to let SLACK TAKE YOU
AWAAAAAAY! With the spoken word alone you can sow the seeds of
success, sex, and SLACK! It's not in the church lingo, but that helps.
It's not in "Bob", but it goes through him before and after it comes
to us. It's not even in THE MONEY (believe it or not). It's in YOU, in
your SCHISM, in what you LOVE and HATE and LOVE TO HATE and HATE TO
LOVE and JUST HOW FUCKING MUCH AND WELL YOU SPEW IT AT TERMINAL
VELOCITY ACROSS THE MINDS OF THE FAITHLESS, BLINDING THEM WITH THE
LIGHT OF *SLACK* AND THUS SETTING THEM FREE TO KNOW "Bob"!

So, that's my damn opinion, anyway.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

From: "Rev. Ivan Stang" <stang@subgenius.com>

In article <20020805001541.12833.00001546@mb-fz.aol.com>, bgfitz001
<bgfitz001@aol.com> wrote:

.
> So, any L.A. devivals any time soon?
>

I hear what you're saying.

I hear it a lot!

As always, I'll show up anywhere for $1500 and a round trip plane
ticket. And a Motel 6 or Super 8 room. We have negotiated down on that
$1500 at times, depending. I do weddings for only $200. (In fact I'm
hitching The Sexicutioner to a nice performance artist gal on
Thursday!)

The closest other SubGenius preacher is Dr. Howll, who lives in San
Francisco.

Over a long period of time, Jesus and I have watched and helped in
dozens of devivals. Jesus wrote up a "devival instruction booklet,"
which you can get from Him, jesus@subgenius.com.

If you do what the booklet suggests, we will all probably break even
and have a great time, and everyone involved will be happy. You'll even
get a Devivor's Certificate from Lil eventually.

We don't have a booking agent. We tried to get one. We talked at length
with the booking agents for both GWAR and Negativland. Both told us we
were "too weird" and that they wouldn't know how to sell us.

The question you keep hearing incessantly is, "You mean it's not a
BAND?" You'll often hear this question SEVERAL TIMES just from ONE
PERSON, a bar owner for instance.

The simplest thing to say is, "It's this BAND called Church of the
SubGenius. It's the coolest thing in (Seattle? Austin? Which town is
the Con using right now?)."

I come with videotapes for projection (optional), and a background
music CD if there's not a good instrumental back-up band or organist. I
also come with a table full of swag to sell.

Einstein's Secret Orchestra would make it a "real" modern-day Old
School New Wave Classic Cleveland-Style Dallas-Era Multimedia
Future-Devival, but there are now 5 guys in that band so it begins to
run into real money.

If you advertise right and utilize our mailing list, you can expect a
crowd of from 100 to 200 paying people in a place like L.A., where
there are plenty of SubGenii, but none has ever met another.

The bottom line: make sure that you don't spend more than you can make
off that core 100 people. American Legion Halls make a good last
resort. But you never know when you'll get lucky... for instance, say,
you call the trendiest, Pinkest, most hoity-toity gallery-salon in the
city just to see what'll happen, and of course the snot you talk to
first says, "SubGenius? I've never heard of it therefore it must suck,"
and is about to hang up when suddenly the snot's JANITOR is heard
piping up in the background, "WHAT??!?!? The Church of the SubGenius?
They might come HERE??!?!? Do you know Rev. Ivan Stang Himself??" and
that could shift the way the conversation goes.

In 1985 we were the darlings of the performance art world -- go figure
-- and High Performance magazine sponsored a BIG devival in what turned
out to be the junkie-ridden Alexandria Hotel. People like Nina Hagen
and Weird Al came to it. Mark Mothersbaugh wore the "Bob" mask and got
shot. There must have been 400 people. There were NO CHAIRS and the
show was 3 hours long. We had the giant 3D Dobbshead for that show and
LEFT it there, wedged in the doorway to the ballroom with a chair
lodged in its mouth. (Brother Cleve and Byron Werner happened by that
same spot 3 weeks later -- AND THE DOBBSHEAD WAS STILL WEDGED IN THAT
DOORWAY -- but, the minute Cleve spoke, THE CHAIR FELL FROM ITS MOUTH.)

During the course of that week, Janor, Sterno and Mark Hosler
accompanied Mohersbaugh to Nina Hagen's UFO church in her house, and
Mark offended everyone there by chanting bizarre Drs. 4 "Bob" slogans
mixed with racialist terminology.

We all got very sick from lack of sleep and all night driving. Sterno's
house burned down while he was gone -- AND HIS CAR WAS VANDALIZED, THE
SAME DAY. The last of the ordeal was a freezing night spent sleepless
in the Seattle home of a friend of Dennis Eichhorn's, who had sponsored
an ill fated 1985 Seattle devival. "Thought they were gonna be BIG ROCK
AND ROLL STARS," Janor uttered through chattering teeth, wedged between
me and Sterno in one bed in the sub-zero temperature attic.

So you see why I mention the Super 8 or Motel 6.

--
4th Stangian Orthodox MegaFisTemple Lodge of the Wrath of Dobbs Yeti,
Resurrected (Rev. Ivan Stang, prop.)
P.O. Box 181417, Cleveland, OH 44118 (fax 216-320-9528)
A subsidiary of:
The SubGenius Foundation, Inc. / P.O. Box 204206, Austin, TX 78720-4206
Dobbs-Approved Authorized Commercial Outreach of The Church of the SubGenius
SubSITE: http://www.subgenius.com
For SubGenius Biz & Orders: call toll free to 1-888-669-2323
or email: jesus@subgenius.com
PRABOB

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From: Her Ladyship Lilith von Fraumench <lilith@ZubJenius.com>

<Cross-posted to alt.friday so Friday Jones can add her tuppence>

In article <050820021219339591%stang@subgenius.com>, Rev. Ivan Stang
<stang@subgenius.com> wrote:

> If you do what the booklet suggests, we will all probably break even
> and have a great time, and everyone involved will be happy. You'll even
> get a Devivor's Certificate from Lil eventually.

Speaking of which, I still need to assemble a list of known Devivors
who haven't received a certificate yet.

> The simplest thing to say is, "It's this BAND called Church of the
> SubGenius. It's the coolest thing in (Seattle? Austin? Which town is
> the Con using right now?)."

Cleveland, I think.

If for whatever reason you can't be dishonest, tell 'em it's a variety
act, with comedy and music, with thousands of fans in (insert cool
cities here--Seattle, Austin, Cleveland, etc. etc.). It's a fairly
accurate take on it. If they want to be REALLY specific, tell 'em it's
in the format of an old-time religious revival show. But don't tell 'em
it really IS a religion. That gives 'em the heebee-jeebies, and will
make the sale MUCH MUCH harder.

> The bottom line: make sure that you don't spend more than you can make
> off that core 100 people.

AMEN. That's the golden rule of throwing any devival, one that I have
broken more than once, because I got it in my head that a bigger, more
spetacular devival means more people will show. Don't make that
mistake!

> But you never know when you'll get lucky... for instance, say,
> you call the trendiest, Pinkest, most hoity-toity gallery-salon in the
> city just to see what'll happen, and of course the snot you talk to
> first says, "SubGenius? I've never heard of it therefore it must suck,"
> and is about to hang up when suddenly the snot's JANITOR is heard
> piping up in the background, "WHAT??!?!? The Church of the SubGenius?
> They might come HERE??!?!? Do you know Rev. Ivan Stang Himself??" and
> that could shift the way the conversation goes.

Indeed. It could happen, and has. For the 2001 Seattle devival, I was
telling the booker, "This is a nice crowd, but I bet I could double
it." He asked, "Oh? Great! What's the name of your band?" I said,
"Well, it's not exactly a BAND, really. It's called the Church of the
SubGenius..." A dubious look started to spread on his face, but then,
SUDDENLY, one of the members of the band that just got off stage
started SHRIEKING, ""Bob"?!? "BOB"!!! IT'S A BOBTISM!!!"

And that's how we got our in.

The Prophet Lilith

--
--=8=-- \m/ --=8=-- http://lilith.foolspress.com/ --=8=-- \m/ --=8=--
You'll say that the 50's isn't the present, but we'll have to differ on
that. -- RLan538885 in 20020617153210.12229.00001550@mb-fe.aol.com
DOBBS' LONG MARCH SEPT 13-15 SEATTLE!!! http://ssucc.com/longmarch.html

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From: nenslo <nenslo@yahooX.com>

bgfitz001 wrote:
>
>
> There's profit to be made here, Stang.

lol

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From: Her Ladyship Lilith von Fraumench <lilith@ZubJenius.com>

I should mention that:

a) The Sunburn Martyr of XDV, Rev. Otto, has already started talking
about organizing an LA devival in the near future; and

b) I am available for ranting at ANY devival that I can get to.

As Popess of LA by Troutwaxer's declaration, I have to visit my fair
city one of these days, if only to flip it off as loudly as I can.
Therefore, if someone beats Rev. Otto to the punch, MAKE SURE to invite
me to rant.

Her Ladyship Lilith

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Original file name: To STANG- Any L.A. d.txt - converted on Thursday, 29 May 2003, 16:43