Bob's Lounge
(2004-2014)
David McIntosh
Created by David McIntosh and Aleister Murphy, Bob’s Lounge was;
A good night to slowly go to Hell.
Bob’s Lounge featured McIntosh, Murphy, alcohol, guest artists, fertility rites, and people who took off their pants.
Aligning, and often contrasting, with these basic elements was an ongoing play with the tensions and expectations of a performance event. Bob’s Lounge lolled in the profane, the sacred and the louche while extending invitations to artists from various disciplines to engage with its concerns - in nightclubs, cafes, living rooms, theatres, galleries, museums, studios, streets, and wedding receptions across the country.
Bob’s Lounge is now closed.
More about Bob's Lounge From the hour:
Pants-off party
Melora Koepke
Vancouver's Battery Opera takes the naked stage with their somewhat crazed, bigger-than-expected offshoot Bob's Lounge
During their four-night stint at Théâtre La Chapelle, Bob's Lounge will almost certainly take off their pants, probably more than once. And though it's encouraged, audience pantslessness is not a requirement at this booze-soaked, somewhat scary and utterly worthwhile lounge offshoot of Vancouver's art/dance outfit Battery Opera. When I saw them live, at some fake-French café on Main St., I was impressed with the size of their saxophone and the best cover of the Dead Kennedys' Too Drunk to Fuck I've ever heard. Chaos ensued that wet Vancouver night, but through it all, the pants stayed on. Or the band played on. I can't quite remember.
Indeed, pants-taking-off is only one pillar of Bob's Lounge - others include "barnyard love, anal sex, freight train jumping, birthing and penises - my penis, specifically," says Lounge lizard and Battery Opera principal David McIntosh. "We're trying to inhabit the core of that classic lounge material, basically. It's a religious thing - in which the spirit of alcohol aids in your personal quest to have your wanton needs met."
Bob's Lounge, to a large extent, defies description. The collaboration between McIntosh and Vancouver sax menace and frequent Battery Opera collaborator Aleister Murphy, as well as other Vancouver and Montreal-based performers, could be termed a loose-goosed, booze-drenched and sometimes dauntingly audience-participatory act. Past performance venues have included UBC's venerable Museum of Archaeology, and pictures on the Battery Opera website feature Murphy naked except for a silk bathrobe and a giant baritone sax next to an unidentified man in lederhosen known only as "the Austrian," under the towering totem poles in Arthur Erickson's iconic Great Hall.
"Yeah, we called that one 'Bob's Lounge Under the Oppressive Weight of History' - all that stuff is basically stolen and uprooted, so it's full of stories and presence," says McIntosh. "Besides, I hate Arthur Erickson - his buildings are suicidal bunkers with hidden entrances - the man is basically a menace to society."
So will there be any sacred cows to slaughter, architectural or otherwise, in the Montreal run of Bob's Lounge?
McIntosh says that they're trying not to "lock themselves in" to anything in particular for their four performances, each of which will be different, though he does cite "martinifraus" and "unibrow dancers" as good bets for opening night.
"We're not really aiming to impress or shock anyone - maybe oppress them a bit," says McIntosh. "The idea for a Montreal run came from [La Chapelle impresario] Jack Udashkin seeing this silly crazy show we did in Regina a while back, where there was a lot of audience resentment, and a lot of really weird things happened - some people thought we were torturing them, and Jack ran into us a while later and was like, 'Yeah, I remember you fucking assholes, I'm going to book you for my theatre.'"
Melora Koepke
Vancouver's Battery Opera takes the naked stage with their somewhat crazed, bigger-than-expected offshoot Bob's Lounge
During their four-night stint at Théâtre La Chapelle, Bob's Lounge will almost certainly take off their pants, probably more than once. And though it's encouraged, audience pantslessness is not a requirement at this booze-soaked, somewhat scary and utterly worthwhile lounge offshoot of Vancouver's art/dance outfit Battery Opera. When I saw them live, at some fake-French café on Main St., I was impressed with the size of their saxophone and the best cover of the Dead Kennedys' Too Drunk to Fuck I've ever heard. Chaos ensued that wet Vancouver night, but through it all, the pants stayed on. Or the band played on. I can't quite remember.
Indeed, pants-taking-off is only one pillar of Bob's Lounge - others include "barnyard love, anal sex, freight train jumping, birthing and penises - my penis, specifically," says Lounge lizard and Battery Opera principal David McIntosh. "We're trying to inhabit the core of that classic lounge material, basically. It's a religious thing - in which the spirit of alcohol aids in your personal quest to have your wanton needs met."
Bob's Lounge, to a large extent, defies description. The collaboration between McIntosh and Vancouver sax menace and frequent Battery Opera collaborator Aleister Murphy, as well as other Vancouver and Montreal-based performers, could be termed a loose-goosed, booze-drenched and sometimes dauntingly audience-participatory act. Past performance venues have included UBC's venerable Museum of Archaeology, and pictures on the Battery Opera website feature Murphy naked except for a silk bathrobe and a giant baritone sax next to an unidentified man in lederhosen known only as "the Austrian," under the towering totem poles in Arthur Erickson's iconic Great Hall.
"Yeah, we called that one 'Bob's Lounge Under the Oppressive Weight of History' - all that stuff is basically stolen and uprooted, so it's full of stories and presence," says McIntosh. "Besides, I hate Arthur Erickson - his buildings are suicidal bunkers with hidden entrances - the man is basically a menace to society."
So will there be any sacred cows to slaughter, architectural or otherwise, in the Montreal run of Bob's Lounge?
McIntosh says that they're trying not to "lock themselves in" to anything in particular for their four performances, each of which will be different, though he does cite "martinifraus" and "unibrow dancers" as good bets for opening night.
"We're not really aiming to impress or shock anyone - maybe oppress them a bit," says McIntosh. "The idea for a Montreal run came from [La Chapelle impresario] Jack Udashkin seeing this silly crazy show we did in Regina a while back, where there was a lot of audience resentment, and a lot of really weird things happened - some people thought we were torturing them, and Jack ran into us a while later and was like, 'Yeah, I remember you fucking assholes, I'm going to book you for my theatre.'"
Bob's Lounge video can be found here.