the hum / By Bob Doran

Crazy Fools

Asylum Street Spankers; what else is happening Jazz Fest weekend

(March 27, 2008) The Asylum Street Spankers’ van was in Arizona heading west when I rang Christina Marrs, the band’s saw player (and vocalist, tenor guitarist, banjo and uke player) on her cell.

We started off talking about Asylum Street, a thoroughfare in the Spankers’ hometown Austin, Texas. “It’s the street that goes by the asylum,” said Christina. “They call it the state hospital now, and they call Asylum St. Guadalupe or The Drag. But if you look at an old map of Austin you see the asylum way out on the outskirts of town and one little road that goes out to it. Now of course, it’s quite central.”

The Asylum Street Spankers

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In the beginning, 14 years ago, Christina and Wammo, the band’s other lead vocalist and washboard player, would busk on Asylum St. and play in Austin clubs with a 10-piece acoustic jug band.

“When we started out we did a lot more covers, old country blues, jug band tunes, that kind of thing,” said Christina. “Original songs started getting added to the repertoire, but we still do old tunes along with our own. Our records tend to be mostly original, but the live shows include older stuff and even more recent stuff that isn’t ours.”

Among the original tunes is a send-up of the song “Tie a Yellow Ribbon,” updated as “Stick Magnetic Ribbons on Your SUV.” According to Christina the topical song written a few years ago has fallen from the repertoire, as the gung-ho stickers seem to have disappeared of late. “And as far as the Spankers being political, it only happens when the opportunity arises to be humorous about it, to have fun with it and make fun of the situation — that’s really the only time we’re ever going to get very political. With our crowd and our demographic, it’s just preaching to the choir.”

What is their crowd and demographic? “Oh, I’d say the average age is probably about 35, but that spans a lot. We like to say we have both kinds of blue hair at our shows.”

The common thread of that crowd is probably a sense of humor. So what could be more appropriate than seeing the Spankers on Tuesday, April Fool’s Day? That’s when the band’s Left Coast tour hits Humboldt Brews.

As Eureka prepares to batten down the hatches for Jazz Fest weekend and the onslaught of blue-haired dancing Dixielanders and zoot-suited youngsters (and everything in between), the rest of the county goes on with business as usual.

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