Dead and Kind of Famous
The podcast where two friends (one who's a nobody and one who's kinda famous) dive into the life stories of dead folks who enjoyed a touch or two of fame in their time and now reside permanently in Hollywood Forever Cemetery.
Dead and Kind of Famous
Punk to Paint: Tomata Du Plenty Part 2
Spoiler alert!!! - Tomata keeps doin' stuff in this episode. Our deep dive into his life reveals an artist who refused to be defined by any single medium, constantly evolving from drag performer to punk rock icon to folk artist without ever losing his authenticity.
When a broken leg temporarily halted Tomata's performance career in 1983, he discovered a children's paint kit in an alley and began creating art. That same year, he received an HIV diagnosis – a death sentence in the 1980s. Yet instead of despair, he saw synchronicity and opportunity, launching an artistic career that would sustain him for the rest of his life. His approach was refreshingly unpretentious: "I always have lots of $20 pieces in the show because I think people should have art."
Even in his final interview, just months before his death from AIDS-related cancer, his optimism and self-deprecating humor remained undimmed. For those seeking permission to reinvent themselves creatively, Tomata's story offers not just inspiration, but liberation. Have you been limiting your own creative expression? Perhaps it's time to follow Tomata's lead and simply create without overthinking.
Episode Links:
Population 1: https://youtu.be/B3QpxnCRtVY?si=b5OZfMaKce75kaNC
Eva Braun - https://youtu.be/gIdlqWcGn_s?si=OpAI7nSRrS8bRSxZ
Visual Art journey - https://sandraschulman.medium.com/tomata-du-plenty-from-screamer-to-artist-b5648dd369d
Jack Rabid Interview - https://bynwr.com/posts/the-screamers-tomata-du-plenty
https://www.ebay.com/itm/315411162470
https://art-for-a-change.com/Punk/psketch5.htm
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Hello and welcome to Dead and Kind of Famous, where we dig into the life stories of dead folks who enjoyed a touch or two of fame in their time and now reside permanently in the Hollywood Forever Cemetery.
Speaker 2:I'm Marissa Rivera and I know nothing, but I do know, man. Thunderstorms in the South are crazy. I am currently in Jackson, mississippi, and there was a crazy thunderstorm that lasted like six hours with thunder and lightning overhead. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. It was insane. We had tornado watch and warnings. I don't know which one is worse, but we had both at some point in the middle of the night. I didn't sleep a wink. It was insane. And before I was like oh, I really, really miss going to sleep to the sound of thunderstorms, having lived in Puerto Rico and Florida, but I don't miss it, I do not miss that, not when it's like a violent storm.
Speaker 3:It was so violent. Yeah, no, that's no good. Marissa is doing her thing, she's filming, she's on location. She's being kind of famous right now. It's just what she's doing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's just what I'm doing currently. Right now, I'm just being kind of famous.
Speaker 3:I'm Courtney Blomquist and I know way too much about what we're going to talk about. But I don't know. I don't know honestly, like what states surround Mississippi, like what states around Mississippi.
Speaker 2:I do know we're like a three hour drive from New Orleans, so Louisiana is right here.
Speaker 3:Okay, all right. So it's like we're almost to the water, but not quite, and Georgia is right here too.
Speaker 2:Okay, okay, okay.
Speaker 3:Okay, got it.
Speaker 2:Got it yeah.
Speaker 3:That's Southern, that's Southern, all right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, all the little.
Speaker 3:Southern states, just snuggling up to you.
Speaker 2:It's not like, oh my gosh and it was like crazy. You know, I I went from New York and it was cold and definitely like spring in New York is like freezing, and then this cuts and then it's kind of like nice and warm, but then it's freezing, you know, two hours later. And then I come here and it was in the 90s, so so green everywhere. It's like they didn't. They didn't have fall or winter, it was spring and summer, only here. And and then the thunderstorm happened and then it got freezing cold. It came in a cold front, came right after, so it was like in the 40s and 50s and I was like I did not pack for this.
Speaker 3:That's scary. That's scary when the weather switches like that, though yes, that's like tornado conditions.
Speaker 2:Yes, well, it was. I could have been blown away. And for what? In a little indie film, oh my God. I could have been blown away. And for what? In a little indie film. Oh my god, what am I doing? What am I doing? And I'm recording this in my closet, in a closet with that doesn't have a door. It has a uh, what is this?
Speaker 3:a curtain a curtain with a hole in it, with with a hole, with a grommet, with a grommet yeah a face-shaped grommet and anyway, like the grossest, I don't even know what this pattern is. Yeah, well, that's why I was like you said it's nice. But then I saw that curtain and I was like you never know.
Speaker 2:You never know by this curtain, but the rest of the room is it as depressing as it looks?
Speaker 3:That's what I said.
Speaker 2:It's actually pretty nice. I'll have to give you a tour after we're done.
Speaker 3:This is going to be like that indie movie that, like the one that that what's her name? Jennifer Lawrence did that like put her on the map. That was like you know what I mean, so small. Maybe it'll be that.
Speaker 2:Winter's Bone. Yeah, that did that. Like put her on the map. That was like a you know what I mean so small, like maybe it'll be that winter's bone. Yeah, that one. I fucking wish this was my winter's bone. God, do I ever?
Speaker 3:well, we know you're doing the most and, uh, yeah, when once, once, uh, that information is released, we'll tell everyone about it.
Speaker 2:We'll see, we'll. We'll see if this movie ever sees the light of day. Yep, let's see.
Speaker 3:Well, thanks for coming back to part two for Tomato today. Everybody, I'm so excited. Yes, he's got so many chapters. So today, like I said, we're returning to the life of tomato to plenty, and thus far we've seen him evolve from a drag and sketch performer to an electrifying punk rocker with electrified looking hair that stood straight up on end by design by choice and in this episode we'll see tomato evolve into his next chapter painting.
Speaker 3:What, by the way? Yep, yep, art. He is an artist, but before we get to that, I want to give a little more context into anything having to do with the Screamers. And he doesn't have much of an ego when it comes to any of his pursuits really any of them actually. No ego, it's crazy. May have had more of a musical influence per se, but tomato wrote many of the band's lyrics and he also put all of his efforts into the stage presence of the band.
Speaker 2:that made them so intoxicating frankly, intoxicating it was and frankly, without it was fascinating to watch gosh yeah truly like watching him just jump around and and his facial expressions alone.
Speaker 3:It's like he's. It's a performance. It's not. It's. It's so much more of a performance than um, it's performance art, for sure it is performance art. It's because it's like he's not even really singing. It's, yeah, it's something else, something else entirely. So, frankly, without tomato the band would have been quite boring to watch. I mean, it's like there's not guitarists, right, it's like people on keyboards and synthesizers and there's a drummer and that's it. So like he was kind of the whole thing.
Speaker 2:In his final interview with Jack Rabbit for NWR, tamada said I was so involved in the stage act you know every show was so much work. It was my only focus the performance, really it was. I don't do very much of the business and I have to give credit to Tommy Gear. He did most of that work. I was free of that responsibility so that I could devote all of my time to going out there and making a total fool of myself, which was a lot, lot, a lot of hard work again super self-deprecating listen, uh, as someone who's a professionally may go.
Speaker 2:I go into every commercial audition and make a fool out of my. I check my ego and pride at the door, and I check my ego and pride at the door and make a fool out of myself.
Speaker 3:I get it. Yeah it's. You know it's fun to be a professional clown.
Speaker 1:Isn't it, Marissa?
Speaker 3:You tell us I wouldn't know.
Speaker 2:No, I'm kidding, you've done a professional everything else. I know it's true and I kind of have been a professional clown. Courtney is an actual professional.
Speaker 3:Yeah, which makes me a professional clown. And though he may have thought himself a fool, he also felt the message and the feeling of the band was more important than the music Tamada told Lee Lumsden in 1977.
Speaker 2:Actually we don't really write songs. We write more like anthems. When we write our songs, we visualize thousands of people marching. Music is not really the correct context to place us in. There really is not a niche that we can really feel meaningful in. The kind of niche that would be meaningful to us would be more political, political, artistic, then say, musical. I find music to be very tawdry. I prefer to think of myself as a designer of sound, of noise, in the context of time. I think that's a more realistic way of looking at music, the purpose being some kind of political outcome.
Speaker 2:I think of politics in terms of power. That's what politics is. It's power. And I think a lot of times Americans get confused that politics means political parties of left wing, right wing, and all politics really has to do with is power and the exercise of it. Power to control people's wants. Power to control people's conceptions oh man, does this hit so hard right now? Shit. Control people's wants. Power to control people's conceptions oh man, does this hit so hard right now? Shit, I know, oh my.
Speaker 3:God I know. But it's interesting that it's like that. They're kind of like trying to tap into a sort of power, like that they're. You know that that stirs people up in the same way and to recognize that I don't know it's an interesting way to think about it and um, and very heady kind of, and I don't know it's just it is. Somebody else said this um, in the research I was going through, but it's like so much, it's so intellectual for la, they were like overly intellectual for yeah um, because it's just not the norm right.
Speaker 2:I mean they feel very portland and seattle.
Speaker 3:I mean yeah, no, no for sure they're definitely like they had a huge influence on la, but it's like they're.
Speaker 3:They were also like very much outsiders though the band may have never put out a record, but before their breakup in 1981 they definitely got around. They once performed in iggy pop's living room for a private party because he personally requested them what yeah they were. They had a bunch of buzz around them. They were like playing at the whiskey, at go-go, like all these places that, like these huge bands that we all know today, played at you know and they were like, their shows were like saw like people were talking about it so so they were, you know, known especially by people that were here.
Speaker 3:Uh, they did a show your favorite band's favorite band yes, exactly exactly 100. They did a show in a warehouse in new y York where the band set up in a freight elevator and played a song when it stopped on each floor, which is awesome. That is fun as hell, I know. I wish I was at that party. That sounds so fun.
Speaker 2:Oh my gosh, that sounds so fun.
Speaker 3:I know I'm obsessed.
Speaker 2:That's like you know, site-specific theater. Yes, exactly, exactly, oh, I'm upset. That's like you know, site-specific theater. Yes, exactly, yes, oh, I love it.
Speaker 3:Without having much to promote themselves with at all besides local LA buzz, they toured a bit and performed in Montreal, toronto, philadelphia, pittsburgh. They made their mark, despite the fact that it was never marked into vinyl the way that many would wish that it was. Yeah, but they had their reasons Again. This is Tamada from his final interview.
Speaker 2:The reason we didn't make records is because the record companies weren't interested in us at all, at all. I mean, first of all, the Screamers was a highly theatrical thing. How could you put that on a record? What I did, what I went out and did, it was a controlled nervous breakdown every night.
Speaker 2:I was exhausted by the end of every set. It was theater, and much of it was theater of cruelty, not necessarily towards the audience, but much of it towards myself. It was a lot of very, very hard work. I'm really glad I did it. As far as seeing that translated to a record, I don't know. I get emails all the time. Somebody wants to put out a Screamers record. I know there are bootlegs out there. In fact, just at my art show the other night, a kid had me autograph a bunch Of bootlegs. You signed those. Oh, I do it all the time. I'll do it. I mean, I'm not mad at them, I'm mad at the people ripping me off, but I can't. A kid comes up to me and, oh sure, I don't know how many times I've done that.
Speaker 3:What a sweetie.
Speaker 2:What a sweetie. He knows who the bad people are.
Speaker 3:He's like I don't blame the fans, I don't blame the fans Exactly, and when he said nervous breakdown, that was something audiences palpably felt. In other interviews, tameda said that his frontman persona in the Screamers was a human illustration of struggle, anxiety and fear.
Speaker 2:And to that point filmmaker Lucas Reiner said when you think of the Screamers, the word that comes to mind is struggle I get that.
Speaker 3:I feel like I get that watching him he does look like. I like all of this feels like if you watch, look up those target performances or look at the links that we're linking to for these episodes, but it you can feel that all of that it really is is true, like so.
Speaker 2:I wouldn't yeah Like something is bursting, just clawing its way out of him.
Speaker 3:Yeah, exactly, exactly. It reminds me of that the credit sequence in Severance right now at the very end, yeah, where it's like his, like head is ripping open. Yes, it feels like that.
Speaker 2:Oh yes, it does. Yeah, like his like head is ripping open. Yes, it feels like that. Oh yes, it does. Yep, that is such a if you guys haven't seen the show, I mean watch the show, but I think that the beginning credits are a study in and of itself. Oh my god.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I was like I love those credits yeah, we watched something about like how they were made. It's's crazy. They're incredible, incredible. The Screamers' desire to put the album on video and to incorporate video may have simply been something that was so ahead of its time that people weren't ready for it. Artist Mark Vallon recalls.
Speaker 2:Of all of my recollections of Tomato and the Screamers, the following are the most vivid. Midway through performances of their song Ava Braun, the band members would walk off the stage. Having eschewed guitars in favor of synthesizers, they let the electrophonic instruments and computerized modules drone on in their absence as a stark evocation of mindless hero worship. The song was chilling enough, but in the context of the song's lyrics, when the band left the audience to the machines, another narrative emerged Either technology is liberatory or it is an adjunct to tyranny. Jesus, this is this, this, this, this, this, this God. It's too close, it's too close to to this, this, this, this, this God. It's too close, it's too close to. Oh God, I know.
Speaker 3:Okay.
Speaker 2:During their very last performance, Whiskey A Go-Go, 1981, the band used banks of onstage video monitors to great effect, displaying videotaped scenes that startled and mesmerized the audience. Considering that video cameras and VHS cassette players were as yet unknown to most people or that video rental stores did not yet exist, the screamers introduced us to the future that evening.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so I feel like it was like they incorporated all of this stuff into their live performances, which was, you know, something that people weren't doing yet, and like MTV didn't exist, we talked about all of this. It's like they it didn't exist, and so there, it was just very, very novel to people. But I think, as far as like record companies go, and specifically in LA record companies, they were just like what the hell am I going to do with this? They had no idea. How am I going to make money off of this? Oh yeah, no idea how to do that. So, all right, I'm going to play a little bit of this song that I believe was this is just one of their target video recordings. I think this is not a live performance, I don't think, but it's hard to tell. So, yeah, this is like you can see everything he's talking about here, like the video.
Speaker 2:You know video or I'm sorry, behind them yeah.
Speaker 3:With the little mustache and they have the swastika on here on the screen.
Speaker 1:With your little black stash With your little black stash.
Speaker 3:She's a girl, she's a girl. It feels very German, doesn't it Like? I feel, it feels very German. Yeah, it's very.
Speaker 2:German. Yeah, it's, it's very harsh. And yes, and you know, german is a pretty, it's a very harsh sounding language. I remember, I remember watching anatomy of a fall. Oh yeah, um, was that last year for for best picture, or the year before. But I remember watching it and thinking is this woman guilty or is she just German?
Speaker 3:I couldn't tell for the whole movie, but still it seems that there were some opportunities within the band's grasp that they simply did not take, for whatever reason. But still, looking back, tomatoameda has no regrets. So what did Devo have to say about you guys?
Speaker 2:Oh, they were really nice. In fact, they offered us a tour to play with them in Paris and for some stupid reason we turned it down. I couldn't tell you all the stupid things we didn't do, but I do remember one Robert Fripp of King Crimson asked me to sing on his album and I had to turn that down. Oh, please, I mean these are just things. I was not in my right mind, but I was working damn hard. So it's not that I have regrets. People say, well, you should have done a record or something like that, and I don't have regrets about that. Maybe a record will come out. I don't own the music. Tommy Greer wrote the music. It's up to him. Wait a minute. He wrote the lyrics too. Nah, I wrote a lot of the lyrics.
Speaker 3:That's right. Well, you are at least half songwriter. Then the compositions would be de plenty gear, not gear.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but I haven't seen him in over 20 years and I don't foresee seeing him in the next 20 years, so it's not a part of my life anymore.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I don't know what's going on with that relationship. By the way, like he's, just like I'm not doing it. I don't know. We're not talking, we're not talking.
Speaker 2:He can have all the credit but we're not talking, I'm not talking, he can have all the credit, but I'm not talking. Yeah, interesting yeah.
Speaker 3:So the band dissolved in 1981, but some of their songs did go on to be included in a strange art film called Population, One which featured in appearance by the one and only Vampyra.
Speaker 2:There she is, there she is, but we'll get to that in a minute.
Speaker 3:Give me just a minute. We're going to get. We're going to get to it. After the breakup of the band, the other members took their own direction with their own careers, some with significant success. Drummer KK Barrett, for instance, would go on to be a well-known production designer for music videos. He won MTV Awards for the new pollution by Beck and tonight tonight by the smashing pumpkins, collaborated on the film being John Malkovich, and was nominated, along with fellow set decorator Jean Sardina, for Academy award for best production design for the film Her.
Speaker 2:Okay, okay, yeah, anything that has looked super fucking cool, like, yeah, all of those things I'm like yeah, that was really cool. That was awesome. Yeah, that was so distinct, like such distinct points of view, such a distinct point of view yeah, that's amazing.
Speaker 3:I know, and it's like, and he was like the drummer, I don't know Just total switch, switcheroo there.
Speaker 2:But it also makes me think like teeth you know, with I mean, I mean the band had a point of view from it did have a point of view, it's true from the songs, to the, to the, to the way they dressed and presented themselves to the set deck Like, yeah, everything had a point of view. Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3:No, it did so. Paul Rossler left the Screamers to go on to play in Nervous Gender, which was another band, with former Germs drummer Don Bowles, as well as in I don't know how to say this Giza X and Mommy and the Mommy Men, and he was involved in playing with DC Squared DC Three. I don't know, you're right, and he was involved in playing with DC squared DC three. I don't know.
Speaker 1:Is it squared a two?
Speaker 3:You're right, you're right. Oh, that's another thing. I don't know Math Forgot it. I have anxiety about helping Iris with her math homework.
Speaker 1:I'm like oh, God oh my God, I dread the day.
Speaker 3:I dread the day. I'm just going to.
Speaker 2:It's going to be Jesse's job. Well, now the math is new. It's like they teach kids a whole new way of learning math.
Speaker 3:So you're probably even if it wasn't math, for even if it wasn't, even if it wasn't I, I can't do it. I can't do it. It was my, it was just. I mean, actually I was pretty decent at algebra, everything else, I was like what is happening?
Speaker 2:Same I. After everything else I was like what?
Speaker 3:is happening. You know every same I. After algebra 2 I was like this is ridiculous. Oh yeah, algebra was like you can make that make sense. The other stuff I'm like what the fuck are you talking about? What is this strange strangeness. Anyway, he was also in criminy with mike watt while also work criminy, sure I don't know, jesus criminy um also while three.
Speaker 2:When I read that, I was like. I was like dc discovery zone um we're going back to our childhoods, right? Now with math.
Speaker 3:I brought that, brought me back with with discovery zone, with the rainbow slide of it all.
Speaker 2:All right, so DC3, criminy.
Speaker 3:Right, and then while also working as a session man with the Dead Kennedys and Saccharine Trust, amongst others. So just, he was like a what's the word? A journeyman, I feel like a band journeyman I don't have a ton of. I think tommy gear was similar, with uh being in bands and stuff, but I don't have as much info on him for some reason.
Speaker 3:So if anybody does fill, that in no, yeah, phyllis yeah, but tomato definitely went in a different direction, as was his nature, but he kept it out of the mainstream which was also his nature.
Speaker 2:Yes, I feel like. Yeah, he is true to himself. God, I love this man.
Speaker 3:Yes, I know, around 1983, tometa Duplenty broke his leg and was unable to jump around like a madman for a time. Unable to jump around like a madman for a time.
Speaker 2:I feel you, I feel you, oh yeah marissa's had some injuries, some some surgeries is what it is, and he had found an injury led me to art, so I get this yes he had found a little paint kit in an alley, like a children's paint kit. Oh my God, and in an alley.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and because he couldn't express himself through performance anymore at the time anyway, he instead expressed himself with paint. This is from his interview with Jack Rabbit. Prior to starting being a working artist, did you have to do a lot of art?
Speaker 2:No, no, I broke my leg in that accident in LA and I was really bored. I was at home and I think I listened to all my Merle Haggard records which made me even more depressed, I can imagine. And I found this kid's little paint kit in an alley off Hollywood Boulevard. I lived off Hollywood Boulevard and I just started drawing. First I drew a picture of my cat, then my boyfriend, then my landlady just people you know. Then Bob Forrest, a Thelonious Monster, said you should show this stuff and he was great. He brought me to the Zero Gallery, which is also on Hollywood Boulevard, and they let me hang all my little $10 watercolors all over the place. And David Lee Roth, of all people, mentioned it on the Tonight Show and it sort of spiraled. What year was that? That was 1983, which is neat because it was the year I also found out I was HIV positive, which made it even better for me. I think it was like maybe there's some reason, there's something going on here.
Speaker 2:So he had an injury and a crushing diagnosis, and yet he never lost his energy to create or his positivity, like just hearing that, oh my God yeah he just was like, yeah, all this terrible, like I broke my leg, I got the work and you know, an hiv positive diagnosis in the 80s was a death sentence period totally that's the thing it was, and so he's just like maybe there's a reason, maybe there, you know, he's thinking in these ways where it's like everything I don't know.
Speaker 3:I just think that he always made the most of whatever direction he was thrown into, and like he didn't have like agendas, you know, like if he did, they were for a project, not for his whole life.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like I just like having so much pain and having to go through stuff and it's like, well, all I can do with this is make art. I get that, I get it.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and also just to find all of your joy in it as well. He's such an artist. He's just such an artist. He's the kind of person who didn't need. It was not about money, it was actually about art the whole time.
Speaker 2:No. And of his artwork. He says I like I sell my stuff really cheap. I do some big pieces that are expensive, but I always have lots of $20 pieces in the show because I think people should have art. I really do.
Speaker 3:I agree. How would you describe your art if it were possible?
Speaker 2:I don't know. At first it was just cartoon stick figures of my friends, but now that I've been doing it for 20 years it's changing. I don't know. I guess I'm a folk artist. I guess that would be the closest there is to it. I've never taken an art lesson and I don't intend to, because I like where it's going on its own.
Speaker 3:So confident, love it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, he just was like I don't want, I just want to evolve how it evolves. I don't want any outside influence. I don't want to how.
Speaker 3:I love that yeah exactly, it's cool yeah exactly, it's cool Big punk, big punk, big punk energy, yep, big punk energy. Even in this art phase, he typically focused on portraits of famous authors, musicians and fellow artists, but he also created a series called Tipsy with Tallulah. That was all just people living or dead that he would love to get smashed with. I love that one living or dead that he would love to get smashed with. It's so funny. I feel like he has such a good sense of humor with everything. He doesn't take anything too seriously, which is great, and you can see that in his artwork too. It's really fun. So whatever he was working on, it was always filled with fun. He also continued performing in the 80s and produced shows during this time as well. That is actually how he got Vampyra involved.
Speaker 2:There she is.
Speaker 3:There she is. Remember when we talked about in the Vampyra episode, the last one about her doing her performances as Honey Gulper in the 80s. Yes, as Honey Gulper in the 80s. Yes, well, those performances were at a club called the Anti Club in Los Angeles and the whole show was organized by Tomato Duplenty. He called the show the Weird Live Show and it seems to me that that name was right.
Speaker 2:on the money, yes, it was Very aptly named, you guys want to see a weird live show.
Speaker 3:Yes, yes.
Speaker 1:I do, I will be there.
Speaker 2:The.
Speaker 1:Weird live show.
Speaker 3:Now, I mentioned before that Tomato was in a film with Vampyra and in all of the research I did on Vampyra I did not find out about this film until I was researching Tomato and it was called Population One. That's right, right, and it is a strange trippy art house movie that stars Duplenty with you know as himself. His name, at least, is used as the character name and he is the lone survivor of a nuclear holocaust. It's basically an arty collaged fever dream punk rock musical by Dutch filmmaker Rene Daldur, and the film is definitely dated but it did make the rounds in the film circuit and largely got favorable reviews.
Speaker 2:Oh, hell yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah, at the time it was seen as something new, and now it's kind of something that you'd put on in the background at a party where everyone is going to be high.
Speaker 1:I mean, I'm going to show you some clips, but it's 100% what it is.
Speaker 3:Yep, in the film, tomato's appliances follow him around the house Like his friends, are the robots for a moment as he sings Scat's poetry and daydreams about his love. I think I can't really tell what's going on in this movie, honestly. But, um, she's played by sheila edwards, who is another um, like musician at the time, who is supposed to be a clubby vampire of sorts. Uh, she has a song called jazz vampire that is super hilarious and fun. Um, and just so random. There's like so many musical styles in this.
Speaker 2:It's bizarre, but this wasn't Vampyra, didn't play the vampire.
Speaker 3:No, because this is no. Vampyra is older at this point, so she did not play the vampire. So this is kind of his love interest or whatever I guess, but he's like the only person alive. But so I think it's like-.
Speaker 3:So maybe it's like a memory, the memory of his love, okay, but so I think it's like, so, maybe like a memory, the memory of his, his love, okay, I don't know what's happening. I'm, I actually watched this. I did actually watch it. I was like in the bathtub doing nothing else with like watching it and just being like what the fuck is happening and I so, if someone can tell me, great, I didn't. I didn't. I enjoyed it, but I didn't know what was going on. Plot wasn't really its strong suit. I'll say that. And then the love song that actually connects this vampire character with Tomato is actually a screamer song with a BDSM lean called I Wanna Hurt. It's like I wanna hurt, I wanna love, like it's, I don't know. It's strange and fun and it features an accordion performance by Beck. Second mention of Beck what the fuck? But he was actually a child at the time. What the fuck. He's a child playing an accordion, oh my.
Speaker 1:God.
Speaker 3:Yep. So that's fun, and I honestly couldn't really piece together, like I said, enough of this plot to comment on it more than that. But as always, Tomato is a performer with a capital P in it. His performance is very fun to watch. So first let's start with Vampyra. Vampyra plays his mother, Tomato's mother.
Speaker 2:Yes, vampyra is mother.
Speaker 3:Yes, vampire is mother, she is mother and she it's like it's weird. I'm gonna show you. It's more of like a series of photos, almost like more than video. It's an interesting. I'm gonna go to the parts where you see vampire yeah on this clock.
Speaker 1:I'm caught in the eye of a hurricane, apple pie and pork chops just beyond my grasp, pictures of dying soldiers, pin-up girls and gi joes. Where am I? What's going on? My mother is struck by a bolt of lightning. I'm unable to come to her help. My mother never needed help. The house is in flames.
Speaker 1:She's singing and dancing where I can clearly see her. Now there's a message she signals through the flames oh, my baby, my tiny little baby, it's you who holds the promise, a promise so big that your poor mother cannot even understand.
Speaker 3:All I have done is sow the seeds so that you can fulfill all your needs I love how narrated it is, because it's actually fits the purposes of this show so well um it's so weird, okay.
Speaker 2:So vampire was just, was just like in, like she was like little house on the prairie clothes with like a torch it should kind of look like lady liberty, but in prairie clothes, yeah and then, and then was just like walking down the stairs and and of this house and then now she's on the floor dead, I think with with the, because she got struck by lightning, is what he said oh, okay, okay, okay but yeah, we saw her kind of I don't know, it was a little again.
Speaker 3:This is a perfect encapsulation of what I experienced watching the whole movie.
Speaker 2:But um, what, um, what the fuck is happening? Yeah. This is exactly what you put on in the back of a party where everyone is high.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I'm gonna try to find what I just mentioned too with the appliances. Okay, I think it's right. Here there's like a hair dryer, that's like hovering near him, other 80s appliances, a saxophone.
Speaker 1:Floating. Oh my god, oh my god, they're like closing in on him. Oh my god, naked or just shirtless he's supposed to be coming out of the bath.
Speaker 3:Now he's kinda like marching with them All in a row.
Speaker 1:Hard work on the graveyard shift. Hard work to keep a smiling face. Hard work to go on with life.
Speaker 3:Hard work to preserve the human race it's a lot of like him, like scat reading poetry or something. Oh wait, oh, this is jazz vampire. We have to watch this. This is absurd, like this I just, oh God, it's absurd. It's like a very pale, vampire looking woman with her arms crossed across her chest.
Speaker 1:Desert eyes for a couple of times.
Speaker 2:Cause I'm a jazz vampire. Cause I'm a jazz vampire. Oh, her eye was on the music. Wise men, keep out of my way.
Speaker 1:You don't know how to lead them astray. They fall the minute I sway. I am. This is amazing. You can't do this. A giant. A giant, that's fire.
Speaker 2:Oh my God, I'm a giant, okay.
Speaker 1:So you get it.
Speaker 3:So you get it and then, oh, oh, I'll close up on the On, you get it. And then, oh, oh, we got up on the On her jagged, on her teeth Jagged, snaggletooth, a little bit snaggly. Yeah, I want to find, I want to find this Beck performance, because that's the other thing.
Speaker 2:I feel, like you, have to say oh yes, the little boy on the accordion, find him, I'm finding it.
Speaker 3:We must find him, we will. We're finding him. Okay, so somewhere in here. Yeah, we're kind of like going around this little circle with all the music.
Speaker 1:He got stuck. He said could you sit him down? Sometimes I think I've found my hero, but it's a queer woman. All that you need is a ticket.
Speaker 2:Come on, big boys, let's dance in that, oh my God and guys, it's not a small child accordion, it's. It's an adult size accordion and he's just a child playing it. And he's just a child with a huge accordion.
Speaker 3:Mac always had the chops. Now we know.
Speaker 2:Now we know.
Speaker 3:Now we know so yes, we always knew. We always knew. So this is Planet or Plan, God damn it. Population 1.
Speaker 2:I can't even remember Population 1.
Speaker 3:It is a trip but it's a lot of tomatoes, it really is he's the star of this movie, so if you want to see it, um, if you want to see more of him, you know, in better quality film this is the way to do it for free, for free, yep, and I'm gonna link to it. I'll make sure you see it Hell yeah, so in 1989, this is like, so this film.
Speaker 3:by the way, this came out in 1986. So just to give you context of this timeline here, so he's still like doing his thing.
Speaker 2:Your birth year, courtney, not to put you on the lap, it is my birth year.
Speaker 1:Yes, my birth year.
Speaker 3:My birth year was this film, which, my goodness. The fact that this film happened in my lifetime does make me feel old. I'm not going to lie, it's pretty dated. It's pretty dated, it's pretty 80s. So in 1989, tomato left Los Angeles for South Miami Beach. He cites a few reasons why he left.
Speaker 2:People are very mad at me for not putting out product. Oh please, why do you think I left LA? People were very mad at me that I left the Screamers. You know, people make it very hard on you if you want to do something else, especially if you made a big noise. You made a big noise and then you decide you don't want to do that anymore. Oh, you can't do that. It's like everything should be in its time and place. People get overly sentimental, especially about rock and roll. Oh my God, you hear the violins. It's I don't know. Know punk rock fans. They're the hokiest. He's probably like I wanted warm weather. Yeah, the hokiest. And like and like a good beach. Because let me tell you something, let me tell you something.
Speaker 2:Let me tell you something this might be controversial LA beaches, they're not beaches.
Speaker 3:What are they? What are they, Marissa?
Speaker 2:They're sad excuses for beaches, because if you ever ever lived in the Caribbean or Florida, I'm sorry, you can't go swimming for pleasure, really, unless it's in August in.
Speaker 3:LA.
Speaker 2:It's freezing cold.
Speaker 3:It's for surfers, it's 100% for surfers, it's a weters.
Speaker 2:It's 100% for surfers. Yeah yeah, it's a wetsuit or nothing. You're on the beach or in a wetsuit in the water and like no South Beach, Miami, that is a beach.
Speaker 3:So he was going to get a. Tan is why he left. He went to go get a tan.
Speaker 2:He was like I'm dying, I need to live on an actual beach.
Speaker 3:The funny thing is this was not like a real idea in his head. It's so weird. According to him and I don't know if this is true this is just what he says, but I trust him honestly. Yeah, why would he make it up? Yeah, he met a couple of fans who gave him a ticket. They gave him a plane ticket, he took it as a sign and he just completely relocated. So that's pretty good. So he just, he just was like all right, I'm gonna leave. I think he was ready to leave, but he didn't have a plan. Yeah, so then he was like all right, plan presented itself, a plan presented itself, a plan presented itself. So once he got there, he hustled and continued his starving artist life with the same happy attitude. He always seemed to have working jobs where he could get them until he found a way to live off of his art.
Speaker 2:I was a bartender in Miami for a couple of years and started making a living as an artist the last three years. And started making a living as an artist the last three years I said, if I don't do it now, if I don't just quit everything and that's when I decided on the three-suitcase idea. Whatever I can get into three suitcases, I call up anybody, I say I'm coming, let me hang them in your place. And it's been working. I'm making a living. I mean, I'm no richer but I'm sure happy.
Speaker 3:Yeah, no, that's. It's cool. He's just like I'm going to find a way to make a living. Doing this in my living is just going to be a small living.
Speaker 2:Like yeah. So he basically was like whatever I can fit into three suitcases is what I can take with me damn.
Speaker 3:So he traveled around doing art shows, keeping it cheap and never even having the desire to break into the art gallery. He himself said it just wasn't tomato, it really wasn't wasn't tomato, the wine and the cheese of it all, it wasn't for him. He eventually made it to new orleans where he had an art studio and continued to dive into portraiture of musicians and performers.
Speaker 2:I love New Orleans. I think it has the best of what America has to offer in terms of food, art and music, all in one city terms of food, art and music, all in one city yes, 100, and it's just like the, the street performers are like top-notch. Yes, yes, the performance art like everything. Yeah, I, I think it's, it's.
Speaker 3:It's our best city and in terms of art, fighting words, I agree, but it's also like cities. Who who have to? I don't know. Cities who band together are always like the ones who have had to go through some some crap, like we're talking like new york and los angeles and new orleans. There's some, you know, we like, we gotta, we gotta roll with it. So I feel like, uh, and the art that comes out of that is often very good, but, um, yeah, so tomato was there?
Speaker 3:uh, he, he was, you know, he was a fixture in the art community and in he was like, that's right, he was he was just always kind of like around um, he, he didn't just like expect, he wasn't one of those people, just expected you to come to his shows. He like went to everything.
Speaker 2:You know, he was that guy, he was around I love that yeah he was just he surrounded with himself, with art, always yes, exactly, and artists.
Speaker 3:So it wasn't just he didn't live in a bubble um, and eventually he got very sick for the first time in his life, despite his longtime HIV diagnosis. So he got AIDS related cancer and he headed to San Francisco where he was offered a place to stay and transportations to doctors appointments. He was always very good at having excellent friends around him and so he just he.
Speaker 2:he was able to be taken in, essentially yeah, yeah, this is like such the opposite of vampyra I it is.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I feel like she was kind of people found her. He was one of the people that found her actually, but I feel like she and she did have community, but she was kind of people found her, he was one of the people that found her actually, but I feel like she and she did have community, but she was, she also like got reclusive, you know, and he never really did that he didn't no, and he was always just like.
Speaker 3:He was always like okay, what's next, what's next, what's next, and that energy was always there, even in this period. He just was not slowing down. Um, and it was actually during this period of his illness that he did the interview that we keep quoting in this episode, the one with jack rabid. So he did this interview and he would die just two months later, I know. So this really is his final interview and just to like to know, you know that he was actually he was really still having fun in this interview, you can tell.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:So it's just, it's to me that's really beautiful, and I don't know how he was feeling physically, but it probably wasn't great, honestly.
Speaker 2:No, he was literally dying during this and, like I had no idea until you said something just now, yeah, and he was going through, like chemo and radiation treatments and stuff which always makes me feel like trash yeah, so yeah, um especially back then. Yeah, well, this is the treatment has come a long way since then.
Speaker 3:Yeah, since 2000. Yeah, so this is another bit. Knowing all of that, this is another bit of the interview.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I really am not a guy who contemplates much, like I was telling you, I just got really sick for the first time in my lifetime Recently. For the first time in my lifetime Recently, right now. So my life has really changed. So maybe now is the time for me to think about things. But up to this point I never thought about anything. I just did it. You know, I remember when I was like 15, I was at the beach in my baggies and I got in a car and we drove all the way to New York in the winter. I've never thought about things ahead of time.
Speaker 3:I like doing a lot of things, being extremely impulsive like that. I don't do it as often as I used to and I never did anything that extreme.
Speaker 2:Well, I guess maybe I'm. I'll be 52 at the end of the month, so maybe I mean I hope to be back on my skateboard soon.
Speaker 3:I'm not predicting too major change here, but you said in your email that you'd been sick. Is it worth talking about?
Speaker 2:Oh well, I've had HIV for a long time and they changed my meds and I got a weird reaction. So I'm working with that, and in New Orleans I was working with the doctor there, but they seem to know a whole lot more here in San Francisco. This is where it all began. They've got the best care in the world here. So that's my decision to hang here for a while. I'm very optimistic.
Speaker 3:I'm not an old jalopy, so he's kind of downplaying it here and he obviously is downplaying it, but like I think it's, I think he was actually as hopeful as he's saying. But also he did, you know, he had cancer.
Speaker 1:He was getting cancer treatments at this time.
Speaker 3:And he's like I just switched my medication. It's like no, no, you're, you're going through it, you're getting chemo man yeah yeah.
Speaker 3:So I think he just I think he didn't want to, he didn't want to go there. And fair enough man, fair enough, fair enough, yeah. So his funeral at hollywood forever was attended by vampyra he she outlived him and his many other friends. It was presided over by his good friend, chase Holiday Um, and fittingly, this was the very cemetery that Duplantis and Holiday used to hang out in during the screamers heyday. And um Brad Dunning, another denizen of the Wilton Hilton, who had helped design the cemeteries renovation that began in 1998. He is the friend who made it possible for tomato to be interred there. So friends in high places, so tomato friends in all places friends in all places, friends in every place.
Speaker 2:It's true, he didn't he was just like a not.
Speaker 3:Yeah he he was. And he didn't even like just like a. Not yeah he he was. And he didn't even like he wasn't starstruck by anybody, like it's just like he. He's just like going in these circles and doing his thing and there's not a hierarchy of people to him you know, and I love that, love that so tomato.
Speaker 3:we hope that you are doing things up there and that you toasted Vampyra when she made it your way. Yeah, yeah, and I think you know. I guess, what would we? What would we leave tomato as a, as a gift, as a graveyard?
Speaker 2:Maybe like a silly little watercolor.
Speaker 3:A little watercolor kit like the one that got him started a little water.
Speaker 2:No, I want to paint something oh, that's.
Speaker 3:I love that. I think that's perfect. Like, like to do something creative in his honor yeah yeah, I think that would be very appreciated. Yeah, for sure I love it. And to also do something that's like maybe you paint with, I don't know, ketchup or something.
Speaker 2:Or like with with my non dominant hand.
Speaker 3:Go outside the box a little bit with it, just try.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 3:For the sake of it.
Speaker 2:You know exactly, Exactly.
Speaker 3:Do something, whatever it is, just do something.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah. Whatever we do, we can't think about it too much. We just got to do it that's a good point.
Speaker 3:Yes, I love this. I love this. Oh, that's so fun. Um, I, I, I did not think of that and I'm all about it because, yeah, I think that, like making it to about music, he just wasn't in that place at the end for his last 20 years of life.
Speaker 3:He was not. That wasn't what he was doing. So, um, I think he always had, like I think he always loves every form of art, but that stage like he doesn't cling to it, that he's dev and like I also really love that. Like I loved everything he was saying about being like he left, la, because he felt like people are like why aren't you doing this anymore? This is what we know you for. And he's like I want to do something else.
Speaker 3:Like that I just want to do something else and fuck you. This is my life. Yeah, I'm like, yeah like we yeah, it's like he didn't give a shit what anybody else thought oh, not one, not one.
Speaker 2:No, not a, not one single shit at any time or any point yeah.
Speaker 3:So, um, yeah, I I just I think like and also just and also.
Speaker 2:Also he's like he. Like you know, he openly, openly talks about his sexuality, his boyfriend and his diagnosis.
Speaker 3:Like he's like vulnerable but also not never wallowing in any of it no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.
Speaker 2:Vulnerable in, in, in, in a way of openness. Yes, that's what I mean yes, no, exactly no.
Speaker 3:I think like this is a, this is like an evolved person, I feel like. So I just I think, like it seems, like you know, and, by the way, there's, there's apparently people are working on a documentary about him, which I would love to see when?
Speaker 2:yeah, it's done.
Speaker 3:um, it's because, especially just with the footy, the video footage that exists and that, like the plans he had for it that were ahead of his time, and it's like, yeah, let's, let's do something with it now. I think because, like, it really is amazing to watch these performances and I hope that you guys do, because it's it really is like it's so cool to see what he's doing and his artwork. By the way, marissa, we didn't, we were having technical issues today, but I will send you links if you want, like you should.
Speaker 2:Yes, I want to see, but you can even look up his artwork.
Speaker 3:It's like he is, it's, it's very it's like.
Speaker 2:I want to. I want to see what you curated for me. But I also will just Google it.
Speaker 3:But yes, but I think that, like you know, what you saw kind of on his on his grave, on his on his box of ashes, so to speak, like it's kind of like I don't I feel like it's in that vein, it's very outsider art vibes, you know where, um, because that's really what he was, he's called folk artist.
Speaker 2:I wonder if we can like, if I can buy some of his art you can.
Speaker 3:it's going up in price for sure, but like you can't, I mean, yeah, it's like it. Lucky are those people who were like at the shows where he's like, yeah, take it for 20 bucks. You know what I mean, because it's going up now, but it's fun. They're all like fun quirky portraits and stuff of people and sometimes they're done on the back of his old band flyers and, like you know, on just like pages from books and so it's very like. I don't know. It's all very like found, looking kind of and and very yeah.
Speaker 3:So it's really fun, but yeah, I will also include links to to the artwork. It's really fun and and yeah, but that was tomato to plenty. And I feel like I don't know. I was interested in him in the vampire episodes. I definitely didn't know as much about him, but I was interested in him. He sounded interesting. And then now I'm like wow, like this is this, is like this whole world just got opened up for me and this is why I love, love, love doing this podcast, because I just feel like these stories get lost and it's like they're so good and the work people did in their life is so cool and it's so cool and interesting and innovative and yeah it shouldn't get lost.
Speaker 3:It shouldn't get lost. So that's our, that's our project. And you know what I also just want to say right now I've been meaning to do? I want to thank everybody who's been leaving us reviews. It's really nice to hear that you guys are enjoying the show and that you also appreciate these stories and that you're just as excited about them as we are, because that just means a lot to me, because I feel like I did, I got excited about it.
Speaker 2:And I'm like.
Speaker 3:I wonder if anyone else cares and you guys care, and it's great. So thank you for listening. And also, if you know of anybody, that's you know, feel free always to be like did you know this person was buried here? And like you know, because I'll keep Marissa from reading the comments, you can just send it, you know. Send them, know that I'll read them and that she won't, and then you know you can also freely talk shit about her because of that.
Speaker 2:So yeah, I'll never know. Say whatever you want. Yeah, say whatever you want, yeah.
Speaker 3:But um.
Speaker 2:I'll take. I'll take a page out of tomato's book and not care. There you go, love it, love it, love it, love it.
Speaker 3:Love it, love it, love it, but yeah, so anyway, thank you, guys, and the next time, the next episode, is going to be a really special one, by the way, because we're going to actually do it from Hollywood forever, so stay tuned for that. If you liked what you heard, or if you have any feedback for us at all the good, the bad, the ugly, the dead, the alive please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts and let us know what you think we really want to hear from you. Also, follow the show, please. You know, definitely subscribe whatever, wherever you get your podcasts, but write us a review, tell us what you're thinking. Dead and Kind of Famous is written, researched and produced by Courtney Blomquist. It is co -hosted by Marissa Rivera.
Speaker 2:We tag team on socials. Jesse Russell and Courtney Blomquist do our editing.
Speaker 3:Until next time. You might not be famous, but you got a story to tell and you're not dead yet. Okay, bye, Bye.
