Tales of Lust & Madness is a new show from Lydia Lunch, New York’s ‘punk poet queen of extremities’ and Joseph Keckler, a singular performer once crowned the ‘best downtown performance artist’ in New York City.
Combining the dynamic spoken word of Lunch and the dark humour and unnerving musicality of Keckler, Tales of Lust & Madness brings these two notorious performers together to create an intimate evening of provocative musical poetry.
Passionate, confrontational and bold. Whether attacking the patriarchy and their pornographic war-mongering, turning the sexual into political or whispering a love song to the broken-hearted, Lydia Lunch’s fierce energy and rapid-fire delivery lend testament to her warrior nature.
Performing in Australia for the first time, Joseph Keckler is a singular artist who performs in a genre of his own design that fuses operatic vocals and contemporary subject matter into absurd and affecting underworld voyages.
One of these performers on their own is enough to discombobulate a person but together, they are a riot – Seven caught up with them from their homes in Brooklyn very early Sunday morning AEDT.
I have to say I am a bit confused – I’ve looked at both of your works and it looks pretty amazing, but I’m not exactly sure what this show is going to give us.
Joseph – well, we’ll be doing back-to-back sets. I’ll be doing a lot of my musical vignettes and songs. So that ranges from operatic monologues to torch songs to the beyond and then Lydia will be performing prose pieces. Our sets might change from night to night. She may pull out some revenge fantasies or some other diabolical diatribes.
Lydia – thank you for calling in prose (laughs)… Joseph’s songs speak of sex with ghosts, mushroom overdoses, bizarre romances – it’s similar subject matter [to mine] actually, but in a very different form. He’ll be the musical part of the show, which helps to embrace the audience, and then we’ll see how much they will take from me.
It’s the velvet hammer – he comes with the velvet, then I come with the hammer.
We both have very different styles of performing – he allows me to bring out your comedic side.
Is the intention of the show to shock people?
Lydia – First of all, no. Second of all, I’ve never done anything shocking in my life according to my standards. I’m telling true or slightly fictitious tales. How can just telling stories be shocking?
I’m not reading from The Marquis de Sade. And Joseph is certainly not shocking – he’s a welcome release into a perverse, different kind of presentation of expressions. Some might be shocked at how wonderful we are.
Joseph – my work hinges on surprise or is driven by unpredictability in some way. But no, I think the show is more to pleasure people. To give them new, strict pleasure.
Lydia – Or, for people that have reversed the pleasure principle – you’re already chuckling ( we are on Zoom) so I think if you come to the show, you’re gonna be quite amused.
I have to ask you both, are you having enough fun?
Joseph – there’s no such thing!
Lydia – Too much fun. What people might not know about me is: by day, I might be statistic-loving, warmongering, anti-patriarchal, corporate core-busting and confrontational, but by night, I’m having a hell of a good day. One of my mantras is pleasure is the ultimate rebellion, because it’s the first thing they steal from us, especially as women, or especially in these times when everything we hear all day long on any news channel is, how rotten everything is, so we must rebel with pleasure, So yes, we’re having a hell of a good time.
Lydia Lunch Tales of Lust & Madness is on at Byron Theatre on Saturday, 9 March.
Tickets from byroncentre.com.au.
