Eternal Erection
For anyone unfamiliar with the band, the title of this post is most likely a little misleading and bewildering. 
I’ve just returned from a free concert in Helsinki by Eternal Erection. And dear god, I can tell you THEY ROCK! Hm. On second thought, rock is probably not the right word, since they’re not a rock band. They are a FUNK band, and man are they funkeh! WOOH! YEAH! They could even make my lonely little butt wriggle to the music. Unfortunately, I didn’t go into full-blown dancing mode since I was weighed down by a backpack, feeling very shy, and completely alone with only strangers to dance with. Some of them had really groovy moves though.
My brother phoned me while I was at work and told me that he’d spotted the Funky Bus over at the statue of the three naked smiths in Helsinki. (Just opposite Stockman.) Unfortunately, I was working fervently to meet a deadline of a few hours just then and couldn’t really question him about it properly, but apparently the Funky Bus was being rigged as a stage!
After work, I began to wander in the general direction of Stockman. I couldn’t hear any funky music coming my way, so I figured they weren’t set up yet. I used the time to buy myself a funky book calledGeneration T: 108 ways to transform a T-shirt. (It appararently even has a website.) I also got some new pens and markers, a set of Moleskin notebooks and then went over to the Three Smiths and sat down at their base, carefully avoiding pigeon-shit. I whipped out my linoleum-plate as well as my tracing paper sketches and began to work on my printmaking, all the while trying really hard to ignore the big plasma screen nearby that was blasting Eurovision music videos and Helsinki advertisements. I listened and doodled, and got really excited when finally someone with a trés funkeh voice popped up on stage and started doing sound checks. “One..two.. YEAH! WOOOOOOH!” etc. Unfortunately, that excitement passed soon and I felt mildly embarassed as I tried to imagine myself having to perform such a test. What would I say? “One..two.. uh.. Help. Is it ok? Please tell me it’s ok. Uh. Yeah. HI EVERYONE…! (very unconvincingly and feebly) ..rock..on..! RAaask….” Luckily, included in the sound check came the announcement that they would start playing at 19.00. Unfortunately, this was two hours away. I didn’t have a coat with me, it was cold, and the eurovision screen was getting to me. I gnawed on a piece of bread and finished my ice tea, trying really hard not to memorize the simplistic lyrics of the entries, yet again boggling at the strange woman in a Ramones T-shirt and her random random random circus entourage, and wondering at the soft core porn of a pseudo-opera song backed up by raped viciously by bad keyboard dance music.
My butt was getting mighty cold, the idiot teenage-boys harassing pigeons with cigarette butts and whacking at them with newspapers were even more infuriating than the Eurovision crap, and the sun had shifted to some less Ann-Mi favoring position, but the time was nigh.
And then it was there. The Funky Bus started to ejaculate Eternal Erection members. They trickled onto the top of the roof wearing pimp-outfits. I counted a red velvet suit, a pink beret, lots of sunglasses, a white suit with an accompanying white hat, a bowler hat… It was a sight to behold. The main singer who wore the white suit was also, of course, decorated with several gold chains and a golden shirt. I wish I’d brought my camera with me, but I had no idea they were performing!
I stood up on my perch atop the base of the three naked giant dudes and began to wiggle along, trying to avoid whacking the kids behind me on top of the statue with any excessive back-pack maneuvering. My hands still tingle from all the applauding.
I escaped unscathed, wanting more, but completely frozen in their halftime half-hour break, and took the bus home. If I’d had my jacket or funkier dance moves, I’d have stayed for the rest.
So, anyway, after all that babble, I give you a link to a very very weird video by them. It’s not live, unfortunately, but youtube seems to be devoid of the appropriate Eternal Erection links. Unfortunately, it’s not my favorite song, but it’s still enjoyable. Plus, you can see the Funky Bus! (I think Funky Policecar might be my favorite.)
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