Unfiltered, uncensored, and totally inappropriate – The King Khan and BBQ Show celebrates the absurdity of life, warts and all
The King Khan & BBQ Show (dis)graced the Echoplex stage with a randy set that unabashedly went nearly Full Monty before a sold out crowd hot and ready for the duo’s uniquely intelligent gross out humor and rollicking vintage rock stylings. Joined by rising stars Miranda and The Beat, it was an evening of uncompromising vision and sheer madness disguised as a rock-n-roll show. It was incredible.
Taking the stage dressed in smart back attire across the board, it was immediately apparent that Miranda and The Beat meant business, channeling the unflappable brand of New York cool that has always placed the City’s scene on a completely different level than comparable metros. This is the band’s first large-scale tour and an opportunity to introduce audiences to one of Brookyln’s best kept secrets, a secret that clearly won’t be kept for much longer as the packed in crowd was immediately receptive to the smoky rock-n-soul that Miranda and The Beat have developed into their signature sound.
Falling somewhere within spitting distance of The Detroit Cobras and Ronnie Spektor, Miranda and The Beat carve out their own space by injecting a double shot of raucous unpredictability to their sets with a hard-partying, take-no-shit attitude that seemingly balances every performance on the razor’s edge of resounding success and unmitigated disaster. Saturday night was, by all measures, a resounding success as this quartet of New York dolls proved without questions they’ve got the talent to deliver an incredible performance and the balls necessary to back up their tough-as-nails posturing.
Behind the icy cool exterior Miranda and The Beat smolder with intense thematic passions; unrequited love, overpowering lust, and fiery tempers blaze like the tip of a lit cigarette briefly illuminating the striking features of a femme fatale lifted wholesale from the pages of a dime store paperback. Firebrand frontwoman Miranda Zipse possesses a voice that is in turns resolutely powerful and disarmingly heartbreaking, backed in complete lockstep by the precision percussion of Kim “The Beat” Sollecito. Dylan Fernandez supplies vintage keys to timeless effect, ungluing the band’s sound from discernable eras and trends while Kate Gutwald holds down the low end with unflinching panache. Together the band presents a formidable front, a street gang turned rock band, locked and definitely loaded.
Although this was the band’s first time playing Los Angeles, the audience responded enthusiastically, shouting and cheering after every song as if everyone in attendance have suddenly found their new favorite band all at the same time. Miranda and The Beat rounded out their set with a reckless rendition of their latest single, “Concrete,” inspiring the crowd to erupt in a fervent mosh spurred on by the boundless talent unleashed upon them. “You guys are fuckin awesome!” shouted Zipse between songs. “This is my dream, I get to do this every night!”
To an outsider, The King Khan and BBQ Show is something of a curiosity. An obtuse relic from a previous wave of alternative music that carries with it a strange reputation and faint whiffs of maybe scandal spoken about in reserved tones. Experiencing their set, and it truly must be experienced, serves to disprove and reinforce everything one may have heard about the dynamic duo – both positive and otherwise. King Khan and Mark Sultan together are a curiosity, for sure, but one that can quickly become an all-consuming obsession once you’ve been fully indoctrinated into their ridiculously dedicated fandom.
The house was completely packed by the time The King Khan & BBQ Show took their places on stage, bedecked in trademark leather masks and little else. Without any shred of pretense, the pair launched into a rollicking set of reverb laden surf rock and vintage rock-n-roll that subverted the saccharine tendencies of those retro sounds with lyrical content that ran the gamut from oral sex to Nazis to movie monsters and everything in between. No topic was off limits, no subject too sacred. With bouts of absolutely crass banter in between songs that bounced along with unscripted mania The King Khan & BBQ Show very quickly devolved into an, at times literal, race to the absolute bottom of correctness. And the audience loved every single minute of it!
The entire front of stage area was a massive pit of pogoing and crowd surfing for the entirety of the set, bodies and bits of trash flung high into the air amid a seemingly unending torrent of splashed beer and sweat, a mass of human catharsis nearly unseen since the pandemic began its stranglehold on everyday life. For one glorious evening it was not only okay but celebrated to live like tomorrow may never come, crack dirty jokes, and get absolutely plastered with a genial likeminded crowd of revelers. This is the magic of The King Khan & BBQ Show, the reason why this pair continues to inspire and disgust a legion of adoring fans, packing venues shoulder to shoulder. The King Khan and BBQ Show is a mirror on life, unfiltered, uncensored, and gleefully inappropriate – delivered with a knowing wink and a drunken smile.
For all the dick and ass jokes The King Khan & BBQ Show is almost Shakespearean in a way, a Dadaist piece of performance art that leverages the most basic and universal of human communication to deliver off-kilter commentary on actual issues. Shakespeare, too, embraced lewd humor as a means of translating high art for the unwashed masses and so too does The King Khan & BBQ Show – deconstructing music and words into shout-along pub songs that address big topics like consent and feminism through the greasy lens of the bottom of a pint glass. King Khan and Mark Sultan know exactly what they’re doing and their fans are all-in on the jokes and the message behind them. This is more than just comedy rock, this is social commentary with a brain and a beating, bawdy heart.
The King Khan & BBQ Show is currently wrapping up their 2022 tour with Miranda and The Beat. Be sure to catch the show, it’s a good one. Stream The King Khan & BBQ Show on Spotify and follow the band on Instagram. Stream Miranda and The Beat on Spotify and follow the band on Instagram.
Upcoming tour dates
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OCT 04 - The Glass House - Pomona, CA
OCT 05 - The Chapel - San Francisco, CA
OCT 07 - Dante's - Portland, OR
OCT 08 - Clock-Out Lounge - Seattle, WA
OCT 09 - Clock-Out Lounge - Seattle, WA
OCT 11 - Rickshaw Theatre - Vancouver, BC