Our Hit Parade

'm the sort of person who gets caught up in other people's nostalgia and find myself wishing I could have been there WHEN. I wish I could have been in New York when Studio 54 was here, or Truman Capote threw his Black and White ball, or Ethel Merman was in Gypsy. I wish I was at Woodstock, CBGB's in it heyday, Altamont...okay, maybe not Altamont. Regardless, it's vaguely ridiculous, since I know there are concerts and performances I'm seeing now that someday I do believe I'll be able to say, "I was there when..." and make some other bitches as jealous as I get. And ideally, I won't be so specifically of a single moment that I end up being one of those old people in documentaries who are grasping onto the memories of how amazing their lives were when...

Point is, one of the performers who always makes me think, "Fuck then, I'm here NOW," is Bridget Everett. Do I ever anticipate that she'll break out in the mainstream in a big way? No. But have I ever left one of her performances without having been entertained, laughed my ass off, and worried slightly about my personal safety? Also a no.

Bridget's a big white girl, often decked out in House of Dereon, who takes a stage with a vengeance. She's aggressively sexual, hysterically funny, big voiced, and completely shameless. I've seen her drink people's wine, lick strangers, strip down, and fall over, all while ripping through pop songs with what is (or certainly looks like) drunken abandon. She is, in a word, mesmerizing.

I caught her on Wednesday at Our Hit Parade, the show she cohosts with the also fabulous Neal Medlyn and Kenny Melman in which a bunch of performers are invited to take to the stage to perform their renditions of the current top 10 songs. Each time I see the show, something amazes me. And each time, something is deeply excruciating. This week was no different. Hank and Cupcake ripped through a version of "Like a G6" that actually made me enjoy the song. Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson's Jeff Hiller changed into drag while lip-synching "Only Girl in the World," in a hysterical effort to woo a straight man. Erin Markey delivered a delightful mash-up of "Grenade" and "Rose's Turn" while decked out in a Speedo for no reason I could identify. On the flip side, Cole Escola did some bad church lady drag as he tried to add humor to "Firework." And electronic band The Fancy tortured "Whip My Hair" (and the audience) for a distressingly long time. The hosts did what they do best. Neal Medlyn performed a wonderfully creepy "Raise Your Glass." Kenny Mellman dove into "Fuckin' Perfect" and amplified every ounce of pathos. And Bridget took the stage (and the rest of the room) to rip through "Tonight I'm Fucking You," which might be the most perfect song she's ever done. Hey, she even took the glasses off my face. She tossed them back to me eventually, which...a person without their glasses has little hope of actually catching their glasses. That's all I have to say.

In any case, as always, I loved the show. I probably catch one out of every three--it's the last Wednesday of every month. And it's just flat out tough to beat in terms of sheer entertainment value.