I’m in Washington, DC right now. Back in November, I took a ride in Joel Laguidao’s karaoke cab in Northern Virginia. That went pretty well and I had a great time. So this week, Joel called me and told me that a TV news crew from a Taiwanese station, TVBS, would be filming a segment in his cab; and he invited me to go for another ride with him, this time in the presence of the Taiwanese TV people. I took Joel up on his offer and rode the train down to D.C. on Saturday afternoon. On Saturday night, the TVBS cameraman filmed me while I was singing in Joel’s cab (I sang “La Bamba” and “New York State of Mind”); and then a reporter from the station interviewed me. There’s no guarantee that any of this raw H-Bomb footage will make it on the air; and even if it does, I may not like the way I look. 🙂 But if there turn out to be any videos worth sharing, you’ll see them here. And hopefully, this will be just the first of many opportunities for me to gain international media exposure for my World Karaoke Tour.
Posts Tagged With: H-Bomb
Hello, Taiwan!
24
Last night, on my very first night in Lisbon, Portugal became the 24th country on my World Karaoke Tour. I didn’t want to go out last night; I’d been up for two days (as usual, I’d been unable to fall asleep on my redeye flight from New York the night before). I was exhausted and really just wanted to be in my hotel room catching up on some zzz’s.
But when I chatted up the man at the front desk of my hotel and had him make some phone calls, he was adamant that I was extremely unlikely to find karaoke tonight (New Year’s Eve) or the following evening (a Sunday). At the same time, he assured me that a venue called Café da Ponte in the Doca Santo Amáro section of town (a region also known as the Docklands or Docks) did in fact have karaoke last night. He called them and confirmed it.
It was possible that by exploring on my own today, I would find a venue that offered karaoke for New Year’s Eve or the following night. But I couldn’t count on that. So if I didn’t hit Café da Ponte last night when I had the chance, I risked having nowhere to sing during my stay in Portugal — and thus jeopardizing the very mission of this trip. Seeing some castles and monuments would be nice, but if I didn’t sing karaoke this weekend, my vacation would be a failure.
So it was really a no-brainer. 🙂 At 10 pm I jumped in a taxi, which conveyed me to the Docklands. It dropped me off at the taxi rank, which was all the way at the end of the strip of bars and restaurants; my destination of Café da Ponte was at the other end. I hadn’t gotten very far when I was accosted by four Portugese youths.
At first they seemed friendly enough, asking me where I was from and feigning excitement when hearing that I hailed from New York. Suddenly, one young man who seemed like the leader of the quartet asked me if I had drugs. “No,” I said. “Let me see,” he responded, pointing to my backpack. I shook my head and started walking away from the youths.
Undeterred, the youths followed me and now surrounded me. “Let me see if you have drugs,” the leader repeated.
At that point, I was thinking that I did not come all this way just to be mugged or whatever by some second-rate hoodlums. Although it was dark and there weren’t many people out yet along the strip (I was later advised that on a Friday night, people don’t really start showing up in that area until about 11 pm), I did spot a group of older folks a little further down. “Help!” I yelled, loud enough so that they could hear me (and I did catch their attention); then I made a run for it. My assailants smiled, realizing that I’d gotten away.
I was still nervous since I would have to return this way to get a taxi back to my hotel after I sung. But I figured I would deal with it, and now I proceeded to Café da Ponte for some Portugese karaoke.
The host, Tiago, was very nice and put me up as the first singer (although the fact that I was the first patron to submit a song may have had something to do with it). By the time that Tiago handed the mic to me, a decent-sized crowd had assembled. From the generous selection of English-language songs in the book, I chose “At This Moment” by Billy Vera & the Beaters, which is one of my A-list songs. And about four minutes later, Portugal had become the latest addition to my World Karaoke Tour.
I was having a good time and would have liked to stay and get to know some of the locals as I would ordinarily do. Unfortunately, after having been up all night, I felt an overriding need to just get back to the hotel for some much-needed rest. So I reluctantly took leave of the nice people at Café da Ponte, and hoped that I would have the chance to make a more leisurely appearance there sometime (but that more leisurely visit won’t happen this weekend, as they have no karaoke tonight or tomorrow night).
Incidentally, when I told the bartender about my encounter with the ruffians at the entrance to the Docks, he called the police. He said that I wasn’t the only person who’d complained about them. By the time I had to walk back to the taxi stand, even though I hadn’t been at the Docks for very long, there was a sizable police presence on site.
Lisbon, like most places in Western Europe, certainly seems like a safe city — it doesn’t have the reputation of a Rio de Janeiro or a Mexico City. But my incident at the Docks is a reminder that no matter where you go, there will always be people who mean to harm you; so it’s important to always be alert and exercise caution.
Well, I shouldn’t spend all of my vacation time in my hotel room writing blog entries. 🙂 Time to get out and take in some of Lisbon’s sights!
My journey into the heart of darkness: an H-Bomb safari extravaganza
Some hotels are situated in dangerous neighborhoods. If you venture down the block, you risk getting mugged. But when you go on safari, stepping outside your bungalow can get you eaten.
My South Arican safari adventure took me far outside my usual comfort zone. As you’ll see, the perils that I faced did include the possibility of becoming fresh meat. But the discomfort started before I even arrived. It began with the airplane I needed to take to get to the safari.
One thing you need to understand about me: I hate flying. I don’t mean that I dislike it because of the delays, or the hassle of going through airport security checkpoints, or the poor customer service that has become all too common (although none of those things thrills me). What I mean is that flying scares me. It absolutely terrifies me.
This might seem surprising for someone who travels as much as I do. Obviously, I don’t let my fear prevent me from doing what I love. When I’m on holiday I force myself to board airplanes, because the rewards of reaching the places to which they whisk me are so substantial. But during much of the time that we’re airborne, I’m a nervous wreck — especially during turbulence. Yes, I know how statistically safe commercial air travel is; and I know too that turbulence usually poses no danger to the safety of the flight (although there may be occasional exceptions). But that intellectual awareness is of scant comfort when my aircraft is being tossed around in the stratosphere. I’m somewhat calmer when I’m riding on one of the jumbo jets that are typically employed for long-haul international flights; but even then, bumpy air unsettles me. Perhaps the most terrifying hour of my life occurred during a flight from Sydney to Hong Kong in January 2010. The plane was shaking so violently that I had to hold on to the tray table in front of me. I kept wondering how close we were approaching to the plane’s stress limits; and until we emerged from whatever horrendous weather we were bouncing through, I was convinced that a plunge into the badly-misnamed Pacific Ocean was imminent. And that frightful episode happened aboard an Airbus A340-600, among the largest airliners ever built.
So when I was making plans to go on safari in September 2011, I became very, very nervous upon learning that the only way I could reach my chosen location (the Elephant Plains lodge at the Sabi Sands game reserve in South Africa) was to hitch a ride on a tiny propeller plane. That was my only option for transit from Johannesburg to Kruger Mpumalanga International Airport in Nelspruit (well, my only option unless I wanted to show up at the Johanesburg airport at 6:00 am for ground transportation all the way to Sabi Sands. And I am so not a morning person; even making it to Johannesburg’s OR Tambo International Airport for my 9:00 am depature to Nelspruit was not easy for me). While Mpumalanga has a cool name, you’re forced to strap yourself into a perilously small aircraft if you desire the privilege of landing there.
As the date and time of my white-knuckle flight approached, my apprehension soared, based on a combination of two factors: the plane would be minuscule, and it would have propellers instead of jet engines. Small planes just provide less of a feeling of security — it’s like the difference between driving onto the autobahn in a SmartCar versus a tractor-trailer. As well, you tend to feel turbulence more in smaller planes. And in case I haven’t mentioned it, I hate turbulence. 🙂 Propeller planes terrify me for the additional reason that I’m always fearful the propellers will stop spinning. Hey, I didn’t say my phobia is rational.
My stay in South Africa began when I arrived at Johannesburg’s OR Tambo International Airport on a Saturday morning. Two days later, I was back at the same airport for my flight to Nelspruit. Shown at right is the actual plane that I was forced to climb into. I might as well have just been wearing wings on my back. After we’d been seated for takeoff, I turned to the passenger beside me and told her I was nervous because I had never flown on a plane as small as the one that we were now on. “I’m scared too,” she responded. That was reassuring . . .
The flight on that little puddle-jumper actually turned out to be remarkably smooth (an example of the very common phenomenon of the apprehension turning out to have been much worse than the thing that was feared). Even so, I was on pins and needles until we touched down at Nelspruit.
The next phase of my journey to Sabi Sands consisted of ground transportation. This involved a roughly three hour ride in a minivan. The distance that we covered was not nearly as vast as the duration might suggest, but much of the drive was over bouncy dirt roads that could only be traversed at a low rate of speed.
It was a huge relief to be securely on terra firma, but a new issue had arisen. I was sick. Beginning the previous day, I’d felt intermittently feverish; now my condition was steadily deteriorating. By the time of my van ride to Sabi Sands, I’d developed full-blown flu-like symptoms. Continue reading
Another year, almost in the books
As 1989 was giving way to 1990 I was in Scotland, where New Year’s Eve is known as “Hogmanay.” The occasion for my visit to the homeland of Robert Burns was the World Universities Debating Championships, which were being hosted by Glasgow University. I was representing Johns Hopkins University, where I was a senior.
That trip marked the first time I’d ever ventured outside of my native United States, and the first time I’d even flown on an airplane. It helped ignite my lifelong passion for travel. Meanwhile, as the 1990s dawned, karaoke was still largely unknown in the United States, but was only a little over a year away from being introduced into my life.
The Hogmanay party that I attended that year involved snifters of scotch repeatedly being carried out onto the dance floor, and resulted in me waking up at 4:00 pm the next day — and only because my debate partner was banging on my door and shouting that I needed to get ready for supper.
Unrelatedly, during that same Scottish visit, I got into trouble during a tour of a maximum-security prison when I attempted to shoot candid photos of the guards on duty. The prison authorities confiscated my camera and destroyed my film. Fortunately, I was released without the need for intervention by the U.S. embassy. (You may be wondering how I ended up visiting a penitentiary in the first place — especially one that housed convicted murderers and other violent offenders. The answer is that during the debate tournament, a match was held at a local prison, with some of that facility’s residents in the audience. Selected inmates were even permitted to give floor speeches — that is, speeches in which audience members may advocate for the pro or con side of the proposition that is being argued — before the debaters delivered their rebuttals to sum up their points for the round. I remember one particularly eloquent and poignant floor speech during which a prisoner stated, “We are not Untermenschen!” I had to admire a hardened criminal who was literate enough to make such a philosophical reference). Anyway, if a similar incident were to occur today, I would, of course, make every attempt to hide the memory card in my pocket, and swap in a memory card containing photos that I would not mind deleting.
A generation later, I still have yet to spend a night in the Big House. And I’ll be in Europe once again for Hogmanay, although they don’t call it that at the place where I’m headed. One week from tonight I will usher in 2012 from Lisbon, Portugal. This will mark my third consecutive time ringing in the new year from an overseas location.
Two years ago, I welcomed 2010 in Hong Kong. In that city’s New Year’s Eve extravaganza, as with so many others around the globe, the countdown culminates with a fireworks show at midnight. But instead of being detonated above buildings, the fireworks are actually shot off of skyscrapers along that city’s beautiful skyline.
London also offers an outstanding fireworks display for New Year’s Eve. I took in that one to kick off 2011. The focus of London’s festivities is the launching of fireworks from barges on the Thames. If you’re watching the spectacle from the correct side of the river, you can see the pyrotechnics exploding with the London Eye in the background.
At the conclusion of this post, you can check out photos of the New Year’s Eve fireworks displays that I witnessed in recent years in Hong Kong and London.
As for my NYE plans next weekend, I’ve heard that Lisbon puts on a fireworks show over the Tagus River. I may or may not end up at that one, depending on whether I find a karaoke show that night. 🙂 In that regard, it should be mentioned that I have not yet confirmed a specific venue at which to sing during my stay in Lisbon. A couple of weeks ago, I contacted the Portugese tourism bureau, asking if they could recommend any Lisboetan establishments that offer karaoke on any of the nights that I’ll be in town. They forwarded my request to the more localized tourist board in Lisbon. Shockingly, the fine folks in Lisbon respoonded to my inquiry as follows:
“Thank you very much for your e-mail. Unfortunately we do not have this kind of
informations.”
And I was like, what the hell?! Isn’t it the job of the tourism authority to gather that kind of informations? And this response became all the more baffling when one of my Facebook friends noticed that the Portugese tourism bureau’s own website states as follows, in describing nightlife in a neighborhood known as the Docklands: “[Y]ou can show off your talent at one of the various karaoke bars . . . .” How hard would it have been for the Lisbon tourism folks to check their own partner’s website? Or just pick up the phone and start calling some bars and restaurants in the area?
Despite the lack of a specific identified destination (and the lack of help from the people who are supposed to assist tourists with these sorts of requests), I’m fairly confident that I’ll find somewhere to sing in Lisboa. After all, I at least know that there are “various karaoke bars” where people show off their talent in the Docklands section of the city. I also have received a hot tip that there may be additional karaoke spots in Lisbon’s Bairro Alto district. So I’ll have to enlist my hotel concierge to make some phone calls, and maybe I’ll even pop in to a few venues myself to chase down leads. These are time-honored methods by which I discover where I’ll be able to sing.
No matter what I end up doing this December 31, I’ll have much to celebrate as I reflect on the year that’s slipping into the history books. Among other stellar happenings, 2011 brought the launch of this blog. 🙂 It was also during the past year that my World Karaoke Tour reached its sixth continent, Africa, during my visit to Morocco. As we embark on 2012, I plan to continue singing in exotic and far-off lands.
A very happy holiday to you and your family!
New Year's Eve fireworks in Hong Kong. Note the year displayed in large illuminated numerals on the side of the lanky building towards the right. That building is 2 International Financial Centre, at 415 metres the tallest building in Hong Kong. My vantage point for this shot was the Kowloon peninsula, across the harbour from the city centre.
New Year's Eve fireworks in London, nearly one year ago, seen from the Westminster Bridge
In beautiful downtown Burbank
The wheel. The printing press. The telephone. The automobile. Aviation. Radio and television. The internet. These are among the transformative inventions that improved the quality of people’s lives and changed the course of human history. If you ask me, karaoke belongs on that list. But where did it come from?
The Japanese origins of karaoke are well-known, although the particular man who is credited with those origins has not become the household name that he deserves to be. Daisuke Inoue, an unassuming Osakan, gifted karaoke to the world in 1971. And yes, I would rank him right up there with the likes of Gutenberg and the Wright Brothers. 🙂
Fewer people are versed in the history of karaoke in the United States. Inoue’s invention reached critical mass in the U.S. in the 1990s, but its American presence dates back somewhat earlier than that. Appropriately enough, karaoke made its American debut near Hollywood, the global epicenter of the entertainment industry. The first venue not only in the United States, but in all of the Western hemisphere, to offer the chance to sing with pre-recorded instrumental accompaniment was the Dimples Supper Club (also known as Dimples Showcase) in Burbank, California.
Named for a Shirley Temple movie, Dimples opened its doors in 1982, and its customers have been singing their hearts out ever since. For anyone serious about conducting a World Karaoke Tour, Dimples is a required destination. If you want to explore La-La Land in all its glory, a visit to Dimples is just as integral to the Hollywood experience as the Universal Studios tour or Grauman’s Chinese Theatre.
Dimples is truly an institution in the Los Angeles area, and has forged a particularly robust connection with nearby Hollywood. Numerous television programs have spotlighted Dimples, and countless stars of TV and film, as well as musical recording artists, have graced its karaoke stage. Some of its walls are adorned with autographed photos of famous guests who’ve dropped by to sing. Oddly enough, one of the celebs who hangs out most frequently at Dimples is Dennis Haskins, who played Principal Richard Belding on the classic Saturday morning television series from the early 1990s, “Saved by the Bell” (he also reprised that role in the spinoff “Saved by the Bell: the New Class”). Hey, I said he was a celebrity; I didn’t say he was an A-lister. 🙂 But he deserves props for his excellent choice of hobbies. Here you can watch him doing a number by Tom Jones. Say what you will about Dennis Haskins, the man knows how to put on a show:
Haskins, who reportedly has been a regular at Dimples since 2002, has actually released a CD compilation of his karaoke stylings (you can also download the tracks individually as MP3s). But I digress.
I’ve been to Dimples twice so far: in November 2009, and July 2011. The decor of Dimples can best be described as . . . garish. The stage area is festooned with props, and singers are regularly encouraged to don bizarre hats and other unusual headgear. For example, the last time that I took to that stage, proprietor Sal Ferraro insisted that I wear a Viking helmet. Because apparently, nothing says “karaoke” like a pair of Viking horns protruding from your head. Naturally, I obliged.
One of the coolest features that Dimples boasts is its live video feed. If you’re singing on the Dimples stage at any time between 6:00 pm and 2:00 am, Pacific time, people all over the world can go online and watch your performance in real time! (another notable karaoke bar with a live webcam broadcasting from its stage is the Cats Meow in New Orleans. As you might expect, I’ve been to that legendary Big Easy karaoke joint too). In addition, after your song is finished, the Dimples management presents you with a free DVD and Polaroid photograph of your performance. Typically, the person bringing these mementoes to your table is Sal himself, who often goes by the moniker “Mr. Dimples” (Sal is an interesting man in many respects, who has visited over 100 countries, thereby qualifying him for membership in the prestigious Travelers’ Century Club. However, the Dimples website, while supplying this tidbit, does not indicate in how many of those countries he’s sung karaoke). Admittedly, the need for such recordings to be supplied by the establishment is greatly diminished in an age where everyone has a smartphone that shoots HD video. But it’s still a nice touch. Plus, the DVD is of superior quality to anything your inebriated friends are likely to produce.
Sal’s restaurant also offers an extensive dinner menu, and it’s certainly a nice bonus when the available victuals at a karaoke establishment extend beyond mere “bar food.”
Here’s a video from my first Dimples appearance, in November 2009. The song is “At this Moment” by Billy Vera & the Beaters, perhaps best known as the love theme for Alex P. Keaton and Ellen Reed on the 1980s sitcom “Family Ties.” I don’t know what the weird background noise is that sounds like running water (I pulled the video off the complimentary DVD that Dimples provided to me). But I wanted to include this video in this post, because “At this Moment” is a reasonable candidate for my best song:
And here’s a video from my July 2011 visit to Dimples, during which I performed a duet of The Human League’s “Don’t You Want Me,” with my friend Erica:
Update (April 2013): My 2011 visit to Dimples was not particularly enjoyable. On that Saturday night, Ferraro, who was acting as karaoke host, was enforcing a policy that, once you’d sung your first song, you would not be called up to the stage again until everyone else who wished to sing had gotten at least one song in (regardless of whether they’d entered the building five minutes ago or five hours ago). As a result, I was made to wait two and a half hours between songs; the constant influx of newly arriving patrons resulted in my being pushed further and further back in the queue. (Most professional karaoke hosts work new singers into the rotation in a staggered manner.) The unacceptably long wait to sing my second song of the evening was upsetting to me, and led me to avoid Dimples during a subsequent visit to Los Angeles in 2012.
In recent years, it wasn’t just me who’d been turned off by Dimples. The bar was perceived as being in a state of decline. But it’s recently undergone an extensive makeover that was overseen by the reality television series, “Bar Rescue”. You can read about that overhaul here. The changes that have been made — including a revamping of the bar’s interior and the promotion of a staff member to replace the octogenarian Ferraro as karaoke host — should reinvigorate Dimples. Although I’d previously felt that I didn’t need to go back to Dimples again, I’m now inclined to give it another chance during my next visit to the area in September 2013. It’s also good to know that a venue with such an illustrious history now has a bright future.
If you enjoy karaoke and your travels bring you anywhere near Los Angeles, you should give strong consideration to spending an evening at Dimples. At the very least, you’ll be able to say that you sang at the place that introduced Daisuke Inoue’s invention to North America. Note that if you go, the renovated interior will look considerably different, and much less garish, than in the photo and videos above.
Karaoke in transit
First of all, I want to say that I’m blown away by the response that my previous post (the one about Santacon) has generated. I never would have expected an honor like the “Freshly Pressed” selection just four posts into my blogging career. In fact, I had not known that this coveted endorsement even existed. On Monday morning I was just some guy bugging my Facebook friends to read my latest blog entries. And now . . . I’m pleased to report that this site, launched a mere 11 days ago, has already welcomed visitors from at least 102 countries.
So thank you all for coming, and for taking the time to read my little jottings. I’m particularly excited about the geographic diversity of you, my readers. This site is global in scope (being that it focuses on my world travels), and it’s important to me to hear perspectives from people in every corner of this big blue marble we call Earth (and yes, I’m aware that spherical objects such as marbles don’t have corners. Work with me here).
With Santacon now in my rear-view mirror, I’m preparing for my long weekend in Lisbon, for which I leave on December 29. While there, I plan on indulging in some karaoke singing, which would make Portugal country no. 24 on my World Karaoke Tour. Any singing that I do in Lisbon will most likely occur in a pub or restaurant. An eatery or drinkery is, of course, the standard setting in which karaoke is delivered, at least in the Western world (a variation, popular in Asia and some parts of the United States, involves renting a private room with your friends and singing only to each other. In a future post I’ll have more to say about private-room karaoke, often dubbed “karaoke box,” which was made famous in a scene in the 2003 film “Lost in Translation”).
But in a growing number of cities and towns around the world, a very different type of karaoke experience is available. Some enterprising taxi drivers have installed karaoke machines in their vehicles.
If you’re lucky enough to hail such an enhanced cab, you and your fellow passengers can sing while en route to your destination. Or you can board the taxi without even having a particular place to go, because if you’re like me, karaoke is your destination. 🙂 There is generally no charge for the opportunity to sing, beyond the fare that you’re already paying for the journey (although grateful passengers often tip extravagantly). And best of all, you don’t have to wait behind a long rotation of singers for your next turn at the mic.
As I will discuss below, I recently had the pleasure of taking a ride in a “karaoke cab” in Washington, DC. A search of Google and YouTube indicates that similar taxis have proliferated recently — sometimes using names like “Cabioke” to brand the multifaceted service that they offer. In addition to the capital city of the United States, they now roam the streets of such metropolises as Bangkok; Singapore; Taipei; Budapest; Las Vegas; Los Angeles; Dallas; Nashville; St. Louis; and Charlotte. They’ve even cropped up in smaller municipalities including Tacoma, Washington; Provincetown, Massachusetts; and Chico, California. So pervasive has this trend become that a filmmaker in Thailand is raising funds to make a movie about a karaoke cab. That one is so going in my Netflix queue when it comes out . . .
The man who made possible my Washingtonian karaoke cab experience is Joel Laguidao, who drives for the Red Top Cab Company in northern Virginia. A charismatic Filipino, Joel was recently featured with his vehicle on a segment of the American morning television program, the “Today Show”:
Joel first came to my attention this past summer, when one of my Facebook friends linked to an article about him on NPR’s website. Let me backtrack a little here, because my November 2011 ride with Joel marked the culmination of a nearly three-year quest.
2008: the Memorex fiasco
My odyssey began in December 2008 when I received a call from my friend Colin, who told me that he’d just taken a ride in a karaoke cab right here in New York City. A Google search quickly informed me that a fleet of six karaoke cabs was being dispatched from selected points in the Big Apple. It was a promotion sponsored by Memorex: if you sang and permitted Memorex to videotape your performance, you could earn a free ride in the cab. I would be only too happy to sing for my fare.
There was one problem: I soon learned that the special cabs were only operating in New York on a temporary basis, for a period of just a few weeks. The day on which I received the hot tip was, in fact, the final day of the promotion. Even worse, it turned out that the Memorex fleet of karaoke cabs had been dodging cable cars in San Francisco a month earlier, during the same time that I’d been visiting that city– and I’d been tragically unaware of their presence. So I missed out on them twice!
I regarded the Memorex debacle as a massive intelligence failure on my part. But in fairness, maybe there was no need for regrets. I looked more closely at the website that Memorex had maintained for its vagabond fleet; and I discovered that the singing took place in front of the cab while it was still parked at the curb. You would collect your free ride after you sang. But once you boarded the taxi, the karaoke would be over. How lame is that — a karaoke cab where you don’t actually get to sing inside the cab? As Lionel Hutz would say, that’s the most blatant case of false advertising since The Never Ending Story!
Regardless of whether one of the Memorex cabs would have provided a satisfactory experience, one thing was certain. With the expiration of the Memorex promotion, there were no karaoke cabs of any nature to be found in New York City. That appalling absence continues today: over 13,000 licensed cabs in New York City, and not a single one has on-board karaoke. If I wanted to become a singing passenger, I needed to broaden my geographic horizons. But that was okay; after all, traveling for karaoke is what I do.
2010: the Charlotte incident
My second failed attempt occurred in September 2010. I was flying from Newark, New Jersey to Rio de Janeiro. During that voyage, I was going to have an approximately six-hour layover in Charlotte, North Carolina where I was changing planes (Charlotte Douglas International Airport is a major hub for US Airways, the airline that was conveying me to Brazil). Knowing I would have all that time to kill in the Charlotte metro area, I was excited to learn of the karaoke cab servicing that region. A jaunt in it would be a memorable way to start my vacation. So I contacted the driver. We exchanged voice-mail messages. The message left by the driver (who shall remain nameless) said he would be “glad to pick [me] up,” and he added that I should call him back on Tuesday or Wednesday of the next week (my layover in Charlotte would be the Thursday of the next week) to advise him as to what time I would be arriving in his city. What I didn’t know yet was that I would never hear from Charlotte’s karaoke cab driver again.
The following week, with my departure to Charlotte fast approaching, I called him as instructed. I began to grow concerned when the driver didn’t respond to any of the three voice-mail messages I ended up leaving for him. In those messages, I had attempted to set up a time and place for him to meet me in downtown Charlotte (I felt it would be easiest if he met me there and drove me back to the airport). He was also informed of the time that my flight was expected to land. But as I boarded the plane to Charlotte, I still had not received confirmation from the driver that he would meet me later that day.
My arrival in Charlotte was on time. Immediately after deplaning, I put in a call to the driver, but his phone went straight to voice-mail. So I left a detailed message, and proceeded to the the ground transportation area in the airport. Time elapsed, and my phone didn’t ring. I tried calling the driver again, and again was greeted with his outgoing voice-mail message. Undaunted, I headed to the bus lanes and boarded an express bus to Charlotte’s central business district (What the hell else was I going to do during a six hour layover? CLT had not yet joined the emerging trend of airports with karaoke).
When I reached downtown Charlotte, the karaoke cab driver again failed to answer his phone. I even contacted his dispatcher, who had no better luck than I did in trying to track down the AWOL driver. In fact, she advised that she hadn’t heard from him all day. To this day, I have never heard back from the karaoke cab driver who stood me up in Charlotte.
Happily, though, despite the dismal start to my holiday, my ensuing excursion to South America and Easter Island turned out to be one of my all-time great vacations. Sometime I’ll tell you about my adventures on that trip — including my attempt to outrun killer dogs on Easter Island. Singing in a karaoke cab, however, remained an unfulfilled wish.
2011: redemption
When I learned about Joel and his karaoke cab in Washinton, DC, I just knew that this time things would be different. It helped that D.C. is much closer to New York than Charlotte is. It’s very easy to get down to D.C. from New York for a weekend trip (which I do several times a year; after all, I attended law school there, so I have many friends in the area and I retain an affection for the city). As a result, unlike with my one-time layover in Charlotte, I would feel no pressure to make my ride happen on any particular day. If things fell through for whatever reason, I could just try again.
Using my proprietary research skills, I managed to get in touch with Joel, and to speak with him on the telephone (The fact that he actually answered his phone was the first good sign. Joel is a genuinely nice guy). We quickly settled on a mutually convenient weekend for me to become his passenger.
On Friday, November 11, I took the train down to D.C. after work. The following afternoon, I met up with my friend Becca, who had agreed to serve as videographer for my groundbreaking taxi ride.
We took the Metro to the Ballston stop in Arlington, Virginia (I chose that location because the Red Top Cab Company is based in northern Virginia and I wanted to make the pick-up point convenient for Joel, who did not yet know me.). At the appointed time, Joel Laguidao showed up with his cab outside the Ballston station entrance. Becca and I got in and took our seats, and we were off.
We didn’t actually have anywhere specific to get to, other than a general desire to end up in the city. So we spent nearly an hour as Joel’s passengers. Joel drove us over the 14th Street Bridge that spans the Potomac River, and we proceeded past the Washington Monument and towards the Capitol building. But I wasn’t in town for sightseeing. While glimpsing national landmarks through the window of Joel’s Crown Victoria, I was doing something that I’d been striving to make possible for almost three years: I was singing karaoke in a moving vehicle! My bucket list had just shrunk by one.
Here is one of my selections from that magical cab ride: John Lennon’s “Imagine.” Fittingly for that anthem of cooperation and harmony, Joel joined in with me (and I apologize in advance for the slight technical glitch with the audio):
And for a much different vibe, here I am performing “La Bamba”:
Joel is a passionate performer in his own right. Here you can watch him belting out a classic ballad by Journey:
Joel has a brand-new Facebook page! So if you like what you’ve seen of him here, please stop by his page and show him some love.
Now at this point, you may be wondering what recourse you may have if you do not live in, and are unable to visit, one of the locales where you can order a karaoke cab. Well, the obvious solution is to buy a car of your own with a built-in karaoke machine. Carpooling with your co-workers will never be the same. And if you scoff at my suggestion, I will have you know that someone else already came up with this idea, all the way back in 2003. In that auspicious year, the Chinese automaker Geely made a karaoke machine standard equipment on its BL (Beauty Leopard) coupe. And while you may not have heard of Geely, the company is not some piddling little buggy-maker; in 2010, it bought Volvo. Admittedly, the BL coupe is no longer in production. (Geely never responded to my email asking whether the in-dashboard karaoke machine is available on any of the models in its current product line.)
A friend recently asked me why I enjoyed the karaoke cab so much, given my previously-stated preference for playing to a crowd rather than singing in isolation. And admittedly, it would seem that the available listener base is quite limited when you’re inside the sealed environment of a motorcar. I guess I can’t completely explain my inconsistency. I’m pretty sure that my voice was audible outstide the vehicle, so that may be a part of it. But only a part, since no one on the street would have been able to hear me for any great length of time. Maybe this is just one of those instances where I have to say “I liked it,” and leave it at that.
By the way, another form of “karaoke on the go” is to sing while on a floating vessel. In October 2008, I took an evening karaoke cruise around Manhattan Island. I understand that karaoke nights are also widely held on international cruise ships, although I’ve never booked passage on one of those behemoths of the sea. One of my work colleagues has suggested that I should take advantage of this phenomenon, and that now that I’ve been able to check off six continents on my World Karaoke Tour, I should set a goal of singing in each of the world’s oceans. Hey, there are only five of them, so that would not be too long of a list to work through. I will say that I’m taking this proposal quite seriously.
Meanwhile, now that I have conquered both land and sea, I am looking upward for my next great challenge. My newest ambition is to sing karaoke on an airplane. I’ve worked out most of the details, and it would go something like this: Since commercial airlines have not yet exhibited the good sense to include karaoke among their in-flight entertainment options, I will need to provide my own instrumental music and lyrics. So I will need to be on a flight with wi-fi; then, using my laptop, I can log on to one of those internet karaoke sites. Ideally, I would like to stream a live video feed of my performance so that people on the ground can serve as a virtual audience. Now, I realize that my fellow passengers will be unlikely to indulge even a few minutes of a singer in seat 25A. To avoid provoking air rage, I may need to hole myself up in the lavatory, as I join my own version of the “mile-high club.” This plan is complicated and has a lot of moving parts, but it just might work!
Whether or not the H-Bomb phenomenon takes to the skies, of one thing I’m sure: I will ascend no higher than cruising altitude. Space will not be the final frontier for me. I hate amusement park rides such as roller-coasters; I get motion sickness when subjected to those g-forces (although curiously, I rarely feel airsick when flying through turbulence). So I could never become an astronaut. Even if I somehow acquired the boatloads of funds that would enable me to afford a private spaceflight, I could never bring myself to sign up for such a mission. The H-Bomb will have to remain earthbound. But there’s a whole lot more of the world left to cover on my World Karaoke Tour!
UPDATE: I’ve discovered that there’s a New Zealand-based alternative rock band called “Karaoke Taxi”! As far as I can tell, however, that band has never actually performed in a taxicab. 🙂
My scenic ride in Joel Laguidao’s karaoke cab included views of the Washington Monument.
So 10,000 Santas walk into a bar . . .
Yesterday was the annual event known as Santacon in New York City. Thousands and thousands of people clad in Santa suits, as well as other seasonally appropriate costumes (Buddy the Elf is a perennial favorite, and for those of the Jewish persuasion, some human dreidels can always be counted on to show up), cavort throughout the city. And sometimes the outfits bear no discernible relation to this time of year. For example, one of my favorite participants yesterday was the person dressed as a giant Chiquita banana. So the sea of red was interrupted by a giant yellow fruit.
The movements of the thousands of Santas are not random. A mysterious behind-the-scenes leader periodically tweets instructions indicating where in the city the throng should next assemble (an example of an actual tweet from yesterday is “Santa’s on the move! Point your sleigh toward the red steps at Times Square.”). In between those official check-ins, the Santaconners file into bars that are near the previous meeting point. Sometimes the organizer tweets suggestions as to where the Santas should imbibe. Said imbibing begins as early as 10:00 a.m., and is, of course, a major part of the day’s activities. However, Santacon is so much more than a mere pub crawl.
As with a more conventional pub crawl, the actual getting around involves a considerable amount of walking. Sometimes, however, the distance to be traversed is just too great, and the Santas must descend underground to ride the subway. Chants such as “Santa rides the 6!” (a reference to the number 6 subway line that serves the East side of Manhattan) are not uncommon in that situation. Hordes of Santas pour into the subway trains, much to the befuddlement of the non-Santacon-affiliated passengers on board; and the rides tend to be punctuated with (often dissonant) caroling.
The greatness that is Santacon is not confined to the Big Apple, although New York City’s version of this festival of debauchery is by far the biggest (I have not yet seen any attendance figures for yesterday’s iteration of the New York City Santacon; but I’ve heard that in 2010 the turnout was estimated at 10,000). While other cities cannot match New York for sheer volume of participation, Santacons are now held in 32 countries around the world. 
According to the offical website, even denizens of McMurdo Station in Antarctica participate in one (yes, McMurdo Station is the same place to which I aspire to travel to make Antarctica the seventh continent on my World Karoke Tour. And yes, the good people down there are really on the wrong pole to be hosting a Kris Kringle-oriented event).
This was my fourth consecutive year taking part in Santacon. Even so, I’m an upstart compared to my friend Laney, who was Santaconning for the seventh time. I’m also known for my stubborn refusal to attend in costume: I wear a Santa hat, and that’s it. I always justify my costumelessness by saying that I’m along to shoot photos and videos that I will then upload to flickr and Facebook (and now I post them on my blog too!). So I still add value to the event. 🙂
For the 2011 edition of Santacon, the day began at two different starting locations: one at a marina on the Hudson in lower Manhattan, and the other in Brooklyn Bridge Park. I chose the location in downtown Manhattan, since it would be somewhat easier to get to from my Upper East Side apartment. 
I joined a sizable contingent of Santas at Marina Cove, a pleasant waterfront area on the Hudson River, behind the World Financial Center. Eventually (after some time spent in various watering holes near the Marina Cove), it was time for all the Santas to move on. The word went out over Twitter that all the Santas were to converge on the South Street Seaport. So thousands of red-costumed revelers, together with their assorted sidekicks, made their way through the tangled warren of streets in lower Manhattan. Meanwhile, the Santacon cohort that had started in Brooklyn Bridge Park trekked across the Brooklyn Bridge to also end up at the South Street Seaport. I kind of regretted not beginning in Brooklyn myself (even though to do so would have required me to awaken at a ridiculously early hour), as it would have been nice to see all the Santas marching across the Brooklyn Bridge. Maybe next year . . .
Incidentally, one of my all-time favorite Santacon moments occurred during the stroll over to the South Street Seaport. Hundreds, if not thousands, of Santas were walking down the street. A young kid, maybe eight years old, was standing in front of a building and watching the procession of Santas. The kid yelled out, “Are you the real one?”
Anyhoo, after a long interlude at the Seaport and some of its many bars and restaurants, the Santas moved on to occupy City Hall Park. Or at least they occupied it until the NYPD arrived on the scene and announced that the park was being closed. Then the scene shifted to Grand Central Terminal. The concourse at Grand Central is famously crowded; indeed, the very name of the station has become synonymous with huddled masses of humanity. But even during rush hour, you will rarely see the cavernous room packed as tightly it was yesterday afternoon. And amid the profusion of Santaconners, a brass band was present to to provide live entertainment to whoever was lucky enough to be on hand:
This musical ensemble was the Hungry March Band, based in Brooklyn.
Following Grand Central, the next announced stop on the itinerary was the steps of the nearby New York Public Library. Those stairs are famously flanked by the twin marble lions, Patience and Fortitude. Sadly, by the time I had arrived in front of the library, the Santas were gone from the steps. In their place were some of New York’s finest, standing watch. It appeared that what had occurred in City Hall Park had happened again. There was only one thing to do: repair to a nearby bar for some much-needed libations.
From that pitstop, it was on to the red TKTS steps at Times Square (the subject of the tweet quoted above). Here again, the Santas had already been banished from the steps by the time my friends and I showed up. This was becoming a recurring theme. So we boarded the subway and headed to the final official checkpoint of the day: Tompkins Square Park in the East Village.
Despite the repeated appearances by the police, there were few incidents of the type that would put Santacon in a bad light; and none of the evacuations directed by the NYPD resulted in any confrontations or violence. For a humongous aggregation of drunken and exuberant Santas, Santacon tends to be remarkably devoid of misbehavior. Sure, there’s the occasional Bad Santa; but most people who participate are just trying to spread holiday cheer, and remain well-behaved. The worst offense that most Santaconners are likely to commit is a violation of the open container law (I may or may not have committed that offense myself). 🙂 I want to stress, though, that I understand where the police were coming from in their efforts to maintain order. I have a great deal of respect for the NYPD, which has done so much to keep this city safe — especially in light of the threats we’ve faced from would-be terrorists in recent years; and I’m sure the NYPD would rather not have to deal with the headache of the potential for undesirable outcomes that is inherent in a sizable flash-mob such as Santacon. And the important thing is that Santacon went on, and a good time was had by all.
Naturally, given the subject matter of my blog, my day of Santacon would somehow have to culminate in karaoke. So, I eschewed the “official” Santacon afterparty, a ticketed event in Brooklyn that I strongly suspected would be too hipsterish a scene for me. Instead, after making an appearance in Tompkins Square Park, I remained in the East Village. I hit two bars in that area. The first was just some random pub, where I had a nice enough time and met some interesting people. The second was Sing Sing, a popular karaoke establishment on St. Marks Place (Sing Sing has an additional location nearby on Avenue A).
So, during karaoke, some guy started singing the Blink-182 song, “All the Small Things.” Suddenly, an admittedly attractive young woman just grabbed the microphone from his hands, carried it to the other end of the bar, and started singing the song herself. She hijacked his song! Eventually the original singer reclaimed the mic and finished singing. He then approached the woman and asked her why she had committed her brazen act of microhpone-thievery. “I’m better than you,” she responded. She may have had a point (although, curiously, she didn’t submit any songs of her own to sing).
Given that I was trying to make a good impression on strangers, my own set-list at Sing Sing included three
H-Bomb standards: “New York State of Mind” by Billy Joel; “La Bamba” (the Los Lobos version from the soundtrack of the 1987 movie); and “True” by Spandau Ballet. No one dispossessed me of the mic while I was singing.
Below are some additional photos that depict a few of the highlights from the latest NYC Santacon:
Santas processing through lower Manhattan, near Bowling Green Park.
Santacon's answer to the Three Musketeers.
The Abonminable Snowman.
Gingerbread men (and women) are frequently seen at Santacon.
A Christmas tree finds comfort among his own kind, but is besieged by the evil Grinch.
This hombre, who was rocking a giant sombrero in place of St. Nick's usual headgear, called himself "Santa Fe." : )
This woman dressed as a fireplace. She even used an iPad to provide continuous video of the Yule log!
The youngest Santa!
Some of the get-ups are quite irreverent. The birthday boy can always be counted on to make an appearance.
Some of the Santaconners who ended up at karaoke. Is that a Viking Santa on the right?
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My favorite place to sing karaoke in the whole world . . .
is quite possibly Las Vegas. Sin City, of course, is fun for many reasons. But for my money, karaoke is right up there with its other attractions. Many outstanding karaoke venues can be found on or near Las Vegas Boulevard, popularly known as the Strip. Here are two of my favorites, both of which offer unique experiences:
Zinger’s Rock ‘n Roll Cafe
The Rock ‘n Roll Cafe is located in the Hawaiian Marketplace, near the Harley Davidson Cafe and across the street from the Aria hotel. The special attraction is that the seating and performance areas are outdoors. So when you’re singing, passersby on the sidewalk can not only hear you; they can see you as well. Many people who are walking past will stop and gather at the railing that surrounds the periphery of the bar’s seating area; and they’ll stay to watch the singers. So when I’m singing at the Rock ‘n Roll Cafe, I enjoy the challenge of getting drunken revelers who happen to be walking down the Strip to stop what they’re doing and cheer on the H-Bomb!
I don’t yet have any videos of myself performing there, but here’s a video I found on YouTube that will give you a good idea of what this place is all about (and I’m really digging the stage name of the male singer here. He calls himself “Smoothini the Ghetto Houdini.” It makes “H-Bomb” sound pretty ordinary).
Oh, and best of all, the Rock ‘n Roll Cafe offers karaoke seven nights a week!
Bill’s Gamblin’ Hall & Saloon
Bill’s is not like those sprawling, theme-oriented mega-hotels that are now prevalent on the Strip. This place has character! And it also offers a karaoke experience like no other. The karaoke lounge is immediately adjacent to the casino, and the sounds of the karaoke singers can easily be heard on the casino floor. So when you grab the mic there, you are the entertainment for the gamblers! I think that’s pretty cool.
No matter where you choose to sing in Vegas, the vibe of the city (i.e., everyone is there to party) makes it even more enjoyable. In addition, Las Vegas has a long and storied association with music, going back to the days of Elvis and the Rat Pack. I believe that the city’s contemporary karaoke scene fits firmly into that tradition. 🙂
So I love singing in Las Vegas; and I am therefore especially excited to announce that I have just made plans to return to Vegas for several days in August 2012. The occasion for this visit will be the second annual Trivia Championships of North America. But I will find ample time, in between quiz bowls and other trivia events, to do some karaokeing! (I’ll also be fitting in some sessions at the blackjack table; and I look forward to checking out the brand-new Mob Museum, officially titled the National Museum of Organized Crime & Law Enforcement, which is slated to open in February 2012).
Viva Las Vegas!
Now that’s what I call chillaxing
“I call architecture frozen music.”
— Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
But in November 2011, a different kind of frozen music was created in New York City’s Bryant Park. In a promotion sponsored by Columbia Sportswear, visitors had the chance to sing karaoke inside a giant freezer, dubbed the “Omni-Freezer.”
As can be seen here, the Omni-Freezer was located inside a tent-like structure, near the ice skating pond that is installed in Bryant Park during this time of year. I understand that the Omni-Freezer has actually gone on tour through a number of American cities. Given the response it has elicited, I would not be surprised to see it make some more appearances in the future.
I’d been to an “ice bar” before, in Las Vegas, where the ambient temperature was maintained at a constant 23 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 5 degrees Celsius). But the conditions in the Omni-Freezer were quite a bit more frigid than that. The temperature inside the 7-foot-high chamber hovered between minus 10 and minus 15 degrees Fahrenheit (a range of roughly minus 23 to minus 26 degrees Celsius). Nevertheless, I eagerly volunteered for the opportunity to participate. It didn’t hurt that there was no charge to sing. An additional incentive was that Columbia would provide me with a video and photos of my icebox jam session, also free of charge.
The song list was quite limited. I’m accustomed to karaoke bars that feature 10,000 or more titles in the songbook; here only 12 songs were offered, all of which contained words like “ice” or “hot” in their titles. 
The complete catalog (such as it was) is shown at left. I get why they did that, but a little more variety would have been appreciated. Would
“I Melt With You” by Modern English have been too much to ask for? And the “Heat Miser” song would have been a nice addition, too. : ) Needless to say, none of my usual
A-list songs was among the listed tunes. Given the choices available, I opted for Katy Perry’s “Hot n Cold.” I had actually sung that one before, so at least I was more familiar with it than with any of the other 11 songs that were being offered. Plus, for a song by a female artist, “Hot n Cold” is not in a very high key, so it’s at least in the vicinity of my vocal range.
While awaiting my turn, I donned a Columbia jacket (or perhaps “parka” or “anorak” would be the correct term for the garment. I wouldn’t know for sure; I’m no fashionisto. And no, that last word is not a typo. “Fashionisto,” ending with an “o,” is the little-used term for a male equivalent to a fashionista. I just learned that while writing this post. But it’s confirmed by that bastion of scholarly authority, the Urban Dictionary).
I monitored the digital temperature readout next to the freezer door, and wondered how I would cope with the Arctic conditions without gloves or ear-grips to protect my extremities (Those accessories were not provided by the organizers. Although, in fairness, I can’t really blame them. Would you want to wear gloves that dozens of people’s hands had been in?). Still, the singers who preceded me did not appear to be suffering from frostbite when they emerged from the freezer.
One pastime that was not possible while I stood in line was to watch the singers who were performing ahead of me. It soon became apparent that contrary to what I had expected would be the case, the singers in the Omni-Freezer could not be heard outside the freezer. The audio was not piped to any external speakers.
Eventually, the time arrived for me to step into the icebox. Once inside, negative 10 degrees didn’t feel as bitterly cold as I had anticipated. I think that the lack of wind made a huge difference. The song terminated, thereby ending my session, after only about a minute and a half; but even though I was constantly shivering, I definitely felt like I could have remained in the freezer for at least a few minutes longer.
Overall, the Omni-Freezer was a unique, albeit brief, experience. In one respect, though, it was a disappointment. For me, karaoke is a performing art that necessitates an audience. Indeed, the best karaoke experiences for me are interactive and involve the listeners responding to the song. I thrive on the energy generated by an enthusiastic crowd. Here, as mentioned, that crucial dimension was missing as the sounds of the singers were not shared with anyone outside the freezer. So in that sense, the Omni-Freezer was really more a recording studio than the activity that I think of as karaoke. Don’t get me wrong, I still had fun; and I can’t really complain about the chance to do some singing in a public place for free. The karaoke freezer also scores major points just for the sheer novelty of the concept. Plus, while I enjoy traveling the world to sing, it’s always a nice bonus when I find new karaoke adventures right here in my home city of New York.
If Columbia takes the Omni-Freezer on the road again, I would recommend that the song list be expanded, and that the singers be given an audience that can listen to them.
You can check out a video of my Omni-Freezer karaoke session here. And below is a still photo from that session. I freely admit that this particular song was not my best work, but I would ask you to consider the conditions that I was operating under. : )
And when you look at the photo and video, you can’t help but notice that they’ve been heavily processed (the form in which you see them here is the only form in which they were made available to me). I think that the special effects that were added are unfortunate. I’m a little creeped out by the sight of a disembodied head singing, even if the head is my own. This is not the way that I wanted to evoke the hallowed memory of Walt Disney . . .
It’s time to get things started!
Shown here is my most recent international singing experience, in Mexico City in May 2011. The scene depicted in this photo occurred at a bar called “Pedro Infante no ha Muerto.” The name of the bar means “Pedro Infante hasn’t died.” In case you’re wondering who Pedro Infante is, Wikipedia states that “José Pedro Infante Cruz . . ., better known as Pedro Infante, is the most famous actor and singer of the Golden Age of Mexican cinema.” Wikipedia also tells us that notwithstanding the optimistic outlook of the bar’s proprietors, Señor Infante departed this world in 1957. Anyway, I think that “Pedro Infante no ha Muerto” is a pretty cool name for a watering hole. What wasn’t cool was how, when I was trying to get back to my hotel at the end of the night, my cabdriver robbed me, forced me to get out of the taxi, and left me in the middle of nowhere. But that’s a story for another time.
Hello and welcome to H-Bomb’s Worldwide Karaoke! This site was created to document my ongoing World Karaoke Tour. I have sung karaoke in 23 countries on six continents, plus Easter Island; and within the United States I’ve performed at karaoke venues in 12 states plus the District of Columbia. You may have noticed that I mentioned six continents, one fewer than the total number that the Earth has. The missing continent — for now — is Antarctica, but I will get there eventually.
Yes, there’s a place to sing in Antarctica. Gallagher’s, a bar located on the scientific research base McMurdo Station, offers weekly karaoke nights. It’s not easy to get there; most tourists who visit Antarctica arrive by sea, and McMurdo is on the opposite side of the Antarctic continent from the place where you would alight if you arrived on a cruise ship from South America. So transportation is a challenge, to say the least. And it’s no easier to find lodging for such an extreme destination. There are no hotels on Antarctica — let alone at McMurdo Station — that you can book through a site like Expedia or Orbitz. Well, to be more accurate, there are no hotels at all. But despite such daunting obstacles, singing on the seventh continent is absolutely a bucket list item for me. I will find a way to make it happen.
I sing karaoke under the stage name “H-Bomb.” I’ve been performing under that nom de guerre since the fall of 1992. Back then — in the mists of time, when the United States was the only country in which I had ever done karaoke — I was a first-year law student at Georgetown University in Washington, DC. On Thursday nights I would sometimes go out for karaoke at an establishment called the Jennifer Street pub, in the Dupont Circle neighborhood where I was living. My actual name is Harvey, and so naturally I would write that name on the song slips that I handed to the KJ. On one such Thursday evening, the KJ didn’t care for my singing. Each time that it was my turn to sing, when he would call me up to the stage, instead of calling me by the name I’d written down, he would summon me as “H-Bomb.” He meant it as an insult. But I immediately saw the possibilities of becoming a weapon of mass destruction. Despite the origins of the sobriquet, I readily embraced it, and I’ve been singing as the H-Bomb ever since. My identity as the H-Bomb has permeated my life; my handles on internet message boards usually begin with those letters, and even at work, it is not unusual for colleagues to refer to me as the H-Bomb.
I said that I’ve been singing as the H-Bomb since 1992. And that is mostly true. But there is one exception: In 2008, when I visited Japan, I thought that to sing under the name of an atomic bomb might not show sufficient respect for cultural sensitivities. : ) So, at those Tokyo karaoke bars, I sang as “Godzilla” instead.
My next scheduled international trip will take me to Lisbon, Portugal for New Year’s weekend 2012. I also am scheduled to travel to Egypt in February 2012 for a cruise on the Nile (I was originally supposed to go to Egypt in February 2011, but as you probably know, a revolution erupted in Cairo’s Tahrir Square in the early part of that month. Egypt’s version of the Arab Spring resulted in the cancellation of my tour, and I went to Morocco instead, while rebooking the Nile cruise for one year later. As my delayed Egyptian vacation approaches, the political situation in Egypt continues to be unstable, and I am monitoring it closely). I hope to fit in some singing during both of those upcoming excursions. As I add additional locations to my World Karaoke Tour, I will post updates on this site — with photographs and videos!
And the updates will not only be about my singing. My karaoke wanderlust is about satisfying two of my great passions: karaoke and travel. So when I am on the road, I will blog about the sights that I’m exploring during the daylight hours, as well as the venues where I grab a mic in the evening.
Between trips, I will use this site to report on my karaoke adventures on the home front; and in the beginning while we’re getting caught up, I will reminisce about my international karaoke experiences to date. Much has happened since the magical night in June 1993 when an outing to the Duke of Argyll pub in London made the United Kingdom the first foreign country on my World Karaoke Tour. : ) I will also blog about my general thoughts on all things karaoke.
I envision this blog being interactive. I’m generally very good at finding karaoke spots in my travel destinations — usually well in advance of my departure. But sometimes, especially in non-English-speaking countries, finding a singing venue is quite challenging for me. I look forward to a time when my readers in far-flung locales will advise me — and each other — on where to sing in every corner of the globe. Maybe I’m being unduly optimistic, but that’s the way I roll.
Last week, I visited the Louis Armstrong house in the Corona section of Queens, New York. This unassuming brick edifice (seen in the photo on the left) is the actual home in which the great Satchmo lived with his wife, Lucille, for the final 28 or so years of his life (Lucille was actually his fourth wife, but by all accounts she was the great love of his life). You can see the rooms of the house, preserved as they were several decades ago when Mr. Armstrong was in residence. It was a fascinating tour. So, the tour guide was mentioning how Mr. Armstrong was the first musician who traveled all over the world to perform. That tidbit has provided further inspiration to me as I continue with my own, much more humble musical wanderings. And another thing: the guide claimed that Mr. Armstrong appeared on “every continent.” However, I strongly suspect that he never made it to Antarctica. So if I can make it down there, I have an opportunity to do something that even the legendary Louis Armstrong was unable to achieve. : )
Well, that should suffice for an introduction. Thanks for your visit, and I hope to see you back here soon! And I apologize for kicking things off with one of those cliched “hello, world!” posts. I promise that some exciting new content is coming soon. This is only the beginning!
Happy singing,
H-Bomb
Meet the H-Bomb!
Hello there! I'm an attorney and worldwide karaoke singer who's based in New York City. I've sung karaoke in 77 countries around the globe, on all 7 continents, plus Easter Island - as well as all 50 U.S. states! This website chronicles my World Karaoke Tour as well as my general travel adventures. Learn more
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