Once upon a time, when a certain writer for Superstarcastic was 18 years old, she was in university in the great state that you shouldn’t mess with.  She was on a much-coveted scholarship for National Merit Student recognition and, sadly and stupidly, she didn’t appreciate the opportunity one bit. She rarely went to class (ok, never) and stayed up way too late doing drugs and going to see bands at various Dallas venues, always with the obligatory fake id, of course.

We don’t need to go into the details of said writer’s early indiscretions at this moment but we do need to point out that, just like today, she had excellent taste in the bands that she broke the law to see.  And one of these bands was called Tripping Daisy. 

Tripping Daisy was a grunge-pop experience for which drugs were not even necessary - you may have heard of them only from their big radio single “I Got a Girl” ( listen to it on their myspace) but this band was…and is…legendary in certain circles that matter.  And it didn’t hurt that bass player Mark Pirro was eminently crushable and posters of him were on bedroom walls that also mattered at the time…namely those of our writer-heroine’s small party flat, located in the pink stucco building right behind the Granada Theatre in the Lower Greenville area of Dallas.  Oh, the stories that could be told about those days, the dramas inherent in the life of a wanna-be-writer living in Texas and tangling the worlds of music and marijuana for the first time.

But I digress.  What does this pointless nostalgia have to do with the Polyphonic Spree, you ask?  Well, Mark Pirro is now the bass player for that psychedelic cult-rock collective (along with Tripping Daisy singer Tim Delaughter and drummer Brian Wakeland), and he is still eminently crushable.  Certain writers might never get completely over him, even. More importantly, however, he’s still incredibly talented and the music that the Spree is making is fascinating and epic.  As epic as Mark Pirro’s answers to our 5 Questions?  I don’t know…you tell me.  And be careful what you say because he’s reading this right now.

1. when historians listen to your most recent CD 1000 years from now, what will they say?
“Nah, this isn’t the original… My older brother burned me a copy”.

2. if you could play a show with any band/musician living or dead, who would you pick and why?
The orginal Who… I think it would be fun to watch them totally wreck the stage.

3. what is the strangest band-related dream (one of) you have had?
That we got really big and sold millions of albums. Does that happen anymore?

4. what do your fans look like?
Old and dusty. I need to get someone over to my apartment and give this place a serious cleaning.

5. what bullshit do you run into at most every show that makes you think “man, this bullshit again?”
When Pete Townsend hounds me after the show to autograph his copy of our second record (which only sold 80 copies cause he and everone else burned it or downloaded it off the web). I always tell him no, then he begs me and even offers to come to my apartment and clean my toilet and dusty fans.

bonus question: why won’t you forget to tip your bartender?
Oops.

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