Artist: Homer Marrs

Artist: Homer Marrs

Links: https://www.facebook.com/homermarrsmusic

http://homermarrs.com/

Let it be said that Homer Marrs can make me laugh with just a song title. It happened on his standout debut EP, Prom King. The song? “A Prayer for Julian Sands.” I had no idea who Julian Sands was, so the name alone couldn't make me laugh. Until I googled it.

I did so with some trepidation, fearing a “Julian Sands” could only be a seminal niche philosopher known for obscurantist epistemology tracts. Hardly the fodder for funny. Instead, staring back at me from Google images: a European pretty boy looking like that big blond dude from Die Hard. [As it turns out, the Die Hard guy is Alexander Godunov, not Julian Sands. And Godunov is now deceased, just like in Die Hard.]

As I moved from Google to Wikipedia to the Marrs song, I learned that Julian Sands is a once-hyped actor who burst onto the scene with starring roles in The Killing Fields, A Room with a View and, wait for it, Warlock. In other words, he's the cool-looking dude from Warlock. And now Marrs, for whatever reason, is praying for him. This can't not work.

Marrs documents the rise and fall of Julian Sands, hitting with laugh lines like, “We saw such glamor in your blond hair / Your frightening eyes, their penetrating stare / That dippy glare,” that Marrs makes memorable through an earnest-though-possibly-ironic hook, “This is my prayer for you / Julian Sands.” But in addition to the funny bone, Marrs is targeting real meaning by finding a parallel amid the most ridiculous set of circumstances – those of a still-working actor who, nonetheless, has fallen from grace.

To set up the comparison, Marrs credits Sands with possibly possessing a greater ambition: “Did you want more Killing Fields / ...Well, Hollywood gave you Warlock, and other B-film leads / And sinister supporting roles. Did you compromise your dream?” Then Marrs closes the loop: “Inside us all is an evil man / With gorgeous looks and a hypnotizing tan / Doing the best he can / Our Father please bless him / And what he represents.” But does Sands represent persistence or acceptance? The future's not yet written. But I'm guessing the answer lies in whether Dexter gets widely syndicated after season eight. [Sands is on Dexter now!]

And then there's “The Facebook Song.” There may be other Facebook songs, but none more famous than Marrs'. It was Marrs who webcammed it in to Jimmy Kimmel Live! as part of Jimmy's National UnFriend Day. In reviewing it, I'm wary of stepping on punch lines, which is the comedy equivalent of a movie spoiler. But suffice it to say that rattling off a series of punches wouldn't scratch the surface of Marrs' scathing indictment of the ubiquitous social network.

Everything detestable is accounted for. Being friends with people we don't like. Being invited by adult strangers to play agriculture- and crime-related video games. Being asked to attend events we don't live near. Being solicited to sign petitions aspiring to effect real change over things that truly do not matter (e.g. getting Celebrity X on Late Night Variety Show Y). But at least Facebook is helping us answer the question: “Can Rush Limbaugh's nut-sack get more 'likes' than Ann Coulter's?” We craved this catharsis. All hail the Prom King for supplying us much-needed succor.

Listening to Marrs' “Bear411,” I get so frustrated there's no hetero-equivalent to the “bear” fetish that demands a website for devotees of fat hairy gay men. As a hirsute hipster with pounds to spare, I couldn't temper my envy while viewing the “bear” phenomenon through the lens of my gay counterpart, the bear narrator: “Bear411.com is so good for my self-esteem / No skinny bitches to tell me to put down the ice cream / No little trannies to tell me my sweatpants are uncool / I'm on a website where armpits and love-handles always rule.” So how does our large gay hairy narrator navigate his favorite site while keeping things on the down low? “I use a fake name when I chat / But my dick pic's real, and that's where it's at.” Well played, bear narrator.

Marrs also deals in another fascinating subject matter: 80's movies. There are two such songs that I've heard Marrs perform. Of these, and like the movies themselves, the song “Heathers” (not on Prom King) is better than “Fame.” "Fame" is a bad original – a five-minute abomination that Marrs mercifully shortens by half. Marrs does improve it a bit; his gentle delivery is a more suitable showcase for the song's lyrical lust for fame. But this means we miss out on the only good thing about the original, which was its endorphin/cocaine-fueled hook, “FAME!”

As for “Heathers,” we get everything that was great about the 80's cult classic – a treasure trove of loving quotations to, “Fuck me gently with a chainsaw”; “I was impressed to see she made proper use of the word 'myriad' in her suicide note”; “What's your damage, Heather? Why do you have to be such a mega-bitch?”; and references to beloved characters like Martha Dumptruck and Kurt & Ram (“I love my dead gay son!”). And to top it all off, we get a double-timed song section for, “Teenage suicide / Don't do it!” Timeless.

Homer Marrs is hilarious – his voice, perfectly suited to the genre. Each Homer Marrs song is its own universe that either adds new insight to oft-explored cultural touchstones, or spotlights under-appreciated phenomena (think: Gaffigan with Hot Pockets). More than that, Marrs dwells on things we love (80's movies), rails against things we hate (Facebook), and teaches us the things we should all know about (bears). And that's why we love Homer Marrs.

Well, that, and he's really fucking funny.

*** The author of this review, Timothy Young, plays the bodhran for the following band: http://youtu.be/tMS73-1kCr8