No More Bush

Sat., Aug 9, 7:30 p.m., $10, visit arthurmag.com for tickets and location.

by A.D. Amorosi

POETRY/SPOKEN WORD/MUSIC

Five years ago, Byron Coley — co-author of No Wave: Post-Punk. Underground. New York 1976-1980 (Abrams Image, $24.95) — hosted a world tour of spoken word and music called "More Hair Less Bush." Designed as an apology to the rest of the world, Coley's event featured artsy pals who, like him, loathed George W. "It was a sub-underground version of the Rolling Thunder Review, with overt politicism stirred into the mix," says Coley. "It didn't achieve much ... but it was fun." Bush may be nearly out the door, but Coley can't resist a final kick. He's throwing another touring showcase, "No More Bush," with musician Thurston Moore, painter Gary Panter and ranter Damon Krukowski (each in different towns).

The Philly event will feature the mussed-up synth-skronk duo Zaimph, guitarist Jack Rose, Stooges bassist Mike Watt and author Charles Plymell, plus Philadelphia musician/producer Tom Lax and San Francisco-based trance/electronic performance duo 50 Foot Women (pictured). "It's fun to throw together disparate things and have people try to figure out how they're connected," Coley says of the artists. But it's the inclusion of beat-lit genius Plymell — a renegade poet and independent publisher of the testily avant-garde Last of the Moccasins and Trashing of America — that will drive the show. For this occasion, Plymell, with his dry, wild wit, will read his greatest works, with Watt backing him. "To me, Charlie's one of the great figures in underground lit," Coley says, "for prose, poetry, publishing, editing, the works."

For all its heralded participants, Coley's "No More Bush" tour is nothing without its George. "It's a chance to get in some last licks, to remind everyone how hideous this fucker actually is, and to make the plea that if someone better doesn't come along soon, I will really have to leave the planet."

Sat., Aug 9, 7:30 p.m., $10, visit arthurmag.com for tickets and location.