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Bianca cannot get married until Kate gets married. Kate is not a happy camper, primarily due to activities like cooking over fires and not taking showers. Their father loves camping more than even arbitrary and dramatically pregnant rules. Let’s camp this weekend, their father says, I feel I need it. The girls feel they do not need it. But they are oddly compelled to obey their father’s wishes.
Lionkiller is at home with this environment. He views Kate as the quarry. He thinks, she is only a shrew. How many lions does he have to his name? He has not kept the numbers well, but the skins certainly dominate his apartment. Can’t open a cupboard without starting an avalanche of the damn things. He wears the headdress pretty regular, and he’s one of the few who put up with lionskin briefs. Sweaty in the summer.
Out there somewhere in the tall grasses of the suburbs lurks a lion, tawnier than most. He blends with the grasses.
Lionkiller’s friend Cass sees Bianca. Cass cannot stop talking about Bianca to Lionkiller. In astronomical terms he is over the moon for her. He thinks this, but never says it. No one can deny that it is a cliché, and Cass eschews these. Lionkiller wishes that Cass would stop. Bianca remains unobtainable for Cass, who attempts to smother himself in Lionkillers lionskins. Lionkiller saves him and agrees that he needs help. He will free Bianca by conquest of Kate. She is a shrew.
He finds out about the family spending several days in the godforsaken wilderness. He presents himself as a guide. He wears his headdress which offends Kate. She does not believe in the wholesale slaughter of lions. Lionkiller suppresses his amazement. Cass comes along as a spiritual guide. His careful avoidance of cliché impresses the hell out of Bianca. She makes eyes at me, Cass observes, but is careful not to say this out loud.
Around the campfire on the first night, watching the fire, drinking sixty-four ounce sodas with shots of vodka, they listen to Cass describe the spirit world. He describes gods as thoughtful executives dressed in Edwardian garb, perhaps in the style of Oscar Wilde. Kate clenches fists. Superstition, she says and jumps to her feet. She snatches a burning coal out of the fire and juggles it calmly before pitching it at Cass. It catches him squarely below the left eye and burns a black mark there that looks not unlike the grease football players apply at game time. This cruelty disturbs Lionkiller. Kate expounds the virtues of atheism. Or, she says, as we prefer, humanism. She goes on for two and a half hours, disturbing Lionkiller further.
In the night the lion lurks, not making himself known. He feels great concern for Lionkiller’s prowess, and his own extra tawniness which he suspects is a tawniness too far.
Lionkiller makes attempts to woo Kate. He dances his groin-oriented “Rejoice, Lion, for Death is Swift.” He delivers a complete narration of the film Never Cry Wolf. He kills a doe elk in front of her to show his power, but spares the doe’s faun to show his magnanimity. These efforts prove unsuccessful, in the sense that she does not fall in love with him. But in the sense that Kate’s father is impressed and suggests that they get married anyway, the efforts, it has to be said, achieve some level of success.
Bianca watches Lionkiller’s performance as well. Her eyes and heart swell with admiration. Unlike her sister, she values such virility. Much to my chagrin, whispers Cass to himself. But, Kate is spoken for, and now is his chance with Bianca. Cass makes an effort to woo her. He performs a dance which he calls “Rolling Up My Pants” In which he mimes the careful rolling of his pant cuffs, the up and down motion of his rump keeping the beat. He improvises a story using the word mammary as a starting point. He smashes a hamster with his fist. The exploits further encourage Bianca’s eye to wander. Such is life, says Cass out loud while buying Arbor Mist Peaches and Cream Wine in a convenience store. He cuts off communication with the whole crew.
Lionkiller and Kate arrive home for the first time after their honeymoon. Kate is mostly fed up with Lionkiller, after an incident on the beach of their coastal Icelandic resort wherein Lionkiller personally dismembered 41 sea-lions while shouting out vows of devotion. Lionkiller sings loudly as he goes around turning on the lights in the house. Kate looks around the kitchen and then decides to put away the many bottles of duty-free rum they’ve brought home. She opens a cupboard and disappears beneath the skins. Lionkiller comes to her rescue. He pulls her from the pile, but does not hold her to him. He stares suspiciously at a skin that appears tawnier than the others. The lion realizes he is discovered and attacks. Lionkiller wrenches off the lion’s tail with a motion like cracking a whip. The lion flees.
He writes a memoir of his troubles which proves popular. He later meets Bianca in a hotel bar during his book tour. They fall into a smooth and flirtatious conversation. They laugh when they realize their connection through Lionkiller. It turns out that Cass is also in town, also on tour, in support of an album. He sees Bianca and moves to her side. Imagine seeing you here, he says, feeling comfortable with the banality of the statement. Bianca makes perfunctory conversation, tells him about Lionkiller and Kate, and then ends the conversation abruptly, preferring to speak further with the lion. Within two weeks the lion proposes marriage.
I do not understand, says Cass to the bartender, why anyone in their right mind would get married nowadays.
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Cass McCombs - “Lionkiller Got Married” mp3
- Flann O’Rion writes from his home in Eugene, Oregon and feels that far too little is made of Arbor Mist Wine products.
- Nate Stevenson has Drawn many Songs. See them here.
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One Response to “Drawn Song in Plaster: Cass McCombs, “Lionkiller Got Married””
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[...] I don’t know much about Cass McCombs and I haven’t listened to any other albums besides Catacombs. The album’s definitely got some of the 50s and 60s sound which I like, and there’s also a lot of country influence. I like this song and the others are certainly listenable, though this sort of music rarely resonates with me.Source: http://www.stereopathicmusic.com/2009/07/song-in-plaster-cass-mccombs-lionkiller-got-married/ [...]