Poisonous, Baby, Poisonous!

Your Pal Foz with Fozpop & Fish (1977).
Fozpop is married and the fish got eaten.
I may be your last hope, Ladies!

There’s no time!  There’s no time!  There’s no time!

Foz the Hook’s Poison Valentine’s Pageant starts in just four hours at Cole’s Bar! 

Normally I write something charming and funny about our lineup of bitter and beaten lovers, and the hilarious and amazing songs they are supposed to sing, but I have to go all the way home, then change into my suit, then get all my music together, then go somewhere and drink myself blind in self-indulgent amorous misery, then go to Cole’s.  Even then, there’s sound check.

Krystal is warming up!

So forget the funny stuff!  Get to Cole’s Bar tonight at 9:00 for Foz the Hook’s Poison Valentine Pageant, featuring Your Pals FtH, Krystal LaFianza Pitzen, Joe Paserski, Bill Bullock, and you!

After that there is comedy.

What is wrong with you?!?!?!?  Be there!!

New Orleans Swan Song!

Hey, You Softhearted Drunkards!

 

Kenny Singing Freebird With FtH

Tonight is the last time you will ever see Kenny Witzgall at Cole’s for a while (until he returns, which he actually plans to do). 

Now, there isn’t much time.  Kenny’s Swansong begins at 8:45, or sometime thereafter, and features Your Pals, Foz the Hook, Wild Bill Bullock, the sleepy saxman, Your Conceal and Carry Sweatheart, Krystal the Pistol LaFianza Pitzen,

and Kenny.

Kenny is going to be in New Orleans while us suckers are trudging through our pointless existences here in Nelson Algren’s cesspool of love!  Chicago!

Kenny at Cole's, by Miguel Guzman

What do I have to say to get you there?  That we are playing a Tom Waits-heavy set?  Ok, that!

What do I have to do to get you there?  Kiss you right on the lips?  What took you so long to ask?

Come to Cole’s tonight for Kenny’s Swansong.  It starts at 8:45 or 9:00, and ends when the funny business begins!

Bye, Kenny (for now)!  You’re one of the good ones!

Wake Up! Time to Die!

Hey, look!  It’s 2014!

Was 2014 the year you always expected to die?

Probably not.

Is This Your Year?

William Shakespeare was born the same year I was, in last digits.  He died in 1616.  He wrote thirty-two plays (I guess – I’m not going to look it up).  He also wrote two hundred eight poems (almost certainly not, but I’m not going to look that up either).  My life span will equal his in two years.  Up to this time I have written zero plays (that is exactly accurate), and my best poem is probably The Ballad of Casino Kit.  My friend, Jeff Drake, wrote the words to With Drunk Astronauts.  Does this mean I should get busy making something worthwhile in my limited time on earth?  Of course not.  We have much better medical care now than in 1616 England.  My brain will probably live on in a jar of formaldehyde and control an external organic robot (replicant?) made by a 3-D printer.  I choose talking dog.

Anyway, it’s the new year, and that’s no big deal.  You probably won’t die, but you might. 

The Bard of Avon.  A Huge Disappointment.

Don’t waste your time writing plays.  You won’t write any that are as good as Shakespeare.  Well, you might write one that is better than Timon of Athens.  Is that really your goal?

Just relax and get a drink.  Life is sweet.

Join Foz the Hook at Cole’s tonight at 8:45 as we begin our fourth year of playing Cole’s Comedy Open Mic!  At approximately fifty-two performances a year, that makes two hundred eight shows.

Suck on that, Bard of Avon!

Double Fisted Fozes at Gallery Cabaret!

Guess what we’re not doing tonight?  We’re not playing!  This is not to say that we’re not playing, it’s more like we’re not playing – because Foz IS playing with Colonel Foz tonight.  It will be a two fisted night of double fisted fozzery!

Olde Foz Sneering at The Green Wall.

First Foz is going to play a fine, long solo set at Andy Fleming’s Two-Hour Comedy Hour at the Gallery Cabaret in Chicago!  If you can wait that out, you will also have the opportunity to see Colonel Foz, the country music cousin of Your Old Pal Foz.

How did this happen?  Because Andy Fleming is an all right fellow in our book!

Andy has hosted the Two-Hour Comedy Hour for about thirty years with such luminous luminaries as Emily Lake and Katie McVay.  All of the great comics in Chicago have played this hoppin Saturday night venue, and who wouldn’t want to with the charming local clientele of drunk hipsters and hip drunkards?  I think it is just the kind of room where we can thrive.

Colonel Foz at The Blackout Diaries.

Other A-listers listed for the bill include Natalie Grace Alford, who is a person I just heard of but is clearly terrific; Chox & Brizz, who are really great too, I guess, because Andy booked them; and then Marcon & the FYF Crew, an act that features Martin Morrow, and that’s good enough for me!  It’s going to be hard to hold a candle to any of these talented folks.  That is why it is so awesome that I get to go first.  You will have nothing better to measure me against.  I’ll probably get out of there with reviews like, “He didn’t fall down,” or “He only fell down a couple of times this time.” 

So go to the Two-Hour Comedy Hour at the Gallery Cabaret tonight at 10:00.  That is 2020 North Oakley in Chicago, America, and it starts at 10:00 (which is when I am playing because I go first.)

We are going to talk about the tragic end of the beloved comedy nook, the Lincoln Restaurant another day.  Right now I can't bring my self to talk about it.  Needless to say, the amazing shows that play there, like The Blackout Diaries, will continue at other venues.

Change!  Arghhhh!

Bye!

Foz the Hook's War on Christmas! Three, two, one… EXECUTE!

Merry, Merry Christmas, my bitter pills!

Your Old Pals, Foz the Hook did not have an autumnal pageant this year because we had better things to do.  But, we were reminded by our bestest friends that we simply could not bypass the great, the beloved, the terrifying event of the season:

Foz the Hook’s War on Christmas Pageant!

This year there will be death defying songs and horrifying affronts to holiday decency!  And these will come to you gratis, from Your Pals FtH, and their Pals! 

Krystal LaFianza Pitzen!

Kenny Witzgall!

Kristen Clifford!

Jason Earl Folks!

We are putting the final, joyous touches on the Pageant right now, so there is no time to answer questions.

 

Just get to Cole’s Bar tonight at 8:45, for a shamefully indulgent Christmas spectacle!  The Cole’s Comedy Open Mic starts at 9:30 as usual.

Santa will cry with embarrassment, and poor Krampus, the German Christmas Demon will cover his face, too humiliated  to eat our children.

And that’s how Foz the Hook saved Christmas!