Hunx and His Punx Stop Touring Blues With American Idol and Hairy Makeovers

Van life can be good for the first four hours. But soon after -- let's say a week to

ten days -- you're worn down, achy, inhaling dirty laundry and wiping

Nutter Butter crumbs off your personal belongings that double as your

mattress! Will this be the case for Hunx and his Punx? The New York "young oldies" outfit performs this evening at the Stage in Miami for a free show sponsored by Sailor Jerry. This comes as part of a 17-day tour in support of their first full length, Too Young to Be in Love (Hardly Art), and with Atlanta gal punks the Coathangers in tow, a fun and messy evening is ahead.

County Grind caught up with the Hunx crew earlier in the tour, as their van headed southbound on Interstate-95 from New Jersey towards Philadelphia for their first show of the tour. Our characters: Seth Bogart (Hunx), Erin Emslie and Shannon Shaw are the original

members of the group on this tour. They have two friends joining them this time,

Daniel Pitout, drummer of Nü Sensae and Kyle Thomas (King Tuff) replace Michelle Santamaria and Amy Blaustein, who left the

band after its last tour.

And judging by what follows, traveling with people can sometimes be a drag. But a delightful one for the voyeur readers among us.

The scene begins with Hunx and his Punx playing the game, "Who Said What," which has everyone anonymously answering three questions and everyone guesses... who said what. They also play American Idol, embodying Steven Tyler and Randy Jackson as they judge each other's performances which can move them on to the power duets in round two.

Another game forces bandmates to guess a secret word based upon only its first letter of a word. It's called "The [insert letter here] Factor." This time, Shaw's word is "lazy," and so "The L Factor" begins. "Rate Seth on the L-Factor," someone might ask.  "I might say, 'Seth, oh he's a 10L,"' Shannon explains. "And then they think, ok, what can Seth be that's a 10L and then they'll say 'rate Erin.' Erin would be like a 2, and you continue to rate people to figure out what the word can be, that's a really really fun one."

Is Seth/Hunx actually a 10L?

"No no, he's not really a 10L at all." she says, "He's not lazy...he works really hard. The laziest person in the band..quit..(laughs), we don't know yet, cause we all just got together today. "

As the Miami date approaches, Emslie looks forward to Cuban food, and Shaw looks forward to the beach. "I can't wait, we always wanna go down there but if you play Miami, that's like another couple days of tour and so it's always hard to get our booker to send us down. But my other band [Shannon and the Clams] is gonna be down there in like a month."

Getting back to games, we're at the most apt one for the band's wild style: Makeover Day. "Everyone anonymously picks a name out of a hat and they get to give that person a makeover," Shaw continues. "It's so incredible and we have like a week or two to start collecting an outfit, a makeover for the other person. You have to get up and put it on and then you have to wear it to your show later on that day, and like, my outfit was so crazy I couldn't soundcheck in it. I had a hairy lampshade for a helmet, a vest made of hair, and gloves made of hair." Shaw counts down the days and says that she'll try and encourage such a day for tonight's Miami show.

"I love the idea of getting to play a free show" she says of tonight's festivities. "I don't give a shit about supporting big, huge companies, but I actually love getting drunk on their booze. It gives you such a weird, fun, mischievous drunk"

Hunx and His Punx with the Coathangers and Lil Daggers, presented by

Miami. The show starts at 9 p.m. and admission is free with RSVP to hunx.sailorjerrypresents.com. Call 305-576-9577 or visit thestagemiami.com.

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