HEADLINES:

- LUKE SKI’S KICKSTARTER
STRETCH GOAL UPDATE: We’re at 55% with 7 days to go!
http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/335203126/luke-skis-av-concert-rig/posts/217863

- PLEASE SUGGEST A 2011 LUKE SKI SONG FOR THE 2012 LOGAN AWARDS!
http://www.loganawards.com/nomination-form/

- “THE BALLAD OF OPTIMUS PRIME” FANVID BY JERED PEREZ
http://blip.tv/mr-tuesday/amv-the-ballad-of-optimus-prime-6116854

- TOUR DATES:
DUCKON http://duckon.org St.
Charles, IL June 1st - 3rd, 2012
DEEPSOUTHCON http://www.dsc50huntsville.com
AL June 15th - 17th, 2012
CONVERGENCE 2012 http://convergence-con.org
MN July 5th - 8th, 2012

- LUKE & CARRIE’S BAD RAPPORT: Episode #063 – Rent-A-Baby
http://badrapport.com

- THE FUNNY MUSIC PODCAST hits EPISODE #100!!!
http://www.thefump.com/podcast.php

…and more!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

HEADLINES:

- LUKE SKI’S KICKSTARTER STRETCH GOAL UPDATE

We are currently at $3,020! That’s 55% of the way to my stretch goal
of $5,500 with 7 days left to go!

To recap, if I hit my STRETCH GOAL of $5,500, I will plan a
“LukeSkiCon” weekend featuring the “FuMP Fest” concert in the
Chicago area for all the donors who are able to make it. For the
donors that aren’t able to make it, I will do a live webcast of the
concert, and make the concert recording available to all the donors.
For details, read this update: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/335203126/luke-skis-av-concert-rig/posts/217863
, and/or watch this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CENo99cOQ3Y
.

So please donate if you can, and please tell your friends online
about it. Remember, there are all kinds of awesome pledge prizes you
can get, like bacon, t-shirts, artwork, puppets, a song about you,
cake balls, house concerts, and Luke Ski mowing your lawn! Here’s
the link to the donation page: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/335203126/luke-skis-av-concert-rig
. This Kickstarter ends at Noon CST on Saturday, May 19th. Thanks
again so much to everyone who donated, let’s see if we can make
LukeSkiCon happen again!

~~~

- PLEASE SUGGEST A LUKE SKI SONG FOR THE LOGAN AWARDS!

The 2012 Logan Awards for Excellence In Comedy Music will be held at
DeepSouthCon in Huntsville this June, hosted by Dr. Demento himself.
The awards will honor the best comedy music of 2011, and it would be
a dream come true if I were to win one of these prestigious cat
statuettes. Songs of mine that have already made the Nomination
suggestion list are “Skeksis Back” (Video), “Sneaking Snacks into
the Cinema” (Original Song), and “Snoopy The Dogg” (Parody Song).
“Jabba Jive” and “We Are The FuMP” which were both written by me
also made the list for Parody Song. Thank you to the fans who
submitted those suggestions.

Please take a look at this list of my other eligible songs/videos.
If you think any of them are so good that they deserve an award,
then please go to the nomination suggestion page and submit them.

Parodies:
- WalkingSilly
- Sheldon’s Delight
- Serenity
- I’m That Type Of Spy
- Red Bank NJ
- Skeksis Back
- The Star Wars Chanukah Song

Originals:
- Smeg Head

Videos:
- “Flat 29 Is The Flat For Me” by Flat 29
- “My Figuas” by Possible Oscar
- “Stupid Cowboy Thing” by Cirque du So What?
- “You Just Don’t Get It, Do You?” by Paul & Storm
- “Shortest Song” by Insane Ian
- “Second Shortest Song” by Insane Ian

Suggestions for Nominations will be taken until May 31st. Here’s the
link to the Nomination suggestion page: http://www.loganawards.com/nomination-form/

~~~

- “THE BALLAD OF OPTIMUS PRIME” FANVID BY JERED PEREZ

Jered “Mr. Tuesday” Perez continues to be an awesome purveyor of
Luke Ski fanvid goodness! This time he tackles an old fan favorite,
“The Ballad Of Optimus Prime”, my filked-up celtic tribute to the
leader of the Autobots, done with the Nick Atoms in 2003, long
before Mr. Bay got his hands on him. Check out the video here: http://blip.tv/mr-tuesday/amv-the-ballad-of-optimus-prime-6116854

~~~

- TOUR DATES:

DUCKON 21
http://duckon.org
Pheasant Run Resort - St. Charles, IL (far west Chicago suburb)
June 1st - 3rd, 2012

This isn’t 100% confirmed, but it looks like I will be doing a
concert at DucKon on Sunday afternoon. Details TBA.

DEEPSOUTHCON 50
http://www.dsc50huntsville.com
Embassy Suites Huntsville - Huntsville, AL
June 15th - 17th, 2012

Special Media Guest of Honor Dr. Demento! Performing at DeepSouthCon
this year: the great Luke Ski, Devo Spice, Worm Quartet, Power
Salad, Tom Smith, Rob Balder, Carla Ulbrich, Steve Goodie, Nuclear
Bubble Wrap, The Boobles, and Danny Birt! This will also be the
location of the 2nd Annual Logan Whitehurst Memorial Awards for
Excellence in Comedy Music, hosted by Dr. Demento himself!

CONVERGENCE 2012
http://convergence-con.org/
DoubleTree By Hilton Bloomington Minneapolis South - Bloomington, MN
(Twin Cities area)
July 5th - 8th, 2012

At long last I am very happy to be returning to ConVergence! I am
doing a concert in Harmonic ConVergence on Saturday night at 7 pm,
with Possible Oscar following me at 8:30 pm.

~~~

- LUKE & CARRIE’S BAD RAPPORT
Episode #063 – Rent-A-Baby

This episode is done in a style that I like to call “thrown together
quickly”. We start off with a quick visit with Blasted Bill and
Moonbeam of Pod Of Destiny fame recorded just after PenguiCon. Then
we jump ahead to Luke & Carrie in the Wisconsin Dells following
their visit to the Twin Cities so baby Alex could meet his
grandparents and great grandparents. We recap the trip as well as
PenguiCon and Luke’s day at the Ultimate Marvel Marathon. Then we
return home to Josh & Sara and wrap up with News of the Stupid
and remind people to please donate to Luke Ski’s Kickstarter,
because if it hits the stretch goal of $5,500, we will throw
“LukeSkiCon” featuring the “FuMP Fest” concert in Chicago (see
website for details, Kickstarter ends on May 19th). We also have
comedy & music tracks by Mikey Mason, Power Salad, Steve Martin,
Wyatt Cenac, Brak, and Digital Underground, and a drawing of Carrie
and Luke as ducks for no reason. Episode length: 1:38:47

Listen, download, subscribe, leave us COMMENTS at http://badrapport.com
You can leave a VOICE MESSAGE for the podcast by dialing
(916)-LUKE-SKI
You can email us at badrapport@gmail.com
You can follow us on Twitter at http://twitter.com/badrapport
And we now have a Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/badrapport
RSS Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/LukeCarriesBadRapport
iTunes:
http://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/luke-carries-bad-rapport/id335287593

~~~

- THE FUNNY MUSIC PODCAST

Devo Spice and Luke Ski interview the artists who posted songs at
the FuMP dot com over the past week. Recent episodes include:

Episode #98: Tom Smith
Episode #99: Consortium of Genius and Insane Ian
Episode #100!!!: Scooter Picnic and Chris Waffle,
and we listen to highlights from the past 100 episodes!!!

Webpage: http://www.thefump.com/podcast.php
RSS feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/funnymusic

The FuMPcast is recorded live on Thursday nights at 9:00 pm CST on
Dementia Radio. To listen live, just take whatever audio program you
use to listen to streaming audio online (WinAmp, iTunes, Windows
Media
Player, RealPlayer, etc.) and have it play the following address:
http://dementiaradio.org:8027
. If you need more help tuning in, visit
the Dementia Radio website, http://dementiaradio.org
. Dementia Radio
can also be heard on Roku.

My Kickstarter hit its goal of $1,750 in less than 24 hours, and I couldn’t be more shocked, happy, and appreciative. So thank you so much to everyone who has already donated. My friends have encouraged me to come up with a STRETCH GOAL, so I came up with a list of more technology that would help me out creatively and practically both at home and on the road at gigs: A drawing tablet for my computer so I can make animated cartoons, a new modern video camera, a Zoom H2 recorder for podcasts and live shows, a GPS for my car, a Laptop so I can get work done on the road, an iPod so I can give the one I’m currently using back to its owner, and an iPad for showing videos at my merch table (which will also help with merch sales at Table 27 at MarsCon). Factoring in fees and the production costs of the pledge prizes, I came up with a stretch goal target of $5,500. I know this seems high, but I hit $1,750 in less than a day, so it’s certainly possible to hit that goal in the next 18 days.

So what is the incentive for the donors for me to hit this stretch goal? I will plan a weekend long series of fun events in the Chicago area, which I am jokingly calling “LukeSkiCon”. The central event of the weekend will be a live at least 2 hour long concert headlined by Luke Ski, and featuring other acts from the FuMP dot com and “The Dr. Demento Show”, which I will call the “FuMP Fest”. If there is decent enough internet at the location of the show, we will webcast the live concert (hopefully both audio & video) so the donors who couldn’t make it can watch / listen to the show as it happens. We’ll also record the show and make it available to donors who miss the live webcast. So even donating as little as $1 will get you access to the recording of the concert. So why wouldn’t you?

Other potential ideas for activities I’ve come up while brainstorming about “LukeSkiCon” are as follows:

• Movie riffing
• Screening rare videos & films from early in my life
• A talent show for the fans to participate in
• Recording things for use in future Luke Ski songs/sketches
• Go to Key Lime Cove indoor water park
• A visit to Galloping Ghost Arcade to play classic 80’s video games
• Invade a Karaoke night somewhere and dominate it
• Play the ‘Boob Tree’/'Eat Poop You Cat’ drawing game
• Luke & Carrie’s Bad Rapport podcast LIVE!

There’s so much cool, fun stuff to be done in the Chicagoland area, we’ll take suggestions and figure out an itinerary full of stuff people want to do that’s as affordable as possible. We can also arrange for all our out of town participants to stay at the same hotel, so it’ll be even more convention-like.

So to recap, if I hit my STRETCH GOAL of $5,500, I will plan a “LukeSkiCon” weekend featuring the “FuMP Fest” concert in the Chicago area for all the donors who are able to make it. For the donors that aren’t able to make it, I will do a live webcast of the concert, and make the concert recording available to all the donors.

So please donate if you can, and please tell your friends online about it. This Kickstarter ends at Noon on May 19^th, let’s see if we can make LukeSkiCon happen again! Thanks again so much to everyone who donated, and I will talk to you all again soon.

To donate, follow this link: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/335203126/luke-skis-av-concert-rig

~ Luke Ski, 4/30/12

• “HOW TO SPEAK SHOEBOX” by Cirque du So What?

Download it now for free at the FuMP: http://www.thefump.com

In 2004, Luke Ski went to visit ShoEboX of Worm Quartet in Rochester. Back then ShoEboX had a couple of sketches written which he recorded with Luke. For whatever reason, they didn’t see the light of day again until the scripts were exhumed for use in “Cirque du So What?”. The first sketch “Escargot Flambe A La Mode” was on our first album. The second sketch is now a FuMP offering, and it can be found on our latest album “Stupid Cowboy Thing - Volume 2: Additional Squid”, available for purchase at the FuMP store, so enjoy your 8-years-overdue language lesson.

CARRIE DAHLBY HAD A BABY!

On Leap Year Day 2012, at 1:55 pm Carrie Dahlby gave birth to Alexander David Rasey, 8 lbs 4 oz, 21 inches long. He has blonde hair, and Carrie says he looks just like his Daddy, Josh Rasey. Much congratulations and hugs to both of them. If you want to tell Carrie and Josh congrats, you can do so by calling 916-LUKE-SKI (that’s 916-585-3754) and leave them a voice message, which we will play to them on our podcast, “Bad Rapport”. Welcome to the world, Alex! http://tinyurl.com/CarrieAndAlex

The greatest weekend in comedy music returns in 2012 to rock the apocalypse! Performing in the Dementia Track this year will be Music Guests Of Honor The Consortium Of Genius as well as newcomers Seamonkey, The Boobles, Spaff, second-comers TV’s Kyle and Dino-Mike, and returning favorites the great Luke Ski, Devo Spice, Worm Quartet, Power Salad, Cirque du So What?, the Gothsicles, and Possible Oscar! Dementia Track schedule and details on other related events are at the track’s website, http://www.marscondementia.com .

You can help us out by ordering the MarsCon 2012 Dementia Track Fund Raiser CD and/or MP3 set! It’s 4 hours of live music & comedy recorded live at MarsCon 2011 by Possible Oscar, the great Luke Ski, Worm Quartet, Toyboat, TV’s Kyle, Steve Goodie, Nuclear Bubble Wrap, Cirque du So What?, Devo Spice, Carrie Dahlby, DJ Particle, Beth Kinderman, Smashy Claw, Rob Balder, BaldBox, Break Man Z, Brett Glass, Gifted Gear, Soggy Potato Chips, Jeff Reuben, Insane Ian, and Puppet Show! You can get the 3-CD set with instant MP3 download for just $30, or you can get the MP3 download only version for $20. All the money raised will go towards covering the hotel room costs for our out-of-town non-GoH Dementia Track performers. Please help us bring you the best set of comedy music shows we can by picking up a copy of the collection and help us reach our goal. Thanks.

I have created a 33-minute long FREE PREVIEW of the MarsCon 2012 Dementia Track Fund Raiser album. It features 8 songs from live performances at MarsCon 2011. You can listen to it on the podcast feed/page for “Bad Rapport” at http://badrapport.com, or you can get the MP3 directly from this link: http://tinyurl.com/MarsCon12PREVIEW .

Also, I’ve put together an ad for MarsCon 2012, the Dementia Track, and the Fund Raiser for D.J.s and podcasters to play on their shows. The short version is about 3:30, and can be found here: http://tinyurl.com/MarsCon12adSHORT . The long version is just under 8 minutes, and can be found here: http://tinyurl.com/MarsCon12adLONG . Any airplay you’re willing to give them would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

Pre-registration for a 3-Day badge to MarsCon 2012 is just $45.00 thru Jan. 31st, 2012. After that it will cost $60.00 at the door. Single day badges are also available. You can purchase your badges, get hotel reservation info, and details on the rest of the convention (Actor Guest of Honor Claudia Christian!) at http://www.marscon.com .

Visit http://www.marscondementia.comfor more information on the MarsCon 2012 Dementia Track.

• “SNOOPY THE DOGG” #1 ON DR. DEMENTO’S FUNNY 25 OF 2011!!!

Also, “WALKINGSILLY” was #13, and “ELEVATOR” by Cirque du So What? was #22!

Listen to the show here: http://drdemento.com/online.html . I posted my annual color-coded overanalyzation of Dr. Demento’s Funny 25 at my livejournal here: http://lukeski.livejournal.com/707419.html . I’m not posting everything from that breakdown here, just the most pertinent stuff…

So, this year I had 2 tracks on the list (#1 and #13), and Cirque du So What? had 1 (at #22, congrats ShoEboX on writing the best track on our 2nd album), and the FuMP overall had 10 tracks on the list. Also, I’m very happy to see Insane Ian hit #7, and Flat 29 hit #6 (they also appear in #13 and #22).

And in case you think I was just glossing over and burying the lead here, I’ll say it again: “SNOOPY THE DOGG” BY THE GREAT LUKE SKI IS #1 ON DR. DEMENTO’S FUNNY 25 OF 2011!!! You have no idea how happy this makes me. Born from an idea I found from my first list of song parody ideas in an old notebook from 1993, this song proves that good ideas don’t die, they are diamonds in the rough waiting to be found again. Thank God I saved all of my “too much stuff”. Hoarding FTW!

Thank you Dr. Demento. Thank you to my fans. Thank you to Jared Ringold, Bob Emmet, Carrie Dahlby, Chris Mezzolesta, Insane Ian, and the Stacey for contributing your extreme talents to “Snoopy The Dogg”. Thank you Calvin “Snoop Dogg” Broadus. And thank you Charles Schulz, my first idol who inspired me to create things.

Also, thank you to Dan from Flat 29 and Bob Emmet for making “WalkingSilly” as awesome as it is. Thank you to ShoEboX, Devo Spice, and Chris Mezzolesta for Cirque du So What?, one of the most artistically satisfying things I have ever done. And thanks to my lovely, beautiful, and tolerant wife Sara Trice, who puts up with me and all of the dementia music, podcasting, convention-hopping, puppet-making, etcetera everything that I do. I love you.

Along with “Peter Parker” (2002) and “Stealing Like A Hobbit” (2003), I have written and performed 3 songs that have been #1 on Dr. Demento’s Funny 25 Countdown. The only artist who has more than me is “Weird Al” (he has 4, or 5 if you count the differing L.A. local Dr. D shows). That makes me feel pretty damn good about myself. If you’re going to go out, go out on top…

“But it was along side these other musicians that Luke realized he had a purpose in life – to be better than them.” ~ Devo Spice, 2010, from the liner notes of “the great Luke Ski: Greatest Hits Volume 1: 1996-2003″

…Yes, I’m stroking my ego here. Cut me some slack. This is the last time I will have a #1 song of the year on “The Dr. Demento Show”. Probably.

Thanks again, everybody. My heart is filled with warmth and love today.

“Happiness is a warm puppy.” – Charles Schulz

~ Luke Ski, 12/31/11

• “SNOOPY THE DOGG” ALSO #1 ON MAD MUSIC TOP 100 OF 2011!!!

DJ Particle hosts the official countdown show of MadMusic.com, and Luke Ski was all over their best of 2011 list!

#1 - Snoopy The Dogg - the great Luke Ski
#7 - Cosplaying Fangurls - Insane Ian, featuring the great Luke Ski
#9 - Sneaking Snacks Into the Cinema - Flat 29, the great Luke Ski, & Carrie Dahlby
#11 - We Are The FuMP - The FuMP (featuring & written by the great Luke Ski)
#13 - WalkingSilly - the great Luke Ski, featuring Dan from Flat 29
#15 - Elevator - Cirque du So What?
#18 - Group Dynamic Meeting (One More Stupid Day) - Cirque du So What?
#20 - 200 Minutes of Free Prayer Time - Cirque du So What?
#28 - Red Bank, NJ - the great Luke Ski
#36 - Sheldon’s Delight - the great Luke Ski
#50 - It’s Good to Be the King - the great Luke Ski, featuring Devo Spice, Insane Ian, & Jared Ringold
#66 - My Baby’s In Love with Jon Bermuda - the great Luke Ski
#93 - I’m That Type Of Spy - the great Luke Ski
#94 - Serenity - the great Luke Ski

Listen to the top 50 from the list get counted down here: http://www.madmusic.com/playlist.aspx?Show=MMDT20_11-FY

• “SNOOPY THE DOGG” also #3 on A-Logg’s Wacked Out 40 of 2011!

“A-Logg On The Airwaves” continues his countdown tradition as well, which you can listen to here: http://www.madmusic.com/playlist.aspx?Show=AOTA-111231 “Snoopy The Dogg” was #3 for the year, and “WalkingSilly” featuring Dan from Flat 29 was #7! Also, back on November 12th, A-Logg posted an episode which features an interview with me we recorded, and I completely forgot to tell all of you about it. My bad. So, go give it a listen here: http://www.madmusic.com/playlist.aspx?show=AOTA-111112

“THE STAR WARS CHANUKAH SONG”
Download the MP3 now for free at http://www.thefump.com

In the original “It’s A Fanboy Christmas” medley I did in 2000, I did a 25-second parody of the chorus of Adam Sandler’s “The Chanukah Song” about the “Star Wars” franchise. Since Adam has done a couple of sequels to his song, I thought it would be a-propos to update and extend mine for “It’s A Fanboy Christmas 3: Return Of The Magi” for the holiday season of 2010. However, when I got done writing the song, the new vignette was much too long for the already nearly 12-minute medley, so I decided to save it and make it into its own 2-minute song to post this year on the first night of Chanukah 2011. Music by Bob Emmet. Video by Donald “Dr. Don” Coleman: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jShjnLfNUOY I hope you all like it and will share it with your friends online. Peace and love to everybody.

LUKE & CARRIE’S BAD RAPPORT PODCAST VIDEO EPISODE #2!

Over a year and a half after the video debut of our truncated yet puppet-tastic episode of our podcast “Luke & Carrie’s Bad Rapport”, we at long last have finally finished our follow-up episode, and this one is even more chock full of awesome comedy songs by some of your favorite acts from the FuMP! We also have News of the Stupid, we meet the respective spouses of Luke & Carrie, and we reinforce the supposition that some of these comedy music acts should probably look into getting a restraining order against Luke Ski considering how much time he puts into making fanboyish tribute music videos of their songs without their knowledge. [Warning: Some NSFW language, you might want to wear headphones just to be on the safe side]. Episode length: 17:58. YouTube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xnnPZW7v13E Watch, download, subscribe, leave us COMMENTS at http://badrapport.com

UPDATE - 10/11/2011 - Jonah tweeted about the “Skeksis Back” video, followed by Chris, who also posted about it on the Nerdist website, calling the video “SKEKTACULAR”! I am very happy that my mission was a success, and that the Nerdist guys and so many others all got such a kick out of it. Special thanks to Eric “Seamonkey” Tomme for graciously donating the music, and to Sara Trice for puppetry assistance. NerdWin!

UPDATE - 10/18/2011 - You can now download an MP3 of the song “Skeksis Back” for free at the FuMP dot com!

And as long as I’m updating, I’ll mention these:

• PLEASE REQUEST “SNOOPY THE DOGG” FOR THE DR. DEMENTO SHOW!

“Snoopy The Dogg” crawled out of the dog house and managed to sneak onto the Top Ten for September 2011 at #10! According to the unofficial Fan Tallies, it’s still the #1 song of the year, but it’s tied with another song which has been the #1 song on the Top Ten for 3 months in a row. Between that and the other great songs by my colleagues, I fear I’m going to fall out of the top spot! Will October’s coming of the Great Pumpkin save me? I don’t know, but you sure can help me stay on top of the countdown by requesting for “The Dr. Demento Show” to play my song “Snoopy The Dogg” again at his site’s request page: http://drdemento.com/request . And hey, with Halloween just around the corner, what better time is there to tune into the show and listen to some spooky tunes and scary melodies! You can do so at http://drdemento.com/online.html . It’s still the best show ever!

It’s also definitely worth noting that my Monty Python tribute song “WALKINGSILLY” featuring Dan of Flat 29 also made the Top Ten this month, at #6! Funny, I thought there was NOOOOOOO #6! So thank you to all of you who requested that one as well, it looks like I’ll have at least 2 tracks on the Funny 25 this year. People will have to start calling me Luke “Two Tracks” Sienkowski.

• THE “LUKE SKI TOP 50 POLL” FOR 2011 - RESULTS ARE IN!
  

Some things stayed the same, but there were also some surprising new changes to the Luke Ski Top 50 poll. The results are now up at: http://www.thegreatlukeski.com/top50/ , as well as all of the songs & lyrics from “Be Amused By Me” having been added to the Song Index with Lyrics page: http://www.thegreatlukeski.com/lyrics/ . Thank you to the at 49+ of you who all voted in the poll.

• LUKE SKI NOMINATED FOR A LOGAN AWARD!

I am very honored to announce that my song “It’s Good To Be The King” was nominated for Outstanding Parody Song of 2010 for the Logan Awards! The song, a parody of “Down With The King” by Run DMC with Pete Rock and CL Smooth, is about the career of Mel Brooks, covering all 13 of his films, and makes note of his work on comedy albums, TV, and Broadway. It has guest vocalists Devo Spice, Insane Ian, and Jared Ringold of Possible Oscar, who also did the music for the track. It was #1 on Dr. Demento’s Top Ten for November 2010, placing it at #19 on his year-end Funny 25 of 2010. Originally posted at the FuMP dot com, the track also appears on my new full length comedy music album, “Be Amused By Me”. The winners will be announced this Saturday at the 1st Annual Logan Whitehurst Memorial Awards for Excellence in Comedy Music at Con on the Cob in Hudson, Ohio. To find out the rest of the nominees in all categories, visit http://www.loganawards.com.

• LUKE SKI INTERVIEWED ON “TALES FROM THE CON FLOOR”

While at ConCeption a couple weeks ago, I was interviewed for a new podcast called “Tales from the Con Floor”, a podcast dedicated to documenting the convention experience. My episode was posted recently, so you can go give it a listen at http://talesfromtheconfloor.com/2011/09/24/live-from-concentric-the-great-luke-ski/

• TOUR DATES:

NERDPOW! 2011
http://www.nerdpow.com
Hyatt Regency Columbus - Columbus, OH
October 28th - 30th, 2011

I’m performing on Friday night at 7:00 pm, and I’ll have a merch table there for the duration of the event. Also performing there will be Dual Core, My Parent’s Favorite Music, The Amazing Brando, MC Cool Whip, and more, as well as dances with awesome DJs spinning tunes, video game tournaments, costume contest, and lots of other fun stuff!

OTHER 2011 TOUR DATES INCLUDE:

CONTRAFLOW - http://www.contraflowscifi.org - Gretna, LA - Nov 4-6
WINDYCON 38 - http://www.windycon.org - Lombard, IL - Nov 11-13

See the Tour Dates page of LukeSki.com for details.

“Snoopy The Dogg” crawled out of the dog house and managed to sneak onto the Top Ten for September 2011 at #10! According to the unofficial Fan Tallies, it’s still the #1 song of the year, but it’s tied with another song which has been the #1 song on the Top Ten for 3 months in a row. Between that and the other great songs by my colleagues, I fear I’m going to fall out of the top spot! Will October’s coming of the Great Pumpkin save me? I don’t know, but you sure can help me stay on top of the countdown by requesting for “The Dr. Demento Show” to play my song “SNOOPY THE DOGG” again at his site’s request page: http://drdemento.com/request . And hey, with Halloween just around the corner, what better time is there to tune into the show and listen to some spooky tunes and scary melodies! You can do so at http://drdemento.com/online.html . It’s still the best show ever!

It’s also definitely worth noting that my Monty Python tribute song “WALKINGSILLY” featuring Dan of Flat 29 also made the Top Ten this month, at #6! Funny, I thought there was NOOOOOOO #6! So thank you to all of you who requested that one as well, it looks like I’ll have at least 2 tracks on the Funny 25 this year. People will have to start calling me Luke “Two Tracks” Sienkowski.

• THE “LUKE SKI TOP 50 POLL” FOR 2011

It’s been two years, and now that “Be Amused By Me” has been out for 2 months, it’s time for me to update the Luke Ski Top 50 at my website to include all the songs that appear on the album into the running for the updated list for my website. Here’s all you need to do. Go to this link: http://www.misterpoll.com/polls/537028 Go down the list of songs (they are arranged chronologically by album), and if a song is a personal favorite of yours, click on it to vote for it. You can vote for as many as you want. I’ll keep the poll open until midnight on Tuesday, October 11th, and announce the updated list soon after that. Thanks fans for participating, I can’t wait to see how “Be Amused By Me” rates against my hits of the past.

• TOUR DATES:

CON ON THE COB 2011
http://www.cononthecob.com/music.html
Clarion Hotel & Conference Center - Hudson, Ohio (Cleveland/Akron area)
October 13th - 16th, 2011

Performing this year in the ShoEboX-chaired Comedy Music Extravagasm is Music Guest Of Honor Carla Ulbrich, the great Luke Ski, Devo Spice, Worm Quartet, Power Salad, Cirque du So What, Carrie Dahlby, Insane Ian, Rob Balder, Positude, Nuclear Bubble Wrap, Soggy Potato Chips, Max DeGroot, Derwood Bowen, ShiSho, and more. Also, the first annual LOGAN AWARDS will be held there. That’s the Logan Whitehurst Memorial Awards for Excellence in Comedy Music, to be specific. My song “It’s Good To Be The King” was nominated for Outstanding Parody Song of 2010! You can find out all about it here: http://www.loganawards.com Be there and witness comedy music history.

NERDPOW! 2011
http://www.nerdpow.com
Hyatt Regency Columbus - Columbus, OH
October 28th - 30th, 2011

I’m performing on Friday night at 7:00 pm, and I’ll have a merch table there for the duration of the event. Also performing there will be Dual Core, My Parent’s Favorite Music, The Amazing Brando, MC Cool Whip, and more, as well as dances with awesome DJs spinning tunes, video game tournaments, costume contest, and lots of other fun stuff!

• “I’M THAT TYPE OF SPY”

Luke Ski’s new parody song tribute to “CHUCK”!
Download the free MP3 at http://www.thefump.com

This song is a parody of LL Cool J’s “I’m That Type Of Guy”, a song about a sneaky lover with a video featuring LL as a covert operative using all his espionage skills to break into the U.S. national scantily-clad hottie depository. Which led me to think, well, just what type of spy is he? And is there another modern spy more deserving of a task like that? The answer is yes, of course there is, and he lives in Burbank. I’m talking about “Chuck”, the titlular character of NBC’s awesome spy show about to enter it’s 5th and final season, starring the nerd machine himself, Zachary Levi. So I hope all you internet-dwelling Chuck fans tell all your online friends about this song available here at the FuMP dot com, and it’s excellent FAN VIDEO made by Emily Ann Meyer, which world premiered at Nerdapalooza 2011.

This song is from my new album “Be Amused By Me”, which also has songs about Anime, Serenity, The Big Bang Theory, Bruce Campbell, Kevin Smith films, Monty Python, Red Dwarf, Disney buying Marvel, Twitter, Mel Brooks, and my big Dr. Demento Show hit of 2011 about Peanuts, “Snoopy The Dogg”. You can get it from my website LukeSki.com, available as an instant MP3 download, or on CD with instant MP3 download.

• PLEASE REQUEST “SNOOPY THE DOGG” FOR THE DR. DEMENTO SHOW!

“Snoopy The Dogg” did not make the Top Ten for August 2011 on the Dr. Demento Show. However, the unofficial fan tallies indicate that it’s still the most requested song of 2011 thus far, so it still has a chance to top the year end Funny 25 Countdown. The competition from the competent, confident comedy conspiritors is constant, so com on and please help keep it at the top of the list by requesting for “The Dr. Demento Show” to play “Snoopy The Dogg” again at http://drdemento.com/request . And as always, I can’t encourage and recommend enough that you tune in and listen to the show every week at http://drdemento.com/online.html . It’s still the best show ever.

In similar news, my new Monty Python tribute song “WalkingSilly” made the August Top Ten at #3! Splunge-tastic! So after you’ve put in a request for “Snoopy The Dogg”, feel free to put in an additional request for “WalkingSilly” if you like, unless some Army Colonel tells you that it’s much too silly.

• LUKE SKI INTERVIEWED ON “CHICAGO COMEDY & ARTIST SPOTLIGHT”

On Wednesday, August 31st, I was interviewed live on Slam Internet Radio (http://www.slaminternetradio.com) by Josh and Abby on their show “Chicago Comedy & Artist Spotlight”! The show lasted about 2 hours and was a lot of fun. There was much frivolity and Pepe the King Prawn impressions. You can listen to the show via Ustream here: http://www.ustream.tv/recorded/16994316

• THE 2010 “LOGAN AWARDS” SUGGESTION FORM IS LIVE!

Yes, next month at Con on the Cob in Hudson, Ohio, the first annual Logan Whitehurst Memorial Award for Excellence In Comedy Music will be held. Each year the Logan Awards will give out awards for excellence in comedy music for the previous calendar year, so this year we’ll be awarding songs that came out in 2010. The awards will be voted on by a rotating jury of 7 experts, which this year includes “Weird Al” Yankovic, and permanent juror Dr. Demento. The jury’s nominations will be based on the suggestions submitted by you, the fans, using the nomination form. The categories are:

Outstanding Original Comedy Song
Outstanding Parody Song
Outstanding Comedy Music Video

The Nomination Suggestion Form website is here: http://www.loganawards.com/nomination-form/ , and also has a link to a list of songs already nominated. Once a song is already on the nomination list, it doesn’t need to be submitted again. The list already has my song “IT’S GOOD TO BE THE KING” on it, as well as Carrie’s music video for “WRECKIN’ BY THE BOOK (THE CAKE WRECKS SONG)”, which makes me very happy. Other songs of mine that qualify for potential suggestion are (Parody category) “Anime Fan”, “It’s A Fanboy Christmas 3″, and (Original category) “Blues Campbell”. So if you feel any of those songs are, in your honest opinion, so good that it deserves an award, then feel free to go to the Nomination Form page and suggest it.

The full details on the Logan Awards can be found at http://www.loganawards.com

• Luke offers reward for stolen / missing / lost notebooks

If we made the CdSW sketch “Looking For Things” into a L.A.R.P., that would accurately describe my sucky weekend.

My Labor Day weekend was spent laboring in various ways, starting at 9:30 pm Friday night and not stopping until 9:30 pm Monday. On Friday night, after seeing my brother’s band perform at Schuba’s in Chicago, I returned to my car to discover that someone had smashed my rear passenger-side window and stole my big black bag filled with my art supplies, notebooks, and such. Obviously, they thought there was a laptop in there, which there wasn’t, just a ton of heavy paper. 24 hours later, I got a phone call from a couple of good Samaritans who found some of my stuff in various garbage receptacles in an alley about a mile away near Wrigley Field. I got back the empty bag, my caricature demo portfolio, my color artstix, and a few other really important things. I did not get back my digital camera (worth $150) or my Dick Blick Manga Set of 24 color Copic sketch markers (worth $125 at my local Blick store) (http://www.amazon.com/COPIC-Wallet-Sketch-Markers-Travel/dp/B000FWEAWM/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1315325874&sr=8-3). Those things can be replaced. What can’t be replaced is two notebooks. One has a blue cover and contains all of my notes, lyrics, ideas, etc., from the past year and a half (May 2010 - August 2011). The other has a pink cover and, even more tragically, is from my High School / College years (1992-ish), which I put in the bag last weekend so I could read an old comic book story that I wrote a script for but never drew a final version of, for later podcast discussion purposes. I read it last weekend, but didn’t remove it from my bag afterwards.

After meeting up with the good Samaritans, I spent late Friday night, Saturday morning, and Sunday afternoon walking the Wrigleyville streets between where the bag was stolen and found, searching garbage cans and dumpsters for the 2 notebooks, even going so far as to put some fliers up offering a $100 reward for the 2 notebooks. A version of that flier can be viewed here: http://t.co/sgyxI0X Realistically, I have to assume they are gone forever, but at least I can go on with my life now knowing that I literally did everything I possibly could have done to try and recover them. Sometime very soon, I will sit down and type up a synopsis of the comic book story from the pink notebook, in case I ever want to try and rewrite it. The rest of my time Labor Day weekend was spent drawing caricatures at my 2 usual locations. I made good money this weekend, but I would have made at least a couple hundred dollars more if I hadn’t stupidly forgotten that my art bag which in reality is a laptop bag was sitting in the backseat of my car when I went to Schuba’s. Normally I am very paranoid about things like this, and I put things of value in my trunk or at least cover them up and hide them from plain view. After I talk about it on Bad Rapport and the FuMPcast this week, I’m going to stop beating myself up over it and do my best to put it all behind me, “keep moving forward”, and get on with my life with a positive outlook on things.

• TOUR DATES:

CONCEPTION 2011
http://concentricconventioncompany.com
College of DuPage, 425 Fawell Blvd - Glen Ellyn, IL (suburb of Chicago)
September 23rd - 25th, 2011

Conception is a small gaming convention at the College of DuPage. I will be there on Friday at my merch table in the dealer’s room 5-9 pm, as well as Saturday from 10 am to 6 pm. I’ll be doing a couple of performances there on Saturday, at 1 pm and at 6 pm. (Note: I won’t be there on Sunday.)

GEEKEASY: Episode II
Saturday, September 24 - 10:00pm to 3:00am
Lucky Number, 1931 N Milwaukee Ave, Chicago, IL
The event is FREE, 21+ only.
http://www.facebook.com//groups/219331881414358

Geekeasy is a late night of nerd entertainment and dance music in Chicago, IL, put together by DJ Aaron Ackerson. This time around, there will be live improvised movie riffing of the live-action “Masters Of The Universe” film by special guests Nostalgia Critic & the great Luke Ski, a performance by Geek Girl Burlesque performers Bella Canto, Hazel Hellbender, Lacey Lay, and Hootenany Cha-Cha, a 5-song set by the great Luke Ski (going on at about 12:30 am), and tunes spun by DJ Jeffito.

OTHER 2011 TOUR DATES INCLUDE:

ARCHON - http://www.archonstl.org/35 - Collinsville, IL - Sep30-Oct2
CON ON THE COB - http://www.cononthecob.com - Hudson, OH - Oct 13-16
NERDPOW! - http://www.nerdpow.com - Columbus, OH - Oct 28-30
CONTRAFLOW - http://www.contraflowscifi.org - Gretna, LA - Nov 4-6
WINDYCON 38 - http://www.windycon.org - Lombard, IL - Nov 11-13

See the Tour Dates page for details.