The touching holiday story of the Crack Whore Santa

 

One evening at Blackout Shoppers’ band rehearsal, our drummer at the time, MickeyFingers, was recounting a story of his apartment being robbed.

He worked in broadcasting at the time and was working midnight shifts. His roommate had been out drinking heavily at bars and had brought home a woman of ill repute with the intention of carnal indulgences. The roommate, however, passed out drunk and the woman burglarized the apartment. She had ransacked the place and taken numerous valuables. Mickey gave the drunkard roommate his walking papers and was shortly rid of him.

Mickey ran through a catalog of what she had stolen: expensive cameras, high-end electronics, books, DVDs, and a plethora of CDs had vanished in the hands of the larceny-prone harlot. It was an immense amount of property, beyond the capacity of one person to haul off by themselves.

“How did she carry all of that stuff out of your apartment?” I asked.

“She took pillowcases from my bed, filled them up with my stuff, and walked out of there like some kind of Crack Whore Santa.”

The Crack Whore Santa never left our imaginations after that. Not long after Mickey Fingers departed from the band, we recorded a song called “Crack Whore Santa” and asked him and his son to come in to the studio and record an introduction to the song. His son was five years old at the time. It is preserved for posterity on the recording:

“OK, so who don’t we want to see for Christmas this year?”

“Crack Whore Santa.”

“And why not?”

“Because she took Daddy’s things!”

[Together:] “Crack Whore Santa! One, Two, Three, Four!!”

Mickey Fingers recovered from the theft of his property and lives in Westchester with his wife and children. Despite having played in Blackout Shoppers, he is gainfully employed and lives a productive life. The drunken roommate managed to turn his life around—the next time Mickey Fingers saw him he appeared sobered up and in a stable relationship.

And Blackout Shoppers continue to play music inspired in part by such absurdist comedies of life. We are playing Otto’s Shrunken Head on Saturday, Dec. 20^th and “Crack Whore Santa” is on the set list.