Welcome to day 4 Bellman Barker’s Mustache Diary. You’ll be following us on a journey through five states in five days (check out Maryland yesterday) on our way back to the Velvet Lounge for a show on Saturday, October 27th. Each day, we’ll also profile someone we meet that has a great mustache.

Today, we’re in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania…

We park and store our shit in the Khyber – fantastic club right down in the historic district near Independence Hall. The openers tonight are a kind of local supergroup called Ladybug Window Party, formed from several different bands – a bunch of them are in The What Monsters. They’d only had one rehearsal ever before this show and they’re doing all of this crazy electronic folk shit. Pretty cool.

Ilad were lounge cats.
Small Town Fires lit it up.

This was probably the best show of the tour so far for us.

But before all this music went down, Aaron and Steve took off on a journey – a journey to find…

THE BELLMAN BARKER MUSTACHE PROFILE!!!!

When we asked around, everyone told us the sickest mustache in the area belonged to Eric LASTNAME, co-owner of Franklins Fountain ice cream parlor. We sat down for a friendly conversation about Tom Hanks, erotic confections and failed dreams:

Eric: Are you guys familiar with the movie Castaway?

Aaron: Yeah, I saw it once.

Eric: Well, when building this place, my brother and I just had a slice of pizza every day, peanut butter for lunch…

Steve: Just like in Castaway.

Aaron: Staring at a soccer ball and crying yourself to sleep.

Eric: Sleeping by the dipping cabinets on the floor. This was an erotic bakery for the last 15 years.

Aaron: Oh, I love bakeries. What made it erotic?

Eric: It was an adult cake shop.

Aaron: So there was a woman hiding in the cake?

Eric: No, no.

Steve: A man?

Eric: No, cakes made to resemble male and female body parts.

Aaron: Oh. Erotic body parts?

Eric: Exactly. There were artistic confectioners that would use jimmies in the most, uh, wild way.

Aaron: Jimmies?

Eric: Jimmies.

Steve: Jimmies.

Aaron: Jimmies?

Eric: Jimmies. J-

Aaron: What are jimmies?

Steve: Jimmies are sprinkles.

Aaron: Oh, so that’s shop talk.

Eric: It is. It’s an authentic term for the, uh-

Steve: I use jimmies everywhere. I used to work in an ice cream parlor too.

Eric: Yeah?

Steve: Yeah. It’s an industry term. Jimmies.

Aaron: Jimmies.

Eric: Yeah. So we – my brother and I – just built everything over a year and half and I grew this giant beard. I just never shaved; I was very slothful.

Aaron: For a year and a half?

Eric: Yeah, it was a huge castaway beard.

Aaron: Oh yeah, I’ve seen that.

Eric: Yeah, that’s what I was getting to.

Steve: Yeah.

Eric: Yeah, so, a week before we opened, I decided to shave it off. But I kept the mustache.

Aaron: Good call.

Steve: It’s glorious.

Eric: Chicks dig the mustache.

Steve: Aaron has a mustache.

Aaron: Who do you think chicks dig more: me or you?

[laughs]

Eric: Probably you because you are taller.

Aaron: but your mustache is longer.

Eric: Yeah, well…

Steve: What keeps you from doing the Raleigh Fingers thing?

Eric: Uh, well, you know, what it is: I’ve chewed my mustache off a number of times eating cheese steaks [laughs].

Aaron: It’s just so flavorful. It’s irresistible.

Eric: No, it just, it will get back in there and you won’t even realize it. It’s something about male and meat, you know, and they just grind it out and the mustache gets clipped. It’s nature’s means of keeping it a certain length: God’s way of keeping it short.

Aaron: God’s will. Divine intervention.

Eric: Eh…

Aaron: Maybe you were supposed to have that mustache this exact length.

Eric: …

Aaron: …

Eric: Also, people are always criticizing me about my mustache.

Steve: Haters.

Eric: They’re like: “oh, it’s not up, it’s not up!” I go to Phillies games and they’re like, “where’s the mustache?” It’s like, get a life dude – I just took a shower.

Aaron: It’s hard to keep it up all the time.

Steve: Chicks dig the mustache.

Eric: And I can’t shave it now because it’s become part of the business.

Aaron: You’re caged by the mustache.

Steve: A prisoner.

Eric: I am. Thing is, there are all these customers, guys, who now have girlfriends who demanded they shave their mustaches. And so they did, and they bring me their old mustache wax, so I have this constant supply of new waxes.

Aaron: …

Eric: It’s like they’re growing a mustache vicariously through me, like they’re still keeping it going.

Steve: So, it’s like you’re harvesting wax from other people’s failed relationships.

[laughs]

Eric: That’s one way of seeing it. Well, not really failed relationships, but dreams. It was just that their mustache had to go to keep the relationship going. And yet, I think something was lost there.

Aaron: This town called relationships should be big enough for both of them.

Steve: Have you had a relationship fail as a result of the mustache?

Eric: No.

Steve: Do you feel your relationships have grown stronger?

Eric: No.

Aaron: But it’s good with chicks.

Eric: It’s a good conversation starter. It gets people to talk to you.

Steve: It’s why we’re talking right now.

Eric: Yup.

Steve: It’s gets chicks to talk to you.

Aaron: The right chick could chew that mustache right off.

[laughs]

Carolyn and Joe from the excellent local Philly bands Rarebirds and Grammar Debate and Walt, who plays in the rockabilly band Bullets showed up at the Khyber and hung out with us ‘til close. They are really nice people – very good conversationalists, which is a pretty important find when you’re in a van with the same fucking people for several days on end.

Carolyn was gracious enough to let us sleep on her floor in South Philly. She has a dog named Eiffel.

Eiffel spent hours wrestling, biting and slobbering on Steve against his will. The rest of the band went to sleep with his cries of protest still ringing in their ears.

Tomorrow we continue our crusade through Pennsylvania…

BB

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