Moon the Loon

Keith Moon: The Real Me
monodrama by Mick Berry
3Below Theaters

Frankly, the whole “insane genius” thing pisses me off. History holds far too many great sane artists to support this idea that lunacy somehow opens the gates to creativity. That said, I can see how mentally ill artists make better stories, and therefore get better “press” when it comes to furthering their legacies.

Keith Moon, the addiction-crippled, mentally unbalanced drummer for The Who, certainly fits the bill, especially in the late-‘60s/early-‘70s Golden Age of rock, when destructive energy matched up with an unstable world to create nihilistic music.

Mick Berry’s wildly energetic one-man biodrama wrestles with this myth in a couple of ways. One, our host, Moon the Loon himself, pulls no punches, blaming himself for courting insanity, at the cost of his family and (in one truly horrific chapter) the life of his driver. Two, Berry’s performance actually addresses the music, the true reason for Moon’s genius, and the manic art of playing drums.

I’ll admit a certain bias. As a semi-pro drummer and singer, I demand a certain level of technical know-how when it comes to my musical novels, and find it infuriating that most music-based stories (Ann Patchett’s supposed opera novel Bel Canto, and just about every article ever published in The Rolling Stone) are about image and nothing else.

The way Berry addresses this problem is to play an impressively large drum kit to several Who songs during his performance. This is difficult enough (a recording has none of the give-and-take of a live band), but he also continues to talk during the songs, which, considering Moon’s highly involved style of play,  is a horribly difficult thing to do.

What we learn about Moon’s approach is deliciously, geekily satisfying. Founded in lessons from rock drummer Carlo Little (who once turned down a gig from an unknown band called The Rolling Stones), Moon learned to depend on a heavy bass beat, freeing himself from the standard 2-and-4 snare backbeat and allowing the production of cascading fills on toms and cymbals, riffing back and forth with Pete Townshend in an almost jazz sensibility. After seeing this show, you’ll better understand how Moon’s thundering, ever-talking presence led to the sense that The Who was simply bigger and louder than all the other bands.

The most impressive passage comes near the end of the evening, as Berry narrates what goes through a drummer’s mind during a song, in this case “Won’t Get Fooled Again.” Having been on that throne, I can tell you it really rings true. By performance time, a drummer has worked out all the technical stuff and  goes about “feeling” the song in a much more visceral fashion. Berry leads us through the sections with phrases like “lay out,” “build the tension,” “lead into the second verse,” “Oh God, I’m playing the same damn beat over and over, I’ve run out of ideas. No! How about this?”

The speaking side of Berry’s show provides quite a few entertaining tidbits about the band: the guitar smashing, groupies, booze, pills – how they made Tommy all about pinball mostly to make sure it got a good review from London’s most powerful rock critic, who was really into pinball. And some of the elaborate jokes Moon plays on strangers are worthy of Candid Camera’s best. But it’s this incredibly demanding combination of simultaneous acting and drumming that makes The Real Me such a treat, especially if you’re a fan of The Who.

Through June 25, 3Below Theaters, 288 S. Second Street, San Jose, 408/404-7711, 3belowtheaters.com.

Michael J. Vaughn is the author of twenty novels, including the rock novel Slow Children, and the drummer for San Francisco’s Exit Wonderland.