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He does it all, in a coat of fresh paint

Every now and then a performer comes through town who’s not easily pigeon-holed.

Stuart Davis is the leader of that group.

He describes his music as folk/punk monk, but there’s a lot more going on when a man paints himself silver, dances around naked and performs 150 times a year.

As he prepared for his show tonight, we spoke with Davis about his claim to have invented dancing, why he had to beat up the winner of the Boston Marathon and the connection between art and lying.

I’ve heard about your campaign to make Minnesota an independent nation, with hockey and Buddhism merged into a new religion and classical Latin revived as the national tongue. How’s that campaign going?

Stuart Davis: There is a small percentage of the population, easily in the dozens now, that passionately supports the campaign.

We have to be patient, as most Buddhists aren’t intimately involved in hockey, and many hockey players are openly suspicious of Buddhism.

Classical Latin (not ecclesiastical Latin) is spoken fluently by most Minnesotans already, and is commonly used in everyday dialogue, so that’s not quite as difficult to implement.

Your career as a performer began after you dropped out of college and went into drug and alcohol treatment. How did you turn that desperate situation into something new and rewarding?

Davis: Desperation has its rewards. I actually only intended to try being a full-time musician for a few months to see how it would go.

That was 10 years ago, and I’ve been a full-time criminal .... er, artist ever since. It’s quite simple: You make up lies, which you relabel "works," and then record and perform your "works."

It’s a profound spiritual practice because this universe and reality are just made-up things too. So the liar/artist is becoming a conduit for the Creator.

Many people don’t realize that a lie is the underpinning of all impermanent phenomena, but a Holy Artist Liar Person does, at least to some degree, intuit this.

You claim to have beaten up the winner of the Boston Marathon in 1999. What were the circumstances?

Davis: He was behaving rudely, sweating all over, all full of himself because he had ambulated faster than anyone else in Boston.

My wife and I — well some guy’s wife and I — well, as it turned out, his wife and I — were standing there trying to, you know, what’s the phrase? "make out," you know, to celebrate his victory, to share the joy.

And I guess in his delirium, he misperceived our happiness as, what? infidelity?

So in defending myself, I pulled down his trousers and cooled him down with some Gatorade. His wife and I have been together ever since.

I’ve seen pictures of you dancing around naked, painted silver — what’s the deal?

Davis: Oh, that’s not paint, my friend. Remember the Incredible Hulk? I am his only offspring.

You also claim to have invented dancing. Are you friends with Al Gore?

Davis: Well, how do you define "friend?" I mean, friendship expresses itself in odd ways sometimes.

You can’t let something like a restraining order prevent you from loving someone.

Your daily meditation seems to play an important role in your life. Can you talk a little about what it does for you?

Davis: I am able to say a little, very little about that. You sit there. It’s pretty boring.

I understand that authors Ken Wilber, Suzuki Roshi and E.J. Gold have influenced your work. What are you reading now?

Davis: I just read "Illusions" by Richard Bach. I think the full title is "Illusions of a Reluctant Messiah." I only read it because I thought it was about me.

You wrote a book called "Kindred Visions, a Complete Guide to Ken Wilber." What is it about Mr. Wilber’s ideas you find so appealing?

Davis: Actually, I only contributed one chapter to the book. Ken is a tall, handsome, bald man, and he used to be a drummer; and I find all of that, except the drummer part, to be very appealing.

If you could have written any song in history, which and why?

Davis: I think I would have written the song "Drown," on my new album, which I did write, and now is part of history, which is part of beautiful lie called time, which is the work of the big Liar.

So let’s love each other and, doing so, we love the Liar.

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