Sunday, October 23, 2011
Obituary Joey Bowker, the Bat Poet, Dies at 59: The Dark Knight Recedes
Posted by Jim Ridley on Sun, Oct 23, 2011 at 8:00 PM
Bowker, 59, presided over one of the weirdest spectacles in the history of Nashville TV programming: a fleabag variety show featuring hand puppets, stuffed-animal warfare, wrestling matches, and local celebrity cameos ranging from attorney Bart Durham to country warbler Miss Melba Toast. These were embellished with crude first-generation video effects and supported by plotlines that could only be followed by kids and the deeply, irretrievably stoned.
But the man in the $62 Batman mask (purchased in 1992 from Spencer's Gifts in Hickory Hollow) had a loyal fan base that included musicians, politicians, wiseguy teens, college kids, and anyone else likely to be home, bored and curious on a Friday or Saturday night, when his shows aired on NECAT Channel 19 (as they have, off and on, since the show debuted in 1995). His notoriety was sometimes regarded as a mixed blessing at a public-access station trying to cultivate an air of professionalism. But there is too much dull proficiency in the world as it is, while there was only one Bat Poet.
A staccato mile-a-minute talker who subsidized his broadcasting habit by working as a cabbie, Bowker had suffered enormous medical and financial blows over the past several years, from diabetes to heart trouble. Benefits put scarcely a dent in his hospital expenses. For those used to seeing him in his jaunty, barrel-chested prime, his appearance in recent years was a shock: frail, unsteady, propped by a walker, wracked by coughing fits and wheezes that tended to stop his perpetual scheming in frustration.
And yet he always steered away from his current troubles to talk about doing that next show, working that next promotional hustle, getting that next cool guest, finding that syndication deal that might allow him to make a living wage off doing what he loved. As a cabbie, he was privy to a whole nightworld most of Nashville never sees, a world of all-nite greasy spoons and strip-club parking lots, a world where the conventioneer in your backseat slips you a couple of bills just so you'll stay put out back of the massage parlor. In standing up for rock bands and burlesque gals and kayfabe wrasslin' matches, he was the anti-Chamber of Commerce, hellbent to remind hoity-toity Nashvillians that they were living in his Music City, not he in theirs.
A memorial service is being planned, and we'll pass along the details as they arrive. A memorial page has also been established on Facebook. In the meantime, here's the end of a 2008 Scene article detailing a benefit held on the air at Channel 19 in Bowker's behalf:
A coffee can passed around by [Channel 19 producer/host Jesse] Goldberg to the 30 or so well-wishers and participants on hand came back stuffed to overflowing with change and bills. In the end, the evening was much like an episode of the Bat Poet's own show — ramshackle, all-embracing and lit by the glare of unextinguished work lights.The only thing missing was the guest of honor. Still too frail to deliver new episodes of his show, Joey Bowker watched the telethon propped up on Melba Toast's couch in East Nashville. But in a basement off Music Row, near the headquarters of the honky-tonk industrial complex, a cowl sits on a wig stand awaiting the call to action.
"I'm not tall, dark and handsome. I'm ugly and short," Bowker says. "But it's amazing what happens when I put on the clothes. I'll still be chasin' women, tearin' up the streets and waitin' for that call from the mayor. God's gonna let me live a little longer."
If only, Joey. We'll keep watching the skies, just in case.
Comments (12)
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A fine example for all to follow; "Rage, rage against the dying of the light". One more piece of the threadbare spangled fabric that was uniquely Nashville gone.
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This was a beautiful story. I'm from up north in Canada and was just chasing a Twitter link, but this dude seems like he should have been all types up Adult Swim's alley. Wishing his soul an easy ride through eternity.
I didn't watch regularly, but there was something so totally off the wall about the Bat Poet that I just couldn't help stopping and watching for a minute, while I channel-surfed.
Rest in peace, Mr. Bowker. You were truly an original.
Joey was a wonderful man and I was very honored to get to work with him for many years. Thank you, Joey, for making so many dreams come true. Watch over those of us you left behind and help to keep us on track, like you always did in life. You will definitely be missed in Music City USA.
Selina Desire
aka
Wonder Princess
The Bat Poet and his crazy show will definitely be missed. He was original when others followed the current trends and he made fun of the things that other people were afraid to comment on. I miss the days when he was healthy and full of energy, at least his pain is gone now.
Sam Bukka
P.S. If you've never seen the show search YouTube, plenty of clips have been posted by various people and his mayhem is seen around the world.
Joey was one of the very first people I met when I arrived in Nashville. He told me he had lived much of the past two years on the streets and I know there were times that he was close to going back. I lent him twenty dollars one time when he wasn't working and he got back in a taxi and paid me back in a week. That's a good person. We were about as far apart as two people could get politically but we shared a few interests and a common enemy and that made us friends. I can't ever remember us having contrary words despite our differences. I always thought of him as a militant flower child from the seventies ranting against whomever held any power over anybody. One time I accused him of being a communist and he was indignant in denial; he wasn't a commie, he was an anarchist. I left Nashville in 2004 and stayed away for five years and when I came back I never had the occasion to look him up, but it's good to know he had friends around him and for him in his last days. Rest in peace, Joey.
Jim Ridley painted a very eloquent and amazingly accurate portrait of Joey Bowker, Nashville's beloved Bat Poet. Joey's art was was so unsophisticated and naiive, it was avant garde. He was weird & wonderful! He made us look at life a little bit sideways and not take ourselves so seriously, reminding us to stop and have fun once in awhile. We knew Joey as close personal friends and treasure our memories. He would tell us of his wild adventures and about all of the celebrities he had had some kind of interaction with. His life was a carnival, filled with bizarre colors and lights...kind of like The Bat Poet Show. We loved him as a friend and as an artist, and are grateful to have known him.
Sincerely, Mr. and Mrs. Melba Toast
I didn't know Joey as much as some but was introduced by my friend a drummer Gary Skipper at a taping. Later we (our Band) were part of a benefit show at the Limelight. Later he would come by our Record Shop ever so often and hang out with us. I was honored to get to know the man behind the Cowl, the same guy my son and I watched so many times on channel 19. You will be missed Joey. : Lee Lane New Life Record Shop & The Stoney Creek Ramblers (Band)
This came as a big shock to me as I was unaware that he had been having medical problems. Unfortunately it's not a shock that another awesome individual has been laid low due to not having adequate care available and having to rely on benefits to whittle away at what I am sure were huge bills for being treated like a human being. I used to watch Joey more than I probably would have admitted at the time, and I always would get a thrill when I'd see him and the other members of the show out on the streets of Nashville. I am sure there are times when I wanted to be on the show too. Anyway, I am saddened to hear this, but as the article put so well, I am a better person for having been witness to his time here. RIPBP.
Well I can say this Joey and I got together one night in the Spring of '92. I was a playback person (for Viacom), and I remember see him go in and out of the editing room all the time. For a few weeks we chatted and would talk about a lot of things, but then , in one of our conversation , he asked me if I could be his cameraman , and I said yes. Then he said to me that he would pay me $5 to do his show. I told him that I was a volunteer at CAT and there was not need to pay me. He did anyway. After that first show he asked me if I would be part of the show. I said sure and thus the start of me and Joey friendship started. We went through a lot of stuff , some good , some bad, and some I can't even describe. What I will say is that it was never dull in the studio with him. Every night we would get into the studio and all I could think about was "What are we going to do tonight?" Joey if your up there I miss you a lot and i hope that wherever you are you are not in pain but making someone smile. I know you did for me and many other. Take care my friend you will be missed.
Your Pal
David "Badboy Breeze" Aubrey
P.S. Don't forget to flush the toilet. (If they have them up there.)
I knew Joey Bowker long before he was the Bat Poet. We grew up in neighboring small towns in northeast Ohio. I don't remember exactly how I meet him, but I was in a band with him in the early 70's. We practiced in a funky old movie theater he rented as a hang out.
Flash forward a couple of decades. I was living in Nashville and happened upon CAT. I could not believe I was seeing the same Joey Bowker in a completely unreconstructed state.
He seemed impervious the forces that pummel most of us into submission. He was always so unselfconsciously exactly who he was, no mater how absurd. He knew a kind of fearlessness that I an honor but may never completely understand.
I regret the fact that never tracked him down in Nashville and got to know him in our "grown up" years. Too late now. Via con Dios, my mad friend.
