Poison Idea vocalist Jerry A. recently spoke to us about his love of cooking, and when pressed for his final meal request, the longtime punk rock singer, a 34-year veteran of self-abuse, hard drinking and pretty much every other bad habit out there, admitted that a Death Row Dinner is something he’s thought of before.
What would you request for your final meal?
Actually, it’s really crazy that you ask that, because I was thinking about this the other night, and what came to me was some kind of gelato shaved ice, but it had to be a certain way, and had to have a certain fruit in it, and I can’t remember what fruit I was thinking about. But I remember thinking how pissed I would be if it was my last meal and I asked for this certain thing, and you give them specifics of what you want, and they give you the wrong thing. They don’t care; you’re dying. They don’t give a fuck.
And they bring you some bad version of gelato?
Right, right. I was in a restaurant with somebody the other day and there were these girls in there, and one of them asked for a bourbon and seltzer water, and it was top-shelf bourbon. She got the seltzer and she said it was sodium-free or something like that and she said, “I didn’t ask for this! This tastes like shit!” and she called the waiter over and she’s like, “Listen, I paid for this! I did not ask for this and this is bullshit!” and made this big scene in this bar and I go, “Oh my god, just drink your fucking drink,” you know? And she’s like, “No, no, I’m paying for this!” So this got me thinking, and then I saw this show where somebody on death row asked for a certain type of dessert and they screwed it up and said, “Eat it and shut your mouth.” And the guy got baked pears or something.
So… what would you pick for that last meal?
I don’t know; my tastes change. When I was a kid, my favourite food was probably hot dogs, or pizza, or macaroni and cheese or some, like, child food, and then there was a time up until 10 years ago when I was on a sushi kick, and I loved sushi, because it was a delicacy. But then I went to Japan and I was forced to eat sushi three times a day, every day, for a few weeks, and all I would eat is fucking sushi. And now I eat sushi maybe once every six months because of that. So, that would have been my last dinner. But if I was on death row and I knew I was going to die, and I didn’t care about my cholesterol or my arteries, it would probably be some big, sloppy southern barbeque with ribs, corn bread and fried okra. People laugh at the southerners and think that they’re rednecks, but they’re all eating fried chicken and watermelon and corn on the cob and that shit is fucking delicious, man. Fried chicken, goddamn! Stevie Ray Vaughan would have people FedEx this stuff in to him overnight from like Austin to wherever he was playing in Germany because this shit was so good, and you don’t do that because you’re a redneck, you do it because it’s good. You don’t want to eat no sauerkraut and bloodwurst sausage or some crap like that. Believe me, that wouldn’t be my last meal; it would definitely not be bloodwurst. It would be barbeque.
And then some pear gelato for dessert to top it all off?
Yeah, something like that. Maybe some pistachio gelato with a glazed whiskey topping, flaming on top. You hit it with a torch and it caramelizes it. Yeah, that’s some crazy shit.
Poison Idea‘s back catalog is available through Southern Lord Records. The band is currently working on a new album with Joel Grind of Toxic Holocaust.
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