A little over a year ago I had the privilege of interviewing Lisa Hammer while she was in town working on the forthcoming sequel to “SLC Punk!” She’s probably most well known for her involvement with Adult Swim’s “Venture Bros.” wherein she voices Triana Orpheus. What you may not know is that these credits are simply the tip of the proverbial iceberg when it comes to her work.
Hammer has been acting since the late 80’s and has touched almost every aspect of filmmaking from producing, directing, editing, writing, and more, ever since. At the same time she has been active in the music scene since the 90’s. She fronted goth band “Mors Syphilitica” from 1995 to 2002 during which time the band released an EP and three full length albums.
Hammer then took a short break from music when she joined the cast of “Venture Bros.” and aside from a solo album titled “Dakini” was more or less out of the music scene.
That was until a few years ago when she started a new band, “Radiana.” We discussed this during the course of our interview. I’ve included an excerpt below because navigating between two tabs can be hard, I understand.
As far as “Punk’s Dead” I’m sure you’re under lock and key, is there anything that you can tell us?
“…It’s exciting to see what some of those characters have turned into and the next generation. There’s always a next generation, so where do you fit in when you were on the scene but now you’re older and you’re doing something else. I’m kind of going through that in New York City. We’re putting a story together called “Maybe Sunshine” which is a web series based around my band “Radiana” but it’s going to be a comedy because it’s me at 40 something trying to get into the costume again, get on stage and compete with 20 year old stick figure gorgeous trust fund kids form Williamsburg. I’m just so unhip and they’re so hip, I can’t even tell what they’re tweeting and twerking, I don’t even know. How am I going to be relevant.”
How much of that is fictionalized and how much is it based on your experience?
It’s all true. We’re bringing back, I had a midget manager from “Mors Syphilitica,” so we’re going to bring that character back and he did some crazy stuff and got into fights with club owners and it was a crazy scene so we’ll be touching on that.
At the time of that interview “Maybe Sunshine” was just a idea but now it’s become a reality, or at least, it almost has. Six episodes are planned and most of it has already been shot. Levi Wilson, director, co-writer, and Hammer’s husband, has launched an Indiegogo campaign with the goal of obtaining the funding needed to finish shooting and bring the project to light. So far they haven’t reached their funding goal yet and there are eleven days left. Contribution levels start at five dollars and include some pretty cool (and clever) perks including shirts, albums, autographed pictures, and production credits. Most importantly, you get to help an independent project get made and as you know, here at Big Shiny Robot we’re big fans of that.
As always, we won’t tell you how you should spend your money, but this show looks pretty fun and you could do worse with a few bucks. Check it out, donate if you’re able and interested, or share if you just think it looks cool. After all, sharing costs nothing but time and it’s ticking by anyway. Pretty soon you’ll be a forty-something too!