Vivian Girls on Jeopardy??, playing NYC's Bowery Ballroom on May 11th

Vivian Girls "Tell the World" @South Street Seaport, NYC. 9/7/08


by Star Child

After eating a nice fish dinner on Good Friday, I snuggled under my sheets for a nap. I was about 60 percent asleep, when I heard mom say, "Jeopardy's on." I rolled in my bed, "uh, I'll wake up for the final question." Moments later, she uttered the words, "Punk rock." I immediately knew that meant, "punk rock" was a category on the show. I jumped out of bed quickly and ran into her room. But I had been deceived. The category she was referring to was actually "arts and leisure." Then suddenly an answer came up. (Note: Apparently it was the category "New York Times" where the question appeared). I don't remember it exactly so I'll just say what it said as a question, if I had to paraphrase and put it simply:

What New York borough is Vivian Girls from?

The man answered, "what is the bronx?," all the while I kept saying, "BROOKLYN." No one else answered. I feel honored to have seen this band back in January at New Brunswick's Court Tavern with Screaming Females to a room of about 50. I didn't realize these 3 shoegazing punk rock girls were big enough to have a Jeopardy question, now that's cool. Mom was right, a punk rock question did appear. But I figured that none of the contestants would get the question. I believe Vivian Girls' audience is 20 something year olds. The contestants had to be in there 30's and 40's, so it's an interesting question. I think it was a $400 dollar question, which made is seem easy, but I think it'd be $1,000.

This reminded me of when a pokemon question appeared on Who Wants to Be A Millionaire? a decade ago. The man had no clue and the question was for $500, 000. The question was:

Which of the following characters is not considered a Pokémon?

A: Jigglypuff
B: Frodo
C: Squirtle
D: Pikachu

Every kid in America was shouting, "Frodo," but the contestant had no clue. This was a bit alarming. I would've thought it'd be $32,000. It wasn't that hard considering Lord of the Rings is well known. We know Frodo is the hobbit, so that obviously has to be it, right?. Even if he didn't watch pokemon, I thought it'd be easy to spot Frodo. I hope there were other college kids that were shouting out, "BROOKLYN."

Thoughts?

Vivian Girls will perform at New York's Bowery Ballroom with Times New Viking and Stupid Party on May 11th. Tickets are available here.

The band is all over the map touring. They're currently out with Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti, then they'll be playing the Coachella Music Festival, followed by a tour with Abe Vigoda and then they are headed abroad.