Stepping into Fulton Street Pub five minutes after 9 pm, you’d be surprised at how empty the establishment was.
As with many locations on our itinerary that night, it would be my first time visiting after hearing so much from friends and co-workers. But, alas, Thursday nights at Fulton Street are relatively slow. We approached the DJ booth, me and the tall man I walked in with.
“He’s writing a review of karaoke for the night. We’re going to bar hop to about nine different spots,” the man said. “He’s going to ask you some questions.”
The night’s host, Lutz, took over karaoke at Fulton Street about three years ago on a friend’s recommendation. They began with Fridays, then eventually took over Thursdays.
“I like the energy a lot more [on Thursdays], we have a lot more theatre folks and cool people,” Lutz said. “Everyone’s very affirming here. We’re all about supporting people who’re trying their best.”
The man I came with, Sean Francis, grew up in Alma before enrolling at Grand Valley State for film and video. Now in his mid-30s, his once casual activity with old college friends has since become his most anticipated weekly ritual.
“My philosophy, in a sense, is there are great nights of karaoke and there are less-than-great nights of karaoke,” Francis said. “But, in general, any night of karaoke is better than none.”
And, that night, we’d be doing more karaoke than anyone has ever done before. Nine bars, all across town, in less than six hours.
One Thursday night.
Anyway, Here’s Wonderwall
Our first stop had been River City Saloon at around 8:30 pm. It took only a few steps into the bar before we were spotted. Shouts of, “What’s up, Sean Francis!” and “Sean Francis, yes!” seemed to accompany us wherever we went.
“There is definitely a community,” Francis said. “Depending on the night and depending on the bar, I’m pretty sure so-and-so is going to be there. With the first bar, River City, there are, like, three people that fall into that category.”
Francis began his first song of the night at 8:43 pm, requesting “Wonderwall” but, instead, singing “No Diggity” by Blackstreet featuring Dr. Dre. This is what he does; mashing-up popular karaoke hits with unexpected genre twists and humorous crowd-pleasers. In this way, mash-ups are a sort of karaoke olive branch, bringing together vast groups of people with different music tastes to enjoy the same, singular performance.
“I’ve done karaoke roulette where someone chooses it for me at random. I’ve also been commissioned to do mash-ups with a certain song. Sometimes, I’ll organically come up with one.”
Our challenge then became to not only hit our carefully scheduled stops, but also, for Francis to perform a different mash-up each time. Later, at The Foolery downtown, we checked in together.
“Could I put in a request for ‘Blank Space’ by Taylor Swift?” Francis asked. “Put it under Captain--”
“Captain what?”
“Captain Seanster, S-E-A-N-S-T-E-R.”
Francis had been wearing a well-worn sailor’s hat that entire time. As it turns out, this was a replacement of an older, plastic-brimmed sailor’s hat he’d stolen from his dad, George. When that hat broke, Francis’ friend Kimmy, AKA K-Snap, gifted him this new one. Like many of his friends, including another named Rebecca who joined us for the crawl, a night out for karaoke is a near constant experience, usually several times in one week.
“He does a lot of comedy, and what always follows the comedy is karaoke afterwards,” Rebecca said.
With our imbibing ship of passengers in tow (including my partner and four other friends), Captain Seanster led us into the night, bar to bar. At Flanagan’s, we met their newly minted DJ, Kyle.
“We’ve been doing it for probably about a month-and-a-half, two months,” Kyle said. “It’s a new thing here, I’m just trying to get it off the floor.”
Throughout the night, different DJs made a point of recommending other solid spots. Both Caesar’s Pub and Iron Well were mentioned. But, we had our own schedule to go on.
Next was Z’s Bar. Karaoke here is still run the old-school way with slips. In order to sing, you need to know the exact track code of that particular song in their binder of thousands of songs, with sometimes confusing exceptions to the alphabet formula. To mediate this, Francis comes prepared with a few slips pre-filled out with his songs of choice. That alone saved us 10 or 15 minutes.
“You’re facilitating an important journalistic event,” Francis reminded me.
Coming Out Of His Cage
We cut across Monroe and stepped into Z’s Bar, easily the busiest stop of our night. A whole variety of people, old and young, intermingle here, including a soon-to-be-bride named Sarah and a stranger at the bar who made sure to tell us he “worked for Warren Buffet.” For those of us with stage fright, performing at Z’s may not be your first choice. The place is crowded, sometimes feeling TOO crowded.
“In general, there’s a threshold,” Francis said. “Size to population ratio. When it’s too crowded and too small of a spot, that’s not good. Or when the building itself is too big and not enough people there. There’s a sweet spot.”
As songs go, Francis believes in a similar middle ground. You want to find something you know by heart and truly love, but something that most folks will respond well to. It might feel like an obvious choice to sing ‘Mr. Brightside,’ but if your heart’s not in it, your audience won’t be either. For instance, Francis performed ‘Truth Hurts’ by Lizzo to the tune of ‘Let It Be’ by The Beatles, harmonica solo included (which left everyone happy).
There are times however, Francis told me, where some experimentation and bravery can be encouraged at karaoke.
“The mash-up I’m working on right now is probably the most maligned, but also, undeniably most popular song of the last 30 years,” Francis said. “The baseline song is The Macarena. It’s something we have to reckon with. Enough time has passed.”
Speaking of time, we were ready for our next stop: Twisted Bull. We’d visited some dive bars, certainly, but Twisted Bull was the only true “country bar” off our list, which may have caused our dwindling group of improv-nerds and old choir friends to feel somewhat out-of-place.
“It’s about what I remember, the vibe is what to be expected,” Francis said. “We’re off the beaten path. There is, literally, a mechanical bull behind us. It’s asleep, but it’s there.”
At this point, I should mention that I’d been singing karaoke as well. I was on a mission to narrow-down exactly which bars had in their catalog my dream karaoke song: “Superman” by Goldfinger. I was hopeful Twisted Bull could become another refuge for my ska antics, but, alas, I’d been resigned to sing only at Fulton Street or Foolery. If I’m not singing Green Day or something ska punk-y, then my confidence sinks. But, for Francis, that couldn’t be further from the truth.
“I don’t care if I look stupid or not, I just want other people to have a good time,” Francis said.
Closing Time
My personal notes become indecipherable after about 12:30 am. Brief, confusing lines like “Green teas x2” or “Holiday vape cloud” are instead replaced by long scrawls of bastardized cursive. I had finally reached my limit (a tequila shot, Hamm’s, Two-Hearted, a shot of Jäger, PBR, a PB&J shot, Coor’s, and another tequila shot), and we’d made it to the end of our night. At 1:26am, Francis and I entered PlayStation Pub and sang our final songs.
The carpool back home was somber and sweet. We had set out to do what neither of us thought possible, and, besides some hiccups (The Pubb closed early), we had succeeded.
Now, if you’re reading this and eager to create a mash-up of your own, Captain Seanster has some advice:
“The secret sauce is that ‘All-Star’ by Smash Mouth goes with every song.”
The Karaoke Crawl:
River City Saloon 8:30-9:30
Fulton St Pub 9:06-9:36
The Foolery 9:40-10:10
Flanagan’s 10:17-10:47
Z’s Bar 10:51-11:21
Twisted Bull 11:35-12:05
Holiday Bar 12:20-12:50
The Pubb 12:55-1:20
PlayStation Pub 1:25-2:00
