Home

Nathan Brady Crain could be doing a lot of things. With a collection of degrees that covers Shakespeare and electrical engineering, a collection of stage experience that spans the Grateful Dead to the Pope, and a collection of bizarre points in a life that once included competitive martial arts, Crain is a varied guy.

Now, Crain drives a Volkswagen van with a camper hitched to the back from Vermont to Colorado, tracing a tour circuit that sometimes includes 200 shows a year.

Occasionally billed as "The Reverend Nathan Brady Crain," the musician/comedian comes to Steamboat Mountain Theater tonight and Saturday for two vastly different sets - the first is family-friendly Americana, the second is standup comedy and humorous songs and "is not for children," Crain said.

He spoke with 4 Points about comedy for adults, Internet religion and the weirdest set of credentials ever.

4 POINTS: Tell me about the kind of comedy you do.

NATHAN BRADY CRAIN: The standup comedy is - although it gets cleaner by the month - it's pretty dirty. It's pretty much rated R by the end.

4 POINTS: Does it just come more naturally for you to go blue? Why?

NBC: I'll tell you why. I grew up a nice boy, raised by Kansas Quakers. And then I went into theater. I got big into theater. I graduated from the National Shakespeare Conservatory. And instead of going into life as an actor, I went into being a professional stagehand, and I worked in rock 'n' roll for 10 years, basically as a roadie. And the only way for a Kansas Quaker to survive in rock 'n' roll is to learn to be dirty, and I did.

That's where I become dirty - my sense of humor is the lotus flower that blossomed from the filthy swath of rock 'n' roll.

4 POINTS: That's ridiculous.

NBC: Believe it or not, that's an analogy from a health teacher. I won't go any further into that.

4 POINTS: Doing both Americana music and comedy, do you find any natural crossover? I mean, there are so many hilarious lines in country music that are meant to be taken seriously.

NBC: There is some crossover. One of the songs I play in my Americana show is based on the joke about what happens if you play country music backward. Do you know that joke?

4 POINTS: No.

NBC: If you play a country song backward, you get your car back, you get your wife back, and you get your dog back.

4 POINTS: Sounds about right. How did you come into this mix of music and comedy?

NBC: I have one of the chilliest and most wildly variegated educations you'll ever get from anybody - I have degrees in theater, philosophy, early British literature, computer engineering and electrical engineering. I have a master's in business administration, and I graduated from the National Shakespeare Conservatory. I was also an expert martial artist and a national championship fighter.

4 POINTS: How much of that do you use as a touring musician?

NBC: I use my degrees every day, pretty much all of them. The MBA and the theater, philosophy and literature - those are all directly related. Literature plays directly into writing poetry, which I do for a living. I wouldn't say I'd be making it in entertainment, which I think I am, without the education I have.

4 POINTS: So where does this "Reverend Nathan Brady Crain" deal come from?

NBC: The story behind that is that I went to a family reunion in 1999 and my cousin had become a minister for the Universal Life Church - which is on the Internet. Anybody can become a minister or a rabbi or a pope or whatever they want to become, the idea being that you define your own religion : so I went on the Internet and I did it.

"The Reverend" kind of complemented my comic style. For someone to call themselves "The Reverend" and then sing a song about venereal disease or Michael Jackson, that was funny.

- To reach Margaret Hair, call 871-4204

or e-mail mhair@steamboatpilot.com