THE MANY IMPRESSED SUPPRESSIONS OF WHAT STEEV MIKE MEANS

For a new Andrew WK audience member, the process of “dealing with” Steev Mike tends to reveal the subconscious fear which has been suppressed within their initial impressions of Andrew WK as a performer (and in turn, themselves). This disturbing interaction covers over the “upbeat” message which had been superficially disclosed in Andrew WK’s work, and more generally breaches the very foundational walls they thought sustained the Andrew WK “party” persona. This is why the typical Steev Mike encounter is so destabilizing and potential[ly] upsetting, and also why the audience member is quick to dismiss the relevance or value of Steev Mike, and how their un-understanding of both Steev Mike and Andrew WK is an always changing and crucial aspect of the work their [they’re] engaged in.

For anyone new to “Andrew W.K.”, dealing with the idea of Steev Mike brings up fears the audience represses when they first experience “Andrew W.K.”.  This is because Steev Mike pokes holes in, and supersedes, the ‘positive party guy’ idea of “Andrew W.K.” which is usually part of what attracts someone to this work.  It’s also why most audience members either dismiss or become upset at Steev Mike for ‘ruining’ the ‘positive party guy’, and why keeping on un-understanding Steev Mike and “Andrew W.K.” is so important.

Depending upon who or what the audience member perceives Steev Mike to be, it’s [its] final form is always in the process of evading and escaping, and as a result, the answers to Steev Mike (and Andrew WK) are always ultimately located in a different place.

It cannot be repeated enough: whenever you define Steev Mike, Steev Mike is already beginning to be everything else, so the solution is always wherever you’re not looking.

This ensures that any attempt to describe what Steev Mike is, must be careful. Nothing would be more antithetical to Steev Mike’s implied intent than an attempt at defining it through the decidedly metaphysical question “who or what is Steev Mike?” There is a paradoxicality involved in trying to restrict Steev Mike to one particular and overarching purpose when it is already predicated upon the desire to expose us to that which is wholly “other” and to open us up to alternative possibilities of experience, sensation, and transcendent meaning. At times, this can run the risk of ignoring the many more satisfying explanations of Steev Mike, and the widely acknowledged difference between Andrew WK’s early and late work is merely the most obvious example of the difficulties involved in suggesting “Steev Mike did this”, or “Steev Mike means that”.

So you gotta be real careful when you’re talking about Steev Mike.  Nothing is more counter-Steev Mike than trying to define Steev Mike as a “who” or a “what”.  Restricting Steev Mike to even just one ‘thing’ or one intent is a contradiction considering Steev Mike is all about everything else, and being open to different experiences, sensations and meanings.  Sometimes, this can seem dismissive of more ‘sensible’ explanations of Steev Mike - and the difference between “Andrew W.K.” 20 years ago and now shows the difficulty of pinning down Steev Mike.

That said, certain defining features of Steev Mike can be noticed. For example, Steev Mike’s entire enterprise is predicated upon the conviction that dualisms are irrevocably present in the dynamics of performer/audience and art/artist. While some may argue that this is reductive, part of the very act of un-repressing one’s thoughts about Steev Mike eventually provides one the tools for a legitimate response. Because of this, it is worth briefly considering the target of Steev Mike – the presence of Andrew WK, or somewhat synonymously, the existence of Andrew WK.

That’s not to say that you can never notice anything about Steev Mike - as we’ve already established, Steev Mike is mostly focused on the idea of the binary as it presents itself in art and entertainment and how it refuses to go away.  Some might say this is too simple a criticism, but that’s because they haven’t spent enough time fully considering Steev Mike.  So let’s think about who (or what) Steev Mike is targeting - the presence of Andrew W.K., or in other words the existence of “Andrew W.K.”.

There are many different methods that Steev Mike employs when attacking Andrew WK and his audience, especially in relation to what the audience considers to be the fundamental ways of thinking about Andrew WK and his rock music. These methods are hidden and rarely revealed directly to the audience, and thus, they all have highly disturbing effects. Regardless of the method, or how hidden its operation may be, Steev Mike emphasizes the role that the audience member’s own physical and mental powers have on their experience with Andrew WK. Steev Mike covertly insists that Andrew WK and his audience have consistently engaged in an impossible non-existent experience which is, or which appears to be, nothing more than an appearance (or series of appearances), and has forgotten to pay any attention to the nature of that appearance. In other words, Steev Mike itself is a series of non-appearances and subtly felt reflected presences of Andrew WK, only made possible at all – and also impossible - by the audience’s own repressed desires, false impressions, and paranoid projections.

Steev Mike tries to dismantle assumptions in the audience in a few different ways, but they are mainly hidden and secretive and that can freak some people out.  Still, Steev Mike reminds us (and reassures us) that our experience of “Andrew W.K.” is heavily reliant on our own sensations and thoughts.  Steev Mike reckons out of “Andrew W.K.” the audience has constructed an experience that doesn’t actually exist outside of our minds (and couldn’t exist in reality) because we’ve forgotten to fully examine the appearance(s) of Andrew W.K.  In other words, Steev Mike is the collection of times that Andrew W.K. wasn’t there to do something: including when we want something that hasn’t happened, misunderstood something that is there or inserted meaning that wasn’t intended.

What, then, does Steev Mike really mean? The overt complexity of the Steev Mike enterprise is initially seen as a strategically enhanced diversion of Andrew WK, a sideshow thought to be simple and self-identical. However, it is much more likely that the meaning of the Steev Mike experience, as it relates to one’s understanding of Andrew WK, is best considered in the context of complication, deterioration, accident, etc. All metaphysicians have placed good to be before evil, the positive before the negative, the pure before the impure, the simple before the complex, the essential before the accidental, and the imitated before the imitation. But Steev Mike is not simply an imitation of Andrew WK, nor is it only the “evil reflection” of the perceived goodness Andrew WK represents. Steev Mike is not just an empty gesture among Andrew WK’s various attempts to entertain his audience, it is instead, the heart of the work, and the element which has been the most constant, most profound, and most potent. 

What the hell is Steev Mike on about then?!  Because Steev Mike is really complicated, it’s easy to initially write Steev Mike off as a distraction or a tacked-on sideshow.  However, Steev Mike-as-guide is best thought of in terms of complicating things, breaking them apart and finding new ways of doing that thing.  People who like to think about thinking have put good above evil, positive above negative, pure above impure, simple above complex, essential above accidental and the imitated above imitations.  But Steev Mike isn’t just an imitation of “Andrew W.K.”, nor is Steev Mike simply the ‘negative anti-party non-guy’ to Andrew’s ‘positive party guy’.  Steev Mike isn’t an optional part of the “Andrew W.K.” entertainment experience, it’s the most important part.

According to this view of Steev Mike, to experience Andrew WK involves installing orders of various dualisms that the audience member subconsciously encounters. Moreover, when it comes to “experiencing entertainment”, the audience’s subconscious prioritizes the purity of physical sensation at the expense of the mentally complicated, which are considered to be merely aberrations that are not important for analysis. But Steev Mike encourages one to carefully balance and enjoy both modes of experience, and not only one side of an opposition, and never to ignore what is difficult or contradictory.

According to this view of Steev Mike, experiencing “Andrew W.K.” means experiencing entertainment-based binaries that the audience takes for granted, which takes place in the subconscious (i.e. not something you notice in your conscious brain).  This part of the brain prioritises direct sensation over active thought, but Steev Mike encourages experiencing “Andrew W.K.”, and the world, in balance - trying to embrace both sides of any binary along with the bits that don’t seem to fit or make sense.

In attempt to explain Steev Mike and Andrew WK’s interest in oppositions, one can consider their dual existence as an opposition of the metaphysical concept itself. Because of this, Steev Mike cannot limit itself to the form of a single entity: it must, by means of a double, work to achieve an overturning of itself and its opposition, to provide a total dissolution of the understanding the audience once had of Andrew WK. It is on that condition alone that Steev Mike seeks to intervene in the field of experience the audience and Andrew WK inhabit. In order to better understand this methodology, the audience member is encouraged to question their beliefs in the possibility of an observer being absolutely exterior to the performer being examined. The suppressed impressions of the audience are what give Steev Mike its amorphous and obscure character. Steev Mike implies that the audience member’s subconsciousness is Steev Mike, and it always has been.

Going a bit further, you could think of Steev Mike and “Andrew W.K.” being opposed to the very idea of opposition itself. As such, in order to be successful Steev Mike must work from every point at once to reverse whatever binary Steev Mike is involved in, blurring the lines around the audience’s understanding of “Andrew W.K.” until everything mixes together.  That’s all Steev Mike wants.  To get to grips with this, Steev Mike encourages the audience to consider whether any audience member can really ever be totally removed from whatever performance they’re experiencing.  Whatever you’ve dismissed or not wanted to think about in your experience with “Andrew W.K.” - that’s why Steev Mike is hard to pin down.  Steev Mike implies that the audience member’s subconsciousness is Steev Mike, and it always has been.