For 30 minutes Wednesday, shock rocker Kevin M. (G.G.) Allin explained to three curious listeners in the district attorney's office how slicing up his body with glass, exposing himself to a crowd and defecating on a stage was an art form.
With scabs on his forehead, bite marks on his arms and chips in his teeth, Allin shook his head in disbelieve and said he couldn't understand was police arrested him.
"I acted out my lyrics, nothing more, nothing less," Allin said. "I'm just showing people reality is there. It's there on my stage."
An assistant district attorney didn't buy Allin's explanation and charged him with disorderly conduct for the wild show that he put on Tuesday night at the Odd Rock Café.
Ten feet away, in a conference room across the hall, two veteran homicide detectives were dealing with another type of reality: trying to sort out clues from a murder.
"Just think," one of the detectives said nodding his head in Allin's direction. "Years ago, you'd go to a circus, a man would stick his head in a lion's mouth and people thought he was bizarre."
"Now that guy there, he's bizarre."
Allin, 32, of Midlothian, Ill. was arrested about 11 p.m. Tuesday at the rock nightclub at 2010 S. Kinnickinnie Ave. after a performance with his band the Toilet Rockers.
Allin, who has performed throughout the nation and recorded 12 albums, proudly says he aims to shock and disgust his crowds.
Police were sent to the club Tuesday after someone felt Allin crossed the line from entertainment into lewdness.
John M. Baker, the attorney for club owner John C. Koshick, said Koshick had no idea Allin was going to perform the act that set many audience members running for the exit.
"If he would, he would have never booked him," Baker said.
Koshick was facing trouble of his own Wednesday.
He was cited for allegedly violating the state's liquor laws by not maintaining a book listing customers who were allowed to consume alcohol after their age had been questioned.
During Wednesday's review of the raid in a small conference room, an assistant district attorney, wearing a neatly pressed white shirt and tie, sat back with his arms folded.
A police sergeant, wearing a clean blue uniform and black boots, stood at the door.
Allin, with long stringy brown hair, a black Keith Richards T-shirt and dirty black jeans, explained that his arrest was a mistake.
"It's theater," Allin said, resting his heavily tattooed arms on a desk that separated him from the prosecutor.
Allin said the scabs on his forehead were from beating himself with the microphone.
The bite marks on his arms were his own doing, he said.
The bruises on his face were from beating himself while the audience of about 50 looked on.
"If people are going to come to our shows, they've got to have a strong mind and stomach," Allin said, a hint of an East Coast accent in his voice showing his New Hampshire roots. "If people are sensitive, they'll take one look at me and leave."
"I'm sure most people hate me."
Allin said his second performance Tuesday might have gotten off on the wrong note and disappointed some in the audience. He was forced to take the stage alone initially and recite poetry.
"I got up on the stage when my band was up the street drinking," he explained.
As the performance progressed, however, he played some of his music, then generally abused and exposed himself.
Eventually, he admitted, he went a bit further, performing an act that most people found repulsive.
"I've done it before, but I don't do it at every show," Allin said. "I don't want to be predictable."
The prosecutor looked straight at Allin as he finished his explanation. The sergeant stood in the doorway, unmoved.
"Sometimes I go off," Allin said finally. "I go over the edge."
David Doege
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