Puddles Pity Party

A 7-foot clown walks into a bar. He motions for a soda water and sits there staring at his drink. The year was 1998 and Puddles had wandered into the Star Community Bar in Atlanta, GA where bartender Big Mike Geier first laid eyes on the sad, silent clown.

“There was a heaviness about him,” says Geier. “I could tell he wasn’t in the mood to chat, so I pretty much left him alone. A couple of weeks later, he came by the bar and gave me a flyer to a show he was doing at a flea market. The sound system was bad, but his voice was something else. I’ve been in my share of bands and wasn’t expecting much from a clown singing karaoke from a boombox. But I’ll be damned if his singing didn’t get me all choked up.” The two soon became close friends, with Big Mike acting somewhat as a confidant as the pair travel all over with Puddles Pity Party, Mike speaking on behalf of Puddles since the clown chooses to stay silent.

Originally from River City before kicking around Atlanta, the sulking serenader gained momentum after hitting the road as the guest performer on the 2010 Aqua Teen Hunger Force Live Tour and the 2013 Eels tour. It was Halloween 2013 when Puddles then teamed up with Scott Bradlee’s Postmodern Jukebox to record an epic version of Lordes’ hit song “Royals,” which instantly went viral on YouTube. With more than 180k fans on Facebook and over 40 million views on YouTube, including his acclaimed version of “Royals,” Sia’s “Chandelier” and other pop favorites, Puddles Pity Party has toured extensively in the U.S including multiple sold out shows at Joe’s Pub in NYC, the Regency Ballroom in San Francisco and the legendary Troubadour in Los Angeles. He has also performed many times in the UK at Soho Theatre London, sold out runs in 2015 and 2016 Edinburgh Fringe Festival, and he was a feature performer in La Soiree’s Southbank show that won the Olivier Award in 2015. Other worldwide festival appearances include the Adelaide Fringe Festival, Perth Fringe World, Melbourne International Comedy Fest, Just for Laughs Montreal and much more.