That 1 Guy

As the one-man band known as That 1 Guy, Mike Silverman plays an instrument of his own invention, which he calls "the magic pipe." After growing frustrated with other instruments, he designed it over the course of a month spent haunting hardware stores, collecting odd lengths of pipe and tools with the manic fervor of Richard Dreyfuss' character in Close Encounters of the Third Kind. Despite never having designed or built an instrument before, at the end of the process he had created something that was surprisingly tuneful, despite resembling a cross between a harp, a bass, a set of bathroom pipes, and drug paraphernalia. Two strings of differing pitches are attached to the pipes, one set firmly grounded and the other able to be maneuvered as it is played. Trigger points all over the piping play prerecorded samples when struck. There's also an electric saw, and a kick drum made from a cowboy boot is attached to the bottom. The effect is something like a washtub bass redesigned by Terry Gilliam and Tom Waits. Also, as the high point of his live show, smoke blows out of the top. Silverman was originally a classically trained double bass player who had been a member of a California jazz band called the Fabulous Hedgehogs. Realizing that the small fees they were being paid for their performances would stretch further if he didn't have to share them, he booked a show on his own and asked to be billed as just That 1 Guy. At the time he was growing frustrated with the traditional style of double bass playing and took to setting up drums and drum machines that he could kick while he played and removing all but one of his bass strings, playing the instrument like another piece of percussion. Still dissatisfied with the sound he was getting, he began dreaming of "the magic...