Diego’s Umbrella Could Totally Take Gogol Bordello In A Fight

By Zooey Mae

Diego’s Umbrella, the self-designated “Ambassadors of Gypsy Rock,” are fresh off their debut at San Francisco’s Outside Lands Music Festival. Described as a vibrant mix of Eastern European sounds and punk rock musicality, they’re bringing their uniformed goodness to towns near you to make love to your ear holes. Tyson and Ben, two of the conversational wizards in the band, spoke with Synthesis about the inception of Diego’s Umbrella, inventing words, and naturally, anal penetration with Harrison Ford. Enjoy.

The obligatory question, who is your favorite Harrison Ford — Indiana Jones or Han Solo?
Ty: You know, I think I have to go with Indie.
Ben: I agree. Just because he carried those movies. You loved Han Solo every time he came on the screen, but as Indie, he was the driving force behind those movies.
Ty: You get so much Ford in Indie, it’s like, give me more Indie. Gimme more Ford. Ass-fuck me Harrison Ford.
Ben: Please, stick it in my butt. Stick it in my butt over and over and over again until you ejaculate in my butt, Harrison Ford. [laughs]
Ty: This is a Christian publication, right?

Absolutely. Very fundamentalist. The readers will love it. Musical influences?
Ben: The list changes all the time, but a short list of currents:?Gogol Bordello, Muse, Bon Jovi and Michael Jackson.

What is the nerdiest thing about you?
Ben: Hmm… I don’t know. I masturbated 20 minutes ago to 3D CG porn.?But… is that nerdy?
Ty: That’s pretty fucking nerdy. I don’t know what’s nerdy about me.
Ben: Well, he invents words. For example, he got on the mic recently at a show and he said, “Can I have your attenchment please?”

Do you have any pre-show rituals?
Ben: There is always a huddle, with various limbs thrown in the middle.?On the count of four, a word or phrase that was in some way fundamental to the day will be shouted with deep passion.?For instance: “New, From Estee Lauder!”

Who would win in a fight between Diego’s Umbrella and Gogol Bordello?
Ben: I don’t know, but I’d definitely go after that old guy.

What occupations would you all have if you weren’t musicians?
Tyson: Pope of the Roman Catholic Church.
Vaughn: Miss Teen USA.
Ben: First garbage man on Mars.
Jason: Prosecuting Attorney for the State of Wyoming.
Kevin: Professional Chubby Chaser.
Jake: Jai Alai Regional Champion, Beaver County, PA.

You have a pretty impressive bevy of band uniforms. How do you decide which to wear?
Ben: We go with the one with the least amount of visible bodily fluids.

If you had to live inside of a Michael Crichton novel, which would you choose?
Ben: I haven’t read all of those…I’m going to say that Sphere was easily the worst movie ever made. I always love all the behind-the-scenes extras, but even more so if the movie is terrible. So I watched Sphere, and then the behind-the-scenes, and I thought this is the most bull shit, incoherent piece of garbage I’ve ever seen, and then I immediately went back and watched it again with the commentary over it. The commentary was with Samuel L. Jackson and Dustin Hoffman. I wanted to hear them rationalize and justify this piece of shit. Dustin Hoffman says two things on it. First: “Hello, this is Dustin Hoffman, I played such and such in Sphere” and then at the very end he says “well, this is Dustin Hoffman, I hope you enjoyed the special features.” Samuel L. Jackson talked all the way through it, and the only thing he’s really talking about is how he was making about four movies at the same time, just deflecting and giving excuses. I guess his head was in The Phantom Menace. So anyway, I would not choose Sphere, and I’ve never read any of the books…I think I’d go with Jurassic Park just in the hopes that I could possibly be Jeff Goldblum. Just to see a dinosaur would be pretty fucking cool.

Anything else you’d like to tell the readers?
Ben: God, put this in your interview, please, no one should ever do this. Don’t ever just put a cap on something and set it down. Whether it be a fucking thing of toothpaste, or a water bottle, or a bottle of Jameson, you have to screw it on, and set it down. Because if you don’t, when someone else picks it up they’re fucked and it goes everywhere.
Ty: Pepper too, be sure to put the lid on that. Ah, there’s pepper all over my shit.
Ben: There’s pepper all over my shit, there’s toothpaste all over my balls! It’s the worst.

Tags: Diego's Umbrella, Gogol Bordello, Gypsy, punk, rock