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Marie Claire magazine recently proclaimed Milwaukee as America’s sexiest city. This came as no big surprise to Mr. Cesar Palace, lead crooner for local legends the 5 Card Studs. The group formed spur of the moment to play a New Year’s Eve gig at the Nomad over ten years ago. The band now plays fifty to eighty gigs a year, many in the summer. They recently played a “Love Boat” gig on the Iroquois boat tour summer concert series and have serenaded crowds everywhere, from dive bars to the Milwaukee County Zoo.
And talk about sexy! At one New Year’s Eve gig at the Hi Hat, scores of dancing women crowded the makeshift stage, and when too many foxes surrounded the band doing the foxtrot, the hen house fell apart and the stage dumped the band and the dames on the floor! The band also found an older, octogenarian fan base when they played the Boerner botanical gardens. After climbing through a jungle to get to the stage, they played to the receptive old bitties, including the red hat ladies.
I recently caught up with Cesar. It was a bit too early to grab a martini for happy hour, so we met up at the Hi Fi café in Bay View.
Alt-: I guess the angle I’m going for in this interview is that, I don’t know if you heard, but Marie Claire magazine named Milwaukee as “Sexiest City”.
Cesar: I heard that. Damn straight baby.
Alt-: How do you think they came to that conclusion?
Cesar: You know on one hand I have no idea, on the other, Milwaukee has always been kind of a stubborn town. It just keeps on going. The people here just have their attitude of moving ahead, chugging along. That alone is pretty sexy. I could say it has to do with the 5 Card Studs, but that would be tootin my own horn.
Alt-: The world’s sexiest mix tape. What songs and artists are on it?
Cesar: Wow...Barry White, Al Green, Otis Redding, Tom Jones; I know I could think of a lot more…Nina Simone…
[Note: Cesar said he wanted to put more thought into this question, and later e-mailed this more detailed list of candidates for the world’s sexiest mix tape…
Certain artists are recommended for their own particular kinds of sexy...I'll try to categorize when appropriate.
-Astrud Gilberto/Stan Getz/Antonio Carlos Jobim ("Mojitos on the terrace at dusk" kind of sexy)
-Los Amigos Invisibles (Pure dance floor sexy)
-Johnny Hartman/John Coltrane (Candlelit dinner sexy)
-Al Green/Barry White/Otis Redding...and their 'offspring'- John Legend/D'Angelo/Maxwell/Erykah Badu
(Bathrobes-and-hot-toddies sexy)
-Van Halen (Diamond Dave-era only) (100-degree summer afternoon beach sexy)
-Billie Holiday (Almost-one-too-many sexy)
There are probably a million more, but hopefully that should suffice ]
Alt-: There is a lot of young, awkward, kind of stupid guys out there. What advice do you have for them when it comes to the ladies?
Cesar: It sounds cheesy, but if you be yourself, and be confident, confidence will go a damn long way. Not to the point of being egotistical, but be comfortable in your own skin. Also, a sense of humor. And it helps to have a savage mane of chest hair.
Alt-: And what do you think the sexiest thing about a woman is?
Cesar: Oh jeez. This is a very deep interview already. Well, probably the same qualities I just described. A sense of humor. Very self confident. Yeah, insecurities are a turn off. Obviously, a nice shape doesn’t harm matters at all.
Alt-: What are some of your favorite songs to play live with the 5 Card Studs?
Cesar: I would say “Secret Agent Man”, but we’ve played that song so many damn times…Definitely the “James Bond Theme” I could listen to that every day and not get sick of it. The funny thing is, I didn’t really like or really listen to Neil Diamond much before we started playing his songs. When we learned “Sweet Caroline” and played it for the first time at practice we realized, this is going to be pretty huge. No matter where you play it, no matter who you play it for. It’s an anthem, even though we get tired of playing it, sometimes, it is really good.
Alt-: What does the future hold for the Studs?
Cesar: It shows no signs of stopping, or slowing down, there’s going to have to be an assassination or something. The joke is still there. Whether anyone outside the band thinks it’s funny or not, I don’t know, fortunately we still do. Like I said, sometimes we do up to eighty gigs a year. Like this month, we had four gigs last week, five gigs this week. It’s a lot of work, it gets to be a lot of long hours, but at the same time we look forward to it and the challenges of it.
Alt-: I notice you book a lot of private engagements. Is this mostly weddings?
Cesar: In the summertime, yeah. We’ve done…the stories I could tell…we’ve done weddings, corporate parties, house parties; we played a gynecologist’s hot tub party, actually twice. Haven’t done a bar mitzvah yet.
You can find out about upcoming 5 Card Stud shows at www.fivecardstuds.com or at MySpace at www.myspace.com/fivecardstuds
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