The thing about Tampa is, it's big enough to inspire lofty artistic ambitions in people, but small enough to convince many of them they need to leave town to seriously pursue their creative impulses. It seems like every other week, some talented soul lights out to find his or her place in some more culturally renowned metropolis, never to be seen again — except when they come home for the holidays to let everybody buy 'em drinks. Or better yet, they show up in a magazine or TV show or other high-profile medium devoted to their calling, proving to other local artists that it can be done, and inspiring the next exodus.
It's a tradition whose familiarity to Bay area scenesters is outdone only by that of its two even more common corollaries: the scenario in which a creative type leaves town only to return destitute four months later, and disavow their passion only as long as it takes to put together another band/exhibition/screenplay; and the one in which a creative type bitches endlessly about the area's lack of patronage and declares to all how much better things will be when they move to (insert hip big city here), which they never end up doing.
"You know how everybody complains and wants to move. I had the same reasons as everybody else," says Michael Patrick Welch, "but I just did it."
Writer and musician Welch is an expatriate of Seminole Heights' once-flourishing enclave of young artists, now living in New Orleans. Local-music fans might know the outspoken, occasionally abrasively opinionated Welch from arty original bands Americar Underworld and FunKruse; he also was a contributor to the A&E pages of the Planet before working for The St. Petersburg Times. In early 2001, an unexpected financial windfall led him out of the Bay area in a search for more inspirational climes.
"My parents bought me a car for graduation [from college], which is the worst mistake anyone can make. I didn't want it," says Welch. "I'm not a new-car person at all, so I sold it and got this cash injection.
"The possibilities opened up. I published a book, bought a laptop, and moved."
After self-publishing a 300-copy run of Commonplace — a collection of entries from his online journal of the same name — Welch began a trek that took him to Costa Rica on an extended writing vacation before depositing him in the Big Easy. Three years later, he calls New Orleans home. He'll be back in town on Feb. 27, however, commandeering the Ybor City venue Orpheum to host a variety show (of sorts) and celebrate the release of his new book The Donkey Show, recently published by independent California upstart Equator Books.
Written in a minimally fictionalized first-person style akin to those explored by Charles Bukowski and, more recently, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius author Dave Eggers, The Donkey Show chronicles a version of Welch's early Crescent City days. The narrative brushes up against race relations, love and the insular world of restaurant work, while providing a look at New Orleans that only a newcomer to the city with a singular sense of perception could provide. Welch, while given to some artsy license, manages to avoid the extended, overly poetic descriptions of everyday banalities that too often render stories of this type tiresome — he just tells the tales, with an imaginative voice and worthwhile asides.
"It's just personal journalism, I guess," says Welch. "That's how I would always describe it."
The road that led to The Donkey Show's release started with Commonplace, the print version of which is now slated for reissue by Equator. While still at the Times, Welch repeatedly pitched a story about author Eggers and McSweeney's, the hip contemporary-lit co-op/journal/online salon in which Eggers plays a large role. He struck up a friendship with former McSweeney's principal Todd Pruzan, who read his Commonplace stories online and suggested some places where Welch could submit his work. An appearance on cred-heavy first-person forum Openletters.net led to further exposure, and the aid of others in the publishing world.
"It was just a really high-profile accident. Because of that, people started asking me for stuff," Welch recalls. "There's that saying that it's all who you know, and it completely is. They just all snuck me in the back door."
Welch was also sending copies of the book to writers whose material he admired. He soon found himself with a relationship with Equator founder Philip Fracassi, a friendship with novelist/former New York Press columnist Jonathan Ames, and an agent. Andrei Codcrescu, who published with legendary Beat house Black Sparrow Press and works as a commentator for National Public Radio, wrote a blurb for The Donkey Show's back jacket.
He credits the idea of self-publishing with virtually everything that's followed.
"If you're in a band, it's not even a question of whether or not you're going to chip in some money, record some stuff and pass it around. But with the writers I know, everybody's just waiting around. That never crossed my mind," he says. "It was just being in bands that made me realize I could do it myself. I would definitely tell anybody to do it themselves."
Welch is still working a day-job in N.O. to support himself, but it's only a couple of days a week, helping out in the Business Research section of the public library. He bolsters that income by writing for local music magazine Offbeat and alt-weekly Gambit. Right now, however, he's touring to promote The Donkey Show, and mostly eschewing staid readings to quiet bookstore audiences in favor of a raucous, entertaining, multimedia presentation that incorporates all of the avenues of expression he favors and left Tampa to pursue.
"I went to art school, so I designed the book. I played music, and I still want to play music," says Welch. "It's just a really natural accumulation of all the things I've done since I was a little kid."
Contact Scott Harrell at 813-248-8888, ext. 109, or by e-mail at scott.harrell@weeklyplanet.com.
This article appears in Feb 26 – Mar 3, 2004.