Puddles Pity Party

Send in the clowns—or at least, the seven-foot sad clown with a golden voice “comparable to any Grammy winner” (Los Angeles Times). Puddles Pity Party’s one-of-a-kind “textured voice laced with melancholy” (The New York Times) has earned him over 900K YouTube subscribers and sold-out shows around the globe with legends such as “Weird Al” Yankovich, Eric Idle, and Jack Black. For his debut at The Barns, Puddles sings moody covers and original songs from his latest album No One’s Free. 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 except to pass him the mustard when he pulled an onion and a heel of bread out of his pocket. A couple 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 crap, 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 guest performer on the 2010 Aqua Teen Hunger Force Live tour and 2013 Eels tour and making special appearances at Seattle’s Teatro ZinZanni and NYC’s Sleep No More. It was Halloween 2013 when Puddles then teamed up with Scott Bradlee’s Postmodern Jukebox to record an epic version of Lorde’s hit song “Royals,” which instantly went viral on YouTube, having receiv…