Early this year, Andrew W.K. convened a town-hall style press conference to make an unusual assertion: That he was, in fact, Andrew W.K.
Since the release of his 2001 album, I Get Wet, rumors have circulated about the singer's identity and origins, some of them quite sensational (many involving Dave Grohl, who is cited without sourcing as the brains behind creating the hard-rock singer's persona), some of them in-depth, alleging that Andrew W.K. was created by, or may have been, a producer known as Steev Mike (many of the theories are floated on this website, which has the creepy, cluttered layout and paranoid overtones of UFO conspiracy sites).
These conspiracy theories were further fueled in 2005, when the singer's appearance seemed to change. In new photos, the singer appeared slimmer, having lost his cartoonishly beefy physique. To conspiracy theorists, this was proof that the actor who had originally played W.K. had been replaced. This graphic began to circulate around the web:
This conspiracy would have been largely dismissed as uninformed Internet chatter had the singer himself not seemed to confirm it in 2008.
"I'm not the same guy that you may have seen from the I Get Wet album," W.K. said at a London Q&A session. "I'm not that same person, and I don't just mean that in a philosophical or conceptual way, it's not the same person at all. Do I look the same as that person?
"Andrew W.K. was created by a large group of people," he continued, "almost a conference of people, and they met, and I was there, and we talked about how we could come up with something that would move people, and it was done in the spirit of commerce, it was done in the spirit of entertainment, which usually goes hand in hand with commerce, and I was auditioned alongside of many other people to fill this role of a great front man, a great performer."
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After a video of that apparent confession was posted online at RockFeedBack.com last December, W.K. went into damage control mode, issuing a statement denying the conspiracy theories, then hosting his bizarre press conference, where he asserted that he was Andrew W.K., but little else. The Atlantic's Chris Good offered an extensive recap detailing W.K.'s evasive answers.
After the statement, Andrew W.K. opened the event for questions. He got a few tough ones, and many softballs.
But what he didand I have never seen this tactic, if that's what it was, used at any press conference or open-question event beforewas to actually avoid answering not just the hard questions that he can't answer for whatever contractual reason, but the softball questions, too.
He was asked whether his songs would appear on Guitar Hero or Rock Band, and he immediately went off on a tangent about the film Couples Retreat and the innate sexual chemistry between Vince Vaughn and Kristen Bell.
When the tough ones came, the audience didn't know what to think of his reactionbut I suspected they suspected it was all a joke. He was asked whether he sang in his own voice on his first albumand he didn't answer directly, except to say that, "to answer your question, I am Andrew W.K. I am the same Andrew W.K. that has been there from the beginning. I am the same Andrew W.K. you have seen...on the albums"but he didn't say the voice was the same.
Whoever Andrew W.K. is, it seems he's enjoying the free publicity the conspiracy theories have generated, and for all the press they have received, the questions about the singer's identity haven't tarnished his brand. The singer remains a popular media personality appearing on cable television shows between his speaking-tour commitments, and he maintains a popular Twitter account, where he primarily tweets about partying.
More pertinently, he's currently a headliner on this year's Van's Warped Tour, which stops at Milwaukee's Marcus Amphitheater on Thursday.
