Portlandia is returning to TV for its eighth season premiere tomorrow night (January 18th at 10 p.m. on IFC), and for the first episode back, Fred Armisen got some punk and grunge legends to make an appearance as older rockers who may or may not have gone soft.
In one sketch, Armisen’s aging punk character Spyke is enraged with the state of the world, so he decides to get his old band Riot Spray back together to share his message of rebellion to the government. The crew reunites, and that’s when Henry Rollins, Krist Novoselic, and Fugazi’s Brandan Canty show up in Spyke’s basement and do some reminiscing. Time would seem to have made them soft, though, at least by Spyke’s standards: He’s a bit incredulous when Rollins praises the watchability of recent Super Bowl halftime shows, and when Canty and Rollins agree that Bruno Mars “incredible.”
In a recent interview with Newsweek, Rollins had a lot of praise for Canty’s work in the “almost entirely improvised” sketch:
“Man, I was biting the inside of my mouth to keep from laughing at everything Canty came up with. I’ve known that guy for years and had no idea he was that funny. We were all just riffing on the notes Fred had for us. He has enough patience and versatility that he can get the best takes and jokes out of nonactors.”
Watch the Portlandia clip above.
