Trying to categorize Mattress, the long-running music project of “the man in the gold suit” Rex Marshall, has always been a little tricky. It's funny, but is it comedy? There are beats, but should you dance? Marshall's memoirella All the Work I Never Wanted may be the easiest concept he's ever floated: It's a “fantastic, enthralling, hardly-embellished” collection of stories about all the minimum wage jobs he held between 1987-2002. Within the 100ish page volume—published by local press Banana Pitch—you'll find tales of the McDonald's grill, quality control at Columbia Sportswear, and a gig that started out with an old man on SE Hawthorne waving his arms at him and asking: “Hey! Hey you! You need a job?” Marshall will be joined in conversation by Michelle Kicherer, founder of Banana Pitch and author of Sexy Life, Hello
Suzette Smith is a Culture Editor at various publications including The Stranger and Portland Mercury. She covers a diverse range of topics such as arts and entertainment, cultural movements, and regional interests, with a keen focus on pop culture, comedy, and subcultures. Suzette's work has been featured in The Stranger, Times Review Newsgroup, Portland Mercury, and EverOut.
