Most music fans, at least those who were around in the mid-’90s, have long since suppressed their painful memories of 311, the Omaha, Nebraska rap-rock quintet that rocketed to popularity on the strength of such Surge-fueled, totally extreme songs as “All Mixed Up,” “Come Original,” and “Down.” The band’s bro-tastic music always seemed to be seeping from the next dorm room over during those now-hazy years. One fan who definitely hasn’t forgotten and is, in fact, going to great lengths to remember is Chicagoan David “Mack” Machajewski. In tribute to the band, he recently launched what might be the silliest and most irresponsible Kickstarter campaign of 2016. “I currently weigh 159 pounds,” he explains. “As a tribute to my favorite band, 311, I want to gain 152 pounds so that my body weight is 311 lbs.”
Without giving any real details about how he plans to reach this target weight, he explains in the campaign video that he wants to do so within 311 hours. Why? “So that I can send a video to the band 311 where I step onto my scale, and the camera zooms in on the scale reading 311 pounds. And then the camera zooms into my face, where I look right in the camera, and I say, ‘Hey, guys, does that number look familiar?’” Sounds totally worth it. And Machajewski is only asking for $311,000.
As of this writing, Kickstarter has suspended the funding for the project, which is probably just as well, seeing as how it had already raised the perfect amount of money: $3.11. To be clear, the band’s name is not a reference to anyone’s weight but to the Omaha police code for indecent exposure, a crime for which its original guitarist, Jim Watson, was once arrested. There was a persistent rumor in the ’90s, however, that 311 was a cryptic reference to the KKK.
There is just the slightest possibility that Machajewski meant this whole thing as a conceptual prank. His YouTube videos shows him to be a master of low-key, straight-faced trolling and occasionally leave viewers baffled and upset. Here, for instance, is his defiant take on Radiohead. Notice that he calls the lead singer “Thom Yorkie.” It has also come to our attention that he is a comedy writer and performer in Chicago, and a member of Ronald Ray Gun, a video team at the iO Comedy Theatre.
And this is his Andy Kaufman-esque non-impression of Robert De Niro.
Caveat emptor.