Bad Copy

Dan Crane is known for many things: AirBnB host, heartburn aficionado, bathroom texter…

What people might not know is that he was also in BOTH of the most fameux faux Français bands in the late90’s/2000’s Tri-State fake French band Indie scene – Les Sans Culottes (“without underwear”), and later, Nous Non Plus (“neither do we”).

He is also an author, a journalist, a TV personality, an acclaimed chef, a TEDTalk’er, a podcaster, and a documentarian. He’s currently riding the promotional train for his two most recent documentaries – Rather, conveniently about Dan Rather, and the Emmy-nominated Let Me Be Me.

I know… yawn yawn… but wait, he’s also interesting!

He is also congenially known and semi-respected as the World’s Runner-Uppest Air Guitarist!

Few competitive air guitarists have not won more than Dan Crane (née, Björn Türoque). Dan/Björn is the star of the feature documentary Air Guitar Nation (85% on Rotten Tomatoes), and this bridesmaid parlayed his ever-increasing profile as The People’s Loser into being the face (and ponch) of the air guitar community. He literally wrote the book on it.

After winning so many losses, Bjorn stepped down from defeat and stepped up to become the US Air Guitar (and later, the World Air Guitar Championships) Master of Airimonies (or the Host With the Most Roast, or Hostess with a Hostess, or…).

It was on this road to redemption that he and I became the friends that we are today. What kind of friends are we today? This kind of friends:

We’ve given speeches at each other’s weddings and we’ve played together onstage with both air guitars and fake air guitars. We also played tennis with Maroon 5 once, but every relationship has its low points.

We’ve laughed together, we’ve cried together (from laughter), and we’ve eaten pizza in numerous countries together. Speaking of cheese, even though neither of us actually speak fluent French we were once commissioned to help write a French screenplay, and to do so were housed in a chateau sur une plage en France and fed nothing but vin et fromage until nous fini. Zut alors! C’est magnifique!

But most of all we seem to play dress up (or dress down), and do stuff like this:

**Lemme take a moment to clarify that this post is not a eulogy.

In recent years we’ve both made our way off the stage and towards quiet lives of domestication. Dan now shares a tranquil and fulfilling home in rural England with his wife and two kids.

But since an air guitar is the heaviest substance in the known universe its pull is inescapable. Björn vowed to return to the sport when he turned 50 (provided he was still alive and able to fit into stretchable stage-wear). He bandied around a great many concepts for his triumphant return but had trouble pinning the right one down. Then, as a result of his endless quest to find the most homoerotic thing on YouTube, the algorithm fed him Elton John’s music video for “I’m Still Standing” and he knew he had his muse.

All he needed was a one-minute version of the song that, ideally, actually had some guitar in it to which he could air. And that’s where I came in, and that’s how this qualifies as a LoveSong of the Month.

For this rendition of “I’m Still Standing” Dan wrote and sang the lyrics and played some of the guitar, his brother played the banjo, 2007 San Jose Regional US Air Guitar Champion Shred Lasso (Kurt Brown) played part of the solo, and I did the rest.

Unfortunately, the pandemic derailed Dan’s plans to hit the world stage by a year, so here he is in 2022 at the dead-old age of 51. I chose August to post this because this month is also when the World Air Guitar Championships occur and I’m always excited to celebrate.

Best of luck to all the finalists traveling to the championships this year, tell Björn I said “Bonjour.” And, as we say in the community, “BREAK WIND!”

Download the audio:

Watch Björn’s performance: