Wheelz O' Steel

Wheelz of Steel is an interactive musical game show. Ten professional musicians collaborate and compete and in the process create a hilarious mash-up of well known songs in a wild variety of genres. The audience chooses the genres and the famous rock bands they want to hear. The Wheelz of Steel choose which combinations come up, and the musicians choose which song. They have ten minutes to plan and play a mashed up masterwork. The audience scores the effort, and the Wheelz are spun again. Points are tallied and the playaz are shuffled into new band configurations. Only one can win. Who will it be?

Dreamed up by Lonny Edwards (the Earls of Bristol), the musical game show is, like Waking Windows, entering its 10th iteration; previously, it took place at ArtsRiot in Burlington and at Hatch 31, now the South Mountain Tavern, in Bristol.

“It started when I was throwing a birthday party for myself with a lot of my talented musician friends,” Edwards told me by phone. “We all wanted to jam, but we needed to figure out how to play where we all took turns.”

Edwards, who plays bass and percussion, came up with a game show-like idea: Create two makeshift bands from the participating musicians. Then spin two wheels: one to select the musical genre and the other to select the famous musician or band. Give the bands approximately 10 minutes to adapt the artist to the genre. Past examples include James Brown paired with heavy metal for an impromptu band called Back in Brown, and Edwards’ personal favorite: One of the bands had to play Prince songs as reggae.

“It’s like karaoke on steroids,” Edwards said. “I love the chaotic nature of it all, and I’m like a mad scientist in my capacity to tolerate chaos.”

“It shows the audience how musicians think and communicate in real time, which is fascinating to me,” said Edwards. “It also short-circuits the worst tendencies in musicians, which is to be competitive or hyperfocused on precision. We’re making everyone have fun.”