Adult Swim alum visits Aggie Radio
This past Friday night, as temperatures dropped below freezing, a small group of fewer than thirty people gathered at Whysound to listen to a 67-year-old man sing eccentric songs about alien abductions, ghost frogs and his ex-wife. This was no ordinary man — it was David Liebe Hart, an artist known for his peculiar performances that are as genuine as they are weird.
Liebe Hart is a puppeteer, singer-songwriter and actor, known for his work on Adult Swim shows like “Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!” and “Check it Out! with Dr. Steve Brule.” David’s work is surreal and blurs the line between performance art and honest expression. These appearances eventually led to his show “I Love David” in 2019, which was canceled after one season but can be found on YouTube.
David was in Logan for one of the last stops on his North American tour. When he arrived at Utah State University’s Logan campus prior to the show for an interview with Aggie Radio, he seemed more like somebody’s grandfather than a touring musician. Recovering from his recent cataract surgery, David needed guidance throughout campus. He mentioned that he was cold and would love some gloves and a scarf. The team managed to find him a scarf, which he gratefully accepted.
As he got settled in, he requested a cheeseburger with bacon but also noted he would settle for a fish sandwich — and asked if somebody could get him Christmas stamps and copies of his Christian sheet music to pass out around town.
During the interview, David frequently strayed into lengthy, unrelated tangents, recounting stories of people he once knew who had passed away and sharing grievances about the mistreatment he’d received from actors, religious groups and even his bank. Resentment was a recurring theme as he continued to share his frustration over how others had wronged him.
Liebe Hart explained that this unfiltered honesty about his life experiences bleeds directly into his music and creative works.
“I just let it unfold, you know?” Libe Hart said. “I wrote a lot about ex-girlfriends that dumped me and left me, especially my ex-wife who left me for a younger guy in 1994.”
He also described his interest in UFOs, which he insisted is due to real encounters.
“I’ve been through a lot,” Liebe Hart said. “I write about UFO phenomena and what I’ve experienced.”
To the right of him sat one of his famous puppets, Jason the Cat. Jason is a large, orange cat puppet who looks like an old handmade porcelain doll. This puppet appears in some of David’s most popular works and is a regular part of his live shows.
The puppet was worn, dirty and falling apart. Liebe Hart mentioned it would take about $1,000 to fix Jason and then immediately promoted his Venmo account, which is just his personal phone number.
Max Murray poses with one of David Liebe Hart’s puppets in the TSC on Nov. 6.
Before taking the stage at Whysound later that night, there was a moment during one of the opening acts where he got lost in the crowd while searching for the green room. While most people chalked this up to being part of his performance, it could more likely be attributed to the recent cataract surgery.
Once on stage, Liebe Hart performed short songs and continued his offbeat tangents between them, sharing everything from his family stealing his inheritance to being haunted by German Shepherd ghosts as a child. The audience seemed to embrace this unique and unfiltered approach and showed a great amount of support. The crowd knew the lyrics to many of his songs, and a mosh pit even ensued towards the end of the night.
“I would say the performance was transcendent,” said Mary Burke, an attendee of the show. “I’ve honestly never seen anything like it. I don’t think anybody has.”
As the show came to a close, Liebe Hart was wrapped up in the scarf he’d received earlier, which served as a reminder that while he was widely considered bizarre, he was also misunderstood.
“A lot of people that don’t understand things call things weird,” Liebe Hart said in his interview with Aggie Radio. ”You just need to believe in yourself. Don’t let nobody criticize you and put you down.”
While the world may be cruel to David Liebe Hart, he does not return that sentiment.
“Know that you’re just as good as any songwriter or actor or writer that I was friends with,” he said. “You’re a winner, not a loser!”
—Maxwell.Murray@usu.edu