The impromptu business exercise opened Evans' eyes to the possibility that his longtime hobby could become an actual career, and four years later he's hard at work making it happen. Known by the stage name Verbal ASE (for Adym Steven Evans), Evans has evolved into one of the most unique performers on the Southern Nevada scene.
I first caught Evans' act at Jillian's last September, when he opened for legendary rapper KRS-One. Wedged between two local hip-hop crews, Verbal ASE easily made the most lasting impression, combining elements of music and comedy to earn respect—and laughter—from an audience there to worship at the feet of the stone-serious KRS.
Draped in a white lab coat, Evans was mad scientist incarnate, concocting an exotic potion that included a trip through the theme from Inspector Gadget, "Your Momma" jokes, battling with a Yoda puppet and a visit from the terror in The Grudge. And all the while, he kept the beat going using only his windpipes and his mouth, fluctuating volume and shifting tempo, but never once failing to maintain a forceful, pulsating rhythm.
When I closed my eyes, I would have sworn there was a drum set onstage—kick drum, snare, hi-hat, the works—and sometimes a DJ with turntables too, backing a vocalist. But every sound emanated from Verbal ASE, his lips popping and vibrating as he altered the flow of air from his lungs past his teeth to create his arsenal of strange sounds.
"My act has gotten better since I added the props. Now it's not only something you can hear, but it's something you can see too. I'm gonna give you a show and a performance at the same time," Evans explains between bites of pizza in the quiet ambience of Balboa Pizza Co., this time making it through most of a meal before being asked to demonstrate his techniques. He lays down a beat while simultaneously singing an R&B number, stealing breaths without tipping me off. He unveils a new, techno beat he'll premiere a few nights later for a dance-oriented audience at the Icehouse. And he launches into his best-known routine—the one regulars at Beacher's Madhouse have witnessed on Saturday nights for the past two years— before I cut him off and advise that we'd better continue outside the restaurant.
Now a safe distance from patrons who had begun staring at our booth, Evans recreates the Beacher's number, a raunchy depiction of a sexual encounter with a squealing Asian woman. His head bobs and weaves with each beat and his arms and hands gesture to and fro, providing further emphasis as he channels two distinct characters at the same time. The gag's not for everyone, but it routinely brings down the house at the Joint at the Hard Rock Hotel, helping Verbal ASE go from sometime participant in the show's karaoke contest to its reigning champion to at long last, a full-time member of the cast.
Still, Evans has reservations about continuing to perform the Beacher's routine. "It's funny, but I don't want people to think that's all I got. I can do so much more," he says. "Also, I know it's a show, but I don't want people to think that's how I think of girls. I'm not disrespectful at all."
Far from it, the 22-year-old, Southern California native who moved to Las Vegas as a teenager comes across as gentle and amiable, almost too polite for someone hoping to make it big in the music industry. He's without a publicist or a website, making it difficult even to contact the beatboxer, to say nothing of booking him.
That hasn't stopped Verbal ASE from earning high praise early in his career, however. Even before sharing the bill with KRS, Evans supported Method Man at the House of Blues at Mandalay Bay, drawing words of approval from the Wu-Tang Clan veteran after the show.
Not bad for a self-made performer who, although vaguely aware of such beatboxing legends as Doug E. Fresh, Biz Markie, Rahzel and the Fat Boys' Buffy—pioneers who took "vocal percussion" from a fringe diversion on the streets of New York in the late 1970s to a recognized art form today—has never witnessed any of their acts, in person or on video. Evans' idol is actually Michael Winslow, the sound effects-generating star of the Police Academy film series, and Evans' first experiences with what he would later recognize as beatboxing came light years away from the world of entertainment.
"I would just mess around, follow my mom around the house and beatbox to her steps. Each time she'd take a step, I'd make a beat out of it," he recalls, re-creating some of those youthful beats for me. "I got some of my sounds by playing video games, like Streets of Rage II for Sega Genesis, trying to imitate the sounds of the game. Then I just started turning all my sounds into actual beats."
Evans soon devised a way to write out his best beats—in strange letter combinations like "bf" and "prsha"—to keep from forgetting them. By his junior year at Silverado, Evans had begun attracting impromptu audiences around campus with his beatboxing displays. "We had this thing called the circle," he says. "Everybody would crowd around while I'd do a beat. Sometimes people would rap, and other people would crypt-walk. We'd usually do it at lunch, and we'd get this big crowd around us. It was crazy." One day, he waged a beatboxing battle with a fellow student, securing a victory when he slayed his opponent with a machine-gun beat, sending the assembled mob into hysterics.
During his senior year, Evans entered a talent contest sponsored by urban contemporary station Power 88 (KCEP 88.1-FM). He finished third, taking home a cash prize close to $200. Far more importantly, he came away from his first "real" performance with a new sense of confidence and unwavering faith that he had discovered his life's ambition. "There was a big crowd, but I didn't get stage fright. I did funny stuff, but I controlled it and didn't laugh," he recalls. "And I felt it right here," he says, pointing to his heart. "I knew it was something I needed to do. I've known ever since that performance."
Evans initially hooked up with local hip-hop collective the Periodic Table, but soon found his beatboxing opportunities too limited within the confines of a group that also featured several MCs and a DJ. "I made an album, and I was only beatboxing for about 30 seconds through the whole CD," he says.
So Verbal ASE went his own way, taking gigs wherever he could find them: Aloha Kitchen, the Las Vegas Hilton's NightClub, the Cooler Lounge, outdoors at Neonopolis. He even hooked up with a recurring variety show at the Barbary Coast called Spotlight, aimed at an older crowd that typically didn't understand Evans' brand of music. "I still got applause, but they would say to me, ‘That's pretty good, what you do with your mouth. I can make that same noise with my lawn mower,'" Evans says with a giggle, his eyes dancing behind the wire-rimmed eye glasses he also wears onstage. "But I think they could tell it's music because I'm definitely in rhythm."
These days, you can catch Verbal ASE on Sunday nights in the Dwane Duke Show at Hookah Palace (1030 E. Flamingo Road), alongside comedians, vocalists and belly dancers. Recent additions to his act include a ventriloquist dummy named Max and a stuffed bird. He also plans to incorporate his other artistic passion, drawing, into the mix sometime soon. "I have a Mickey Mouse beatbox, asking ‘What if Minnie Mouse cheated on Mickey with me?''' he explains. "I want to draw out the story of the song, and have the pictures react to me. So if I punch Mickey, the next picture will show Mickey falling back."
Last week, Evans traveled to Qatar with Las Vegas-based break-dancing troupe the Knucklehead Zoo for performances in front of U.S. troops stationed in the Persian Gulf, shows with the potential to significantly raise his out-of-town profile. Long-term plans include recording a CD and trying to latch on as the opening act for a steady-working comedian such as Carrot Top
Most significantly, Evans is dedicated to Verbal ASE now more than ever. For the first time, he is concentrating all his energy on honing his skills, having recently quit his day job at Wal-Mart.
"Do you ever feel like your brain is thinking one thing but your heart wants to do something else?" Evans says. "Well, my heart and my brain finally agreed that Wal-Mart was wasting my time. I knew that I should start pursuing this all the time, so that's what I'm doing."