For over 20 years, Nardwuar The Human Serviette and his band of merry garage dwellers The Evaporators have been alternately delighting and beguiling the public. The BC native’s thorough research and semi-abrasive interview style have gained him an increasingly high profile, garnering plaudits from super-producer Pharrell Williams, who hooked him up with an audience with Jay-Z, and tried to get Nardwuar in a N.E.R.D. video. Now the checkered-pants-wearing fireball is bringing his Video Vault show on the road, unveiling interviews with politicians, musicians and actors, followed by him screaming his brains out in his role as frontman of The Evaporators.

Do you ever lose your voice with The Evaporators?
Pretty much every time. When we played “Welcome To My Castle” not long after our first Toronto show [in ‘94], I got a cold and I couldn’t do it anymore. I couldn’t sing “Welcome to my castle” as high as I could then. But when we have a good sound system, it never happens.

How often do you have a good sound system?
Like, never.

How do you respond when interview subjects react poorly to your method of questioning?
I try to move on. If you don’t like it, why do it? But the Sebastian Bach incident was especially hurtful, because he stole my favorite toque, and I never got it back. That’s why I wear a tam now, because he stole my toque that I would wear to all interviews. My godmother had knit it for me when I was very young, and it still fit my head, because I don’t have a big brain. That very night someone contacted him and he said the only way I was going to get my toque back was if I performed sexual favors for him, so I backed off. He also destroyed a tape that had interviews with Pierre Elliot Trudeau, Sandra Bernhard and George Clinton.

Would you interview Obama?
Oh yes, I’d love for him to do the “hip flip.”

What would you ask him?
I’d ask him about [one of the first rappers] in Chicago called Casper, who had a song called “Groovy Ghost.” He also developed a dance called “the cha-cha step.” I’d ask him about Chicago early rap history. I’d also ask him if he ever went down to Maxwell Street to buy Polish sausage, or if he’d seen the cable access show Chick a Go-Go. It’s a tween dance show where bands play, but just lip-sync to their music. It’s huge in Chicago.

What would you ask McCain?
I’d ask him something based on presidential lore. I would ask him, “Gandhi used to always travel with a portable toilet. George Bush travels with a portable toilet. Do you travel with a portable toilet?” I heard George W. Bush travels with one so that his waste does not fall into enemy hands, because then it would be analyzed for his weak points.

Is [classic Evaporators song] “I Gotta Rash” based on a true story?
Yes! I was on the island of Trinidad, and I was cleaning boats down there while on vacation. My hands became totally rashed and puffed up. I don’t know why; I think it’s because I’m allergic to salt water. And so I said, “Gimme some ointment, I need an appointment! I got a rash!”

Any other rashes?
I would always get heat rash in high school. We’d have shirts-and-skins pick-up basketball games, and I hated being skins, because when I took off my shirt, I would have lots of rashes and be embarrassed, and people would laugh at it. I also got impetigo when I was younger. It’s a kind of weird rash/skin condition. Again, I think I got it from working at a marina. I got a bunch of weird dirt inside of me — I looked at my skin, and it looked all bubbly. I never really thought much about it, until later on I found out that Amy Winehouse got the same thing on her face. I shared a rash with Amy Winehouse!