Quintron and Miss Pussycat’s uncanny journey to their 30th Anniversary Tour

Photo by Caitlyn Ridenour

The idea of musical artists touring in celebration of an anniversary is nothing new, but there’s something extra special about the upcoming 30th Anniversary Tour of garage rock, experimental,  puppet show duo Quintron & Miss Pussycat’s 2025 series of tours. Not only are they celebrating three decades of performance, they are celebrating being married for the same amount of time.

And, let it never be said that a musical act that combines the Drum Buddy—a “mechanically rotating, five-oscillator, light-activated drum machine”—and a puppet show during the same set ever did anything traditionally.

“We got married in Las Vegas after a show at Benway Bop! record store,” recalls Miss Pussycat. “We had just met. We didn’t really know each other very well.”

Quintron proposed using a ring pop sucker. Miss Pussycat did not know Quintron’s last name. It was the third show of their first tour. On the marriage certificate, Quintron’s father was listed as Don Bolles and Miss Pussycat’s was Danny Doll Rod.

“And then we went to Chapel of The Bells and we got married and the puppets were the witnesses,” Miss Pussycat continues.

“We had some human witnesses—a Vegas dancer, Catherine Delish was one,” interjects Quintron. “One of the other ones was from the chapel.”

After the wedding, they discovered that the lead singer for Kool & The Gang had just gotten married there, and then the chapel was hit by a truck and the sign fell off.

Photo Courtesy of Quintron and Miss Pussycat

“Then we went to Circus Circus and we went on a pink rollercoaster ride,” Miss Pussycat says. “Then we went to the MGM Grand and there’s this huge buffet, so that was our wedding dinner, and then we went to a magic show in the Emerald Forest at the MGM Grand.”

From there, the inaugural Quintron & Miss Pussycat tour continued on to Burning Man. Keep in mind, this was 30 years ago when the festival was very much in its early stages, and few outside its community knew what to expect, least of all two musicians from New Orleans.

“It was the first or second one,” Quintron says. “We didn’t know what it was. I thought it was just a music festival.”

“Our friends in California have been telling us for a while, ‘This is the coolest thing,’” Miss Pussycat says. “So we show up and we’re like, ‘Oh my God.’ There’s naked people rolling around in the mud. We didn’t have a tent. We didn’t have water or food, and we were completely unprepared.”

Long story short, they spent the night in a nitrous oxide tent, their van got stuck in the mud, and the naked people pulled it out the next day. They then met up with the Demolition Doll Rods and toured the West Coast.

Touring has gotten easier since then, the couple says, although it’s not without its challenges.

“I think if we were just a band and the puppet show wasn’t part of it, it would be easier,” Quintron explains. “It’s really difficult to figure out logistically how to do that in clubs that vary in sizes and load-in times and all that kind of stuff. But I know that this wouldn’t have lasted as long had we not forced the square peg and the round hole together and made it the quadrangle and rolled it down the hill of America and beyond.”

While the tour kicks off in Kansas City to celebrate 30 years, Quintron says it’s so they can go attend the Puppeteers of America festival in Verona, Wisconsin, take a vacation in Wisconsin Dells, see the Circus Museum in Baraboo, and visit House on the Rock. It might not be traditional tour routing, but goodness, it sounds like a fun time.

“We started doing this thing when we started touring again after COVID,” Quintron explains of how he and Miss Pussycat defy the logical way to do it where you tour in a loop to one major spot such as a festival and then you tour your way back home. “We started just routing to where we wanted to go, picking where we want to end, and then just hang out there and drive home.”

As they put it, in the end, it takes two days, four tanks of gas, and some cheap hotels to get back home after a tour that ends in a fun spot, and it’s absolutely worth it.

“It actually works out spiritually better,” Quintron says. “And, financially, it’s not that big of a blow because a lot of times the way home is a lot of weird Monday nights in Champaign-Urbana. And we’ve done that.”

Quintron & Miss Pussycat’s 30th Anniversary Tour stops in Kansas City on Sunday, July 20, with support from Still Animals, Wayne Pain & The Shit Stains, and the Go-Go Muck DJing at The Ship.

Click below to read the July 2025 Issue of The Pitch Magazine: