By Frances Reade

Eugene Robinson has been the leader of S.F.'s most dangerous art-rock band Oxbow since 1989. We don’t mean Oxbow is "dangerous" as in "Tipper-Gore-no-likey." We mean "dangerous" like “Eugene is known to lurch into the crowd mid-set and strangle irritating audience members into unconsciousness." "Dangerous" as in "the man strips down and brandishes his pee-pee in a threatening manner onstage." "Dangerous” as in… "awesome."

Besides slinging 18 years of sweet, sludgy blues-metal here and abroad with Oxbow, Robinson's also the product of a Stanford education, a widely published writer (for Vice, Hustler, and GQ, among others), a senior editor at MacLife magazine (der?), star of a hilarious and frightening tour video and a deadly wizard of mixed martial arts. His elegant coffee table book on the latter subject is called Fight: Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Ass-Kicking but Were Afraid You'd Get Your Ass Kicked for Asking, set to be released Nov. 13 by HarperCollins. It's a guide to the terrifying/empowering world of human combat, with plenty of info for the murderous fightaholic and the cowardly bar-brawling novice alike. Lots of pretty pictures too!

Eugene is also secretly a total sweetheart who hugs people repeatedly upon first introduction. He was gracious enough to answer a few questions for SFist. Bonus! He will be reading from Fight tonight at SF Camerawork at 6 pm.

So you just returned from touring with Isis. How'd that go?

We were playing to 1,000 people a night, and they didn’t all run to the bar when we played. It was a worthwhile waste of money and time.