Remember about this old pair of Vans that Mac Demarco was auctioning on eBay a week ago? I have been following the bidding and they finally got sold on Sunday for the incredible sum of $ 21,100… Last time I checked they were around $11,000, so what looked first like a joke really took off, and maybe people got motivated by the fact the whole thing was done for a worthy cause, as all the money will go directly to the Willie Mae Rock Camp for Girls.
According to the Village Voice, DeMarco will speak directly with the camp to see how the money will be used. He declared to the Voice: ‘I was getting a little stir-crazy over the holidays, being home while everyone’s out of town, I didn’t want to keep the money for myself. I thought that would be kind of greasy.’
Well I hope so! That was part of the deal right? However, Mac didn’t believe a minute it would turn this way, he had previous experiences and thought he would get a good $100 of his old shoes: ‘There was another band on my label [Brooklyn’s Captured Tracks] called DIIV,’ he explained to the Village Voice. Since singer Zachary Cole Smith had left a sleep mask on DeMarco’s couch, he decided to sell it on eBay. ‘I said I thought this will be funny. I’ll put Cole’s sleep mask on the internet. Some kid in Japan bought it for like fifty bucks.’ Inspired by the experience he did the same with his Vans and got this overwhelming response.
‘This is just completely insane,’ he declared. ‘The person who is buying these has either stolen their mom’s credit card or is really into the cause as well. Someone is buying essentially garbage.’… at least he is honest!
The camp executive director Karla Schickele was very surprised and wants to reach out to DeMarco directly to see what he has in mind for the funds. DeMarco did not know much about the camp before he posted the shoes online, but had some idea based on similar organizations he knew in Vancouver. ‘They would teach young kids how to rock,’ he says. ‘There was a similar place in Brooklyn — seemed cool to me.’ The organization runs music-centered programs for girls aged eight to eighteen, has a cosign from Joan Jett, and the money could fund full scholarships for girls to come to Willie Mae’s week-long summer camp program.
Now should Mac be praised for this at all? All he did was to get rid of some garbage-bound shoes and he accidentally raised a lot of money,… however, the guy who paid for the shoes should be praised because he is either very generous or a complete nutcase.