Die, You Ungrateful Bastards

In the never-ending quest to counter unfounded insults & criticisms levelled at THE GRATEFUL DEAD (and in firm solidarity with the sentiment behind a grip of recent posts by Nazz “Pigpen” Nomad), I give you the first in what you can bet will be A SERIES OF KIND REVIEWS aimed at SETTING YOUR PUNY HEADS STRAIGHT.

May Jerry’s guitar haunt your subconscious forever, as it does mine. First up on the chopping block is

Truckin’ Up To Buffalo: July 4, 1989 (Rhino Records, 2005)

(Yeah maybe not the one you’d pick first but fuck you too, you don’t ever really LISTEN to these guys/gals anyway. Truth be known I, too, HATED the DEAD in ‘89 – oh, with a burning passion! – but hey, we all make mistakes, right?)

OK. So:

You’re stuck in Hermosa Beach, CA on a weeknight, and you don’t fucking know nobody or give a shit about any of it, except you know you want a drink and wouldn’t mind if it were down near the ocean. If only to get a better handle on this whole overhyped, emptyheaded, West Coast faux-culture thing.

And so: you roll down to the beach and troll for a friendly-looking bar. And there really ain’t one that looks right, but . . . after paying 8 bucks for parking, you finally end up on a not-uncomfortable barstool just off Pier Ave., next to an overly-tan, stringy-hair fella who’s sipping a rum and Coke, wearing flip-flops, and grinning like a mutherfucker. Riiiiight. So you order a Maitai – it seems expensive, but hey what the fuck – it comes in a commemorative Hermosa Pier glass that you get to keep! – so you don’t complain. You just drink.

After a while a band starts up off in the corner. It’s a bunch of old men with beef jerky for skin, wearing Hawaiian shirts and mirror shades and beaded necklaces – and it’s like this folky, out-of-tune rock-lite nonsense, the kinda shit you peed on in high school. The keyboardist – with his bogus synthwashes and overplaying – man, he is fucking it all up, royally. He’s just . . . shit.

But as you drink a bit more, you start to reassess the situation.

Ok, so:

The one Mexican-looking dude can actually play a bit of guitar. Not what you’d ever play, but whatever. He’s got his own thing happening, definitely.

The other main guy is at least singing like he MEANS it, which is very cool.

The slow, easy-paced songs seem kinda calculated to please the baby-boomer element in the bar. But these guys are adding extended instrumental breaks and stretching everything out – taking the tunes elsewhere, far far away . . . it’s a neat sensation, listening to these songs bend/fold out in all these little unexpected directions.

Yeah these old boys are definitely taking some chances, following the sound up all manner of sidestreets and alleyways. Sometimes failing miserably, but occasionally . . . ditching convention and floating right on out there . . . going for broke, hell even going for FREE . . . ok well maybe not free, but at the very least these fellas are pushing things in ways shitty bar bands – hell, MOST bands – never, ever have the balls to do. There is no denying this.

And after a few more Maitais (3 to be exact), it all starts making a twisted form of sense. I mean, here you are, it’s a weeknight in this stupid beach town, in stupid SoCal, the drinks are watered down something fierce and the creep next to you is still grinning his maniacal grin . . . but these old fuckers are definitely on to something wiiiiiide open, doing it in real time not unlike . . . well, shit, not unlike instrumental BLACK FLAG once were too, and probably just down the street from here. And though it’s long over, that bogus hippie dream underlying all this – in the end you can’t resist grinning back at the stringy-haired dude next to you, and raising your glass to em all (even the annoying, way-too-far-up-in-the-mix keyboard player), toasting them once before they croak. Cause tonight: they deserve it.

And TRUCKIN’ UP TO BUFFALO? Well, it’s more or less THIS GOOD.

—–

THE GRATEFUL DEAD – “Row Jimmy”

Don’t Knock the Rok!

Saw ROKY ERICKSON & THE EXPLOSIVES live earlier this week here in London. Man, it was a long time coming. Let me recount this.

‘84: I ride my bike up my road, turn to cruise along the Lunada Bay cliffs, up to where the big mansions lay obscuring the Pacific Ocean view. Up ahead, I spot a dozen or so parked trucks, and folks unloading lots of big equipment: a camera crew. I stop:

Me: hey, what are you guys filming?

Him: A movie.

Me: Really? What’s it called?

Him: The Return of the Living Dead.

Me: Cool!

I hung around for a half hour or so, but left bummed as I didn’t see any zombie-looking guys lingering around. I then waited on baited breath all year for that movie to finally come out. When it did, we went to see it opening night at Del Amo Fashion Mall in Torrance. Turns out, all they were filming in my neighborhood was this short scene at the US military general’s home – far removed from the zombie chowdown sequences. But who cares – it was definitely my favorite movie that year. And Roky’s “Burn the Flame” is the soundtrack to this sad old guy crawling into a crematorium oven! I loved the grim, camp misery of it all.

‘89: I’m outta high school now, I full-grown man doncha you know. And so I decide to take a solo roadtrip into the American Southwest in my shitty beatup ‘73 Chevy Nova. I pack the glovebox with mixtapes – GERMS (GI), THE ORNETTE COLEMAN QUARTET, alot of early Dangerhouse and What? Records stuff – plus the 13TH FLOOR ELEVATORS’ Easter Everywhere record. Out near Gallup, NM a highway sign – Route 666 – catches my evil eye in the dying early evening sun. To the sounds of “Leave Your Body Behind”, I turn off and begin riding 100 miles of that filthy, damned road. I don’t turn it off and never turn back.

‘94: I’m sitting around with a couple of grand ol’ Texas hill-country 40-something hippies, smoking DMT for the first and last time in my life. These hippies I’d do just about anything for, but DAMN – they are so luddite, they only listen to 8-track tapes! Seriously. And their favorite being choice ELEVATOR & Roky tracks dubbed from beat-up vinyl copies. Now: there is this point, 4-5 hits in, when I can hear Roky singing and Stacey Sutherland playing, ringing out loud and clear, but I can’t for the life of me figure out if the music is eminating from outside or from deep within my skinny, fucked-up head. I’ve no sense of self, I’m flying and it’s all so heavy and then . . . CLICK! Goes the 8-track. It’s the sound that’s ruined 100,000 trips – in a split second, I’m stone cold sober again. Take Me to the Empty Place, indeed.

‘95: I’m at a benefit show in Austin (at Antoine’s maybe?), the proceeds going to pay for some local guy’s medical bills. Roky’s supposedly the headliner, and well-after midnight he does step on stage, with nothing but a gtr and big ol’ fat belly. He says “this one’s called ‘Starry Eyes’ – have you heard it?” The place goes wild. Roky hems and haws and picks and strums for a little while, but apparently, he can’t remember the chords. So he settles into this off-kilter, minor chord dirge over which he sings the refrain of ‘Starry Eyes’ but little else. He looks really unconfortable, panicky actually, says “sorry” and flees the stage. And that’s all she wrote. It was pretty sad – but he still gets a standing ovation.

I could go on and on with little stories like these – you might be able to, too – but oh yeah! You wanna hear about the gig! Read on . . .

1) The venue was this great big posh theatre space made for PHILLIP GLASS symphonies and the like. And the presence of this little bar-band – 3 old guys and 1 really old guy – all huddled together, in the middle of this massive stage, was totally anachronistic. The ticket sales fella told me over the phone: “now if you arrive late, our policy is to let people in, but gradually – during periods of audience applause.” I told him: “yeah man I don’t think you’re gonna have to worry about that tonight – these guys play rock n roll.” He didn’t respond. Yes I do live in London, don’t I.

2) They played the early 80’s horror-rock set in its entirety – “I Walked With A Zombie”, “The Wind And More”, “I Think of Demons” etc. Plus, they did a killer version of “Splash 1″ that FINALLY brought this song to life for me. And Roky actually looked slimer, healthier, halfway comfortable – how freaky was that? The Olanzapine must be working.

3) EXPLOSIVE gtrist Cam King looks like yr basic Texas boomer dad, what with his shit-eating grin, gel-styled hair and xpensive cowboy boots – and he plays his licks straight in that StevieRayblooz tradition. He’s precisely the kinda guy you’d stumble across 8 days a week at someplace like the Continental Club in Austin in the 90’s – and the total antithesis of GARAGE, or PUNK, or whatever it was that the hip London indie elite expected/wanted. He even dedicated the set to Paul McCartney: “it’s his birthday, you know.” His uncool was PERFECT. And man – he tore it up, like only them white Texas blues mutherfuckers can. I get homesick when I see that kinda living, breathing soulful string action.

4) The sound BLEW MAJOR CHUNKS. Roky – the man with the best rock and roll voice EVER – wasn’t mic’ed properly for the first few songs, and the entire mix was mud. Just who the fuck was this loser who calls himself a soundman there? Introduce me, please. I’d be happy to point out a few things to this worm.

5) People gave em a standing ovation, but that was preordained. I left wanting to see these guys rip it up in a more natural, friendly environment – like around a backyard bar-B-Q, with little ponies milling about nibbling at my denim fringe. Or in a freakin’ graveyard, surrounded by howling wolves, on the longest goddamn night of the year.

6) Real SOUL music is so, so fucking hard to find these days.

Roky Erickson & the Explosives – Night of the Vampire (Casting the Runes, Five Hours Back, 1987)

(Thanks to Dan for the great and wiggly shot of Roky on that cold, cold London stage)

Dead Man’s Family

Been thinking hard about two bands tonight. They be FAMILY and DEAD MAN.

FAMILY were bitterly curdled prog/bluesrock hippies from Leicester (never been there myself, but if it sounds like this I wanna go!). They started up in the late 60’s, throwing folk, jazz, blues, R&B, outerspace etc. together in a schizo way that spelled ART to some. But hey, these boys usually sought fit to eventually bash it all home in that grand early Brit hard rock tradition – so I stand right there with em, all the way down. And singer Roger Chapman’s voice . . . DAMN . . . that was some HEAVY SOUL CUSTARD for ya! Their records always slathered him on THICK, so your ears were like DRIPPING with it. Gooey good fun, that.

The early recs sound kinda like TRAFFIC/BLIND FAITH with Arthur Brown hollering over the top of them; the middle-period recs, like FREE tearing through the STEELY DAN catalogue; and the later daze nuthin’ so much as good ol’ FAMILY – of the crazyuncle/pervgranpa variety – on their first flight TO THE MOON. In other words: beyond words. In my alternate universe, it’s THIS stuff that corporate twats are pissing themselves silly to license for stupid MINI cars ads or whathaveyou.

I’d recommend the Family Entertainment LP for those with freshly-stamped UK tourist visas, Bandstand for miserable Sunday afternoons crusin’ the 99p shops around the Hounslow High St., and Fearless for catwalking that damp, musty, 6 ft. wide tunnel connecting Greenwich with the Isle of Dogs. Yikes!

(On a personal note: I once sold the first 3 or so FAMILY LPs to somebody named THURSTON MOORE out of a record store I used to manage in Hollywood in the 90’s. When he asked me what they sounded like, I had to fess up: “they rock pretty good but like with THE FLESH EATERS you gotta be up for dealing with a difficult singer.” Now, you can argue all you want but I’ll always swear that next Sonic Youth LP – A Thousand Leaves – hadda a distinctly FAMILY-esque vibe.)

FAMILY – “Lives and Ladies” from Anyway (Reprise Records, 1970)

But then there’s DEAD MAN.

DEAD MAN are kids from Sweden who kinda sorta actually look like FAMILY. They released their first, self-titled full-length in 2006 – it’s great through and through, all the way to the end. Plus: it kinda sorta sounds like FAMILY. Which is really weird. Since, clearly, this is the first record ever to be released by human beings on Planet Earth that strives to kinda sorta sound like FAMILY. I realize it’s not as twistedly tweaked as Roger Chapman & Co., and that there’s also a QUICKSILVER MS influence to be found – and maybe a bit of THE GROUNDHOGS – in the mix too. But hey give em time, they’re young. That FAMILY schizo thing is in there deep, undeniably. And there’s CUSTARD coating this Swede’s voice, too! This is a monumentous occasion, me thinks.

Dead Man – “Mumbo Jumbo” from Dead Man (Crusher Records, 2006)

Loud 3D

Hey: anybody out there ever seen this?

It’s a slim, softcover volume put together in Dec. ‘84 by Gary Robert, Rob Kulakosky, and Mike Arredondo (with help from the Maximum Rock N Roll crew) up in the Bay Area. And it’s filled with nothing but – get this: 3-D IMAGES of all your favorite hardcore bands!

Now I must’ve ordered it out of the pages of MRR sometime in ‘85/’86. Cause I thought I was a punker. True HxCx, you know? Little did I know I’d eventually end up being one of them TIRED-ASS NEW-RO POSEUR HIPPIE GLAMFAG METALHEADS everybody moaned about back then.

The book ain’t particularly relevatory, but you’re not likely to see a copy of it anytime soon. It’s got a few bands in it I listened to at the time – BLACK FLAG, DK’s, FEAR, MINOR THREAT, 7 SECONDS – and alot I didn’t (THE LEWD, CAUSE FOR ALARM, STRANGLEHOLD, and somebody named RIISTYTET, who were apparently Finnish). But it did suceed in making my buddy Bob laugh hard the other night (“shit, this guy’s middle finger is practically UP MY NOSE!”) as we talked about how bad that American Hardcore documentary turned out to be. Yep: I’m glad I kept it.

I was always a Flipside reader myself. But you know: I tried really hard to get on board that Max R’N'R activist train in the mid-80’s, I really did. I bought an Augusto Sandino t-shirt that I wore to death. I listened hard to the SUBHUMANS record with that song about killing Mickey Mouse on it. I even went vegetarian! But in the end, I’d always be lured back to loud, rockin’ things with questionable/perverse lyrical content. Ah, well.

Those MRR guys were probably well-intentioned. I went to college with a dude (called himself Jux) who eventually joined their team/army, and I can vouch for him, he was a great one. But the mag was kinda dry, the lack of color kinda draining, and not a joke in sight . . . it did seem they were asking just A BIT MUCH of their readership. And Flipside, well – they didn’t ask a goddamn thing of me, other than my dollar. And maybe, that I bring a sense of wild fun to the preceedings – which most people don’t NEVER ask of me to do. I still appreciate that warm invitation, 2+ decades on.

Big Hair Redux

(I wrote the following for another blog of mine a year or so back, but as I’m bumming heavily on a recent turn of events initiated by the provider of that blog, in apparent “good faith” – I’m moving house. Do excuse the mess.)

_____________________________________________________________________

Not long ago, I won this on e-bay:

Yep – NEW BIG HAIR HAS ARRIVED AT MY DOORSTEP.

“Here in a once-in-a-lifetime box set are all the memories, all the music, the fashion and culture from Hollywood’s most-remembered(?) decade, wrapped up in one glorious stargazing vehicle we’re calling Hollywood Rocks – The Audio Companion! Designed as a companion to the book HOLLYWOOD ROCKS!, this two-year project involved collecting demo cassettes, 12” vinyl, CDs, VHS and video tapes submitted by hundreds of current and former rock stars. Listen in awe to the demo-quality of an early DOKKEN. Close your eyes and pretend that you’re in the studio while WARRANT refines their songwriting craftsmanship. There’s no “re-recorded” stuff, either, since we passed on the countless submissions dated post ’93! So, here they are – digitally remastered and represented exactly how they were, straight from the original recordings!”

As I sit here staring at this thing, my mind is transported back to a time when I could barely breathe in Hollywood, what with all the hair spray wafting around the Blvds. God, I remember sifting through record bins in THE ROCK SHOP and paging through issues of BAM and ROCK CITY NEWS, month-after-month, in search of SOMETHING, ANYTHING that might vaguely appeal to a glam-hating, HC kid with a half-shaven head like myself. And always, no dice. I’m not being elitist here: objectively, it was so goddamn caustic, the presence of all that careerist, dead-on-arrival poncy pop hair metal. They were milktoast hacks in corporate candypants. And their rock was SICKLY, man.

Of course we all change, grow, move on. Some mature, others (me?) get progressively lamer, less discerning, more dimwitted. With time my musical and non-musical interests began circling ever closer to the dreaded BIG HAIR aesthetic. Inexplicably, I began to appreciate the presence of skinny, ass-shakin’ banshee dudes in female attire, screamin’ goofiness atop wailing gtr solos. So much so, that I ended up buying the HOLLYWOOD ROCKS! coffee table book last year – so I could BETTER FIGURE MY SHIT OUT.

Now I didn’t mean to win this CD box set, really. I was really drunk when I bid. But I won it, and it’s arrived. And now I’ve got to tell you about it. It’s 4 discs, 1 big fat error-riddled booklet, plus collectable HOLLYWOOD ROCKS! badge and “all-access backstage pass”. I’ll skip over yr WARRANTS, STRYPERS, POISONS – you might already have a better perspective on that stuff, since it still doesn’t mean much to me. But fuck apologies – are you READY to hear about the MEAT of this collection?