Richard Hell Speaks (NYC 1/5/77)

Interview text © 1976 by Bernie Kugel;
RBF intro © 2010 by Robert Barry Francos
Live photo © Robert Barry Francos
Other Images from the Internet

The following interview with Richard was originally published in Big Star magazine, issue #1, dated May 1977. It was conducted by Bernie Kugel, and reprinted here with his kind permission. I have left the text the way Bernie originally had it (cleaning up some typos kinds of things), changing only the way the names are presented in the Q&A (e.g., “Hell” rather than “R.H.”) for clarity. Text added by me in 2010 is in [brackets].

It was a different world back then. I was getting ready to go to Queens College, and Bernie had come back home to Brooklyn from Buffalo State. Via letter, Bernie had arranged to interview Richard Hell, with only the fine details left to be ironed out, such as where and when. Bernie had arranged for Richard to call him at his parent’s house, where he was staying.

I’m sure I don’t need to go into the history of Richard Hell, but leave it to say that between Television, the Heartbreakers, and the Void Oids, he was a key figure in the nascent New York scene in the mid- to late 1970s. Having been regularly going to see bands play since June of ’75, we had seen him a few times, both in the Heartbreakers and the Void Oids, and having just missed him in Television.

Meanwhile, in January of 1977, Bernie was pacing the Bensonhurst apartment, anxious about getting the call, as he had to be getting back to college in a couple of days. To calm down, we decided to go for a walk around the block. When we came back, his mom – a character in her own right – was sitting at the kitchen table, arms crossed and just fuming. The conversation that followed went something like this:

Bernie: What happened?
Goldie: I don’t like your friends!
Bernie: What do you mean?
Goldie: One of your friends called, and he started cursing at me!
Bernie: [expletive deleted].

Bernie called Richard Hell back, believing the interview blown, but when Hell answered the phone, he was still laughing. From him, this was what transpired:

Goldie: [Picking up the phone] Hello?
Richard: Hello. Is Bernie there?
Goldie: Who’s calling?
Richard: Richard Hell.
Goldie: Hell?! You say “Hell” to someone’s mother you don’t even know!?!?

And then she hung up on him.

The next day (If I remember correctly), Bernie and I hopped on the subway and went down to the Lower East Side to find Hell’s apartment in Alphabet City. We got lost looking for the building numbers. Bernie called Hell from a pay phone from a grocery store across the street from some projects. Fortunately, we were only a few blocks away.

Hell’s apartment was stereotypical LES, with the bathtub in the kitchen doubling as the kitchen table. There were some guys (the band?) in the bedroom yakking away, and during the interview, every once in a while Hell would get up and go into the bathroom. Perhaps, our imagination of the why was stronger than the reality.

Hell was pleasant and open, and the interview went smoothly. I sat on a chair and watched it all transpire, thinking perhaps I should start my own fanzine. But this was Bernie’s interview… – RBF, 2010

Bernie Kugel: Why did you change your name [from Myers to Hell]?
Richard Hell: Well, me and Tom [Verlaine] both decided we were going to change our names because we felt we had such common names, and I chose mine because I thought that was the best, most accurate description of me at the time. I just felt like my life was hell. I thought I would just start my career off on the right step with absolute honestly, make it my name.

Bernie: I understand in the early days of Television, everyone was rolling on the floor while playing, and things like that.
Hell: Oh, yeah, it was extremely wild. And that’s the way I think rock and roll should be. I’m always trying to think of methods to make it more possible for that to happen. It’s hard for me ‘cause I have to stay on the mike and I’m playing bass with my hands so I can’t really stroll with it…

Bernie: Did you ever think of adding another bass player so you’d be freer?
Hell: I’ve thought of doing it. I’ve always had it in the back of my mind to find a bass player, but I like coming up with bass stuff I do, and the person I would have to have would have to do exactly what I told him and that would be boring for somebody. Or else it would have to be somebody who’s a better bass player than me but has the same kind of feel for what the bass lines should be. I mean, the reason I’d want to come up with the base line is not ‘cause I’m the best bass player, but just for the right kind of feel. If I could find someone who was a better bass player than me but had the same feel, that would be great. But I’m not actually actively searching for somebody, you know? But it would be nice if somebody turned up and I would like to experiment with it. I don’t even know whether I could feel right myself onstage doing a whole set without an instrument, but I would like to experiment a little. I did one song last time (at the Void Oid’s debut performance) without a bass…

Bernie: How did you get the name Void Oid?
Hell: Well, actually, I was searching and searching for a name. I had all the guys in the band [Ivan Julian (guitar); Robert Quine (guitar), Marc Bell (drum, who would later become a Ramone) - RBF] thinking all the time for a name and we had three of them, and none of them seemed right, and one day I remembered that word because I had made it up as the title of a book I had imagined writing at one time, and it was to be called The Void Oid [it would be released in 1996 – RBF], and I suddenly thought of it as a possibility for the name of the group, and all the guys in the band liked it, so…

Bernie: You think this band will last a long time?
Hell: Well, absolutely everything that this band has done has worked out better than my greatest expectations. This band will probably continue even after all the members are dead.

Bernie: Were you satisfied with the way the EP came out? [
Hell: Umm… yeah, I mean it wasn’t the same conditions that you have for making a record if it were really commercially competitive. It wasn’t meant to be and it couldn’t possibly have been able to compete on that level, but it was exactly what I wanted to do.

Bernie: What do you feel about kids all over the U.S.A. and Europe looking up to you as an idol?
Hell: That’s such a sweet question… I’m lucky if I get one letter a week that smells of perfume and has lipstick traces on it. I’m aiming for the big time, yeah, but that question’s a little premature…

Bernie: Do you think the Void Oids will someday go on television?
Hell: Any group would love to go on television. It’s the ideal kind of exposure… and of course the more control you have over the whole thing… anyone would want to do it.

Bernie: Do you think you’ll be doing this ten years from now?
Hell: Probably about 10 years, maybe. I would say it would probably last about that long.

Bernie: What do you think you’ll do then?
Hell: Millions of things I’d love to do; millions of other things I’d like to do… I’ll probably do them all at once. The more things you do at once, the better… there’s really a lot of time in the day when you think about it.

Bernie: Do you feel very influenced by movies in your songs?
Hell: I’m sure it has some effect just because I like movies so much and I go to them all a lot. I’m sure it effects it very deeply. One really cool thing about movies is that it exposes you to so many… if you’re living your own life and getting exposed to all the experiences you yourself have every week and then at the same time you go to four or five movies in that week, you’re like getting four or five other people’s experiences as well, with really strong impact on each one. The more impact the better. The better movies have the greater impact. You’re getting the biggest effect it has on your consciousness… it sort of increases your sophistication. That’s the effect it has on writing songs.

Bernie: Do you have favorite movies?
Hell: One of my very favorites is called Pickup on South Street (1953). Another one’s called Pierrot le fou (1965) and A Touch of Evil (1958), though I’ve seen it so many times already I can’t watch it anymore. That’s the top three.

Bernie: Did you wanna be in bands when you were a kid?
Hell: The two things I always wanted to be when I was a kid was a writer or an actor. And the thing that always grabbed my imagination the most was making great rock and roll, and being a big star out of it. But I never really thought it was possible because I didn’t seem to be in an environment where I could make it happen…

Bernie: Do you like performing? Do you enjoy it?
Hell: I really dread it when I think about having to do it, but when it comes to doing it, when I’m actually there and doing it, it’s not bad… it’s pleasant but I don’t wanna go overboard.

Bernie: Do you think recording is easier?
Hell: I think it’s a different thing altogether… maybe not that far apart. But when you’re tense on stage… like it’s real tiring when you’re mixing something ‘cause you have to concentrate so hard, but it’s really great to do because it’s so exciting.

Bernie: Do you foresee the band getting tighter and better as time goes on?
Hell: Oh yeah, I got a pretty good idea. We have a real tight and carefully put together repertoire right now, and we probably won’t add at the most a couple more song. We already have a few more songs that we can fit on an album. So I have a pretty good idea.

Bernie: Do you look forward to extensively touring?
Hell: I look forward to it and I do want to do it in the most comfortable way possible.

Bernie: Do you look back to one performance by this band or any previous band, and say that that’s the best performance you ever did?
Hell: Well, definitely, the last gig I played with this band… it had some very dynamic moments.

Bernie: Do you have a favorite New York band?
Hell: I really don’t… What the best of the New York bands are doing is definitely the most exciting thing happening in rock and roll in the world, and I think that’s self-evident; I think that’s obvious. I think it’s as any of the other historical developments in rock and roll that have gone on in the past.

Bernie: Do you have a favorite band of all time?
Hell: No, because there are too many. I have records going all day long. When you’re really immersed in something… I mean I could tell you my favorite movies because I’m not a filmmaker, but the only way you could do that would be to write down all the records here.

[I won’t do that, but here’s a few: Pinups - Bowie; Between the Buttons - Rolling Stones; Let’s Stick Together - Bryan Ferry; The Thirteenth Floor Elevators’ first album, etc., etc. – Berne]

Bernie: Do you like the way your life’s gone up to now?
Hell: I think I’ve gotten a lot of good breaks. I think I’ve gotten overwhelmingly good breaks, and they seem to get better. I just hope it keeps up.

Bernie: Is there any trouble or friction in this band?
Hell: Oh, no, and that’s such a relief after so much of that thing in the past. There’s absolutely none of it here. Ya know, we’re all each others’ best friends. It’s like perfect.

Bernie: What do you think you’ll be doing fifty or so years from now?
Hell: I don’t think the world will last that long. I don’t wanna say that… I want do everything I can. Vote for me.

Two with TALKING HEADS, 1977-78

Interview text © 1978, 1979 by Bernie Kugel;
RBF intro © 2010 by Robert Barry Francos
Images from the Internet

The following interviews with Talking Head were originally published in Big Star magazine, issue #2, dated August 1977, and Big Star magazine, issue #3, dated August 1977. Both were conducted by Bernie Kugel, and reprinted here with his kind permission. I have left in the text the way Bernie originally had it (cleaning up some typos kinds of things). Text added by me in the present is in [brackets].

Talking Head were the first band I saw play CBGB’s, on June 20, 1975, when they were opening for the Ramones. Many years later I would discover that this was also the first night out for Talking Heads. I went there with Bernie, natch.

When David Byrne started singing back then, he moved the back of his head, the front passing the mic with a Doppler effect. The next time we saw them, he had figured out the whole move the back of the head instead thing. As I have said before, I enjoyed the band more as a trio, finding a keyboard made their sound too “New Wave,” rather than quirky. – RBF, 2010

Part I – 3 x 3: Talking Heads Talk
Big Star #2, August 1977

Since their emergence at CBGB’s in 1975, David Byrne, Tina Weymouth, and Chris Frantz, otherwise known as Talking Heads, have been a consistently entertaining pop music band bringing to mind aspects of bands like the early Modern Lovers and Velvet Underground, but basically sounding like themselves more than anyone else. With super catchy songs like “Don’t Worry About the Government,” “Psycho Killer,” “I’m Not In Love,” “Thank You For Sending Me an Angel,” and others, they present a happy melodic future for music. Recently, they’ve been quite busy with bassist Tina marrying drummer Chris, Jerry Harrison of the Modern Lovers joining the group on guitars and piano, and most importantly, finishing up their first album on Sire [Talking Heads ‘77], which should be just about ready to be released when you read this. But until that comes out, here’s a few little insights into the Heads from the Heads themselves, from a conversation I had with them in January. Jerry Harrison wasn’t in the band at the time so I didn’t speak to him, but hopefully I’ll have the chance to do that real soon for an upcoming issue. But for now, as they’re seen in the pic, here are Chris, Tina and David…

Chris Frantz

1. Do you have favorite New York groups?
Yeah, I would say my favorite New York band right now is the Ramones, other than ourselves of course. I know people might think it’s funny that we like the Ramones and all but before we’d ever even played we’d seen them; in fact, the first night I moved to New York City I went to hear the Ramones, I think they were just beginning. I liked them even though they were really terrible then. They’ve cleaned up their act considerably since then. I think they’re great. Television, of course, is good.

2. What prompted you to write to Crawdaddy [magazine] (concerning an article severely putting down the Ramones)?
Well, you know I’d never even written a letter to a magazine before, that was the first and only one I’ve written so far. I just thought it was a really mean record review. I understand that writers can write whatever they want and all that, but it made me angry what this fellow said. I hate to say it but Crawdaddy’s a kind of dry rag, but maybe it’s picking up now that they’ve got us in there; maybe they’re getting better.

3. Do you have favorite movies?
To tell you the truth, I just went to see three movies. David goes to the movies pretty frequently and Tina does also, but I don’t go so much ‘cause I get nervous sitting in the chair for that long, or I get indigestion. But I did go see Carrie and I liked that a lot, and I liked King Kong a lot, and I liked Rocky a lot. When we were in school, we used to have to see movies all the time. They were sort of required in art school. We got a very heavy dose of the “art film,” or at least I did when I was there, and as a result, I have a tendency to go to things like Rocky rather than Cousin Cousine. I avoid those kinds of movies nowadays.

Tina Weymouth

1. What’s it feel like playing live now compared to the early days?
The crowds are really big now, compared to the early days. And where the crowds used to just look at us and say “jeez, they’re so weird” and think that we were very arty and stuff like dramatic and theatrical, we weren’t trying to be; I think it just happened because we wore very simple clothes and not glitter. We’d just put the lights on and leave them on and not use any colored lights or anything. But now it’s really fun. In New York, at CBGB’s, people get very excited, and some of them scream – scream so loud it actually hurts your ears on stage. And it’s louder than our amplifiers.

2. Do you have favorite historical figures or heroes of any kind you look up to?
I’m sure we do. I’m sure we have a lot, although I can’t think of any in particular right now. We like a lot of the old R&B originators. One of the reasons why we decided to take the risk and make the band even though we weren’t sure at all how we would be received and we knew it would be a lot of work, was because we were very disgusted with the art world. There was so much heroizing and the artists that we met were so inflated with themselves - not all of them but a number of them - and so full of themselves and people really looked up to them as though they were magicians, real heroes, and they thought of themselves as elitists: fine artists, and therefore very noble, and I think that kind of turned us off. It really made us decide we don’t like heroes; we don’t like any of that and we’re certainly not going to be heroes ourselves. We’re not gonna do that, we’re always gonna be normal people. We’re not gonna be pretentious and try to have people look up to us as though we’re something special. We try to stick to that pretty much. I guess we sort of got away from that kind of heroism.

3. Do you have any advice to new band starting out?
Yeah, one very important thing is to rehearse a lot before you perform because sometimes you’re a little overanxious to just get up on stage and do it. Of course, audience response is very important in the development. From the time you begin to a few months later you could sound different. But rehearse a lot beforehand so that everything’s very tight, very together, so that the first time people see you they think it’s good and you won’t get a reputation for sounding bad. You could start out terrible and then get good some months later and people will remember you as having been the way you were when you started and they’ll say, “Oh no, that band’s terrible.” So that’s the only advice I can imagine. Work very hard. Practice a lot, like the old Julliard saying goes, “Practice, practice, practice gets you into Carnegie Hall.”

David Byrne

1. What were some songs that you used to play in the early days that you don’t do now?
“I Want to Live,” “Sugar On My Tongue”… I can’t remember them all. We keep dropping more and more, and adding new ones.

2. When did you get the idea for the acoustic guitar now used on many Talking Heads songs?
I don’t know, it was always on records. You would always listen to records and you’d hear acoustic guitar and I thought, “How come nobody does that in a band?” I mean outside of folk acts and stuff. So I thought, well, I’ll give it a try. Just have to crank up the volume.

3. Did you think you’d have the success you’ve found in New York?
I always thought it was possible, but I didn’t expect it to happen this fast. I set a sort of tentative timetable and thought, “Five years before we get good enough so that people get what we do.” And it seemed to happen a little bit faster, which is very pleasing.


Part II – Talking Heads: 78
Big Star #3, Spring 1978

Since our last issue, the big Talking Heads news is that their debut album has of course been released. And, all in all, it’s a fine first album with the second side being especially strong. Definitely one of the better records of ’77, and this decade. Recently, the band has been touring all over (including a superconcert in Buffalo) and I guess it won’t be too much longer before they go into the studios and start recording songs like “The Big Country,” “Stay Hungry,” “Good Thing,” “Let’s Work,” or whatever songs will eventually become Talking Heads album number two.

We’ve been fortunate enough to talk with the band on a couple of occasions now, and it is from these conversations that we present this epic.

Chapter One: First telephone conversation with Tina Weymouth, Part One:

Bernie: Do you think this band will stay together for a long time?
Tina: Oh, I don’t see why not; I don’t see anything that’s gonna… yeah, it could last a real long time… it depends… what do you mean by that?

Bernie: Well, like in lotsa bands there are personality clashes and bands break up.
Tina: Um hum. Well, David and Chris have been together in bands for several years now and they’d know by now whether they were gonna break up or not. I guess it’s only common sense to say that sometimes knowing that different people have different ideas and start to go in different directions, then it’s just logical that the band break up or if the band is not successful, then that’s logical to break up too, because then you have to mutate and change so that you get to be some kind of collaboration that does work. That just seems to be a natural thing that happens all the time – if a band isn’t working, and you break up, then it’s a good thing.

Bernie: You probably get asked this a lot, but are there any special problem being the girl in the band?
Tina: I don’t know; I really don’t know. I don’t know whether the problems I have are problems anybody would have or just problems a girl would have. I don’t feel any particular discrimination if that’s what you mean. That’s a question that’s been asked only a couple of times and I don’t know how to answer it except to sort of ignore it because it just doesn’t seem to be that much of a problem. I don’t think about it; the boys don’t think about it. I think they thought about it at first when they first asked me to join because they didn’t know how it would be, but they knew me very well and I guess I worked out better than some boys would, just because I have similar ideas and concepts. So it was better to have me than a boy who had a totally different direction.

Bernie: Is there any truth to what was printed in the Village Voice a few weeks back that the name Talking Heads comes from David’s neck, or something like that?
Tina: No, no, that was [Robert] Christgau going wild. I thought it was real funny because I thought it was Tom Verlaine of Television – his was the neck that everyone looked at. But I guess David does have a long neck; we’ve been teasing him, calling him “Neckrifiti” ever since, but no, that’s not how it originated. The name came from an old back issue of TV Guide when we were tyring to find a name for ourselves ‘cause while we were in rehearsal we had no name; it was only just before when we auditioned for CBGB’s we had to have a name. So we had to have a name right away, and we had a friend who was staying with us, and he was looking through the TV Guide and he wrote it on one of our numerous lists of possible names. It’s video jargon for a talk show; it’s what cameramen use when they’re talking to each other: “This afternoon, 1 PM, we have a talking head” – so it’s almost a documentary type of name. And so when we were looking at the list, it was the only name we felt had so many connotations to it, that it didn’t offend us and we liked it. It was the only name that made us all laugh and that we all liked. The name is not very important; I think what happens is that you try to find a name that is original so that when your style or whatever it is that you’re doing gets identified with the name, so Talking Heads now means something particular. It means us. Well, it still means what it did the way the cameramen use it, for TV people, but it’s not something like some sorta particular name which connotates heavy metal or anything like that. We didn’t try to find a name which would suit our music, we figured it would work the other way around. The group would define the name, not the name define the group.

Chapter Two: Post-concert party interview with David Byrne

Bernie: Are you influenced by a group like the Troggs as you have played two Troggs songs (“Love Is All Around” and “I Can’t Control Myself”) in your live sets over the past couple of years?
David: I don’t think so, I just liked those. We mainly did that one, “I Can’t Control Myself” a long time ago sort of before the whole punk thing got started. It seemed like a real sort of punky song and they were a real sort of punk group band then, and we just liked it. But then when all this punk thing started happening, we thought we better not do that. It seemed like there were plenty of other people doing that sort of material.

Bernie: You’ve fooled around with playing Ramones songs?
David: Yeah, a year ago in Boston we did “Boyfriend.” We did that a couple of times. It sounded great. That was when I used the acoustic and I just turned it all the way up so it would sound like the Ramones, but it really didn’t.

Bernie: In your [Sire] press bio it states that there was a time when you thought that Tina would be the lead singer?
David: I don’t think so. I don’t remember that; maybe it was brought up but I don’t remember that.

Bernie: Do you ever think you should use more harmonies and try for that kind of sound?
David: Jerry [Harrison] sings sometimes but maybe if we get better we could do that, but it’s a really hard thing to do and make it sound right. I don’t think we’re able to do it yet.

Bernie: What are some of your favorite recording artists presently?
David: I really like Booker T & the MGs’ records from a while ago. I really like James Brown. I really like that group Parliament and Funkadelic, and stuff like that. I like them but I don’t like KISS, although some people might think there was some sort of similarity. I got the new Randy Newman record; I liked that. I’ve been listening to a lot of foreign stuff like music from Japan and Bulgaria, and things like that.

Bernie: Do you think it’s influenced your writing?
David: Not yet.

Chapter Three: Post-concert Backstage by the Elevator Interview with Jerry Harrison

Bernie: Were there a lot of old Modern Lovers songs that didn’t come out on the first Modern Lovers’ LP?
Jerry: Oh yes, another album’s worth (Some titles: “Tenderness,” “I’m Straight,” “She Takes the Pill for Me”).

Bernie: Were any real, real great ones?
Jerry: You know the song “Government Center”? We have a great version; we (original Modern Lovers) did that song. “I’m Straight” is really good.

Bernie: Do you think that stuff will ever come out?
Jerry: I doubt it. It should. I wish they made a single out of “Old World” and “She Cracked.”

Bernie: “Old World” is like my favorite song offa the album…
Jerry: Those two came out pretty well as far as the recording sounded.

Bernie: Did you immediately fit in with Talking Heads?
Jerry: Yeah. It was sort of amazing. Every time we played together it just got better and better, and just got to the point of “Well, alright, it can’t come any further doing this now and then so let’s try it.” And it’s been real good.

Bernie: Do you think you’ll be writing songs for Talking Heads?
Jerry: I hope so. You never know how compatibility will work. Songwriting is a very funny thing in a band because everyone really does enter into the way it sounds; the arrangement. And often the arrangement really starts to influence the way the song is, so it’s very hard to define what you mean by song. A lot of times it’s best for one person to come up with some sort of original conception and take it from that point. People enter in too early and it just gets confusing.

Bernie: Yeah, a lot of the songs seem drastically different from the early days…
Jerry: Yeah, that’s the case. Cos it certainly isn’t like you feel that you’re not involved in the process.

Bernie: Do you like any bands you’ve seen in New York or Europe?
Jerry: I love the Ramones, who we played with in Europe. I think they’re wonderful. I saw the Clash; I thought they were alright. I think they might turn into a real good band; they’re getting to play all the time and they have a real following, and those things are great nurturing experiences, but as far as strictly taking them for their music, it sounds like I’ve heard it all before. So I don’t know what to say, I think the politics are a little bit bullshit, at least when I talked to them. Having been through politics in the United States with the war in Vietnam, I see that they’re angry about things but they don’t have any developed ideas about them; there’s no theory behind it. But maybe I didn’t talk to the right person, so I really don’t know.

Bernie: Do you like any other bands?
Jerry: Well, I haven’t seen Television except when they first got started. They wanted Ernie [Brooks], the old bass player in the Modern Lovers to play with them when Richard Hell left. So I went with him to go see them and at that time I thought they were just dogshit. You gotta see that at that time we came out of a band who we thought could’ve gone everywhere and to just start playing with a band that was nowhere… it’s a very hard thing to go backwards, but yet maybe he shoulda done it. But at that time I didn’t really like them. I haven’t seen them now; I like their record O.K. [“Little Johnny Jewel,” Ork Records]. I didn’t like it that much when I first heard it but I’ve heard it more and it’s grown on me.

Bernie: What do you think of all the current Boston stuff?
Jerry: Well, I like the Real Kids. The Cars are real good; the original drummer from the Modern Lovers [David Robinson] plays with them. I think in general bands in Boston are still influenced by the English sound, sorta like Aerosmith, being a combination of the Yardbirds and Stones. They’re friends of mine; I like them. I don’t have any idea if I would really like them… you see, the Modern Lovers and they… we were ahead of them in a way at some point. Like J. Geils had gotten up there, and then we would; and there was this band called the Sidewinders, they used to live in my apartment. Ernie used to play with them… So anyway, we were sort of the next group, the next group of bands that were gonna make it, so I feel this real allegiance to Aerosmith. Even if they played the worst shit in the world, I’d still stand by them and I do think they’ve developed more of their own sound, and they have something. I don’t think they’re the most amazing band in the world or the most original…

Bernie: Why did the original Lovers break up?
Jerry: Just personalities.

Bernie: What do you think of Jonathan’s current stuff?
Jerry: I’m not wild about it. I mean, I think it’s sort of interesting, but it’s not exciting to me. That’s really why I didn’t want to continue, because it was all his personality. If you really like his personality, then that’s great. I don’t think his personality is that great.

Bernie: Yeah, cos it seems to me that early Modern Lovers was his personality plus a really solid band…
Jerry: Yeah… early Modern Lovers. He was a teenager who’d gone through this unhappy childhood and he’d written some incredible songs that expressed that unhappiness. We all realized that.

Chapter Four: First Telephone Conversation with Tina Weymouth, Part Two

Bernie: Do you have favorite foods?
Tina: Oh, yes. I like avocadoes an awful lot. We don’t really eat a lot of desserts, like candy or anything like that. Everybody in the band has their own tastes. David will eat anything. He likes baked beans for breakfast. He eats anything at all. Put it in front of him and he’ll eat it. We’re not very finicky eaters. We all eat just about everything. I guess that’s because we’ve all travelled a lot. Wherever you go, you eat the food that’s there, and you learn to acquire a taste for a lot of different things. The only thing I don’t like is sauerkraut. But everything else I like.

Talkin’ with Television’s Tom Verlaine (At CBGB’s, New York City, 7/29/76)

Interview text © 1976 by Bernie Kugel;
RBF intro © 2010 by Robert Barry Francos
Images from the Internet

The following interview with Tom Verlaine was originally published in Big Star magazine, issue #1, dated May 1977. It was conducted by Bernie Kugel, and reprinted here with his kind permission. I have left the text the way Bernie originally had it (cleaning up some typos kinds of things), changing only the way the names are presented in the Q&A (e.g., “Tom” rather than “T.V.”) for clarity. Text added by me in 2010 is in [brackets].

The esoteric level of television was lost on me to some extent in the mid-70s, but even so, there were a band a saw quite a few times back then, and enjoyed the experience nonetheless. My favorite live song of theirs, after “Little Johnny Jewel,” was the cover of Dylan’s “Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door,” in an extended version they had made their own, much as Patti Smith had done with “Gloria.” This was around the time Richard Hell had just left the band.

I was sort of there the night Bernie Kugel interviewed the band. Well, I was at CBGB’s, saw the show, but I hung out with drummer Billy Ficca while Bernie was interviewing Tom (for privacy reasons). I can’t remember I talked with Billy about all that time, during the early sound check period before the doors to the club officially opened, but that’s not the point here.

Television, of course, is part of the reason there was a CBGB’s, and their history is well chronicled elsewhere (in many different places), so on with the interview. – RBF, 2010

Bernie Kugel: Would you think of Television ever going on television?
Tom Verlaine: No, I don’t want to do TV at all. Fact is, a lot of groups ruin their own live performances by playing TV because everybody sees them on TV and they’re not going to pay $6.00 for a concert if they can see ‘em like that. They might check ‘em out if they’ve never seen ‘em, but if they see ‘em and didn’t like ‘em, they’re not going to pay money for the concert, see? That’s why a lot of people don’t… Blue Oyster Cult don’t do TV for that reason…. A lot of groups are very smart in not doing TV… I wouldn’t mind doing a three-minute spot if I got my own video guy and did it my way, but usually the sound on TV is crummy and you got these asshole cameramen doing psychedelic shit with the lenses while you’re playing. It’s just silly.

Bernie: Would you say you like jazz more than rock…?
Tom: No, no… not by any means. I mean I like all kinds of music, but I’m not hooked on any kind of music, so to speak. Like I don’t sit around and play KISS records all day long. But I do like everything; all kinds of music.

Bernie: How does the writing of a Television song come about?
Tom: I get the words… sometimes get the words, sometimes you get the riffs first, rehearse and throw this around, and I might have ideas for guitar lines… show [guitarist Richard ] Lloyd something like this, he take it and maybe improve it. Same with Fred [Smith, bass]… Fred will come up with a line or I’ll come up with a bass line and he’ll take it and make something better out of it… Billy [Ficca, drums] will make something better out of it… It’s like in any group really. It’s like one guy who writes the material and has the basic idea for the arrangement and you do it for a week and throw it around and everything falls into place. If it doesn’t you find out about it when it’s too late.

Bernie: Would you think there would come a day when Richard or Fred or Billy would be writing songs for the group?
Tom: It’s sorta not how we operate, ya know… exactly… it could happen.

Bernie: Do you foresee Television lasting a long time?
Tom: Oh yeah.

Bernie: Do you see people in the band going into solo careers shortly or anything like that?
Tom: No, I think we’re getting closer as the years go on, so to speak.

Bernie: What’s your favorite types of guitars?
Tom: I’ve always liked Fender guitars; they have a real juicy sound, you know? They’re not great for rhythm, they‘re real good for lead. They don’t stay in tune either, though they’re still worth it somehow. I might end up playing a Gibson because it stays in tune and in a big space it makes a bigger sound; it doesn’t get lost in the room. But in a studio I like to play a Fender.

Bernie: In The New York Rocker, you were explaining about how drugs help you expand yourself…?
Tom: Oh yeah…

Bernie: Do you still experiment with drugs a lot?
Tom: No, not much at all. I wouldn’t say really at all. Drugs are like… if you’re intuitive about things or something and you take drugs, they make you believe in your own intuitions more ‘cause there’s something very nebulous about drugs, and there’s something unspeakably true about what you go through with any given drug.

Bernie: What’s this about Theresa Stern (authoress of a book of poems, Wanna Go Out, credited by many to be the early works of Verlaine and Richard Hell, currently denied by Hell in recent interviews)?
Tom: What do you know about Theresa Stern?

Bernie: Teresa Stern is, in reality, you and Richard Hell.
Tom: Who told you that?

Bernie: I’ve just sort of got the idea from everything I’ve read.
Tom: I got no comment.

Bernie: One of the deep dark mysteries of Television?
Tom: (laughter)… Ya see, I don’t wanna have any bad words about Hell, you know what I mean? He’s always accusing me of this and that over the years… he considers himself a founding partner in the band and I don’t even think about it. It’s like two and a half years ago. I got no opinions on it anymore and anything he wants to say, let him say, I don’t care.

Bernie: So it wasn’t exactly an amicable split when he split from the band?
Tom: No, he quit and that was it, you know.

Bernie: What have you done to earn money over the past few years?
Tom: I haven’t had a job since… Well, I quit the Strand Bookstore in 1970, so I haven’t had a steady job since then. At one time, I worked ten hours a week in a bakery bagging bread, shit like that, part-time job here, putting books in mailing envelopes, when I need money. After the Strand I stretched unemployment for like two years so that was real good.

Bernie: Were you doing writing when you were on unemployment?
Tom: Yeah, always working on stuff…

Bernie: I remember an early [Village] Voice article that mentioned you worked on fiction a lot during those years….
Tom: I was working on some stories…

Bernie: Did these later develop into Television songs?
Tom: Yeah, one of them did, a thing called “Breakin' In My Heart” that we stopped doing for a while; I think we’re gonna do it again. What I got sick of is the whole “spoken style”; I just got sick of it. I didn’t want to project that myself, so I stopped it. I wanted to make it a little more… “listenable” or something.

Bernie: Do Television practice a lot?
Tom: Yeah, we really work out. When we first started we rehearsed six days a week for four months before we even played live; then we still stuck. We were awful, y’know? Now we rehearse four nights a week if we have a job or are breaking in new stuff. If we have a month of no jobs, we might rehearse three nights a week. We have problems finding a place to rehearse, though. If we get some more money… We’ll get some money with this record deal… we probably won’t get a dime after it’s all… ya know lawyers take this, and managers take this, taxes that this, producers take this… and that’s the end of it. Then you buy a new set of drums and a couple of new guitars and you have to go play live for a year.

Bernie: But if you do get some money what do you think you’ll do with it?
Tom: If I had a lot of money?

Bernie: Yeah.
Tom: Well, I’d get a decent place to live. You wouldn’t believe the shithole I live in. You really wouldn’t believe it. The floors are like black with shit and the windows are… the glass is ready to fall out and kill somebody in the street, like it rattles. There’s one radiator for four little rooms. In the winter, it’s like… the only thing is I haven't paid my rent since last November… I owe my landlord like $1500 and he hasn’t come after me for it, which is like a miracle ‘cause I haven't had any money this year at all really. I’ve had enough money to live on from the jobs we’ve been playing. But it’s like a miracle that my landlord hasn’t asked me for rent in almost a year.

Bernie: Do you have television in your place?
Tom: I had one… I had this great little old TV, but the aerial broke on it.

Bernie: Do you watch a lot of television?
Tom: No, I can’t stand it, to tell you the truth. I do find a strange thing happening though. I very rarely watch television really; I watch a movie or something, or the boxing matches, or the Olympics or something, but I noticed that five of our songs that have titles of TV shows… There used to e a game show called Prove It I think in the ‘50s… there’s a soap opera on weekday afternoons called Guiding Light and this kind of shit… I don’t look through a TV Guide to find a sing title… this kind of stuff happens…

Bernie: You have a song called “Guiding Light”?
Tom: Yeah, we do. We can’t do it live ‘cause it’s so gentle that if the guitars go out of tune it ruins it… we’re going to put it on our record, though. It’s a real sweet song.

Bernie: What was it like playing your first performance in some theater in midtown Manhattan?
Tom: It was just a tiny theater; it only had at the most 140 seats and it was designed for screening movies for like Federico Fellini or something. It was just a little hole in the wall, but it was very plush, very small. And they wheeled in this P.A. – it was Alice Cooper’s old P.A. – it was an enormous P.A. It was like 15 feet tall; it was just completely nuts, just crazy. We were all like nervous as hell. We played for two hours or something, it was just completely crazy, insanely loud for a room… the room was like a third the size of this club. The P.A. was at least as big as the one that’s in here now, maybe bigger. Plus all of our equipment was completely fucked up, breaking strings on every song.

Bernie: Do you have favorite Television songs right now?
Tom: I like the long ones more and more for live… I like to do long stuff. I’d stretch any song out to 20 minutes, but it’s hard to do that within a group ‘cause if not everyone’s reading each other right it just sounds fucked up. It’s like a group must have a strong leader. No group survives without a strong leader. Our drummer’s completely behind the band here, he can’t really hear anything. He has to listen to hear what’s going on. We’ve got this room down pretty good ‘cause we’ve played here [CBGBs] 200 times. It’s like playing in your living room now.

Bernie: Do you ever think that you should be doing something else other than this, like you’ve chosen the wrong profession or something like that?
Tom: No, but I’ll tell you a feeling I have though, sometimes. It’s like half of me is in New York, and the other half of me is myself standing on some fertile hillside raking a lawn or something, with a real bright sky. The exact opposite of New York. It’s like completely true. It’s like simultaneous realities or something. Maybe it’s like… rock and roll is sort of self-destructive, there’s no question about it. Unless you attack it as a complete business, I guess that’s why a lot of people end up doing it. They just forget about anything but the business – just do this in the show, bring out this prop, and do this. But I’ve never approached it completely as a business. To me, it’s like an art. The whole struggle is to get the art as perfect as possible. And it is a struggle. I’m not in good shape at all. Like we had to play an hour and a half at My Father’s Place [Roslyn, NY] on Tuesday night. I get offstage, I feel like I’m gonna collapse, at the same time I’m so wired up I couldn’t fall asleep for eight hours. It’s really dangerous for your health, even if you don’t use drugs.

Bernie: Do you have favorite guitarists?
Tom: I have solos that I like. I like Hendrix’s solo in “The Wind Cries Mary,” thought that was a really fantastic little short solo. I used to like John McLaughlin playing on the records with Miles Davis. He had this really beautiful tone, this silvery tone that he doesn’t use anymore. The best John McLaughlin solos are on a record called Mountain in the Clouds by a bass player called [Miroslav] Vitous. They’re the solos of McLaughlin’s I think are completely untouchably fantastic. Really insane, but perfectly in control. Just incredible. There are some solos I like. But my favorite solos are the early Kinks solos on the ’64-’65 Kinks’ “All Day and All of the Night”…

Bernie: The ones that Jimmy Page’s taken credit for and Dave Davies says he did…
Tom: Nobody knows…but he was another guy I was thinking of getting as producer, Shel Talmy, who did the early Kinks and the early Who, but I hear he’s no good now that he has 16 tracks. He gets a great sound on a crummy tape machine, and he goes to 16 and he loses that. That roar, that big sound.

Bernie: Do you have favorite authors?
Tom: I went through a whole period where I was really crazy about French writers like [Paul] Verlaine, [Arthur] Rimbaud, especially this guy [Gérard de] Nerval. I really like Nerval. Nerval wrote this one story that’s really great. It’s sorta the diary of a guy going crazy, so to speak. It’s a real beautiful story. Nerval did go crazy, unfortunately. I still like Persian writers, like Omar Khayyam and stuff, about the “wine”… some of those poems are real sweet.

Alex Chilton: Remembrances Plus a 1977 Interview

Opening text, and photos © Robert Barry Francos, 2010
Interview from Big Star Magazine, by Bernie Kugel, 1977

I was introduced to Alex Chilton through Bernie Kugel, who was a big enough fan to name his own fanzine Big Star. Bernie wrangled an interview in June 1977 with Chilton and Stamey in Chris’ apartment on corner of Bleecker St. and Mercer St. I’m sure it was because of the name of his mag. This was right after Chilton had split with Big Star. Bernie came down from Buffalo for this, and I remember taking a lot of photos with my month-old 35mm. I picked the best shots, all of which Chilton later said he hated. These photos have not been scanned as of yet. The interview follows my comments.

The first time I saw Chilton play was later in ’77, at one of his infamous Village Gate appearances, with the underrated Chris Stamey backing him. I was sort of fascinated by the way he took his cigarette and put it into the neck of the guitar while he was playing, to keep his fingers free (later I would see Johnny Thunders do the same). The show felt more like a rehearsal than an actual show, with Chilton stopping songs, changing key or tempo, and starting it from the beginning once again. It felt like being a fly on the wall, and somehow magical. Their drummer was new, and I distinctly remember Chilton often yelling at him to either slow down, speed up, or keep tempo; I doubt he lasted past the show. This was also the night I met the then-Marbles (“Red Lights”) manager and New York Rocker founder, the late Alan Betrock. I went with Bernie that night.

Another time I saw him was at Max’s Kansas City, during the late ‘70s. I don’t have any photos of that, but it was a great show, that I attended with Bernie’s college roommate (and then-bassist for the Good), Steve Lum, and their friend, Janet. Chilton seemed comfortable on stage, but I don’t remember who backed him up. What I do recall, and I am digressing here, is tormenting this poor kid who sat across from us at the communal table. The teen was obviously waiting for someone and even more obviously bored. He sat down as the show began, and so had no idea we all knew each other. By the denim jacket he wore, I made some taste assumptions. When Chilton left, I said to the kid, “So, what did you think?” He shrugged his shoulders as if to say, “Meh.” I said, “Well, it coulda been worse…it coulda been Led Zeppelin.” He grew pale, eyes wide and jaw slack, and said, “You don’t like Zeppelin?” like his whole world was being questioned. I said, “Naw.” He looked at Steve, again, not knowing we knew each other, and Steve made a “yuck” face. Looking at Janet next, she gave a thumb down. At this point, if he would have said he liked the Ramones, one of my personal faves, of course, I would have done a Peter and denied them, just for the reaction. Then I started mentioning any band I could think of that I presumed he would have liked, and made disparaging comments, about the likes of Kansas, America, Yes, and the like. Luckily, these are bands I’m not impressed with anyway, so it was not hard. He walked – nay, stumbled – away, and we all had a good laugh, and waited for the second set, which did not disappoint.

In 1981, I was driving through Greensboro, North Carolina, while visiting my pal Nancy Neon Foster, and saw my very first Big Star supermarket, for which the band is named.

The last time I saw him play was at Irving Plaza, in the mid-‘80s. With Human Switchboard opening, Chilton breezed through his more bluesy numbers, with Bernie Worrell jumping on stage to join him on keyboards. That was another fun night. – RBF, 2010


Alex Chilton: “A Self-Made Man…”
By Bernard Kugel, Big Star Magazine, 1977

What do ya do when ya have something like fifty handwritten pages on somebody and ya can’t possibly fit it all into one issue? Well, how about if you print some of the most interesting parts of the interview you did and save the other stuff for some later date??? That sounds O.K… so here’s a little of what the kid who sang “The Letter” and who wrote “September Gurls” and was in a little Memphis group named Big Star had to say one June 1977 night in New York.

Bernard: Do you have a favorite Box Tops song?
Alex: “The Letter” I guess is my favorite Box Tops song.

Bernard: Do you have a favorite songs off Radio City?
Alex: Mmm… I don’t know… I like “She’s a Mover” a lot.

Bernard: A favorite song off #1 Record?
Alex: “In the Street.”

Bernard: Fave song offa the 3rd album?
Alex: “Kanga Roo.”

Bernard: I really like “Nighttime off that album…
Alex: Yeah, we do that now.

Bernard: What are some of the songs you’ve written recently?
Alex: I haven’t written many things lately. Like the last time I saw you (Feb. ’76) I had a lot of new songs written. I haven’t really written anything since then. Since I’ve been in N.Y., I’ve written “Fishy” and “Shakin’ the World”; I rattled them off in one day, so we’d have something to do on stage. But just living has been so distracting… I still haven’t got a place to live even.

Bernard: You think your current band’s better than previous bands you’ve been in (current band consists of Alex on vocals and guitar, of course; Ex-Sneaker Chris Stamey, bass, backup vocals; Fran Kowalski, keyboard, backup vocals; and Lloyd Fonoroff on drums)?
Alex: Yeah, it’s the best group yet.

Bernard: What do you think about being a cult figure and Big Star albums going for lots and lots of money?
Alex: It don’t pay no bills. I don’t know. People recognize me on the street all the time in New York.

Bernard: Have you seen any New York bands?
Alex: Yeah, I’ve seen I guess all of them.

Bernard: Do you like any of the ones you’ve seen?
Alex: Not really… yeah, I like the Ramones. I think they’re good and I like their records, but not really live so much. I haven’t heard Blondie’s album; I heard them live, they were really bad. I haven’t heard Television live but I don’t think their album’s that good.

Bernard: What special stuff have you been listening to lately?
Alex: Colin Blunstone.

Bernard: What did ya think of the Sneakers’ EP?
Alex: It was god.

Bernard: What do you think of Dwight Twilley?
Alex: It’s alright. It sounds kid of empty though in a funny sort of way. It’s like they’re in a big echo chamber, two or three of them, and they can’t really play that good ‘cause they’re in the echo chamber all the time. Something’s weird about that record, but no, I haven’t heard it all. Let’s see, a record I’ve liked… The Ramones. You know every time I see a record player and a Ramones album, I play “Oh, Oh, I Love Her So” and “Kill that Girl,” and California Sun,” in that order.

Bernard: Do you have any idea of the songs on an upcoming album? Would you be redoing “September Gurls” or would it be new stuff, or…
Alex: I don’t know. There’s about half an album of new stuff or maybe a little bit more right now… but I haven’t really be writing ‘cause there’s not really an outlet and I guess if I wrote some good songs some of them would do it [get them signed, I think – BK]. But I don’t write unless there’s a real tangible, commercial purpose for the song.

Bernard: What happened to the two girls you were singing with for a while in Memphis?
Alex: Yeah, well, that just kinda went down the drain. We didn’t record or anything…

Bernard: What drove you to put songs like “Can’t Seem to Make You Mine” and “Wouldn’t It Be Nice” [The Seeds, Beach Boys, respectively – RBF, 2010] in your current repertoire?
Alex: Lack of really good stage material for one thing. I think those are good songs and they just fitted into the sets and they were something everyone in the audience would know about even if they hadn’t heard anything I’d ever done. And it was such an odd idea to do “Wouldn’t It Be Nice” with three pieces that it always went off in the right way. The vice was nice, and it was like a novelty and we actually did it well. Now we do it with all those harmonies... now it sounds just like the Beach Boys.

Bernard: Would you think of putting “Wouldn’t It” and “Can’t Seem” on an album?
Alex: “Can’t Seem to Make You Mine,“ I was thinking about doing for an Ork single. I probably wouldn’t do “Wouldn’t…” but I’d try it. But “Can’t Seem to Make You Mine” is a good song to record ‘cause it’s not as big as it could have been and we do it really well.

Bernard: Do you know what the other guys from Big Star are doing now?
Alex: Yeah, Chris (Bell) is managing a hamburger joint that his dad owns a chain of and wants to turn into the next McDonald’s. He goes around the store with all his Jesus doctrine; it’s pretty weird [Bell died December 27, 1978 at the age of 27, in a car accident – RBF, 2010]. I don’t know what Jody’s (Stephens) doing, maybe still living with his mother, working somewhere, some incredibly miserable job [He currently works at Ardent Studios – RBF, 2010].

Bernard: What about John Lightman (who became bass player after Andy Hummel left)
Alex: I don’t’ know what he’s doing – I think he’s working in a bowling alley and going to school, and waiting for his trust fund to come in
[We somehow forgot about Andy Hummel, but I remember Alex telling me what he was doing in ’76, and while I can’t recall what Alex said Chris was doin’, I don’t think it was really very different than what the other guys are doing now. – BK]

Bernard: Would you like to see the Big Star albums reissued someday?
Alex: Yeah… or maybe a Greatest Hits. You know, I think it would be a neat compilation… I don’t expect I’ll ever make any money from them whatever happens, but I would feel honored if they’d be re-released someday by some record company catering to the collectors of this world.

Bernard: Do you think if “September Gurls” was put out again it might possibly be a hit single someday?
Alex: Yeah. But there might be better singles, like I have a recording in the can of “Oh, My Soul” that’s a lot better than the one that’s on the album with different musicians that I did when I quite the band after the first album came out. It’s real hot; that’s probably a hit song, too. It’s got a twelve-string on it.

Bernard: If someone gave you a million dollars and said you could do what you want with it, would you not make music ‘cause financially you wouldn’t have to, or do you think you would?
Alex: I’d make a lot of music. Make a lot more music; make films, interview people…

Bernard: Is there anything you like about New York?
Alex: Yeah, you know, it’s like real easy to run though New York, skim it, get all the glimpses you want. Everybody loves me here, it’s incredible. In Memphis, everybody thinks I’m a jerk. Come up there, get respect, girls wanna sleep with me.

Bernard: What did you think of the Dudes when you met them last year?
Alex: Not much, really.

Bernard: You wouldn’t think of doing anything with them?
Alex: Oh, yeah, but I would let him [Bob Segarini, of the Dudes, I believe – B.K.] control me… I just think I know more than he does.

Bernard: Did you hear about the big super-session plans for you and Segarini, Wally Bryson, and (Nils) Lofgren?
Alex: Yeah, I was prepared to do that because I just figured once we get into a recording studio you do what you could do and everybody does what they can do, and what I can do is… it all [laughs]… but I was prepared to do that.

Bernard: Why did the deal with DJM / Amherst [the record co. who last year brought Alex to Buffalo, introduced him to the Dues in Toronto, and had these super-session plans for Chilton] fall through?
Alex: They never called me back. I went home and never heard from them again, which was OK. You know, I don’t know what was in their heads. I don’t’ know what they thought after they met me [laughs]…

Bernard: Were there a lot of fights within Big Star?
Alex: Chris Bell had a lot of them, but I couldn’t ever tell who he was having them with…

Bernard: When you stared out playing in Overton Square in Memphis with Big Star, were you playing songs that weren’t on the album?
Alex: We were doing a few things like Todd Rundgren’s “Slut” and the Kinks’ “Come On New,” and some more covers.

Bernard: What do you think of the whole “new-wave” thing and people releasing their own records?
Alex: It’s a step in the right direction…

Bernard: What would you like written on your grave?
Alex: “A Self Made Man” sounds best to me.