The Rage May Surface: An Op-Ed Piece

Original text by Alan Abramowitz, 1978
Introduction by Robert Barry Francos, 2011

This opinion piece was originally published in FFanzeen No. 3, dated Winter / Spring 1978-79, which was the first newsprint version of the ‘zine. Art Editor of the issue Alan Abramowitz discussed the then-current state of music and the cultural milieu in which it existed. During the 1980s, Alan would go on to create the music and arts-centered cable access show Videowave, which is not only still on the air in the tri-state area, but new shows are in the process of being created.

Some further commentary from me follows the piece. – RBF, 2011

“Oh, get off!” you cry. “You don’t think music; you just listen to it.” I scream back, “Oh! The poor little angel. Thinking burns up too many calories.” That’s right, don’t try to reason out the lyrics, just enjoy it. Just because you spent hours spinning records backwards… “Paul is dead… Paul is dead… Paul is…” Wouldn’t it be nice for once to think about where you’re going? Radio is about as interesting as sidewalk cracks. Most of those kids out there are most lost than the Pepsi generation.

This is the age of diversity. There is southern rock, acid rock, punk, d***o, jazz, MOR, pop, R&B, new wave, and so on. Not only is the music scene fragmented, but the fragments are fragmented. And most groups or soloists stick to more than one style. What is the trend for the next decade? Will music continue as it is or merge like the Beatle era?

Sixties music dominates the airwaves, along with d***o, pop, and ‘50s revival music. Listeners still look at the last decade trying to recapture that lost sense of purpose. We in the ‘70s are dissatisfied. The nostalgia we admire not only includes periods 20 or 30 years ago, but recent times such as the early ‘70s. Something in modern music is missing so we look to the past. Oldies sell like hotcakes. Frozen into a trend since 1969, music begs for a revolution; but people have to change their attitudes first. The issues of the war years have changed – for the worse. Alienation and dehumanization are still here. Your draft number doesn’t bother you but your Social Security number does. The revolutionary tirades of the hippie age have become the complacent tunes of the ‘70s. Crosby, Stills & Nash sing of “Dark Star’; gone are “Nixon’s soldiers.” Music only appears to be rebellious when really it’s as conformist as you can get. People tend to forget the shock of the flower people, long hair, the Beatles, the Mod look, miniskirts, protest marches and living together – the counter-culture. Today’s sound reflects that. Gone is the controversy. No more daring on the airwaves. Just complacency.

Look at the past. That’s where the future lies. Every 20 years a new generation must face new truths and tear up old lies. Like a snake, we shed our skins of old values. Occasionally the skin sticks and we have to rip it off with a vengeance. A fit of rage. It’s the kids who see it first. They view the world from a vantage point. In the ‘20s, they broke from the past with the Charleston, the fast cars and flappers. Most of their parents still lived in 1896, mentally and morally. People changed and the music changed. In the ‘40s, the war kept the kids preoccupied; nevertheless, in the ‘50s, their culture, such as the “Fonz’s,” like rock’n’roll, existed mostly in the cities. This rock’n’roll was an omen for the ‘60s. It said being involved was like torture. It said your parents are a hassle. It said, look around you; isn’t it all stupid? Then it all broke open on the Ed Sullivan Show. And there was turbulence. But like before, it was absorbed. When the Beatles arrived in America, reports mentioned how long their hair was. It covered the tops of their ears! By 1972, Lyndon Baines Johnson had hair down to his shoulders. And again, the omen has arisen. It is the new wave. Since 1967 is still fresh in our minds, the next explosion will resemble the last.

Music… rock needed some earthiness. Blacks were then welcomed into the pop scene. Their music dealt with the reality of day-to-day life (until then, they had mostly been left out of the mainstream). It was called soul music for a reason. But now, look around you. Is there any soul in d****o? The music creates money – the money creates music. No meaning; the turbulence is gone.

Vietnam made all our standards obsolete. The rat race was just what it described: people reduced to a groveling state, not a description told at cocktail parties. Mr. Businessman was a square. All we were taught wasn’t true. Nothing else made sense anymore. War wasn’t glory. Suburbia wasn’t living. College wasn’t an education. Frank Sinatra wasn’t music. Sgt. Pepper’s heralded the total experience. Rock metamorphosed from jukebox tunes into a view of life – the “trip.” Other movements long in the sidelines moved into the forefront. Elvis came in with rockabilly, Joan Baez with folk, and the Supremes with R&B. Violence, sex, love, frustration, alienation, were now part of the art. The art was alive. To those on our side of the generation gap it was “the living are dead and only the dead are truly living.”

Music always changes. We must deal with confusion, compassion, rejection, and reflection. That is the way music appeals to us. Unconscious emotions play in the sound and the lyrics confirm it. What we’re thinking becomes popular music. You live the sound. You like it because you think, “Hey!... that’s part of me!” But a culture can be forced down your throat through radio, television, records, and elevator Muzak(t). That is the mellow sound. That is imposed music. ‘Sixties-ish rock has lost much meaning in the last few years. Issues and talents are ignored. The roots of pop rock have been forsaken for the derivative R&B.

As rock’n’roll outraged the generation of Ozzie & Harriet, new wave upsets the modern Archie Bunkers. It seeks publicity and seeks to astound. Absurd realities that are accepted as fact of life because all they are is old, worn-thin ideas. Like rock’n’roll, new wave reveals the dumb.

Corporate America has taken over. Imposed culture means stable, predictable profits. Rock once protested big business; now it is big business. Hype creates the event. Hype creates the group. Talent becomes an insignificant part of the formula. Groups like KISS rely on mystery, action and gossip, but little originality. “Record companies are run by accountants and lawyers,” David Crosby* admits. Being profit seekers, they have little contact with the artists. They control radio, TV, magazines, etc. Radio, as a medium of expression, is incredibly conservative. The trend has gone from Top Forty stations to Top Ten. What upsets people’s preconceived notions of music simply is not aired. The real meat is sacrificed for dough. What makes money is what reaches the most people. The gold record, which was a rarity, is now a common thing. The music of the ‘60s was incorporated into Muzak(t). When you hear “She Loves You” by Percy Faith, you wonder how long it will be before there is “Sheena Is a Punk Rocker” by the Ray Coniff Singers. The creative artist is at the mercy of administrators who think in terms of feeding the machine. The machine is shocked by the Ramones, Television, Blondie, Dead Boys, Iggy Pop and the Adverts. The machine loves only $$$.

Sex is money to the corporations. If it appeals, it can be exploited, is their motto. What is Donna Summers Selling? Music? Talent? No, it’s sex youtube.com/watch?v=UPXizlnS7go]. “Move it in / Move it out” (that well played d****o single [“Disco Lady” by Johnny Taylor: youtube.com/watch?v=-3JkEoQ0Cz8]) isn’t about dancing. It manipulates your emotions. Is there any soul in Barry White’s moaning? You become programmed to like what you hear. If you don’t believe the sex part, just pick up a popular album and look at the cover.

Do you notice how big stars are touted? Not to say they have no talent, but you can tell by the push behind those concert tours. Hype pushes it and talent is used up. It pushes the Wings, Elton John, the Stones, Fleetwood Mac and Barry Manilow. They push the groups who’ve lost their glory, like Led Zeppelin. They are illusions of the past. “He who is first, he will be last / The times they are a-changing.”

And what does this add up to? Violence, turbulence, and change are building up. Rock and roll led to “1-2-3-4 / We don’t want your fuckin’ war.” Music isn’t answering the questions of life anymore. New wave does. What will this new wave lead to? How dynamic it is depends on the resistance to change. Kids are angry, unemployed and pissed off. They see dad work for 50 years only to get laid off. Is England 1978 an omen for American 1984? Will this anger lash out? The music reflects the times. And the frustration is overwhelming.

If there is turbulence, rock’n’roll will take in elements of new wave, jazz, reggae, punk and folk. Like pre-Beatle America, today’s music is in pieces. From cause, it became a taste or preference. Turbulence would merge elements of all music. D****o will be revealed as a fad. In social upheaval, it would be tossed aside as “not relevant.” Country will - and is - becoming institutionalized Muzak(t), MOR and pop. A new wave comes in hard times (i.e., U.S. –> Vietnam, England –> depression).

Jane Fonda once said, “It is the age of nothingness. Even with the problems of the “60s, there was this moral issue that got kids off their feet. Below the layer of apathy, in today’s young people, is a tremendous amount of rage.”

The rage may surface…


While I don’t agree with everything Alan said (e.g., sex always sold rock’n’roll, which itself is named for a blues term for sex), his argument is pretty solid, and only proven to be more so in retrospect. There have been other commentaries about much of what he brought up back then, such as the commercialization of music; check out The Mansion on the Hill: Dylan, Young, Geffen, Springsteen, and the Head-on Collision of Rock and Commerce by Fred Goodman, for example. As for “hype creates the event,” I recommend reading Daniel J. Boorstin’s 1962 book The Image: A guide to Pseudo-events in America.

At the same time saying it’s the “age of diversity” of style and about the stagnation in experimentation sound like opposites, it is actually an oxymoron, in that it’s opposites that work. While the genres are splintered, there is also a dummying down and overlapping that make event the difference minimal, despite the shards. Country is more pop than bluegrass these days; rock by groups like Slipknot, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, and Kid Rock have incorporated rap into its sound. And don’t get me started with the auto-tune making it all a lie on top of a lie. It seems all the shards of genres have pretty much the same sharp point, but no edge. To add to when Alan said, “What we’re thinking becomes popular music,” now in the 21st Century, popular music becomes what we’re thinking.

That is why independent music is more important now than ever. What used to take a whole studio of equipment to produce can now be done on a laptop. What took factories to make a physical product can be done with a disk copying program (if hard copies are needed at all).

Every type of music has been co-opted at some point. The scary Elvis, Chuck and Little R. are turned into Pat Boone, Frankie Avalon and Fabian. The Beatles resurrected it with the Mersey Beat, which became muddled in its own use of technology, causing it to cease with Sgt. Pepper’s. The Last Poets and Public Enemy turn into Lady Caca and Christina Arugula. The Byrds and the Yardbirds lead into hair bands like Poison. The Ramones and Television get bought out by the disco (aka d****o) of Blondie. Sadly, in many cases, the compromised get a larger market share than the originals, because unlike the indie groups that started it, there is more control, therefore more money in the homogenization.

Someone once said to me after I had commented about how much better the Heartbreakers from New York were compared to Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, “Oh yeah, then how come Tom Petty outsold that other group by so much?” My response was, simply, “Look how many people voted for Nixon.” Just because something sells more, does not mean it is better. I’m still waiting for that rage to surface, all these years later.

* In the original piece, this quote was attributed to Elton John, but an Internet search reveals it to be David Crosby.

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.

THE SKELS with a Live CHEETAH (CHROME)

Text by Julia Masi, 1982
Introductory text by Robert Barry Francos, 2010
© By FFanzeen
Images from the Internet

The following article/interview with The Skels was originally published in FFanzeen magazine, issue #9, in 1982. It was conducted and written by Julia Masi, and I was also present for the rehearsal, interview and brief photoshoot on St. Mark’s Place, though my memory of the whole experience is kind of weak.

Bassist Gerry Lambe (not to be confused with the British musician of the Skunks) died around 1986 after a long career on the New York scene. Cheetah Chrome, infamous for so many reasons, including his tenure with the Dead Boys, now has a powerful new autobiography out called A Dead Boy’s Tale, which had been reviewed last month in this blog (ffanzeen.blogspot.com/2010/09/book-review-dead-boys-tale-by-cheetah.html). In the book, there is little mention of the Skels, so here is my contribution to honor the history of Cheetah. – RBF, 2010

In a dark, musty studio on West 27th Street, Cheetah Chrome and his band, the Skels – Gerry Lambe, bass, and Jeff Miller, drums – are absorbed in practice for an upcoming gig in Baltimore. Almost oblivious to an audience of two jaded rock’n’roll journalists, the Skels seem every bit as intense, polished, and energetic in rehearsal as they do in actual performance.

But the band isn’t satisfied. In unison, they interrupt the flow of smooth-sounding “Sonic Reducer,” crack a few jokes, tune their guitars, pinpoint their problem and try it again. A series of similar stops and starts punctuate the rehearsal, magnifying the camaraderie, seriousness and sweat that make the Skels one of the tightest new trios in New York.

All three have been in bands before: Cheetah, who started out in his native Detroit with Frankenstein, and Rocket From the Tombs, reaches his peak of success with the Dead Boys in the late ‘70s; Jeff’s been a studio musician here and abroad, as well as playing with bands like Wayne County & the Electric Chairs, and the Fast; and Gerry’s a veteran of the local scene, most recently with Disgrace. From their combined experience, they know what it takes to make or break a band, and the Skels is where they put their knowledge to the test.

“Three creative people all working together. That’s a band. That’s this band, at least,” said Cheetah. “It’s a real exclusive club. The only way anybody’s gonna join is if they are brought in by another member of the band. It’s like the Guardian Angels. You’ve gotta be sponsored.” They frequently kick around the idea of having another member, but at this point it’s not in their immediate plans. “I’ve decided it’s a five piece band, ‘cause me and the drummer are both skitz,” Cheetah quipped. “Before this band started, before I had these two buys, it was a four piece or a three piece, depending on who showed up for the gig. It became a big pain in the ass for me to do a three piece. I had to sing, play guitar, dance around and balance an egg on my heard or something. It got to feel like I was doing too much work. With these guys, they’re so solid; I can play whenever I want to.

“Before I was playing in a trio that should have been a four piece. Now, I’m playing with a trio. Another guitar would be nice, but at the same time it isn’t necessary. And I like the extra bread!”

“Three piece, if you screw up it’s more evident. But four piece, it’s sloppier,” noted Jeff. “To me, it’s convenient. We only have one guy doing his job. If we have another player, what am I gonna tell him about lead guitar? What is he gonna tell me about drums? And vice versa. We each do our own thing. He can hear, obviously, if all of a sudden I screw up and I play in 7/8 when I’m supposed to be playing in 4/4.

“The thing that’s great about this group is that nobody’s retarded. Like in almost every group I’ve played there’s always been one guy you had to drag along. It’s like, ‘Duh, what do I play here?’ And you have to do [he imitates a guitar] do-do-do. ‘Oh, yeah, right. That riff.’ But everybody knows what the hell they’re doing. Like he’ll [Cheetah] start a song and we’ll come in.”

“I think the band falls into different categories,” explains Gerry. “We could do a bill with somebody like Iggy Pop and be compatible. We have the same raw energy he has. Whereas we can also do gigs with a band like the Stray Cats. ‘Federal Case’ and ‘I Don’t Know’ are basic 12 bar rock’n’roll. Or we could open for a heavy metal band.”

But the only type of music that they all feel they are incompatible with is hardcore punk. Jeff feels “a responsibility” to his audience because he knows that “there are young drummers in the audience. I don’t want them to see us and go back and pick up sloppy habits. What will it be in a year? Hardcore will be dead and we’ll have another trend. Why can’t we just have bands anymore?”

“It’s real weird ‘cause I’m the oldest in the band; I’m 27,” said Cheetah. “And when I was with the Dead Boys, I met Jeff. He was just this young whipper-snapper. He’s two years younger than me. I watched Jeff grow from this kid form Queens who used to come to our gigs and playin’ with the Fast and the Dictators, and playin’ with Wayne (County) and watchin’ him develop. And Gerry, the Dead Boys were to Gerry like the Stooges were to me: somebody to identify with. It’s great because I’m playin’ with two people that I’ve influenced, in a way.

“I met a little kid who came up to me and said, ‘I learned to play guitar to your records.’ It makes me feel good that somebody sat down with my records and took the time to learn. ‘Sonic Reducer’ is a standard for bar bands to cover. The Bad Brains, I think, said in their press kit, that the band was formed after one of the members listened to a Dead Boys album. To me that’s mission accomplished.

“Right now, we’re gonna do our gigs with the set we’ve got, but we’ll enlarge the band every time. We’ll add a couple of new tunes. With these guys, I really find myself trying to develop more as a guitar player and extending myself more, which is something I haven’t done. I haven’t felt such a creative outburst like this (before)!”

As the band evolves, they intend to get Gerry up to the mic to sing. “Yeah, let it be said,” commented Jeff, “that our bass player can sing very, very well. He just doesn’t want to.”

“If Gerry would just get off his ass…’ nagged Cheetah in feigned annoyance, “I’d get a break. This guy can sing the ‘Hippy Hippy Shake’ real good, but he won’t do it. You know why? ‘Cause he’s shy.” Although the brown-eyed bass player didn’t seem the least bit shy during this interview, he still won’t sing no matter how much this reporter begged.

“Eventually Gerry is gonna sing,” Cheetah confirmed. “It’s a fact of life he’ll just have to deal with. During the set we’ll time it so that he does the song and I’ll take a break and just play guitar. I’d like to do some instrumentals.” He also intends to incorporate more of Jeff and Gerry’s songs, which are heavily influenced by the ‘60s and rhythm & blues, into their act.

“We’re looking forward to gettin’ into that,” Cheetah noted, “but right now the main thing was to get a set down that we could stand by.

“As soon as we got this band together, all of a sudden it just clicked. And I just said, ‘Let’s get to work.’ The creative spark is there. If I don’t have a part for a song, these guys will come up with it. We don’t just rehearse together and let things happen. We talk about it. I didn’t want back-up musicians. I had that. That’s why it’s just ‘The Skels.’ Right now, it’s ‘The Skels featuring Cheetah Chrome,’ but that’s only so everybody knows what the name of my new band is. Eventually, I don’t see why it can’t be the Skels featuring all three of us.”

“We wanna be one of the top new groups,” admitted Jeff. “The problem in New York is that nobody wants to forget. I used to like the Dead Boys, but we’re not trying to be the Dead Boys. We’re not tryin’ to be anybody but the Skels.

“And there’s another thing that Cheetah pointed out at the first gig we did. He gave a rap about how there are a lot of hardcore band out there, bands that are going back to punk and ska, everything but good rock’n’roll bands. That speech was really weird, but it means something.”

What it means is that there is a rock’n’roll audience ready and waiting for the Skels, as they found out when they played Baltimore. Despite all their anxiety over a slightly imperfect rehearsal, the gig came off without a hitch and the crowd loved them.

About Baltimore, Cheetah remarked, “The band was incredible. They just kept me going. They just fired me up. It was the best gig I had since the Dead Boys. I got this rush, and I just started sweatin’. I can always tell how good a gig is by how much I sweat.”

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.

Ode to a Mixed Tape – ‘70s Underground

Text © Robert Barry Francos
Images from the Internet

This tape was made around 1980, created when I was getting ready to drive to Boston for the first time. Well, actually, I was given the opportunity to “couch” it at my friend Joe Vig’s place on Dragon Ct., in Woburn (about 20 miles north of Boston). This was the trip I would also meet the great Kenne Highland (who gave me easy directions for a local, but totally confusing for a New Yorker: “take Mass Ave to Comm Ave…), and photographer Rocco Cippilone, who would go on to create Bang! fanzine before disappearing into the ether.

The idea for the tape is of a collection of the start of the underground scene in New York (and beyond), that is loosely chronological at start, but varies as the vinyl came into my hand from my collection. As always, I have tried to find a video of the original release of the song as it appears on the tape, and if that’s not possible, an alternative or live version by the same artists. The qualities of the videos vary widely.

SIDE ONE

The Stooges - I Wanna Be Your Dog
The New York Scene of the mid-‘70s, starting with the New York Dolls, could arguably be considered the bastard child of Iggy and the Stooges, and the Velvet Underground: a mix of melody and amelodic layering. It’s harsh and sharp, with lyrics that were certainly not by the books. The VU had “Venus in Furs” and the Stooges had this, both of which have sadist / masochistic themes. While the VU one smoldered with artistic leanings, this just rocked as they did in Detroit in those days. Sometimes Alice Cooper gets lumped in with the “father of punk” label, but as much as I respect the man, even with angst ridden lyrics, he was more theatrical rock, much like KISS, but punk was stripped down (even though many of the early fans came from liking the both of these).


The Stooges - Search & Destroy
With Ron Ashton’s guitar madness (RIP Ron) holding this tune up, Iggy just explodes in one of the best opening lines of the period: “I’m a street walkin’ cheetah with a heart full of napalm.” In that timeframe, this line alone can be seen as one of the key reasons Iggy was seen as such a strong proto-punk figure. I’ve seen Iggy two or three times now, including at the Brooklyn Zoo and the Palladium. At Zoo show, he was a couple minutes into a song, when someone threw some ice at him. He stopped the song, and snarled, “Don’t you fuckin’ throw ice at me. This isn’t a request, this is a command!” Then he started the song from the beginning.


The New York Dolls - Personality Crisis
The only time I ever saw the Dolls in the ‘70s was post-Johnny and Jerry, and it still was exciting. Their sloppy stage performances were just what was needed in the days of excess but technically precise musicianship. The group was a perfect combination of musicians who were in worlds of their own while on stage, musically stepping all over each other, but they making it work. If I made this tape today, I would have followed this with “Trash.” (RIP Johnny, Jerry, etc.)


The Ramones - Blitzkrieg Bop
This is the start of true punk rock, even though the Ramones never considered themselves in that genre (Miriam Linna, in 1977, said to me that they did think of themselves as punks. This iconic song was mostly created by Tommy, originating as “Animal Hop,” before the rest of the band put their creative input to task, and came up with this, the most played of the Ramones songs. I remember at least 4 or 5 television commercials that have used it, the first being a beer ad. While I don’t think it’s their best song, it certainly seems to be their best known. (RIP Joey, Johnny, DeeDee)


The Ramones - Glad to See You Go
As much as I loved the self-titled first Ramones album, it’s their second and third that are my favorites. As this song shows, the lyrics are a bit stronger, the melodies are more pop without compromising their fierceness, and they rock hard, as Suzi Quatro may have said.


The Ramones - Gimme Gimme Shock Treatment
The grilling guitar as Joey sings the title line is a great shredding sound that would be imitated often by harder metal bands to come. If I made this tape now, I would have probably put in “Rockaway Beach” here, which has come to be my favorite Ramones song of the moment.


The Ramones - Oh Oh, I Love Her So
See, the Ramones could write some beautiful love songs without giving up who they were. I’m surprised a certain fast food chain hasn’t snatched this one up as a theme. I can’t remember how many times I’ve seen the Ramones play, starting with a show shared with Talking Head (who opened) on June 20, 1975, at CBGB. My first roll of 35mm film was used to take snaps of the Ramones, and the contact sheet was recently signed by Tommy, thanks to my pal Bernie Kugel. It’s framed on our living room wall.


Richard Hell and the Voidoids - Blank Generation
While I was never into drugs, this song managed to feels like it defined me in its moment in time, and I still consider myself part of the blank generation as a term to describe a regular on the New York City mid-1970s pre-punk rock/New Wave underground music scene. What a great opening line: “I was sayin’ let me outta here before I was even born / It’s such a gamble when you get a face.” Plus Richard Lloyd’s ripping, nearly a-tonal guitar shatters any preconceived ideas about standard song structure. The Voidoids and Television (at some point, bassist Hell was in both) were far closer to the center of the Velvet Underground noise and Stooge’s rock sonic attacks. (RIP Bob)


Richard Hell and the Voidoids - Love Comes in Spurts
This is about drugs and sex as much as Chuck Berry’s “Maybelline” was about women and cars. There are three versions of this song that I know of: the earliest by the Heartbreakers (another band in which Hell was a member) which is represented in the video below, the Ork single that is on my tape, and the one from the Sire album, which is the better known. I put the one I liked best on this tape.


The Heartbreakers - One Track Mind
The lyrics to “Love Comes in Spurts” was written by Hell, and the music by Walter Lure. When Hell left the Heartbreakers, Lure wrote his own lyrics on a similar topic line, but the chorus is on a different part of the melody (ingenious, actually). When the title of the song comes up in the chorus, I like to overlap it by singing the original lyrics. Like something Sondheim would have done (or not!). While the line “There’s tracks on my arms / And tracks on my face / Tracks on the walls / All over the place” is the most quoted, my favorite is “My rule book is thin / It says ‘Don’t. Come. In!’” I understand Thunders was the main focus of the Heartbreakers, but Walter was equal in my eyes as far as personality, and possibly further in talent. I really miss the Lure / Thunders / Nolan / Rath version of this band, when it was at its peak they were (usually) tremendous to watch.


The Heartbreakers - Let Go
Now it’s Johnny Thunders’ turn on vocals, as he commands, “I don’t know why you just don’t bloooooooowwwwwww.” The video below is live, but mine’s from the L.A.M.F. album.


The Heartbreakers - Chinese Rocks (Live)
Written by DeeDee Ramone, the ‘Breakers make it their own by changing the lyrics at the end of each chorus. My tape is taken from the Live at Max’s album, and while the video here is different, it has the same altered lyrics, though the sound on the album is superior. Any one who knows me will tell you I love the Ramones, but the Heartbreakers’ version of this song is superior.


The Dictators - Master Race Rock
Led by four Jewish guys, the irony of the title of this song is not lost on their fans. From their first Go Girl Crazy album, basically this is making fun of the class bullies more than anything else, with hysterical lyrics, killer rock bottom, and a sailing guitar. It’s a perfect combination of Shernoff and Manitoba vocals, with a sharing of stanzas and chorus. I mean, how can anyone take lines like “My favorite part of growing up / Is when I’m sick and throwing up / It’s the dues you’ve got to pay / For eating burgers every day” serious enough to point a finger at the boys. I saw the band play many times, starting in ’75, and every one was a great show. DFFD.


The Dead Boys - Sonic Reducer
First time I saw the Dead Boys was them opening for the Damned. In fact, it seems the first few times was that combination, and always at CBGB’s. The Dead Boys were a killer act, and arguably the first hardcore band. From the opening salvo of the scream/whelp of “I don’t need anyone!” the challenge was initiated. Whether ripping off Mariah Aguier’s top onstage (I was there that infamous night) or crawling into the crashing drum kit mid-song, Bators was more than a singer, he was a force. The Lords of the New Church never really did that much for me, but the Dead Boys has not been matched by any of the band members’ other work. My tape has the opening cut of their Young, Loud and Snotty LP, though the video below is a live take. (RIP Stiv)


The Dead Boys - What Love Is
“I wanna write on your face with mah pretty knife / I want some of your precious smile… / I want you to know what love is.” That’s starts the chorus. Some of the songs on the album was dedicated to one of their underage groupies, Lydia Lunch (“I Need Lunch,” “Caught With the Meat in Your Mouth”), and I was kind of thinking this may have been as well, for some reason. There is a sense of both anger and pleading for understanding that runs through this. Bator again handles it with strength, and just the perfect hint of whine. The video below is a bad live version, but it’s the best I found.


Tuff Darts - Slash
Robert Gordon, who fronted Tuff Darts for it’s initiation, fortunately stayed long enough for two live songs recorded for the Live at CBGBs double album. This is a truly ballsy song about a groupie (I used to know which one, but I can’t remember these days… Fox?). It’s just full of sexual contempt, and pre-rockabilly Gordon totally emotes that he’d rather “Slash my wrists and cut my throat / Than have to spend the night with you.” I never saw Tuff Darts play that I can remember, but I have a fond memory of interviewing the band’s true leader and fashion maven, Jeff Salen, at his clothing store on 72 Street a long time ago. Say what you want by Gordon’s replacement, Gordon really fucked this band over royally, and what was his reward? A couple of near hit singles (“Someday, Someway” and “Only Make Believe”) and some non-selling albums. They could have been the Teenage Head of New York.

SIDE TWO

Tuff Darts - All For the Love of Rock’n’Roll
This song is more manifesto than anything else. It posits, “I don’t care about the money / I ain’t seen none / And I don’t care about the women / ‘Cause I just need one / The reason I say it / You really oughta know / It’s all for the love of rock’n’roll.” Someday, someone needs to do a bigger cover of this to perpetuate it. The video is from Jeff Salen’s Memorial. RIP, Jeff.


Patti Smith Group - Gloria (In Excelsis Deo)
The first time I saw Patti was at the now famous (and often bootlegged) show at the Bottom Line. She was such an exiting performer, especially in a smaller setting, where she would come out and talk to the audience and read some poems as the Group set up, and then when everyone was ready, she’s usually lead off with “We’re Gonna Have a Real Good Time Together.” The Horses album is one of the first of the New York underground scene to be recorded, and there is not a bad cut on it. Imagine how brave it must have been to have the first line of the first song of your first album start off “Jesus died for somebody’s sins but not mine.” I realize she was being poetic, but remember the hell (pun intended) that Lennon went through not very long before with his Jesus comment. When the PSG did the song on the first season of Saturday Night Live, it was well received. Now, it would probably cause a scandal due to that line; think of what happened to Sinead O’Conner. Despite a long fallow musical gap in the ‘80s and ‘90s, Patti came back and her material is as magnificent as ever. I’m looking forward to reading her new autobiography about Mapplethorpe. (RIP Richard Sohl)


Patti Smith Group - Free Money
I actually wanted to put “Land” here, but the song is nearly 10 minutes long, and it would have taken up too much time. So I picked this wishful song of desperation, that if I remember correctly, features Tom Verlaine (another of Smith’s paramours) and his flashing guitarwork. Like I said, the album is flawless, so I just went with an eeny-meeny pick.


The Afrika Korps - Jailbait Janet
After Kenne Highland left the Gizmos, he came to the New York tri-state area and did a song that would become one (of many) of his I-IV-V classics. This is a true story of a rivalry between Kenne and his friend, and the woman they both lusted after. Kenne is back doing music, and I look forward to hearing so much more from the man who has fronted more bands than anyone else I know - a few of which I’ve seen, and one I was a participant in both the naming of the band (The Hopelessly Obscure) and a recording session down the block from the Rat. The video is live; the album cut on my tape is not.


Talking Heads - Love (Goes To) Building on Fire
The Talking Heads only released one song as a trio, before Jerry Harrison joined the band, and it remains my favorite, despite the “inexplicable use of horns” (as Michael of the ex-Bleecker Street store Disc-o-Rama once said). I saw them a few times, the first opening for the Ramones in June 1975 (the Heads’ first show), and I was intrigued. Without any implication meant towards Harrison, I thought the keyboards made them too slick and I lost interest shortly after he joined. This song, their first release on Sire, is a non-LP 45.


The Modern Lovers - Pablo Picasso
From their first groundbreaking self-titled album, Jonathan Richman ended up being into the more pop side that followed on his next album by the time this came out, and refused to do any of the songs live when it hit the streets. Actually, I prefer the second album to the first, but this is a nicely dark and thumping song, which is highly influenced by the Velvet Underground (John Cale would later cover it).


The Modern Lovers - Road Runner
While the video below is the album version, though I actually prefer the alternate from the Beserkley Spitballs comp album (my fave JR song, “The New Bank Teller, is amazing), which I have on my tape. A digression… This mixed tape was playing as I was driving up to Woburn, and when Richman says, “Can you feel it out in Needam now?” I had just past the sign for the town. Then he sings, “Out on Route 128, by the power lines.” At that moment I was on Route 128, and there to the left were the power lines. It was a Keanu Reeves “whoa” moment.


Blondie - X Offender
Blondie were opening for the Ramones the second time I went to CBGB’s during the early summer of 1975, and I saw them quite a few times after that. At either that show or the one after, Debbie presciently stated, “Here’s our upcoming disco hit, ‘Heart of Glass’.” This was before they were even signed to a label. And speaking of which, Chrysalis released this single before the first album came out, which has a different mix. The video, fortunately, is also the single version. For me, Blondie’s best release was their first album, which had everything I liked about the band. After, they became way more over-produced, glossy and polished, and while they were still interesting, their records became more and more blah for my tastes at the time.


The Criminals - The Kids Are Back
After Sylvain Sylvain left the Dolls, but before his underrated stint with the 14th Street Band (whom I saw a few times, including at Hurrahs with the Rich Kids opening, featuring Glen Matlock and Midge Ure – who I found pretty lame), he formed the Criminals. This single is a nice, kick-ass number showing that he had more chops than just backing up Johansen. But even here he can’t get away from his Dolls “jacket,” naming off all the previous band’s members at a later point in the song. The video is the same song, but done live and with a different band backing him up on a telethon.


The Count - The Morn of the Confrontation
I was going to visit Joe Vig, so I figured I may as well put one of his songs on the tape. This was one of his very early recordings, and one of his best of the time. It’s a full out production, with a great tune and strong lyrics. He cries out on the chorus, “Seems like I’m trying / You know I’m trying all the time!” Viglione is another musician whose material is better than his career as a musician, which is a shame.

The Jumpers - I Wanna Know What’s Going On
Ah, the Jumpers, from Buffalo. Their first single was produced by Bernie Kugel by money borrowed from Dave Olka, it was written by band member Bob Kozak and fronted by the irrepressible (and Joey Ramone-level tall) Terry Sullivan. Kozak remains a strong songwriter (he and Kugel have performed together a number of times). Both this song and its flip, “You’ll Know Better When I’m Gone,” are likeable numbers in a Real Kids vein (or vice versa).

The Marbles - Forgive and Forget
From the first time I saw the Marbles, I fell in love with their sound. They had a scene-level hit with their powerpop Ork release, “Red Lights,” but I chose this Eric Li fronted number for this tape. Eric struggled with the high notes, but the melody and harmonies are as wondrous today as they were then. The Marbles only released two singles, but neither contain my favorites, “You Tomorrow” or “She’s Cool.” There is a live video of one of their shows floating around in some studio, and I recommend seeking it out (the clip below is from it). (RIP Eric)


Iggy Pop - Lust For Life
I started with Iggy, so I end with Iggy. This is one of his first solo hits, which has been way overused in commercials on television. It’s a commentary about the evils of consumption, and it’s used to promote the same. Go figure.


BONUS:

THE UNDEAD: Just a Modern Folk Band!

Text by Julia Masi, intro by Robert Barry Francos
Article & interview © 1982; RBF intro © 2010 by FFanzeen
Images from the Internet

The following article about New York-based hardcore metal band The Undead, led by ex-Misfits Bobby Steele, was originally published in FFanzeen magazine, issue #9, in 1982. It was written by Julia Masi.

While I never saw the Undead play (nor the Misfits, for that matter), I did get to hang out with Lori Wedding (of the band Suburban Berlin, who was Bobby Steele’s girlfriend at the time) and Julia, while Julia photographed her for the front cover of the issue. The one thing I remember her saying was that she was not attracted to handsome men (and so I hoped she did not find me winsome).

Bobby Steele is often on social networks, going off on right wing rants against us liberals (though I wonder if he would consider himself more libertarian, but I’m not sure), and for that I respect him (and not). There are actually many right winger punkers (like Johnny Ramone, for example). Whatever his political affliation, Bobby made some fine pulse-pounding music, and still does to this day. – RBF, 2010

The Undead are an uncanny mixture of politics, personality, and high-volume, high-intensity rock’n’roll. Bobby Steele, vocals and guitar, Natz, bass, and Patrick Blank, drums, who have just released their first EP on Stiff Records, Nine Toes Later, are often inaccurately pigeon-holed into the hardcore category. But they prefer to describe their music, which often incorporates a twist of rockabilly or a flair for the satirical, as modern folk.

“We’re a modern folk band,” says Natz, who tries to convince interviewers that he’s Che Guevara: “We’re, like, puttin’ the word across music.”

“Folk music used to be acoustic because the world was a lot quieter,” Bobby adds. “Now you’re competing with a lot of things in the background. You’ve got trucks and heavy traffic. You’ve got jack hammering. You’ve got atomic bombs blowing up and everything. So, you’ve gotta sing your folk songs a little louder. You’ve gotta amplify them.

“Our music is our own kind of music. We can do a soul rock song, or we can do a rockabilly song if we want. We’re not locked into a certain category. A lot of bands make the mistake of categorizing themselves, then they’re locked into that category. Then they’re stuck in that category and it’s what the people expect, like George Reeves is Superman.”

Patrick, whose lanky body and horn-rimmed glasses recall the stereotype of the Science Club president, feels that the Undead “try to avoid the trends, because trends are just that – trends.

“We’re a rock’n’roll band with something to offer. There is politics and you have to talk politics; the point is you can’t get too serious.” He sees the band’s politics as a form of anarchy. “Not like writing an ‘A’ in the circle on the corners. Only in the ideas of no rules. That’s the problem. There are too many rules.” He further explains, “We can’t get put in any groups, because once you do that you become a trend. And if you become a trend, then once you get accepted, you’ll change. And if rules weren’t observed, if rules weren’t thought about, then nothing would ever get done. The rule there is a universal rule, to reach people through quality. Quality means giving your all – 150% towards quality.”

Their ability to abandon the rules is evident in the unorthodox way that the Undead presented themselves to Stiff Records. The band had been hanging out in a bar one night last March when they heard about a private party at Stiff. Immediately, Bobby started to cook up a scheme to con his way into their consciousness.

“We grabbed this wino off the street,” Bobby remembers, “and said, ‘You’re our manager tonight.’ And we just walked up to the door at the place and told them, ‘We’re the Undead and this is our manager.’ We just went in there and we graffitied and spray painted the whole place. And then a few days later we went down there and coated the whole building with posters, and made sure we never showed our faces again.”

For months the band teased the record company by sending flyers and press releases to their office, always careful to make sure that they arrived the day after an important gig. Stiff got so frustrated by this mysterious band that they sent an all-points bulletin into the streets to find them. But Bobby’s phone number is classified information and his friends wouldn’t tell Stiff where to find him. Finally, DJ Tim Sommers brought the Undead and Stiff together, and the band was signed.

Shortly afterward, they went into the studio to record their EP, which includes their own “1984” and “I Want You Dead.” But just as the recording sessions got underway, they had to be interrupted so that Bobby could have his toe amputated. “It was rotting away and stinking up everything,” he explains. Hence the title of the EP, Nine Toes Later.

Recently, the Undead completed a brief tour of the Midwest: Dayton, Detroit and Indianapolis. The audience reception was warmer than they expected and the band is anxious to get back on the road again. Patrick is hoping that he’ll eventually play Ireland, “Because the scene is so sporadic that the kids are starved for music over there.” Bobby’s goal is a little more patriotic: he’d like to play “El Salvador. It would be fun. Join the USA,” he grins.