The Queen City Roller

Goddamn I spend a lot of time at sea!

2010-08-28T09:10:00.002-05:00

Have you seen The Squids? They are really, really cool. They hang out around 9th and Elgin and occasionally I've seen them rotating clockwise near Papeete. I go there often for decaf. Along with their buddies, The Cnidarians, The Squids don't take any shit off of anybody. I was hanging out near the front of the boat just last week when I caught a lash. Very funny! It's true that I have better things to do than spend my time at sea with such hudson jerks but what am I going to do?

I'm in love.

Back on solid ground.

Away from those guys that swim around me and make things miserable.

Summer is almost over.
Be sure to listen to as much Joe Strummer and the Mescaleros as you can.
Life is that damn good.

More soon.
ap

When Jokers Attack

2010-03-15T21:39:00.006-05:00

I've been at sea. It was cool. I suggest it.

And now…
When Jokers Attack - The Brian Jonestown Massacre

I don't know what I would've come up with if I took all the best parts of Their Satanic Majesties Request, started a band, and had the balls to do my own fucking thing with it. I don't know how The Brian Jonestown Massacre became so fantastic. I don't know how a band as inconsistent as them could constantly punch out nugget after golden stone. But they did and they do. If I had wings I would want to fly to this song, if I wanted to play the drums I would learn this one first, and if I could go-go dance in a cage well, I'd do that too.

A brilliant, lush, ominous, and freeing track, When Jokers Attack jumps out the speakers and washes over me. It rolls like quick waves with a simple and electrifying drum sound that punctuates one of the best guitar lines ever written. The song is threaded throughout with such studio genius and tone. Lyrically it pierces the heart of romantic love while swirling like 30 freaked out dervishes. Try that in Turkey! Guitar parts weave in and around the percussion with the same breadth The Chesterfield Kings borrowed from The Chocolate Watchband. If you don't believe me listen to No Way Out by either of them. But there's Rain Parade in there too and as much Bryan MacLean, Love, moxie to ensure that in their time, or another time, Jac Holzman and Bruce Botnick, the producers of Forever Changes, would have given TBJM a fighting chance on Elektra.

I am so damn thankful for it.

(this girl is dreadfully cute)
ap - 2010

Benny Mahan

2009-09-26T08:36:00.007-05:00

“Hey kids, plug into the faithless
Maybe they're blinded
But Bennie makes them ageless
We shall survive, let us take ourselves along
Where we fight our parents out in the streets
To find who's right and who's wrong...”

That's from the Elton John/Bernie Taupin classic “Bennie and the Jets.”

It's been going thru my mind the past few days when thinking about my friend -and godfather of the Springfield, MO, rock n roll scene- Benny Mahan.

Benny has been laid up in the CCU after a triple (possibly quadruple) by-pass surgery on Monday. He hasn't awakened yet but is holding on and making whatever progress is available to the comatose. I just read on BookSpaceFacePlace that he was semi off the ventilator. But yesterday I read he had died. Instant news is like Tang. Instant, but not really orange juice.

On the surface, the song “Bennie and the Jets” is a period piece.

It seems to be Sir Elton and Bernie Taupin's acknowledgment of a new era: This was the just-shy-of punk era, after glam had reared his/her head and proto-punk bands like The Stooges and The MC5 had already fizzled. But they had left their burn on a generation waiting to play it loud.

The Velvet Underground had subverted a small but fanatic following. Lou Reed, under Bowie's wings had broken the Top 40.

Power pop had been invented by The Raspberries, Badfinger and the VENERABLE, quintessential power pop band, Big Star.

And Bowie had changed the world (drawing on many of the above bands as inspiration) by being Ziggy Stardust. It's heresy, I know, but I liked “Hunky Dory” (just prior to “Ziggy”) and “Alladin Sane” (just after) much more than “Ziggy.”

It was the Ziggy record that tore the roof off the sucker though. A day the world changed.

That's the vibe that Elton and Bernie were feeling with “Bennie and the Jets.”

And it can translate to any era.

Imagine seeing Louis Armstrong for the first time. Or Robert Johnson. Or Charlie Parker, Sun Ra, Thelonious Monk or John Coltrane.

Or Frank Sinatra or Tony Bennett.

Or Little Richard. Or Gene Vincent. Or Buddy Holly.

Or The Quarrymen/Silver Beetles in Hamburg. Or Dylan. Or Buffalo Springfield.

Or Jimi Hendrix.

Hendrix is the absolute for me. I wrote a song for a woman I loved (and still do) called “You're My Jimi Hendrix.” Anything I experience that I consider beyond compare is a “Jimi Hendrix.”

IT'S ABOUT SEA CHANGES & PARADIGM SHIFTS.

“Oh Candy and Ronnie have you seen them yet? Oh!, but they're so spaced out.

B B B B B B B Bennie and the Jets.”

IT'S ABOUT FINDING SOMETHING THAT MAKES YOU UNDERSTAND YOU AREN'T ALONE.

It can happen on grand (if you live in London, New York, LA or the like) or a small (like the rest of us) scale. But the revelation is primordial. A thunderbolt. And nothing will ever be the same.

Some people never have this moment. They go on to live boring, although self satisfied, lives. And god bless 'em.

Some see a glimpse but don't respond. They become “normal.”

Others get it, very intensely and then lose it. They will never quite forget it.

Others get it and never lose it. They remain obsessed with the mojo. Some manage to find real lives and good paying jobs. Some die.

Some get trapped in limbo waiting for their vision of fruition.

Some run with the vibe and end up never ending up.

For better or worse, I am one of the latter.

Rock n roll -like Homer Simpson says of alcohol- has been both the solution to, and cause of, all of my life's problems.

I never would have survived high school without Jimmy, Dale, David, Dave, Ray, Larry, Terry and Tom. But maybe I would have gone to college and been somewhat employable at 56.

There's no time machine so I try not to dwell on that shit.

Oh but they're weird and they're wonderful
Oh Bennie she's really keen
She's got electric boots, a mohair suit
You know I read it in a magazine

Benny Mahan changed the Springfield music scene in the early 1960s with his rock n roll band The Ravens. I never saw them but my cousin played guitar with them and they were legendary. They caused more bands to be formed in Springfield, MO than anyone will ever be able to count. Benny changed the world. Lew Taylor and his band The Seven Days did so as well.

The Esquires changed my world. I saw them late in my eighth-grade year. They, and The Jaguars, were the cool bands of the time. Later they combined members and became The Lavender Hill Mob, a band that inspired yet another generation of young people to start bands. I saw The Electric Prunes at SMS my freshman year in high school (with Jimmy, David and Dale...”Bubble”) and “The Mob” opened. They were wearing matching yellow robe type things and did Vanilla Fudge's version of “You Keep Me Hangin' On.” It was so fucking intense. And we KNEW we could have a band. And we did. We got gigs in our freshman year and by the time we were sophomores we were playing every weekend. And we got good.

Other bands above us were The Dimensions, who later became Pure Sunshine. Their lead singer, Charlie McCall (RIP) was one of the coolest guys around. And they were a great band. General Scott's Limousine had a multi-colored hearse they traveled in and were on par with The Lavender Hill Mob. Marty Barin was their lead singer and was hippie cool, when hippie cool was kicking in.

On Valentine's Day 1970 Bubble opened for The Turtles at The Shrine Mosque and it was the BIG TIME for us. We had seen The Box Tops (with Alex Chilton) a few months before and The Turtles were Top Ten legends. AND WE OPENED FOR THEM.

Things changed shortly after, I got booted from Bubble and joined Papa John which became Five Star Cadillac Band. Pure Sunshine disbanded and Charlie started Irving with some of the Mob guys. Smitty and his band Zap came along and were doing Uriah Heep and Deep Purple while Five Star was doing Stones and Allman Brothers.

The flux fluxed.

When Granny's Bathwater came on the scene it was too much to believe. Horns, rock n roll, soul, R&B and FUNK. And Benny was singing with them on and off.

I moved to California but came back in short order and started Baby LeRoy Band. Stevie and Terry and Tom had The Queen City Punks (pre-punk rock and I made up the name), Jimmy had been through Hangdog with Billy Pool and he and Dale and David reunited to form Fools Face.

Looking back on it all, it seems like things were changing monthly, but at the time it seemed like a natural progression.

We listened to everything from Bowie and T Rex and Alice Cooper to the Stones and Allman Brothers and Yes and Jethro Tull and Nazz (who had changed Bubble's lives earlier) and Iggy and The MC5 and Waylon Jennings and other outlaws.

It was all a melting pot.

Everyday was important. Every few weeks there was a paradigm shift.

And we all were amazed and amused.

And Benny was always there. Always doing something no one else was doing. In these days bands would play 4 hours a night, 6 nights a week for months at a time.

The first 5 Star gig was in Tulsa. We had been rehearsing for about three weeks and we had to play SIX SETS A NIGHT. In Birmingham we did SEVEN, except on Friday and Saturday when we did EIGHT. And, the owner stiffed us on our pay.

There's much more to this story for the next segment which begins in 1976.

The fuel for these memories is the sad plight of Benny Mahan. The world of rock n roll, as seen through the eyes of Springfield, MO, would be drastically different without him.

God speed, my friend.

Hey kids, shake it loose together
The spotlight's hitting something
That's been known to change the weather
We'll kill the fatted calf tonight
So stick around
You're gonna hear electric music
Solid walls of sound

Benny and the Jets, indeed. The circumstances may be different but the changes are the same. Wonder, joy, confusion, knowledge, pathways, LIFE.

wunderle - 9/2009

The death of The Conniptions

2009-09-24T19:44:00.004-05:00

I've just been able to process the incredible power of The Conniptions final show. It was amazing. They hated the hell out of each other but decided to get the band together and start anew. And they did, for one show. I'm sure after hours of practicing and song writing, new songs that debuted and died in one night, they had planned on a long term engagement. But it wasn't to be.

Jessie and Jason drummed and guitarted the hell out of themselves after wrecking the car, dealing with all the drama and shit, and with very few drinks. Andy smirked and sang the hell out of every song. He tore his guitar up. His tone was amazing. The best I had ever heard him sound. And Jason Loftin on the bass played one of the most amazing sets I had ever, ever seen. It was like Bruce Thomas, Entwistle, John Paul Jones, and Tim Tobias were inside of his head kicking and screaming to get out. He had such command over his instrument. Aggressive, confident, and aloof.

The Conniptions were on the Lindberg's stage with such power that I stood there grinning because I felt so fucking lucky to be in the room. Their songs are a mix of Big Star bravado, Television mastery, and Stooges blitzkrieg. And to top it off, I hadn't heard a live Guided By Voices song in seven years and they plowed through "Game of Pricks" and "Motor Away." I felt like a legionnaire again being sent off to battle. Like I felt at every GBV show. As if this day was my last and what the war held for me was up to Pollard.

It's too bad that they had to breakup.

Shit. Have I been up in the mountains?

2009-08-25T15:11:00.002-05:00

It seems that I've been gone a mighty long time. Summer is almost gone. I got older. I saw Paul McCartney. I've been working on the house, listening to a lot of music, and being generally crabby. Such is my way. But its taken a new bloggers new blog to get the Roller rolling again. So, if you have the time, and I hope that you do, please read Wreckless Eric's new blog; Ericland.

As for Squire Paul, he was majestic. Gracious. Happy. Giving. Honest. Usually words I have not used to describe McCartney in the last pair o' decades but I guess the historiography can change with just about anything can't it? Great big set list. Homages to John and George. Marina was dancing up out of her seat and seeing Marina dance is not something one sees outside of a draped bedroom, late at night, and after a glass or two of the red.

So, The Queen City Roller's hiatus is done. You are now free to move about the cabin.

Let Me Roll It #2 - Cheap Trick

2009-05-23T08:35:00.013-05:00

In February of 1964, my Mom saw The Beatles on Ed Sullivan. As with so many other people around the world (including Davy Jones who appeared on stage just before The Fabs), her life was changed forever.

I didn't get to have the shock and awe that was Beatlemania. I wasn't even born yet. But I got the next best thing stuck in Atlanta traffic while on summer vacation in 1977; Cheap motherfuckin' Trick!

A FM station decided on the hottest of days, in the most polluted city I've ever been in, to play In Color in it's 32 minute entirety. From the opening notes of "Hello There," through the head bopping catchy ride that is "I Want You to Want Me," and well into the brilliance and sheer perfection of "Southern Girls," I just kept nudging myself closer to the dash of the Volare trying to get all the sound in my ear hole that I could. I was simultaneously bummed and over the damn moon when the album ended but to my shock the DJ put Cheap Trick on! I had never heard any of this! None. "Elo Kiddies"?! "He's a Whore"?! And to think that a DJ would take it upon his all powerful and amphetamine fueled head to spin whatever in the hell he wanted... that's just insane.

So that was it. I was already the head of the KISS Army in my junior high but I was mixing my enthusiasm for Ace Frehley (which my mother would soon destroy) with my increasingly more grown up/adolescent mania for Zander and Nielsen.

In the summer of 1978, free from the emotional dishwater of Oklahoma and relaxed in the record store nirvana of Missouri, I was free to do whatever my Rock n' Roll heart desired. That was to see Cheap Trick. And I did many, many times over. Since they were a regional act they played support to any fucking band that came through town. It was like being in Liverpool after all only with a lot of beards and hot pants. I wore my black Cheap Trick shirt with its repeated and brilliant logo everywhere. I wore my 1978 tour baseball sleeve T to every school function, teen blowout, and to work at the record shop. Heaven Tonight was a masterpiece. It was on that tour that my friend and mentor, Cathy Stevens (who turned me on to Tom Petty and Reggae over one stony week at the store in the fall of 1978), not only took me to a show with a front row seat but managed to get me back stage to meet the band. Her designs were to make-out with Robin Zander but with me in tow she had to do something other than say that I was in fact NOT her kid. She stuck me in front of Rick Nielsen and went to do her business. Rick talked to me about playing the guitar and he gave me a handful of picks with his comic face stamped on each one. He gave me something like 50 of them, I ended up taking the picks to school and scored a date with a cheerleader just because of one Rick's little presents. You were awesome until I had chicken pox, Connie Grogan.

1979 saw the release of Dream Police, another tour, three more shows for me to see, and my favorite Cheap Trick track, "Way of the World." That school year ended with the annual talent show. At one end of the Parkview High School Gym, some upper-class longhairs took ten painful minutes to grind out "Freebird." It was laced with bandannas and a huge confederate flag motif. I was reminded of the 1977 talent show in Oklahoma when some cool 8th graders smoked "More Than a Feeling" and how that was a way better song than this piece of shit. When they were done the lights turned on over the stage that I was in front of and Greg Frazier's band kicked into "Surrender." I was with my people. My crowd. My friends. United in a high school gym singing how our mamas were alright and our daddies were alright but they just seemed a little weird.

We're all alright! We're all alright!

ap - 2009

Video Concert Hall - the big influence

2009-04-04T11:35:00.007-05:00

Video Concert Hall. No other thing, save maybe “URGH! A Music War,” and the rise of the video arcade, had more of an affect on my delicious formative years. Dad may have owned a record shop but VCH is where I first got turned on to so many of the records that ended up in my collection.
It came on at weird times of the day. Late at night, after Midnight Special, it would pop up. In the middle of the afternoon I could switch over to USA Network and hear “Carouselambra” by Led Zeppelin, VCH's theme song, and be fixed in the seat. I could see something on Video Concert Hall and run upstairs with a list to make sure that I had the records I wanted on order the next day. Spider (go Anton Fig, go!), The Sports, PhD, The Shoes, The Buggles, Pete Townshend’s Empty Glass, Devo, Gary Numan, Iggy Pop, Bowie’s Scary Monsters, The Cramps, and most importantly Tom Petty, The Motors, The Pretenders, Squeeze, Split Enz, and The Police.

Where else would I have discovered Split Enz in 1978 if it weren’t for VCH? It’s not like I would have heard them on the radio in The Queen City. “I Got You” was a monster song. “One Step Ahead” was even better. Seeing “Tattooed Love Boys” by The Pretenders was sick. The Police? Forget about it. Those videos just had me hooked. And whenever I saw Squeeze pushing the piano down the street in the video for “Another Nail in My Heart” I couldn’t wait to go put the record on and play it all day. Some songs just stuck with me. In particular I think “Love and Loneliness” by The Motors was my first introduction to a really BIG pop song. Even to this day, whenever I play Tenement Steps, from which that song comes, I feel this huge, wonderful sea change in my well being. I fucking love that song. Even some one offs, like Nazareth’s “Holiday,” and Tim Curry’s “I Do the Rock,” still thrill me like they did in the late 70s and I really think that “We Can Get Together” by Icehouse is one of the best pop songs there is.

Video Concert Hall passed on in 1981 and gave rise to Night Flight and my temporary crush on Lisa Robinson which was then replaced by my undying love for Martha Quinn. Night Flight turned me onto Urgh!, Fantastic Planet, and New Wave Theater, and kept me in that swirling see of analog video – you know how all those videos seemed to look before MTV. Video Concert Hall was the key, the surrogate parent, which solidified the music geek in me and made me want to be James Honeyman Scott.

ap - 2009

The Automatics!

2009-04-02T07:45:00.003-05:00

Seems to have escaped me on the day that it hit me but Fools Face's Jim Wirt and Brian Coffman, along with the great drummer Paul Crowder, have teamed up with Dave Philip of the semi-legendary, Automatics. The Automatics were mainstays at The Marquee in London along with The Damned and The Sex Pistols. Now based out of Los Angeles, where all the good punks go to stay (hello Steve Jones and John Lydon), Philip has surrounded himself with one of the best trios in LA. Would love to have The Automatics play The Queen City. Then we could kind of be hip and Paul, Jim, and Brian could play Tommy. Always a plus.

ap-2009

Jeebus.

2009-04-02T07:38:00.002-05:00

I let March go by with nothin'. I had nothin'. Well, I've got loads of stories in the head but the laptop seems to have decided to screw me. So it did. Now, I must find another way to get back on the chain gang. In the meantime, watch this...

ap - 2009

Goodbye old Kaleidoscope haunt, home, and heart.

2009-02-26T19:48:00.012-06:00

In 1972, my dad and his new (and still together after all these years) wife were passing through The Queen City on their way back north. They drove by this little stucco building, saw a for rent sign, and opened a record store. It didn't happen that fast but on opening day it took a long while for anyone to waltz through the door. Wunderle was one of the first customers. He was a neighbor and I like to think he just waited and waited for it to open. Kaleidoscope became the record store in town. It was a haunt, a home (for me from 1972 -73, I lived upstairs), a heart.

The store became the center of a thriving music community. The Ozark Mountain Daredevils were the store's softball team. Chicks from the Minstrels worked there. Wunderle, Rick Nivens, Dave Milner, Jim Lewis, Mary and Maureen Gollub, Kelly H'Doubler, Pam Babcock, Cathy Stevens, Don Freeman, Dave Day and so many more were the people I grew up around. The people that enriched my life and made growing up the coolest thing I could ever do. Mounds of records came home. I listened to everything my dad would haul and my collection grew and grew. I couldn't get enough of the first Dire Straits album.

There were giant Costello posters, Police posters, Foghat took up a good wall for a long time. The Nitty Gritty Dirtband did an instore. It was the best place to be. So Lester Bangs. Wild. Outrageous. Just to be around some aspect of the record business in the 1970s was a mad experience and when I turned 15, I was able to work at a new store that the folks opened on the north side. I spent most of my time there listening to the Clash, making t-shirts, and fucking off down at the Sip n' Flip in front of a Defender cabaret. That store eventually closed. More people moved in and out of the main store and in 1983, Kaleidoscope sold its last record. I know that the last new release was Rush's Signals. Perhaps the store just couldn't take that kind of punishment.

The store became a kind of new wave haunt. Fashion shows, a hair boutique upstairs where all the leather, jewelry, Fabulous Furry Freak comics, and rolling papers had been. New employees like the great Bill Brown brought more music cred back to the store. Nothing stayed the same for long. Items moved, went, staff grew and shrunk. In times of personal economic strife I was allowed to work there as long as I kept busy and didn't drink too much. My sister began working there and asserted herself as one of the best people you could work for or with.

A few years back, the lease wasn't renewed on the old store and the folks moved to a new location 30ft east. Something bigger and greater than the old place but you only had to walk out the front door to see the old beaut. To see it occupied by people who didn't give a shit about it hurt. To see it gradually decay became a daily experience

Today, it was torn down. My sister found a little piece to have my uncle put in silver. A keepsake, something close to her heart. Just like that old building must be to so many people in The Queen City.

I'd like to thank everyone who ever worked there, shopped there, felt it, fucked in it, or made it part of their lives for only a moment. It was a beautiful place.

ap - 2009

The Queen City punks

2009-02-25T15:38:00.008-06:00

There were always good rock/punk/power bands in Springfield and this town was never decades or years behind the punk rock thing. In fact it has a pretty powerful history starting from the first tier old school bands.

During times of less activity there were always a few bands carrying on around here. Don't forget that the New York Dolls opened for Lynyrd Skynyrd at the old Walnut Bowl many years ago. I bet that was an interesting show. And the Ramones played here in 1978 (remember you guys?). Talking Heads were in Joplin around this time too. Social Distortion many times. PIL, etc.. Springfield had an all girl punk band way back in 75, The Debs (that's the same time The Runaways were in L.A.) The Debs were great. Fools Face was much rougher in those days almost bringing CedarShake (is that what it was called?) down to the ground a coupla times. Rudy and the Razors, Symptoms, Resonance, Man About Town, The Limit, The Royal Nonesuch and others were all beating their drums at the same time everything else all over the world was happening.

Here are a few more bands that should be mentioned that carried on along here through the course of our times: The Fabulous Flaming Balls, Monsterbox, Johnny Quest, Walking Octopus, the Jim-Bobs, Jesus Lee Jones, Remnants, Luvhandles, Cheerleaders, Redundants, Results, Thee Fine lines (who you can hear on Little Steven's Underground Garage on occassion), Rabbi Sputnick, any band with Lou Whitney and D. Clinton Thompson, Wunderle's bands of any ilk.

You could go on and on to the bands that inhabit the rock needs around here to this day, you know who they are. Don't forget our own Annette Weatherman was in London taking pictures of the Buzzcocks, Pistols, etc. and getting chummy with the Clash and Adam and the Ants (don't laugh if you don't know how punk the early Ants were). IT's all here baby. Forgive me for not remembering all the old bands and mentioning all the new bands that are here and who gave a nod to real punk rock, the kind that was inclusive, original, varied, non-misogynistic, and non-racist. That's why, even though a few of those bands were good, the hardcore scene left me cold and it quickly became an excuse for knuckleheads to get in fights. That's why a lot of the cool bands around during the same time didn't want much to do with that scene. It always struck me as kind of weak that a bunch of nazi skinheads would make a racket here, where there are hardly any African-Americans or Jewish Americans to blame. So it turned into the racist bands/fans versus the rest. Recipe for lameness in my view. For me, the hardcore (?) scene that was here in Springfield was a blip on a much bigger and fruitful map of local rockers/punk rockers - whatever you want to call it.

ss - 2009

Bill Brown - There's the man I want to see right there!

2009-02-14T08:19:00.004-06:00

My friend Bill Brown died in a fire a few years ago along with his friend Don Shipps. It was a really horrific fire. Bill’s service was meager while Don’s was a full Catholic send off. The Knights of Columbus have really groovy hats. The Groovy Hats, that should be their band name. A giant wake was held in Bill and Don's honor at the Shrine Mosque to celebrate their lives and their contribution to the local music scene. These guys contributed a lot. Don was the blues staple in the Queen City. He played with everybody. Bill came up in rock and power pop bands like The Misstakes and eventually was a member of The Ozark Mountain Daredevils and The Bluesberries and Don Shipps and the Titanic Blues Band. Bill taught me how to play guitar.

I think of Bill, like I do, when I’m prowling through my music collection. Bill was regarded as this fine blues player, which he was, and his wake was full of blues and rock music as if these genres defined him. They did not.

The Bill I knew, the Bill Brown I loved, was the funniest guy I had ever met. He was an older brother, a statesman, a historian, a wizard, a true star. Bill gave me the uncanny ability to be all The Beatles at once. His McCartney became my McCartney. He redefined humor on a daily basis. He gave me his green Ibanez tube screamer. He always had a new record he loved and couldn’t wait to share it. But why do I think that songs like “Little Wing” didn’t define him? Because Bill Brown loved a perfect pop song. He worshipped the Beatles. He thought Difford and Tillbrook and the entire Squeeze catalog was a must. Bill would not shut up about XTC and when Apple Venus / Wasp Star came out he insisted that I go for a drive to listen to them both. Bill loved the songwriting of Neil Finn and played Crowded House incessantly. Elvis Costello and the Attractions and no Attractions, it didn’t matter, Bill made damn sure that Costello was tattooed on my brain. He couldn’t get enough of Cheap Trick, Badfinger, Raspberries, Rundgren, and on and on and on. When I moved to San Francisco, Bill gave me an envelope full of rare baseball cards in case I should ever fall on hard times. Or if I just wanted to read stats out of lack of anything else to do in The City.

His kids play music now. Drums and guitar. They’re good kids.

Man, I miss him. What I wouldn’t give to hear him ask in his best scouse accent, “What are you doing with your nose in that booook?”

ap - 2009

Let Me Roll It #1 - Queen

2009-01-22T08:00:00.010-06:00

Let Me Roll It is a new item within the friendly confines of The Queen City Roller. Let Me Roll It is a series of essays, a memoir if you will, of Rock and Roll experiences, brushes with greatness, and defining moments that have shaped a little life.

I spent a lot of time grounded in 1975. Banished to my upstairs room. Left alone to beat myself at Monopoly, Sorry, to dress up like the Green Goblin (I mean I made the whole outfit), or to just listen constantly to the radio. I had one of those all in one stereo set-ups. Turntable folds down, speakers fold out, big tuning knobs to the right. On a good cloudy night, I could pick up Chicago stations. Chicago seemed like a continent away. Really, it was just 10 hours but I was ten so what did I know? I was grounded for a lot of infractions. Flashing the neighborhood girls, peeing on their playhouse, tearing up the neighbor's tree, crapping in their yard, jumping off the television set, lying, being lazy, and really just having a good time being a kid. What else was I going to do?

The radio was always on. Tuned to local FM stations in the day, tuned to them secretly at night while I lie in bed with ginormous, Keith Moon headphones on my head. In 1975, all I really wanted to hear was Queen. I had LP copies of Queen II and Sheer Heart Attack. I played the crap out of them. I pranced around my room dressed in my self fashioned harlequin leotard to "Killer Queen" all the damn time. I had no idea what the hell Moet Chandon was but I really didn't give a shit. I should have taken the act on the road to fifth grade show and tell. By late 1975, the FM dial began playing a new Queen song, "Bohemian Rhapsody." It was the most brilliant thing I had ever heard. Theatrical, expressive, odd, freaky, gigantic.

I was probably the only kid my age who had a subscription to Rolling Stone and I plowed through every issue. I hung pictures and covers on my wall, like any dedicated follower of fandom. I knew everything there was to know about Brian May, Roger Taylor, John Deacon, and Freddie Mercury. My idol. Freddie. I had a pool cue that screwed together and I used the top half as my half-mic stand. Just like Freddie. I wore mom's ballet leotards and fashioned different outfits, just like Freddie. My dad, who owned a record store a few hours away, hadn't sent me my requested copy of Night At The Opera yet so all I did was sit, wait, and flip the fuck out when my song came on. One particular grounded day, it came in spades.

Up in my room I waited. The DJ would spin all the FM hits. I sat on the end of the bed, at my desk, at the window, on the bed, in full Freddie regalia, waiting for my song. It came on, I performed it like a god. Later, it came on again. I freaked out again. A third time later, exhausted from a long, full day of rocking out, I sat on my floor in front of the speakers, my head as far into them as I could go and listened... "Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy?" I rocked back and forth to the light introduction, paying close attention to the tale of a guilty man. "Mama, life had just begun, but now I've gone and thrown it alllllll awayyyy."

During the big, monstrous, operatic bit I would do as many of the harmonies as I could. I acted out roles. Accuser, bailiff, judge, murderer, Galileo, Figaro. Thunderbolts and lighting were very, very, frightening to me. But I knew what was coming up. I knew that snare crack and the guitar solo were on the horizon. I could feel the surge coming from inside the carpet, into my feet, up to my ass and up my back. I stood up. I grimaced, made a proud peacock pose, and ran to my desk. I opened the drawer, I pulled out my matches, and just as Brian May was well into his solo, I set my bedroom on fire.

Any way the wind blows.

Gong.

ap - 2009

1st Poll has closed and the votes are in!

2009-01-17T16:21:00.005-06:00

The 1st Queen City Roller poll, Who Smelled Bad All the Time?, is officially over. If you voted, you have to feel pretty good about it. Coming in on top, with 60% of the votes is, Lita Ford. Stinking up second the incomparable, Frank Zappa. I've thought ever since the toilet photo that Frank had the stank but I've been proven wrong. So, congrats to you, Lita Ford, for smelling bad all the time. Hey, I didn't say it your public did. In fact one person said, "I'm not surprised."

ap - 2009

The Who

2009-01-17T15:34:00.009-06:00

I just watched The Who at Kilburn 1977 dvd and I can tell you that it is unsurpassed. Amazing. What starts off as a shaky "Can't Explain" (the band hadn't performed in over a year together) turns into a monster of a show. Shot with multiple 35mm cameras and remastered in digital surround it almost blew up my simple 27" TV. Pete seems rather pissed off at something and turns his anger into a performance unlike one I've ever seen from him. He looks like he just finished the Empty Glass cover shoot and wandered over to Kilburn eager to keep up with the punks. Which he does in spades. Roger paces in circles. Pete mocks him. Entwistle is surely The Ox. Moon holds the whole thing together. Pundits harp about how out of shape Keith is but I don't buy it. He's a mongrel, canine. He plays with such ferociousness, especially on "My Wife," and the closing moments of "Won't Get Fooled Again" are so cool that I watched it over and over again.

The second disc, with the band playing at the London Coliseum in 1969, is like finding the Holy Grail under the seat of a taxi. It's a monster set featuring the earliest recorded performance on film of a complete performance of Tommy. An amazing and brilliant piece of film.

Thanks to Paul Crowder et al., for bringing this and his Grammy nominated Who doc The Amazing Journey to an eager public in 2008.

For those living in Los Angeles, Paul is playing with Jim Wirt and Brian Coffman (Fools Face) at O'brien's pub in Santa Monica on January 23. They will be performing Tommy and it's a show not to be missed

ap-2009

Ron Asheton - Sail On You Genius Bastard!

2009-01-06T18:02:00.000-06:00

Shit. Ron Asheton died. Dead in his house for days before they found him. Sitting in a chair. No Maltese crosses or guitars in his hands. Sunglasses on? I would hope so. Is there something about getting into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame that causes the geniuses to die off just before playing the damn thing? Joe Strummer, I'm thinking of you. Ron Asheton...

The first time I heard The Stooges, I mean the first time I really heard The Stooges, was at Rocko's House of Mirrors. The first Stooges album was blaring from the speakers. Just incendiary! We were all roaming around on some kind of paper. Cooper holding court like a turd holding vinyl. I just sat in front of the speaker and had my mind literally blown. Shot. Exploded into a new way of thinking about the music I loved and a better way to consider the music I would hear in the future. Iggy howling, mad. Scott Asheton, pounding and hurling. The late Dave Alexander rolling a steady bass line. Ron Asheton playing guitar like no one before him. Proto-punk. Bolder MC5. Balls to the fucking walls. Sold!

But enough of this palaver, watch an old Stooges video and remember Asheton.

ap - 2009

Meet the QCR staff!

2009-01-05T09:14:00.000-06:00

Welcome, 2009, and welcome all you young dudes and dudesses. We thought it was high time that the reading public got a chance to meet and greet the staff of the Queen City Roller. We're really excited about the year to come. Some of us are still enjoying the holidays a little too much and that person will receive some stern words when they get back to town. In the meantime, consider your resolutions, think about the now, and put on a good record. Time is tight and it's time to get down with the QCR staff.

AP - a long time Queen City resident and former bay area denizen, Alan is your humble editor-in-chief and really likes Indian food. Bottom row, 2nd from right.

JAE - a drummer, a lover of kid's books, a hero, and an all around great girl, Jessie is shoulders over giants.

JE - Jason, top row third from left, is a guitar wizzard, a master of the hammer and nail, and one of our favorite guys. Really, you should meet him.

MH - he's building a guitar, he's reading some books, he's corraling the kids, he's checking things out. He's, Michael

SP - Silky Poplin is a son-of-a-bitch. He's too long on holiday, he's always using the last of the coffee, no one likes his jokes. But, he's a good writer who meets his deadlines. I guess we shouldn't complain.

Whineboy James - 2nd row, 4th from right. Blue shirt. Glasses. A machine that we use like a machine. Oily. Sharp. Goddamn genius.

GH - Gordon is gonna be a daddy! He hosts the Psychedelic Solution on Compound Radio. You can read about that crap here.

WCL - Billy is like a brother to the staff of the QCR. We think he smells real nice and when the weather is fine he's dealing figs and apricots in the park. Figdealer.

Stu Sturgis - artist, guitarist, orangutan.

And rounding out the staff:

Interns Jackie, Mason, and Collete.

M, the queen of rubylithe. (upper left corner)

Boomer and Lowdown, punks with funny names who check our mail and picture rights.

Pascual, Chugga, Lester, Nick, Veronique, Maddy, Topher, and Carol. Here's to the kids in the office.

ap - 2009

Fall Out Boy already the worst band of 2009

2009-01-03T16:29:00.002-06:00

I was at a party on NYE. A great one. Dick Clark's Ryan Seacrest Bigtoothed Bullshit Rockin' Eve Extravaganza beamed silently at us throughout the last hour of 2008. The people in the audience sucked. The other performers sucked. Alan Thicke's son Robin performed! Wow. Some chick had yellow crap on her eyes. The audience looked like robots and still sucked yet again. Fergie and Ryan turned my brain to jello. Then came Fall Out Boy.

What a joke. 2008 wasn't even over and yet they claimed the crown of Worst Act of the Year. Just in the nick. As 2008 rolled over into 2009 there they were again to hold on to that sacred trophy for 365 more days. How do you think they do it? What makes them so bad?

Fall Out Boy are a cartoon. A really bad cartoon. They are what is wrong with music today. Why nothing that the radio plays has any substance. Not that the radio wouldn't mind playing music with meaning and staying power. They are why the major labels breathe with heavy and phlegm filled lungs. A little boy Spice Girl collective of every bad genre that every Wal-Mart in the country can shit out.

Fall Out Boy is a Jason Mraz (now there's a tool) lead singer who can't quite find his voice. An Adrian Brody/Strokes/Neo-Manhattan lead guitarist who wishes he was Mars Volta. Animal on the drums. Not quite Dave Grohl and surely not Chuck Biscuits who despite having no reason to play shirtless, insists on it. He's there to reassure all you Disturbed fans that Fall Out Boy has some balls and some tattoos. Then, there's Pete Wentz. For the love of god someone kidnap him. A mexican drug cartel. Terrorists. The Westminster Dog Show. They don't have to release him, just keep him until my death then let the world get reacquainted with his 15 minutes. He's a wet nap ass with his bogus outfits, his pathetic strumming bass style, and au natural Anthony Keidis good looks. In fact he has all the staying power of a Kiedis rhyming couplet. I hate him.

I guess one of the things I'll have to look forward to besides the inauguration is watching the relative rate of decline of Fall Out Boy.

sp - 2009

Editor's note; It was reported on Jezebel that Pete Wentz has stopped reading blogs because he's tired of being called a "douchebag." We didn't call him that but wish we had!

Cheap. You want it, you got it.

2008-12-30T19:48:00.000-06:00

Ladies and Gentlemen the QCR staff would like to take this time to welcome a new blogozine to the nets...

Cheap - Using it up, wearing it out, making it do, doing without. All of this, and looking good doing it.

The staff at Cheap are doing a bang-up job educating, relating, and testifying. The word cheap is going to be brought back from the trash heap of negativity and reborn as a new way to live and learn. Issue #1 is about, WANT. There are many articles in Cheap and they're updated often so get your trunks on and swim around.

Push off now by clicking here.

By the way, Happy New Year to everyone that's come around the Queen City Roller. We've had a great time starting this thing up and hope to achieve things that only muffins dream of in 2009.

ap - 2008

Stu Sturgis, meet Ray Davies.

2008-12-27T14:08:00.000-06:00

Johnny Thunder lives on water, feeds on lightning.

Thanks, Ray Davies and thank you Stu Sturgis for once again bringing the good things to life.

Last night's Dog People show was killer and the best song of the evening was, ironically, “Where Have all the Good Times Gone?”

Goddamn, I love The Kinks.

The Benjamin Orr Trifecta

2008-12-19T20:53:00.000-06:00

"Moving in Stereo" was just floating in from the coffee shop next door. I know it's eternally connected to Phoebe Cates' body and rightly so but it's only the middle section of three perfect songs to me.

I played the hell out of The Cars when it came out. From the first day my dad brought it home from the record shop he owned, it was mine. I played it inside and out. I got the cassette. Played it on my boom box at school. I did the same thing with Candy-O. I took both the tapes and played them nonstop on a school bus trip. Everyone needed to be a Cars fan, I thought.

The trifecta that is "Bye, Bye Love," "Moving in Stereo," and "All Mixed Up" is a beautiful thing. I love the entire album but side 2 is where it's always at. "You're All I've Got Tonight," leading off the side, is one of Ocasek's best songs and the never skip a beat moment that pops right into "Bye, Bye Love" always gets me where it hurts. It sets off over ten minutes of one of the best song sequences in rock. I don't want to blather on about how much I love of which particular song but Orr's vocals are sublime, perfect, wonderful. Eliot Easton's playing is over the top, and Greg Hawke's keys, synths, and especially his sax solo closing out the album on "All Mixed Up" is simply put, a reason to start the album over again.

Here it is, in parts, but worth the time to watch.

Shake, Rattle, and more shakes.

2008-12-18T07:31:00.003-06:00

Jerry Garcia and I only have one thing in common. Even from the grave a dead person can still have something in common with another person. It's true. I've done the research. Julie Andrews may have the same flat feet as Harpo Marx. Paul Weller might have, say, the same love of hangnails as Ernest Hemingway. Paris Hilton could be walking around with the same unsightly tongue mole that plagued Audrey Hepburn. It happens. Does that make the living doppelgangers for the dead? Maybe. Does my chocolate shake addiction, the thing I have in common with Jerry Garcia, make me likelier to wear black T-shirts as a force of habit and grow a groovy beard? No. But the addiction may kill me. Not as slow-fast-slow as heroin but it may give me the betes and no one wants that.

The Queen City Roller staff was sent out across the region to recon various shake making establishments and to report back with their findings. Your humble editor graciously agreed to accompany staff on their trips to various chocolate shake making huts to provide an unbiased second opinion. Here are the results. Remember, only chocolate shakes were served because that's all Jerry Garcia liked. And the editor too.

Steak n' Shake - With an "n" in your name, how can you not suck? Yuck. Yuck Yuck. Steak n' Shake shakes are awful. They have the taste of really cheap chocolate syrup, like government cheese chocolate syrup and sometimes, malt gets mixed in with the shake. The worst part about Steak n' Shake shakes besides the taste is the terrible value of their to-go cups. For just under $4 you get a plastic cup that tapers just under the lip making it just a few ounces bigger than a small. One time, in desperation, I ordered a large shake. The soda jerk made me a small. "I ordered a large," I said. He then took the small and poured it into a large cup! Can you believe it? Jerk.

All fast food shakes - suck. The value is bad and they're all made too fast to care. Only Hardee's uses the hand dipped method but their size to value ratio is the pits. And, all the shakes taste the same. Shitty. Oh, and don't skimp on shaky goodness by letting them top the things off with whipped cream. It's a trick used by the big coffee chains to rip you off. I mean, you want more frappy coffee goodness, not whipped fucking cream. If you were to get a Slurpee you wouldn't stop before the top and then add a bunch of white stuff? No! You would fill it up so even the dome was packed. That's the way you do it.

Andy's - tastes like a Wendy's Frosty and it's $4 more. Bad deal. Buy the Frosty and don't call it a shake. I will add that I bet Andy's uses better ingredients.

Braum's = awesome! 4.9 stars out of 5. Braum's shakes are huge, no tapered cups, no whipped cream. These shakes are brimming with cool goodness and the staff, who see you drive up every day, have the courage to call you by your first name. You're a regular. You're their hero. Braum's uses hormone free milk and ice cream that they make themselves in Oklahoma. It's Okiefied and it's full of natural goodness. The only reason Braum's is a 4.9 and not a 5 is because it's not...

Casper's - That's right! Tommy makes the best shake in town. Tall. Good. Wonderful. Casper's might even use the cheap stuff but it's the way it's presented, over flowing like the burgers and chili, that makes the chocolate shake at Casper's top shelf. Their chocolate shakes are addictive, like heroin, and that's why Jerry Garcia, were he alive today and living in The Queen City, would be sipping a tall cool one while coming off a nod, at Casper's.

ap - 2008

Dog People - Fools Face shows to brighten the holiday corners!

2008-12-15T09:34:00.000-06:00

I'm back! Too long a holiday off the blog. Michelle says that it isn't a blog if you don't update the thing so it's about damn time.

There are two big shows after Christmas is done and the misery is lifted in the Queen City.

Friday, the 26 The Dog People will be at The Outland Ballroom.

The Dog People have been playing together for about 25 years. Traditionally the Dog People have been called upon to entertain the masses around the holidays while playing absolutely NO holiday music. None. They'll play for hours because that's what you do with cover songs, you play the shit out of them. They'll play Traffic, Small Faces, soul nuggets, Stones, Stones, Stones, to a packed house that shows up expecting to get exactly what the Dog People deliver. The goods? Damn right.

The Dog People consist of Nashville good time man and Ozark Mountain Daredevil Supe Granda on bass. Supe's got some original material that he's thrown to the Dogs and it gets played rather well. On drums is Tommy Whitlock resident Oscar winner. His drumming finesse usually takes my breath away. On guitar, flying in from Los Angeles, is Terry Wilson. In the 1980s Terry was in The Rave-Ups. They used to be Molly Ringwald's favorite band. Now, it's just really cool when they come around on the iPod. Lead vocals are filled by Wunderle. Seeing Wunderle on stage when I was young was what made me want to get up there too. Not Mick, not Patti, not The Clash. It was Wunderle then and it still is now. He's the best front man this town has ever known. I mean, remember The Symptoms? Seriously.

Saturday, the 27, Fools Face , will be downstairs at The Highlife Live.

This incarnation of the legendary Power Pop band will consist of Jimmy Frink, Brian Coffman, Jim Wirt, and Chris Coffman on the drums. For those who need to be in the know, there was a time when Fools Face were the toppermost of the poppermost in Springfield and the whole damn Midwest. Infectious. Stunning. Brilliant. They resurfaced in the late 90s and put on a trio of powerhouse shows at the Outland to record a live album in the early 2000s. I can't say enough about how incredible there albums are or how much they meant too so many people in the Queen City. Their first three albums and some other live material can be downloaded from this killer site put up by a friend of theirs in Texas. Here's the TrouserPress entry for this formidable and amazing band. Tickets are on sale @ Kaleidoscope for $10.

Finally Facing My Waterloo.

2008-11-06T07:55:00.000-06:00

It's no secret that I love Abba! Between 1974 and 1977 all I listened to were Elton John, Queen, Heart, Abba, and Disco. The wonder that I am not the homosexual is not lost on me. I've figured out that when The Cars and The Police came around they spoke to me and I then I found myself. And the girls quite fancied my new waviness. I guess that makes me Ducky. So what.

I stood in for my girlfriend last night for "girls movie night out" at Mamma Mia. As much as I love Abba I hate musicals, unless they're Tommy, Hedwig, or RHPS. The little woman had a migraine. Old friends were in town. She really wanted to go but her brain was doing the clampdown. So, I was her proxy. I had a great time.

Mamma Mia was a delight. Wonderfully cast, Meryl Streep is great, scenic locals, great Abba hits and some filler songs that stunk. I thought the interpretations of the songs, the skillful use of lyrical content with plot, and the whole movie felt like The Tempest. Maybe it was the whole Greek thing. Tempest fugit.

I was disappointed with the absence of "Knowing Me, Knowing You." One of the all time best videos, best songs, and best fucking everything. It's usually an open-mic stunner. Still, I got to sing it in the car on the way home.

One more thing, Pierce Brosnan is a singing penis. I don't mean a euphemism for penis, I mean an actual penis. Either that or a really sexy Gordon Lightfoot.

And you couldn't get a better recommendation than that.
Now, sing along to this.

ap - 2008

The Broken West

2008-10-15T11:29:00.001-05:00

Jason whipped I Can't Go On, I'll Go On by The Broken West my way last spring. I love it. This is wonderful, pure, Power Pop sent from the clouds. The Broken West, out of sunny LA, open the album with one of the best tunes of the last five years, "On the Bubble." This track makes any brilliant pop cassette even better. It gives a striking opening punch to any comp you put together. The rest of the album is just amazing and as much as I repeat "On The Bubble," "You Can Build An Island" is my favorite track. There's great guitar work here, brilliant harmonies, and this is such a strong, kick ass debut, that I'm going to stand in the street and scream about it.

Their sophomore effort, Now Or Heaven, has just been released. I haven't heard it yet but that's going to be part of my life's work for the next few days.

Just get the damn thing.

ap -2008

Power Pop Heaven

2008-10-08T21:34:00.000-05:00

Download this stuff now!
These songs will save you in times of trouble.

The absolutely coolest thing on the webbernets is this, people; http://powerpopcriminals.blogspot.com/search?q=ultimate+powerpop+guide

Here's an abstract from Angelo, the man responsible for taking us to Power Pop Heaven.
Thanks, Angelo.

If you're blogging around, now you know there's a list of the 200 most essential power pop recordings of the last +35 years. John M.Borack has put together the list for the excellent "Shake Some Action" book published by Bruce Brodeen and Not Lame. John Borack is one of the preeminent writers/reviewers covering the power pop/pure pop musical style we all know and love. You may or may not agree with the list (IMHO i do agree mostly with that list, even though mine would have been different) but i guess it would be interesting to post a complete "Best" of the ultimate power pop guide. So, i picked one song from each album selected by John Borack. My picks were totally subjective, so you won't get any "September Gurls", Rock'n'Roll Girl"', "Tomorrow Night" or other all-time classics. I tried (but not always) to not chose the songs you could already find on some famous power pop compilations ("Yellow Pills", "Poptopia" or the Rhino "DIY Series" and many others...).

ap - 2008

The Raspberries - "I Wanna Be With You"

2008-10-08T08:27:00.000-05:00

The Raspberries "I Wanna Be With You"

Released 1972

Ah, the opening track on "Fresh." You can't beat an album that opens with a simple drum roll that segues into chiming, open chords, and lyrics about teenage romance. "I Wanna Be With You" makes Vietnam seem like a distant memory, even if it's 1972. Just think about it, there you are in your Duster driving to the "Stop n Shop" thinking about Vietnam, if only for a minute, and the DJ spins out this nugget of pure powerpop shang-a-lang. You can't help but go faster, turn up that factory-in dash stereo, and drive straight to your girlfriend's house or trailer. Chances are she's got a cooler car.
Dad bought her that Nova.

And you knew that tonight would feel so right didn't you? I mean you've been seeing her for what four months and she hasn't given it up? Well Eric Carmen's made everything alright for you... He's given you an in. There's nothing that would make a 1972 Ohio evening perfect and all that silly war crap go away than you and your girl, in the back of her car, with "I Wanna Be With You" blaring the hi-fi. It's like Eric Carmen is Cyrano. He's taking the panties off for you. He's so convincing. Your love could really live forever, tonight.

But be careful. For while "I Wanna Be With You" is one of the greatest powerpop songs of all time, I mean all the ingredients are there, it's all harmonies, a walking bass line, chimey guitars, the verses are only two frickin' lines, the song does have one of rock's signature lyrics encouraging date rape...

"Hold me tight

Our love could live forever after tonight

If you believe that what we're doing is right

Close your eyes and be still."

Or it's the best line to get into a girl's pants EVER!

ap-2007

"Go All The Way" b/w "I Wanna Be With You"

The super sugar sweet world of 80s Pandora

2008-09-27T07:48:00.000-05:00

I work at a library. Next door, at the coffee shop, great people do great things. Large doors separate us but they're always open and the ace kicking stink of coffee and the musical what-nots of any employee fill this space that's traditionally hush, hush. Mallory, could be blasting some Guided By Voices or Sonic Youth. Jami, likes things soft and twangy. Ian, he's a songwriter guy and frankly too sensitive for a Dutchman. Tom, he's all over the map.

There's a turntable at the coffee shop and Tom, has a crate full of records. Leon Russell, Big Bambu, The Commodores, Sly Stone, Cat Stevens. These records hide how much of a Rush fan he really is. Huge. He could be Geddy Lee if he wasn't Tom. He's that much Rush. Maple or Oak, he can't decide which tree he likes better. I bet when he's driving, Tom's marching with the Oaks but when he's with his daughters it's the Maples. This morning was a different story.

The beauty of Pandora is how easily we can lose ourselves in our own usness. That shit we picked out is US. Okay, I wouldn't have picked Six Pence but I did pick out The Sundays and Pandora got that one right. Harriet Wheeler can do no wrong. Tom loves the Pandora.

This morning it's 80s hits: Our House, Howard Jones, Heart and Soul, Outfield, Quaterflash, Romantics, Donald Fagen from that fucking awesome and don't you fucking forget it smash album that I can never forget and absolutely tell everybody I know to get it, The Nightfly. Dexy's, Duran Duran, Bangles, Sewing Machines of Love, Culture Club, King of goddamn Pain. Berlin, No More Words, a personal favorite of mine for private reasons that will remain private. Okay, sexy dancing. I really need to hear Lene Lovich's Lucky Number to complete an incomplete vision of dark haired, sexy dancing, Serbian, 1980s eroticism.

Watching the sunrise over such a beautiful park as the one we have here is made all the more special by Come On Eileen. If I only had a pair of coveralls that would really cover all. And a floppy hat. That would really make the people outside follow me around and "Toora Loo-Rye-Aye!" And who doesn't want to do that in the first days of Fall?

ap - 2008

The first time I heard the MC5

2008-09-13T07:51:00.000-05:00

This is one of my formative experiences...

I was working at Hastings (an old entertainment store in Springfield, MO) and there was this really cool guy name Chris who worked there. He was a few years older than I was, (I was 21) and way more knowledgable about music than I was, but I was trying to play cool with him. We were talking about stuff and the topic wandered over to Henry Rollins and I was like, "Oh, I love 'Kick Out the Jams' that song rocks" and he looked at me kinda funny. He says, "You've heard the MC5 version right?" like he's afraid of my answer. I said, "Huh?" He jumped up and down, and was yelling, "Oh my God! Wait till close! You're about to get an education!" I had absolutely no idea what I was in for.

The store closed...half the lights were out, and from the huge soundsystem in the store I hear, "KICK OUT THE JAMS, MUTHAFUCKA!" and it was bliss from there on out. Suddenly I was launched into this whole new world of ROCK that was different from what the mainstream rock was that I was listening to. I didn't know anything but while I was standing there in the book section, mouth agape, soaking it all in, I thought, "I must have more of this." (I'd been listening to Radiohead a lot) To hear the MC5 for the first time like that was like the Heavens parting and the voice of the Almighty saying, "Let there be Rock!" (like in the AC/DC song) just for me.
I had heard rock before, but it was cold and empty. This had swing and was loose but tight all at the same time. The bass was what sucked me and swirled me around and pulled at my gut. The howls were unparalleled and the mix allowed me to imagine they were just on the roof rockin' the house down. I wish everyone coulda had that experience. It's a great one.

So, thank you, Chris for tearing me away from the shoe-gazers and the imitators. Thank you for an experience I will never forget. Thanks to you, I'll be in the nursing home, with Alzheimer's, happily screaming "Kick out the Jams Muthafucka!"

jae - 2006

How I fell in love with Rock and Roll

2008-09-13T07:35:00.000-05:00

My folks have never been music lovers. This has always struck me as odd because my dad's uncle, Don Day, has practically dedicated his life to bluegrass music. He converted his dairy farm in Conway, Missouri into a sort of amphitheatre / campground hybrid, and puts on a fairly large bluegrass festival (Starvey Creek Festival) twice a year. Uncle Don's vision and hard work seems to have paid off, too. He doesn't milk cows anymore. Anyway, one might think that this passion for music would have made its way down the gene pool to my father. But it didn't. When I was small, you could count the records in our house on one hand: a couple of Ventures albums that I suspect he bought for the bikini clad girls on the cover, a carpenters album, and a couple of (fat era) Elvis 45's. These were all filed away neatly in the console of the record player that was seldom touched.

Around the time that I was about ten or eleven years old, my folks decided that the old record player was of no use to the family. The record player, it's console, and the contents inside were hauled away (big loss, I mean the fucking Carpenters?!). It's likely that this may have been inspired by one of those "purge your lives of rock music" sermons that we heard at church regularly, but I can't be sure of that

A couple of years later, we moved to a new house with a basement. One day I was rummaging around in the basement looking for a tennis ball that I'd been aimlessly bouncing against the wall for what seemed like hours when I came across an LP that had fallen between the cracks and ended up in the same cardboard box that my tennis ball had landed in. The record's jacket was mustard yellow. In the middle was a circular "fish eye" photo of three really freaky looking guys with huge Afros. Printed across the bottom, in bold purple letters and a font that reminded me of wax dripping down the shaft of a candle were the words, Are You Experienced? "Clearly not," I thought to myself; and I desperately wanted to be.

The image that those three guys (especially the one in the middle) projected from that album cover was irresistible to me. The only problem was that I had no turntable to play this LP on. I tucked the record under my arm, bolted upstairs, and stashed it away alongside my sports illustrated swimsuit issues. It just felt like contraban somehow. I'd get it out every now and then and just stare at it and wonder what kind of sounds would jump out of those grooves if I ever had the chance to drop a needle in them.

By the time I got to the ninth grade, my folks had noticed how much in enjoyed listening to the radio in the car and bought me a "boom box" type cassette player/radio (though I still had no tapes). Also around this time, I had earned their trust enough to be dropped off at the mall on Friday nights with my friends. One of the first things I did when I got there was head straight for Camelot to get a copy of Are You Experienced? on cassette so I could finally hear it (I had actually skipped lunch all week and pocketed my lunch money so I could afford it). My friends laughed. They were all listening to Tone Loc and Vanilla Ice. I didn't care. Hell, if I'd had my own ride, I would have left right then. The suspense had been building for about a year and I couldn't wait to satisfy my curiosity.

Anyone familiar with this classic album can probably guess the rest of the story. My life was changed when I heard the grinding, opening riff of Purple Haze. And the backward guitar riff on the title track even frightened me (still does a little bit). Though it seems obvious now, at the time I could hardly believe how great this music was and the jacket (as much as I love it) paled in comparison. I was hooked

je- 2008

Portishead - Portishead - 1997

2008-09-07T20:47:00.000-05:00

Got the second Portishead cd at the library. Pretty stunning. They're one of those countless bands that I've always read glowing things about, but have never gotten around to hearing. My only objection is that the gal singing (Beth Gibbons) emphasizes the nasally, cutting edge of her voice more often than she needs to. She clearly has some good vocal abilities, and uses them accordingly. I could stand to hear more of her subtle, breathy, back-of-the-throat singing more often. That fingernails on blackboard singing fits some of the tunes, but a little goes a long way with me. Having said that, what an amazing, dark, creepy, hazy musical world those folks have created. David Lynch nightmare druggy evil clown music. The perfect soundtrack to Cindy McCain following you through the woods in a blood-stained wedding dress while clutching a meat-cleaver and smiling the whole time as she softly intones, "turn around and look into my eyes, my eyes, my sweet white eyes..."

mh - 2008

Stu Sturgis is Mr. Kick Ass!

2008-08-16T12:43:00.000-05:00

The Queen City Roller would like to welcome the decorative Rock and Roll stylings of Stu Sturgis. There's nothing too tall he can't tackle and nothing too short he can't kick over.

The QCR hopes that you enjoy art as much as the next Joe or Jane.

And this illustration gives us a chance to quote DBT;
"Lord knows, I can’t change” sounds better in the song than it does with hell to pay."

Tom Petty - Even the Losers

2008-08-14T10:04:00.000-05:00

Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers "Even The Losers"
Released November, 1979

"It's just the normal noises in here."

Yeah, just what you would've expected from Petty in 1979, but "Damn the Torpedoes" is anything but normal. It's like the band operated from within some genius brain. I don't think it's all Jimmy Iovine's doing but someone, something, made one of the greatest albums ever and in the fall and spring 79-80 I suddenly realized what it was to be an individual. I mean look at the cover! Signature black suit coat, probably velvet, a simple red shirt, and a Rickenbaker so cool I bought one. Hell, I bought the whole goddamn look. "Damn the Torpedoes," song for song, taught me what it meant to be cool and at 15 I really needed to be cool. I'd had enough of Darren Kinney spitting on me in the halls of Parkview High.

I didn't really have a connection with "I'm One" by The Who in 1979 but "Even the Losers" proved to me that the best music isn't written by bullies. The best pop songs are about everyday guys and gals getting off or getting one over on the Nugents of the world.

Ever have a summer when it was just you and the girl or guy at the lake? Or your neighbor that you've always hung out with but when the hair started to grow all you could really think about was them? That's where the guy in "Even the Losers" lives. It's the moment. That time when nothing else matters but hanging out on the roof, smoking mom's stolen Pall Malls, and pointing out things that are further away then the nearest star. Three months of lovin', touchin', and squeezin' and then at the end of it all they're gone. They're all you can think about and school really sucks.

Who knew that guys like you could get that lucky? Skipping rocks, skinny dipping, heavy petting, and maybe making it to a Babys song. It may never happen again and part of you hopes that it never does. "God it's such a drag when you're livin in the past."

Big Rickenbaker chords and a simple D-A-G melody aren't all it really takes for "Even the Losers" to work. Stan Lynch's shaker and fuck-all fills combined with Benmont Tench's great, thick, Hammond chords texture and frame the song through the first two verses and chorus. They give a little extra in the bridge but after the last chorus, as Mike Campbell plays a second solo that shoots the song home, the whole band just makes you move. The Heartbreakers spin you with the promise that everything after this moment is going to be awesome and that "even the losers get lucky sometime."

"Oh-oh-oh-OH!"

ap - 2008

Isaac Hayes - Sail On You Soul Bastard!

2008-08-13T11:50:00.000-05:00

I'm still bummed about Black Moses. This guy, who the thumbs are pointing to, is a big fucking Stax fan. Huge. I have Stax people I love and people I really love. Black Moses is one of them. Issac was Soul Brother number 1.5.

Can I just say that his version of "Walk On By," is way soul heaven to me. While I really love Bacharach era Dionne Warwick, Hayes' spooky ass arrangement and killer chick backing vocals took this song places that old Burt wouldn't have ever imagined; bedrooms around the world.

I went to see Eartha Kitt once in the East Bay. Eartha was in the middle of a song in French, or Turkish, or Kitty Kat, and she was wailing away like she does when all of a sudden, in my right ear, comes this silky soapy baritone saying "Man, Eartha really sounds good tonight." I turned around and in the booth behind me was one bad mother. Eartha's alright but this was Isaac! I kept looking around because he wouldn't stop talking and then when he wouldn't stop talking I wanted him to shut his mouth, so I could dig Eartha. I think it was a show that actually cost me money and I didn't want it ruined by anyone, especially Isaac Hayes.

I could give a shit about Scientology or Chef and as far as Shaft is concerned, I'm more thankful for the sequel because it's responsible for one of the baddest motherfucking soul performances of all time and it gives me an excuse to post the video. Just watch the sister dance in this performance from Wattstax. No one dances like that anymore and no band looked or sounded like they were coming straight outta the funk box to devastate more than The Bar-Kays (who were the band that backed Hayes on Shaft ) in this live version of "Son of Shaft."

Righteous.

ap - 2008

Scott Murphy - Sail On You Punk Bastard!

2008-08-11T12:06:00.000-05:00

My old friend Scott died this week. Drugs took him in the Pacific Northwest. He was easy for drugs to find, difficult for friends. I'd only seen Scott once in 20 years. He roamed into the Outland in the middle of a set I was doing in 1999. He gave me a wave and was gone. I had so much catching up to do.

Scott was punk rock. He was the "get your ass kicked for just being a punk" punk. Only, Scott fought back. We skated ditches, parking garages, ramps. We wrestled over issues of Maximum Rock and Roll. We wore old man bermudas. Swapped decks and folded pizza the proper way, down the middle. We stayed up late with Tony, Andy, and Kellett watching URGH! A Music War. We took punk rock to the roller skating rink and busted our asses doing DEVO flips in the back. We worshipped the The Jam. We lived together. We stole food. Shared girlfriends. Scott and I took a trip to see Die Kreuzen, skated all over Kansas City, did an interview with The Star. We dropped acid for the first time together. Thanks be to DEVO for getting that party started.

Murphy and I were mates. Thick as fucking thieves. Scott took all the English Punk Rock shit he could take, blended it with really early and cutting edge American Hardcore, and turned himself into a one man wrecking crew. Crass, Husker Du, Throbbing Gristle, Black Flag, The Jam, Minor Threat, Bad Brains, J.F.A., Bauhaus, Youth Brigade, were just a few of the bands that passed from his wide eyes and fast talking mouth into my record collection. Scott moved at a speed that none can imagine. He was firmly electric.

After Scott moved back to the Queen City from Tulsa, where we had moved to further ourselves, I moved towards Modism and we lost touch. Scott became a father of two and ventured towards Seattle. And there he stayed.

His Glendale yearbook featured a blurb about Scott and his punky new wave ways. This nifty skate ditch photo purports to show Murphy in action. The QCR staff is not sure about the short shorts and safety gear. They may have been needed to teach good, responsible boarding. I can't make out the deck but I think it's mine. The yearbook staff asked Scott what he thought about society…

"I think people are too caught up with other people's standards. Society suppresses people and strips them of their individuality. Individualism is my main idea on what I really stand for."

That sounds a lot like Paul Weller and like Weller, Scott made the standards and he made the rules. I'll miss him.

Take care brother.

AP - 2008

It's a Holiday!

2008-07-28T19:49:00.000-05:00

Recent readers, contributors, artists, hooligans and roustabouts, The Queen City Roller is going on a short holiday. A week. Grin and bear it. They'll be stories and action to report. Bears. Things of that sort. Tiny museums will be explored and rocks overturned. Cars may be set on fire. Kitties washed.

In the meantime, listen to The Psychedelic Solution on Compound Radio. Compound Radio is actually in a damn compound. It's true. Neck tattoos, broken bottles, a kitchen. Things that one normally finds in a compound. Sometimes, there is a radio. Jim Jones had one at his compound. And shows? Hell, there are so many shows on there that it will blow your damn mind. Or your friend's mind!

The Psychedelic Solution airs Monday nights at 8pm Pacific. That's 10pm for all you Okies and Bleeding Kansans. When the QCR gets back from holiday, well, you just watch out mister!

The Sweetness of Honeyboy Edwards

2008-07-20T23:05:00.000-05:00

I don’t sleep. I doze occasionally but morning, noon, night, evening, dead of night, early morning, the wee hours have no relevance to me. I’m always tired but seldom sleep.

So I got up from a thirty-minute nap to go to CVS, the store formerly known as Osco, Skaggs, Katz and Cranks. I had to find a blank VHS tape that, in the age of TiVo, is tantamount to trying to find a buggy whip or slide rule.
There’s a news show coming on HBO’s “In Focus” called “Vampires in America.” I told my friend Lisa I would tape it for her. She works at a “shelter” facility in NYC counseling homeless teens, drug addled kids, hopeless cases. Some of her “kids” claim to be vampires. She wants to see the HBO report and I want to make her happy.

Lisa is a brilliant writer. She worked for “The New Yorker” and wrote a great novel, “Because of You.” Then she was a junkie for several years and I thought she had died. I am glad she didn’t. Lisa is a middle class white girl. But she knows, loves and understands the blues. Some white kids can. Dig up the first two Electric Flag albums. Or “Better Days” by The Paul Butterfield Blues Band. Or any John Mayall record. Or the original Fleetwood Mac.
So... I’m out to find the archaic VHS tape and am tuned to NPR rather than the usual stuff I listen to, right wing radio. It was the godfather who said, “keep your friends close...and your enemies closer...”
I hear the strains of an obviously ancient blues recording.
Guitar and voice.
The announcer is saying, “This is David “Honeyboy” Edwards, recorded in 1942 by legendary folk/blues archivist Alan Lomax.”
The music crossfades into a higher fidelity version of the song and the announcer continues, “...and this is Honeyboy Edwards today, in our studio.”
Honeyboy Edwards is still playing the blues. He still loves the girls, the booze and the music.
At 93, Honeyboy is the LAST living link to the man who brought the Delta Blues to prominence, Robert Johnson.

Johnson, by all accounts, sold his soul to the Devil to learn to play the guitar. He is the father of American blues music. He was the Jimi Hendrix of his time. He remains the absolute mojo man. He is the end all of any discussion of the blues. Charley Patton, some will point out, was more proficient. But Patton didn’t SELL HIS SOUL TO THE DEVIL for his music. That kind of action requires a commitment. Ask Batman, the Joker or Dick Cheney. Selling one’s soul can’t be taken lightly, even if you’re an atheist.

In the interview, Honeyboy says, “Robert loved two things: Whisky and women.”
I understand that. I would sell my own soul for either and indeed may have done so. I still can’t play the guitar but I have been devil drunk and I know and love the kindest women on the planet who give me nothing “bluesy” to sing about because they have never done me no wrong. No wrong at all. Damn it! I could have had a blues career if I didn’t know all of these NICE women... Somebody, PLEASE, break my heart, do me wrong, treat me like a fool, step out, high faloot.

Johnson was killed at a house party one night in 1938. A husband -whose wife Johnson had been diddling- gave him some bootleg whisky laced with strychnine.
Honeyboy was there. He saw Robert Johnson die. For lovers and students of the blues the implications of “I saw Robert Johnson die” are beyond the realm of sanity. Thinking about it will only put a hellhound on your trail. Not to mention stones in your pathway.
Honeyboy went on to play with Big Joe Williams, Rice "Sonny Boy Williamson" Miller, Howlin' Wolf, Peetie Wheatstraw, Sunnyland Slim, Lightnin' Hopkins, Big Walter, Little Walter, Magic Sam and Muddy Waters.
Honeyboy Edwards is the real thing and I heard him sing and play today. At 93 he kicks every young poseur’s ass.
Honeyboy is 93. But in the interview he sounds younger. He is still vibrant and vital. He can still play the blues. And sing the blues. He is not feeble in any manner. The blues he plays and sings are THE blues. He was there when the idiom was being formed.
He’s not some suburban white kid who can flash on the guitar and thinks his life is hell because his parents were selfish yuppies. Yeah, life’s a bitch.
And yeah, I fucking hate “modern” blues.
The last blues guy who had the shit was Johnny Winter. He is an albino. A “Bizarro World” nigger. He’s an outcast because of the color of his skin. It’s a world gone mad. They hate dark skin and they reel from NO pigment. Everyone must be Caucasian, I guess. You know, “normal.”
Johnny was a junkie. A womanizer. A man who was born into the blues. And he plays and sings the real thang. Listen to his “Progressive Blues Experiment” He’s not Stevie Ray Vain or the people of the ilk who come through Springfield on a regular basis and make believe they “have the blues.” They have the blues if they don’t get dinner as specified in their contract rider. Baby ass white suburban blues. Pitiful? Yep. Certifiable? No fucking way.
Honeyboy told a story about his early adult life.
If a black man happened to be found in the daytime hours not working, he would be arrested for “vagrancy.”
Honeyboy realized he could make more money playing on the weekends than working the fields all day and he bucked/fucked the system. When asked what he did to avoid being found out, he says he just “stayed inside all day.” When asked what he DID all day he says, “Sleep. Eat. Ha Ha.”
Honeyboy stuck it to the man. God bless him.

At 93 Honeyboy still has the thing that has made men play music from time immemorial: The love of women. I would say “the chance for getting pussy” but that might be considered rude.
Honeyboy says, "I can do anything I ever done. It just take more time." The woman interviewing him laughs and is somewhat taken aback at a man of Honeyboy’s age talking about sex. But he’s a consummate bluesman and I’m sure he’ll be fucking until the day he dies. And maybe there will be 72 hookers waiting for him in heaven. I never understood the appeal of 72 virgins. I want some womens who already KNOW what ta do.

93 and still singing, playing and running with the girls. God bless Honeyboy. If there is a god he surely DOES bless Mr Edwards.

From time to time I have the privilege to sing with The Bluesberries, Steve Smith and the Sneakers, The Maxwells and some other local bands. I always do a Howlin’ Wolf song or two. I take the time to proselytize and tell the folks, “Go to Amazon.com or your local record store and BUY EVERY HOWLIN’ WOLF CD YOU CAN FIND.” I mean that. The Wolf is my spiritual blues guru. And Honeyboy is in the same realm.
Honeyboy Edwards is still alive. He knew Robert Johnson and Charley Patton.
He’s the end of the line, a real treasure. He deserves his respect.
Hearing him on the radio gave me hope that maybe things were OK.
But when I got home, Still President GW Gump was on TV and the hope faded.
So now I’m spinning up Wolf’s “Killin’ Floor” and am being taken away.
The “blues” is cathartic. And so is rock and roll. Next in line on my queue is “Search and Destroy” by The Stooges. Which is just a hype, skip and jump from Honeyboy Edwards. Acid fueled, Nixon era speed blues.
Ah the lineage will never be put asunder.
Johnson, Honeyboy, Wolf, Waters, Stones, Jimi, Iggy, The MC5, Cobain.
Tear out my heart but give me hope there’s something that’s gonna fill the hole.
The mens don’t know but the little girls understand.
I’ve worn this .44 so long, it’s made my shoulder sore.
There’s evil goin’ on.
Another mule’s been kickin’ in my stall.
And if I had listened to my first mind, I wouldn’t be here, down on this killin’ floor.
I am the world’s forgotten boy, the one who searches to destroy.

There ain’t no heaven. But if there were, the first thing I’d like to hear if I got in would be Howlin’ Wolf admonishing me the way he did Eric Clapton on “The London Sessions” record. While explaining “Little Red Rooster” to the band (Clapton, Bill Wyman, Charlie Watts, et al) Wolf is incredulous when Clapton says, “Maybe you should play it with us.”
Wolf says, “Oh man, come on! All you got to do is to count it off.”
He then plays the most sublime acoustic slide and counts, “One...two...three... four...and then the E drops in and he say BOOM! Always stop at the top, don’t stop down here...”

It’s one of the best musical moments ever documented.
When the E drops in he does indeed say boom.
In an era where Britney Spears gets a month of coverage for showing her kooch while drunk driving, it’s sad to think that when Honeyboy Edwards passes there will be little notice.
God bless you Honeyboy. And The Wolf and Muddy and Lightnin’ and Lead Belly and Willie Dixon and Little Walter and BOTH of the Sonny Boys and BB and The Stones for turning us dumb kids onto an indigenous American art form.
Everyone needs to remember, “All you got to do is to count it off.

Whineboy James 7/19/08

Hear the Honeyboy Edwards interview

"Put the panties back!" - My life with The Minstrels.

2008-07-17T20:28:00.000-05:00

I've thumbed through dozens of girlie magazines in the last 30 years. They're all over the place. Circus of Books, Paradise, Barnes and Noble, the Stop n' Shop. They're in my bedroll. Inside my copy of The Grand Illusion, no one would ever look there. Cheesecake rags were under the passenger seat of a 1978 black Monte Carlo that my friend Jeff and I used to ride around in trying to scare up Glendale girls on summer break. Switching between Badfinger's No Dice and a Devo back n' forth jerk. The latter sounds sexy, sure it does, admit it, and I can't speak for Jeff but I'm sure that one of those nights was filled with The Minstrels. The only band that would let a girl put a panty liner on her thigh for the hell of it.

The Minstrels, for the uninitiated, were an all hotshit girl new wave band from The Queen City in the earliest of 1980s. They were so fine that they turned Robert Palmer into a buttery dishrag. You think he got that sexy man guy crap on his own? No, no. The Minstrels taught that act to him. That and how to behave.

The Minstrels recorded the first "A" side only single in pop history, "My Boyfriend Jerks Off." That's hotshit and that's what got Jeff and I to go to as many Minstrels shows as we could. It spoke heavy volumes that you could only wipe away with a gym sock. You could tie that sock around your head, ball an end up, shove it in your mouth, and you still wouldn't be able to contain yourself. The Minstrels were that good. How many times did we get thrown out of Klinkers before we got it right?

Eventually you could pick us out of the crowd. Black suitcoats, black peg legged pants, a Minstrels club only t-shirt which featured a sexy "M" with panties pulled down around the opposing legs of the letter. We each had a number of colorful Canal Jeans t-shirts. Remember that scene in American Gigolo when Julian is laying all his clothes out on the bed? Ties, jackets, sox, manpanties, and cummerbunds (always the favorite article) spread out so he could decide just how much he'd pull in a single night. That was Jeff. He had more Minstrels buttons than I did. I had more Costello buttons. Especially the tiny little Elvis head model. I knew that one of The Minstrels was really into Elvis and I knew that if I wore that button just right then maybe I could after party. A guy could really dream in 1982. So much more than now.

The Minstrels only needed an "A" side. A motherfucking "A side." That was it. The other side, the so called "B" side was just black vinyl. Limited numbers, something like ten, had the M with the panties thing etched into them. The cover was simple. A photo of the gorgeous chicks, Kelly with the panty liner in her tights. A deft touch and an ode to Wunderle. Mary smoking. It was when Mary smoked during their sets that The Minstrels took off. It was if her smoke, her smoke rings, the essence and smells of the smoke, would turn the girls on and make them play even better than ever. That's what happened that night in Kansas City, at the Uptown, when Kathleen got busted for soliciting. She couldn't keep the show inside. Had to take it to the streets.

"My Boyfriend Jerks Off" wasn't the only club hit. It's just the one that stuck. The regional sound that The Minstrels had rivaled their partners in Fools Face. The Minstrels told it like it was. I mean, you really can imagine the guy in Fools Face's "To Be Someone" actually having a masturbation issue. "Now I get to hang out with the number one gang." Please. That's 1962 guy code for jerking off. It's from a Dion song. Look it up.

I recently was sent this photo that was supposedly taken during the shooting of the lost Minstrels film. For the last 25 years the rumors surrounding this film were as thick as Nixa kudzu. "Cocksucker Blues" is brought up so many times when referencing the scratchy, wood paneled porno chic of the thing but Larry Clark and Helmut Newton didn't shoot that goddamn movie so that doesn't explain the amazing amazingness of this small yet perfectly breasted outtake that features The Minstrels having a party. Look at the blatant merchandising not only for the single but for another band. A Fools Face t-shirt, long brunette hair, and girl underwear all in front of an open window. This is an after party we weren't invited to but after following Kelly's car after another show at Klinkers we hung out outside some guy's house. I can attest to the authenticity of this picture being from the movie. They played Twister too. In front of the window. It was fucking awesome.
I could've taken a whole magazine of those photos.

"On your knees boys, The Minstrels are in town!"
Damn right, sugar.

Silky Poplin - 2008

Squeeze

2008-07-15T18:50:00.000-05:00

Me mate was visiting from college in 1996. It was the beginning of fall, as I sat copying all the Velvets' songs I had never heard before from his "Peel Slowly and See" box set to two used cassette tapes. I immediately fell in love with the early demos. "Sheltered Life" and "It's all right the way that you live", showed me a VU that I had never dreamt of before. I also got my first taste of Doug Yule's Velvets. It would be another 8 years before I would run across "Squeeze" in my brother's crates during a mini-vacation at his apartment in Springfield, MO.

I still listen to the Velvet Underground. Although now it is an occasional selection from the "Loaded" extras, like "Ocean" and "Ride into the Sun". And of course, "Squeeze". "Squeeze" means as much to me as the very discovery and re-discovery of music itself. That is because "Squeeze", though minted in 1972, seems to me, to embody that "lost" age: perhaps Doug as a ten year old boy, listening to old radio programs before his folks could ever afford a television. That "lost" age is in all of us. However, it is lost out of society as a whole, never pressed elsewhere for fear of some base corruption by the coarse minds and ears of unworthy n'er-do-well's. I was fourteen or fifteen when I bought "The Velvet Underground and Nico".

Walking into Starship Records and Tapes in 1991, the scrawny pre-adolescent kid who couldn't yet make a distinction between Metallica and Public Image Limited, approached the old longhaired dude at the counter."I want to buy an album by the Velvet Underground," I told him. Of course, his first question was: "Do you want album 'The Velvet Underground?'""No." I said. "I want the Velvet Underground and Nico." It would be another five years when Dan returned from school, before I would ever hear Doug Yule's immortal voice on 'Candy Says'. But I liked the tape I ended up buying that day, especially "Sunday Morning", which I feel to reflect that quality of "lost" time, found again and again as we move from album to album. Now I am not sure if "The Velvet Underground" and "Loaded" are better than the first two albums because of: A: The fact that they had lost all their sound effect equipment and were forced to actually come up with some groovy tracks without using effects to make them sound good. Or B: The fact that they were one of those bands that makes greater and greater albums successively. Or C: God forbid, the fact that they no longer had John Cale was a positive thing. Or D: The addition of Doug Yule's particular style was the prime factor.

When I found "Squeeze" hidden among my brother's records back in 2003, I knew I was on to something good. I had never heard of it. But when I saw 10 tracks I was not familiar with on the back cover, I quickly produced a cassette and taped it. For a period of time, not being familiar with the album, I assumed Lou Reed was singing. I didn't know he had nothing to do with the album. I also had thought that he sang Candy says and all the tracks on "Loaded". This was probably because the liner notes on "Squeeze" are sparse. Furthermore, although "Squeeze" was made sans Reed, Tucker, and Morrison, it is without a doubt worthy of the status of being labeled an album by the Velvet Underground.

Remember the lost time of post-December 2002. How the winter in Tulsa was coming on—when I brought the cassette with me back from Springfield, and couldn't keep it out of my little recorder-walkman. There was heavy ice on the ground that winter. I remember waking up in the middle of the night, gasping for air, and frying tempura chicken at the restaurant I worked in by day. My cassette was originally intended to be a compilation. It had Neil Young, Radiohead, King Crimson, and the Replacements. But when I was looking for the next song to put on, I had found gold. It was "Squeeze". I thought "that's real nice." I also filled side "B" with "The Stooges", although I cut "Anne" in half, regretting it later.

That time in my life was very sad, and that album made me feel warm. It was cold outside and my heater was a piece of shit. I suppose at that moment Cale was trying to be too avant-garde, so Reed kicked him out. After all, he had Yule who had then come on the scene with a more subtle sound. I imagine Reed felt then like he could finally have free reign and do what he wanted using Yule to support his agenda. "The Velvet Underground" was obviously Lou's baby. All the tracks show his influence, (the "closet" mixes). I think Yule was afraid to come out too much with his ideas, like he really had no pull in the band, having just joined a band that had already been around for 5 years.

Even though Candy Says has a slight affectation of Yule simply because it's him singing, I think on "Loaded" he finally felt comfortable and/or was allowed more opinions of where the album was going. We hear Yule's contributions not just in the "Loaded" tracks he sings, but on "Train round the bend" for instance. Lou is singing, and that driving bass may be Morrison, but the bass sound is essentially Yule.

Yule's sound at that time was essentially whimsical. It shows most of all, on his baby, "Squeeze". Cale and Nico era VU was very avant-garde, as opposed to when Yule had his sway, with his signal touch of the whimsical sigh. We all know that Yule pretty much had free reign with Squeeze, mostly because Polydor wanted to cash in on a final VU album. It may be true that essentially it was Yule's solo album with a VU moniker, but it's just not a bad trade when you think about it. He must have had second thoughts about releasing it as a VU album. I feel like he was then pressed by Polydor to call it a VU album, giving in, in the end because he knew he could have pretty much free reign to make it sound like he wanted it to sound. Polydor was happy as long as they had a product, but it backfired when it was not initially received.

It was decided not to release the album in America. It may be said that they knew that VU fans wanted to hear a VU album, and not Yule's solo stuff, and that it's not a VU album. To me, Squeeze was a totally free chance for Yule to record his special sound, musical freedom given by releasing the album as a VU album. For starters, Squeeze typifies the early seventies bass-driven roots rock, comparable only to some of McCartney's solo work for it's whimsy and heavy bass. And it has an unparalleled nostalgia permeating it, which despite it's roots rock formulas, seems it could have been found in a record store fifty years hence, because of the piano aspect. This made it essentially a mixture of ballad Americana and seventies roots rock and a touch of nostalgia thrown in.

* * *
Thirty-three and a half. The Age of Christ at the time of his passion: also, the length in minutes of Doug Yule's masterwork, "Squeeze". This is a lovely juxtaposition. I ascribe three major qualities to "Squeeze". The songs are either primarily one or the other, always a hint, though in every song. It is primarily Americana. It has a touch of whimsical nostalgia. At the heart, however, of the work, is pure seventies roots rock. When it isn't whimsical nostalgia, it is the bass that drives the music on Squeeze.

I don't like "Squeeze" because it's by the Velvet Underground. I like it because it's a great damn album. Of course, if "Squeeze" was by Rod Stewart, I'm not sure I would have picked it out of my brother's crate of vinyl. I think it's funny that after being a big VU fan for over 10 years, I had never heard of Squeeze. And most people I know have never heard of it either.

A great band can take time away from us. They can make us forget our sorrows when they are rife, and make us remember them when we are happy. Time has no beginning and no end, if you can replay it over and over and over again. This is shown in the Akashic records. If one is to breathe deep enough and long enough, he can remember those childhood days when we could not differentiate between kinds and qualities, only sounds.

I remember the eras well. There is the time surrounding my purchase of "The Velvet Underground and Nico". I would hang out at the Metro Diner and smoke pot behind the buildings across the street. I had a wooden pipe with a glassy stone above the bowl I bought at the Starship headshop, which, along with the record store, wasn't but a block or two away. Often I would go in there before I hitched a ride home or had mother come and pick me up. One particular night I remember buying these matches that smelled like incense, if you let them burn down all the way. Of all my Velvet Underground eras, however, I appreciate the most that winter I came back to Tulsa with "Squeeze". I went to Springfield with a copy of "Watership Down", which I never finished because it was boring, and I came back with "The Mucker" by Edgar Rice Burroughs, which I never finished because it got ruined by water.

Then, of course, there is the summer of 2001 right after returning to Tulsa and the Immortal Cherry Street. "The Velvet Underground" was on my walkman at the time, and I found myself constantly humming "Candy Says" and "Pale Blue Eyes" as I was contemplating oblivion at my astute job at Jason's Deli which I absolutely hated. I also had a job at the Saint Louis Bread down the street. I mention also that wonderful age of 25, when I roamed the streets of downtown Tulsa alone at three oclock in the morning, listening to "Transformer".

However, when it comes to the pedantic, the most salient of my VU epochs was the winter of early 2003, when songs like "Caroline", and "Mean Old Man" were resounding in my satiated ears. I cannot place much in the manner of the album, probably because I did not grow up in the late fifties. But if I had, I most certainly would understand the novelty of "Squeeze", for I am sure, having seen movies, that there is a quiet age of reflection for Yule in those days, as if not only he was ten, but time itself, spent quietly composing the piano parts in some little apartment in New York.Expecially the three tracks ("She'll Make You Cry", "Wordless", and "Friends" also the end of "Louise"), are unarguably the most significant aspect of the timeless feeling of Squeeze. The wistful, almost somber expectancy of these tracks contributes a plethora of memories of some remote age, doubtless the less-known musics of the late fifties, the time of his middle childhood.Of course, all the other tracks on "Squeeze" have some nostalgic hint at the music of the late fifties, but the one I posit the most erstwhile timlessness is "Friends".

"Friends" is my favorite song on "Squeeze". As I listen to it now, as I hear the needle touch the vinyl, I am utterly swept into what love felt like when I was ten. However, it also has a hint of what love feels like to me now, and there you have it. Sitting in an attic somewhere with a girl my age, listening to an old recording perhaps dug out of some musty box, I can look into her eyes and know: sighing: total resignation.But the soft novelty of "Friends" is not the only appreciable aspect of "Squeeze". It is quickly followed by "Send No Letter", which, being my least favorite track on "Squeeze" simply because the husht confidence of "Friends" is abruptly broken by it. Nevertheless, it is still a jiving, bootlegging romp replete with the signature Yule bass-piano combination. I do like the song, but, coming after "Friends", any song could easily become my least favorite song.

Two facts remain ambiguous. One is: how could Reed, who was rumored to have been upset about "Squeeze" being labeled a VU album when they resurrected in 1990, place Yule 'out' of the lineup? After all, did not Reed recruit him to play on "Sally Can't Dance" and even touring with him in the 1970's? And why does no one know the identity of the females whose backing vocals add that faint touch of eternal sighing that is so prominent on this album? Has no one asked Doug this question? And if so, why is he so loath to produce the truth? Could it be that these women are in actuality victims of a possible Yule blackout due to excessive drinking and drug use? This is a probable explanation and my personal opinion of the mystery of the matter. And it ends. The driving bass and piano again repeat a simple formula perhaps heard in a saloon in 1870's Kansas. A straight romp called "Louise" that employs a progression of repetitions starting with the bass and piano, with that existent chorus "But everybody knows you used to dance the hoochy-coo". Then a subtle use of organ, ending in the quiet repetition of a single hum, over and over and over again, marking that distinctive quality of forlorn childhood love that is so prominent somehow in each and every track on "Squeeze".

If you listen to it for even a moment, it is hard to understand why it was "thumbed-down" by Velvets fans, who termed it "The Velveteen Underground". I like it. I also like cheese.

wcl - 2008

Welcome to The Queen City Roller.

2008-07-13T22:13:00.000-05:00

"More music, more music, more music, more music."

From high atop the Springfield Plain, in the Queen City of the Ozarks, comes the dynamo that has just enough wheels to be The Queen City Roller.

A high toned and somewhat light complected source for stuff.

Bloggland is a curious place bees and britches but we at The Queen City Roller will do our best to navigate the bogs and marshes. What will you find at The QCR? Music mostly, rants some, links to things we find stellar, politics, food, crap around the house, brushes with greatness and tales of places far away that only some of us can dream of, and more music. Marvel at reviews of records old and new. Sounds undiscovered or ignored. Recommendations to the real things and advice on how to avoid the shit that passes for the real. We'll be making Lime Rickies. We'll be thinking of the fly on the wall. The QCR will analyze record covers, singles, shows, genres. You will find essays on major fuck-ups and little minor happenings that shaped the lives of The Queen City Roller staff.

And that's what you're going get.
Cake or Death. You decide.

Thank you for being a friend,
The Queen City Roller.

Adventures in Hi-Fi to Lo-Fi and back again.

2008-07-04T10:30:00.000-05:00

The obsession. Followed, sought. Anticipated. Agonized over. Written in Sharpie® over bathroom walls, notebooks, mix-tape covers, endless amounts of paper, and knuckles, as is all too often the case with "OZZY."

Molly Ringwald wrote The Rave-Ups all over her Sixteen Candles notebooks. Oklahoma punk rockers wrote bullshit all over their jeans. Some made really stupid jackets. There was a girl in the documentary The Complete Beatles who almost cried displaying her groovy painting of McCartney as a tree. People used to wait in line for days for concert tickets. Allen Doss once pulled Elvis Costello's King of America out of his bag and waved it at me in the street shouting, "It just came out today!" He looked like his teeth were going to bite him.

The crush is a love either unspoken or something that you're so fucking into that you tell everyone about it. You scream it. You measure everything against it. Nothing stands in its way. And a central element of the crush is anticipation.

I was talking to a girl about life, the sound, and anticipation. Today, people have to really struggle to avoid spoilers. If a record's going to come out in August, there are dozens of ways to hear it and decide if it's going to be shit or shinola. I did that with Wilco's Sky Blue Sky and even though I love the record, it took me over a year to buy the thing. In today's cool economic climate it only makes sense that people either download an album off a blog or rip it from a friend whose already done just that. It's rare that I hear of anyone spending months waiting for an album. I don't even know if there are many bands today that warrant that kind of fervent dedication. What was once months of waiting turns into years. Years between projects until no one cares (Elastica, Stone Roses, Guns n' Roses) or years that really can make a difference (Mission of Burma, Portishead). But what about the crush that continues year after year and pays off each time? Well, for five years at least.

The summers between 1984 and 1989 were heady times for me. Every spring or summer meant a new R.E.M. album which meant every fall had a tour. I picked up Murmur in 1983, the same day I bought The Pretenders' Learning to Crawl. I had never heard Chronic Town but I read a blurb about Murmur in Trouser Press and immediately went out and bought it. Murmur stunned me with its subtlety, harmony, and openness. Radio Free Europe was a brand new sound to me. Resonant, spooky, and with so much Rickenbacker salt that I picked the needle up five times to repeat it before I just let the record play out.Talk About the Passion, Shaking Through, and Perfect Circle became staples. I really wanted to see the band.

Next spring, Reckoning was released.

Seven Chinese Brothers and Little America. A Summer's worth of listening, videos seen, tour dates announced and then a drive with friends to an old church turned nightclub in OKC to see Romeo Void, The DB's and R.E.M. Deborah Iyall churned Romeo Void. The DB's were spot fucking on and the headliners were the most amazing thing I'd ever seen. I sat just above the band. Entranced. Deer eyed. Michael Stipe had been bitten by a jellyfish in California. He sang with his foot on a stool. All long hair and shy. He had a drawing of a bear on the back of a long jacket with an arrow pointing towards Peter Buck that said "Bear." Peter Buck doesn't look like a fucking bear but he may when he's 70.

Then came the year of FFA jackets, growing my hair like Mike Mills, buying a Rickenbacker 620/6 with a hot check and sitting with my friend Sondra learning songs. We waited for Fables of the Reconstruction to come out, bought it, jumped around, hung out, listened and pined for the tour. Driver 8, Life and How to Live It, Green Grow the Rushes. Damn. I hit OKC and Dallas. Saw them at an outdoor stage under the full moon and the Cotton Bowl. Life would repeat the same circle with Life's Rich Pageant. I sucked the album dry. It was everything I imagined it would be. Begin the Begin, Cuyahoga, Just a Touch on the heavy loop. At the time, I couldn't imagine playing anything else but Life's Rich Pageant. Yesterday, it's all I listened too.

Another year another album. Document. Absorbed and released. More shows seen. Lightin' Hopkins played over and over. Sam Lines took the Stipe photo attached to this story at Memorial Hall. A great show with lots of sleep lost. Then what? For the next eight years I would move in and out of Green, Out of Time, and Automatic for the People. I dug Monster, some, enjoyed the show with Sonic Youth. But the first five records, plus Chronic Town, and Dead Letter Office (that wonderful album of outtakes and live material that served as toast and biscuits between album releases) got taped, archived, given to girls, and raved about. New Adventures in Hi-Fi, released in the fall of 1996, is still a work of art to me, and their best album of the 90s. Binky the Doormat, Be Mine, New Test Leper. Bill Berry's swan song. An album conceived and recorded on the road. Soundchecks, studios, dressing rooms, and with Patti Smith to add sauce and touch. The press keeps hounding me to get the new album, Accelerate. Perhaps it's time to get obsessed.

ap - 2008