The Archeological Music Dig.

968.
That's the number.
I didn't know what it would be when I started but that's where it came out.

968.

Albums.

I don't know how long in minutes or hours but I know that I started this listening project in 2015 and only just finished today.

So, what is this?

I was a teenager in 1978. I turned 13. It's in those teen years that we develop our musical tastes. What speaks to us. What we relate to. We become possessive of bands that we "discover" and think they are "sell outs" when they become popular and sell millions of records.

Life was different in the days between 1978 and 1982. Not just for me. Every teenager goes through changes and those stories are unique and boring and I'm not going to write my autobiography here.

Life was different for us growing up in that era inasmuch as we had some access to new music or popular music but it was from varied and, sometimes, veiled places. It was just plain hard to hear new music, underground music, different music. Not like it is today. On our phones. And I'm thrilled about that. I LOVE the access we have today. But it was not the same back in the old days....

First there was, of course, top 40 radio. I didn't JUST listen to WNBC in the afternoon to hear the hits of the day. I put my boxy tape recorder next to the speaker on my Technics stereo, held down PLAY & RECORD and just walked away, making sure to return in either 30 minutes or 45, depending on what length tapes I had lying around. Then I would listen back, over and over, and decide, with great and delicate precision, which song represented the album I would fork over cash to own.

When I was just a little older I discovered Trouser Press. This was after a dalliance with CREEM (which seemed to pander to the stadium rock that already had legions of fans) and Rolling Stone, which was fun in 77 when it featured Star Wars on the cover (and an interview with George Lucas where he said that there would be NINE movies in total! 3 sequels followed by 3 prequels where Mark Hamill would play his own father and then 3 sequels to the original 3 where Mark would play the older Luke. It was a glorious idea. I never forgot it. Unless I imagined it.)
No. Trouser Press was the one for me. One issue (I don't recall which) and I was hooked. I subscribed so I could get my "flexi-disk" singles. The first one I got was Adam & the Ants "A.N.T.S." to the tune of YMCA! And it was in the back of TP that I heard of bands like Romeo Void and X. Although X was written about in Time in 1981 along with The Blasters as having the Album of the Year. But I had already discovered them so it was vindication. And, since X never really got out of cult status I never had to call them sell-outs. Bands I had never heard of plus stores. Stores! Like Trash & Vaudeville in that mysterious "Greenwich Village" in NY. And Sounds records. And what were "Beatle Boots", anyway? And somewhere, I just knew it, in the caverns of the lower part of Manhattan, I would find an import copy of Adam & the Ants' "Dirk Wears White Sox". (I did and my father could not believe I would spent $14 on a record!)
Later, in the confines of the unfinished attic I had converted into my bedroom I would listen, deep into the night, to college radio. Where "The Kid" on WFMU played the entire album of Martin Briley's "Fear of the Unknown", an album upon mentioning it, caused Robbie Rist to run to his van and show proof that it was among his favorite "rekkids".  The Kid let me come in an spin a couple records once. He promised me an entire show but, when I arrived, platters in tow, he had forgotten that he did that and let me sit and spin ONE record. His. David Bowie's "Andy Warhol". A resentment of Bowie festered throughout my life because of that event.
But that's where I heard R.E.M.'s "1,000,000" for the first time. And all of Gary Numan's "The Pleasure Principle", an artist I had already fallen in love with because my friend and crush, Toby, loved Gary. And turned me on to him, Human Sexual Response and The Dickies.
My buddy, Pete and I would go to the record store in Maine on our way to the Pizza Parlor to play Defender, or on the way back and we would chug through the new releases. His faves were Ozzy Osbourne (We went to see him in concert at the Bangor State Fair. I stood 3 people from the stage and Randy Rhodes looked right at me! Def Leppard opened...when the drummer still had both arms!), Van Halen, Sammy Hagar. He got The Stray Cats album when I picked up Elvis Costello's "Imperial Bedroom". I picked up Dead Kennedys "Plastic Surgery Disasters" when he was air guitaring to Iron Maiden. (We both air guitared to that, actually. It's where I developed my air guitar chops)
I could go on and on. But the point is that I loved music. But, who could listen to it all?

Me. Now.

Thanks to streaming and some rudimentary Wikipediaing, I compiled a list of as many Rock albums released during 1978-1982, those teen years and got to listening.
I created a spreadsheet to catalog release dates along with links to Allmusic reviews, Pitchfork, if they reviewed the album, and my own blog, www.septenary.blogspot.com, if I covered it in a Listening Post.
Anal. I know. But, who would expect anything less from an obsessive compulsive project such as this?

Of equal interest to discovering if the stuff I already loved, the music that formed me and informed me, still held up, there was the archeology of the entire affair. Would I discover music that I might have missed? Would there be something I might've loved that went unheard? Might I have newfound affection for music I had disregarded or dismissed back then?

The answers to those questions are resounded Yeses.

I liked Punk less than I thought I remembered. Anything outside of what I already knew was grating. Annoying.

But the Post-Punk, The Pop Group, Killing Joke, Throbbing Gristle, Joy Division, John Foxx, Captain Beefheart and The Residents all surprised me, excited me, made me wonder if I would've loved it back then or if I had to be the person I am now.

I waited 30+ years to listen to Glenn Branca's The Ascension, even though I'd read about it and loved him in theory. It was worth the wait. Brilliant.

Anvil? I thought they were a joke. Turns out they shred.
Demon? I never heard of them. Too bad. I would've probably air guitared to them as well.
I heard the name Mink Deville but never gave the Springsteen-esque guy much due. Too bad.
And Bobb Trimble? Who knew? Almost no one since he only released two albums and only about 500 copies of each.
Saxon, Willy Nile & Young Marble Giants. The Ruts, Magnum, New England.
Great stuff.

And there's a lot, a LOT, of bad stuff out there. I won't go down the list but I will say that The Beach Boys...Rick Derringer....Cocteau Twins...I will never forgive you for that time you took for me.

Oh. And regardless of Pitchfork, I fucking HATE The Raincoats.

Anyway.

Here's the top 210 albums. The first 59 are 5 star records. The rest got 4.5.

In addition, I listed "Heart Songs" or "Starred Tracks", which is how you let Apple Music or Spotify learn what you like and profile you.

If you want the entire spreadsheet, complete with links, let me know and I will send you a link.


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1/18/1978	Warren Zevon	Excitable Boy	5
2/10/1978	Van Halen	Van Halen	5
3/17/1978	Elvis Costello & the Attractions	This Year's Model	5
6/6/1978	The Cars	The Cars	5
6/9/1978	The Rolling Stones	Some Girls	5
9/21/1978	The Ramones	Road to Ruin	5
10/9/1978	Judas Priest	Hell Bent for Leather	5
6/2/1978	Bruce Springsteen	Darkness on the Edge of Town	5
1/5/1979	Elvis Costello & the Attractions	Armed Forces	5
3/5/1979	Joe Jackson	Look Sharp!	5
6/15/1979	Joy Division	Unknown Pleasures	5
11/23/1979	The Jam	Setting Sons	5
10/19/1979	Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers	Damn the Torpedoes	5
9/7/1979	Gary Numan & Tubeway Army	The Pleasure Principle	5
10/5/1979	Joe Jackson	I'm the Man	5
10/19/1979	Madness	One Step Beyond...	5
11/30/1979	Pink Floyd	The Wall	5
1/1/1979	The Ruts	The Crack	5
4/1/1979	Gary Numan & Tubeway Army	Replicas	5
10/9/1979	The Boomtown Rats	The Fine Art of Surfacing	5
1/4/1980	The Romantics	The Romantics	5
1/14/1980	Rush	Permanent Waves	5
3/10/1980	Billy Joel	Glass Houses	5
4/22/1980	The Cure	Seventeen Seconds	5
4/1/1980	Xex	Group:Xex	5
4/25/1980	Black Sabbath	Heaven and Hell	5
4/1/1980	The Feelies	Crazy Rhythms	5
4/1/1980	X	Los Angeles	5
10/17/1980	Bruce Springsteen	The River	5
6/30/1980	Queen	The Game	5
7/11/1980	Ultravox	Vienna	5
7/25/1980	AC/DC	Back in Black	5
7/1/1980	The Vapors	New Clear Days	5
1/1/1980	Human Sexual Response	Fig. 14	5
9/5/1980	Gary Numan	Telekon	5
9/12/1980	David Bowie	Scary Monsters (and Super Creeps)	5
9/20/1980	Ozzy Osbourne	Blizzard of Ozz	5
10/8/1980	Talking Heads	Remain in Light	5
10/1/1980	The Residents	Commercial Album	5
10/1/1980	Rockpile	Seconds of Pleasure	5
11/3/1980	Adam & The Ants	Kings of the Wild Frontier	5
1/7/1980	Pretenders	Pretenders	5
1/23/1981	Elvis Costello	Trust	5
2/13/1981	Phil Collins	Face Value	5
2/21/1981	Rick Springfield	Working Class Dog	5
5/15/1981	Squeeze	East Side Story	5
5/1/1981	X	Wild Gift	5
6/1/1981	Joe Jackson	Joe Jackson's Jumpin' Jive	5
7/8/1981	The Go Go's	Beauty and the Beat	5
7/1/1981	Romeo Void	It's a Condition	5
11/1/1981	Glenn Branca	The Ascension	5
3/15/1982	Richard & Linda Thompson	Shoot Out the Lights	5
4/19/1982	Laurie Anderson	Big Science	5
6/1/1982	Roxy Music	Avalon	5
6/1/1982	Stray Cats	Built for Speed	5
7/2/1982	Elvis Costello & The Attractions	Imperial Bedroom	5
11/1/1982	Donald Fagan	The Nightfly	5
7/2/1982	X	Under the Big Black Sun	5
2/10/1978	Judas Priest	Stained Class	4.5
3/1/1978	Nick Lowe	Jesus of Cool	4.5
3/1/1978	The Rutles	The Rutles	4.5
5/1/1978	Cheap Trick	Heaven Tonight	4.5
5/19/1978	Kraftwerk	The Man-Machine	4.5
6/1/1978	The Boomtown Rats	A Tonic for the Troops	4.5
7/21/1978	The Rezillos	Can't Stand the Rezillos	4.5
8/28/1978	Devo	Are We Not Men? We Are Devo!	4.5
10/13/1978	Billy Joel	52nd Street	4.5
11/2/1978	The Police	Outlandos d'Amour	4.5
11/10/1978	Queen	Jazz	4.5
11/24/1978	Gary Numan & Tubeway Army	Tubeway Army	4.5
6/1/1978	The Dickies	The Incredible Shrinking Dickies	4.5
5/5/1978	AC/DC	Powerage	4.5
10/1/1978	Captain Beefheart & The Magic Band	Shiny Beast (Bat Chain Puller)	4.5
8/1/1978	Magnum	Kingdom of Madness	4.5
1/1/1978	New England	New England	4.5
10/13/1978	Southside Johnny & The Asbury Jukes	Hearts of Stone	4.5
1/1/1978	Big Star	Third	4.5
3/1/1979	Graham Parker	Squeezing Out Sparks	4.5
6/9/1979	Nick Lowe	Labour of Lust	4.5
7/27/1979	AC/DC	Highway to Hell	4.5
9/25/1979	Gang of Four	Entertainment!	4.5
10/19/1979	The Specials	The Specials	4.5
12/14/1979	The Clash	London Calling	4.5
2/1/1979	Tangerine Dream	Force Majeure	4.5
3/27/1979	Ian Hunter	You're Never Alone with a Schizophrenic	4.5
3/29/2979	Supertramp	Breakfast In America	4.5
3/30/1979	Triumph	Just a Game	4.5
4/5/1979	Journey	Evolution	4.5
4/13/1979	Thin Lizzy	Black Rose: A Rock Legend	4.5
4/20/1979	The Pop Group	Y	4.5
4/1/1979	Blackfoot	Strikes	4.5
6/9/1979	Dave Edmunds	Repeat When Necessary	4.5
6/11/1979	The Knack	Get the Knack	4.5
8/1/1979	Van Morrison	Into the Music	4.5
9/17/1979	Frank Zappa	Joe's Garage Act 1	4.5
11/19/1979	Frank Zappa	Joe's Garage Acts 2 & 3	4.5
10/30/1979	Adam and the Ants	Dirk Wears White Sox	4.5
9/1/1979	The Residents	Eskimo	4.5
11/1/1979	Simple Minds	Reel to Reel Cacophony	4.5
12/1/1979	Throbbing Gristle	20 Jazz Funk Greats	4.5
1/1/1979	The Roches	The Roches	4.5
5/8/1979	The Cure	Three Imaginary Boys	4.5
3/3/1979	Frank Zappa	Sheik Yerbouti	4.5
5/17/1979	Patti Smith Group	Wave	4.5
5/21/1979	Saxon	Saxon	4.5
8/10/1979	The Radiators	Ghostown	4.5
1/1/1979	Sky	Sky	4.5
1/18/1980	John Foxx	Metamatic	4.5
1/28/1980	J. Geils Band	Love Stinks	4.5
2/4/1980	The Ramones	End of the Century	4.5
2/15/1980	Nazareth	Malice in Wonderland	4.5
2/1/1980	Squeeze	Argybargy	4.5
2/1/1980	Young Marble Giants	Colossal Youth	4.5
2/1/1980	Willie Nile	Willie Nile	4.5
1/1/1980	Teenage Head	Frantic City	4.5
4/21/1980	Pete Townshend	Empty Glass	4.5
5/23/1980	Peter Gabriel	Peter Gariel (Melt)	4.5
5/1/1980	The English Beat	I Just Can't Stop It	4.5
5/1/1980	Tangerine Dream	Tangram	4.5
8/4/1980	The Fabulous Thunderbirds	What's the Word	4.5
6/28/1980	The Soft Boys	Underwater Moonlight	4.5
6/30/1980	Girlschool	Demolition	4.5
7/18/1980	Echo & the Bunnymen	Crocodiles	4.5
7/29/1980	Daryl Hall & John Oates	Voices	4.5
8/1/1980	Siouxie Sioux & the Banshees	Kaleidoscope	4.5
8/5/1980	Pat Benatar	Crimes of Passion	4.5
9/1/1980	Saxon	Strong Arm of the Law	4.5
9/2/1980	Dead Kennedys	Fresh Fruit for Rotting Vegetables	4.5
9/12/1980	Simple MInds	Empires and Dance	4.5
9/24/1980	Utopia	Deface the Music	4.5
9/29/1980	Stevie Wonder	Hotter than July	4.5
10/17/1980	Dire Straits	Making Movies	4.5
10/20/1980	U2	Boy	4.5
10/1/1980	New England	Explorer Suite	4.5
11/8/1980	Motorhead	Ace of Spades	4.5
11/17/1980	The Fall	Grotesque	4.5
11/21/1980	REO Speedwagon	Hi Infidelity	4.5
11/28/1980	The Jam	Sound Affects	4.5
11/19/1980	Blondie	Autoamerican	4.5
11/1/1980	Yello	Solid Pleasure	4.5
1/1/1980	Blue Angel	Blue Angel	4.5
1/1/1980	Bobb Trimble	Iron Curtain Innocence	4.5
5/23/1980	Graham Parker	The Up Escalator	4.5
1/1/1980	Mink DeVille	Le Chat Bleu	4.5
10/5/1980	Killing Joke	Killing Joke	4.5
1/12/1981	April Wine	The Nature of the Beast	4.5
2/12/1981	Rush	Moving Pictures	4.5
3/13/1981	Slade	We'll Bring the House Down	4.5
4/6/1981	Roger Taylor	Fun in Space	4.5
4/13/1981	Billy Squier	Don't Say No	4.5
5/15/1981	The Moody Blues	Long Distance Voyager	4.5
5/30/1981	Echo & the Bunneymen	Heaven Up Here	4.5
5/1/1981	Plasmatics	Beyond the Valley of 1984	4.5
5/10/1981	Kraftwerk	Computer World	4.5
5/22/1981	Jean Michel Jarre	Magnetic Fields	4.5
5/5/1981	The Undertones	Positive Touch	4.5
6/6/1981	Siouxie & the Banshees	Ju Ju	4.5
7/2/1981	Foreigner	4	4.5
7/31/1981	Journey	Escape	4.5
7/31/1981	Eddie Rabbitt	Step by Step	4.5
7/1/1981	Demon	Night of the Demon	4.5
9/18/1981	Genesis	Abacab	4.5
9/21/1981	Triumph	Allied Forces	4.5
9/1/1981	Kix	Kix	4.5
9/1/1981	Hall & Oates	Private Eyes	4.5
10/16/1981	The Human League	Dare	4.5
10/26/1981	J. Geils Band	Freeze Frame	4.5
10/1/1981	Mink DeVille	Coup de Grace	4.5
10/1/1981	Bow Wow Wow	See Jungle! See Jungle! Go Join Your Gang, Yeah	4.5
11/4/1981	Black Sabbath	Mob Rules	4.5
11/7/1981	Ozzy Osbourne	Diary of a Madman	4.5
11/8/1981	Orchestral Maneuvers in the Dark	Architecture & Morality	4.5
11/9/1981	Men At Work	Business As Usual	4.5
11/1/1981	The Sound	From the Lion's Mouth	4.5
12/1/1981	The Blasters	The Blasters	4.5
12/1/1981	David Byrne	The Catherine Wheel	4.5
1/1/1981	Martin Briley	Fear of the Unknown	4.5
2/12/1982	XTC	English Settlement	4.5
3/22/1982	Iron Maiden	The Number of the Beast	4.5
3/23/1982	Rick Springfield	Success Hasn't Spoiled Me Yet	4.5
3/29/1982	Scorpions	Blackout	4.5
4/19/1982	Jethro Tull	The Broadsword and the Beast	4.5
4/19/1982	Motorhead	Iron Fist	4.5
4/28/1982	Marshall Crenshaw	Marshall Crenshaw	4.5
9/1/1982	Uriah Heep	Abominog	4.5
3/29/1982	Sparks	Angst in My Pants	4.5
4/30/1982	A Flock of Seagulls	A Flock of Seagulls	4.5
5/16/1982	Fear	The Record	4.5
7/17/1982	Judas Priest	Screaming for Vengeance	4.5
8/20/1982	Yaz	Upstairs at Eric's	4.5
8/24/1982	R.E.M.	Chronic Town	4.5
8/1/1982	Hughes/Thrall	Hughes/Thrall	4.5
8/1/1982	Demon	The Unexpected Guest	4.5
9/13/1982	Kate Bush	The Dreaming	4.5
9/17/1982	Phil Lynott	The Phil Lynott Album	4.5
11/1/1982	Dead Kennedys	Plastic Surgery Disasters	4.5
11/20/1982	Whitesnake	Saints & Sinners	4.5
11/1/1982	Venom	Black Metal	4.5
4/15/1982	Anvil	Metal on Metal	4.5
1/1/1982	Mission of Burma	Vs	4.5
6/14/1982	Pete Townshend	All the Best Cowboys Have Chinese Eyes	4.5
1/1/1982	The English Beat	Special Beat Service	4.5
10/1/1982	Madness	The Rise & Fall	4.5
9/13/1982	Simple Minds	New Gold Dream	4.5
6/17/1982	The Police	Synchronicity	4.5
3/8/1982	The Fall	Hex Enduction Hour	4.5
3/15/1982	Graham Parker	Another Grey Area	4.5
1/1/1982	Triumph	Never Surrender	4.5
12/1/1982	Venom	Black Metal	4.5

Tweets-a-Rama

ADVENTURES IN CORD CUTTING – PART 8 – WHERE ARE WE NOW?

MARCH 19, 2014 1 COMMENT

I get a lot of people asking me about this cord cutting experience. And, after the last post (Number 7 if you are new to this party. I know, the order is messed up here on the ol’ WordPress) I just gotta tell ya: Nothing’s changed. In fact, we seem to be even more committed to the cut.

How shall I put this?

My wife is on board.

I think it was Grimm that did it for her. She got really addicted to the show a few weeks ago. We are kind of divided in this house. She is the Grimm-er and I’m more into the Fairybacks. I dig Once Upon a Time. Which is the cheesier of the two.

Beth started to catch up by jamming the first two seasons on Amazon Prime. I mean, she just ate up those dozens of episodes. And then, she was stuck. We had never TiVo’d them, why would we? But Hulu didn’t have the first half of this, the 3rd season. So, the easiest thing to do was find it on VoD somewhere.

Whatever she couldn’t find she just bought on VuDu. Just a few is all she needed. And, once she did that we both realized that we don’t need cable. Anything we want is just a click away, really. And if it isn’t it will be.

Could she have VoD’d it on DirecTV? Maybe. It actually didn’t occur to me to check, that’s how checked out of DTV I am.

Considering the amount of stuff we want to watch vs the amount of time we have, I just can’t justify cable or satellite.

We are living in a great age of television. Lots and lots of great tv out there. And you don’t need a satellite dish to get it.

THERE REALLY IS A PIPER DOWN.

AUGUST 26, 2015 4 COMMENTS

It was late 2000. 

The commercials strike had devastated my business, being an actor whose main source of income came from appearing in TV ads. I had little to do with all the free time. Auditions had completely dried up, as they would during a work stoppage. Many of my friends and colleagues started new businesses or got support jobs or just went home to their families.

I started a band. 

Like many other actors in Los Angeles I was an orphan in search of a home. Some sort of connective tissue that allows us feel worth some and not worth less. The desire to belong to someone or some thing is strong in performers. I assume it is with anyone, really, but actors seem to crave it more; the attention, the lights, some hole to be filled, some emptiness longing to be replaced with, sometimes, anything.  However, it’s not just the bond with people that we covet. Contrary to what many assume, the bohemian lifestyle, while occasionally wonderful with its virtual lack of responsibility and constantly changing environs and experiences, is just as often chaotic and disjointed. There’s really no center. No gravitational pull to keep us grounded. We just spin and jut from one class or workshop or show or audition or job to the next. Until and unless we “couple up” or start a family, some of us seek to carve that home out of the people available to us, usually they are other ragamuffins and journeymen and women who only truly shine in the limelight. 

While I spun around, in search of something grounded, the sun I would orbit was my home, a one bedroom apartment in the heart of West Hollywood. A haven, yes; a Melrose Place to call my own, with a pool that was surrounded by big windows behind which neighbors, who all knew each other, embraced and welcomed me and my daughter and were almost as bohemian as I. 

But, still, it wasn’t a family. It was, by happenstance, a collective of supportive weekday sunbathers but it wasn’t that home. I would find sanctuary in the shape of a little theater company in east LA called Sacred Fools (a company so aptly named) situated on Heliotrope Dr., a street name so suited for it housed a motley bazaar of foundlings and strays. That was where I found my family, my friends and colleagues. People with whom I would toil, for free, till wee hours of the morning making theater. A community with whom I would be intimate, both personally and physically. That dusty and creaky old playhouse just off of Melrose before the Hipster invasion, with its legendary ladder that led up to a light booth that was, supposedly, built by Harrison Ford in his pre-Han Solo days, was where I met my closest confidantes, my best and lifelong friends and, most surprisingly and satisfyingly, my wife. 

That was also where I was encouraged, by some generous and kind patrons, to start a band. 

And, just like a 13 year old self taught guitar player with dreams of pyrotechnics and groupies, that is what I did.

We called ourselves Throttle Back Sparky and we opened for our theater company’s “Music Night”, a covers and originals concert where anyone who wanted to could play. A nonstop monthly party that went to the deepest hours of the night. 

Our little 7 piece theater-rock outfit played at that theater on the night that Dubya was elected. Band members moved on and out and in, as amoebic as bands are and we morphed into other incarnations with new players, though all of them from  the house on Heliotrope until we settled on a drummer (!) and that became my family. 

And then we ventured out of the safe cloister of where we formed to the real world of the Los Angeles Rock Scene.

Our first gig was at a club that doesn’t exist anymore. The appropriately named concert hall/bar, “The Gig”. It was a dark and nondescript room where the stage perched high at the back end, elevated about two and a half feet above the ground, the bands viewable from the moment you entered the joint. It also had a curtain which would rise to present each act and a smoke machine on the stage. Oh, man, how I loved that smoke machine. When we played we would ask the stage manager for “More smoke! More! More! More!” while the curtain was down. To the point where the seven of us could no longer even see each other and I reached through the cloud to find my microphone when the show started. I wanted us to emerge from the mist like rock gods. I wanted us to be Kiss. If people paid seven bucks to see us, I wanted them to feel like they saw a $50 show. The Gig was exactly what I was hoping to play to fully embrace my Rock Family Experience. 

I used to jump from that stage into the audience pit when we would play our faux-swing song, “Great Big Mardi Gras Head”. During the guitar solo, it gave me the opportunity to show off my sweet East Coast Swing dance moves, an integral element of my lead singer courtship repertoire. (It should be noted that I married the first person I danced with during that song and my membership into “Lead Singer Lothario Academy” was summarily revoked. No regrets!)

I don’t remember who we played with on our first night. It was a blur. After the show, Martha, the club’s booker, told me that she liked us but our demo didn’t do us justice. It didn’t. It was recorded on an antiquated-by today’s standards-four track in that same theater where we were born. And it was on cassette. It was lame. And, more importantly, it didn’t sound like us. Martha thought we would work better on another bill with another band. Someone that might fit what we were about. She had just the band in mind…

We were booked. We rehearsed and got ready to play our first show with–

The Piper Downs. 

Now, look, I, along with the other members of the band, crafted a show that, like I said, was designed to give you more than your money’s worth. If we couldn’t leave you wanting more we could at least satisfy you to the point where you wanted to come back for seconds. 

And I thought we killed it that night. When I left to go home I found a note on my car from the lead singer for Four Star Mary lauding my singing voice. High praise, indeed, coming from a rock belter whose power could be felt at the back of any theater where he played.

But as strong as I thought our show was, the headliner was the real show. 

The Downs. The band with the super cool chick drummer who pounded the skins like she was inventing joy. On stage right stood that goofy lead guitarist who seemed to jump out of his skin while ripping through those rollicking licks like a guitar tech who had been champing at the bit to get his chance and finally did! On the other side, with a perpetual beam of a smile was the bass player whom we were supposed to believe was the band’s biggest liability, the clown. The one player that needed to be carried by everyone else when, in fact, he nestled perfectly in the pocket with that awesome woman behind the kit. It would come as no surprise to learn that they were actually married. Well, maybe to some, like the member of my band who was so taken by her that he was crushed to learn the truth.

And that lead singer. The guy who wrote the tunes. The Big Sexy. A songwriter whose self-effacement was actually a laser guided song-writing technique. A master with a turn of phrase who let you in on his heartbreak and his journey through power chords and infectious melody.

A personal highlight in my brief sojourn into the stream of LA Power Pop/Rock was when Bobby (Big Sexy) Bognar sang lead on my song, “Prozac Girl” at the concert that my bandmates never knew was going to be my last. It wasn’t but, damn we came pretty close. And, dammit if Bobby didn’t make the melody just that much better. He found notes that I didn’t even know I had written. 

Another highlight was when I was asked to perform A Piper Downs song with them. I clambered up to the stage at Molly Malone’s, the place that would seem to become their second home after The Gig disappeared into some grotesque bistro/bar/cafe thing, and warbled out “Madeline”.

I got through that damned song, a favorite of mine, but, truth be told, I could barely remember the words to my own songs let alone someone else’s despite how much more fluid and lyrical they may be. 

The Piper Downs are playing their last show on August 29th. In a fashion that I would come to expect from them, they are also releasing their first album in a decade. 21 songs for 21 years. And then the last of the power pop rock acts of the aughts are hanging it up for good. 

It is my hope to hear “Madeline” one more time. 

And “That Way”, one of the first songs of theirs I ever heard, before I knew who they were and one of their best. 

And “Hail”, the song they played and allowed me to sing along with when they played my wedding. (How many people can say that their favorite local band and the best unsigned band in town played their wedding???) 

Maybe I’ll get to hear “I Am a Dick” or “I Swear to God What He Calls Love” or “Hardcore” or “Louder” one more time. 

Whatever they play, it will be bittersweet. Because it means the era has really ended. From a time when a few dreamers who were a little “too tall for the ride” took over some stages in Los Angeles and created their own rawk scene. When a boy with rock and roll dreams got to play alongside some real local heroes. 

We may not have sold a million records but for a brief and shining moment the Danny Blitzes and The Andersons!s and the Four Star Marys and The Pissants and The SparkleJets U.K.’s and The Bat Countrys and The Throttle Back Sparkys and The Piper Downs had our way with the music scene just long enough to burn an indelible set of memories in the few who saw us, danced to our tunes, sang along with us, partied with us.  Those are memories I will cherish forever when I tell my son, “Yes, your father was cool…once….”

 Thanks, Piper Downs, for leading the way with generosity and encouraging us all to be better by watching you be the example of how to do it right almost every single time.  Almost, because, you know…Yell. 

LET’S GET COOKING.

JULY 5, 2015 LEAVE A COMMENT

In 2014, after burying two husbands, surviving stage 4 colon cancer and a massive heart attack with quadruple bypass, my mother finally died. It was a capstone to a tumultuous last few years. She and I were not without our disagreements after Liz (my 13 year old daughter) died. But we always tried to find our way back to each other. She was a very supportive and sympathetic mother.  Loved her children. Loved her grandchildren. I’m not sure she liked herself all that much, however. I don’t think she trusted herself or felt safe y herself. I think loneliness was her ultimate killer.

But, I’m not doing a memorial post. This is about her last gift to me.

I love to cook.

When I was a kid I used to make my own concoctions. At 8 I was making these elaborate sandwiches that could’ve been called “kitchen sinkers” because, if I could put it between two pieces of bread, I did. I recall a Peanut Butter & Jelly and potato chip and chocolate cake thing happening at one point. When I got older I used to make my own Italian Dressing. It was terrible. But my parents ate it. Yes they did.

As I got older I became less and less…adept. To the point where I prepared an embarrassing dinner with frozen broccoli that was burnt and chicken that was inedible. That was a low point. And then it all started to change. My love of food and cooking really began in earnest at the turn of the century. I loved experimenting again. And making dinner for friends and family. It helped during parties that we would host. I could just stay in the kitchen with my chili and people would come to me and I would have a safe ground.

My love of cooking hit the apex at my son’s pending birth. I became a madman of asian cuisine. I made just about everything in the China section of Charmaine Solomon’s The Complete Asian Cookbook. I had a love affair with my wok

, a brilliant and sturdy hunk of metal and wood that I got at Ikea of all places.

And, just like that, poof, I was burned out. A new baby. Training for the Aids ride (which I accomplished, all 545 miles of). Career. Life. There wasn’t any time to cook. Or energy.

And my kitchen was horrible. It still is. I went from a self-designed oversized cook’s kitchen to a galley sized one. It was depressing. We’re still working out how to make it better.

Bit by bit I came back to the kitchen. First I installed a peg board to hang just about everything that I would need.

Then I got a couple cast iron skillets.  And before you knew it I was adding fleur-de-sel to brilliant frittatas and finding 10 new ways to cook Brussels Sprouts.

Then I was asked to emcee a chili cook off. One that I was entered in (I lost, hard. Which was disappointing because I knew my mistake and this was a previously award winning recipe that I had come up with). And I had to meet with the planner at a local cafe that was attached to, of all things, a cooking school.

Before I knew it, I signed up for the culinary course. 6 months. French cuisine. And I start, as of this writing, tomorrow. I couldn’t be more excited and a little scared.

I have my pants. Black and horrible kitchen clothes. I have my shoes. Black and surprisingly comfortable. I get my chef’s coat tomorrow. And my hat. And, hopefully, I learn something.

Oh, why did I go on about my mom?

She left me a little something after she died and I used that to pay for school. Her gift to me. She was always saying, “get yourself something nice.” so she didn’t have to shop. By the end of her life she would’ve been just as happy to give you her credit card to buy yourself a birthday or hannuka gift. This was her last one to me.

Thanks, Mom. Goodbye, Mom.