Steve Kravac, Mike Usinger, Social Outcasts and Porterhouse Records, AKA Triumph of the Normaloids---a Montecristo expansion pack

(a long OOP CD cover, courtesy Todd McCluskie)

This story began as an assignment for Montecristo Magazine about Porterhouse Records. That article has gone online now -- see here!

I own a good number of Porterhouse releases. In some cases, as with the Young Canadians' Hawaii, I own two copies: the original and the Porterhouse reissue. I'll explain that all presently in an article in Montecristo, I also have two Modernettes records, a Pointed Sticks record, a S.C.U.M. record, two Circle Jerks records, a Dils record, a Personality Crisis record, an ALL record, and, indeed, a Steven Bradley record, all on the Porterhouse imprint (I had the Urge Overkill one but decided to gift it to Keith Morris). 

As I explain in the Montecristo piece, which should appear online around the time I hit "publish" on this, I actually have two copies of the Young Canadians record: the original Quintessence version (minus the "Automan" 7", sadly) and the Porterhouse reissue, pictured above. Even though I had the one before I bought the other, I've kept the Porterhouse specifically for Bev Davies' shot of Art Bergmann lying naked on the beach, included inside (and pictured above). 

Davies remembers the day of the shoot well. “Art phoned and asked if I would take a nude picture on the beach bound with phone cord. And I told him I would take the photograph but I wasn’t going to tie him, he’d have to bring someone else to do that. It just seemed too intimate, because whoever bound him also had to take his clothes away, because otherwise his clothes would have ended up in the picture!”

Davies and Bergmann disagree about who did the final tying (Davies says YC's drummer Barry Taylor, Bergmann says bassist Jim Bescott); otherwise their accounts are in accord.“Art wanted it to be the cover of the album, but it got nixed by the forces that be because it was too risque,” Bev says (“They were scared of it,” is how Art puts it). “Then Art got hold of me a few years later and got a copy of it for a poster, and I said, ‘Oh Art, that was supposed to be my blackmail photo!’”

There are even better reasons to double up on the Modernetttes' A View from the Bottom, if you have the original of that, but you'll have to  read the Montecristo interview for more of that (or find my Big Takeover interview with John Armstrong, which covers some of the same ground. It's a great read; John is as sharp-witted and articulate an interview as he is a writer!). 

Steve Kravac grew up in North Burnaby, playing in a band while in high school with Mike Usinger of the Georgia Straight, among other members (Todd McCluskie and David Thom). That band was called Social Outcasts; there are a few songs of theirs on Youtube, in fact, in that early incarnation: "Eat the Rich," "No Death Like It," "My Brian Hurts"-- a phrase I think Usinger has used when editing pieces of mine--and "Tears of Death." The Social Outcasts online band bio, provided by Todd McCluskie, says "The recording resulted in a self-titled, self-released 4 song cassette EP. The project and band got mentioned in The Georgia Straight, The Vancouver Sun, and local fanzine Idle Thoughts, which called the band “a force to be reckoned with” and singled out the McCluskie/Kravac penned 'My Brain Hurts' as 'fantastic.'"

The bio continues about the afterlife of Social Outcasts, who would release a CD in 2004 and reunite in the 2020s. "Tears of Death" would be reworked as "Day to Night" by a later version of the band, featuring Todd McCluskie and Dave Thom, with Don D'Ercole, an on-and-off member of the band for some time, on lead guitar, Dave Laprise on bass, and Koji Laprise on drums. But Usinger and Kravac were both gone by the summer of 1983, and it's the early years I'm more interested in (this is, after all, an adjunct to an article about Steve Kravac!). 

McCluskie-Kravac-Usinger-Thom, courtesy Steve Kravac

As I say in the Montecristo piece, I believe thee sessions for those 1982 recordings were Kravac's first time in a recording studio, which is a momentous enough occasion that it's getting mentioned both there and here. Mike Usinger remembers it this way: "We did record at the Scissor studio," he writes. (It would later be known as Profile, and become an important Vancouver recording studio, but I don't think it had that name yet). "The night we made the recording you hear on the record, No Exit headlined. They were a really great band. I don’t know how much you know but they were awful that night as they had lost the twins. I think they disbanded afterwards."

What matters in terms of where things would go was Kravac getting a chance to watch Ray Fulber and Scissors frontman Bill Barker at work behind the console. Kravac wasn’t the type to be shy about getting in there and asking questions, according to Mike Usinger: “Steve was fearless about going up to anyone, even as a teenager, when the rest of were, well, introverted social outcasts. We'd be kind of starstruck seeing Ray Fulber of the Scissors walking up the street, but Steve would run up to him and say ‘Your bass playing is amazing.’” (Fulber would later become the bassist for Art Bergmann's band Poisoned).

People who are bummed out that they can't afford the No Exit album (the Discogs "low" is over $700; don't get me started on the high) can console yourself by easily finding the Scissors EP, which shouldn't cost more than $20. It's terrific!

I got to see some of Kravac's social skills in action myself. Kravac and I went to see Russian Tim and the Pavel Bures at the Red Room back when this interview took place, and I offered to introduce him to people. I fast learned: Steve Kravac does not need to be introduced to people. John Wright was in the room that night, in fact, seeing his Dead Bob bandmate Kristy-Lee Audette do her thing (I think all of the members of Dead Bob but Colin were there). Not only was Kravac not shy about talking to him, Wright, it turned out, knew him: "Hey, Steve!"

I shoulda got a photo of them together. Oops.

Usinger, who normally doesn’t talk much about the Social Outcasts, was willing to share other perceptions of Kravac. Continuing on the theme of Kravac's fearlessness, he remarked,“His great gift was being able to talk to people. He got that from his dad, who was super outgoing.”

One time, after Kravac had relocated to Montreal, he came back for Christmas and hung out with Usinger. “I remember we were at a New Year's show for D.O.A. at the New York Theatre and someone onstage grabbed the mike and said, ‘Party at Lux Bob's place. If you know where that is, see you there. If you don't, you can't go.’”

Usinger figured they were out of luck. "I knew no one in the Vancouver scene-was was too introverted, so I didn't know. Steve was like 'Hold on,' runs off, and comes back with the location two minutes later."

Usinger says he and Steve made a brief stop at a house party "where he suddenly knew everyone, and I sat in a corner," then arrived at Lux Bob's. "NoMeansNo is playing. Steve runs up to the stage, starts doing a dance that might charitably be described as screamingly freaky, and Nomeansno goes from the stage, 'Hey everyone, look—it's Steve Kravac from Montreal!!!'"

Kravac was actually musical, too. "Unlike the rest of us, Steve was multi-talented," Usinger remembers. "Even though he didn't come from a musical family, he was already really good on the drums and could also play guitar and bass. The rest of us were starting from zero, learning to DOA and Young Canadians records. 

"He also had tastes that varied from ours. I was a strict West Coast hardcore kid—if it wasn't D.O.A., the Subhumans, Adolescents, Circle Jerks, or Black Flag, I wasn't listening to it. He was a sponge who soaked up all that stuff the first time I brought my records over. But he also loved KISS and the Blues Brothers soundtrack and Visage."

The gigs that Kravac and Usinger played together during those early years were cool from the start. For their first gig, Social Outcasts (“a bunch of normaloid 17-year-olds from Burnaby,” is how Usinger describes them, hence my title) opened for D.O.A. on West Hastings. California punks True Sounds of Liberty ended up dropping off that bill--the band almost always has had trouble at the border--but the gig poster theme would be-recycled for the D.O.A. compilation, Bloodied But Unbowed, the first D.O.A. album to get wide distribution in the U.S.A.

The gig was a baptism of fire, Usinger remembers. “The bouncer, some giant skinhead guy, was a complete asshole, yelling at us to hurry up and load in. Before we've hit a note some punkier-than-thou kid with spiky hair and ripped clothes starts yelling about how to be a true punk rocker you have to live it ‘day by day’ and that Crass rules, and that we don't look like we're living it ‘day by day’. After our first song, he yells, ‘You can play, but you're not living it day by day!’ And he continues to yell like an asshole the whole set. It was low-key kind of awful.”

The punkier-than-thou asshole apparently abused the next band, the Shun, just as badly, lying down in proximity to the stage and pretending to sleep from boredom. Usinger notes with some satisfaction that the guitarist from the Shun seized the moment to kick the guy in the head.

If I've got Mike right, here, and if Mike himself isn't in error, another noteworthy aspect of that gig was that it was the only show where Chuck Biscuits drummed with his brother Dimwit on bass. "He left DOA shortly after, going, 'No one wants to be in a band with their brother.'"

Social Outcasts also shared the stage with the Zero Boys, a formidable, under-appreciated Indiana hardcore band touring their debut album. That gig, at the Smilin’ Buddha, took place June 18th of 1982; the photo by Bev in the Montecristo article is from that gig. Todd McCluskie recalls that their payment for that gig was “a case of warm beer,” most of which got drunk by their entourage.

That early incarnation of Social Outcasts also shared stages with Portland band the Rats, members of whom would later reappear in Dead Moon; UK street punk band the Angelic Upstarts; and, on that same bill, the Fastbacks, whose most famous member, Duff McKagan, was no longer with the band, but whose MVP in terms of Social Outcasts was Kurt Bloch.

Usinger remembers of that gig, "Social Outcasts’ guitarist, Dave Thom, didn’t have his own amp and tried to borrow one. The Angelic Upstarts guy was like, ‘Are you joking? We're on tour and can't be lending out our gear.’ So Kurt from the Fastbacks lent him his amp.”

Kravac still has a framed gig poster for that show; he was “in awe of the Fastbacks, who were such a great band.”

courtesy Steve Kravac

Social Outcasts continued after Kravac, having graduated from high school and feeling ambitious, moved to Montreal. Usinger relates that "the guitar player Dave Thom, who plays with the version that sometimes hits the practice space today, got married and quit. So Len Morgan from Idle Thoughts introduced us to a guy named Jamie"--"Jamie Hendrix, according to this bio; could that really be his birth name?--"who was an really skilled guitar player. He was also punk as fuck--crashing in squats and attending all the parties we never even knew about because we were so uncool. I remember our singer saying to me after we were first introduced and Jamie and his friends walked away, they are probably all going, 'Look at those normaloids.'"

They needed a new drummer, Usinger remembers. "I met some kid in the dish pit at the Owl and the Oarsman in Burnaby who said he could play drums. So we started practicing in the practice rented by Ground Zero featuring Randy Rampage and Brad Kent." But the drummer struggled, and that version of the band "never really clicked," Usinger remembers. "We ended up third on a giant multi-band bill at the Oddfellows Hall off Commmercial that was supposed to be a like a coming out party for young bands. Personality Crisis from Winnipeg and House of Commons from Victoria were also on that bill, above us. We wanted to play early, but both of them told us that they say this show as a coming out showcase for them, and wanted to play early as people would start to leave."

Buy this if you find it. Shouldn't cost too much. 

Usinger remembers the night well. "House of Commons was fucking amazing--like incindiary, and did something that sounded really fresh and new. Like hardcore but with a really GBH type metal edge. They blew us off the stage. It was the only gig of that lineup At the end of the night, bussing back to Burnaby, I was like to the singer, 'This is kind of done.' Jamie must have thought the same things as he never contacted us after that. I'd see him at gigs and he'd kind of pretend he didn't see me. He later died in a small plane crash."

When did Usinger actually start with the Straight? Was it in temporal proximity to being in Social Outcasts? "Nothing to do with that, although Alex Varty had roundly and hilarioulsly shit all over a demo tape that we submitted in '82 when he ran a column called 'Demo Derby.' I tried out for a couple of non-punk bands after the Social Outcasts, and was obviously not thought to be good enough, so I kind of stopped playing. I often wondered, but never really asked Steve why he didn't continue playing music after moving to Montreal and L.A. He was in a band called My Dog Popper for a short while in Montreal, but then seemed to go strictly on the behind the scenes side of things in LA until deciding to make his solo record."

More about the "Steven Bradley" record in the Montecristo piece, but I think Usinger is giving My Dog Popper a bit of the short end of the stick, as they did have a reputation. Try "I Lost My Job to a Guy Named Gino," here. There's also a short, very strange little video called “Eric Gets His Head Cut Off,” which sees a soldier beheaded, with his head then being used as a football; it is all ridiculous, surreal, and no-budget enough that it won’t remotely disturb even the most sensitive readers; it helps explain why they were seen as Canada's answer to the Butthole Surfers.

Within a few years after hhe arrived in Montreal, Kravac was producing some of the best bands on the Montreal punk scene, including the Asexuals, starting with their 1985 LP Contemporary World; the “deeply respected” S.C.U.M, whose debut LP, Born Too Soon…, he would end up reissuing on Porterhouse decades later (he describes them as akin to Black Flag in terms of their rep in Montreal); and the Doughboys, back when Brock Pytel, now of the Vancouver band SLIP~ons was their singer/ drummer.

Note: I still do not have this record, or anything by My Dog Popper, if anyone has copies to part with!


Pytel counts Kravac as a good buddy to this day, and happily shared his impressions of him. “He was constantly in a leather jacket with torn jeans, chucks, and whatever punk rock t-shirt, like most of us, although he also had the dyed-black-dreads look going on." (Kravac confirms this!). "It was striking, because he’s pretty tall and has these piercing blue eyes.”

Kravac loaned Pytel his 22” Zildjian swish cymbal for that album and for the band’s subsequent U.S. tour.

“Steve is a lovely guy, and he was very good at vocal coaching in the recording studio,” Pytel recalls. “There was one point where I was struggling like hell to hit the high notes in a certain song (I think it was "You're Related") and we wound up recording me lying on the floor beside the baby grand piano, with a Neumann microphone hanging over my head about a foot off the floor.”

Sorry, Brock: the story just didn't make the Montecristo edit. But people wanting to read more about Brock Pytel's time in the Doughboys should go here. As for Steve's Kravac's years in Montreal, he also collaborated in a band, Los Gatos, with the late Alex Soria of the Nils, another one of Montreal’s most respected punk bands, but that material has not yet been released as of yet; if it ever sees the light of day, we think we can guess what label it will be on.

One final bunch of outtakes has a bearing on two classic Vancouver albums, the Pointed Sticks' Perfect Youth, which has just been reissued by Porterhouse and is in stores now, and D.O.A.'s Something Better Change. As many people know, the Pointed Sticks were previously on Joe Keithley's label, Sudden Death Records. I had to ask if the split with Sudden Death (and move to Porterhouse) was amicable. I checked in Nick Jones, who said that Joe "was not unhappy or surprised to see us go, just mad because he had to go looking through the disaster area that is his garage to find our records. You could do a whole story just on that garage!” (Actually, it seemed pretty tidy to me, but I can't speak to how well-organized it is; Joe found me an MDC record without much fuss, though).

I believe that Joe did corroborate that he was fine on the Pointed Sticks moving on, and said something nice about Steve Kravac and Porterhouse, but I can't find that email exchange now (it may have gotten purged from my inbox). Just trust me, there's no bad blood.

And Kravac--a man who pays his dues--has a lot of respect for Keithley. “When I heard Something Better Change," he told me in our conversation about his time in Vancouver, "I knew that the old guard was over. And when Hardcore 81 hit, and defined what hardcore music was in North America, and I learned that here’s this guy from my high school that is spearheading an entire movement of music in North America, it blew my mind. That’s why I have so much respect for those who have gone before me and have laid that path. These people worked really hard and made huge sacrifices in their personal lives to create those records, and I don’t think, sometimes, that people think about it that way.”

People with record collectors in their lives looking for Christmas gifts should be advised: you can't really go wrong with Porterhouse releases. They're not limited to Vancouver bands, either; Red Cat, Neptoon, Matterhorn, and probably a few other stores all re-stocked when Kravac was last in town, and currently have equally cool stuff like the Germs' complete anthology (which I also don't have, if you're shopping for gifts for me!). And if you can't find one of their releases (and are reading this in Canada), do look in the upper right hand of the grey banner for links to finding a Canadian store near you that you can find these albums at. I don't want to seem like I'm shilling for Steve, here, but his re-issues truly are top notch.

There's a lot more to the story of Steve Kravac, after he moved south to Los Angeles, but for that, you'll have to go to Montecristo! Thanks for Mike Usinger for his stories and Steve Kravac for his patience!

64 Funnycars and Go Four 3 at Eric and Tony's Birthday Bash Part Two, Live at LanaLou's Last Night

Tim Chan and Eric Lowe last night!

Well THAT was a fun night! And it was, it turns out, the place to be... packed room Lana's, door by donation, proceeds to charity... tons of familiar faces, even a coworker... I cheaped out and gave a ten but I had written an article and I'm down to my last $20 before payday so...  

Anyhoo, I barely saw the Soreheads... during their set, I was soliciting an autograph practically AT THE URINAL from Tim Chan... he was peeing when I first came in and I was peeing next when I called, "Don't go away" and there we were practically still in the bathroom when he signed it, there by the door of treachery that wiped out Ed Hurrell... that's how Ed hit his head... it nearly left him dead... but it's not how Kurt got hurt... that was a Sweaters blurt... speaking of whom, Pete Campbell was around last night! A Pete Campbell appearance at a gig he wasn't playing at! I delivered him a piece of cake at the end of the night... do any of you even KNOW what I'm talking about? 

Usinger would call it all "inside baseball" and cut it... anyhoo, sorry I made ya miss the Soreheads, Tim! You cut a distinctive figure at the urinal but I DID NOT SNAP A PHOTO. I promise. 

But I got my record signed by 3/4s of the band, and hey, look at the photo Mike dug up for my article! It REALLY IS A DIFFERENT COLIN MACRAE! THERE WERE TWO BASS-PLAYING COLIN MACRAEs in the Victoria scene back then! They aren't lying! Memo to Dave Bowes, who was there last night and like me was entertaining the possibility that legs were being pulled... nope... I have it confirmed by Colin AND Tim now, and that blonde guy on the left was not in Pigment Vehicle and is NOT in Dead Bob... 

And Jesus those guys were YOUNG. Lookit 'em! Babies! What, is Eric Lowe even in puberty in that photo? Holy shit! And now he's half of 120! 

Anyhow, if I can't get the original, proper Colin Macrae to sign my record, I might get the Dead Bob/ Pigment Vehicle one to write, "Look, I told you this is not me" on it and sign it in the other guy's place. Whoever inherits it when I'm gone will have some detective work to do! Discogs still thinks this is the same Colin MacRae... it ain't...! 

Maybe he can write, "I'm not the Colin MacRae you're looking for" (the Dead Bob Colin prefers a capital R, he tells me, even though he lacks one on his Facebook profile. Confused yet? Whereas 64 Funnycars prefers to lowercase it, unless that's an error).

Hey, if you are the correct Colin Macrae, note: I am a bit of a completist in these matters! I want your signature!!!! (But find me on Facebook, or ask Tim or something). OR MAYBE I CAN GET BOTH COLIN MACRAES TO SIGN IT AS EVIDENCE THAT THEY ARE DIFFERENT FUCKING PEOPLE!!!? No one will remain skeptical after THAT! 

Worlds left to conquer! SOMEONE WILL OWN THE RECORD AFTER I AM GONE and they will care if there is a missing name... I have a duty to them... right? 

And hey, I also really enjoyed Go Four 3, who did a fun jangly pop, kinda Paisley Underground-ish. They were way better live than on the Youtube clips I saw... my first time seeing them! Hope other people post video of them because I only kept "Roxy Roller" so I'd have room for 64 Funnycars... I shot a snap of their setlist, if you're curious. Glad I did, because I thought "Blast of Sunshine" was actually called "Plastic Sunshine" and I would have spent the rest of my life wondering what the fuck plastic sunshine was: 

As for 64 Funnycars, them I shot a lot of, like, here, here, and here (with a guest appearance by Tony Lee). What's that last song? I'm not sure! But appy birthday Eric Lowe and Tony Lee!!! 120 years old! Wow! 

PS: Tim tells me that Happy-Go-Lucky is going to get a re-issue digitally on streaming and MAYBE on CD from 604 Records... keep your eyes peeled. It's never been on CD! (But there was still a copy of the vinyl at Neptoon in the "used S" section, last I checked). 

Maybe I shoulda got Cara to sign it in Colin's place? I only got one decent image of her, so if you want better pics, go talk to Gord McCaw!! (Sharon was there, too... Chris Crud... Grant from Zulu... Wayne... Kristina... Lisafurr... the whole LanaLou's crowd, minus Ed Hurrell -- he had leaned on the stall door, if you're wondering, and conked his head and spine on the toilet... he's still in rehab... do not lean on the stall door, it barely locks at the best of times...).

All photos by Allan MacInnis. Someone should use that top one when the 64 Funnycars reissue breaks! 

Ozzy's Birthday Bash at the Rickshaw: random notes (not really a review)

Space Queen by me. Don't re-use any of this unless you check, okay? (Unless you're in the bands). 

So: see my Space Queen interview about tonight here. Otherwise, random observations about the first Ozzy's Birthday Bash ever, earlier tonight at the Rickshaw. 

Bloodrhine

1. It is hard to shoot a good video when there is a very active moshpit, so I did not get all of Bloodrhine's "Into the Void." I tried real hard but I nearly got knocked over a couiple of times! Eventually my phone shut off as I escaped the pit.   

But Bloodrhine won the night, overall. Fucking amazing!  I think they must have attracted the Black Wizard pack (were there TWO members of Black Wizard in the band? Three? I shoulda mentioned that in the Straight article). 

I sure hope their debut album is on vinyl. I didn't see it at the merch table, but money is tight so I stayed far from that location. Great cover!

2. I did get all of Space Queen's "Children of the Grave." If there was moshing for that, it did not affect me. Sadly, Karli's got a bad case of cymbal-face in that clip. My best photo of a single member of Space Queen was bassist Seah (pronounced like Leah, but with an -S, or "Seeya," but with no "y.")

3. But damn it was good to see Matt Wood drum again. I haven't seen him do that since the Lovelessness days, those huge expressive swings he takes at the kit, the way he's lifted off his stool... no one drums so vividly. Wasn't just a Bison thing, it's how he does it. And his band Worse favourited that swingin' bluesy Sabbath I am partial to, like, say, "Lord of This World," so they were also great.

See Matt? 

I got no vid of Worse, sorry to say-- I tried, but it was too dark, my angle was wrong. I'll see them again, though! I want to see them doing originals (Bloodrhine too). 

4. Some guy who liked my Dead Bob shirt and saw them open for FEAR told me about buying acid off Darby Crash of the Germs back in the early 80s. It was his second ever acid trip. We went from Dead Bob to buying acid off Darby very quickly. I wonder who he was? Seemed a true enthuasiast. 

He was not the only person to compliment my Dead Bob shirt, there was some guy in the line for the washroom. Survival tip: if you gotta pee and you're a dude in this sort of audience, do not wait to do it between songs. The lineup went down the stairs...

5. Karli of Space Queen had a real cool dress on, but drummed barefoot. Second time I have seen them, and she was drumming barefoot the first time, too. Some kinda signature? I like it. I shoulda asked about it. That would be a good title for a memoir: Drumming Barefoot.  But she came out from behind the kit for "Planet Caravan," which I think was actually the high point of their set. I saw her later in the pit, too. I like it when bandmembers show up in the pit for the subsequent acts...

6. Was that Amber of Black Mountain who was singing with Dagger? Was that announced? She was real good! They just said "Amber" and I was in the balcony, and she wasn't singing like Amber Webber (I thought she was a dude at first), but... how many Ambers are there on the scene who do not require a last name when you introduce them? It musta been. 

There was a guitar part that sounded just flat-out wrong on "Sabbath Bloody Sabbath"... or was that just me? 

7. Bend Sinister deserve special mention not just for playing with a keyboard but doing Sabbath's "Changes," the least-expected song of the night. They sang it real well, too. 

Bend Sinister

8. Bend Sinister's opening song, "Mr. Crowley," aside, there was almost no 80s hairmetal Ozzy. Unless it was the first or last song of the night, both of which I missed, no one even touched "Crazy Train." There was also no "Bark at the Moon." What does it say about our scene that these songs could be missed, that there is no one "fun" enough on our scene to touch those songs? They're actually also not my favourite window into Ozzy's world but I did expect to hear them. And now I'm trying to imagine who here could play that stuff and pull it off, or at least make them sound appropriate. 

I hereby nominate Cousin Harley to interpret these songs next year. 

9. Actually, the whole night consisted pretty much of deep cuts. If someone did "War Pigs" or "Black Sabbath" or "Sweet Leaf" or any of the really OBVIOUS Sabbath songs, I did not hear them. A couple songs by Bloodrhine and Worse, I could not even tell you what they were. Meantime, the most obvious songs in the Sabbath repertoire that DID get covered, the songs you'd expect to get saved, "Iron Man" and "Paranoid," were both given to Michael Slumber, the opener. I wasn't expecting that! Generally I approve of deep cuts but I was a bit surprised, especially since everyone seemed to really dig the night. The audience seemed as "deep cut"-oriented as the bands. How 'bout that! 

"N.I.B.," that's another one I didn't hear and would have liked to have heard. I love that first Sabbath album.  

Michael Slumber

10. Might be controversial, but I really want a gay band next year to rewrite and do a campy fashion-show cover of "Fairies Wear Boots," while wearing boots. Maybe that's not actually funny on paper, or, like. on your computer screen or such... but it could be funny onstage, if done right? Maybe the new lyrics could be written about a guy who covets Fluevogs or something because of peer pressure from his cool queer friends, or, like, a dude getting makeover advice or somehting? The song is too good for it to be disappeared forever and too politically unpleasant to be played straight without some mandatory subverting of it.  

Just a thought! 

Overall, I do have to confess here that it annoys me that a show consisting entirely of cover songs had more people in it, overall, I think, than the last four shows I have seen at the Rickshaw combined (Stick Men, Dream Syndicate, Lene Lovich/ Royal Strays, and Shelly Orcutt Miller). I might be exagerrating there, but not by much, and it shouldn't oughta be that way. It was as packed as I've seen the Rickshaw this year, in fact. The balcony was open, too! 

But, as the Japanese would say, sho ga nai, ne? And apparently (saith Matt) over $11,000 was raised for Parkinson's research. Even I can't complain about that!

Mere Mortal Wizards: Stick Men Live at the Rickshaw, Vancouver (an epiphenomenal review with photos, mostly of Rob Frith)

Well, that was fun! Stick Men were dizzyingly virtuosic, as expected. There was exactly one duff note that I heard, during the first set (I think during "Brutal," actually -- the first public performance of the piece! I did note who made it but I will not say further).  

The members of Stick Men were also funny and charming, as last time, but I took no notes: the funniest bit involved Pat coaching us how to clap along to the intro of a song. Even the explanation quickly proved impossible to follow ("when it starts, it's 3-3-2, but then it shifts to 3-2-2, then it's 2-2-3, then..."). Everybody laughed, even the band. All my pics of them playing look dead serious, though: 

Most of the band's humour in fact dealt with the challenges of presenting this music live, but they made it seem quite effortless; Markus had commented about one of the appeals of seeing the band play is that they are on the edge, in a situation of "fragility," but what is interesting is that unless they actually do encounter problems, you don't actually notice that any such fragility pertains. From an audience perspective, it's basically like seeing wizards, except it's really wizards who know first hand that sometimes their magic might fail them, like someone is going to pull back the curtain and go "aha!" 

But that one duff note aside, no curtains were pulled back that *I* noticed. In a way, it was that one duff note that proved their wizardry otherwise... maybe it was even deliberately duff, like they sneak in one single flaw, an act of humility, a point of contrast for their expertise per every other note they played...?

It was further curious that Tony tended to actually look at his hands (or at Markus), while Markus tended to look out at the audience, but in a thousand-yard-stare kind of way. It would be interesting to know if he is seeing anything at all, what his visual intake is at such times. It's almost like his brain is too full of the music he is playing to bother with mere acts of "seeing." Tony, meanwhile, wherever he was looking, was in full focus. He has very intense eyes, actually... which figures; he has a page about his photography here. 

Speaking of which, Tony's photograph of last night's audience, the first of the tour, is here... I can't see myself but I do see Barry "Boom Boom" Benson of the Spores and Aging Youth Gang in the bottom left. (He's going to be part of a Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band tribute on Dec. 12th at a Legion somewhere, but I didn't take notes. I think David M. might be involved. Mostly Barry and Rob Frith talked about the times R&B Brewing, his former company, had provided Neptoon with beer for in-stores).  

I cannot presume to review the show last night, despite these observations. Epiphenomena dominated my perceptions: the first set, I was upstairs, which was the wrong place to be, because really, the "close your eyes and just listen to it" approach to the music just wasn't working for me. I can do that at home with headphones on, y'know? You really do want to be able to watch their hands; that seems key to the Stick Men experience, or at least my Stick Men experience, so the one vid I am posting (I hope with their tolerance; I did not check) really is quite hand-centric. Shooting their hands was actually really the correct way for me to focus on their music, was the stuff I enjoyed most: I was unable (unlike a couple people) to really commitedly DANCE to this music, and, y'know, there's nothin' much to sing along to (though Tony did sing "Prog Noir" at one point; Markus says he is working on vinyl reissues, and that's the album of theirs I'm keenest to snap up. I did see some people with the CD in hand, later in the night, but even that seems to be out of print and pricey).

By the end of the night, my brain was full and I mostly checked out the sparse remaining merch and waited to get stuff signed, but this is no reflection on the amazing music being made. 

Said merch sold quickly. They had cool purple t-shirts that I thought I might buy, despite never no more needing no t-shirts, especially with this upcoming deal with the House of Exu (more on which later), but they were all gone before the mid-set break (except for a sole XL one of a lesser design). Ditto most of the vinyl. The merch person was actually Deborah Mastelotto, Pat's wife, who was one of the performers on the Mastelottos album which some of us bought (it figures that a bunch of King Crimson fans would arrive primed to shop). She writes about that record here -- I am glad to have gotten it on CD (that was the only CD I got signed, by her and Pat; getting people to sign CDs just feels a bit silly once you've gone back to records, y'know?). It actually sounds like a really interesting project. I wish I'd had the requisite cash to buy it on vinyl before it sold out -- I went to the ATM but didn't come directly back, so... do not hesitate and be prepared with the cash, folks! 

Seattle note: she does have one copy there... but only one!

Deborah was very charming and reminded me, oddly, of an ex-girlfriend of the guy who turned me onto THRAK by King Crimson in the first place, many years ago. One note: the CD players she was selling -- a brilliant move, to sell portable CD players for people who say "they don't even have a player" -- are *not,* apparently, bluetooth enabled, which was how she had described them (there's nothing about bluetooth in the booklet, anyhow -- I spent half an hour investigating it just now). The charging cable was a piece o' junk too, but otherwise it seems to work fine, say with AA batteries (or my other, better cable), so that's good. I am still not quite sure what I am going to do with it. It might end up a Christmas gift for a friend who only has a turntable -- that was ostensibly who I bought it for -- but it would be nice to have a plug that works, first! 

Anyhow, I'll get use out of it. Thanks, Deborah, nice meetin' you! 

In fact, for whatever reason, there was a much higher women-to-men ratio last night than at the Dream Syndicate show the other week, though the audience still tilted towards men. That was one of the reasons I left the balcony, actually: I didn't want to hear the guy in the seat below me mansplaining King Crimson to his wife ("A Mansplainer's Guide to King Crimson," ha). 

Afterwards, the band came out and signed stuff. Pat and Markus had read about Rob Frith's Beatles story, followed up here, and were interested to say hi; Tony had not and was not, at least on that topic, but chatted with Rob about a mutual friend named Bob Jeniker of Park Avenue Records, who ran out of money for a record he was making by an artist he managed, Pamela Golden, and got Rob to send him some money via Tony, who Bob was staying with (and who is on the album). Tony remembered Bob but not the transaction! "Bob gave me a Butcher Cover as a thank you for lending him the money to finish the recording," Rob notes. RIP Bob Jeniker. 

Tony graciously took in everyone's stories, but by the time he got to me and my stack of album covers, kinda had no interest in the one funny thing I was going to tell him (but he had signed all my vinyl, so how can I complain?). This involved this ridiculous item I bought off Rob Frith last year: a King Crimson album that Adrian Belew is NOT on... which did not stop Belew from signing it. But -- and Rob enjoyed showing me this detail -- Robert Fripp, also signing the record, noticed Adrian's signature and wrote a little query, "Hey, pal, what are you doing here?", challenging Belew's right to be on this album cover. Which is pretty funny! Around the time of the Beat show, I posted about this somewhere and Adrian Belew himself commented that Fripp was absolutely right, "I had no business signing that record, shame on me!" 

Alas, Tony did not want to spend a minute listening to my story: "I don't care, I've got to pack up, if you want me to sign it I'll sign it." And I had to think for a minute. My idea, unexplained, had been to ask someone to comment on Fripp's comment, to go meta-level and smartass, something like, "I stand with Adrian" or "vive le revolucion" or "I'm not on it either" or something. But well, whatever. I can't blame him for not having been amused -- I am sure he's been asked to sign this record before, too, and who is less likely to be wowed by a Robert Fripp inscription, however witty, than someone who has been in King Crimson? But what the heck, I got him to sign it and let him get on with his night. Deborah Mastelotto reports that people get Pat to sign that one too, but he was gone by that point. I guess I could have gotten Markus to sign it with, "I've never even been in the band!" 

Thanks for signing my stuff, though, Tony! You handle your fame much more graciously than I would, if I had any. All these people wanting to tell you their stories would be absolutely... fucking... exhausting -- a long queue of people who want you to sign things, listen to them, and pose... sign things, listen to them, pose... I'd be like Richard Thompson, myself, and just stay backstage. Fuck that noise!  

I took no selfies with the band but I did shoot a ton of stuff with Rob in it. Maybe Sir Paul will see these? Ha! 

Markus gave me a copy of one of his limited-edition CDs as a thank you for the article (see also my blogpiece below, which is also pretty good, and got lots of views). He and Pat seemed really to enjoy mingling and signing stuff more than Tony did, but they had much, much shorter lineups. And JJ Caithcart, who I hadn't seen since Scrape Records closed down, had even more stuff for Tony than I did! (But he didn't try to bend Tony's ear).

Pat, meanwhile, added little drum doodles to his signatures... I love stuff like this... but you can't expect it, y'know?

Oh, and Deborah Mastelotto recommended, of Markus' albums on the merch table, Truce 2, which definitely leans more in the rock direction than the subtle, ambient one. Like me! I listened to a bit of it on the very CD player which she sold me; sounds great! 

So I had a great night, a bit epiphenominally-loaded for me, with the high point actually being my Markus Reuter interview the other week, but whatever. I'll see these guys anytime they come to town. Don't waste the chance, if you have one! (And don't slouch on the merch, or it will all be gone). 

Wizards, seriously. Mere mortal wizards.  

All photos by Allan MacInnis, not to be reused without permission. Etc.