(And Khats and Adstock, perhaps?).
Tuesday, July 05, 2016
Mo has moved!
(And Khats and Adstock, perhaps?).
Sunday, July 03, 2016
The weekend in review
On Friday, China Syndrome played a song off their previous album, "Let's Stay At Home and Let It All Hang Out." I'd forgotten how funny that song was, but I didn't manage to shoot video. I did shoot two clips of David M. at the Small Salute to David Bowie at Music Madhouse Records, here and here. It was great, as usual, with Ozzy and his ball merrily upstaging David throughout. I'm not sure about the mashup between "Starman" and "Over the Rainbow" - it was a little jarring, frankly - but "Andy Gorgo," one of the new additions, was a hoot. Does this look more like a Pringles can or a PEZ dispenser, to you? (Art by David M., of course).
I also shot video of the Pointed Sticks, here, dedicating a song to their friend from New York, Jack Rabid. But I haven't much to say about the show. It was fun to meet Jack, and to chat a bit with Joe and Laura Keithley, and see my friends Liz and Blake and Bev - the last of whom Erika and I took to the Spaghetti Factory - but it was more social than anything. Tayt Modern and We Found a Lovebird were fun (the latter doing a radical reworking of Slow's "Have Not Been the Same," which I've heard no one cover before, ever). It was a strange little venue, a half-lovely hall that seemed equally suited to weddings and livestock auctions, striking notes both ornate and mundane, depending on where you looked. I think they might do a lot of dinner theatre or something. Ian Tiles apparently had a hand in my Reid Fleming t-shirt - more on that later, I think; he's going to be involved in booking other shows there this summer and fall, so...
Anyhow, let the music roll on, I'm back to work this week, kinda, and may not be blogging so much this next while, though I do have a few projects on the go, so who knows...
Saturday, July 02, 2016
Attention Shallows fans: re: Jaume Collet-Serra, plus The Neon Demon
A few movie thoughts: having enjoyed - with a few misgivings - the effective shark horror film The Shallows, and having previously kinda loved (Shallows director) Jaume Collet-Serra's Unknown, a smarter-than-usual formula action film (with Liam Neeson, who seems to be cranking out five of these a year while the work is there and the money is good), I went out and picked up two other Collet-Serra DVDs: Non-Stop and Run All Night (also both with Neeson). Non-Stop is the weaker, drawing on a formula I find tedious (better handled in Unknown, which had a twist that I could not anticipate and kept Mom and I guessing and engaged throughout, when we watched it a few months ago, back when Mom was still alive, obviously): it's an "is the hero nuts film." Without spoiling anything, 99% of the films in this genre answer that question "no," so there's not much sense of suspense left in the question, plus Non-Stop has the unfortunate added drawback of being an "is the hero nuts ON AN AIRPLANE" film, which kind of reached its generic apotheosis with Flightplan (not a good film, but the one that flies its formula to such maximal heights that it somewhat exhausts it for all future time; no more really needs be done with this subgenre, really, or at least not for decades). Story is simple enough: Liam Neeson is an air marshal who is texted terrorist threats on a flight - but is he himself the terrorist? It's effectively done, and Neeson acquits himself fine - at least it's not another Taken sequel - though Julianne Moore is kinda wasted, and in the end its just not that notable a movie. Unknown is more fun - it's a hero-with-memory-loss film, who wakes into a Twilight Zone world to discover that no one remembers him: it's somewhere between a middle-aged Bourne movie and Flow My Tears the Policeman Said, with, as I say, a twist that I did not, could not guess (and energetic, confident direction by Collet-Serra, who is definitely good at this sort of thing).
Anyhow, that's about it, I'm kind of rushed, but these are some entertaining films I've been watching. The Neon Demon continues its run at International Village, but only late at night. Thanks to Chris Desjardins, on Facebook, for getting me to get off my ass and see it while there were still matinees.
Of course, now my thoughts will turn to De Palma... Planning a triple bill on Sunday at the Vancity. More on the retrospective below, I have nothing to add, though I was happy to learn that Adrian Mack and I share many DePalma-y enthusiasms....
Friday, July 01, 2016
Tim Chan guitar-centric mini-interview, re: China Syndrome on Canada Day (with Two Apple Tobacco and the Sylvia Platters!)
I've been asking people if they think power pop gets taken less seriously in Vancouver than harder, more political punk - if that's maybe one of the differences between the Vancouver and Victoria scenes (because power pop seems to flourish over there). I put the question to Pete Campbell (of Pink Steel, the Wardells, and the Sweaters) and to the Pointed Sticks' Nick Jones, who both kind of agreed (though Jones doesn't much like the designation "power pop," it turns out, and only singles out a subsection of the Vancouver scene, aka "idiots" with revolutionary aspirations, as dismissing the form). Ford Pier, meanwhile - to whom I put the question while shopping at Red Cat - disagreed with me quite decisively, pointing to a number of successful power pop bands from here and elsewhere, who drew big crowds in Vancouver, like the Smugglers and the Fastbacks; he even remembered well-attended Cruel Elephant shows by the Young Fresh Fellows, who in my experience never really had a huge fan base here (the only fans of theirs I've met are in fact FROM Victoria).
The interesting thing for me is that in the course of the conversation with Ford, I had a realization: *I* didn't, for years, listen to much that could be called power pop. So maybe the takes-self-too-seriously snob I had in mind as a typical Vancouver punk was, in fact, myself? Thinking about it, I had a little shudder of self-recognition: I mean, *I* never paid much attention to the Pointed Sticks until they reunited, for instance - never owned Perfect Youth in my teens or 20's, or at least not for very long: it's possible that I bought it at a thrift store, played it once, and sold it to Ty or RPM or such the next time I came into Vancouver. I think I remember something like that. But that's about it: I never saw the Fastbacks or the Smugglers, and still don't own any music by them - just wasn't interested, despite their reps. Though I did love the Young Fresh Fellows - mostly thanks to the Replacements' Paul Westerberg, advocating for them in interviews - most of my punk tended to political hardcore, Crass and stuff like that. Locally, I was a big fan of the Subhumans, DOA, and, in terms of what was happening in town when I was actually seeing some shows, the Spores and Death Sentence and Slow (not political, but not pop either - if a band wasn't necessarily that political, that was okay, as long as they were on the heavy, dark side, along with other favourites of my teen years, like Nomeansno, the Flesh Eaters, Black Flag, Husker Du...). Hell, I didn't even like the Ramones very much. (And I liked Get the Knack, but the Dead Kennedys made me feel like I shouldn't, so I stopped). Guess I had a bad conscience about enjoying pop music, was mistrustful of its pleasures as a young man, didn't want to make things too easy on myself? If it sounded too much like something that COULD get on the radio - even if it didn't - maybe I was afraid it was all a lie, a trick, a sell-out, a swindle, a seduction? That I might get fooled into liking the wrong stuff?
Hmmm.
Anyhow, happy to report that indeed if it was, in fact, me I'd been thinking of all along, I've gotten over it. I just spun all of Get the Knack with my girl yesterday and shamelessly loved it. And I mean, one of my very favourite local bands to see live at the moment is China Syndrome - a band with (that I've noticed) zero political content whatsoever (incidentally, one of Tim Chan's first big rock concert experiences was The Knack, he tells me). They do have their heavier moments - check out the opening riffage on "Corner of Gore and Pender" on their (just terrific) album The Usual Angst, and you half-expect Robert Plant to leap in and start screamin', like it's "Communication Breakdown" or something - but they also have gotten dubbed "Dad rock" somewhere (which they made plenty of during their Car Free day performances in front of Neptoon, lately, in proximity to Father's Day). I'm not sure what "Dad rock" means, exactly, but it's sure not something that's likely to burn down a church, blow up a missile manufacturing plant, or fling its feces into the audience, is it?
And what could be wrong with that?
Anyhoo, here are some outtakes from a chat I had with China Syndrome frontman Tim Chan, apropos of his gig tomorrow night (Canada Day) at the Fairview. We take in his time in 64 Funnycars, in Vancouver in the 1980's, and we also manage to address at least one confusion, because when I reviewed The Usual Angst for the Straight, I'd mistakenly credited Tim, not Vern Beamish, as the lead guitarist on "My Pal Dan," so I asked him to clarify which songs he played lead on (I think I'd only seen them live once at that point, at the Alex Chilton tribute I mention, and had just seen Tim doing lead guitar for a Gun Club tribute act, Sex Beat, a short while before I wrote that review, so I hope I can be forgiven for my confusion). There are a few big holes in the interview, but that's because there are pieces of our talk that might be appearing in print at a later date... it still is a fun chat...
And by the way, the more I listen to The Usual Angst, the more I like it. You can probably still find the limited vinyl that Tim had pressed - I think it was something like 200 copies - at stores like Red Cat. China Syndrome goes on at the Fairview tonight at 11pm (they're second on the bill, after the Sylvia Platters).
Allan: Do you agree that the Vancouver scene is harder edged than the Victoria one? That there's a kind of snobbery about power pop in Vancouver?
Tim: Well, you know, I think there's an audience for the power poppy stuff everywhere, even in Vancouver. But yeah, a lot of people on the scene I'm involved in in Vancouver is more old school punk. But a lot of them like that kind of music... Victoria, I dunno. It's definitely a lot smaller city, and it's on an island, so it's more of a concentrated and closed community, so people tend to talk about the music more with each other. And as Pete said, the Fellows would sell out in Victoria every time they were in town. They'd play two nights, and both nights would be crazy busy.
People seem nicer and happier on the island, too, though. I mean, my girlfriend is from the island, her parents live there still, so I've gone back and forth quite a bit. People in Vancouver seem to have a little more angst going on.
(Laughing - a bit nervously?). I don't think so!
Not that there isn't a lot of angst in your music.
...the usual angst?
Yeah! So what was the biggest show 64 Funnycars played?
We opened for NRBQ, which was a big show. We opened for the Pandoras, who are a classic garage rock band.
A girl group?
That's right. And the Buzzcocks, we opened for the Buzzcocks at Harpo's. That was 1991, on their first reunion tour. It was the three original members, and they had Mike Joyce on drums, from the Smiths. That was one of our last gigs, as the original 64 Funnycars. We were together from 1987 to 1992, and then we all moved to Vancouver and we reunited and played a bunch of shows about four or five years ago. We're kind of on hiatus again.
You were named for some sort of radio ad for a Seattle, what was it, a smash-up derby?
No, it was drag racing! They'd always say "64 funny cars!" In Victoria, you'd get all these Seattle radio stations, and they were better than the Victoria radio stations. So you'd hear those ads constantly - "Seattle International Raceway! 64 funny cars!"
When did China Syndrome form?
2005. I moved to Vancouver in 2003, and before I moved to Vancouver, the last four or five years I lived in Victoria, I wasn't playing. I jammed on and off with some people, but I wasn't in a band. And then I came over here, took a few years to settle down, and finally Eric Lowe from the Funnycars days said, "Hey, I've been jamming with some people," and we got together, and that's how China Syndrome came together.
How important was that Alex Chilton tribute gig that you guys played at?
That was 2010, a bit later, but that gig was a pretty eventful gig, because that time - the whole group of bands, the people that I know in the punk music scene, that was kind of a time of cohesion, and I met a lot of people at that show that I know now fairly well, like - I don't know if you know Bob Petterson, he plays in a bunch of bands, he plays with Orchard, he plays with the Mud Bay Blues Band, he plays with Eddy D. and the Sex Bombs... he was in Buddy Selfish, with Ian from the Pointed Sticks. And that gig was sort of my intro to people like that.
Kind of your peer group...
...but people I hadn't met before. And Facebook helped, too, bring a lot of people together at that time.
Did you identify as a punk, on the scene in Victoria, as a teenager?
Yeah, I did, definitely. That was my scene. I wasn't really a huge part of the punk scene in Victoria, but I enjoyed going to the shows. I was a pretty shy guy, so I didn't really socialize a lot, but seeking out knowledge, reading about music, understanding pop music and rock music... I read voraciously about all the bands at that time, and I continue to do so. It's just constant, and it started back then.
What were you reading, Creem?
Oh yeah. Rolling Stone - Rolling Stone was a lot better at that time, Trouser Press... all that stuff.
What were you listening to as a young man?
Well, if I start right at the beginning, because of my uncle [more on whom in said future article], the Beatles. They were my biggest influence I would say, and I still love and admire them. And in high school, I got into what is considered "classic rock" now, like Led Zep and ELO. And one of the things that was a huge part of my upbringing as a kid was just listening to AM radio, just growing up with that. It'd be on all the time, and I knew all the songs. And it was such a mix, then - you'd hear Aerosmith, and then you'd hear the Spinners, then Joni Mitchell... it was all over the map! That really helped influence me to also want to know more about music, because it was all so interesting. Everything's so formatted now, but it was so diverse at that time...
Right.
And I got into the Clash, got into the Jam [Tim tells me later he was lucky enough to see the Jam live, with Paul Weller]. Gang of Four. I think Entertainment is one of my all time favourite albums, even though the style of music I play now has nothing to do with it. XTC, some of their stuff is at the top of my list.
How about guitarists?
I tend to like the more under-rated type guitarists. Andy Gill is just incredible, he's a huge influence on me.
Did you go see them at the Venue, with Gill and his new lineup?
No! I saw them about ten years ago at the Commodore.
Beating up the microwave?
Yeah, yeah! That was amazing to see that, and they were great.
Do you have other favourite guitarists?
Aggh... I always have a list, but now that you ask me... One person I like a lot is Terry Kath of Chicago, early Chicago.
I don't know early Chicago well.
Their early stuff is good, their first two albums. George Harrison, nobody talks about him that much, but I think he was an amazing guitar player. I thought Johnny Thunders was really cool. Richard Thompson... Will Sergeant of Echo and the Bunnymen... Al Anderson of NRBQ, Mick Ronson, Lou Reed...
You covered Squeeze's "Another Nail in My Heart" and Modern English's "I Melt With You" recently. Any particular reasons for those choices?
Sometimes we play dances, or long shows - sometimes we play three sets in a night, at a dance oriented event, and we thought we would learn some songs people would know. It's fun to record some covers. Usually whenever we go into the studio we record our own songs, but we thought we'd just do that for fun as well.
They're brilliant choices, though, because they're also kind of underrated songs. They should still be on the radio all the time. Like, 80's radio and nostalgia and that, they're playing Bob Seger's "Against the Wind" all the time, or super dull stuff like that, but the Squeeze song is gone. You never hear it.
It was never a hit. I think sometimes a station like Jack plays that song.
But once every twelve years... You know they're coming, right?
Squeeze? Yeah, I got my ticket already! I've never seen them, that's one band a lot of people I know have never seen. I guess they haven't played around here that often.
How did you hook up with Vern?
It was through Eric, when we originally formed China Syndrome. I didn't know him beforehand.
He plays leads on all songs?
No, we split the leads, it's just song-by-song. If you want to know who played the lead, you have to ask me!
Okay, tell me! (Hands Tim his CD).
Okay. "Corner of Gore and Pender," that's Vern. "October Mansion," that's me. "It's Happening Over Again" is Vern. "My Pal Dan" is Vern. "It Seemed Like a Good Idea" is Vern. "Pay to Play" is me... "One too Many" is Vern... "Happy Song" is me. Everything else is Vern, except "Humble Pie" is both of us.
Why "Corner of Gore and Pender?" What was there, or is there?
It's the entrance of Chinatown, but it's also Downtown Eastside-ish, and there's a feeling of hopelessness... a lot people feel that, what's going on, why can't the system help me, I guess I'll keep waiting.
Being stuck.
Exactly.
The press release says it's about poverty.
Right.
See, I hadn't been hearing it this way, I was thinking maybe YOU were feeling stuck!
(Laughs). Right, sure! That's a good reading. Maybe that comes out a bit, sure.
Because for such a pop album, there's a lot of darkness on this album - insecurity, frustration, confusion... angst!
Yeah, my lyrics do tend toward the dark, I would say. It's easier for me to go that way, for sure.
Is there anything in particular that was informing this album?
It's just about the usual angst! [Tim writes in his press release for the album that he was "wracking my brain trying to think of a title," when his wife asked him what it was about. He answered with "the usual angst," and they both thought it was funny, so he kept it.]
What is "It's Happening Over Again" about?
I think I wrote in the press release that it's kinda of about geopolitics, and in a way it is. If you go back through history - the Middle East situation, say - we do the same thing over and over again, and nothing's been resolved.
Maybe it's me, then. I keep applying all your lyrics to you, keep taking your songs as being more autobiographical than they are... I was wondering what might be happening over again TO YOU. Heh. Anyhow, are you happy with where the band is at these days?
Yeah! We all have fun, we all enjoy writing songs and playing gigs, so it's good!
Do you tour very far afield?
No, the island is about it. We had some thoughts about trying to apply to some festivals, and we did - there's always summer festivals around the province, that sort of thing - and haven't been approved for any of them, but we tried, y'know?
One thing that I think would be fun to have happen would be for you guys to play China.
Ha ha!
There's a whole bunch of Vancouver bands that have played China. Unleash the Archers, War Baby - DOA have been to China twice! There's a magazine called Painkiller that's booking gigs over there. I think it would be awesome.
Yeah, sure, that would be really cool actually. I don't know what the other guys would think. But it's a funny thing that you mention China, because my wife's Dad lived in China in the 1980's, and he formed a band. They were one of the first rock bands to play in China.
What were they called?
Beijing Underground. He was a teacher in China. And he formed this band with other teachers, and they toured around - with members of the party there; it was usually very stiff, but I remember they got some press at that time.
Were they from Vancouver?
They were from all over the place! They were all in China teaching English to Chinese people, in their spare time, and they realized that they were all musicians and they formed a band.
Was he also Chinese-Canadian?
No!
Oh, okay. That would confuse some people, a band called Beijing Underground and they're white guys or somethin'! But it's interesting, there's a fantastic Beijing band playing the Rickshaw in October, Carsick Cars, and you gotta see them.
They're from Beijing?
Yeah! And the singer Zhang has told me, when they play shows in China, they have to give setlists to the government to get pre-approval. There are songs they're not allowed to play, if I recall - there's a brand of cigarettes that has a name very similar to that of the Chinese parliament. "Zhong Nan Hai," that's it. So you can smoke cigarettes, or you can smoke the parliament. The government doesn't care for it.
Yeah, I seem to remember Sarah's Dad had to do that, too. That had to have things pre-approved, they had to be really careful.
I don't know how DOA managed.
Yeah, right! I know.
To come back to the album, can I ask about the song for Steve Marriott? "Humble Pie?" Where did that come from?
Well, I'm a huge Small Faces fan, and my wife and I became obsessed with a couple of videos that have come on Youtube, of the Small Faces playing in Germany in 1966. Actually, we have them on DVD. It was on this German music show called Beat Beat Beat, and they were just amazing. Steve Marriott is a little white guy, but he has the soul of a bluesman in him, and he's a great guitar player, speaking of great guitar players, and you don't really hear about him. And this one particular performance was just so cool, so there's a bunch of references in the first verse of the song to that particular performance. And then the second verse talks about another performance he did when he was in Humble Pie, on The Old Grey Whistle Test. It's a BBC TV show from the early 70's, and he was on that show doing a song called "Black Coffee," and he had this back up band called the Blackberries.
Not the old blues standard, I think by Ella Fitzgerald...?
No, I think it's an original. But - they're three African American women who are backing him up, and he's just so part of them, like, he's in the same community as them in this performance. They're looking at him, he's looking at them, and they're flashing each other secret glances, and the chemistry is so great, in this video. And at the end there's this mellow guy, the BBC host - Bob Harris is his name - and he's like, "oh, this is Steve Marriott" - he's so proper, he's so mellow. So that's sort of what the second verse describe.
I think I might have started watching one of them.
There should be a whole video of the Beat Beat Beat video, and you have to see the bit where the host comes in. He's American. Basically, all these bands went to Germany to play to American forces kids, because they bring a girl onstage and interview her, and they're asking questions...
I've actually neglected my Humble Pie. I know "30 Days in the Hole" more from a Mike Watt cover version... [Note: I came out of Neptoon on Car Free Day with the Humble Pie album that that song is on, and proudly displayed it to Chan, who approved].
We watched those videos over and over again. He's so cool, talk about being under-rated, very few people talk about him now.
He died really young, didn't he?
Yeah, I think in his mid-40's. He could have given a lot more. I know he had a lot of problems, the usual stuff - drug problems, alcohol problems, what have you...
Anything else we should say? Mike, your bassist, he's a new member, right?
Yeah, he's on The Usual Angst, but him and Kevin, the drummer, they've been with us for five years now. It's actually the most stable lineup we've had for China Syndrome.
Any future plans?
We have a bunch of new songs, now, and hope to have a new album, maybe next year. We're going to do some of them tonight. We're playing with a young band who apparently like us a lot, the Sylvia Platters will be starting the night. They're quite the fans of us. They're in their early 20's, and they called us out of the blue last year to play a show with them, and we did. And we just found out, they've been following us the last couple of years.
And the other band, Two Apple Tobacco?
They're kind of like - I've heard them described as Frank-Zappa-esque, and there's like, a fiddle player, a trombone player; there's something like eight people in the band. It sounds really interesting, actually.
Are there other Bowie songs in the set, or was that just for the Bowie tribute night?
We have been playing "Ashes to Ashes," and we had been playing "Let's Dance" anyways. It was kind of one of those songs we would add if we played a dance situation.
I really like your version of "Let's Dance," but it's weird, because it's one of those songs that's underrated by virtue of being a hit. Which doesn't make a lot of sense, but people are snobbish about that album.
Yeah, right!
It was too successful.
Exactly.
Why did you pick "Ashes to Ashes?"
It's one of his greatest songs, I would say.
It's also very self-referential.
It's really cool how that is.
Is there any personal connection between you and that song?
I just like the song, but I do love the referential aspect of it, looking back, it was ten or eleven years after Space Oddity, and he's looking back... I think that's really cool, how he kind of continued the character and made him a junkie. And I guess with the video for Blackstar, he took it to its logical conclusion.
Below: hey, look, it's an ad! For all you "Ad Mistrusters" out there, note that I actually received no monies for putting this on my blog. (I have never received any $$$ from gig posters or banners I have put up here, though occasionally I *have* cadged guestlistings. I mean, I'm no saint.
The interesting thing for me is that in the course of the conversation with Ford, I had a realization: *I* didn't, for years, listen to much that could be called power pop. So maybe the takes-self-too-seriously snob I had in mind as a typical Vancouver punk was, in fact, myself? Thinking about it, I had a little shudder of self-recognition: I mean, *I* never paid much attention to the Pointed Sticks until they reunited, for instance - never owned Perfect Youth in my teens or 20's, or at least not for very long: it's possible that I bought it at a thrift store, played it once, and sold it to Ty or RPM or such the next time I came into Vancouver. I think I remember something like that. But that's about it: I never saw the Fastbacks or the Smugglers, and still don't own any music by them - just wasn't interested, despite their reps. Though I did love the Young Fresh Fellows - mostly thanks to the Replacements' Paul Westerberg, advocating for them in interviews - most of my punk tended to political hardcore, Crass and stuff like that. Locally, I was a big fan of the Subhumans, DOA, and, in terms of what was happening in town when I was actually seeing some shows, the Spores and Death Sentence and Slow (not political, but not pop either - if a band wasn't necessarily that political, that was okay, as long as they were on the heavy, dark side, along with other favourites of my teen years, like Nomeansno, the Flesh Eaters, Black Flag, Husker Du...). Hell, I didn't even like the Ramones very much. (And I liked Get the Knack, but the Dead Kennedys made me feel like I shouldn't, so I stopped). Guess I had a bad conscience about enjoying pop music, was mistrustful of its pleasures as a young man, didn't want to make things too easy on myself? If it sounded too much like something that COULD get on the radio - even if it didn't - maybe I was afraid it was all a lie, a trick, a sell-out, a swindle, a seduction? That I might get fooled into liking the wrong stuff?
Hmmm.
Anyhow, happy to report that indeed if it was, in fact, me I'd been thinking of all along, I've gotten over it. I just spun all of Get the Knack with my girl yesterday and shamelessly loved it. And I mean, one of my very favourite local bands to see live at the moment is China Syndrome - a band with (that I've noticed) zero political content whatsoever (incidentally, one of Tim Chan's first big rock concert experiences was The Knack, he tells me). They do have their heavier moments - check out the opening riffage on "Corner of Gore and Pender" on their (just terrific) album The Usual Angst, and you half-expect Robert Plant to leap in and start screamin', like it's "Communication Breakdown" or something - but they also have gotten dubbed "Dad rock" somewhere (which they made plenty of during their Car Free day performances in front of Neptoon, lately, in proximity to Father's Day). I'm not sure what "Dad rock" means, exactly, but it's sure not something that's likely to burn down a church, blow up a missile manufacturing plant, or fling its feces into the audience, is it?
And what could be wrong with that?
Anyhoo, here are some outtakes from a chat I had with China Syndrome frontman Tim Chan, apropos of his gig tomorrow night (Canada Day) at the Fairview. We take in his time in 64 Funnycars, in Vancouver in the 1980's, and we also manage to address at least one confusion, because when I reviewed The Usual Angst for the Straight, I'd mistakenly credited Tim, not Vern Beamish, as the lead guitarist on "My Pal Dan," so I asked him to clarify which songs he played lead on (I think I'd only seen them live once at that point, at the Alex Chilton tribute I mention, and had just seen Tim doing lead guitar for a Gun Club tribute act, Sex Beat, a short while before I wrote that review, so I hope I can be forgiven for my confusion). There are a few big holes in the interview, but that's because there are pieces of our talk that might be appearing in print at a later date... it still is a fun chat...
And by the way, the more I listen to The Usual Angst, the more I like it. You can probably still find the limited vinyl that Tim had pressed - I think it was something like 200 copies - at stores like Red Cat. China Syndrome goes on at the Fairview tonight at 11pm (they're second on the bill, after the Sylvia Platters).
Allan: Do you agree that the Vancouver scene is harder edged than the Victoria one? That there's a kind of snobbery about power pop in Vancouver?
Tim: Well, you know, I think there's an audience for the power poppy stuff everywhere, even in Vancouver. But yeah, a lot of people on the scene I'm involved in in Vancouver is more old school punk. But a lot of them like that kind of music... Victoria, I dunno. It's definitely a lot smaller city, and it's on an island, so it's more of a concentrated and closed community, so people tend to talk about the music more with each other. And as Pete said, the Fellows would sell out in Victoria every time they were in town. They'd play two nights, and both nights would be crazy busy.
People seem nicer and happier on the island, too, though. I mean, my girlfriend is from the island, her parents live there still, so I've gone back and forth quite a bit. People in Vancouver seem to have a little more angst going on.
(Laughing - a bit nervously?). I don't think so!
Not that there isn't a lot of angst in your music.
...the usual angst?
Yeah! So what was the biggest show 64 Funnycars played?
We opened for NRBQ, which was a big show. We opened for the Pandoras, who are a classic garage rock band.
A girl group?
That's right. And the Buzzcocks, we opened for the Buzzcocks at Harpo's. That was 1991, on their first reunion tour. It was the three original members, and they had Mike Joyce on drums, from the Smiths. That was one of our last gigs, as the original 64 Funnycars. We were together from 1987 to 1992, and then we all moved to Vancouver and we reunited and played a bunch of shows about four or five years ago. We're kind of on hiatus again.
You were named for some sort of radio ad for a Seattle, what was it, a smash-up derby?
No, it was drag racing! They'd always say "64 funny cars!" In Victoria, you'd get all these Seattle radio stations, and they were better than the Victoria radio stations. So you'd hear those ads constantly - "Seattle International Raceway! 64 funny cars!"
When did China Syndrome form?
2005. I moved to Vancouver in 2003, and before I moved to Vancouver, the last four or five years I lived in Victoria, I wasn't playing. I jammed on and off with some people, but I wasn't in a band. And then I came over here, took a few years to settle down, and finally Eric Lowe from the Funnycars days said, "Hey, I've been jamming with some people," and we got together, and that's how China Syndrome came together.
How important was that Alex Chilton tribute gig that you guys played at?
That was 2010, a bit later, but that gig was a pretty eventful gig, because that time - the whole group of bands, the people that I know in the punk music scene, that was kind of a time of cohesion, and I met a lot of people at that show that I know now fairly well, like - I don't know if you know Bob Petterson, he plays in a bunch of bands, he plays with Orchard, he plays with the Mud Bay Blues Band, he plays with Eddy D. and the Sex Bombs... he was in Buddy Selfish, with Ian from the Pointed Sticks. And that gig was sort of my intro to people like that.
Kind of your peer group...
...but people I hadn't met before. And Facebook helped, too, bring a lot of people together at that time.
Did you identify as a punk, on the scene in Victoria, as a teenager?
Yeah, I did, definitely. That was my scene. I wasn't really a huge part of the punk scene in Victoria, but I enjoyed going to the shows. I was a pretty shy guy, so I didn't really socialize a lot, but seeking out knowledge, reading about music, understanding pop music and rock music... I read voraciously about all the bands at that time, and I continue to do so. It's just constant, and it started back then.
What were you reading, Creem?
Oh yeah. Rolling Stone - Rolling Stone was a lot better at that time, Trouser Press... all that stuff.
What were you listening to as a young man?
Well, if I start right at the beginning, because of my uncle [more on whom in said future article], the Beatles. They were my biggest influence I would say, and I still love and admire them. And in high school, I got into what is considered "classic rock" now, like Led Zep and ELO. And one of the things that was a huge part of my upbringing as a kid was just listening to AM radio, just growing up with that. It'd be on all the time, and I knew all the songs. And it was such a mix, then - you'd hear Aerosmith, and then you'd hear the Spinners, then Joni Mitchell... it was all over the map! That really helped influence me to also want to know more about music, because it was all so interesting. Everything's so formatted now, but it was so diverse at that time...
Right.
And I got into the Clash, got into the Jam [Tim tells me later he was lucky enough to see the Jam live, with Paul Weller]. Gang of Four. I think Entertainment is one of my all time favourite albums, even though the style of music I play now has nothing to do with it. XTC, some of their stuff is at the top of my list.
How about guitarists?
I tend to like the more under-rated type guitarists. Andy Gill is just incredible, he's a huge influence on me.
Did you go see them at the Venue, with Gill and his new lineup?
No! I saw them about ten years ago at the Commodore.
Beating up the microwave?
Yeah, yeah! That was amazing to see that, and they were great.
Do you have other favourite guitarists?
Aggh... I always have a list, but now that you ask me... One person I like a lot is Terry Kath of Chicago, early Chicago.
I don't know early Chicago well.
Their early stuff is good, their first two albums. George Harrison, nobody talks about him that much, but I think he was an amazing guitar player. I thought Johnny Thunders was really cool. Richard Thompson... Will Sergeant of Echo and the Bunnymen... Al Anderson of NRBQ, Mick Ronson, Lou Reed...
You covered Squeeze's "Another Nail in My Heart" and Modern English's "I Melt With You" recently. Any particular reasons for those choices?
Sometimes we play dances, or long shows - sometimes we play three sets in a night, at a dance oriented event, and we thought we would learn some songs people would know. It's fun to record some covers. Usually whenever we go into the studio we record our own songs, but we thought we'd just do that for fun as well.
They're brilliant choices, though, because they're also kind of underrated songs. They should still be on the radio all the time. Like, 80's radio and nostalgia and that, they're playing Bob Seger's "Against the Wind" all the time, or super dull stuff like that, but the Squeeze song is gone. You never hear it.
It was never a hit. I think sometimes a station like Jack plays that song.
But once every twelve years... You know they're coming, right?
Squeeze? Yeah, I got my ticket already! I've never seen them, that's one band a lot of people I know have never seen. I guess they haven't played around here that often.
How did you hook up with Vern?
It was through Eric, when we originally formed China Syndrome. I didn't know him beforehand.
He plays leads on all songs?
No, we split the leads, it's just song-by-song. If you want to know who played the lead, you have to ask me!
Okay, tell me! (Hands Tim his CD).
Okay. "Corner of Gore and Pender," that's Vern. "October Mansion," that's me. "It's Happening Over Again" is Vern. "My Pal Dan" is Vern. "It Seemed Like a Good Idea" is Vern. "Pay to Play" is me... "One too Many" is Vern... "Happy Song" is me. Everything else is Vern, except "Humble Pie" is both of us.
Why "Corner of Gore and Pender?" What was there, or is there?
It's the entrance of Chinatown, but it's also Downtown Eastside-ish, and there's a feeling of hopelessness... a lot people feel that, what's going on, why can't the system help me, I guess I'll keep waiting.
Being stuck.
Exactly.
The press release says it's about poverty.
Right.
See, I hadn't been hearing it this way, I was thinking maybe YOU were feeling stuck!
(Laughs). Right, sure! That's a good reading. Maybe that comes out a bit, sure.
Because for such a pop album, there's a lot of darkness on this album - insecurity, frustration, confusion... angst!
Yeah, my lyrics do tend toward the dark, I would say. It's easier for me to go that way, for sure.
Is there anything in particular that was informing this album?
It's just about the usual angst! [Tim writes in his press release for the album that he was "wracking my brain trying to think of a title," when his wife asked him what it was about. He answered with "the usual angst," and they both thought it was funny, so he kept it.]
What is "It's Happening Over Again" about?
I think I wrote in the press release that it's kinda of about geopolitics, and in a way it is. If you go back through history - the Middle East situation, say - we do the same thing over and over again, and nothing's been resolved.
Maybe it's me, then. I keep applying all your lyrics to you, keep taking your songs as being more autobiographical than they are... I was wondering what might be happening over again TO YOU. Heh. Anyhow, are you happy with where the band is at these days?
Yeah! We all have fun, we all enjoy writing songs and playing gigs, so it's good!
Do you tour very far afield?
No, the island is about it. We had some thoughts about trying to apply to some festivals, and we did - there's always summer festivals around the province, that sort of thing - and haven't been approved for any of them, but we tried, y'know?
One thing that I think would be fun to have happen would be for you guys to play China.
Ha ha!
There's a whole bunch of Vancouver bands that have played China. Unleash the Archers, War Baby - DOA have been to China twice! There's a magazine called Painkiller that's booking gigs over there. I think it would be awesome.
Yeah, sure, that would be really cool actually. I don't know what the other guys would think. But it's a funny thing that you mention China, because my wife's Dad lived in China in the 1980's, and he formed a band. They were one of the first rock bands to play in China.
What were they called?
Beijing Underground. He was a teacher in China. And he formed this band with other teachers, and they toured around - with members of the party there; it was usually very stiff, but I remember they got some press at that time.
Were they from Vancouver?
They were from all over the place! They were all in China teaching English to Chinese people, in their spare time, and they realized that they were all musicians and they formed a band.
Was he also Chinese-Canadian?
No!
Oh, okay. That would confuse some people, a band called Beijing Underground and they're white guys or somethin'! But it's interesting, there's a fantastic Beijing band playing the Rickshaw in October, Carsick Cars, and you gotta see them.
They're from Beijing?
Yeah! And the singer Zhang has told me, when they play shows in China, they have to give setlists to the government to get pre-approval. There are songs they're not allowed to play, if I recall - there's a brand of cigarettes that has a name very similar to that of the Chinese parliament. "Zhong Nan Hai," that's it. So you can smoke cigarettes, or you can smoke the parliament. The government doesn't care for it.
Yeah, I seem to remember Sarah's Dad had to do that, too. That had to have things pre-approved, they had to be really careful.
I don't know how DOA managed.
Yeah, right! I know.
To come back to the album, can I ask about the song for Steve Marriott? "Humble Pie?" Where did that come from?
Well, I'm a huge Small Faces fan, and my wife and I became obsessed with a couple of videos that have come on Youtube, of the Small Faces playing in Germany in 1966. Actually, we have them on DVD. It was on this German music show called Beat Beat Beat, and they were just amazing. Steve Marriott is a little white guy, but he has the soul of a bluesman in him, and he's a great guitar player, speaking of great guitar players, and you don't really hear about him. And this one particular performance was just so cool, so there's a bunch of references in the first verse of the song to that particular performance. And then the second verse talks about another performance he did when he was in Humble Pie, on The Old Grey Whistle Test. It's a BBC TV show from the early 70's, and he was on that show doing a song called "Black Coffee," and he had this back up band called the Blackberries.
Not the old blues standard, I think by Ella Fitzgerald...?
No, I think it's an original. But - they're three African American women who are backing him up, and he's just so part of them, like, he's in the same community as them in this performance. They're looking at him, he's looking at them, and they're flashing each other secret glances, and the chemistry is so great, in this video. And at the end there's this mellow guy, the BBC host - Bob Harris is his name - and he's like, "oh, this is Steve Marriott" - he's so proper, he's so mellow. So that's sort of what the second verse describe.
I think I might have started watching one of them.
There should be a whole video of the Beat Beat Beat video, and you have to see the bit where the host comes in. He's American. Basically, all these bands went to Germany to play to American forces kids, because they bring a girl onstage and interview her, and they're asking questions...
I've actually neglected my Humble Pie. I know "30 Days in the Hole" more from a Mike Watt cover version... [Note: I came out of Neptoon on Car Free Day with the Humble Pie album that that song is on, and proudly displayed it to Chan, who approved].
We watched those videos over and over again. He's so cool, talk about being under-rated, very few people talk about him now.
He died really young, didn't he?
Yeah, I think in his mid-40's. He could have given a lot more. I know he had a lot of problems, the usual stuff - drug problems, alcohol problems, what have you...
Anything else we should say? Mike, your bassist, he's a new member, right?
Yeah, he's on The Usual Angst, but him and Kevin, the drummer, they've been with us for five years now. It's actually the most stable lineup we've had for China Syndrome.
Any future plans?
We have a bunch of new songs, now, and hope to have a new album, maybe next year. We're going to do some of them tonight. We're playing with a young band who apparently like us a lot, the Sylvia Platters will be starting the night. They're quite the fans of us. They're in their early 20's, and they called us out of the blue last year to play a show with them, and we did. And we just found out, they've been following us the last couple of years.
And the other band, Two Apple Tobacco?
They're kind of like - I've heard them described as Frank-Zappa-esque, and there's like, a fiddle player, a trombone player; there's something like eight people in the band. It sounds really interesting, actually.
Are there other Bowie songs in the set, or was that just for the Bowie tribute night?
We have been playing "Ashes to Ashes," and we had been playing "Let's Dance" anyways. It was kind of one of those songs we would add if we played a dance situation.
I really like your version of "Let's Dance," but it's weird, because it's one of those songs that's underrated by virtue of being a hit. Which doesn't make a lot of sense, but people are snobbish about that album.
Yeah, right!
It was too successful.
Exactly.
Why did you pick "Ashes to Ashes?"
It's one of his greatest songs, I would say.
It's also very self-referential.
It's really cool how that is.
Is there any personal connection between you and that song?
I just like the song, but I do love the referential aspect of it, looking back, it was ten or eleven years after Space Oddity, and he's looking back... I think that's really cool, how he kind of continued the character and made him a junkie. And I guess with the video for Blackstar, he took it to its logical conclusion.
Below: hey, look, it's an ad! For all you "Ad Mistrusters" out there, note that I actually received no monies for putting this on my blog. (I have never received any $$$ from gig posters or banners I have put up here, though occasionally I *have* cadged guestlistings. I mean, I'm no saint.
Thursday, June 30, 2016
David M.: on David's Bowie, CanCon, and so forth
Meantime, here's David M, speaking to a few points of relevance to the Pointed Sticks interview (and his own set). On the Retinal Circus show that never happened (which I first heard about through him; apparently collectors often ask him for copies of gig posters for that particular piece of history):
I think that the promoter couldn't get proper licensing, or the capacity was limited by the fire marshal, or the building wasn't habitable, or something technical like that. It got cancelled abruptly and without much explanation. There was some speculation that the city didn't want the show to happen, but it's likely that the promoter just couldn't make the venue work. As for why the poster might be in demand, obviously it's because of the nostalgia Vancouver old-timers have for NO FUN. The fools!Asked what year that was, he writes:
It would have been the day after our Thursday/Friday/Saturday at the Smilin' Buddha and 8 days before our Monday to Saturday at the Cave, so it would have made our insane career trajectory of November 1979 even more insane.
We had also been booked by Perryscope to open for Talking Heads on October 6, 1979, at the Commodore. It was going to be two shows, 8 P.M. and midnight. But a couple of weeks before that date Talking Heads management decided to bring their new signing Pearl Harbor and the Explosions along as opening act. That kind of thing has started up again, I've noticed, now that the "real money is in live shows".
Then I asked David about CanCon. Specifically, I wrote: "I'm curious in particular - a lot of bands that WERE good, like the Payolas and Doug and the Slugs, really started to blow goats the more they chased radio play. But did that have anything to do with Canadian content regulations? The Replacements were getting a bit blowy, in their later career (before the reunion), and that had nothin' to do with CanCon..."
David M. replies:
Allan,An industry arose because of Canadian Content that provided very nice livings for a lot of hard-working Canadians by emphasizing the “Canadian” over the “Content”. Jim Vallance told me back in 1979 that “a hit will buy you a house”. Ra McGuire told me at around the same time that “you guys would have hits if you weren’t so fucked up”, to which I replied “you guys would have hits if you weren’t so fucked up looking”.Money money money money.As for music, I think Phil Ochs covered the importance of that with “Bach, Beethoven, Mozart & Me”, just with that title, and he was probably clinically insane.Zeus preserve us from the fragile egos of old musicians, especially me.David
All images lifted off David M's "Small Salute" Facebook page, which, I discover, is distinct from the Music Madhouse event page, previously linked. So go check it out, there's lots else there. That's David and Ozzy with a Jim Cummins' Bowie.
Wednesday, June 29, 2016
Pointed Sticks 2016: a Nick Jones interview
You know who else is a Pointed Sticks fan, though? Jack Rabid. He's the man behind US music mag Big Takeover, which has run countless pieces by me, both in print and online. Jack's present plan is actually to be present in New Westminster for the July 2nd show at the Columbia. He writes the following about the Pointed Sticks:
I first heard of the band through following everything i could about the Vancouver scene, getting the early singles and Vancouver Complication, and seeing D.O.A. on their first trip through New York and asking them about Subhumans and what else I was hearing about from there. It was pretty much a comprehensive dive: at the same time, I was obsessing over the L.A. bands and San Francisco bands. I still think those were the three best scenes 1977-1979, and I'm a New Yorker! Only saw them once, when they made their only New York appearance at a power pop fest, 2006? 2007? I interviewed them the day after the show. can't wait to see them a second time! my favorite songs are "Out of Luck," "What Do You Want Me to Do," and the louder version of "True Love," and most of all the Vancouver Complication version of "Marching Song," man I am a sucker for that kind of Buzzcocks-type mix of power-pop 60s melodies with punk's raw energy and guitar edge, and good lyrics too.The following is an interview with Pointed Sticks singer Nick Jones, conducted, as I write this, yesterday afternoon, by cellphone from Jones' home base in Nanaimo. The band plays the Columbia in New West on July 2nd. It's kinda next to the Army and Navy, near Columbia Street station - an easy Skytrain out. Local music fans will also want to stop by Music Madhouse Records, near Lougheed Mall, at 3pm to see David M. of NO FUN do his small salute to David Bowie (free of charge!).
My kind of music!
Nick follows...
Allan: Okay, so - I've been thinking about you as a songwriter. You've written some fantastic songs, and I don't think I've ever talked to you about songwriting before. Why is that?
Nick: I don't know, but
that's what the Pointed Sticks have always done, and the reason we're
still going, and why people in other places still cover our songs and
listen to our music, it's because of the songwriting. It's not because
we were like DOA, a totally dynamic, heavy, confrontational live band,
or anything like that. I think the whole key to our band has really been
the songs. And it's not just me. There's three other really good
songwriters in the band, too.
Yeah, but I've talked to Bill (Napier Hemy, Pointed Sticks guitarist) and Tony (Bardach, bassist) about songs they wrote, but, like, "The Marching Song" is probably like one of my top ten Vancouver punk songs, maybe one of my top ten punk songs anywhere, and I don't think I've ever asked you about it.
Hm.
So did you write the lyrics for that, or did Steve (Macklam, Pointed Sticks manager at the time)?
Macklam wrote the lyrics for that. I had the music - it was at a point where I was having a hard time writing lyrics, and I had two songs, "The Marching Song" and "The Real Thing," and I loved them both, but I couldn't come up with anything good for the lyrics for them. And regrettably, I let him write the lyrics, so he's gotten half the money for them over all the years, half the cut.
I had hoped you were the one who wrote the lyrics, I wanted to ask about them...
I was not.
It's a complicated song! What strikes me about it is it seems too mature of a relationship song for a bunch of guys that young. The emotions in it are emotions I didn't feel until well into my 30's or maybe my 40's, and you guys were practically teenagers!
Well, Macklam was an older guy, so I'll put it down to that... yeah, I dunno, I think he wrote that song as a sort of silly song, really; I don't really know what he was thinking about when he wrote that. But yeah, I dunno. I can tell you where I stole the music from, though.
Where did you steal the music from?
"Wooden Heart" by Elvis, do you know that song? (Sings) Doo-doo-doo, doo-doo-doo, doo-doo-doo-da-doo-doo-doo, but I don't have a wooden heart." I think it may have been from GI Blues. It was one of the really bad songs from the movies, but it was a hit single. I just liked that little melody, so that was kind of where I lifted "Marching Song" from.
There are two different versions of it.
There's at least two.
I assume the Vancouver Complication version precedes the Perfect Youth version?
That's the first version of it, yeah, that's Robert Bruce playing drums, and the other is Dimwit playing drums.
The drums do this thing in the Complication version that I really like, where they kind of really punctuate the song like it's the sound of marching, a rhythm that's de-emphasized on the Perfect Youth version. Is that down to Robert being the drummer?
I think so. Robert had some technical limitations, as a drummer. The style he could play in, no one could play better than him; he would have been a perfect replacement for Tommy Ramone, in the Ramones, because he could play that style down pat, that quick eight on the high hat, he had no problem doing that. But Dim was a little more adventurous, shall we say, a little more developed as a drummer, so he brought a little more fills and things... It's funny with Robert: he was only in the band for, like, three months, but he plays on "The Marching Song" and he plays on the Quintessence "Out of Luck/ Real Thing" single, and those could be the most played things we ever recorded. The "Out of Luck" single certainly is, and "The Marching Song" is probably second, really. It's kinda odd...
Is he still around?
Yeah, I saw him at the Brad Kent thing, the celebration of life for Brad, I saw Robert there. He's still around.
Does he still play?
I don't think so. He played in a couple of bands after he left us, he played in the Antheads and I think he played in the Thirsty Souls for awhile, that's a band off Bud Luxford's second album, Tony Balony [AKA Tony Walker, of Trailerhawk] was in it, and Mary (AKA Mary Jo Kopechne/ Mary Celeste) was in that band as well... I can't remember who else.
Has Robert come to see the Pointed Sticks?
I don't know if he was at the last show, but he was certainly at the one before that that we said could be the last show, at the Rickshaw, I think it was December of 2012, when we sort of stated that we might not be playing anymore. Robert came to that show. I didn't speak to him because I was so drunk that night that I couldn't talk to anybody! (Chuckles).
The last show - not the "last" show, but the last show - was also at the Rickshaw.
Yes.
The one last year... Steve came to that! I was talking to (former Quintessence employee/ current Noize To Go proprietor) Dale Wiese in the audience and he was telling me that that was the first time Steve had seen you guys since you reunited. Is that true?
Yes, absolutely.
Why was that?
I think there probably was - I wouldn't say it was animosity, but I'm not so sure that Steve and our relationship ended on such a good note. Steve's a strange fellow - he's very Steve-centric, shall we say. But back in the day I was pretty good friends with his wife Caroline, who worked at Quintessence, and I told Caroline that they should come, Steve and Caroline. And they came, and two of their three kids, and it was very nice. We all talked to them and they stayed to the end and watched the band and were quite complimentary when we finished. It was nice.
Do you want me to tailor that for print?
Well, no... I think he wanted us to become big faster than we were ready to become big. We sort of got moved along back in the day a little faster than we were ready for. We were only 21 years old, and we had a record contract and were in England, a year and a half after the band started, when, in retrospect, it probably would have been better for us to just sit back and make a couple more singles, and take another six months or so before we did what we did. And I think a lot of that - I mean, he was doing what we wanted him to do, but probably in retrospect, he should have known that we weren't ready for it, as a manager. I think he did the same thing with Colin James, when he managed Colin James; Colin was a young blues phenom guy and Steve turned him into Bryan Adams, and shoved him to the top. He had that one record, and then he just kind of disappeared for a few years, and had to make his way back with the Little Big Band later on, after Steve wasn't managing him anymore. That's what managers are supposed to do, I suppose, is move their artists along and send them straight to the top, but we just simply weren't ready for it at the time. But Steve's had a very successful career as a manager, since then, and he probably wouldn't make the same mistake again.... I mean, we were making an album when we probably just didn't really have enough songs yet. We put out three great singles, and we could have kept on doing that.
And the other thing that we never really did, which so many bands that came after us did, and which bought them their houses and cemented their careers, is make sure we had the Canadian market locked up before we went anywhere else. Like, bands like the Payolas and 54/40 and even Images in Vogue, they had hits in Canada, which we could have done. Except we sort of overstepped our bounds, we were like, "fuck Canada, we want to be big all over the world!" So we kinda left that behind and kind of ignored that in favour of chasing another brass ring, which we never achieved.
In the lyrics to "The Marching Song," the word "stiff" pops up, that wasn't an early attempt to cultivate Stiff Records from the gitgo or or anything?
No, no, that was long before we were ever signed to Stiff. "Marching Song" was pretty early. "Marching Song" was probably like, maybe March or April of 1979, and that was a full six months, at least, before we had our deal with Stiff. Boy things happened fast back then. The band was only together two and a half years start to finish!
And now it's the stuff of legend.
And now we've been together ten years, since we came back! (Laughs).
So did you write the lyrics to "Out of Luck?"
I did.
Tell me about that one! I tried to grill Bill (Napier Hemy) about a couple of his songs - "True Love" - and "Found Another Boy" - asking him if they were about girls he still knows, or such. He didn't want to go there at all.
I can see that. He probably got very uncomfortable.
Very quickly. So was "Out of Luck" written about an actual, specific life experience, or...?
No, I don't think "Out of Luck" was a very specific song... "Out of Luck" was literally a five minute song. I was sitting on the couch one afternoon and I sort of came up with the idea, the intro and things like that, and I would say 80% of the song was done within maybe five or ten minutes later. I showed it to the band and we probably played it very quickly after that. Sometimes songs just work like that. Sometimes you work on them for months and months and months and they don't ever get any better and they don't ever get where you want them to be, and sometimes they just fall right out. And "Out of Luck" was definitely one of those ones, which is pretty crazy, because, if you look on Youtube, there's probably, like, ten covers from bands that do "Out of Luck." I think it's kind of a basement staple, where punk rock bands get together and jam in basements around the world; I think "Out of Luck" is one of the ones that come up.
Well, I would say... back then the first girlfriend I ever had, she kinda bore the brunt of a lot of those early songs. I think that's kind of natural that people would write about what they know. A lot of them were based around the love experience, the relationship with her, though I wouldn't call her a muse, that's for sure. The songs were pretty simple. They were good, though - they were good punk songs, and... the thing was, when we'd write a song like that, when anybody in the band wrote a song like that and took it into the rest of the band, the rest of the band always changed what came there in the first place, it wasn't very often that we'd play a song the way the songwriter had initially figured it out. The way it was initially presented to the band was quite a bit different from the way it ended up turning out, because everybody's got an opinion, and everybody's opinion is usually pretty valid. Like, Tony's the songwriter on "Part of the Noise," but me and Bill wrote the bridge on that one. And there were other songs, where people contributed little bits - we just figured the first person who put his name to it was the one who got the credit for it. There was enough to go around - we didn't ever got rich, but we made a little bit of money off of them.
Coming back to "The Marching Song," there was a line that changed between recordings, where "she's in command of my har-har-har-heart," where you stutter a bit on the delivery, whose contribution was that?
Oh, I dunno. The band put the stutter in it, when we put the accents in it - it was probably just me being theatrical, something like that.
Had you all had serious relationships at a young age, by the time you were writing these songs? Because one of the things that makes your songs memorable is that there's a real emotional richness. they're young people's emotions, maybe, but they're not simple.
Well, I would say... I can't really speak for Gord (Nicholl, keyboardist), but I would say that me and Bill and Tony all had fairly serious relationships by that point in our lives. And all three of us had travelled, when we were teenagers, and... I dunno, our experience was probably a little bit richer than the average 21 year old. And also, I think 21 year olds were a lot older back then, than they are now, too, in terms of, like, life experience. Like, 21 year olds now can manipulate a lot of machines and come up with answers very quickly, but I don't really know that they have as much interpersonal interactions with a lot of people as 21 year olds had had, by that point back then. That sounds like a strange thing to say, but I'm not saying that as a "things were better when I was a kid" grumpy-old-man kind of thing, but, having children of my own, I know that I'd done a lot more worldly things by the time I was 21 than any of those three had. And I think that that experience is true of the other guys in the band, as well.
How old are your kids?
My kids - my oldest, she is going to be 28 this year, and my middle daughter has just turned 25, and my son is 21.
Wow.
Well, Tony's got a daughter in her 30's. We got a few kids between us. Ian's the oldest guy in the band with the youngest kid, which is pretty funny.
I agree with you, by the way, to say, that you had to grow up faster. It does ring true, it doesn't sound odd to me.
I think that just - you had to make your own experience, I don't think it was presented to you. I think the whole internet platform, and social media thing, just puts things on kids plates, rather than having to go out and find them yourself. There wasn't really anything to entertain you, you really had to go a long ways to make your own entertainment back then. I think that has a lot to do with it.
At the same time, I know when I was young, like, I've written songs - I mean, nothing that anyone has done anything with - and I know that when I was a kid and playing around with writing songs, and a lot of the really early songs I wrote, weren't based in experience. They were faking it. Were there any early Pointed Sticks songs that were like that, where you were putting on emotions, trying to guess and get it right, where you hadn't actually lived through it yourself?
I think there's fakery in all of the songs! I also think it's a bit of a trap to try to write too literally, when you write about relationships, when you write about anything. That's almost the problem... like, I've always admired songwriters that can write stuff that sounds fantastic but doesn't mean anything, you know? Like words that are stuck together and you're listening to it, and you go, "oh, this is fantastic, this must really mean a lot," and then when you start thinking about it, you go, "whoa - or maybe it just doesn't mean anything at all." I've always tried to not write literally, but it's hard to get away from that, it's hard to get away from that, it's hard for me to write abstractly. So I would say, in terms of faking it, there are songs we wrote that we knew nothing about. When we started out, it was punk rock, so there's a few Pointed Sticks songs that never saw the light of day, particularly where we lean towards the political side. We were never very good at writing that. I don't think, other than "American Song," there's an overt political song in our entire canon, and we never even play that one live now, just 'cause it seems silly.
Nick Jones 2006, at Richards on Richards, photo by Cindy Metherel (now Cindy LeGrier), not to be reused without permission
Are there older songs you thin of bringing back to the light?
At Brad's thing, we played a song, "You Must Be Crazy," that we haven't played since we got together again, so that means we haven't played it in over 35 years. And we're going to play it on Saturday, too. There's a couple of Bill's that I tried to get him to learn to play again, but he didn't... but we're playing a song called "All I Could Take" that we haven't played in a long time. We try to mix it up, keep things fresh. We play the odd cover, play songs that we don't play... I'll tell you a story. When we came back and we played those gigs in Japan, and they were great, and we played the gigs in Vancouver, and the gigs in Vancouver were great. But then we did those gigs in Toronto and New York, and in Toronto, the gig wasn't that great. We were kinda tired and we didn't really play all that well and I don't think we were really feeling it. And then we came back and we sort of thought we should sit down and talk about this, so we sit down, and we had a meeting at Tony's house, when he had the Dental Lab, he had this place upstairs, it's like a big long boardroom table, it was like having a board meeting there. And the consensus, particularly led by Bill more than anybody else, was that continuing to just go and play the songs we had written 35 years ago was a total non-starter. We were already bored with doing that, already, after having only done it three or four times. The gig in Toronto, it felt like were were faking it, and that was really distracting to us. And then we talked about whether we should say, "Okay, that's it, we've had our little thing," or, whether - if were going to continue on, there was going to have to be a creative aspect to it, it couldn't just be, like, a sideshow, just playing those old songs. And that's when we started writing songs. At first, the songs were just pouring out of Gord and I, just like literally every week we'd call each other up: "Well, I got this, I got this, I got this..." It's kinda slowed down a little bit since then.
Naturally.
The Pointed Sticks in Japan! (Provided by the band)
But I think that's what made us want to continue on. We like to challenge ourselves, to play new songs, to make records to record, and to just not be the same thing. We could go out and play the same fifteen songs every night. Another reason we can't really do that is we can't really travel, we've got some legal issues, so we can't really go anywhere. We can't go to America and play because of legal issues. And everybody's got jobs and stuff. If we're going to play to the same audience in Vancouver over and over again, we gotta give them something every time we play. So that's where the idea of songwriting came from, plus the pride you feel when you've written a new song and the songs are good... it'll be half new songs, on Saturday night, so...
Naturally.
But I think that's what made us want to continue on. We like to challenge ourselves, to play new songs, to make records to record, and to just not be the same thing. We could go out and play the same fifteen songs every night. Another reason we can't really do that is we can't really travel, we've got some legal issues, so we can't really go anywhere. We can't go to America and play because of legal issues. And everybody's got jobs and stuff. If we're going to play to the same audience in Vancouver over and over again, we gotta give them something every time we play. So that's where the idea of songwriting came from, plus the pride you feel when you've written a new song and the songs are good... it'll be half new songs, on Saturday night, so...
Anything new new?
A few off the self titled album, and four, maybe five off Three Lefts Make a Right.
Anything since then?
We've got a couple of things we've been working out. We kinda tend to collect stuff and get together and put it into order, but I doubt... if you're familiar with all of the Pointed Sticks material, we wouldn't playing anything you haven't heard yet, that haven't appeared on a record, although there's a couple of covers we haven't played before, that we're going to play. But I'm not going to tell you what those are, heh-heh-heh.
I kind of feel like I did Three Lefts an injustice. I'd heard it when I was going through a weird time, and it didn't grab me. I like the self-titled one a lot. But... do you have a preference between them?
Well, they're very different. Three Lefts is very much closer to being a continuation of what the Pointed Sticks were when we broke up in 1981. Which is kind of understandable. I think Three Lefts is about half great, and there's a couple songs on it that aren't very good. But "Anytime" is a great song, "On Fire" is a great song - there's a few really really great songs on that record. I don't have a preference between them. Three Lefts was a little more spontaneous, a little faster. We really laboured over the self-titled record. I mean, Gord and I spent months on that record. I'd be away working and then I'd come back and we'd spend three days working on it at a time, change a bunch of stuff that we'd already had before. It was very labour intensive. I'm really happy with that record, too. I think it's a really great record - lyrically too.
I think we already talked about a couple songs on it - "Tsune's Song," I know that "You're Not the One" was a Bill Scherk song from the Los Popularos days. "La La La" kind of interests me, but I don't have a full sense of what that song's about. It sounds like advice to someone on the scene.
Yeah, I think it's just kind of a song that says, "Don't be so sure of yourself." Because sometimes the people with the very most confidence have got the furthest to fall. It's basically a song about someone who thought they had everything going their way, and all of a sudden you realize that you don't, and - how do you deal with it, at that point? The whole "La La La" thing was, like, when you try to talk to somebody, or - not that I'm in the business of giving anybody advice, but sometimes you might want to say to somebody, and say, "hey, this isn't working out exactly the way you think it is," and that person's just like, "LA LA LA LA LA LA LA," the "La La La" part was just the person not paying any attention to warning signs that people are trying to tell them about.
Was that autobiographical, or are you thinking of someone specific?
I think all songs have things have slightly autobiographical elements, but - I'm not going to tell you who, but I was thinking of someone else when I wrote that. But you know, especially because we took so long on that record, I tried a lot of different things. A lot of songs I changed tenses, changed genders. Sometimes I would be singing the song from a first person point of view, and change it to a third person point of view. "Tsune's Song" was at one point sung from the girl's point of view, and then it turned around and it was sung from the guy's point of view, and at one point it was a first person song too. So we had the opportunity to try and do all those sorts of things, and we found out a whole bunch of interesting things about how quickly the whole tenor of a song can change when you do things like that, how the whole tenor of a song can change, when it's something just as simple as changing from first to third person.
Is there a song you're happiest with?
I'm trying to think what my favourite song on that record is. Mmmmmm.... I think "Lovely Bird," that's a good one. Kind of a creepy kind of song, I like that. We've never played that before, and we're going to play it on Saturday.
Where did that song come from?
I think that one was just a kind of makin' up a story, kinda song. Gord had that one - the music got finished top to bottom, done, and I just sort of fitted the words to it. I think again, it's a typical Pointed Sticks relationship kinda song.
Were there songwriters that really mattered to you as a young person, as a kid?
Well, I didn't really start writing songs until the Pointed Sticks started. It was punk rock that inspired me to start writing, that inspired me to be a musician. Before then, I was a kid growing up in the 1970's, and being a musician, unless you were classically trained... those were the days of Yes and Led Zeppelin and really complicated bands. So the idea, when punk rock came along, that anybody could do it, the whole DIY aspect to it, I loved that. Loved that. That was the greatest thing ever, that all of a sudden, something that had seemed like you had to have started working on it when you were 13 years old, to perfect all of this, to become some sort of a maestro musically before anything you did was valid - to have that concept blown away was really important. But I don't think it was the punk rock songwriters, except for Pete Shelley. Pete Shelley and the Ramones, those were the ones I liked. But I was a young kid growing up in the 60's, so the whole pop music thing - I loved Herman's Hermits, I loved every British invasion band, every single one of them - the Beatles and things like that. And when I became a serious young man, when I was in Grade 10 or whatever, it was Dylan. I got to see Dylan with the Band in Seattle in 1974. Dylan was a very formative influence, too. When you start writing words, there's really nobody to look to, moreso than him, because he could do it all. He could write the simplest song, write a song with five words or write the most complicated imagery, that you would never be able to understand... he was somebody to be admired. I still admire him. I still think the albums that he's made lately... obviously he had a patch in the '80's and '90's where he wasn't doing so good, but the last few original records he made, I thought were great, as well.
That's neat, I didn't realize that.
Bill was a Dylan man, as well.
I only have a couple of more questions. I've been asking a couple of people this question, whether power pop gets taken less seriously than punk rock, especially in Vancouver.
I sort of don't even believe in power pop, I think that that's sort of way too nebulous. I think it's a category that you put bands in that's kind of convenient, but it's too broad... then there's the power pop aficionados where unless it's got a Rickenbacker 12 string it's not actually power pop. See, I don't think we are a power pop band. I think we're just a rock band, and we bear all our influences on our sleeves, and those influences, like I say, come all the way from the British invasion 60's bands, like obviously the Beatles and the Stones and those kinds of bands, then came of age in the 1970's and were enabled by punk rock coming along. I would never call us a power pop band. But in terms of "does it get taken less seriously?" By idiots, it does, yes! By anybody who thinks that... by people who believe that punk rock, especially punk rock in Vancouver, was somehow this political movement was going to change the world. I mean, punk rock in Vancouver, let's face it, it was kids just wanting to have a good time. It was kids who could be in a band, who could escape from their suburban realities, move downtown, and just have a great time. The people who were involved in it were all smart, so they understood what politics meant, they understood what social injustice was, but to suggest that somehow the music was going to open people's awareness to that, unhhhh, I dunno, I think that's a bit of a stretch for me.
Okay. A last question: David M. of NO FUN is doing a set at Music Madhouse Records by Lougheed Mall the same day as the Pointed Sticks. So I wonder if you had any NO FUN stories, if you were a NO FUN fan?
David is a super-smart guy, good songwriter, sarcastic, very observant, and their track on the Complication record [and here I presume Nick is talking about "Mindless Aggression," not "Old," which is also on the Complication record, but is very easy to miss]... when NO FUN first came out, they were on the record, but they never played in Vancouver; like, nobody ever saw them, they were kind of a mystery kinda-thing, and there were a lot of people in Vancouver who didn't think they deserved to be on the Complication record? They obviously did, because the song is great, and of any of the bands that didn't get on the Complication record, it was usually due to their own incompetence; I'm thinking about the Rabid, here. I mean their incompetence in getting themselves recorded, in getting a recording in in time, not in being a band. People were just like, "Come on, guys, there's a spot for you on the record, but you've gotta have a song recorded." I don't have any NO FUN stories, but I do admire David. I think he's a smart guy, and I saw him last year at the Kits fest, and he's pretty funny! He sorta has declared himself to be not commercially viable. He wanted to poke fun at the whole idea of being commercially viable, so the whole thing with his Gorgo and his sponsorships... I don't have any stories, never played on a bill with him, but always followed them and thought they were pretty damned good. And also, he had Paul Leahy in his band, which says a lot there.
There was a gig poster he gave me, for a gig that never happened, that had had the Pointed Sticks, NO FUN, and the Subhumans...
At the Retinal Circus, correct.
That never happened, and that was the only gig where you would have shared a bill with them?
Correct, although we may have played a benefit for the Complication or a benefit for something else... but that gig at the Retinal Circus, the fire marshal closed that down, like, two days before. All the permits were in hand. I think that's the place that became Celebrities or something, at Davie and Burrard. It had been a hippie place in the 1960's, and we sort of had the idea that we would reopen the place; Gerry Barad was kind of instrumental in that, and he was promoting that gig. And it was closed down. The fire marshal stepped in a few days before, which was something that happened... if you want to talk about the political side of punk rock, that's who we were fighting against. We weren't fighting injustice in the south of the United States or wherever, we were fighting injustice from the authorities and the music industry in Vancouver. The music industry in Vancouver did everything in its power to squelch all of the bands like us, and the Young Canadians and the Modernettes and the Dishrags and DOA and the Subhumans, they did everything they possibly could to make sure that this never really got out of the bag.
When you're talking about the music industry... could you be more specific?
Well, I should say it wasn't a matter of the press. The press in Vancouver was very supportive. First and foremost would be Tom Harrison, who was with the Georgia Straight before he went over to the Province. Then Fiona McQuarrie, Neil Hall, John Mackie and Vaughan Palmer, who was a music critic before he became a political bigwig, those were the main writers. And there was television too, Nite Dreems and Soundproof and even the Vancouver Show. Every single one of those bands got a shot on the Vancouver Show.
Right.
So I'm talking about CFOX radio, Bruce Allen, clubowners... Bruce Allen and Sam Feldman controlled all the bookings in all the clubs, so it was quite easy for them to make it known that they didn't want... they had their own bands that they were booking and getting 15% of, and they made it pretty clear that we weren't welcome in those places. And weren't really welcome in the radio. The only time "The Real Thing" got played on the radio was when Quintessence bought an ad. It was a great ad, I don't even know where it is now, but JB Shayne did an ad for "The Real Thing" and that got played on CFOX radio, but the song itself never did. They waited until Bruce had his own little band, waited til he had the Payolas, waited til it was safe enough to actually promote this. So they were the first and only... Payolas, 54/40, and all the bands that came after us, they were all a little more malleable, shall we say, to the corporate interests, and they were the ones that reaped the benefits of all the work that the people that came before them did.
Well, I should say it wasn't a matter of the press. The press in Vancouver was very supportive. First and foremost would be Tom Harrison, who was with the Georgia Straight before he went over to the Province. Then Fiona McQuarrie, Neil Hall, John Mackie and Vaughan Palmer, who was a music critic before he became a political bigwig, those were the main writers. And there was television too, Nite Dreems and Soundproof and even the Vancouver Show. Every single one of those bands got a shot on the Vancouver Show.
Right.
So I'm talking about CFOX radio, Bruce Allen, clubowners... Bruce Allen and Sam Feldman controlled all the bookings in all the clubs, so it was quite easy for them to make it known that they didn't want... they had their own bands that they were booking and getting 15% of, and they made it pretty clear that we weren't welcome in those places. And weren't really welcome in the radio. The only time "The Real Thing" got played on the radio was when Quintessence bought an ad. It was a great ad, I don't even know where it is now, but JB Shayne did an ad for "The Real Thing" and that got played on CFOX radio, but the song itself never did. They waited until Bruce had his own little band, waited til he had the Payolas, waited til it was safe enough to actually promote this. So they were the first and only... Payolas, 54/40, and all the bands that came after us, they were all a little more malleable, shall we say, to the corporate interests, and they were the ones that reaped the benefits of all the work that the people that came before them did.
The Payolas kind of got fucked over because of their name, still. That didn't really work out for them so well.
I guess so. But there was also the fact that they were a terrible band, as well! I mean, they had one big single, which was fake Police/ reggae stuff, but... I never thought much of the Payolas.
Wait a sec, there, Nick, their first EP...
Oh, the first EP is great, the one with Ian and Gary Middleclass playing on it, the first EP is great, but once they started making albums and things like that, egggh. I dunno. I feel the same way about most of the bands that came after them, 54/40 and Images in Vogue and all of them. They road the coattails of a lot of people who did the work before them, who were never really rewarded for it. I'm not bitter about it or anything, I still have a better band than any of those guys, and we still get to play gigs, so he who laughs last, right? But I think it's just the case. And when I was talking about taking care of the Canadian aspect of things beforehand, that's one of those things that all of those bands managed to secure: radio airplay. I mean, 54/40 can still go and tour across Canada, because their songs are ingrained because of Canadian content rules. They got that built-in advantage where 30% of the music played is Canadian content. And it has led to some astonishingly terrible music over the last 40 years.
It's true. There's such a small pool of songs that they draw from, too. It's hearing the worst ever Doug and the Slugs song over and over and over again, is what it boils down to.
That's right. It's why a band like Tragically Hip can sell out stadiums across Canada, yet they go five miles across the border on the other side and they're playing in a nightclub to 300 people. It was an engineered reality for the Canadian music industry, and it worked out pretty well for some Canadian record companies, that's for sure, and for some Canadian bands. But in the long run - it's like Tony Walker says, if you're not good enough, you're not good enough, and legislating "good enough" is a weird kinda thing to do. It's a particularly Canadian kind of thing to do, it seems to me. Basically we're saying, "Okay, you guys aren't good enough, so we're going to legislate it so we're going to play your music over and over and over again," because you and I both know, if you're exposed to music often enough, it doesn't matter how bad it is, eventually it will get in your brain, and you'll start humming it, and you'll start thinking you like it, even though you probably really don't. So.
People eat what they're fed.
Well, it's true, don't you think? Especially if it's something you don't choose to listen to. People listen to the radio at work and they hear "Switchin' to Guys" by the Kings or whatever that stupid song was - "Switchin' to Glide" - they hear that all day long, and eventually, they think that they like it! And it takes away from the really good Canadian songs that get sort of just get lumped in with all of that, because it's Canadian, I mean like great songs like "Echo Beach." It's a great song, but people think, "Oh, CanCon, it's just another shitty Canadian song," but "Echo Beach" obviously was a good enough song that it became a big hit in Britain and the United States.
I didn't even know it was a Canadian song!
"Echo and the Beach," Martha and the Muffins. It's a great song, but people just lump it in with Rough Trade and Parachute Club and all the other nonsense that came out of Toronto around the same time, because that's when it came out. I was against CanCon when it started, and looking back on it... it breeds mediocrity, that's what I think!
Pointed Sticks play the Columbia in New West, July 2nd!
Pointed Sticks play the Columbia in New West, July 2nd!
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